1904-05-17

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Mr. LEIGHTON MCCARTHY (North Sim-coe) moved for leave to introduce Bill (No. 114) respecting the Western Assurance Company.
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first time.
Mr. McCarthy. I would ask the indulgence of the House to move that this Bill be read a second time now. Notice has been given to adjourn the House over Monday next, which is a private member's day, and so the time of the Bill will be lost. The case is one of emergency, as the company desire to carry out what is authorized by
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322S
the Bill to reduce their capital stock and issue new stock. This is a domestic matter simply. The Bill only gives the shareholders power, by a two-thirds majority, to carry cut what is necessary in order to raise funds to replace an impairment of capital.
Hon. W. S. FIELDING (Minister of Finance).: In view of the request made by the hon. gentleman (Mr. McCarthy), I see no reason why we should not facilitate the passing of these Bills to get them before the Banking and Commerce Committee, but without committing ourselves in any way.


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Motion agreed to, and Bill read the second time, and referred to the Committee on Banking and Commerce.

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Mr. LEIGHTON MCCARTHY moved for leave to introduce Bill (No. 115) respecting the British America Assurance Company. He said : This is asking the same power as is asked for in the case of the Western.
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first and second times, and referred to the Committee on Banking and Commerce.

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Bill (No. 116) respecting certain patents of the Canadian General Electric Company, limited, and others.-Mr. Grant.

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List of Shareholders of the Chartered Banks, as on December 31st. 1903.-Hon. W. S. Fielding (Minister of Finance).

Sir WILFRID LAURIER moved :: That when this House adjourns on Friday next, it stand adjourned to Wednesday the 25th May instant.


Mr. SAM. HUGHES (North Victoria).: Is that not a misprint, should not Friday be Thursday ?


Wilfrid Laurier: No, it is not. I did it on purpose. Friday is a good day. Has my hon. friend (Mr. Hughes) any suggestion to make on that subject ?


Samuel Hughes: I would suggest Thursday evening so that we might get to the races.


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Motion agreed to.

Mr. F. D. MONK (Jacques Cartier).: Before the Orders of the Day are proceeded with, I would like to call the attention of the government, and particularly of the Minister of Railways, to a matter of some urgency ; I refer to the construction of a bridge over the canal at Cote St. Paul. The sub-struc-Mr. McCarthy.
ture has been Executed properly and with due celerity, 7>ut there is an inexcusable delay in the placing of the ironwork, the superstructure and the completion of the bridge. This is causing great inconvenience to Cote St. Paul and to the whole of that neighbourhood where there is considerable traffic, particularly at this time of the year. It is a matter of notoriety that iron works are always the delaying elements in the execution of contracts of that kind, but I am perfectly certain that if the Minister of Railways and Canals would bring some pressure to bear upon the contractor the work will be terminated without delay, because I believe that most of the iron work is ready and has simply to be brought there and put in place after which the work of finishing the bridge will be very short indeed. There is great interruption to traffic on account of this delay, people cannot cross the canal even on foot except with some danger by passing over the gates, and I would therefore ask the Department of Railways and Canals to bring some pressure to bear upon the contractors in order that the work may be terminated at once.


Hon. H. R. EMMERSON (Minister of Railways and Canals).: In answer to my hon. friend (Mr. Monk) I would say it is quite true, as he has stated, that the sub-structure has been completed for some little time and that the delay has been caused entirely through the contractors for the superstructure, the Dominion Bridge Company. The matter is engaging the attention of the department; the deputy is going to Montreal in the morning to bring pressure to bear upon the defaulting company. I might say that the department has taken every precaution to make it as convenient as possible for the parties interested. Temporary crossings were provided for foot passengers, but of course there has, no doubt, been inconvenience to the travelling public and the department will take every step to have that cease at once.


Samuel Hughes: It is not my intention to indulge in this debate nor to ask that now that we have the Minister of Railways in the House, we might get an expression of opinion from him on the Grand Trunk Pacific.


Wilfrid Laurier: Order.


Samuel Hughes: I am saying I am not going to.


Henry Robert Emmerson: I am sorry you are so worried about the Minister of Railways. [DOT]


Samuel Hughes: I was going to suggest that inasmuch as the traffic on the canal system which terminates at Montreal is likely to be used very much more than in the past, the Minister of Railways should take into his consideration the advisability of doing away with bridges over the canals entirely and of having sub-ways beneath

the canal. I was in Montreal the other day and a string of vehicles blocked the street for some distance. There should be subways under the canal at every point in the city of Montreal.



GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC RAILWAY BILL.

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House in Committee on Bill (No. 72) to amend the National Transcontinental Railway Act.-Sir Wilfrid Laurier.
On section 7 of the Bill,
Subsections 2 and 3 of section 7 of the National Transcontinental Railway Act are hereby repealed, and in lieu thereof it is hereby enacted as follows :-
Notwithstanding anything in the said Act or in the scheduled agreements contained, His Majesty the King, acting in respect of the Dominion of Canada, shall not be bound or obliged to perform, carry out or fulfil any of the covenants, undertakings, conditions or stipulations in the scheduled agreements contained on behalf of His Majesty, acting as aforesaid, unless and until the Grand Trunk Company covenants and agrees as follows with His Majesty, acting as aforesaid :-	[DOT]
(a.) That it will guarantee the bonds of the Pacific Company for the balance required for the complete construction of the western division in the scheduled agreements mentioned, as provided in clause 34 of the agreement a copy of which forms the schedule to the said Act ;	*
(b.) That it will acquire and take the common stock of the Pacific Company to the amount of not less than $24,900,000 as in clause 27 of the said last-mentioned agreement provided.
Mr. BLAIN.: I have an amendment to this section which reads :
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section :
Notwithstanding anything in this Act or in the said supplementary agreement contained, the amount of interest payable by the government without recourse against the Pacific Company under the provisions of the 32nd paragraph of the said original agreement shall not be increased but shall remain and continue as fixed and provided in the said original agreement and as if the first, fourth and fifth paragraphs of the said supplementary agreement were not therein contained and as if the said three paragraphs formed no part of the scheduled agreement or of any agreement between the parties thereto.
During the course of the discussion on this Bill the Minister of the Interior (Mr, Sifton), and I think the member for Annapolis (Mr. Wade) made the statement in the House that the changed agreement under the supplementary clauses would not increase the liability of this country one dollar, or would not increase the amount of interest which this country would have to pay by one dollar. I am sorry that the Minister of Railways and Canals left the House the moment this was introduced, because I was going to ask him to be good enough to favour the committee for once with some explanation
as to whether, in his opinion, this altered amendment would increase the liability of the country or as to whether this country would have an increased amount of interest to pay under the agreement presented for our approval. In looking over the original agreement I find that the country was to guarantee upon the mountain section $30,000 a mile. The estimated length of that part of the road is 500 miles, which at $30,000 a mile would be $15,000,000 for which, under the original agreement, the country would be liable. Interest upon that for 7 years at 3 per cent would be $3,150,000. In other words, under the original agreement passed by the House last session, the country became liable for the sum of $15,000,000 and for the payment of interest to the amount of $3,150,000.
Now these hon. gentlemen have made a statement of the House that the supplementary agreement which <we are now considering would not increase the liability of the country one dollar, and that we would not have any increased amount of interest to pay. It is important to remember that fact, so that the committee and the country will understand as to whether our liability is increased or whether the amount of interest that we will be called upon to pay under the new agreement will be more, or whether it will be the same as under the old agreement as hon. gentlemen opposite were good enough to tell us. Under the new agreement the clause providing that we shall give a guarantee to the extent of $30,000 per mile on the mountain section is cancelled and instead thereof there is inserted a clause in the new agreement that requires the country to guarantee three-quarters of the total cost of the mountain section. We have had the statement in this House that the cost of the mountain section will be $50,000 per mile. A period of eight years is allowed for the construction of this road now instead of five years as under the old agreement, and interest for four years will amount to $6,000 a mile, so that practically the total cost of the mountain section covering a distance of 500 miles will be $56,000 per mile according to the estimates given. The committee will readily understand that this must impose an increased liability upon this country because it will be remembered that the old guarantee was $30,000 per mile. The cost of the mountain section including interest for seven years will be $56,000 per mile. The country is called upon to guarantee three-quarters of the whole which will amount to a liability of $42,000 per mile instead of $30,000 per mile under the old agreement passed last session. Taking the 500 miles at $42,000 per mile under the new agreement we have a liability of $21,000,000 instead of $15,000,000. Yet, in face of this agreement * the hon. Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton) from his place in this House during this dis-

cussion called upon the committee to pass this agreement because it imposed no increased liability on the country. The committee and the country are entitled to a further explanation from the hon. Minister of the Interior and also from the hon. member who represents the county of Annapolis (Mr. Wade). Now then, we come to the question of interest. We have to pay interest upon $21,000,000 for seven years under the new agreement which will give us an interest account of $4,410,000. The liability under the old agreement is $15,000,000. The liability under the new agreement introduced at this sessoin is1 $21,000,000. The interest to pay under the old agreement is $3,150,000 and the interest to pay under the new agreement is $4,410,000 or an increased liability placed upon this country because of this, as hon. gentlemen term it, unimportant change of $6,000,000 placed upon this country since last session and an increase in the actual payment of interest that must be taken out of the treasury of this country of $1,260,000. The country will very naturally ask the question : What has the Grand Trunk Pacific done for the people of Canada that they should so alter or change the original agreement that seemed to be so satisfactory to the hon. gentlemen opposite who were supporting the government last session? What have they done for the people of Canada that they should be granted a new agreement under which they ask the people to pay this increased interest amounting to $1,260,000 and to place upon the country ah increased liability of $6,000,000? This opens the door to a very dangerous kind of railway construction in this country. The statement was made on the floor of this House by an hon. gentleman who understands railway matters very well, that during the first ten years after a railway is constructed the cost to the railway company is almost equal to' the original cost of construction. If that be true you can readily understand the advantage that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company will receive from the government by this changed or altered agreement. The government have to pay three-quarters of the cost of the mountain section no matter what it may be. Fifty-six thousand dollars a mile may be a fair estimate. If it costs $70,000 per mile the country is still held by this new agreement to pay three-quarters of the cost and bearing in mind the fact that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company are particularly interested in the western section, the committee will readily understand that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company will be quite willing to make an increased expenditure upon the construction of the western section because they know full well that the government are compelled to pay interest and compelled to guarantee Mr. BLAIN.
their bonds to the amount of three-quarters of the cost no matter what the cost may be. I repeat that I am very sorry indeed that the bon. Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Emmerson) is not in his place. I think it would be the duty of the right hon. leader of the government to send to the room of the hon. Minister of Railways and Canals and ask him to come into the House, tie could remain here wrhile the unimportant business of the sitting was going on after the opening of the House at three o'clock but just the moment the chairman took the chair and the Grand Trunk Pacific was taken up he went elsewhere. It seems to me that that is not fair play, I speak candidly and I say that I do not think the people of this country will think that the government are discharging their full duty to the country when they allow the gentleman who occupies that important position to leave the House and absolutely refuse to give one word of explanation as to why these important changes should be made and as to why this increased liability should be placed upon the people of Canada. I think we are entitled to further explanation from the government and in particular from the hon. Minister of Justice. I am quite sure that hon. gentleman will give it his attention. I would be glad to have a statement from him as to whether this changed and altered agreement will not place upon the people of Canada an enormously increased responsibility and an increased cash payment out of the treasury of this country for interest. I think this is a question that we require some further explanation upon and I hope the hon. Minister of Justice will be good enough to state his opinion now because his opinion will be very valuable upon this point, very valuable indeed in the days that are to come, perhaps more valuable than it may be at the present time because they have put their seal to this document and I am sure that when trouble comes as trouble must come between the government and the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company in the future it will be very important to turn back to the discussion in ' Hansard ' and find the opinion of the hon. gentlemen who are responsible to the electors for this change in the agreement that increases to such an enormous extent the liability imposed upon the people of Canada.


Mr. WADE.: Mr. Chairman, hon. gentlemen opposite are very anxious to have the views and opinions of other people in regard to the cost of this road, and they seem to be willing to set up the late Minister of Railways and Canals as an authority whom they are ready to follow on all occasions. How would it do to look and see what his opinion is in regard to the cost as stated in his speech delivered in this

House last session ? You will find it at page 8457 of last year's 'Hansard.' He says :
Then we have GOO miles of mountain section, which it is said will cost $30,000 per mile. Nobody, X think, is informed sufficiently to say whether that is very much of an under-estimate, or whether it is an ample estimate. We know very well that mountain railway construction is expensive construction, although there are goo'd reasons for supposing that this line can be built through one of those passes at substantially less cost than the mountains can be crossed at any point to the south of where it is-proposed that this railway shall pass to the coast. I figure that $35,000 would not be out of the way. I want to make a fair and reasonable calculation.
These are the figures that Mr. Blair, the then Minister of Railways and Canals stated as the cost of the mountain section of this road. Now. I have undertaken to express my own opinion as to what the mountain section of this road will cost. That opinion is based on the information I have received. and it is of a similar nature to that given to Mr. Blair. The information I have received may be wrong, and consequently my opinion would be erroneous, but until I am in possession of facts to the contrary, I will adhere to my opinion. In any case, it does seem to me that it is idle to propose such an amendment at the present time, in view of the fact that there is a contract entered into between the railway company and the government. That contract is subject to ratification by parliament; we either have to ratify the contract as it exists, or, we have to refuse to ratify it, and if any change of this kind were made in the contract, it would neces sitate going back to the railway company to see whether they would agree to this alteration or not. That is the whole thing in a nutshell. The hon. gentleman who proposes the amendment knows that it is impossible for us to adopt it for the reasons I have stated. I wish to say further-1 have said it before, but I wish to repeat it-that if I am entirely wrong in my judgment and if hon. gentlemen are absolutely right, and if the highest figure they have put as the cost of this road is the correct figure ; even then we would not be justified, because of the additional cost, in refusing to construct this road at once. I do not believe they are right. I believe they are wrong. The estimate of Mr. Blair, of $35,000 per mile may probably be too low, it may be that my estimate is too low ; it may be found that my estimate is too high, but as Mr. Blair stated last session in this House, there is no man today with sufficient information on which to base an accurate judgment as to what the road will cost. One can only give his opinion, and that opinion must go for what it is worth.


Mr. BENNETT.: I do not think the general public realize the character of the legislation now before this House. There is a pious belief among the electors, that parliament is a representative body of men sent here to legislate, and that the supporters of the government of the day are not as the hon. member (Air. Wade) would describe them, just a number of jaclcs-in-the-box ready to jump when the government pulled the string. Relying on their success in the past the government have ventured to introduce this measure. The Yukon Railway Bill possessed many similarities to this. On the eve of parliament the government made the Yukon Railway deal, and having implicit confidence that their supporters would swallow anything, they threw it at them and told them to vote for it, and vote for it they did. Again in the case of the Intercolonial Railway extension to Montreal, the government made the deal, submitted it to their docile supporters, told them to vote for it, and vote for it they did. Why, the electors of Canada might as well send proxies to this parliament, in the same fashion that the electoral colleges conduct their business in the United States. . The member for Annapolis has intimated that as the government have brought down this contract it must be assented to by the Liberal majority in this House as a matter of course. I remember that when the Intercolonial Railway deal was up in the Senate, and when one of its absurd propositions was being discussed, Senator Cox ip the innocence of his heart believed that parliament was a debating and thinking body and he suggested that the clause in the Bill should be changed. I suppose Senator Cox has since changed his opinion about the functions of parliament, I suppose he has come to the conclusion like many others, that the supporters of the government are to be regarded as a machine to carry out the wishes of the cabinet ministers ? We heard some talk in this House yesterday about factious opposition and delay, but whatever delay there is must be attributed to the Grand Trunk Pacific Company and to the government, for if they had perfected their legislation last year, we would not be here discussing it to-day. Last year the Grand Trunk Pacific people made propositions that goodness knows everybody thought were sweeping enough, but they found the government so easy and their followers so docile, that they thought they would come back and get more. There was a time when some of the members oil the Liberal benches were cautious about the expenditure of a few thousand dollars, but here to-day they are ready to squander millions, and this paltry one million and a quarter that my hon. member from Peel mentions in his amendment, they hardly deign to notice. This is not a time to consider thousands; this is a time when this high and mighty government can spend millions by the hundreds. I am surprised at the moderation of the Grand Trunk Pacific

Company when they found the pliable putty they had to deal with-


Samuel Hughes: Puttee from Winnipeg ?


William Humphrey Bennett: Puttee from Winnipeg; he is hard as adamant compared with this government when it comes to taking the money out of the pockets of the people. I am glad that the Minister of Justice condescends to give the Bill a little attention, because most members of the cabinet get a cold fever whenever we come up to discuss it. Where are the Ontario ministers ? The Minister of Customs had a warning of what was in store for him. He was in two by-elections, and when he talked of this great Grand Trunk Pacific scheme he was dumfounded at the lack of applause that greeted his efforts. But there was a time when the Minister of Justice had not much interest in the Bill ; in fact there was a time when the members from Quebec district were rather adverse to it. That was when the Grand Trunk Pacific promoters looked upon the parliament of Canada as a business body, and when Mr. Hays and his friends wanted to submit a business proposition. But the representatives from the Quebec district, afterwards followed by others, intimated that it was not a business but a political proposition they were after, and of course, that proposition includes the sale of this wonderful and at present useless Quebec bridge.


Samuel Hughes: Is it sold ?


William Humphrey Bennett: I don't know that, but I do know that this Bill guarantees its sale. I can tell the Minister of Justice that if he should come into the province of Ontario during the approaching elections he will not find very kindly audiences when he endeavours to point out the advantages of this Grand Trunk Pacific measure. It is viewed in many different lights. In the far west it is looked upon by some as a transcontinental scheme to assist transportation, but in the maritime provinces, according to the member for Annapolis, it is going to be a distribution of money. Money is to be lavished in its construction and when money is going, Nova Scotia must have a share of it. That was the high ground taken by the hon. member for Annapolis. He gave parliament fair notice that when anything was going around in the Way of dollars, the maritime provinces were not to be forgotten.
Well, I think the maritime provinces are going to consider a little in the question of ultimate cost. The dealing by the government and by their supporters with this Bill -because they are all in it-is a good deal in the line of a man who happens to own a small parcel of real estate in a town where a big bonus is going to be given to a new industry. He throws up both his hands to hamper the town with a bonus.


William Humphrey Bennett: because in the meantime he hopes to sell his lot and make a profit. So the government seem to think that this whole scheme is going to work to their advantage politically, nothing 'more or Jess ; the hon. gentlemen opposite have swallowed themselves in supporting it. Take, for example, the hon. member for Hants (Mr. Bussell). We remember a couple of years ago, when the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals was promoting a project for the extension of the Intercolonial Railway to the Georgian bay, there was no more ardent admirer of that project than the hon. member for Hants. In fact, the scheme was supposed to be his inspiration. That was not the time that the hon. member for Hants regarded the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals as unfit to untie the shoestrings of the premier. That was the time when the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals was the king-bee of the maritime provinces, and the little fellows all jumped when he pulled the string. So we saw this letter from the hon. member for Hants, then the member for Halifax, applauding to the very echo the extension of the Intercolonial to the Georgian bay. But, Sir. things have changed. The Minister of Railways and Canals is not to-day the power in the land that he was then.


Mr. WM. ROCHE.: Which member for Halifax ?


William Humphrey Bennett: I am not alluding to the hon. gentleman, who is unknown outside of his own bailiwick. When the member for Halifax is referred to in this country, more particularly in the province of Ontario, it goes without saying that the hon. gentleman is never thought of. It is the hon. leader of the opposition who is meant. Now, what is this amendment ? East year we had the suggestion made by the Grand Trunk Pacific Company that the mountain section would cost about $30,006 a mile ; but to-day the government is placed in this fine dilemma, of having on the one hand the opinion that $30,000 a mile would pay for that section, which is the opinion of the hon. member for Annapolis, and yet humiliating itself by accepting the assurance of Sir Charles Rivers-Wilson instead of the opinion of the hon. member for Annapolis. Now, I think the hon. member for Annapolis is entitled to an apology from the government for having had the temerity to increase this guarantee from $30,000 to $56,000 a mile. It is quite true, as quoted by the hon. member for Annapolis, that the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals said that the mountain section would only cost $35,000 per mile. That was only his opinion, however, and the opinion of the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals does not go with this government except for one thing. When he comes

to this government, bludgeon in hand, and tells them that it is his opinion that the province of New Brunswick will be against them in the next elections unless he receives the best position in the gift of these hon. gentlemen, then they take his opinion, and give him the best position they have : but they will not take his opinion in the matter of railway building. The whole matter presents itself in this light. The government turn a deaf ear to every suggestion except what is for the benefit of the Grand Trunk Railway Company ; but all that company require to do with this government is to ask what they w'ant; and they get it. Talk about David Crockett and the coon. It does not come down for him with half the celerity that this government does when the Grand Trunk Company calls. Talk about the widow at Windsor-all the Grand Trunk Company has to do at any stage of the game is to say what it wants, and this most pliable government immediately accedes to its demand. Now, I do not suppose that the Minister of Justice will make any defence of this increase of $1,260,000. He will say that it is only a little thing, and that the tail might as well go with the hide.


Fletcher Bath Wade: I regret very much that the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat, and a great many of those around him, entertain the opinion of the maritime provinces that they do. It is true, I have stood up in this House in defence of the maritime provinces in connection with this scheme, and for having done so I have called down upon my head continuous abuse from the other side of the House. When the hon. gentleman states that we support this scheme because it involves a distribution of money in the maritime provinces, he states what is incorrect. I have never made any such utterance in this House or anywhere else. What I have stated, and what I state now, is that whenever there is a great national scheme on foot, the maritime provinces wish to be in that scheme. If the Dominion of Canada is to progress, we have a right to progress with it. If there is to be a transcontinental railway built, we are entitled to have a terminus in the maritime provinces. That is what I said, what I repeat, and what I will stand by ; and no amount of sneering or abuse will divert me from that position for one moment. Another misrepresentation by the hon. member for East Simcoe (Mr. Bennett) of what I said was this- that I stated that whatever the government did we had to vote for. What I stated was this : that the government had entered into an agreement with the railway company, and we had either to vote for that agreement or vote against it in its entirety. That is common sense, and every man proposing these amendments knows it. The government has entered into this contract with the railway company ; it comes before parliament to have that contract either rejected or approved of ; every member of parliament is at liberty to vote whichever way he sees fit; but you cannot get away from the fact that you must accept that contract in its entirety or reject it. I can readily understand that it affords no great pleasure to hon. gentlemen opposite to see such unanimity on these benches, to see that we are ready to follow our leaders, to see that we have confidence in their judgment, to see that we will back them up in the scheme which has for its end the welfare and advancement of Canada. It must be gall and wormwood for them, because when they rise to speak, we find them at variance with themselves and their leaders, as witness the last speaker.


Samuel Hughes: Are the hon. gentlemen on the other side all in one solid phalanx ?


Fletcher Bath Wade: All in one solid phalanx. Let us illustrate the difference that exists on the other side of the House. The hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat says that the first proposition made by the Grand Trunk Company was a business proposition-that it was the correct proposition. Six or seven others said the same thing. That proposition was to let the Grand Trunk Company build into the Northwest from North Bay, and so divert the whole of the traffic down over their own system of railway and away to American ports.


Samuel Hughes: The hon. gentleman is in error. I never spoke of that as a business proposition.


Fletcher Bath Wade: I am not referring to the hon. gentleman. The hon. member for.East Simcoe made this remark a short time ago. The hon. member for East Hastings (Mr. Northrup) said the same thing, and undertook to speak for the whole opposition ; and every member of the opposition in the House at that time applauded him, and it was not until three weeks afterwards that his leader repudiated the statement he made. We have most of these hon. gentlemen declaring that the proper thing to do is to construct a road to North Bay to connect with the Grand Trunk system. And we have the leader of the opposition saying that what he would do would be to extend the Intercolonial into the prairies, and possibly build it to the Pacific coast. They are at variance with one another. If any such unlikely and unheard of thing should happen and these gentlemen come into power, I ask which would prevail ? Would the opposition members from Ontario, with their scheme of lopping off the eastern section entirely and

building from North Bay prevail or would the leader of the opposition prevail with his scheme ? It is a very hard question to answer and one which I shall not for one moment attempt to answer. When lion, gentlemen are going back into ancient history with regard to the maritime provinces I would ask them to look for one moment at what was done by lion, gentlemen opposite when they were in power in connection with this very company. At the time they purchased the RiviSre du Loup branch of the Grand Trunk from Quebec down to Riviere dn Loup and made it part of the Intercolonial in 1879 and 1880, Sir Charles Tupper in this House stated emphatically that under the terms of. that agreement it would be impossible for the Grand Trunk to divert their traffic to Portland, but that the traffic would be carried to Quebec and handed over to the Intercolonial. And yet when we come to examine the agreement there is not a line in it to accomplish such a result. But there is this in the transaction. We have gentlemen complaining that the Grand Trunk have interests in the United States. I would refer them to the agreement made at that time and the legislation which was then carried into effect and they will find that the Grand Trunk was forced by the agreement and legislation to expend a portion of the purchase money received from that road in building and extending the Grand Trunk into the city of Chicago. That is one of the provisions made at that time, and yet these gentlemen find fault because the Grand Trunk Railway has American connections. I did not intend to say a word about this matter but I do not think the debate can be furthered by rash and reckless statements of the character made here. I am standing for the maritime provinces as a part of the Dominion and I intend to stand for them and intend to raise my voice on every occasion I can for that purpose, and when these gentlemen come forward and cast aspersions on the character of the people of the maritime provinces-and this is not the first time it has been done in this House-
Some lion. MEMBERS. Oh, oh.


Fletcher Bath Wade: Last year it was the people of New Brunswick. We were told that no one there wanted the road but some men who desired to have money spent. That is the character given to the people of New Brunswick. I resent, on the part of the maritime provinces, the statements made here that the only interest the people of the maritime provinces have in this matter is that money shall be spent there. We have a different interest ; we have expectations from this road and expectations which I believe will be realized. We believe that when this road is completed, we will reap some benefit from confederation. We have faith in this scheme, that it will accomplish the object desired, and we believe that our interests should be properly protected.


Fletcher Bath Wade: 


Mr. NORTHRUP.: The hon. member for Annapolis (Mr. Wade) as usual in addressing this House has placed us under a deep debt of obligation for the light he has shed upon the question under consideration. I do not think that the House has yet received as clear, explicit and distinct a reason why lion, gentlemen opposite are supporting this Bill as the member for Annapolis has just given. He has pointed out the difference between hon. gentlemen on the other side and hon. gentlemen on this side, and we have earned his withering contempt because we laboured under the delusion that we had the right to think for ourselves, while hon. gentlemen opposite, according to him. have perfect confidence in the judgment of their leaders and are prepared to follow them. There is no member on this side, who last session did not believe that the only reason hon. gentlemen opposite supported this measure was because they had confidence in the right hon. gentleman who had made the bargain and were therefore determined to support him in that bargain whether it was for the good of the country or not. But when we find a gentleman of the legal standing and parliamentary position of the hon. member for Annapolis gravely telling this House that we are bound to accept or reject this contract that is surely hardly an argument to address to a court of law. It is true there is a contract before the House, and that unless this House confirms the contract the contract falls to the ground. That is exactly what took place last year. We were told we had no right to interfere with the contract at all. Tiie contract was made with responsible men and must stand or fall as it was made. Hon. gentlemen opposite, when they found themselves unable to defend particular provisions, took refuge under the excuse :	We cannot possibly interfere
in this contract which is made with responsible men. If the House could not interfere the country knows now that the other party to the contract could and did interfere. The contract now before us is an entirely different contract and I would like to ask the hon. member for Annapolis what possible difference there could be if this House changed any part of this contract ?


Fletcher Bath Wade: The trouble I fear would be that if he changed the contract as I said before, it would be necessary for us to go back to the Grand Trunk and that the arranging of a new contract would cause the waste of another year so that there would be no chance of getting into the west with the "haste that is desired.'
Mr. [DOT]NORTHRUP. There is a contract now which can be carried out after it has been approved of, and if this contract is altered instead of standing for a year all that is necessary is to have a meeting of the Grand Trunk shareholders called which could be done in a very few weeks, and within a month of the time this House rises,

the Grand Trunk shareholders could ratify a new contract and proceedings be taken within two months of this date. When an hon. gentleman of the standing of the hon. member for Annapolis gravely tells this House and the country that if we amend the contract the whole matter was to stand for another year it is more than we are prepared to agree to. The whole reasoning on which the hon. gentlemen opposite are proceeding, as voiced by the hon. member for Annapolis, is that we must have this particular contract. That is what was said last year and we find the result that we would expect in any business transaction where one party says :	I must have a contract with
you and with no one else. The other party to the contract is certain to hold up the party who thus admits his weakness and to exact the most rigorous terms possible. We have had from the president of the Grand Trunk, and this was stated by a minister in the House, that the government knew other parties who would build th:s road. I venture to say that if all the government wants is another road into the Northwest they will have no difficulty in getting it built bv'other parties than by the Grand Trunk. He said the Minister of Railways estimated the cost to the mountain section at $35,000 and he is rather inclined to accept the figures of the Minister of Railways.


Fletcher Bath Wade: Not at all, I put it at $40,000.


William Barton Northrup: You had information which led you to believe that $40,000 would be about the amount but not exactly the amount. The Minister of Railways said $35,000. The hon. member for Annapolis says $40,000 and yet the hon. member for Annapolis (Mr. Wade) is supporting this clause. Does he not know that the original contract is based on $40,000, because when the government liability was limited to $30,000 that meant that the road would cost prirna facie $40,000. When we find the government charging a liability limited to $30,000 which would allow an expenditure of $40,000 a mile, to an unlimited liability, that is the best evidence in the world that the government do not expect to build this mountain section at a cost of $40,000.


William Roche: I do not know what X have done to bring down on my head the withering castigation delivered by that transcontinental statesman the hon. member for Simeoe, (Mr. Bennett). He said my reputation was not known outside my own bailiwick.


William Humphrey Bennett: I meant the hon. gentleman's political reputation.


William Roche: The hon. gentleman paid my reputation was not known outside of my own bailiwick. Although I am a very humble member of the community from which I come, I rejoice to say that I possess the confidence of the people of the city in which I was born as
has been demonstrated on repeated occasions. I am happy to say that in my own neighbourhood, where I am known, my reputation stands good, and I hope that the gentleman who assailed me has a similar reputation in his constituency ; and when my reputation becomes so malodorous as he would Imply it is. I will withdraw from the House and my hon. friend may follow my example. The question which I put to him was most pertinent. If there was any meaning in the remark he addressed to the House, they meant that I applauded the proposition to extend the railway to a certain place. The hon. gentleman was inveighing against the conduct of the hon. member for Hants in applauding a certain proposition and then went on to attack the member for Halifax for having applauded it. If we were in the same category, there would be some sense in the argument of the hon. gentleman, but if the proposition were applauded on the one side by the hon. member for Hants and on the other by the hon. leader of the opposition, there was no antagonism and no sense in the attack. The whole thing amounted simply to this, that two members from the maritime provinces, each on a different side of politics, approved of the proposition. But as far as I am concerned, I never applauded any such proposition and I wish to put that statement on record. A very favourite topic with some hon. gentlemen from the rural districts in Ontario- extremely rural-is their pretension that the maritime provinces are ever ready for barter and sale, that all that the people down there look for in any project is what they can make out of it. But, Sir, I protest against any such mercenary motives being imputed to the people of the maritime provinces. They are no more actuated by such motives than are the people of the grandest province in the Dominion. The maritime provinces, on the contrary, set an example in patriotism and every other good quality to the rest of the Dominion. At the time when the province of Ontario was in rebellion against the British government, the little province of Nova Scotia voted the-whole of its revenue to arm its militia to suppress that rebellion-a rebellion which originated not very far from the county of my hon. friend. I hope that now there will be a cessation of these scoffs at the maritime provinces and particularly the province of Nova Scotia, which requires to take no lesson from any other province, either as regards the spirit of her sons or the reputation of her inhabitants ; and if you will take from this House the members representing the mar* itime provinces on both sides, you will find none superior left. I believe that not one mile of this railway will be built in Nova Scotia, so that as regards any pecuniary benefit to be derived from the'building of the railway itself, that province has nothing vain, but of course we expect to reap the incidental advantages and benefits, in pro-

portion to our size and population and our contribution to the Dominion treasury, which will accrue to the country at large. If we support this measure, it is not because we look selfishly to any pecuniary and private benefit as a province, but because it will benefit all parts of the Dominion, and it is with that patriotic purpose and desire that the votes from the maritime provinces on this side will be given to that project. If we support it, it is because we think it will be beneficial to the whole Dominion and for no other reason.
Amendment (Mr. Blain) negatived.


William Barton Northrup: Before this clause is adopted, I have an amendment to move. The amendment is as follows :
That section 7 of the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following as subsection (3)
(3) That all paid up stock of the Pacific1 [DOT]Company which shall be acquired and taken by the Grand Trunk Company at any time henceforth until the expiration of the term of the lease mentioned in clause 20 of the said last mentioned agreement, or until payment and *discharge of all bonds guaranteed by the Dominion of Canada under the terms of the scheduled agreements shall be pledged and transferred to the Dominion of Canada as security for the due performance and observance by the Pacific Company and by the Grand Trunk Company respectively of all the covenants, undertakings, obligations, conditions and stipulations of the said companies respectively which the Dominion of Canada shall be entitled to have performed and observed under or by virtue of the said scheduled agreements, and the instrument creating such pledge shall contain all such usual provisions as may be necessary to carry into effect the true intent and qpean-ing of the scheduled agreements as modified by the National Transcontinental Railway Act and this Act.
Very few words. Sir, will be necessary to place before the House the views of those who think that the interests of the country will be protected by the adoption of the amendment I have just moved. When my hon. friend the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Sifton) admitted yesterday that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway itself has no credit and would be unable to borrow any money in the markets of the world, he said what is well known to every one. It is also well known to every member in this House that the only covenants which this country has to secure the performance of the agreement with the Grand Trunk Pacific are the covenants of the Grand Trunk Pacific itself. Beyond its undertaking to guarantee the second mortgage bonds, we have no covenant with the Grand Trunk Railway, so that, although there are many conditions and stipulations in the agreement, there is no way of enforcing them except by such action as it may be necessary to take against a company which the Minister of the Interior himself admits has no credit.
Now, when we look to see if there is any way in which the country mar be secured, Mr. WM. ROCHE.
we find that there is a large amount of stock which is to be issued by the Grand Trunk Pacific. According to the terms of the original agreement this stock was to be held by the Grand Trunk. When the magnates of the Grand Trunk were willing to make a bargain to hold this stock, when the ministers, from the right hon. gentleman (Sir Wilfrid Laurier), who leads the House, down, pointed out to the House that there was great security to the people in the fact that the Grand Trunk was to hold this stock and not put it in the market, it is possible some of the hon. gentlemen opposite may have supported this Bill in consequence ol that understanding. Well, even at that time we on this side contended that the Grand Trunk might acquire this stock without the payment of any' cash, while hon. gentlemen opposite contended that under the original contract it was necessary that the Grand Trunk should pay cash. Now, conditions are altered, and every one admits that the Grand Trunk Is not obliged to pay cash, but that they may obtain this stock in consideration of 'the guarantee they are to give on the second mortgage bonds. If, when the Grand Trunk was supposed to pay cask- and that was the contention of the government last year-the government then thought that it was so reasonable, so proper and so necessary in the interest of the country that the Grand Trunk Company should hold this stock, how much more necessary, how much more reasonable it is that the Grand Trunk, which does not pay a dollar for the stock, but merely obtains it in consideration of giving a guarantee, should hold that stock under pledge for the performance of this contract ? The House has been assured by hon. gentlemen opposite-and we are not prepared to contradict them ; we say we do not know, but we hope they are right-that the western division will be successful. In that case, the liability of the Grand Trunk on these second mortgage bonds will not involve them in the actual cash payment. If the western division is to be a success, so that the Grand Trunk never puts anything more into it than its guarantee of certain bonds, why should it have twenty-five, or thirty, or forty millions of dollars of stock which it can cash the next day, if it suits them ? The country, having so much greater risk than the Grand Trunk, should be protected, and this motion will meet the point that the stock should be security for the country in some form. The House has voted down the suggestion that the country should have stock in proportion to the security given. This is even a less objectionable mode of securing that point. If it was necessary that the Grand Trunk magnates should hold the stock when they were required to pay cash for it. surely in asking that they should not be allowed to part with it when they pay nothing for it. but that the stock

should be held as a guarantee that the stipulations into which the Grand Trunk Pacific enter shall be carried out, we are not asking anything unreasonable. The government seems to think it of great moment that the Grand Trunk should control the policy of this new company. They still insist that the Grand Trunk should control the proxies on the stock, even though they do not own the stock itself. If the Grand Trunk is to control the policy, what objection can there be to saying that the Grand Trunk shall hold the stock as a security to us that the obligations that the Grand Trunk Pacific enter into shall be carefully carried out ? One hon. gentleman on the other side-I think it was the hon. member for Annapolis {Mr. Wade)-says that the Grand Trunk has no other way of making anything out of the contract than by the sale of stock, that they have no other way of recouping themselves if they should be required to pay under the guarantee they put on the bonds. Surely that is not correct. From the very day the Grand Trunk Pacific begins to operate, the Grand Trunk will be in receipt of large gains and emoluments from its operation. When the president of the Grand Trunk was urging his shareholders to enter into this agreement, he pointed out that up. to this time they were obliged to hand their west-going freight over to a foreign corporation and receive nothing for the hauling beyond their own lines, and, in order to maintain their dividends, they must have an extension westward so that the Grand Trunk may have money for carrying freights between the east and the west. If they expect to make money by the freight to be transferred to them by the Grand Trunk Pacific, all the more reason that the people should require that they shall hold the stock as security to the people that the undertakings entered into by the Grand Trunk Pacific shall be carried out. It was said a few minutes ago that if the road had been built as originally contemplated, from North Bay to the west, the Grand Trunk could have diverted freight to Portland instead of sending it out by Canadian ports. Consider what that means. When the Grand Trunk was asking for a charter to build from North Bay to Winnipeg, it was asking for something that we were not bound to grant, but to the granting of which we might attach any conditions we chose. I venture to say it would puzzle any lawyer in this House to point out how it would be possible to bind them under this agreement not to divert traffic to Portland more completely than it would be under a charter authorizing them to build from North Bay westward. We are told that with the carrying out of this contract the freight will go to Quebec. But in what way are you going to compel freight to go to the maritime provinces, or not to go to Portland, that cannot be used now
when the freight is being taken to Montreal ? When you reach Montreal you have a road to Portland. But when you reach Quebec you have a road to Portland. If you can bind the Grand Trunk at all, you can bind them, changing the word Quebec to Montreal. Sir, I do not think you can bind them by any form of words ; and, therefore, I think that such a clause as I am moving is one that should be accepted by hon. gentlemen opposite as one that can be of no injury to the company, but one tending to secure the performance of the covenants that we have no other way of enforcing.


Mr. FITZPATRICK.: This amendment proceeds on the assumption that the stock of the company is absolutely of no value and can be of no use to the company. That matter has been brought up for discussion several times and has been the determining cause of a great number of amendments. So, I think I may be permitted to say, without offence to my hon. friend (Mr. Northrup), that the House is fully informed as to the opinions of both sides on that subject. My hon. friend's position is that this company is created for the purpose of building a road from Winnipeg to Port Simpson and is also authorized to carry on many subsidiary enterprises, and, for carrying out these enterprises it is authorized to issue bonds to an amount barely sufficient to construct the road ; and yet, notwithstanding that, the company is to be deprived of the use of its stock for the purpose .of furnishing equipment, betterments, terminal facilities and the hundred and one things that a company of this kind must have. The true way to dispose of this would be for hon. gentleman to take the position that the company does not require a capital stock at all, and that the House should simply and purely declare that this company shall be restricted to its bond issue and shall have no capital stock at all.


Mr. CLANCY.: The hon. gentleman pointed out the other day, I think-it certainly was pointed out on several occasions-that one of the main items towards which the proceeds of this stock was to be applied, and one of the main reasons why the stock should be sold, was terminals. The hon. gentleman is a lawyer, a good lawyer, I believe. As a lawyer he-knows perfectly well that terminals are provided for as part of the cost of construction, and do not need to be provided for in this way. Then, with regard to the other question as to whether we take the position that there was not one copper to be furnished for the purpose of equipment and so on, we do not take that position. We follow entirely the views of a gentleman who was in a position to know the whole case. I refer to the president of the Grand Trunk, who told his shareholders in the city of London that not one copper more than $15,000,000. in round figures, would be required from the

Grand Trunk Railway Company-that their liability rested wholly and solely in their guarantees amounting to the figure I have named. Now, the answer of the Minister of Justice (Mr. Fitzpatrick) has been time and again : We care nothing for what Sir Charles Rivers-Wilson may have said on some other occasion ; we are bound by the contract. I am at a loss to know-up to this moment there is nothing in the contract to indicate how provision is to be made for the matter the hon. gentleman is discussing. If it has been stated, I have not heard it, or both my memory and my understanding must be at fault.
Now, I think, without desiring for a single moment to prolong this discussion, that the hon. gentleman who sits behind the hon. the Minister of Justice has given the explanation of it. It has been given on other occasions by the hon. the Minister of Finance and by the hon. the Minister of Customs (Mr. Paterson) namely, that the Grand Trunk Railway Company have asked that certain changes be made in the original contract with the sanction of parliament. Nothing else can be done. We must accept that, good or bad. I. appeal to you, Mr. Chairman, if this is not a humiliating position in which to place the House of Commons of Canada. Has it come to the time in the history of parliament that members on both sides of the House shall utterly and completely surrender their independence, that they shall lose sight of every duty they owe to themselves as members of this House, and that any corporation can, under any conditions, come to this House and say : You must sanction that and nothing else, no more or less ? It is certainly a very extraordinary position. It is one that I scarcely think comports with the dignity and independence of this House, and one which I am sure will not appeal to those who are not in this House. One hon. gentleman said :	We want to prevent delay.
What is the answer to that ? My hon. friend from Bast Hastings (Mr. Northrup) gave the answer. He said : This House may possibly be in session for six weeks yet. Any alterations that are made in the Grand Trunk Pacific agreement, or in the Act affecting that agreement, may be submitted to the Grand Trunk shareholders who may be conveniently called together to ratify these alterations. There is no need of any delay. It is an excuse. The world likes an excuse. I never found a man yet who had not an excuse, but we have found men and aggregations of men even amongst members of parliament who have had an excuse even if it were a bad one. Would any hon. gentleman opposite be bold enough to say that they have not offered this as an excuse ? Could any hon. gentleman imagine anything that could be invented which would be a shadow of justification for hon. gentlemen opposite other than the mere excuse which they have put forward Mr. CLANCY.
on this, occasion ? The amendment of my hon. friend from East Hastings seems to be pertinent in this way :	The government
have undertaken large obligations and there is no reason, it seems to me, having that in view, why all the paid up stock which is handed over to the Grand Trunk Railway Company should not be deposited with the government of Canada to be returned at the time at which the obligation ceases. It is a v^i'y fair proposition. I am not going to repeat that the' Grand Trunk people who are concerned in this are as utterly at variance in their contention in reference to this particular point as day is from night.


William Barton Northrup: 
Mr. HEYD.: When ?


William Barton Northrup: The moment the stock is sold. Surely the hon. gentleman (Mr Heyd) must see that if the .Grand Trunk have acquired the stock it can be sold at once.


Charles Bernhard Heyd: When can they sell that $25,000,000 worth of stock ?


William Barton Northrup: As soon as they get it. Will my hon. friend point out any clause in the contract that prevents the Grand Trunk Railway Company from selling that $25,000,000 worth of stock when they acquire it ?


Charles Fitzpatrick: The difference between my hon. friend and myself is that he proceeds by construing this document which is an agreement between two parties by the construction put upon it by one of the parties to the contract. I am only construing the contract by the terms contained in the contract itself.


William Barton Northrup: The hon. gentleman: will see that by the amendment brought down this year the Grand Trunk Railway Company can acquire the $25,000,000 of stock in consideration of their guarantee, whereas, last year under the original contract, according to hon. gentlemen opposite, the Grand Trunk Railway Company could not acquire this stock in consideration of their guarantee. The hon. gentleman said last year that they must pay cash for it, and so the lawyers acting for the railway company said : Whatever our ideas may be as to that if the Minister of Justice says we have to pay cash for that stock we will make it beyond peradventure and so we will put a clause into this amended agreement, which will enable the Grand Trunk Railway Company to acquire the whole of this stock in consideration of giving the guarantee. So far the predictions of hon. members on this side of the House have been verified. When we find that our predictions have been verified so far and when we find the president of the Grand Trunk Railway Company representing to his shareholders exactly what we are contending today, I think we cannot be blamed if we are disposed to adhere to the opinion which we expressed last year.


James Clancy: The contention of the hon. the Minister of Justice is that the proceeds of this stock will be required for certain purposes which he has already stated. I would like to ask the hon. gentleman what right the Grand Trunk Railway Company have to take the moneys that belong to the Grand Trunk Railway Company and use them for the purposes of the Grand Trunk Pacific Company ?



DEVISED

Charles Fitzpatrick: The Grand Trunk Railway Company would have the right to take the funds of the companv for the purposes of the Grand Trunk Pacific Rail-' way Company in connection with the purchase of stock, because it has been repeated ten times over that special authority is given them to do it.


James Clancy: That is not the question I asked the hon. gentleman. I asked what right they would have to expend the proceeds of the stock for the purpose of constructing terminals.


Charles Fitzpatrick: The proceeds of the sale of the stock go to the company owning the stock ; that is the Grand Trunk Pacific.


Some hon. MEMBERS: No.


Charles Fitzpatrick: If the Grand Trunk Pacific have the stock and they sell it to the Grand Trunk the proceeds go to the Grand Trunk Pacific.


James Clancy: The hon. genetleman is assuming that they pay cash for it.


Charles Fitzpatrick: Of course I am.


James Clancy: They pay nothing for it, but they sell that stock to some person else and leceive the proceeds. The Grand Trunk get that $25,000,000 of stock for nothing beyond the mere obligations that they are undertaking. They go on the market next day as provided by the amendments that hon. gentlemen opposite are asking this House to assent to and they sell every dollar of that stock. The proceeds are placed in the treasury of the Grand Trunk Railway Company. I ask the hon. the Minister of Justice what right the Grand Trunk Railway Company have to take the money so earned and, under the circumstances I have stated, construct terminals or provide equipment for the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company.


Charles Fitzpatrick: I think my hon. friend must answer that question for himself. I never said that such a thing was possible and it never entered my head to imagine such a thing.


Mr. BARKER.: 

EDITION

[Stage Direction]
Pacific Company, and perform such other services for the Pacific Company as are agreed upon, and the Grand Trunk Company may receive and take as the consideration, in whole or in part, to be given to it under the terms of any such agreement, shares of the capital stock of the Pacific Company for such amount and upon such terms and conditions as are agreed upon.
When these two companies have agreed as to the number of shares that are to be given to the Grand Trunk Company in consideration of its guarantee, will not the shares so given be the property of the Grand Trunk Railway Company ; and if they be sold upon the market will not the money received from them belong to the Grand Trunk Railway, and go into the treasury of the Grand Trunk Railway Company ? If the treasurer of the Grand Trunk Railway should afterwards use that money for the purposes of the Grand Trunk Pacific it would be a misappropriation of the Grand Trunk Railway funds. It is merely arguing in a circle to say, that the stock is sold to enable the Grand Trunk Pacific to do anything that is within the functions of the Grand Trunk Pacific. The Grand Trunk Pacific loses all control over and interest in the stock the moment it gives that stock to the Grand Trunk Railway, and it becomes absolutely the property of the Grand Trunk Railway Company.
Amendment (Mr. Northrup) negatived.
Mr. BENNEttT. There was a good deal of discussion the other evening as to the remuneration which should be paid by the Grand Trunk Pacific Company for the use of any part of the government section, before the completed road was finally handed over by the government. It is a peculiar feature of this contract, that the power of leasing any portion of the road is conferred on the three commissioners-we are told lately that there are to be four commissioners-and that that power is not to be vested in the government itself. We have it on the authority of Sir Rivers-Wilson and of Mr. Hays, that the section of the road from Winnipeg to North Bay will be a most remunerative section, that it will pay from the very outset, that it will connect with the old Grand Trunk Railway system ; and as this 900 miles is likely td be built first, it will no doubt be at once leased to the Grand Trunk Pacific. It seems to me that the government should not be absolved from all responsibility in the! granting of a lease of this magnitude. The commissioners may be worthy men, but nevertheless it is the government which is responsible to the people, and these leases should be confirmed by Orders in Council. When we consider that under the provisions of this Bill, the commissioners are not allowed to let contracts exceeding (510,000 without the consent of the government, it is an extraordinary thing that this 900 miles Mr. BARKER.
of road, costing over $27,000,000 should be handed over to the commissioners to do what ever they please with it, without the government being responsible. I therefore beg to move :
That section X of the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following subsection :
Provided always, that no lease shall be concluded by the commissioners under section 3 of the supplementary agreement until such lease has been sanctioned and approved by the Governor in Council ; and a copy of every such lease shall be forthwith deposited with the Secretary of State for Canada.
William Stevens Fielding: I am not sure that this amendment is not in the right direction, and I would suggest that it be allowed to stand. We would never contemplate that the commissioners would make a lease of that character except with the knowledge of the government, and before the Bill is passed, the amendment might perhaps be incorporated in its proper place, if it is not already provided for. The substance of the amendment is reasonable,-and in one form or another it should be adopted.


Mr. SPROULE.: Mr. Chairman, I desire to move in amendment :
That the Bill he amended by adding thereto the following section as section 5 :-
5. Should the government he of opinion at any time during the continuance of any obligation of the government in respect of the western division, or during the lease of the eastern division, that the earnings upon the traffic interchanged between the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company system of railways and the system of railways of the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada, have not been properly apportioned between the said tw'o companies, the question of such apportionment shall be determined by arbitrators to be appointed by the government and the Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada, in the manner provided by paragraph 47 of the agreement, or shall be determined by the Board of Railway Commissioners as mentioned in section 19 of the said agreement.
Before dealing with this amendment, I wish to say a few words with reference to some observations made by the hon. member for Annapolis (Mr. Wade). He started out by saying : We are a unanimity behind the government ; there is no diversity of opinion amongst us. Yet I have a distinct recollection of the hon. gentleman saying a few days ago :	If there are
any weak-kneed members of the party, they may just as well understand first as last that this contract is going through.


Fletcher Bath Wade: I did not say anything of the sort.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I can only say that is what I understood the hon. gentleman to say, and I incline to the opinion that ' Hansard ' will bear me out. Since he denies it, I am, of course, bound to accept his statement. The hon. member went on to

say :	we cannot change a single condition
of this contract or a single clause of the Bill, but we have to accept it in its entirety or reject it in its entirety. Who is saying this ? It is not the government who have made the contract. It is only a common member of parliament. What authority had he to make that statement ? Was he the party who made this binding agreement ? I find that the agreement was signed by Henry Robert Emmersou, Minister of Railways, representing Canada. We like to have principals speak, and not Subordinates. We like to have those speak who have the authority to speak. But, strange to say, the principal is not here, and it is left to his subordinates to say what is the binding nature of this contract. His deputy, the Minister of Justice, who is employed to act for him, is the only man in the House who assumes any responsibility, and who speaks authoritatively. The deputy of the Minister of Railways speaks, but the Minister of Railways himself is not present. We would like to see him here. We would like to have his interpretation of this contract. We would like to hear from him whether there can or can not be any amendment to it. If it be the fact that there can be no amendment to this contract, why are 213 or 214 members of this parliament, representing the people of Canada, wasting their time debating it clause by clause ? If we are to accept it or reject it in its entirety, why do the government not move it en bloc ? Does it not seem to be silly child's play to take up the time of this House day after day discussing the clauses of this Bill and the binding nature of the contract, when we are told by one who is supposed to know that we are wasting our time, because we have to accept the contract or reject it in its entirety ? If we cannot remedy any defects in it, we are only wasting the time of this House considering it clause by clause. This House was plied with a similar argument last year, when the original Bill was before us. We were told that not one clause of that Bill could be changed, because a solemn and binding agreement had been entered into by the government with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, that the country was bound to carry out the obligations entered into, and that we were compelled to accept it whether we liked it or not. Every amendment we proposed was voted down', and the Bill was carried through in its entirety. How long did the company stand by that agreement ? So far as we know not one month. How do we know that they will stand by the present agreement ? We do not know. Immediately after that agreement was confirmed by parliament, the other contracting party began to find excuses for withdrawing from it, and they did withdraw.
103J .
The other party withdrew from the contract, and asked to have the agreement changed. The government agreed to the changes demanded and now call upon the House to ratify this supplemental movement. But what greater obligation are we under to honour the agreement made by the government than the railway company were to honour the agreement into which their representatives entered ? We believe that this contract contains defects and we desire to remedy them. The government, however, refuse to consent to any remedy. They say that the contract must be accepted in its entirety. With regard to this amendment, I have proposed it for this reason. We find that tjie contracting parties are the government, acting on behalf of the country, as the party of the first part, and the Grand Trunk Pacific as the party of the second part. The party of the first part agrees to build the eastern division and to guarantee three-quarters of the cost of constructing the western division, and the party of the second part agrees to lease the eastern division from the government at a rental of three per cent upon the cost of its construction, and to pay besides three per cent interest upon the bonds guaranteed by the government for the construction of the western division.
But during the first seven years the party of the second part is to pay no rent on the eastern division or interest on the bonds guaranteed by the government for the construction of the western division, and during the succeeding three years, unless the earnings of the road be sufficient to pay operating expenses and three per cent interest, the party of the second part is not to be obliged to- pay any interest on the eastern division or on the guarantee of the western division, but thb amount of that interest is to be added to the principal and it will pay interest on the entire amount for the future. It will therefore be the interest of the Grand Trunk Railway, which is to have entire control of the Grand Trunk Pacific, that the earnings be not sufficient to enable the Grand Trunk Pacific to pay that three per cent interest for the first three years at least after the expiration of the seven years. How is the Grand Trunk Pacific to pay tile interest ? Out of the earnings of the road. But the earnings of the road, in the first instance, have to be divided between two or three railway corporations- between the Grand Trunk Pacific, the Intercolonial and the Grand Trunk Railway, as regards all the freight that may pass over the Intercolonial Railway, the contract stipulates that a division of the earnings between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the government will be made on fair and equitable lines. That provision is made in clause 44 :
In respect of the tolls for any traffic carried partly over any line of railway operated by the company, and partly over any of the lines of

the Intercolonial Railway, a fair and equitable ratable division of all such tolls shall he made hy mutual agreement.
Between whom ? Between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the government, I assume; but if they fail to come to an understanding as to what is a fair and equitable distribution, then such division shall be fixed by arbitration in the manner provided by paragraph 47, or by a board of commissioners which may hereafter be appointed, as mentioned in paragraph 190 of the agreement, and subject to the right of appeal as therein provided. But, when the third party comes on the scene, the Grand Trunk Railway, whose freight may be carried over a portion of this line, there is no provision made lor a fair and equitable division of the earnings between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the Grand Trunk Railway. It is true that the two companies will be obliged to divide the earnings in some way or other, but as it is the Grand Trunk Railway which will be operating the road, it will be to the interests of that company to defer any payment to the government as long as possible, and if, by taking more than a fair share of the earnings for its own railway, they will be able to defer payment of interest for three years, they will be likely to do so. We had a considerable discussion about that last night, and I understood the Minister of justice to say that there was a provision in the Railway Act which met that objection. Well, I cannot see any such provision in that Act. While the Railway Commission have the right, before assenting to any rate, to see that it must be a fair rate as between the people and the railway corporation, it has not the right to see that the division of rates is a fair one between the two railway companies. There is a provision in the event of dispute between the government and the Grand Trunk Pacific, but there is no provision in case of a dispute between the Grand Trunk Railway and Grand Trunk Pacific or the Grand Trunk Railway and the Intercolonial. There is no provision for an equitable division in these cases, and it is to provide a means of settling the dispute, similar to that which the government has provided in the case of a dispute between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the Intercolonial, that I move this amendment.


William Stevens Fielding: The object which the hon. gentleman has in view is substantially the same as we have had. The one question is whether that object is already accomplished by existing legislation ; and if not, whether the amendment proposed will cover all possible ground of objection. As respects the division of rates between the western division, which would be the property of the Grand Trunk Pacific itself, and the eastern division, which would be the property of the government, but under lease to the Grand Trunk Pacific, we have al-Mr. SPROULE.
ready made 'an arrangement for distribution.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Where ?


William Stevens Fielding: By the contract.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: What clause ?


William Stevens Fielding: Section 19 of the original contract. There' is no question that, as between the western division owned by the Grand Trunk Pacific and the eastern division which they will operate, over which they will exercise the rights of lessee, there is already provision. There is also provision, I think for the equitable distribution of any through rate between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the Intercolonial. What my hon. friend draws attention to is, however, an additional item, the possible lack of legislation governing the distribution of a rate which will be in part over the Grand Trunk Pacific and in part over the old Grand Trunk. Now, we are advised that that is probably covered by existing legislation in the Railway Act.


Samuel Barker: Where ?


William Stevens Fielding: That was discussed last night; I do not wish to dwell too strongly upon that aspect of it. But there is another aspect of it to which the hon. gentleman has not drawn attention and which might be considered. and that is the possibility of a through rate being made as between the Grand Trunk Pacific operating that western portion of the road, for utilizing part of the eastern division, and then coming to the Grand Trunk, but using for part of the route water communication by means which might or might not be in the hands of a company with a nominally distinct organization, but controlled by the Grand Trunk. My impressions is that the amendment wThieh my hon. friend has moved would not meet that difficulty, but only the case of the connecting lines, the Grand Trunk Pacific and the Grand Trunk proper. If, therefore, there is any need of additional provision, it should be made to cover not only the mere connection of the two rail lines, but any water line which forms part of their route and over which a commercial through rate might be granted. Our advice is that that is probably covered by the Railway Act, and, for the present, we should take that view. But, if it be found on more careful examination, that there is any doubt on that point, we think the proper remedy would be, not by an amendment to this particular Bill, but by an amendment to the Railway Act which would apply to all such cases and make it clear, if it is not already clear, that the functions of the Railway Commission may extend not only to fixing a through rate but to inquiring into the manner in which that rate is divided between two railway lines. I will not press the point too much that it is covered by legislation, though we are so advised. But, if, on inquiry, it is

found that It is not so, we shall meet the difficulty by an amendment to the Railway Act which will cover not only the amendment which my hon. friend has mentioned but also the difficulty of a through rate part rail and part water. We think it better to amend the Railway Act, if it is necessary than to put it in the form of an amendment to this Bill.


Samuel Barker: I think the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) will find it exceedingly difficult to deal with the difficulty we are discussing in the General Railway Act. I think it will be an impossibility to deal with it there. You cannot leave it to a board of railway commissioners to settle the division of a through rate between common carriers. It is done by telegraph very often ; scores of such cases arise from day to day. A short time ago we had a similar case discusssed in this House. The government, in connection with the Canada Atlantic and the Grand Trunk, were carrying wheat from Depot Harbour to the ocean port. The three concerns, the Intercolonial, the Grand Trunk and the Canada Atlantic, got a through rate. The Canada Atlantic got a fair paying rate for through traffic over its portion of the line, the Grand Trunk got a higher rate than the Canada Atlantic because it had a short haul, and the government was left with actually less than the cost of hauling the traffic. That was made perfectly clear. The departments answer showed that the only reason they thought the traffic was profitable to the Intercolonial was because of the return traffic ; that is, you were carrying one way at a loss hoping to get something back that would pay. In that case, supposing the railway commissioners were to say to the Grand Trunk and the Canada Atlantic : You must accept a pro rata division, what would be the result ? The traffic would not be carried. The three could not agree to carry at a low through rate unless there was an arbitrary division. That is a matter between the freight agents. It does not concern the public in the least ; what the shipper is concerned in is what the through rate will be. When the freight agents get together they have to consider many circumstances. It may pay a railway company to carry at a loss, but they could not leave it to the discretion of a board of railway commissioners. Take the Grand Trunk hauling to Portland, for instance, there are times when it would pay the Grand Trunk to haul wheat at less than cost. It may be that they have entered into an agreement to fill a ship, and if the ship must go before its load arrives, it must go in ballast. They must put the freight aboard the ship on her sailing day. All such circumstances must be considered, but could not be left to the railway commissioners. They are dealt with as a retail merchant deals with his trade. He deals with it at his discretion, but no man not concerned in the profit and loss account could be allowed to interfere. It would be
absolutely impossible, in my opinion, to deal with the point in the General Railway Act as the minister suggests. There is another point in this matter the minister makes-that there may be a part water-haul. If there is a water-haul in which neither of the railway companies is interested, they will be willing to trust their common interest not to let the ship have more than they are absolutely obliged to allow. But, if the ship is a part of the Grand Trunk, then, what the ship gets will be part of the Grand Trunk rate. The only way you can deal with this is, if the Grand Trunk, owing to its special interest, the fact that it will control both lines, should try to divert the traffic to one portion, there should be somebody in the interest of the country to see that they deal justly. There would be no necessity for this if they were independent companies, if thb Grand Trunk did not control the Grand Trunk Pacific. The necessity arises from the fact that the government have given the Grand Trunk absolute power to control the Grand Trunk Pacific ? This is not a thing you can put in the Railway Act, because you will not have such cases arising under the Railway Act. If this thing existed between ordinary companies, the moment such an arrangement as this was made, it would be one entire company and there would be no division between sections at all. But here, the Grand Trunk, controlling the Grand Trunk Pacific and so having a motive might seek to deprive the government section of the road of some of its earnings. You must have a clause that will enable you to protect the country from anything of that kind.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I wish to draw the minister's attention to the clause, which, he says contains a provision which is ample for the purpose for which this amendement was intended-clause 19. Clause 19, if I read it correctly, has two objects in view.


William Stevens Fielding: I said that it is provided as respects the eastern and western divisions.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: That is the only clause I can find that applies to it at all. Section 19 has two objects in view. One is to give the government the right to examine books and accounts to ascertain the cost of construction. The other is to ascertain the net earnings of the road, so that they may detei mine whether the company has completed its obligations or not. It says that :
For the purpose of enabling the government to determine the cost of construction of the said railway, or of any portion thereof, or the cost of the equipment supplied, or the net earnings of the railway, or of any part or parts thereof, pursuant to this agreement, the government shall have the right .... to inspect all the books of account, pay-sheets, contracts, correspondence and all other books, papers and documents, the inspection of which may be considered necessary for the purpose of determining such cost or net earnings. The

But there is no provision made that they shall keep an account of the earnings as between the Grand Trunk and the Grand Trunk Pacific.


William Stevens Fielding: I must confess that this clause has not that effect.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I can find no other clause. The question was raised last night by the Minister of Justice, who claimed that this clause provided how the division of earnings shall be made between the eastern and western division.
-the earnings from through traffic shall he apportioned between the eastern and western divisions, according to the usual practice of connecting lines of railway operated by two separate companies,

The hon. member for Hamilton (Mr. Barker) has given the usual practice over and over again, that is to divide the profits privately between them according to their own desire and arrangement, with which, I take it, the government will have no concern.


William Stevens Fielding: Bead on.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: -any dispute as to the proper divisions of such earnings shall be determined by arbitrators to be appointed in the manner provided by paragraph forty-seven of this agreement.
But remember that refers only to the eastern aud western divisions. The amendment which I move refers to the Grand Trunk Railway, which has a line of its own over which a portion of the traffic will be carried, and as the Grand Trunk is the .party interested iu having the payment deferred, it would naturally aim at taking for itself the larger share of the earnings to be divided between the Grand Trunk and the Grand Trunk Pacific, so as to show that the Grand Trunk Pacific was not earning sufficient to justify its payment of its obligations.


William Stevens Fielding: I think that if at that time the company were in default that would be simply fraud, and it could be dealt with as such. With regard to the statement of the hon. member for Hamilton (Mr.. Barker) that you cannot deal with a question of this character, the division of a rate, by the Commissioners, I would call attention to the fact that we have attempted to deal with it, and our right to do so has not been challenged. Under section 44 o? the contract of last year, we stipulated :
In respect of the tolls for any traffic carried partly over any line of railway operated by the company, and partly over any of the lines of the Intercolonial Railway, a fair and equit able ratable division of all such tolls shall be made by mutual agreement, or, in case of dispute, such division shall be fixed by arbitrators Mr. SPROULE. .
appointed in the manner provided by paragraph forty-seven of this agreement, or by a board of commissioners.
We provided that in the contract of last year.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: As to the Grand Trunk and the Grand Trunk Pacific ?


William Stevens Fielding: I do not claim that we have made any provision iu this contract as respects the Grand Trunk and the Grand Trunk Pacific. I was simply replying to the point raised by the hon. member for Hamilton, that such a, thing was not practicable. We have tried it, and I have not heard any objection raised to our doing so, under our agreement of last year.


Mr. HAGGART.: It would be easily done between the eastern and western division of the Grand Trunk by having the apportionment made on a mileage basis. It is different when a particular railway has particular claims on account of a local rate or local traffic, as the Intercolonial say they have a right to the traffic of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. When traffic comes to be carried over two or three roads, and then goes to the Intercolonial, they insist on their local rates, as any railway would have a right to do, and the rates there are not divided on a mileage basis. Of course, each day there is a telegram sent to the manager of a road when freight is offered : What will you carry this for on your particular road ? For the purpose of covering the obligations under this Act a simple plan would be that the rate shall be allotted to each of the divisions on a simple mileage basis.
There is a provision under the Act by which the Grand Trunk may exercise the power of foreclosure when there is default to them. In the event of foreclosure and the Grand Trunk taking possession of these properties, would the Grand Trunk, becoming possessed of the property, be obligated by the contract and the obligations of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway ? That is, if they exercised the power of foreclosure.


Charles Fitzpatrick: If the Grand Trunk exercised the power of foreclosure, the government of Canada would be absolutely disinterested in so far as the money consideration is concerned, because under the foreclosure we would be entitled to first claim under the sale.


John Graham Haggart: The Grand Trunk has the power of foreclosure, you do not cut that away ?


Charles Fitzpatrick: Foreclosure! subject to our first mortgage.


John Graham Haggart: Subject to your first mortgage or anything you like, subject to the payment of the first mortgage and in-

terest. Out there are other obligations and other arrangements made between the Grand Trunk Pacific and the government. Suppose the Grand Trunk assume the obligations and foreclose against the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. Would the Grand Trunk Company, assuming that, be compelled to carry out the obligations of the Grand Trunk Pacific to the government ?


Charles Fitzpatrick: Would my hon. friend point out to which of the obligations he refers ?
working the railway are then the Grand Trunk Railway Company, and you have not a solitary covenant from the Grand Trunk Railway Company for the protection of all this traffic.
Amendment (Mr. Sproule) negatived.
Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER, Shall the section be adopted 1


Charles Fitzpatrick: Do I understand that section 7 has not been adopted ? The section to which the last amendment was moved was section 1.


Samuel Barker: I suppose every covenant in this agreement on the part of the Grand Trunk Pacific with 'relation to through-traffic, Canadian routes, &c. There is a good deal in the point raised by the hon. member for Lanark (Mr. Haggart), if the Grand Trunk forecloses and wipes out the existence of the Grand Trunk Pacific.


Charles Fitzpatrick: What then becomes of the lease of the eastern division ?
Mr BARKER, That is one of the difficulties The Grand Trunk Pacific is no longer the owner of the western division, the Grand Trunk becomes the owner, of it. Now, the only covenants we have with regard to the operation of the western division undei this agreement are the covenants of the Grand Trunk Pacific. You have refused to make the Grand Trunk responsible. If yoa had accented some of the amendments offered, the Grand Trunk would have been a covenanting party, and you would have had a hold on them. While I have not yet considered the point raised by the hon. member for Lanark (Mr. Haggart), I think the hon. gentleman might well consider it.


Charles Fitzpatrick: It is too abstract altogether.


Mr BARKER.: I do not know. There is a peculiarity about the provisions in the supplementary contract. The government, as the guarantors of three-quarters of the bonds, have been deprived of any right of foreclosure, but the right of foreclosure has been left to the Grand Trunk. Now, suppose a default occurs. I suppose when we are taking security as mortgagees, we contemplate the possibility of default, otherwise there is not much necessity of caring at all what your mortgage is on. The very fact that there is a possibility of default is what we would like to' try to secure the country against. If there is default in the payment of interest the Grand Trunk Railway Company have the right to foreclose. They cannot foreclose the government, but they can foreclose the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, and wipe them out of existence as the owners of the property. Where are you then ? You have your mortgage bonds guaranteed all right remaining against the railway, but the owners of the property


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER.: Yes, section 1 has been adopted, but I stated that I was going to bring up the point that you could not amend a section that has already been closed. Section 7 has not been closed.


Mr. KEMP.: would be in such a condition that money could be borrowed by this government at the rate of three per cent, or perhaps at a lower rate. Therefore they stipulated that the rental to be paid for the eastern division of the road should be three percent. Since that time, as has been pointed out by the right hon. leader of the government, and as we all know, the money markets of the world have changed. Money is scarcer ; interest is higher. At any rate we are reminded of the fact that money at the present time is dearer and that perhaps it may be dearer still. Perhaps we may not again have during the next 25, or 30 or 50 years the conditions which have existed during the last 25 years and that money will not be as cheap as it has been during the last quarter of a century. What this resolution contemplates is that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company shall pay as rental for the eastern division the rate of interest which the government pay for the money which they have to borrow for the purpose of constructing this road. This is one of the most reasonable propositions that could be imagined and I have been surprised in listening to the speeches of hon. members on the government side of the House to notice that when they spoke in the early part of April on the question of the money market they did not refer to the great interest which the country has in the eastern division. The Grand Trunk Railway Company are responsible, as stated by the president of the company, for 515,000,000. The responsibility of the country in this whole undertaking will probably be $150,000,000 or $170,000,000. If the money markets have changed and' if there is any possibility of the government having to pay more than three per cent for the money that is borrowed for the construction of the eastern division surely there should be some provision made that the railway should pay the extra rate. The amount of the difference may be very considerable. If the road from Winnipeg to Moncton costs $72,000,000 an addition of a quarter of one per cent, or a rate of interest of three and a quarter per cent, would result in an extra cost of $7,500,000 during the forty years in which the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company are to pay this rental which is provided for at three per cent. If the rate of interest should be three and a half per cent or one half of one per cent more than is provided for by the contract, then, of course, the amount will be doubled, or $15,000,000 during the forty years. Therefore, it seems to me that we are bound in this House in some way to protect the interests of the people of the country. If the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway come here and assert that on account of the changes in the money market they have to have concessions, on the other hand the interest of the country Mr. KEMP.
being far greater than that of the railway company; then, we, as representatives of the people demand that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company shall pay that extra rate of interest whatever it may be. I must say, Mr. Chairman, that it seems to me that the Grand Trunk Railway Company are very anxious to go on with this contract, and I do not take very much stock in the excuse which has been put forward by certain hon. members on the government side of the House that if everything the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company have asked for is not granted to them they will throw up the whole thing. The president and directors of the Grand Trunk Railway Company at the stockholders meeting made it very plain that they knew that other people were anxious to build this road and they were very desirous of impressing upon the stockholders the necessity of closing the bargain which they had made there and then. They pointed out that unless this was done and done immediately other people were anxious to build this road. Therefore, under these circumstances, I think there is no risk in the government making this resolution part of the bargain ; that is to say that if the average rate of interest costs the country to borrow the money to pay for the construction of this eastern division more than three per cent, the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company shall be liable to pay that extra rent whatever it may be. I hope the government will, as they have done in two other cases, accept the amendment, include this provision in the bargain and make it part of the contract.


William Stevens Fielding: The government have thought it best in dealing with the company as respects the lease of the eastern division of the road to fix a definite flat rate of interest. My hon. friend from East Toronto (Mr. Kemp) says that if it should turn out that we have to pay one-quarter of one per cent more than three per cent it means an increase of seven and a half millions in the forty years of the lease which is a very large sum of money.
But, he might also add, that if we had to pay a quarter per cent less than three per cent, then we would save that seven and a half millions, and there is just as much chance of our getting that money at a quarter per cent less, as there is of our having to pay a quarter per cent more than three per cent. Any argument based upon the present condition of the money market, as respects the issue of government loans,' is not a fair argument. We all know that the condition is temporary ; it has arisen out of the events of the last two or three years, and although we may not expect cheap money immediately, it is not too much to expect that long before we are called upon to issue the bonds, long before we are in a position to close up the

transaction and see how we stand, the money market will have returned to its former condition. We have borrowed money at less than three per cent. That is a matter in which we can fairly take the risk. If it turns out that we have to pay more than three per cent for the money for the eastern division, then, to the extent of the difference between that three per cent and the rate we would have to pay, it becomes an additional payment for this enterprise. We frankly acknowledge that. But my hon. friend proceeds on the assumption that we must pay a larger rate of interest, and therefore he wants to make provision for it. With equal reason he might assume that we shall have to pay not three per cent, but a shade less than three per cent, and, that so far ns the rate of interest is concerned, instead of the transaction being an unprofitable one, the balance may be materially on the other side of the account. Even already' there is a perceptible change in the money market ; not large enough to enable us to build much upon it, but at all events, money can be borrowed cheaper today than it could a few months ago. As respects the western division, we do not take it for granted that money will co3t more than three per cent, but at the request of the company, who felt somewhat alarmed, we have provided that under certain conditions which may possibly arise, we should implement the issue of bonds. Although we make that provision to meet the objection, we do not for a moment assume that we must necessarily, even in that case, pay a higher rate than three per cent. The eastern section is our own affair; the transaction is entirely under our control, and we are quite justified In assuming that we can borrow the money at three per cent. If we should have to pay anything more, which is altogether improbable, then to the extent of the difference we frankly acknowledge that it is an addition to the obligation we are assuming.


James Clancy: This is another example of the government making the country take all the risks, while the Grand Trunk Pacific takes none. Does the Minister of Finance think that we are contributing enough to them by giving a rebate of the interest altogether for seven years and possibly for ten years ? The liue must be built at a certain time, and the money must be borrowed. and in all probability the loan may have to be made under the ruling conditions in the money market at the time. It might be possible that we may have the advantage of making the loan at a somewhat less rate than that paid us by the Grand Trunk Pacific for rental, but that is no reason why we should take this risk. This is but another instance of the country surrendering everything to the interest
of the Grand Trunk Pacific. I am unable to recall a single instance in which the country has been relieved from any risk n this transaction. After the great sacrifices tiie country is taking, why should we leave the door open to further sacrifices ? Suppose the Minister of Finance should be obliged to borrow that money at four per cent


William Stevens Fielding: Why not suppose five per cent ?


James Clancy: Well, it is only a question of degree, and while I should hope the government of Canada would not be called upon to pay even four per cent, yet it is entirely possible. If we had to pay three and a quarter per cent, or three and a half per cent, then under the conditions of the contract we would be compelled to pay that interest for the company during fifty years following the renewal of the lease. That is a very serious matter, and I am amazed that the Minister of Finance should not have immediately accepted the reasonable safeguard provided bv this amendment.
Amendment (Mr. Kemp) negatived.


Mr. EARLE.: I have an amendment which I propose to move, and which I think will be accepted by the government, as it does not affect either of the contracting parties to any very great extent. The principle underlying this amendment is one of considerable interest and importance to the province which I have the honour to represent. I beg to move, seconded by Mr. Taylor :
That the Bill be amended by Inserting the following provision :-
That no contractor or sub-contractor on the said railway shall employ any Chinese labourer or workmen in the construction of the said railway. Any contravention of this section shall render the person so contravening liable to a penalty of	dollars in respect of
every such person so employed for each day during which he shall be so employed.
The subject of the employment of Chinese in the construction of public works has been brought before the government many times during the past few years, and has been represented as affecting to so great an extent the white labour of the country that the government last session passed an Act practically prohibiting the admission of Chinese into Canada. As the province of British Columbia contains nearly the entire Chinese population of the Dominion, and as the mountain section of this railway' will be very accessible to the Chinese, it is of great importance .to our province that they should be debarred from sharing in the benefits of the construction of this work. Moreover, the employment of white labour only upon that portion of the road will be the means of introducing

population into our province, as many of the workmen will become settlers and remain citizens of the country. It will also be the means of retaining in the country the money that is expended on the labour employed in the construction of the road, instead of it being carried out of the country, as it would be if Chinese were employed. It is needless for me to take up the time of the committee on this matter, as it has been already fully discussed, and as the government have accepted the principle of the evil effects of employing Chinese labour as against white labour so far as to enact a law that is almost prohibitory.
I cannot see any reason why they should not accept this amendment nor imagine any objection that will be raised by the company. I have therefore pleasure in moving the amendment.


William Stevens Fielding: The motion of my bon. friend is either too much or too little. The object which it has in view is one with which we all sympathize. I unhesitatingly say, assuming always that a reasonable amount of . white labour can be obtained in Canada, that we ought not to employ Chinese labour on this work ; but if the matter is dealt with, I think it should be dealt with on more general lines. It would not be a wise policy to say that this company should not employ Chinese labour, while every other company should be free to employ it. The proposal to penalize this company in particular and to allow all other companies to employ Chinese labour is one that should not receive the assent of this House. The government, in dealing with the Crow's Nest Pass Railway, dealt very effectually with tffat subject, and what has occurred since shows that some general legislation might well be enacted.


Mr. R. L. BORDEN.: How was it dealt with in the case of the Crow's Nest Pass Railway ?


William Stevens Fielding: There was a clause in the contract, I believe, that the company should not employ foreigners on the work, but only residents or bona fide immigrants. However, my suggestion to my hon. friend is that he should not press this amendment, because it is manifestly inadequate. I sympathize with its object, but I would go further, and I feel confident that my colleagues in the government would take the same view.


Samuel Hughes: These matters are talked over.


William Stevens Fielding: There is such unity on this side of the House that we do not need so many conferences as our hon. friends opposite do. in then' efforts to steer north by south. Let me say, however, dealing with the matter seriously, that I do not think Mr. EARLE.
it would be wise for my hon. friend to press the amendment excluding the Chinese particularly. The exclusion of any particular nationality is always a matter of some delicacy, and might give rise to some difficult international question. If the matter is to be dealt with, it should be dealt with on broader lines, and any legislation that may be necessary for the protection of Canadian labour should be contained in a general Bill, which will apply not only to this company, but to all other companies in Canada.


Robert Laird Borden: Was not the very thing that was done in connection with the Crow's Nest Pass Railway that which the hon. gentleman says should not be done now ? Has he not told us that there was special legislation in respect to that railway ? And yet he puts that forward as a reason why similar legislation should not be enacted in the present instance. I am not familiar with the fact, but I am taking it as my hon. friend has stated it. Here is a railroad of which the government are guaranteeing three-fourths of the cost, and the amendment proposed by my hon. friend from Victoria is that in its construction Chinese labour be not employed. If that were a good measure in the case of the Crow's Nest Pass Railway, why was it not inserted in this Bill in the first instance, without waiting for the amendment which my hon. friend from Victoria has proposed ?


William Stevens Fielding: There was nothing in the Crow's Nest Pass arrangement, if I remember it correctly, specifically excluding the Chinese. My criticism of the hon. gentleman is that he is confining himself to one class of persons only. Whatever feeling there is in Canada on this question- and there has been a broadening and developing of the feeling with regard to giving encouragement to Canadian labour as against foreign labour-that extends not only to the Chinese, but to all other classes of labour that might be imported into Canada and might be only less objectionable than Chinese labour. I suggest to the hon. member for Victoria that the matter be left over, so that the government may, as I hope they will, have a much broader measure, excluding all classes who are undesirable, and making it applicable not to one railway alone, but to all railways.


Robert Laird Borden: There is no objection to letting the amendment stand, if that is the desire of my hon. friend.


William Stevens Fielding: I do not ask it to stand. I ask the hon. gentleman not to move it.


Robert Laird Borden: I am afraid that the wish of the hon. Minister of Finance in that regard will not be accomplished. As I understood his argument in the first in-

Btance, the principal objection be put forward was that this provision should be made applicable not to one railway only, but to all railways ; and in the next breath he pointed out a case in which the government had departed from that very principle. What reason could there be for imposing a stipulation of that kind with reference to the Crow's Nest Pass Kailway that would not be applicable to all railways ? Whether it was in the contract or in the statute, I presume it was a binding stipulation. If it was proper to apply that provision to one railway at that time, why is it not proper to apply it to this railway to-day, which is to be built very largely upon the credit of this country ? If it is a good principle, as my hon. friend the Minister of Finance says it is, let us have it, and let us have it for the same reason that we had it in the case of the Crow's Nest Pass Railway. If the hon. gentleman desires to make this provision any broader, let him state in what respeet he desires to enlarge it, and I have no doubt the hon. member for Victoria will accede to any reasonable amendment of his proposal in that regard.


Mr. RALPH SMITH.: Do I understand the leader of the opposition to say that there is a special provision in the Crow's Nest charter excluding Chinamen from employment on that railway ?


Robert Laird Borden: I did not know of the provision until it was mentioned by the Minister of Finance.


Ralph Smith: I am not aware of it.


Robert Laird Borden: Nor was I, but we have the statement of the Minister of Finance to that effect, and I assume he has stated the fact correctly. If he has not, of course the base of our argument disappears.


William Stevens Fielding: I did not say that the Crow's Nest Pass Railway charter or contract contained auy stipulations requiring the exclusion of the Chinese. The point of difference between us is this. Public opinion is no doubt progressive, and some things we would not have been disposed to do in matters of legislation a few years ago, we are all willing to do to-day. In the case of hon. gentlemen opposite, they propose to exclude Chinese only and admit all other classes.
Mr, INGRAM. No. What is the good of our Alien Labour Law if that is the case?


William Stevens Fielding: The hon. gentleman has invoked the Alien Labour Law, but. is not content to rely on that law. He wants a special provision in this contract regarding the Chinese. If he is content to abide by existing legislation, this government has already provided legislation which practically excludes the Chinese from Canada. [DOT]


Some hon. MEMBERS: Not at all.


William Stevens Fielding: Very largely indeed. It will be found that the number of Chinese coming into Canada under existing legislation is not large and not likely to be large. This amendment deals entirely with the exclusion of Chinese, and hon. gentlemen opposite are willing that anybody else should be brought in to work on that road. We say that we do not think that would be a wise step. If there is to be any exclusion, it should be of a broader character and apply to other classes perhaps equally objectionable, and the exclusion should not affect one company only, but all companies engaged in public works.


Robert Laird Borden: If any such provision is contained in the Crow's Nest Pass contract, would my hon. friend produce the contract ?


William Stevens Fielding: There is no special reference to Chinese in that contract. It does not specifically exclude Chinese, but provides for the encouragement of the employment of native Canadian labour.


Robert Laird Borden: It might be useful to have the contract laid on the table.


The PRIME MINISTER.: It is in the statutes of 1897.


Robert Laird Borden: I understood my hon. friend to say it was in the contract.


William Stevens Fielding: I do not think it is in the statute.


Robert Laird Borden: If it is in the statute, we have access to it. But if it is in the contract, it would be well to have the contract before us, so that we can see exactly what it does provide.
At six o'clock, committee took recess.
After Recess.
Committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Mr.   MAOPHERSON@: Mr. Chairman, when you left the chair at six o'clock the subject under discussion was the amendment of the hon. member for Victoria (Mr. Earle) regarding the employment of Chinese on the Pacific division of the Grand Trunk Pacific. I may say that the hon. gentleman who presented this motion has shown very little consistency during his political life, so far as the employment of Chinese is concerned. He has shown little or no consistency as a business man, so far as the employment of Chinese is concerned. I believe it is advisable, when we want to carry legislation into effect that we ourselves should live as nearly as possible in accordance with the legislation we desire to see prevail. I should not think it right, if I were an employer of Chinese, particular l.v if I were an employer of any considerable number of Chinese, to rise on this floor and

present a motion that would prevent another man from employing that class of labour.
I believe the hon. gentleman who presents this motion was a railway contractor himself, and built a considerable portion of the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway. I shall stand corrected if I am wrong, for I do not wish to misrepresent the case, but 1 believe that in the building of that road the hon. gentleman was a very considerable employer of Chinese labour-that, practically, the Chinese built that part of the road for which the hon. gentleman had the contract. And now he comes and asks us to support a motion to stop another citizen from employing the Chinese in the same manner of work.
' Consistency, thou art a jewel ! ' The hon. gentleman has been in this House from 1891 until the present time. Yet I do not think he has ever, from his place in this parliament, even when he had the honour of sitting to the right of the Speaker, and when he had influence with the government, raised his voice in defence of the white labourers of British Columbia, or made any effort to protect them against the hordes of Chinese that formerly came in under Conservative legislation. I have looked into the debates of the House, and have failed to find any record of that kind. The hon. gentleman was here supporting the people who brought in these Chinese, brought them in in hordes and advocated the bringing of them in. Away back in 1882, when it was a question of building the Canadian 'Pacific Railway, we find that hon. gentlemen who are now so loud in their declarations that no Chinamen should be employed in any other road, first created the evil that they now tell us is to be deplored. This, in my opinion, is death-bed repentance. I may tell those hon. gentlemen opposite who do not know the public opinion in British Columbia as well as my hon. friend from Victoria knows it, that the Conservative party have never shown any desire to pro tect the white men in British Columbia. We did not expect, and never can expect, any defence at the hands of the Conservative party, so far as anti-Chinese or anti-Oriental legislation is concerned. ' By their fruits ye shall know them.' We can judge these hon. gentlemen only by their acts. Now that there is no chance of Chinamen coming into the country, now that the tax of $500 imposed by this government effectually stops the influx of this undesirable foreign element, these hon. gentlemen solemnly rise and say that no Chinaman must be employed in the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific. Why is this done ? Is it done to help tha people in British Columbia ? Not at all. These hon. gentlemen are only using this question as a political football. But when the hon. gentleman (Mr. Earle) goes back to Victoria, the question that he will have to face is whether he is for or against the building of this Grand Trunk Pacific. That is Mr. MACPHERSON.
the line of demarcation between the Liberal party in power to-day and the Conservative party out of power. The iLiberal party says it will build the road, irrespective of what may happen, believing it is a good thing for the country. The Conservatives say they will not have the road, irrespective of what may happen, because they claim it is not a good thing for the country. After all, it is for what he has done in opposing this great enterprise that the hon. gentleman will have to answer ; it is for that he will be called to account. He cannot draw a red herring across the trail by an amendment of this kind. As an employer of Chinese, whether as a railroad contractor or in cannery propositions, he cannot win the favour of the people of British Columbia by now taking the position indicated by this amendment. It is not enough for employers of Chinese to make broad their phylacteries in this House and say to others :	Do not employ the
Chinese. The people of British Columbia know that if it had not been for the Conservative party we would not have had these hordes of Asiatics as a menace to the welfare of the whites in that province. For my part. I have always been against the influx of Chinese. I neither employ them nor have anybody about me who does employ them. That is my record, and as long as I stand on that ground my skirts are pretty clean. But the man who does employ them should be the last to present a motion such as this. For my part, I would not single out the Chinese ; I would go further, and say that no man who is not a British subject, no man who cannot become a Canadian citizen, should be allowed to participate in any work toward which the money of the public is given. I would provide that any railroad receiving public aid for its construction or maintenance should not be allowed to employ aliens-I would say not only Chinese or Japanese, but aliens of any class. I believe that we have a government that will bring in a Bill to that effect, because this government is the government that brought in a Bill for a tax of $500 on Chinese, which, I say, has effectually stopped the importation of Chinese into our country. But hon. gentlemen from British Columbia who get up and say, do not employ Chinese, when they themselves have been all along habitual employers of Chinese can hardly claim to be consistent, and will be certainly called to account by the people. I will support the amendment, of course. The hon. gentleman knows very well that I will do so.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Mr. MACPHERSON.: Some hon. gentleman says I have put my foot in it. Well, if I have, I am quite prepared to stand the consequences of any mistakes I make in the line of conduct I am pursuing. Any

amendment which will prohibit the employment on a public work of anybody who is not or cannot become a citizen of our country shall receive my hearty and unqualified support.


Mr. INGRAM.: I have listened carefully to the hon. gentleman from Burrard (Mr. Macpherson) and I am sure I cannot congratulate him on his consistency. He finds fault with my hon. friend from Victoria (Mr. Earle) for making this amendment, on the ground that that hon. gentleman is not consistent. The hon. member for Burrard does not see the difference between a private citizen and a railway company or contractor who is spending money granted by the public for the carrying out of a public project. The private citizen is spending his own money, not the people's money, and is at liberty to employ whomsoever he chooses, so long as he does not bring in alien labour under contract. But, in the case of this railway, the people of Canada are paying vast sums of money Jor it as a public work, and my hon. friend from Victoria, speaking on behalf of the people of British Columbia, declares it to be in the interest of the country, and of his own province particularly, that this amendment should carry, and that is the reason why he has introduced it. The hon. member for Burrard finds great fault with my hon. friend from Victoria on the ground of consistency. Has the hon. member ever thought of the government that he is supporting ? They talked free trade, but never granted it ; they talked economy, but! have spent more money than did the Conservative party that they condemned as extravagant. T)oes the hon. gentleman think that is consistent ? I would very much like to hear his opinion on that point and his explanation of how it is consistent in him to support such a government and yet find fault with a fellow member of this House on the ground of inconsistency. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding)) speaks of the Alien Labour Law and asks why we should ask to have this amendment introduced while that law is on the statute-book.
For the very reason that the Alien Labour Law is not carried out in this country ; its provisions are being violated day after day.
I understand that some hon. gentlemen opposite have an idea that the present law provides a cure for this, under section 205 of the Railway Act. I would like to hear any hon. gentleman who believes that, read section 205 and give reasons whv he believes that, it covers this point. I would like to have an explanation from some gen-tieman who believes he is capable of giving that explanation.


Mr. CLARE.: I was not present this afternoon, when, as I understand the Minister i of Finance (Mr. Fielding) made the statement that he is going to insert a clause in '
this Bill to protect Canadian labour in the building of this railroad. I had prepared an amendment which I intended to introduce and which I shall read to the House. I shall ask the government to insert this clause in their Bill or to go even further than I have gone in the amendment. I may say that if they do not do so, I shall consider it my duty to bring in an amendment on the third reading of the Bill. I shall read the amendment to the House ?


Mr. TALBOT.: Is that in order ?


Peter Macdonald: It is not an amendment until it is read from the chair. The hon. gentleman is simply reading it.


George Adam Clare: I am simply stating what I intend to do. The amendment is as follows :
In all cases where persons are employed in or in connection with the surveys for, or the construction of the said Transcontinental Railway preference shall be given to British subjects by birth or naturalization.
It shall be unlawful to employ any person in or in connection with the surveys for, or the construction of, the said Transcontinental Railway, or any part thereof, who is not a British subject by birth or naturalization, or who, being an alien, has not for one year immediately preceding such employment been a bona fide resident of Canada.
Provided always, that whenever it shall be made to appear to the satisfaction of the Minister of Labour that it is not possible to obtain labour for the construction of the said railway with reasonable dispatch owing to the restriction aforesaid with regard to the employment of labourers, it shall be lawful for the said, minister by order in writing, subject to the approval of the Governor in Council, to suspend for such time and on such terms and conditions as may to him seem reasonable in the premises the operation of the said restriction as to employment of labour for construction purposes only. And a copy of such orders of suspension shall be forthwith published in the ' Labour Gazette.'
For every violation of any of the provisions of this section the person, partnership, company or corporation violating it shall forfeit a sum not exceeding $1,000, nor less than $50, and a further sum of $50 for each and every day during which such unlawful employment shall continue.
The sums so forfeited may be sued for and recovered as a debt by any person who first bona fide brings his action therefor in any court of competent jurisdiction in which debts of like amount are now recovered.
If the government inserts such a clause as I understand the Finance Minister said he intended to insert, then I should be satisfied and I hope that the government will see fit to do this, but I wish to notify the government and the House that upon the third reading, I intend to move this amendment.


William Stevens Fielding: Perhaps my hon. friend will permit me to correct a slight inaccuracy in the remarks he attributed to me, as he stated- that he was not in the House this afternoon. I did not say that the government

would Introduce into this Bill any amendment of the character indicated. I stated that the government were giving attention to the question on broader lines, and that their desire was that any legislation with that object in view should not be confined to this particular company, but should be general. Consequently, if my hon. friend (Mr. Clare) should move that amendment as applied to this particular company only, I am afraid we would not be able to agree with him. The view I presented to the House was that whatever might be done on this subject ought to be done generally, that the government were preparing legislation on this line. The legislation which we intend will be broader and will apply to other companies, while my bon. friend's proposal would apply to only one. The difference between what he attributes to me and what X said may not be material, but as he was not in the House, I thought it well to correct him.


George Adam Clare: I am sorry I made a statement that is not correct. We are about to spend an enormous amount of money of the people of Canada on this national Transcontinental Railway, and it seems to me that judging frcm the treatment which the government has given to the workingmen of Canada since the introduction of the Alien l.abour Law, we should not depend upon any general Bill which they may bring [DOT]down, but should insist that a clause be inserted in this particular Bill, so that we shall know that at any rate during the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific the labouring classes of Canada will be protected.


Mr. PUTTEE.: The proposed amendment which has just been read by the hon. member for Waterloo (Mr. Clare) will, I think, bring to the mind of the hon. member for Victoria (Mr. Parle) the fact that this is a very much better resolution than his somewhat crude amendment. It seems to me it would be inadvisable to insert his amendment. specifically stating in this Bill that Chinese will not be employed in the building of this line of railway. I do not think that amendment should be inserted, and I would not vote for any amendment that I was not willing to see become part and parcel of the Bill. If this were two or three years ago, when there was a limited tax upon Chinese, and Chinese were coming into the country, then there would be necessity for an amendment of this kind, but the Chinese question has been dealt with and fairly satisfactorily dealt with. There is now a $500 tax on Chinese coming into Canada and the result is the Chinese are not coming into Canada, and so long as the government sees that that law is properly and honestly enforced. I believe we shall not be further menaced by any large importation of Chinese. The Chinese who are in Canada to-day are bona fide residents of this country, and they are mot here in any larger numbers than some Mr. FIELDING.
other nationalities who have been brought in by other corporations and are to-day idle in this country. It does not seem to be reasonable or sensible to attempt to put in an amendment barring Chinese labour because that is simply misleading to the people who are not well informed and who still think that the Chinese question is a vital one in this country. As a matter of fact it is more likely that the Japanese will present a far larger question than the Chinese on this road. I have far more faith in the suggestion made by the hon. member for Waterloo (Mr. Clare) that the whole matter of alien labour should be covered and properly covered in the Bill and that question, I think, will be best met as a part of this contract. I am not at all enthusiastic, until I see what proposals are to be made, of any promised legislation of the government upon this general question. Unfortunately our general laws in this respect are not well observed, and our Alien Labour Law is not as a matter of fact, enforced ; it does not seem to me it has ever been fairly and honestly enforced. I notice that only three or four days ago in the city of Vancouver itself there were 13 or 14 prosecutions under the Alien Labour Law, but the judge dismissed the charges giving reasons that were altogether opposed to the arguments put forward in this House when the Bill was passed. By this means the law is nullified and nullified purposely because the law was in favour of the worker and the law has been interpreted in favour of the employer.


Ralph Smith: Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for East Elgin (Mr. Ingram) stated that there was quite a difference between an hon. member of this House employing labour on his own account and labour being employed on public works assisted bv public money. The point that my hon. friend from Burrard (Mr. Macplierson) made was in my opinion a good one, that an individual member of this House can best support a principle when he makes that principle practical in his own business. I would like to remind the hon. member for East Elgin that on the Esquimau and Nanaimo Railway, which was subsidized to the extent of $750,000, with a land subsidy of 1,900,000 acres and free of taxation forever, the hon. senior member for Victoria (Mr. Earle) who had a contract for more than $1,000,000 in connection with the construction of that road employed Chinamen. If I had a contract from this parliament, if I was remunerated or paid out of public money and if I thought fit to employ whatever labour I liked I would certainly think fit not to prevent others from doing what I had done myself. I consider it is a proper argument to present to this House that no member of this House, when public money is used, after he has had the advantage of the use of that public money and after he has taken the opportunity of em-

ploying whatever labour be likes, is entitled to bring an amendment into this House preventing another party from doing the same thing if he thinks it best. I consider that he js not only inconsistent in doing that but I think this is but another [DOT]evidence that a large number of the amendments presented by hon. members of the opposition in connection with this Bill are presented with the desire merely to make political capital. As I have always done in this House I am prepared to support any restriction of the Chinese, but I want to say that this present government has done more to make it impossible for the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company to employ that kind of labour upon the construction work on the Pacific coast than any government that was ever in power in this Dominion before. My hon. friend, and I am speaking altogether politically, was elected to this House in 1889. The government that my hon. friend supported was in power for six years after he came to this House and he did absolutely nothing in these six years to bring relief to the people of the Pacific coast in regard to this question. During the particular period in which my hon. friend was connected with the party in power this was a burning question because this was the time when Chinese labour in the province of British Columbia was affecting white labour. If there was any period iu the history of Chinese labour In British Columbia when regulation was necessary it was during the period that my hon. friend sat in this House and supported the party in power without lifting his hand or his voice to secure any restriction upon that kind of labour. I contend that it comes ill from an hon. member who has such an experience to present an amendment of this kind at this particular time. But, I want to say more. As I stated on Friday evening when this question was under discussion there is no special legislation, or legislation against a particular class that will provide the proper remedy in connection with this question. My hon. friend must see the inadequacy of such legislation. We were discussing the question of alien labour on Friday last. It had special reference to the Americans who are brought over to be employed on the Grand Trunk Pacific in Manitoba. In British Columbia it is Chinamen, in Manitoba it is Americans, in Ontario, it may be some one else, in Quebec it may be some one else, and that shows the wisdom of the proposal of the government to bring in general legislation That will cover all possible grievances arising out of this question. What does it matter to the white working man in Manitoba or British Columbia whether his stomach is kept empty by the Italian or the Chinaman ? What does it matter to him what particular alien happens to be work-ling on the public works of this country
who prevents him from getting a livelihood ? It does not matter to him at all. The whole question must be considered so as to find a remedy that will cover every phase of it. If there are people to be brought to this country whose presence will deteriorate the importance and standing of the labour men of this country we ought to have general legislation that will cover the whole ground and which will provide a remedy for the workingmen of Canada. Let me say this : The party in power have practically excluded the Chinese. I have made inquiries within a few days and I find that not a single Chinaman has come into this country since January, 1904, when the legislation enacted by this parliament came into effect. Whilst the hon. senior member for Victoria is moving an amendment, which, I have to admit, is demanded by the people of British Columbia, I want to point out that my hon. friend is not logical in his position. The people of British Columbia say: We do not want the Chinese to be employed on the construction woi'k of the Grand Trunk Pacific and my hon. friend brings in an amendment to make that impossible so that in that particular he is complying with the wishes of the people of that province. But, the people of British Columbia say : We want the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway ; yet, my hon. friend has consistently voted against that proposal. In that he is not consistent. If he wanted to carry out the wishes of his friends he would support the proposal which is now before the House. I want to say here as I said when I addressed the House on the Grand Trunk Pacific question that representatives of the Conservative party in British Columbia had solicited the influence of members of this House in connection with the passing of this Bill and my hon. friend is not answering the disposition of his own friends in British Columbia by voting against this Bill. Then, the position the hon. gentleman takes is, that because he can let down a little on some proposition that he thinks will apply with some force to a certain class of people in British Columbia he proposes this amendment. But, what about the general question ? I want to repeat that if the hon. gentleman desired to comply with the wishes of the people of British Columbia on the general question of the Grand Trunk Pacific, as he is attempting to do in regard to this particular question, he would cast his vote in favour of this general measure. I support the Bill because I know that the people of British Columbia want it. The amendments of the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) moved last session and the amendments of the hon. leader of the opposition moved this session have not been discussed seriously in the political associations in British Columbia right up to date. If any one looks over the files of the

public press, and of the Conservative press of British Columbia he will see that the people of that province, Liberals and Conservatives alike, with the exception of certain points that I have mentioned, are supporting the Grand Trunk Pacific. Now, if the hon. senior member for Victoria wants to be consistent, wants to be logical in his position, why does he not do not only in regard to this particular thing but in regard to the whole question, what the people of British Columbia want ?


Mr. PRINGLE.: I think it hardly proper for the hon. member for Vancouver (Mr. Smith) who has just taken his seat to accuse my hon. friend from South Waterloo (Mr. Clare) of inconsistency.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Victoria.


Robert Abercrombie Pringle: I understood that the hon. gentleman was opposing the motion which had been presented by my hon'. friend (Mr. Clare).


William Stevens Fielding: The hon. member (Mr. Clare) intimated that at a future stage he intended to make a motion. The question before the chair is the amendment of the hon. member for Victoria (Mr. Earle).


Robert Abercrombie Pringle: I did not understand it in that way.


Thomas Earle: I do not propose to jis-cuss this question at any length, but in reply to the statement of the hon. member (Mr. Ralph Smith) who charges me with inconsistency, let me say, that I admit that the people of British Columbia want a railway, although I am satisfied after hearing the discussion on the government railway scheme, that when the people of British Columbia understand the whole question thoroughly they will be as utterly opposed to this proposal of the government as are the members on this side of the House. That the people of British Columbia want a railway across the northern part of their province is undoubted. They are quite prepared to support any reasonable scheme that would give them such a road, but they have not yet had an opportunity of learning the enormity of the proposal that is now before the House, and when they do understand it, I am satisfied that they will not favour it. Let me tell my hon. friend (Mr, Ralph Smith) that it is true that some twenty years ago I had a railway contract, and in order to obtain sufficient labour to complete that contract within the time limit, we were obliged to employ Chinese labour. I did then what I had a perfect right to do as a private citizen, and I did what it was necessary for me to do to carry out my contract, but I have always been opposed to the introduction of the Chinese in large numbers into British Columbia. The time has been in Mr. RALPH SMITH.
British Columbia-and that time has scarcely yet passed away-when the necessity for cheap labour was a very great problem for us. One of my objects in moving this amendment to prevent the Chinese being employed on the Grand Trunk Pacific in British Columbia is : that if there is such a prohibition, it will be the means of inducing a very large number of white labourers to come to the province and to settle there after the road has been constructed. It is the experience of the past, that when white labourers are employed on a work of this kind, a great many of ' them will take up land, or go into mining after the road is completed, and become useful residents of the province. On the other hand, if Chinese are employed on the construction of that road, they will take their money and leave the country, and there is no benefit to be derived from them except possibly the benefit which the contractors may reap.


James Clancy: We have had many instances in this House of acrobatic feats performed by Liberal members, but we have had none to equal the exhibition of this afternoon. We saw the member for Bur-rord (Mr. Macpherson) referring to the member for Victoria (Mr. Earle) in every kind of language that the rules of parliament would permit, and all because my hon. friend (Mr. Earle) had the courage to introduce an amendment prohibiting Chinese labour on this railway which is to cost so. much to the people of Canada. And, after the hon. member (Mr. Macpherson) had accomplished this, he concluded by saying that he heartily supported the amendment of my hon. friend (Mr. Earle). I commend his conduct to his constituents in Burrard. And why does the hon. gentleman (Mr. Macplier-son) support the amendment ? It is because he knows what the public sentiment in his province is, and because he fears it. He told us that there were no Chinese coming to the country now, and that the amendment was absolutely useless, but if that be the case why does he hesitate to oppose it ? He blamed the hon. member (Mr. Earle) for having employed Chinese labour on a work constructed a quarter of a century ,ago, and he told us that it was Chinese labour and the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, or no Chinese and no railway. Does the hon. gentleman mean to say that if Chinese were not employed, the railway would not be constructed ? I challenge him to repeat his words. The gentleman asked:	Why not exclude all
others ? The answer is perfectly plain, and it is : that the intention is to exclude a class of men who have no families, who take upon themselves none of the duties of citizenship, who are not ready to defend the country, and who are aliens in every sense

of the word. It is not very complimentary to the people of other nationalities, that the hon. gentlemen should compare them to the Chinese. It is not fair that the white labourers of this country should be pitted against men who can live upon one-quarter what it costs the white men to live, and who are of no practical use in the economy of the nation. It is not a fair race in life to make the white man compete with the Chinaman


Robert George Macpherson: Why did you not think of that when you were in power ?


James Clancy: My hon. friend is anxious about the past.


Robert George Macpherson: Why did not the Conservative party use the same argument in 1882 as they are using now ?


James Clancy: If we compare the promises of the Liberals with their performances we will see many things to the great disadvantage of the Liberal party. Let us meet the case as it presents itself to-day-


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


James Clancy: We are not dealing with the past. We are dealing with the present and the future, and it is the duty of this House to pass such legislation as will prevent the recurrence of these evils. I congratulate these hon. gentlemen on their splendid inconsistency, and I confess that it tallies well with their whole conduct in this parliament. When the time comes for the hon. gentleman from Burrard to meet his constituents, I have no doubt he will have to reckon with them.


Robert George Macpherson: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Clancy) need not shed any crocodile tears over what I am going to do.


Andrew B. Ingram: When the hon. gentleman (Mr. Macpherson) put that question to my hon friend (Mr. Clancy) I noticed a broad smile came over the face of the Prime Minister. I was in the House at the time, and perhaps I can give a satisfactory answer.
I think I remember the right hon. gentleman then saying that in the matter of treaty and trade arrangements between China and other countries, it would perhaps be well for this parliament to legislate carefully, and it was because the present Prime Minister joined with the then leader of the Conservative party in this view of the case, that we did not have any legislation on the Chinese question. I can well remember how my hon. friend sent a telegram to British Columbia, and, in order to capture the votes of the people of that province, made a solemn promise of early legislation along that line ; but sever-a! sessions passed before he had the courage to put the legislation on the statute-book, and I presume that it was put on for political reasons. I have no quarrel with the hon. gentleman for putting that legislation on the statute-book, because I have always believed that the importation of Chinese into this country should not be encouraged, because they do not take up ordinary citizenship in this country, and because the honest labouring men of the country should not be put on the same plane with that class of people. I should have thought the hon. member for Vancouver would have taken a Christian view of this amendment, and would have felt that whenever a sinner repents, even if it is at the eleventh hour, he should be encouraged in his repentance.


An hon. MEMBER.: That is what you are doing now.


Andrew B. Ingram: I have never had to repent, because I have always supported the principle of the amendment. The Minister of Finance is very good in making promises. He has been making promises ever since he came to this House, especially on the tariff question. He has been holding out promises with one hand and brushing them aside with the other. He now promises general legislation on this subject, but I have very little hope of its being brought down, and I think the best course for us is simply to accept the amendment. The hon. member for Vancouver has endeavoured to show that because we on this side of the House are supporting several amendments, we are opposed to the Grand Trunk Pacific scheme. I wish to point out that gentlemen on this side of the House are as eager to have a railway built into the Northwest as hon. gentlemen opposite ; we simply differ from them as to how we should get it. We believe that a better scheme than that proposed by the government could be carried out. But the government have the majority, and we believe it is our duty to propose certain amendments with the view of improving their scheme.


Robert Laird Borden: I would like to ask whether the Minister of Finance has ascertained where the stipulations are contained in regard to the Crow's Nest Pass Railway ?


Sir WILLIAM MULOCK.: In the contract of 1897.


Robert Laird Borden: As that has been referred to, I suppose there will be no objection to putting it on the table of the House ?


William Stevens Fielding: We can have it brought down at the next sitting.
Amendment negatived.


Mr. PORTER.: Mr. Chairman, notwithstanding the many amendments which have been offered from this side of the House, and which, in my humble judgment, should have commended themselves to the favourable consideration of the government, I



venture to move, in the interest of the country, the following amendment:-
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section as a subsection :-
Notwithstanding anything in this Act or in the Act hereby amended, or in the scheduled agreements contained, His Majesty the King, acting as aforesaid, shall not be bound or obliged to perform, carry out or fulfil any of the covenants, conditions or stipulations in the said scheduled agreements contained on behalf of the Dominion of Canada, unless and until the Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada shall have entered into an agreement with His Majesty the King, acting as aforesaid, by which the said Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada shall covenant and agree as follows That the Pacific Company, so long as the Grand Trunk Company shall control the policy of that company, shall perform, fulfil and carry out, according to the true intent and meaning thereof, all the provisions of the National Transcontinental Railway Act and all the covenants, stipulations and conditions in the scheduled agreements, which according to the terms thereof ought to be performed, fulfilled or carried out by the said Pacific Company.
I feel constrained to move this amendment for various considerations. Many of these considerations have already been debated by members on this side of. the House, and I shall not take up the time of the House in reiterating the arguments which have been already advanced, and which to my mind should have appealed to the sense of justice of hon. members on the government side. The government during this debate have persistently declared that the Grand Trunk Pacific Company are to do a great many things in connection with this contract.
It needs no argument on my part to show the importance of these things in the interest of this country. They are important, in my opinion, not only on account of the many concessions granted by this government,' but also by reason of the many onerous obligations assumed by this country in connection with this enterprise. Stress is laid by the government on the point that the Grand Trunk Eailway will control the policy of the Grand Trunk- Pacific, at least for a certain length of time or up to a certain point, but it is notorious that the Grand Trunk Railway are to be very well paid for any obligation they have entered into. By virtue of this contract, they are to receive ?25,000,000 of the common stock of the Grand Trunk Pacific. If that were all they were to get, they would even then be amply paid for any obligation they have entered into, but that is by no means all. If this Transcontinental Railway should prove a paying concern, the Grand Trunk Railway are the parties who will benefit. No one will believe that that company is associating itself with this enterprise in any other view than that of reaping a substantial benefit from it. It is certain that it Mr. PORTER.
is going to reap the benefit to the extent of 825,000,000 of the common stock, and should the railway prove a success, as the government say it will-and as we all hope it will-then the Grand Trunk Railway is going to receive, not only the 825,000,000 common stock, but the lion's share of the profits that will accrue from the operations of this railway. It seems to me, therefore, that we are asking what is eminently reasonable when we ask that a company, placed in this fortunate position, should give some adequate consideration iu return for what it will receive. Suppose this contract were being made with an individual instead of with a powerful corporation would any one dream of not requiring some guaranty from the individual that he would perform his share of the agreement ? And I do not see anything in this contract which affords any substantial reason why we should make a different rule in dealing with a corporation. On the contrary, there are many reasons why the government should insist on the Grand Trunk Railway giving a guaranty. It seems to me that in the ordinary course of common prudence the government should insist on the Grand Trunk Railway giving something iu return for the advantages it will derive from this contract. It seems to me that it should be compelled to give a guarantee that, so long as it controls the policy of the Grand Trunk Pacific, the obligations entered iuto by the latter will be carried out. The Grand Trunk Pacific is not an entity, you cannot expect any obligation it enters into to be any greater than it is itself, and it is the duty of this government to insist that the Grand Trunk Railway, which is to get all the benefits, should be given the guarantee which this amendment calls for. I hope, therefore, that notwithstanding the fact that the supporters of the governmemt have consistently voted down every amendment offered from this side, thev will not so far forget their duty as not to support the amendment which I have the honour to submit.
Amendment (Mr. Porter) negatived.


Robert Abercrombie Pringle: I regret that the Minister of Railways has seen fit to leave us at this early stage in the evening, just as we had entered upon the discussion of certain amendments to this Bill. That lion, gentleman has certainly a very peculiar idea of his responsibility as Minister of Railways and Canals, when he cannot be prevailed upon to remain and take some part in the discussion of this important measure. I desire to move the following amendment:
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section as section	:-
Notwithstanding anything in this Act or in the Act hereby amended o-r in the scheduled agreements contained, the Grand Trunk Company shall not during the term of the lease

mentioned in clause 20 of the original agreement, nor while any of the bonds guaranteed by. the government under the terms of the scheduled agreements remain outstanding and unpaid, transfer, convey, sell, pledge or make any disposition of any common stock of the Pacific Company except such portion thereof as shall have been subscribed for payment in cash at par.
If we refer to section 27 of the Act of 1903, providing for the construction of a national transcontinental railway and the agreement attached thereto, we find this clause !*
The company undertakes that the Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada shall acquire and take the said common stock to the amount of twenty-five million dollars, except shares held by directors, not exceeding one thousand shares, and shall hold the same during the term of the said lease, and so long as any of the bonds guaranteed by the government under the terms of this agreement shall remain outstanding unpaid.
Then, if we turn to the Act, we find that under section 7, subsection (b) :
That it will acquire and take the common stock of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company to the amount of not less than $24,900,000, as in clause 27 of the agreement provided.
Then, subsection 3 :
The Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada shall hold the said common stock to the amount aforesaid so acquired and taken as aforesaid, during the entire term of the lease mentioned in clause 20 of the agreement, and so long as any, of the bonds guaranteed by the government under the terms of the agreement remain outstanding and unpaid ; and no pledge, transfer or conveyance of any part of the said stock during the said period shall he valid or effectual.
These clauses were discussed at some length when the Bill was before the committee, and very strong ground was taken by those who took part in that discussion on behalf of the government that this clause would stand as a protection to the people of this country and to the government. But we find that a great change has occurred since the passage of the Bill, and in the amended agreement we find that clause 9 provides :
Notwithstanding anything in the twenty-seventh paragraph of the said contract contained, the Grand Trunk Railway Company shall not, after the acquisition of the twenty-five million dollars of common stock therein mentioned (less shares held by directors, not exceeding one thousand), be prevented from making any such disposition of such common stock as the said Grand Trunk Railway Company may deem expedient, provided, however, that the said Grand Trunk Railway Company shall, during the delay mentioned in the said paragraph, continue to hold the majority of the said stock by such title as shall enable the Grand Trunk Railway Company to control the policy of the company.
104 J
The Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) discussed this subject at a considerable length last session, laying great stress upon clause 27 of the original agreement, and pointing out to the committee that, under that clause, the Grand Trunk Railway Company would be absolutely prevented from putting that $25,000,000 on the market so that it would reach the hands of innocent holders and subsequently be brought forward for the purpose of claiming an increase of rates so that a dividend might be paid on that stock. I would like to refer to the part of the discussion which took place at that time. The Minister of Finance said, as will be found at page 8570 of ' Hansard ' of 1903 :
We have provided that practically the common stock of this company to the full extent of $25,000,000, shall be held, not by promoters, not even by the old Grand Trunk Railway officials individually, but by the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada itself. There are 250,000 shares of common stock, of which 249,000 will he held by the Grand Trunk Railway, in its corporate capacity, and 1,000 only are available for distribution among those who may be qualified as directors. I want to know where there is a chance for promoters when they can only hold 1,000 shares against 249,000 ?
Then, later on, he said :
If the Grand Trunk Railway acquired that stock at a comparatively small sum and afterwards floated it on the market, at a higher sum, that would be a proceeding which might be open to objection

That is just the very thing we now say is open to objection under this amended clause, because we have the statement of the Grand Trunk Railway Company that they receive this $25,000,000 of stock for some slight obligations they have incurred on behalf of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. The president of the Grand Trunk says :
I must not forget to mention that in return for the support which we ask you to accord to the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, the Grand Trunk Company will retain a controlling interest in that company, and will become the possessors of the whole of the common stock, amounting to $25,000,000.
And further :
In return for its assistance the Grand Trunk receives the whole of the common stock of the new company amounting to 25 million dollars, which one may regard as waste paper or as an asset having enormous possibilities in the way of eventual appreciation-according to the view one happens to take of the prospects of the new line.
Now, the lion. Minister of Justice (Mr. Fitzpatrick) has stated that this $25,000,000 of common stock might be, and would be, required by the Grand Trunk Ry. Co. for the purpose of acquiring rolling stock. But we have the assurance of the president of the Grand Trunk Railway Company that it will not be required for that purpose. He states

positively that that is provided for in an entirely different way. He says :
As regards the five millions for rolling stock, it is not five millions-it is estimated at three millions. With that the Grand Trunk has nothing to do. That rolling stock will be provided by the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, and, as the general manager will tell you, they have laid their plans for providing that rolling stock by a trust fund.
So I say it is idle for the Minister of Justice to make the statement that this $25,000,000 of stock will be required for the purpose of providing the rolling stock. This $25,000,000 of stock simply goes to the Grand Trunk Railway Company, as the president says, as a consideration, practically a bonus, for their guaranteeing bonds to the amount of less than $15,000,000. Now, we have had a statement here also that this $25,000,000 of stock will never be taken into consideration when fixing the rates of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. I do not agree with that statement, and I think I can find a statement of the Minister of Finance that the very danger that the government desired last year to provide against was that, if this $25,000,000 of common stock got into the hands of innocent purchasers, then it would come forward when the question of freight rates was being considered. I will quote the language of the hon. minister :
If this stock were to be put upon the market and taken over by the Grand Trunk Railway Company-I will take the figures of my hon. friend the leader of the opposition for illustration-at 25 cents on the dollar, and in later years it passed into the hands of other people at 100 cents on the dollar, if the question of freight rates comes to be adjusted at any time, and it becomes a question -whether we are to have such freight rates as will earn a fair dividend on the 100 cents that the present holder paid or on the 25 cents that originally went into the treasury, there certainly is much to be said in favour of the man who purchased the stock and who says : ' I paid 100 cents on the dollar for it.'
He further says :
But the Grand Trunk Company must not only take this stock, but hold it for all time ; they cannot put a dollar of it in the market. It is absolutely impossible to buy a share of that stock; it must be held by the Grand Trunk Railway Company itself and no person can buy or sell a share. Where, then, comes in the chance of speculation ?
Now, as I have stated, the Minister of Finance took very, very strong ground on that clause. He said that it was important for several reasons that the Grand Trunk should take hold of that stock and not dispose of it.
Instead of that being merely a privilege given to the Grand Trunk Company, we think it is a privilege which carries certain responsibilities of value to the country. Therefore, we insist that they shall acquire, take and hold that stock.


Robert Abercrombie Pringle: ,
Now, if they insisted so strongly last year that the Grand Trunk Company should acquire, take and hold that stock, why will they now, simply at the request of the Grand Trunk, waive the provisions which were contained in the agreement of last year ? The Minister of Finance further said :
The Grand Trunk Company would be delighted to have that clause srticken out, so that they might be allowed to take that stock up and float it in the money market if they pleased, no doubt.
The Grand Trunk must have been very pleased when they changed their terms to the government and struck that clause out for them. No doubt they were delighted just as the Minister of Finance said they would be if the clause was struck out.
Some little literature was sent out through the country during last January. The whole of the Northwest Territories were flooded with this literature under the frank of the Minister of the Interior and in that literature they quoted very copiously from the utterances of the Minister of Finance. They quoted this at page 4 of the campaign sheet :
We say we are prepared to go before the people to-day with this policy in the fullest confidence that it is a policy which has been wisely considered, that its provisions will stand investigation, that the cost to the country is not excessive, and that we firmly believe we -will be able to give to the Dominion of Canada one of the greatest achievements in Its history.
. Then he says :
Sir, we give them this contract made in good faith not with empty promoters, not with people who are irresponsible, but with men who are the most capable railway men in Canada, with men who have given every guarantee of good faith, with men who are prepared to back their urc'ertaking in a manner no company ever did before.
This is the literature sent forth in January, but on January 12 the government found that the Grand Trunk had something further to say in regard to this contract. It was finally settled and they were ready to appeal to the people when the Grand Trunk came down and said : You have to change all these clauses or we will not go on with this scheme. The elections were then called off and hon. gentlemen came down and made every change that was requested by the Grand Trunk. That is why we find that this very important clause, the clause upon which the Minister of Finance laid such great stress last session is struck out, and the Grand Trunk are now permitted to take this $25,000,000 of stock and do whatever they please with one half of it. They get that stock practically for nothing, or as Sir Rivers-Wilson says, for the slight obligation of guaranteeing a certain amount of bonds. We are told when this question

comes up : But we will not consider this $25,000,000 of common stock when fixing rates. The gentlemen who control the rates of railway corporations in this country are the Railway Commission. Who is at the head of that Railway Commission? We have at the head of the Railway Commission, Mr. Blair, the ex-Minister of Railways and Canals and that was one of the strong grounds that he. took when he presented his memorandum to the government in favour of extending the Intercolonial, and of not building and subsidizing this Grand Trunk Pacific. Now let me see what Mr. Blair says in regard to the danger of heavy capitalization and of heavy rates to meet that capitalization. He says :
An appeal from the holders of the company's bonds and shares to fix tolls sufficiently high to insure a moderate dividend, cannot easily be resisted, and as a consequence the country, through its business and traffic, is In effect as much charged, though indirectly, with the weight of these obligations as if the amount was covered by an issue of government bonds.
This is the gentleman before whom in all probability this question of rates will come, and we know his views are that the rates must be fixed according to the capital, bonds, &c. Has that been the case in this country ? I would like to refer for a moment to the revenue that is derived at the present time by our railroads on the capital shares, the bonds, the preferred shares, and in fact the total capitalization of these railroads. I find that during 1902 they rea-ized 5-72 per cent so that their rates must have been fixed so as to provide interest and to provide dividends on the capital stock to the extent of some $400,000,000 at which the railroads in this country are capitalized -and I venture to say that these railroads were built for the $404,806,000 of bonds together with the subsidies of $233,000,000 which this country has given towards the railways. So I say that there is no reason why the bon. gentlemen opposite should have changed their views on this question. They were all in favour of the contention of the Minister of Finance last year that it was in the interests of the Canadian people that this $25,000,000 of stock should remain in the hands of the Grand Trunk Company until such time as the agreement was fully complied with. Thus I say that we ought to have the support of the hon. the Minister of Finance and the other members of the government in favour of this amendment, which is an amendment in the interests of the people of this country.


Robert Laird Borden: Company is to put upon the market and sell to the people of this country and elsewhere stock which it has not subscribed for payable at par. What good reason in the public interest can be advanced in favour of a proposition of that kind ? If that stock is going into the hands of bona fide purchasers, and if that stock afterwards is brought forward as a reason for keeping up rates in this country, surely it is right that it should represent dollar for dollar of its face value, and that the money represented by the stock should actually have gone into the construction of this road, or into the furnishing of its equipment, or into betterments. As the contract stands at present, that result is not accomplished. The object of the amendment made by my hon. friend who has just taken his seat is to ensure that such shall be the result, and I do not think it becomes the members of the government to sit silent in their seats, because. When a reasonable amendment, such as this, is proposed, I think some argument should be given against it, or some reason should be shown why it is not in the public interest, before the committee proceeds to vote upon it.


William Stevens Fielding: I am afraid that I cannot agree with my hon. friend that it is necessary to discuss any part of this contract over and over and over again without limit. I am in the judgment of the committee when I say that not one word has been said to-night in this House that has not been said repeatedly in the earlier stages of the debate. My hon. friend (Mr. R. L. Borden) has the advantage, if it be an advantage, of having my views, not only of last session, but my views of this session.


Samuel Hughes: They are different.


William Stevens Fielding: They are different only because the conditions have changed. My views of last session were given in reference to the contract as it stood last session. If there had been no change, there would have been no need of any. discussion about it, but the change was made, and my views of that change were fully expressed to the House at an earlier stage of the discussion while this committee was sitting, and ' Hansard ' has them embalmed in its valuable pages. I do not know that my hon. friend will attach enough importance to them to induce him to look them up again, but if he really does regard them as of any value, I can only refer him to ' Hansard.' I can only assure him in all good faith that nothing has been said to-night that has not been said in previous discussions, and I do -not think that I should fill the pages of ' Hansard ' with a repetition of my own speeches.
Mr. R, L. BORDEN. Comparing the views which my hon. friend has expressed this session with the views which he expressed last session, there is a remarkable ineon-Mr. R. L. BORDEN.
sistency. However, they lie, as he says, embalmed in 'Hansard.' They He in beauty side by side, but they do not resemble each other very much. I do not know that the exact suggestion which is made to-night by my hon. friend who moved this amendment has ever been made before in this House, either during this session or the past session. The amendment is not designed to prevent the Grand Trunk Railway Company from transferring stock, but it is designed to prevent that company from so disposing of stock unless that stock has been subscribed for at par. It leaves it open to the Grand Trunk Railway Company to acquire a very considerable portion of this stock for the mere nominal consideration which has been suggested as the consideration by the president of that Company, but it imposes upon the qualification that the stock obtained for that nominal consideration shall not be put upon the market. If the Grand Trunk Railway Company desires to put on the market any portion of the stock of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, it must subscribe for that stock payable at par. It seems to me that this amendment accomplishes all the results which have been desired by the government, and safeguards in some measure-able extent at least the public interest. It permits the Grand Trunk Railway Company to acquire a large portion of this stock for a nominal consideration. That seems to be an object, not only desired by the Grand Trunk Railway Company itself, but also desired by the government, but it also safeguards the public interest by providing that stock so acquired, not subscribed for at par, but acquired for a nominal consideration, shall not be placed upon the market and shall not come into the hands of bona fide purchasers for value to be afterwards used in increasing the rates. I do not know that any member of the government has dealt with this amendment from that standpoint or in that light up to the present time. My hon. friend the Minister of Finance, when he refers us, as he is, of course, entitled to refer us, to what he has said in the past, is not giving a very forcible answer, or a very fair answer, to the amendment which has been moved, and to the very logical and forcible speech which has been made by my hon. friend who has just taken his seat.


Charles Bernhard Heyd: Inferentially, hon. gentlemen opposite, in moving that amendment, have confessed their faith in the ultimate success of this undertaking. How this stock is ever going to be worth a hundred cents on the dollar unless the Grand Trunk Pacific fulfils all its agreements with the government I cannot understand. I can understand that the Grand Trunk might want to realize on this stock, but I cannot conceive of any man with money to invest investing it in stock that is at the present time absolutely worthless, and will always be worthless unless these united companies carry out their obli-

gations. It is assumed that value is given to these pieces of paper that the railway companies have the right to issue. I do not think that any value attaches to them at all until it can be shown that this stock has an earning capacity, that it is capable of declaring dividends, and not until the public are satisfied that the Grand Trunk Pacific will carry out its obligations to the government, that the eastern as well as the western part of this* railway is an absolute success and that the interest upon the bonds is being paid will this stock begin to assume any value at all and not until then will any one with common sense and money invest one single dollar in it. I have no fear at all about the ultimate disposition of this $25,000,000. Besides the obligations that these railway companies have undertaken the Grand Trunk Railway Company or somebody must raise immense sums of money to carry out this undertaking. We have provided in so far as we can see for the building and equipment of the railway. That is only a portion of the expense that is involved in this immense undertaking. Millions of dollars must be raised in some form or other. The road is already mortgaged, three-quarters of the western section to the government and the other one-quarter to the purchasers of the bonds to be guaranteed by the Grand Trunk Railway Company. The eastern division we do not need to bother about. It is tied down by agreements. The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company must pay three per cent interest upon the entire road for fifty years, they must provide shipping facilities at both ends of the line, and incidently involved in it is the construction of branch lines from the main line and before we get to the end in the construction of this railway it may be that another hundred million of dollars must be raised and the only way in which it can be raised is by the guarantee of the Grand Trunk Railway Company. Therefore, all this fear that is manifested as to the ultimate disposal of this $25,000,000 is entirely premature, and the fact that our friends on the other side believe that ultimately this $25,000,000 of stock which at present is absolutely worthless, will be worth $25,000,000 in cash, is the best evidence of the faith they have got in the success of this undertaking.
Amendment (Mr. Pringle) negatived.


Robert Laird Borden: I move :
That the Bill he amended by adding thereto the following section :-
1. In the event of any complaint being made that any of the terms and provisions of the 41st, 42nd, 43rd, 44th and 45th clauses of the agreement, a copy of which forms the schedule of the National Transcontinental Railway Act, are not being duly complied with and observed, such complaint and all the circumstances connected with such non-compliance and non-observance, shall be immediately investigated
and reported on by the Board of Railway Commissioners for Canada, and their report with the evidence shall be laid before parliament forthwith ; or, if parliament be not in session, within the first ten days of the following session, for such action thereon as parliament may deem expedient.
2. The Pacific and Grand Trunk Companies shall be duly notified of any such investigations, and shall have the right to appear and to be heard thereat.
A great deal of importance has been attached by the government to the provisions of the paragraphs in the original agreement which are mentioned in the amendment. It is no doubt of the highest possible importance that any comprehensive scheme of transportation in which this country may engage or which it shall encourage by public aid, shall safeguard the carriage of Canadian traffic by Canadian routes and from Canadian ports. That idea was especially dwelt upon by the Prime Minister last year when he introduced this measure. It is of especial importance to the people of eastern Canada, and of the greatest importance to the people of the maritime provinces, that public aid should not be given to the building up of a railway which shall eventually carry the traffic of the Canadian Northwest tc United States ports. The maritime ports of Canada have the greatest possible interest in ensuring that no such results shall ensue from any scheme of transportation which is encouraged or aided by the government. If this traffic goes, as a great deal of it has gone in the past, to the city of Portland, it means that our maritime ports like Halifax and St. John must remain at a standstill, instead of participating in the commercial development of the future. It has been argued by the government, that this agreement will secure the trade for Canadian routes. In answer to arguments from the other side of the House to that effect, we have repeatedly pointed out, that although these provisions are binding upon the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, there is no penalty for the breaking of them, and further, they are not binding in law upon the Grand Trunk Railway Company because the Grand Trunk Railway Company is not a party to the contract in which these covenants and provisions are contained. The Minister of Justice and the Minister of Finance have agreed that the Grand Trunk Railway Company would be in a very precarious position-I think that was the expression used-if it undertook to disregard the provisions of this agreement, although it is not a party to it ; and it was suggested if not plainly stated by these gentlemen, that if these provisions were not fairly carried out by the Grand Trunk Railway Company in controlling the policy of the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, the Grand Trunk Railway Company might expect that

parliament would take action of a somewhat stringent character. I have not taken that view of the contract, and last year I pressed the opinion, that if we see fit to enter into an agreement with the Grand Trunk Pacific Company; if we see fit to permit the policy of that company to be controlled by the Grand Trunk Railway Company, and if we do not insist upon any stipulations being imposed on the Grand Trunk Railway Company by way of contract, it would hardly be in the ordinary course of parliamentary procedure that we should afterwards attempt to punish by Act of parliament the Grand Trunk Railway Company, for not observing the terms of a contract to which it was not a party.
We think, however, that we may put something in this Act of parliament which will serve as a notice to the Grand Trunk Railway Company in that behalf. We know where the danger points lie, they have been pointed out to us last year by the Minister of Trade and Commerce, the Minister of Finance and other members of the government. One danger point lies at Chicago, with which the Grand Trunk Railway Company can very easily connect Winnipeg and thus connect its system in the United States with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway system. Another danger point lies at North Bay, because the Prime Minister has said during this session that all traffic which comes over the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway to North Bay will inevitably go to Portland ; and yet he is authorizing the construction of a branch, to be controlled by the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, (which in turn is controlled by the Grand Trunk Railway Company), from some point on the eastern division to North Bay. There are other danger points, but I mention only these two. Now, if this view is taken by the government, and if the government has not seen fit to impose any stipulation upon the Grand Trunk Railway Company, but has seen fit to impose stipulations only upon the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, which has not terminals in the United States, and from which danger is not specially to be feared, then I say it is a wise thing to insert a clause in this Bill by which the Grand Trunk Railway Company, as well as the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, shall receive notice that any infraction of the provisions of this agreement to which X have referred may be and shall be inquired into by the Board of Railway Commissioners for Canada, that their report with the evidence accompanying it shall be laid before parliament, and that parliament thereupon may take such action in the premises as shall seem most in the public interest. I regard this as a most important stipulation in the interest of the people of the maritime provinces. Suppose for in* stance, that the people of Halifax find that the Grand Trunk Railway Company, being abound by no stipulation in this contract, Mr. R. L. BORDEN.
and controlling virtually the policy of the Grand Trunk Pacific Company, continues in the future to divert the traffic to Portland, as it has done in the past. The Prime Minister says he does not expect that the traffic which has gone to Portland in the past will go to the maritime provinces in the future. He expects that it will go to Portland in the future as it has done in the-past. He does, however, entertain the hope and expectation that the new traffic which is gathered up by the Grand Trunk Pacific in the west will go to the ports of Halifax and St. John. I cannot understand it, but that is the position he takes. However, it is important to the ports of the maritime provinces that this traffic shall go to those ports and not to Portland, where traffic carried by the Grand Trunk Railway has very largely gone in the past; and I desire to propose this amendment as a substitute, perhaps not the best, for alternatives which we have suggested and which have been voted down. I desire by this amendment to afford the people of Halifax, the people of St. John, the people of Sydney and the people of other maritime ports, the opportunity to bring their complaints, if they shall have any in the future, before the Board of Railway Commissioners, and to demonstrate, by such evidence as they can bring forward, the fact that the Grand Trunk Railway Company is still diverting traffic from Canadian ports to Portland, as it has been doing before this Act was brought before parliament. For the reason that this amendment is in the public interest, that it is along the line of what has been suggested, if not openly proposed, by the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Finance, I commend it to the attention of the government; and I ask if it is not a fitting and proper thing, inasmuch as this country is to engage its credit to the extent of $150,000,000 in promoting this enterprise, that there should be some tribunal established and indicated to which complaints might be made, in case the true intent and meaning of this agreement, as contained in the clauses to which I have referred, should not be carried out by the Grand Trunk Railway Company in the future. I am aware that there are provisions in the Railway Act to which attention may be directed ; but there is no provision in that Act which quite fulfils the entire office which will be fulfilled by the amendment to which I have referred. The 23rd section of the Railway Act passed last session provides as follows
The board shall have full jurisdiction to inquire into, hear and determine any application by or on behalf of any party interested :
(a.) complaining that the company, or any person, has failed to do any act, matter or thing required to be done by this Act, or the special Act.
The provisions which I propose are not in any part of the Special Act, within the
3293

meaning of tlie Railway Act, so far as I can understand that Act. Furthermore, the amendment to which I have referred points distinctly, as 1 intended it to do, to some action which may be taken by parliament In case the Grand Trunk Railway Company sees tit to disregard and ignore and overlook and depart from t-he clauses of the agreement to which I have referred. The Special Act is defined by the Railway Act as follows :-
The expression ' Special Act ' means any Act under which the company has authority to construct or operate a railway, or which is enacted wjth special reference to such railway, and includes all such Acts.
If we look at the statute of last session, we find that it has an agreement annexed to it, which is ratified by clause 2 of that statute, is as follows :-
The agreement, a copy of which forms the schedule to this Act (hereinafter called ' the agreement '), is hereby ratified and confirmed and declared to be legally binding upon His Majesty and the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company (hereinafter called 'the company'), subject to the provisions of this Act ; and His Majesty and the company are hereby authorized and empowered to do whatever is necessary in order to give full effect to the agreement and to the provisions of this Act.
I say that the provisions contained in the agreement do not seem to me to come within the definition of the Special Act contained in the clause of the Railway Act to which I have referred. But even if my hon. friends on the other side of the House, especially the Minister of Justice, should disagree with my view of the construction of the statute in that regard, I would still press the amendment, because it contains something more than is contained in the Railway Act, and it points to the possibility that in the future, if the Grand Trunk Railway Company shall disregard the provisions of this Act, which are of great importance to the people of this country, and which are regarded as of special importance by the government. it may look for an investigation from those interested, and for action by parliament. For that reason I trust that this amendment will commend itself to the government, and we will thus have some safeguard that Canadian traffic shall not in the future be diverted from our maritime ports to ports in the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: My hon. friend was good enough to give us notice of the other proposed amendments which it was his intention to move, so that we were in a position to deal with them freely on their being presented. This amendment, however. was not included in the list. I am not taking exception to this because it is his right to move without giving notice, but he will see that this gives us very little time to consider it


Robert Laird Borden: I quite agree with what my hon. friend says, and the amendment need not be discussed now. I have been rather busy during the last day or two or I would have sent a copy to my hon. friend, the Minister of Justice. It was my intention to hare done so, but not having done so I agree at once that my hon. friend is perfectly right in desiring a postponement of the discussion.


William Stevens Fielding: I shall only detain the committee a moment with an observation or two. I am afraid that I do not attach as much importance to the amendment as does my hon. friend. I am not, speaking of the object he has in view, to which I attach as much importance as he does, but I question whether what he desires is not already sufficiently accomplished. Section 23 of the Railway Act, which my hon. friend quoted in part, says :
The board shall have full jurisdiction to inquire into, hear and determine any application by or on behalf of any party interested ;
(a.) complaining that the company, or any person, has failed to do any act, matter or thing required to be done by this Act or the special Act or by any regulation, order or direction made thereunder by the Governor in Council, the board, the minister or any inspecting engineer, or has done or is doing any act, matter or thing contrary to or in violation of this Act or the special Act, or any such regulation, order or direction.
It would be difficult to devise words broader aiid more comprehensive. A special Act is defined in another part of the Railway Act to mean * any act under which the company has authority to construct or operate a railway or which is enacted with special reference to such railway.' I think my hon. friend will see that the National Transcontinental Railway Act comes under this definition. It would seem to me, therefore that the legislation now existing is broad enough to cover what my hon. friend has in view. However, we quite realize that the object is one in line with the policy of the government, as fully set forth in the clauses of the contract to which my hon. friend has referred. He is simply giving what he may regard as a legitimate supplement to these clauses ; and if any such amendment as he proposes is necessary and will give better effect to the defined policy of the government, as expressed in the contract of last year, and as adhered to and confirmed in the contract of this year, we should be disposed to give effect to the view expressed by my hon. friend. I would suggest that the amendment should stand, with the understanding that at a later stage an opportunity will be afforded to bring it for-word again.


Robert Laird Borden: I would like to move it before we leave committee, and I thought

it was understood wre would get out of com rnittee to-night.


William Stevens Fielding: That would not prevent our going back into committee at any time if necessary.


Wilfrid Laurier: We expected to get out of committee to-night, but that need not interfere with our reaching the ultimate result we have agreed upon.


Robert Laird Borden: I am as anxious as my hon. friend to get out of committee.


Charles Fitzpatrick: We do not want to get in again.


Robert Laird Borden: The Minister of Finance suggests we might get in again.


William Stevens Fielding: Once out, I do not desire to get in.


John Graham Haggart: I beg to move :
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section.
Notwithstanding anything in this Act or in the supplementary agreement contained, the government shall have and may exercise all rights, powers and remedies in respect to possession, foreclosure and sale upon default by the Pacific Company in the payment of interest on the bonds guaranteed by the government as fully and effectually to all intents and purposes as if the sixth, seventh and eighth paragraphs of the said supplementary agreement were not therein contained, and as if the said three paragraphs formed ho part of the scheduled agreements, or of any agreement between the parties thereto.
This amendment virtually covers all the changes made in the agreements between the Grand Trunk Pacific, the Grand Trunk Railway and the government-both the agreements passed last year and the one now submitted to us. It applies particularly to the security which the government have on the western section of the line, which section is 'divided into two-the mountain and the prairie sections. The government guarantee bonds to the extent of $30,000 per mile on the mountain section and $13,000 on the prairie section. On the mountain section they agree to collect no interest for the first seven years, and should there be default in the payment of interest in the succeeding three years, the Grand Trunk Pacific have the option of capitalizing the amount and paying interest on it to the government after the three years are up, or redeeming it in the form of payments divided over forty years. But on the prairie section, the Grand Trunk Pacific are obliged, after the completion of the road, to pay interest upon the bonds guaranteed by the government. This is what is provided by the original agreement, but under the supplemental agreement, these terms are considerably altered. The government guarantee must be given, not merely to the extent of $30,000 per mile on the mountain division, but to the extent of whatever amount may have to be floated in Mr. R. L. BORDEN.
order to produce a net result of $30,000 per mile, and they extend their guarantee in a similar manner as regards the $13,000 per mile upon the prairie section. Then under the old agreement, should there be default in the payment of interest, the government have the right to foreclose. That right they abandon under the supplemental agreement, and substitute for it the right to appoint an agent or manager to operate the western division, and should possession be taken in this manner, the right of the government to such possession shall terminate ' if and when the application of the proportions herein provided of the said surplus tolls and revenue shall have paid off all arrears of such interest.' In other words, the second-class mortgage bonds to be issued by the Grand Trunk Pacific, and guaranteed by the Grand Trunk Railway, shall rank pari passu, as far as value is concerned, with the government bonds.
And, instead of exercising the right ot foreclosure the government exercise only the right of appointing a manager or agent, with the concurrence of the company, or if they do not concur, such officer to be appointed by the majority of the Supreme Court. This agent will manage the road and apportion the receipts between the government and the holders of the securities guaranteed by the company. Under this arrangement the holders of these bonds guaranteed by the Grand Trunk are given at least equality with the government. In one respect they have a decided advantage over the government. The government cannot even appoint a manager of the mountain section until seven years after the construction of the road, then three years after that, and, under the new agreement, until there has been a default of at least four and a half or five years after that. In other words, the government cannot collect a dollar of the interest on any sum which they advance for the purpose of building the mountain section for twenty-two and a half years from the present day. On the other hand, the holders of the bonds guaranteed by the company can compel the payment of interest, and need not wait until the agent is appointed to administer the affairs of the company. They can exercise foreclosure at any time after there has been default. Why this was extended I do not see. It seems to me that even the parties who drew the agreement really do not intend it. Let me read the clause.
Notwithstanding anything in the said contract contained, the government shall not exercise any rights in respect of possession, foreclosure or sale, by reason of non-payment of interest by the company under the thirty-first, thirty-second or thirty-third paragraphs of the said contract, or under all or any of them, unless and until there shall he such default to the extent in the whole of a sum equal to five years of such interest, as the company is not relieved from payment of or permitted

to defer or capitalize by the provisions of the said paragraphs.
In other words, added to the ten years they had before upon the mountain section they have four and a half years further. And there is no provision in this clause when that four and a half years' interest is to be paid. I think they need not pay it until the end of the fifty years. The president of the Grand Trunk told his board and his stockholders that the prairie section will be a paying portion of the road from the commencement. But, under this contract the government allow interest for a further period of four and a half years and make no provision as to when it is to be paid. That was bad enough. But, there is the other point which I argued with the Minister of Justice a little while ago. His only answer was to pooh-pooh my argument and to tell me to ask my leader. I pointed out that the holders of the bonds guaranteed by the Grand Trunk can exercise the right of foreclosure at any time when there is default. But, is it a condition of the bonds that if the holders of them exercise the right of foreclosure, they shall be bound by all the conditions contained in the contract ? Among the conditions are these :	The routing of freight,
the preference of Canadian ports, the company to develop trade through Canadian channels, division of tolls for traffic over the company's lines and the Intercolonial, shipping facilities on the Atlantic and the Pacific. Is it incidental to the foreclosure under the bonds that a.re guaranteed by the Grand Trunk that those who take possession of the road shall perform these conditions ? If I understood the Minister of Justice he said there was no doubt about it. But I doubt it very much, notwithstanding the hon. gentleman's opinion. Or, rather, I can hardly say he ventured an opinion but merely pooh-poohed the idea. As far as common sense is concerned-but the hon. gentleman may say that he is not here to interpret things with the good morals of common sense, but to tell us the legal construction. But my opinion is that, even under the legal construction, this possibility may arise. And whenever it is'to the interest of the Grand Trunk Railway they can easily make arrangement with the holders of the bonds to exercise the right of foreclosure. On the other hand, what rights have the government ? They can exercise the right of foreclosure, in case of default twenty-two years from now, so far as the mountain section is concerned. So, what hon. gentlemen on this side have been asking, what my hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) has been asking is that there should be some provision in this contract that the undertakings to be performed by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company should be, in case of their default, performed by the Grand
Trunk Railway Company.. But I do not see any condition of that kind ; if my argument is correct there is no such condition.. The Grand Trunk Railway Company merely enter into a contract with the government, to hold a majority of the stock of the Grand Trunk Pacific by such a tenure as will enable them to control the policy of that company. But, suppose the holders of the bonds guaranteed by the Grand Trunk pay no attention, as they may, in case of default, to these conditions, there is nothing I believe, to compel them to observe them. For these reasons, the remedies under the old agreement, which were little enough, have been considerably lessened by this agreement.
Surely the government never intended: that a default on the prairie section or a default in the payment of the interest on the mountain section for 4J years need not be paid until the end of 50 years, the interest need not be paid or capitalized or an arrangement made for payment in annual instalments for 40 years. The provision In the Act is that the only default is after five years and there is no remedy provided for collecting that amount. I move this amendment believing that the bargain as confirmed by this parliament in 1903 was far more favourable than the present bargain.
Amendment (Mr. Haggart) negatived.


Mr. CASGRAIN.: Might I ask the Minister of Justice whether there is any provision in this Bill or in the contract by which it is enacted that a majority of the directors of this company snail be British subjects ? I do not find any such provision, and it seems to me that a provision should be made that at least a majority of the directors should be British subjects. I would like to have my hon. and learned: friend (Mr. Fitzpatrick) point out anything at all in this contract or the contract discussed last session by which this is provided. I must admit that I could not find any such provision myself.


Charles Fitzpatrick: I have a fairly good knowledge of the Act of incorporation of the Grand Trunk Pacific and also of the Railway Act, but I must confess that I cannot be cross-examined at first sight on every question that comes up.


Charles Eusèbe Casgrain: Of course, I do not wish to cross-examine the minister. I quite understand that in a matter of this kind he cannot carry everything in his memory. I can almost assure him that there is nothing in the contract or in the Bill which provides that the majority of the directors shall be British subjects.


Charles Fitzpatrick: The general law, of course, would be applicable to this as to other companies.


Charles Eusèbe Casgrain: There is nothing in the general law either which would oblige the

company to have a majority of its directors British subjects. I find in the statute concerning the Canadian Pacific Railway, in the schedule to the Act 44 Vic., chap. 1, which is entitled, ' An Act respecting the Canadian Pacific Railway, ' the following proviso :	Section 5, after enumerating the
gentlemen who are to form a part of the first board of directors of the company, reads as follows :-
And a majority of the directors, of whom the president shall he one, shall be British subjects.	*
The evident reason for this provision being inserted in the statute, is that as the Canadian Pacific Railway was a transcontinental railway line, running from one ocean to another, and was being built for the purpose of binding together the different provinces of the Dominion and also for carrying out a general policy which was a Canadian or a British policy, it was thought best at that time that a majority of the directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway should be British subjects. The project which is now before the House is not only a transcontinental line, but it is called in the Bill a national transcontinental line, and as I had occasion to remark before, the two objects which the government seem to have in view were, first, the carrying of the immense traffic which we expect will originate in the west down through Canadian channels to the eastern termini in our seaport towns, and, secondly, the colonization of the country. It seems to me, and I submit to the House, that if it were found necessary to enact that the majority of the directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway should be British subjects, the obligation on the government and on this House is greater in connection with the project which is now being discussed by the committee. We have had within the past few days an example of what a board composed of or controlled by parties who are not Canadians or British subjects can do. We have had evidence before us that in the preliminary surveys that have been made British subjects and Canadians have not been employed in such numbers as they should have been employed, in fact that a preference has been given to American engineers. When it comes to carrying out the policy of the government in connection with this road the general policy which has been outlined a great many times by gentlemen on this side of the House and which this company is supposed to carry out in the future, we must be assured by the composition of the board of directors, that British interests and especially Canadian interests will be safe-guarded. If a majority of the board of directors are not Canadians or British subjects, we cannot hope that this policy will be carried out.
For these reasons, I beg to move the following amendment to the Bill :


Charles Eusèbe Casgrain: That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section as section	:-
The majority of the directors of the Pacific Company, of whom the president shall be one, shall be British subjects.


Charles Fitzpatrick: No notice has been given of this amendment and therefore I would like to have an opportunity to consider it, although I must confess so far as I am personally concerned, that my own desire would be that a provision of this sort should be inserted in a General Railway Act, and be made applicable to all railway companies in Canada. I can see no reason why we should distinguish in the case of this particular company. I would draw attention to the fact that for a great many years we have had a provision in the law that foreigners may be shareholders and directors in Canadian companies and entitled to direct the affairs of the companies. That has been the law since 1888, and I think long before that. I know of no exception to that except in the case pointed out, the Canadian Pacific Railway, and I am not quite sure that that is still the law respecting the Canadian Pacific Railway. I would like to have time to inquire into that if my hon. friend (Mr.) Casgrain) has not investigated it.


Robert Laird Borden: Certainly ; I think that is reasonable.
Amendment (Mr. Casgrain) allowed to stand.


Robert Laird Borden: It may be convenient to give notice now of two other amendments which we will move and then perhaps let the matter stand until to-morrow, and until these have been considered. There are two other amendments which we propose moving. As far as I know the two amendments that I am now about to refer to will be all that we will move in committee. I do not wish to be understood as saying that there may not be some further amendments on the third reading because I am merely referring to the committee stage. In order to get through the committee stage within a reasonable time it is possible that one or two other amendments which were to have been moved may be reserved until the third reading. My hon. friend from Leeds and Grenville (Mr. La-vell) who expected to move this to-night will move to-morrow, if that arrangement meets with the approval of the government, the following proposed amendment:
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section as section No. : -
If at the expiration of the lease mentioned in the eleventh clause of the supplementary agreement the Pacific Company shall elect not to retain one or more of the branch lines in said clause mentioned, the government shall be entitled in such case to take over not only such branch line or lines as the said company so elects not to retain, but any one or more of the remaining branch lines which the government under the circumstances may think

necessary or requisite for tile efficient or profitable operation of tire eastern division, and the value thereof shall be determined in the manner and subject to the deduction in the said eleventh paragraph set forth.
Perhaps I may acid a word as io what it means. The eleventh clause of the supplementary agreement gives to the Pacific Company the option to retain, if it sees fit, certain of the branch lines and those not retained must be taken over by the government. The object of the amendment is to provide that if that election is exercised by the Pacific Company and if the government is obliged to take over the remaining lines the government, then, in its turn shall have the option to take over one or more of the lines so retained by the company which jthe government may think necessary or requisite for the efficient or profitable operation of the eastern division.
The other proposed amendment of which I wish to make communication to the government is this :
That the Bill be amended by adding thereto the following section as section No.
Notwithstanding anything in the scheduled agreements, or in this Act, or in the Act hereby amended contained, it is hereby declared and enacted that in the event of the government determining to undertake the operation of the eastern division upon the termination of the said lease, the government shall be entitled for a further period of fifty years to such running powers and haulage rights over the western division, or any portion thereof and over any branch line or lines running from any point or points in the eastern division as may be necessary or expedient in the opinion of the government, upon such terms as may be agreed upon between the government and the Pacific Company, or as may from time to time in case of failure to so agree be determined in the manner provided by clause 24 (2) of the original agreement, which is hereby made applicable to cases arising under this section.
_ This amendment is concerned with a subject that has already formed a topic of discussion between the hon. Minister of Justice and myself and other hon. members on this side of the House, and I do not think that any explanation of it is necessary.


Albert Edward Kemp: In connection with the question that my hon. friend from Montmorency (Mr. Casgrain) brought up with reference to the directors being British subjects,
I may draw the attention of the right hon'. Prime Minister to the fact that when the Act of incorporation was under consideration in this House last year I moved an amendment similar to that to which attention has been directed by my hon. friend from Montmorency, and the right hon Prime Minister said that he thought it would be better, instead of putting it into the Act of incorporation, to put it Into the contract and that he would take steps to have it put in the contract. It has been overlooked. He will find his statement in reference to
that matter at page 8066 of last year's ' Hansard.'


Wilfrid Laurier: I overlooked it and I suppose we all overlooked it also, but there is a good deal to he said in favour of the idea, and I think the suggestion of my hon. friend the Minister of Justice is perhaps the best that it should be made a general law applicable to all railway* corporations in this country.
Progress reported.



GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC RAILWAY- APPOINTMENT OF COMMISSIONERS.

[Stage Direction]
House went into committee to consider the following proposed resolution :
Resolved, that it is expedient to amend section 9 of the National Transcontinental Railway Act, so as to provide for the appointment of four commissioners of the Transcontinental Railway, instead of three.-Sir Wilfrid Laurier.
Wilfrid Laurier: The Act which we passed last session provided that the construction of the eastern division of this railway should be confided to three commissioners. I have moved that instead of the work of construction being entrusted to three commissioners it should be entrusted to four and the only reason I have to give for this is that in a matter of this magnitude in which all sections of the country are interested, the centre, the east and the west, the different provinces and sections of the country should be represented, that Ontario should be represented by one commissioner, Quebec by one, the maritime provinces *by one and the western section also by one. That is the reason for the amendment which I now propose.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Will the appointment of a fourth commissioner carry with it the salary that the other commissioners get ?


Wilfrid Laurier: The salaries have been provided for but they have not been fixed yet. I suppose the fourth will be entitled to the same salary as the other three commissioners.


Robert Laird Borden: I did not quite gather the reasons the hon. gentleman gave. There is to be one commissioner for Ontario ?


Wilfrid Laurier: Yes.


Robert Laird Borden: One for Quebec ?


Wilfrid Laurier: Yes.


Robert Laird Borden: One for the maritime provinces ?


Wilfrid Laurier: Yes.


Robert Laird Borden: One for the west ? Sir WILFRID LAURIER. Yes.


Robert Laird Borden: Which of these important sections of the community was overlooked by the government in reference to this measure ?


Wilfrid Laurier: I do not know which was overlooked, whether it was the centre, the east or the west, but in order to make doubly sure we have provided that all shall be represented.
Mr. CASGRAiIN. I presume the reason why the four commissioners are to be appointed is the very grave difficulty which exists in the province of Quebec. I do not know whether it is true or not but it is stated on all sides that there is a grave difficulty in connection with the premier of the province of Quebec and that it has been found convenient by this government to provide a very fat berth for that gentleman so that he will be able to resign and become one of the commissioners.


Charles Fitzpatrick: My hon. friend (Mr. Casgrain) knows that we are accustomed to that sort of difficulty in our province in respect to premiers.


Thomas Earle: I would call the attention of the right hon. Prime Minister to the fact that it is understood that construction will be commenced on the Pacific coast simultaneously with the other sections of the road, and therefore will it not be necessary to have a commissioner for that province ?


Wilfrid Laurier: No, I think four are quite sufficient.


Thomas Earle: If it is necessary to have one for the prairie section, it is particularly necessary that a commissioner should be appointed for the mountain section which is certainly the most important section of the road as far as the western division is concerned.


Wilfrid Laurier: I would remind my hon. friend that the British Columbia section will be constructed by the Grand Trunk Pacific, and not by the commissioners.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: If you have an even number of commissioners, there may be some difficulty if they divide evenly on any question.


Wilfrid Laurier: It is to be hoped that there will be unanimity after the example we have set them in this House.	-


Robert Laird Borden: I do not know that L altogether see the force of the hon. gentleman's reasoning-one to represent the maritime provinces ; one, Quebec ; one, Ontario, and one the west. What relevancy is there betwen that and the construction of the eastern division ?


Wilfrid Laurier: I Sir WILFRID LAURIER. The selection of the route is a most important matter, and I apprehend that the commissioners cannot altogether overlook the geographical conditions. It is expected that each section of the country will be better served if each section has a representative.


Robert Laird Borden: Are the commissioners to select the route ?


Wilfrid Laurier: Not finally, but I suppose they will have a great deal to say about it. We expect to have the benefit of their advice upon the question.


Mr. WILSON.: If the Grand Trunk Pacific is to build the road west of Winnipeg, why should the western section be entitled to a commissioner when the government will have nothing to do with it ? Unless you make the commissioners responsible for the location of the route, they will have nothing to do with the construction of the line west of Winnipeg.


Wilfrid Laurier: Winnipeg is an important centre of the western country, and as the road will go as far as Winnipeg the argument of my hon. friend (Mr. Wilson) would not be relished in Manitoba.
Resolution reported, read a second time, agreed to and referred to the Committee of the Whole on Bill No. 72 to amend the National Transcontinental Railway Act.-Sir Wilfrid Laurier.
On motion of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, House adjourned at 10.45 p.m.

Wednesday, May 18, 1904.