1904-07-21

Hon.  W. S.@: FIELDING (Minister of Finance) moved for leave to introduce Bill (No. TOO) to amend the Bank Act. He said: This is a measure of which mention was made some days ago in connection with the programme of business for the remainder of the session. While I propose to repeal a statute passed in 1899 and reenact it in amended form, this is only done for convenience of drafting, and the actual change which is made is very slight indeed. Some of our banks are doing business in British colonies other than Canada, notably in the case of the British West Indies, and it is found to - be convenient in the way of business to per-

iuit those banks to issue notes expressed in the currency of the colony in which they are doing business. We have provided for that in our Bank Act by allowing them to issue notes in pounds sterling as well as in dollars and cents, which is the form of our own currency. A case has arisen, however, in one of the West Indian Islands which it is found is not quite covered- by the terms of the Bank Act. In the island of Trinidad, one of the largest and most important of the British West Indian colonies, they use dollars and cents as we do, but while their currency corresponds in form to ours it does not correspond in actual value. The West Indian dollar is worth a little more actually than the Canadian dollar, therefore a note circulated in the Island of Trinidad redeemable in Canadian currency would be a cause of confusion. The bank in question proposed to overcome the difficulty by making a depost of securities with the colonial government equal to the difference between the Canadian dollar and the West Indian dollar, to the extent of the whole issue of the notes in that colony. But the British government which has a supervision over the Island of Trinidad-for it has not quite the same system of government that we have-the British government thought that it was an undesirable way of dealing with the matter, and the Colonial Office suggested that the Canadian government should be asked to make such an amendment to the Bank Act as would recognize the issue of notes expressed in the currency of the colony itself, that is in the West Indian dollar instead of the Canadian dollar. It is wholly a technical matter, and does not depart in any way from the spirit of the Act already laid down. As the imperial government think this is the best way of dealing with it, I propose such an amendment to the Act as will make j.t clear that our banks can issue their notes in the currency of any particular colony in which they are doing business. We have already done that in relation to pounds sterling, and we simply adapt ourselves to the peculiarity of the West Indian dollar as distinct from the Canadian dollar.


Mr. SPROULE.: Will those notes be a sufficient legal tender here V


Mr. FIELDING.: The notes will be redeemable only in the office of issue, provided that if at any time they cease to do business in that colony, they must then redeem them at any office or bank in Canada.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: But they would not be legal tender here ?


Mr. HAGGART.: Do the assets of their business in the West India islands appear in their balance sheets here ?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, they have to make a return, and are subject in all respects to the conditions of the Bank Act.


William Stevens Fielding: 


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first time.


Mr. BLAIN asked :: 1- What is the total expenditure to date for taking the census of 1901 ?
2. What further amount will be required to complete the work ?


Hon. SYDNEY FISHER (Minister of Agriculture) :: 1.	The total expenditure to date for taking the census of 1901 is $1,183,729.48.
2.	So far as the census woi-k is concerned it is practically done. There may be a small amount required for the binding, from time to time, of certain further compilations to be made in the statistical work of the department.


PAYMENT OF CREW OF THE ' LADY LAURIER.'
Mr.  R. L.@: BORDEN-by Mr. Taylor-asked :
1.	Has there been any delay in paying the wages of the crew of the * Lady Laurier ' or other vessels owned or employed by the gov^ eminent ?
2.	To what extent, if any, are the wages of the men in arrears ?
3.	What has occasioned the delay ?
4.	What action is the government taking in the matter ?
Hon. SYDNEY FISHER (Minister of Agriculture! :
1.	Yes.
2.	For the month of June.
3.	The main vote being exhausted.
4.	The amount has been placed in the supplementary estimates for 1903-1904, and the wages will be paid when the money is available.


COMMISSION TO UNITED STATES RE CULTIVATION OF TOBACCO.
[Stage Direction]
Mr. MONK-by Mr. Taylor-asked :
1. What persons have been sent to the United States to seek information in connection with the cultivation of tobacco ?
2- What instructions were given to such persons, and have they made a written report to the government ?
3.	What amounts have been paid to such persons '(a) for expenses ; (b) for their work?
4.	Have any reports or bulletins in connection with the cultivation of tobacco in Canada been printed and circulated ?
Hon. SYDNEY FISHER (Minister of Agriculture) :: 1.	Messrs. Pierre Denis and J. B. Dugas.
2.	They were instructed to investigate the methods practised in the State of Wisconsin of cultivating, curing and preparing for the market the tobacco grown in Wisconsin, and to report on the same to the Minister of

Agriculture. Yes, they have made such a report.
3.	(a) to Mr. Pierre Denis for expenses, $227.75, and to Mr. J. B. Dugas for expenses, $231.27 ; (b) to Mr. Denis $218.34 for his work, and to Mr. Dugas, $197.33 for his work.
4.	Not in connection with the investigations made in the United States. The reports only came in a few weeks ago.


LIGHTKEEPERS AT POINTE AUX ANGLAIS.
[Stage Direction]
Mr. LEONARD-by Mr. Taylor-asked :
1.	Who was the light-keeper at Pointe aux Anglais, on the Ottawa river, before September, 1S97 ?
2.	Did he always fulfil his duties to the satisfaction of his department ?
3.	If not, what blame did he deserve ?
4.	Was he replaced ?
5.	By whom ?
6.	And why 1
7.	Does his successor fulfil all the conditions of his contract and of his employment 1
Hon. SYDNEY FISHER (Minister of Agriculture) :: 1.	Oalixte Labrosse. dit Raymond.
2.	No.
3.	Dismissal.
4.	Yes.
5.	Lucas H. Masson.
6.	To fill the vacancy.
7.	Not entirely ; and as the department [proposes to make tlie light an automatic one. his services will be dispensed with when that is done.


SUBSIDY TO TILSONBURG, LAKE ERIE AND PACIFIC RAILWAY.
Mr. INGRAM asked :: 1.	In what year was the subsidy granted to the Tilsonburg, Lake Erie and Pacific Railway ?
2.	In what year was such subsidy paid, and what was the total amount so pail ?


Hon. H. R. EMMEBSON (Minister of Railways and Canals) :: 1.	Subsidies were granted to the Tilsou-burg, Lake Erie and Pacific Railway in the following years, viz. :-
(a)	In 1894, chapter 4-Port Burwell to Tilsonburg, not exceeding 16 miles.
(b)	In 1897, chapter 4-From present terminus through Tilsonburg to the Michigan Central Railway, not exceeding 3J miles.
(c)	In 1899, chapter 7-For an extension from Tilsonburg to Ingersoll or Woodstock, not exceeding 35 miles.
(d)	In 1903, chapter 57-Woodstock or In-gersoll to Grand Trunk Railway, at Berlin, not exceeding 35 miles.
2.	The following amounts of subsidies have been paid, viz. :-
1.	For 16 miles in April, 1896....$ 51,200 00
2.	For 3'41 miles-
In Feby., 1899, part.. ..$10,912 00 In June, 1900, balance.. 7,159 48

 18,071 48
3. For 15-05 miles-
In July, 1903, part.. ..$44,160 00 In May, 1904, balance... 4,000 00

 48,160 00
Total amount of subsidy paid..$ 117,431 48 SECURITY BONDS FOR PUBLIC OFFICERS.


Mr. CLARKE asked :: 1.	Has the government taken any action yet on the statement made by the Honourable Minister of Finance, on the 19th of May last, respecting the placing of its guarantee business with British and Canadian guarantee companies exclusively ?
2.	Has notice been given yet, and if so, when, to foreign guarantee companies of the intention of the givernment to place no more of its business with them 1
3.	After what date does the government intend to do its guarantee business exclusively with British and Canadian companies ?


William Stevens Fielding: Instructions bave been given the various departments that so soon as the existing policies in foreign companies expire they will not he renewed, but the business will then be given to British and Canadian companies. No special date has been fixed, because the policies will not expire upon an even date, but whenever the policies do expire that will he the method adopted.


TWENTY-FIFTH BATTALION CLUB ROOMS, ST. THOMAS.
Mr. INGRAM asked :: 1.	When were the 25th Battalion club rooms established in St. Thomas ?
2.	What amount of rent was paid for same from date of establishment up to June 30, 1896 ?
3.	What amount of rent was paid per month for rent of club rooms so established"?


Hon. Sir FREDERICK BORDEN (Minister of Militia and Defence) :: 1.	No record in the department.
2.	$263.32.
3.	$20 per month.
MILITARY CAMP, DISTRICT NO. 1.	/


Mr. INGRAM asked :: 1.	In what year was the military camp for district No. 1 held at St. Thomas ?
2.	How many corps attend the same ?
3.	What was the total expenditure in connection therewith ?


Hon. Sir FREDERICK BORDEN (Minister of Militia and Defence) :: 1.	1891.
2.	Eight..
3.	$19,316.68.


GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC-PERSONAL EXPLANATION.
Hon. CHARLES FITZPATRICK (Minister of Justice).: Mr. Speaker, before the Orders of the Day are called. I wish to trespass upon the attention of the House for a very few minutes in connection with a mat-

ter that is personal to myself. In the ' Mail and Empire ' of Tuesday, July 19, 1901, there appears an article under the heading.
' The Rush for the Stuff,' from which I take the following extract:
But noteworthy as the departures will be, that which will attract the largest share of attention will be the acceptance by Mr. Fitzpatrick of the valuable solicitorship of the company.
I may say that the company Here is the Grand Trunk Pacific.
Certainly the company ought to be willing to pay Mr. Fitzpatrick handsomely. He has secured for it a splendid contract. But what do you think of the morals of Ottawa when a lawyer sits in the cabinet and makes a bargain for the country with a railway company-a bargain under which an immense obligation is thrown upon the people, and a small obligation is east upon the company ? What do you think when that same lawyer, after having occupied, or having appeared to occupy, the position of representative of the people, becomes, immediately after the contract has been put through, the paid legal representative of the company with which as a minister he has been bargaining? Look at the danger involved In a transae1 tion of this kind. A man may sit in parliament, he may occupy a position in the cabinet, and while bargaining, apparently for the country, he may really be the representative of the company with which, as a minister, he is transacting public business. A bargain may be devised, the minister may know that if it goes through he will get a very highly paid position. He sees to it that the interests of his employers or clients of the near future are duly attended to. He takes care to push the thing through in as good a shape as may be for the company, for he wants the position, and the money attached to it. Is this right ?
This statement constitutes the most serious charge that could possibly be made against a professional man. I quite realize that in so far as certain elements in this country are concerned a man who happens to be connected with public life can be charged with every crime short of murder, but in so far as our professional reputations are concerned it seems to me that we ought to some extent to be protected by the ordinary rules of decency. I need not say that there is not a word of truth in this statement. No such offer was ever made to me or ever contemplated or would have been entertained, and the gentlemen connected with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway know better than to make any such offer or entertain the hope that an offer of that description would be entertained for a single moment. I think that this statement is absolutely

An lion. MEMBER. Malicious.


Charles Fitzpatrick: I will not say malicious, but it is absolutely unjustifiable in view of the fact that when this ridiculous story was first spread I took the pains to deny it, and I think that in the very same number of the ' Mail and Empire ' as that Mr. FITZPATRICK.
in which this article appeared my denial is to be found; at all events, the Ottawa ' Citizen ' of July 19 contained a denial of the statement. It does seem to me that under these circumstances, I am Justified in expecting that the same publicity will be given to this denial as was given to the charge contained in this article. That is all I ask for and that is what I mean to have.


NATURALIZATION AND ALIENS- AMENDMENT.
[Stage Direction]
House in Committee on Bill (No. 147) to amend the Acts relating to Naturalization and Aliens.-Mr. Fitzpatrick.
Charles Fitzpatrick: When this Bill was up for consideration some days ago my hon. friend from Marquette (Mr. Roche) suggested with respect to the amendment I introduced providing for the naturalization of aliens in Manitoba that some alterations should be made so as to provide that an alien should be obliged to apply to the county court nearest to the place where he resided. In view of that I have prepared this amendment, which I have submitted to my hon. friend, and which, I believe, he found to his satisfaction. I therefore move :
That section 11 be further amended by striking out the lines from 20 to 26 +hereof and substituting the following ; In Manitoba to the county court, which has Jurisdiction where the alien resides or if there be no county court in that jurisdiction, then to the county court nearest to his residence or the county court the place of holding of which is nearest to such residence.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Bill, as amended, reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Bill (No. 148) to amend the Dominion Elections Act of 1900-Mr. Fitzpatrick-read second time, and House went into committee thereon.
John Graham Haggart: I did not notice the House going into committee, but I may say that the leader of the opposition is away, and he would like to be here when this Bill is going through.


Charles Fitzpatrick: Very well.
Progress reported.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER.: Are you ready to go on with Bill (No. 149) to amend tin Representation Act of 1903 ?


John Graham Haggart: That had better stand too.


Wilfrid Laurier: Can we take Bill (No. 152) respecting the arbitration with the Grand Trunk Railway Company ?

Mi-. BARKER. I think there will be some discussion on that. I would like the hon. gentleman to let it stand.
Orders allowed to stand.


SEED-GROWERS' ASSOCIATIONS.
[Stage Direction]
Hon. SYDNEY FISHER (Minister of Agriculture) moved second reading of Bill (No. 151) respecting the incorporation of seed-growers' associations.
Some hon. MEMBERS: Explain.


Mr. FISHER.: This Bill is founded on the lines of a law which was passed by this parliament a few years ago to authorize the incorporation of live stock associations. Gentlemen who have followed recent events are aware that a good deal of discussion has occurred in the country in regard to the seeds that are used by our farmers for sowing purposes. A number of persons interested in seed-growing and anxious to bring about a better quality of seed which should be true to name have formed themselves into an association, but there is no law under which this association or subsidiary associations can be legally constituted. I have been asked to introduce this Bill, which would make those associations legally incorporated bodies. The real reason for this is to provide machinery by which a certificate of the purity of the seed can be given. The Bill authorizes the formation of these associations and the confirmation of the by-laws. The association was formed only a couple of months ago at a general meeting, which was held at Ottawa, and the reason of the late introduction of this Bill is because of the but recent action of those interested. I think the measure is in the interests of the farmers of this country, and I hope there will be no opposition to" it, and that it will become law even though introduced at this late period of the session.


Mr. LENNOX.: The association will be capable of contracting debts ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The Bill would indicate that.


Haughton Lennox: Section 9 provides that the liability of each member shall be limited to the amount of his membership dues. If this association can contract debts, there would seem to be no adequate provision for meeting these liabilities.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Would it not be 'better to discuss the details in committee ?


Haughton Lennox: This is a question of principle. When we incorporate companies with limited liability that is set out on the face of the Bill, and they are so advertised. This association may be necessary, or it may not be necessary, but anyway the proposition on the face of the Bill is that the liability of the members shall be limited to the fees they happen to owe. Gan the minister guarantee to the House that this is satisfactory ?
Mr. FISHER, The by-laws of the association will have to be approved before the association can become incorporated, and these by-laws would be known to any one who is connected with the association. There are a large number of associations in this-country, agricultural societies and live stock societies, which are incorporated in the same way. The members of these associations are not liable for the debts of the association beyond their membership fee ; and yet the association, being a body corporate, has power to deal with the subjects within its control, and all its property would be liable to that extent, but no further. I think that would be a sufficient safeguard to the public dealing with it.


Haughton Lennox: What the minister says is certainly true to some extent, in regard to agricultural associations and other associations of a similar kind. But I cannot see that his reference to the question of bylaws can help him, because by-laws are subordinate to the Act, which determines the liability and the status of the association and the remedy which any person can have against it. I do not want to offer any unfair opposition to the Bill. I merely want to draw attention to these points. If the minister, having looked into the matter, is of opinion that this association can be incorporated without danger to the public, I do not propose to say any more about it at the present stage.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The provision discussed by the hon. gentleman is exactly the same as the provision incorporating live stock associations.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I take it that the annual fee would provide a fund from which all ordinary accounts would be paid. It is not likely that this association would be disposed to engage in anything like commercial transactions. The only expenses incurred would be the carrying out of the objects- of the association, such as keeping a record and publishing that record.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the second time, and House went into committee thereon.
Mr. CLANCY.: While the hon. Minister of Agriculture has stated that this Bill is on the same principle as an Act already on the statute-book relating to live stock associations, he clearly perceives, I am sure, that the conditions are not quite the same. Without offering any very decided objections to the Bill, I wish to point out that we are incorporating an association, which may be started by five persons, and on which the hon. gentleman proposes to confer very wide powers in the shape of bylaws which are not before this House, and which may be changed from time to time. That may be a menace to persons who are not members of the association. It is said by the minister that they may become



members ; but there is no reason why any man should have to become a member of such an association in order to escape difficulties adverse to his interests that might arise from its operations. The first thing we ought to have from the minister is a copy of the by-laws, which might be made a schedule of this Bill ; otherwise we do not know what powers this association may exercise. The hon. gentleman may answer by saying that the by-laws must be subject to the approval of the minister ; but that is not a sufficient safeguard. I think we ought to know at the beginning just what we are doing. Bet me point out further that all such legislation as this is asked for in the name of the people. I have not quite as much confidence as some may have in that being the real object that impels men to seek extraordinary powers from this parliament. I am not denying that the public receive great advantages from these associations ; but I have always viewed with some suspicion those who seek legislation of this kind in the name of the public interest. There will be to some extent a close corporation, which means that those in the association will have the seal of approval from the Department of Agriculture, and, after following the experiments, may be able to control the sale at very much increased prices of seeds which are the products of these experiments. I would like the hou. minister to consider the point I raise, that we ought to know just what powers are to be given by this parliament to the association, by way of making bylaws to govern it afterwards.
On section 1-application for incorporation,


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I think it would be impossible for us to put in a schedule of this Act the details of all the by-laws of this association. My hon. friend will notice that in section 5 there is an outline of what these by-laws and rules shall provide for:
(a.) the registration of the history of selected seeds for use in the production of one or more kinds of field or garden crops ;
(6.) the admission, suspension and expulsion of members ;
(c.) the election of officers and their duties ;
(eZ.) the mode of convening annual, general and special meetings ;
(e.) the audit of accounts ;
(f.) the location of the head office and the branch offices, if any.


James Clancy: The two first ones would be the objectionable ones, if any.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The general association which was formed here this winter passed what I might call preliminary or tentative by-laws. I have just sent to my department to get those and they will be here in a few minutes, but I hardly think it would be advisable to incorporate them in the Bill. The regulations and by-laws might be very different in each association. This Bill does not Mr. CLANCY.
contemplate the formation of one association only for the whole Dominion, but according to section 4, it provides :
Not more than one association for keeping the records of selected seeds for each different kind of seed or garden crop, shall he incorporated under this Act.
There might he an association for the growth of seed corn, another for the growth of seed wheat, and so on, and each of these would have different by-laws and regulations. In the Act incorporating live stock record associations, on which this Bill is modelled, there are no such by-laws or rules, nor are they to be found In the Acts incorporating various other agricultural organizations.


James Clancy: Under this Bill you can only have one distinct association for each kind of seed. But take localities where different classes of cereals are grown and where different associations may be formed, will you have one set of by-laws and rules for all ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I do not think it would be possible for more than one association to be formed to deal with any one particular class of seed. The seed growing oats in the province of Ontario, for instance, would have to be under one association, but that association might have its local branches. Otherwise you would have a clash of authority between the different associations in the issuing of certificates. We would then experience the same difficulty which has arisen to a certain exteut in the live stock business, and there would be one class of pedigree or certificates which would be valuable and another of no great value.


John Graham Haggart: The objection to legislation of this kind Is simply this. Although these corporate powers are given for a most laudable purpose, the danger is that they may result in the forming of corpor-tions for speculative purposes without the usual liability attaching to the parties connected with them. That might be remedied by giving power to any one upon certain conditions, such as the payment of fees and agreeing to certain by-laws, the right of becoming a part of the corporation. The danger of a Bill of this kind is that three or four parties may form themselves into an association and become a close corporation.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The by-laws must be approved by the Department of Agriculture, and certainly no Department of Agriculture would think of allowing a by-law to be passed which would prevent anybody Interested in the business becoming a member of the association. Sections 1, 2 and 6 guard against the danger my hon. friend anticipates.


Haughton Lennox: I think that probably, so far as that point is concerned it would work

out under sections 1 and 2, in connection with the schedule. But what that brings us to is this-we are doing what we are fre

quently invited to do, we are framing skeleton legislation and leaving it to the minister to fill it in according to his judgment. We are putting into the hands of the minister not only powers that are frequently asked by the ministers, but we are going a good deal further than we usually go. We are asked to give the minister indefinite power in a new field, in an experimental ^matter where we have, so far as I know, nothing definite in the way of knowledge or experience. It would be right for the minister-and I presume he will do it when called upon-to give us a distinct statement of exactly what this association, when formed, is intended to do, and what their powers are to be, and to outline-as he has thought the matter out-what will be the effect of their action assuming that they carry out liiSj intentions. Now, here we have under section 4 :
Not more than one association for keeping records of selected seeds of each distinct kind of field or garden crop shall he incorporated under this Act.
Now, suppose that one association is made for .keeping t'he records of selected seeds of wheat, another for barley, and so on with the various kinds of grain. But it is not confined to grain for it covers garden products as well. Suppose, that five persons, as provided under this Bill, form a society to keep the records of seed wheat for Canada. (By what particular method this is to be done I do not know ; no doubt that will be explained to us.) But, suppose that all these five people live in the Klondike. We shall thus have in the most extremely distant portion of the Dominion the association that will have control of the records of seed wheat for Canada. And another association in a section distant from the centre of the Dominion may have control with reference to seed oats, and so on, Then, we have it in the Act that no other association can be formed. How that can be beneficial, or how it can work out satisfactorily, I am at a loss to know. The minister says-though the Bill does not say it- that there may be branch associations. I submit to the minister that that will not be found satisfactory. It is bad enough to have the parent association consisting of five members controlling the whole matter in regard to one kind of produce, but it would be infinitely worse if that association could farm out the business all over the Dominion. I submit that that will not be satisfactory. As I said, this may be a good Bill or a bad one, but it is certainly the duty of the members of the committee to have such facts placed before them as will enable them to judge that the Act will probably result in good. This is an experiment, and, until it is shown beyond all reasonable 230J
question that there is necessity for it, that there is a difficulty to be overcome and that this measure is likely to overcome it, we should not move in the direction proposed- we should not make a plunge in the dark. The first thing is to have the minister define clearly the object of this association, and to state how it is to accomplish that object, what power it will have when in operation and what control we shall have over these powers as exercised from time to time.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I think that if the hon. gentleman (Mr. Lennox) examines the Bill, he will see that section 5 answers most of the points he has brought up. From the experience of other agricultural associations, X infer that no by-laws will be proposed by the association-and certainly, if proposed they will not be approved by the department -which will .not authorize anybody interested in the business to join. Taking the instance given by hon. gentleman that five people in the Klondike form into an association for the selection of seeds for the growing of wheat, let us see how it would work out. If they submitted by-laws which were accepted, then anybody in Ontario or any other province might join the association, and the people in the Klondike would be immediately swamped by the majority against them if they attempted to do what was not in the interest of the production of this kind of seed throughout the whole of Canada. There is no possibility under the provisions of this Bill that any group of people can seize the association and manage it for their own gain, for every association must be open for people in any part of Canada to join it.


John Graham Haggart: There ought to be a clause to that effect. Otherwise there is danger of it becoming a close corporation.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: To provide that anybody engaged in tlfe business for which the association was formed migiit join ? I think that section 5 which provides for the admission, suspension and expulsion of members could be added to or we could put in a special section to provide that any person in the business would be eligible for membership.


John Graham Haggart: Not eligible merely, for that leaves it in the power of the corporation. They should have the right to join.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I do not think there would be any objection to that. I will frame a clause for that purpose.


John Graham Haggart: Let the Minister of Justice draw up a clause.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I take it that this will be the same as the live stock associations. Any one who pays his $2 Is eligible to all the advantages of the association. When he wishes to register anything, all he has to do is to make out the papers according to the

7236:
prescribed form of the association and send his fee.


Mr. SAM. HUGHES.: Mr. Chairman. I do not wish to seem petty or small, but there is a point of order which it seems to me worth while to call attention to. A number of gentlemen on the other side, entering the chamber, deliberately walk by this side, and do not even do the gentleman who happens to be speaking the courtesy of bowing as they pass. I noticed that last night the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Fisher) deliberately walked by the gentleman who iwas speaking, and did not even deign to bow as he passed between that hon. gentleman and the chair. The hon. member for West Huron (Mr. Holmes) has just walked *by on this side of the House past the hon. member for East Grey (Mr. Sproule) and 'has not done him the courtesy of bowing, although this is not the side by which he has to pass. Now, the rule is clear that no member shall pass between the member who is speaking and the chair. Yet, the hon. member for West Huron has done it five or six times, while gentlemen on this side were pSpeaking. yet he did not even extend the courtesy of bowing his head as he passed. I do not like to bring these matters up, but I insist upon the rights and dignity of hon. gentlemen on this side being respected.


Richard Blain: I understand the Minister of Agriculture to say that a largely attended meeting was held in the city of Ottawa during the winter for the purpose of giving some opinion respecting the formation of a society of this kind. I would like the minister to give the committee some explanation as to the number of representative men that assembled themselves together. Perhaps at the same time he would give some information as to the resolutions they passed, and what general demand for the formation of an association of this kind has come from the people of Canada. Perhaps the minister would say as to whether there were representatives from all the provinces of Canada, whether the introduction of a Bill of this kind has the approval of the Minister of Agriculture of the local governments, and of the officers of the experimental farms. What X fear is the danger that we are going to spread out this kind of tiling until the average farmer will not know just where he stands. It would bother the Minister of Agriculture himself to know -whether he is controlling the whole of the agricultural interests of Canada or not. It seems all these organizations should come within the scope and control of either the Dominion government or of the local government; and I rather see in this some indication that a certain .number of men may form themselves together for the purpose of registering seeds of different kinds, and then they will lead the farmers to believe that it will not be possible for them Mr. SPROULE.
to grow any other kind of seeds than those-registered. It may be that in certain sections of Canada people may be growing a class of seeds which it may not be possible to have registered under this association. I think it is a measure that requires mature consideration on the part of the minister. I fear he is rather hasty in this legislation. I think it would be interesting to the committee if the minister would give us full information regarding these gentlemen who-assembled together in Ottawa recently, what was their object, and whether they made any very extended recommendations to the minister for the introduction of a Bill of this kind.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I am glad to give the hon. gentleman the information he asks for. In regard to the provincial governments their Departments of Agriculture were all communicated with, and a good many of them were represented at the meeting which took place here about three or four weeks ago. They expressed their sympathy with this work.


Richard Blain: How many 1


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Three departments were represented by officials, and two by letters which were written to the officer of my department who had charge of this'meeting

that makes five provincial departments. There are to-day about 140 gentlemen scattered all over the Dominion who have given ip their names to form the Dominion Seed Growers Association.


Richard Blain: Are those farmers chiefly or business men ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Farmers ; I do not think there are business men concerned in it at all. They are men who are interested in the growing of seeds. The work of growing seeds has been gradually increasing in this country, and there has been correspondence with the officers of my department for about four years, until it has culminated in this gathering which took place at Ottawa. It was in consequence of a general interest which has been felt in the country at large and resulting in a request for a gathering of all those who were interested to organize themselves for the purpose in view. They formed themselves into an organization and passed by-laws, a copy of which I have under my hand. I will read to the committee the one which indicates the objects of the association :
The object of this association is to advance the interests of seed growers and other farmers
by,
(a)	Making regulations respecting the growing, selecting and preserving of seeds of various kinds of farm crops for the guidance of its members ;
(b)	Causing records to be kept of the history
of seeds produced by members ;	.
(c)	Fixing standards for seeds that may be eligible for registration ;

(d)	Publishing information as to standards;
(e)	Issuing certificates of registration to members by which hand selected seed or the product therefrom may be known from other seeds;
(f)	Such other means as may be expedient from time to time.
Then they went on to adopt certain rules and regulations :
The general officers of this association shall consist of a president, three vice-presidents, a secretary and ten directors, elected each year at the annual meeting, which body shall have power to add five directors to its number.
Then it goes on to define the duties of these officers in the usual way under incorporation.
Membership. The association may admit as operating members the persons now enrolled as members of the Macdonald, Robertson Seed Growers' Association, any person resident in Canada who may choose to make seed-growing a special branch of their farm operations, and who agree to conform to bylaws and regulations of the association.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I think it would be better to change that word 1 may ' into * shall.' ' May ' leaves it optional.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: There is no objection to that change. This is the other section relating to membership. The association may admit as honorary members persons who may be directly or indirectly interested in agriculture in Canada, hut who may not be producers of seed, and such honorary members shall be eligible to hold office or otherwise enjoy all of the privileges provided for the members of the association.


James Clancy: Do I understand that honorary members will be entitled to vote in making the by-laws ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: They would here..


James Clancy: That is a very extraordinary privilege to give honorary members.


Mr. OSLER.: I think the minister said this Bill was based upon the Live Stock Associations Law. On the face of it, this looks like a monopoly. An important clause of the Live Stock Bill is to be left out, clause 8 which reads :
The association may consist of annual subscribers and life members, and the annual and life membership fees shall be fixed by the members at the annual meeting or at a meeting of the association called for that purpose.
2.	Any person who has not been expelled from the association may become a member thereof by giving or sending his name and address to the secretary, together with the annual or life membership fee ; and such person shall thereupon be entitled to the rights and privileges, and subject to the liabilities of a member as fully as if he had signed the application for the incorporation of the association.
That covers all the points that appear to be left out in this Bill.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I do not thiuk there is any objection to that. It was left out because, for the present at any rate, there was no intention of charging fees for giving certificates. It is not intended to charge for registration. That is the only reason it is left out.


Edmund Boyd Osler: In time these certificates may become valuable, and the association would naturally charge a fee for them, and that would create a serious monopoly.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: There is not only no intention or desire to create a monopoly, but there is every intention and desire to prevent the creation of a monopoly by this Bill. The suggestion of my hon. friend is well worthy of consideration and it will obviate the difficulty that has been referred to.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: There may be a condition adopted in regard to the payment of fees. The association could include in its regulations a provision that a member who pays his annual fee is entitled to such a certificate free just the same as a member who would be in a live stock association, although if a pedigree is got out there is a charge.


James Clancy: I thought the hon. minister would conclude reading the proposed by-laws of the association.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: These by-laws are rather voluminous. There is a number of them that are the ordinary by-laws of any association and which deal with the duties of the office. I hardly think it is worth wlrle to go over them all in detail.


Mr. GOURLEY.: Read the by-law about membership.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I have just read that. My hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) suggested that the word ' shall ' be substituted for ' may.' I think that is wise. My hon. friend from Bothwell (Mr. Clancyl asks whether honorary members have the power of voting and controlling the organization. I think that power ought not to be given to honorary members. Any person who does not wish to join the asso-cation and pay his fee I do not think should have the power of voting and perhaps controlling the association. I would suggest that a change should be made in these by-laws.


James Clancy: Has the hon. gentlemau under his hand the by-law which relates to the issue of certificates of registration ? That is a very important matter.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Yes, as regards registration of seeds it says :
There will be three distinct classes of registration for seed :
1.	In the hand-selected class there will he registered as ' hand-selected registered seed,'

only seed obtained from beads selected by hand from the plants relatively the most vigorous and productive on a registered hand-selected seed plot of at least the third year. The registration certificate 1 hand-selected registered seed ' will show the number of years of antecedent selection, as for instance, ' hand-selected registered seed of the fourth year ' or the tenth year as the case may be. Such seed will be suitable for use oil hand-selected seed plots to produce ' improved registered seed.'
2.	In the improved class there will be registered as ' improved registered seed ' only grain obtained from a crop produced from hand-selected registered seed. The registration certificate of improved registered seed will show the number of years of antecedent selection of the crop from which it was obtained, as for instance, ' improved registered seed from a crop of the third year ' or of the tenth year as the case may be. Such seed will be suitable for use on improved seed plots to produce ' general crop registered seed.'
3.	In the general crop class there will be registered as ' general crop registered seed ' only seed obtained from a crop produced from improved registered seed. Such seed will be suitable for use for the general crop of the farm, and the product from it will not be eligible for registration.
That is the rule in regard to the registration of seed as proposed. I may say that the gentlemen who drew up these rules have been engaged in the production of selected seeds for three or four years. About four years ago Sir William Macdonald, of Montreal, offered a certain sum to be distributed in prizes amongst people who would select seed, hand packing it, selecting it and growing it under certain rules and regulations. These people have more or less multiplied and the seed that has been produced from their hand selected seed has been sold as such seed. It is partly out of that that the Seed Growers' Association has grown. The work has been carried on very largely under the direction of Prof. Robertson, who has been entrusted by Sir William Macdonald with the administration of the fund offered for prizes.


James Clancy: How is the certificate perpetuated or transferred from one holder of the seed to another ? For instance the seed may undergo a change by passing tliroug'h three or four hands and yet it is the same seed. I have heard no provision or rules so far by which that certificate will pass from one person to another. It is the same seed, but how will you preserve its identity until it is finally disposed of for sowing- purposes ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: It would have to be accompanied by a ticket or certificate, the grower having just so many tickets for so many bushels. In the event of a man raising fifty bushels of a certain seed he would get fifty tickets. Each one of them would accompany a bushel of seed and if the seed passed through two or three hands Mr. FISHER.
more it would be accompanied by a ticket in the same way as when an animal is sold it is accompanied by a certificate.


James Clancy: Would the certificate issued to the grower be a sufficient warrant in the hands of the second holder or in the hands of the next person to establish the identity of the seed ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Fraud might occur in the substitution of ordinary seed for selected seed by one or other of the persons through whose hands it passes, but there is in the Act a clause providing penalties for a fraud of this kind just in the same way as the law operates in regard to animals. A man may buy a registered animal, the animal may die and he may substitute another 'animal and pass it on, but if he does so-ha (will be committing a fraud in which case he will be liable to penalties. I do not think there would be any more danger in regard to this than there is in regard to live stock. Any safeguard that it is possible to invent will be invented to prevent such fraud. That will have to be a detail of the regulations of the association.


Mr. BRUCE.: How is such a certificate obtained in the first place ? Is there any government supervision over the grower or do you take his word for it ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The association would have to send an inspector before issuing the registration certificate. The association by-laws would provide machinery by which under certain conditions the association could issue the registration certificate.


Francis Carmichael Bruce: Is it the intention that the seed of 140 growers shall be accumulated in one place and distributed from there, or is it intended to allow the grower to sell it as he pleases ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: It will not be accumulated in one place. The grower distributes his own seed under the rules of the association.	_


Mr. COCHRANE.: I understand the hon. minister to say that the plan upon which this Bill is based has been in operation for some years. What has been the result in connection with this seed that has been hand-picked ? Has the result been such as would warrant any outlay in regard to this subject ? Have the crops been more productive ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: The observation of the Macdonald Seed Growers' Association is that the increase has been 19 per cent. The result of selection of seed for three years has been 19 per cent in regal'd to the number of seeds per head, and 27 per cent in the actual increase of production per year.


Edward Cochrane: Has that been ascertained by actual measurement or weight ; or is it imagination ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Actual test.


Edward Cochrane: It appears to me that you are incorporating a hotly of men who might perpetrate a good deal of fraud on the unsuspecting public.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I suppose there is possibility of fraud in almost anything.


Edward Cochrane: Is there not a probability there would be ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I do not think so. For six years there has been a corn growers' association in the United States, and the result is an increase of 50 per cent in the production from those seeds which were selected and registered.


Edward Cochrane: I hope the Bill may result in good, but there is a good deal of nonsense in this paternalism as if you were dealing with a class of men who did not know how to conduct their business. From my earliest recollection I knew that you could increase productiveness by changing your seed and by selecting it so as to get larger kernels. The farmers know all that without any paternalism from an association that is given power to defraud the public and that very likely will, unless human nature changes.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: That may be true, but the organization will enable them to do their work successfully.


Edward Cochrane: Farmers know their business as well as most people and they do not want any organization to tell them. This society cannot give them any better seed than they themselves could get If they took care.


Seymour Eugene Gourley: I have had a letter since I came here asking me what kind of punishment could be inflicted on a merchant who sold seed oats which was mixed with seed of every imaginable kind of trash. In Nova Scotia we have to depend on the people of Ontario for our seed, and I am very anxious that this Bill shall go through, if it will bring about the result hoped for. Most people are not good judges of seed and they have to trust to the seed dealer, and we know that bad seed is sold all over the country. The hon. member (Mr. Cochrane) is quite correct that there may be fraud but if the Bill will help in any way to give us good seed, I shall be glad to see it passed.


Haughton Lennox: The committee is liable to be misled by what is read from these proposed rules as distinguished from what the Bill actually says. The minister told us that any person who was engaged in the (growing of seed would be eligible for membership in this association, but the Bill says: 'Any person ' and does not restrict it to seed-growers. Five dishonest men or five exceptionally honest men, as, for instauce, five lawyers, could form themselves into a seedgrowers association so far as the Bill goes. Any men who want to get control of this matter and exact for themselves undue profits from the farmers, can associate themselves together under this Bill. We may not always have the happiness and blessing of having the present Minister of Agriculture ; we may have some other Minister of Agriculture, and he has power to give these associations what they ask. Again, although the Bill is said to be mainly for seed-growers' associations, and although that is in the title of the Bill, there is not one word in the Bill itself to show that it has any connection with seed-growing. The men who associate themselves together need not grow one pound of seed. They are simply an association for the purpose of keeping records- not a seed-growers' association or an association of farmers, but simply a speculative monopoly of persons not necessarily connected with production of any kind. The minister said I had overlooked the 5th section. I did not overlook it ; but there is not one word in that section about the growing of seeds. The association may be controlled solely by a monopoly, and the only safeguard we have against that is the control of the minister. I say again that I am distinctly and positively opposed to this skeleton legislation and to giving the minister the power, not simply of framing one set of rules, but of framing a new set of rules for every association that may want to be incorporated. I am casting no reflection on the present Minister of Agriculture;
I am speaking of the matter in the abstract. It is too much power to give to any one man. It is the equivalent of delegating to a minister of the Crown power to say what shall be the laws of the country. As representing a rural constituency, I particularly object, on behalf of the farmers, to allowing any Minister of Agriculture to say what shall be the rules in regard to the main basis of the success of the farmer, namely, the seed which he shall put into his ground from year to year, and the price which he shall pay for that seed. I am not in harmony with this everlasting evidence of paternalism. I have faith in the intelligence of the farmers. I believe they have got along very well in the past. They are one of the main elements which have gone to make this country what it is, and there is no need of our everlastingly legislating for them and keeping them in leading strings, as the minister seems to want to do from time to time. A perusal of the Bill is sufficient to convince me that it does not express the ideas that are set forth in the by-laws which have been submitted to the committee or the ideas that have been enunciated by the minister himself. It is loose, careless and indefinite. I do not say this for the purpose of being offensive, I say it because I am bound to say what I believe to be the truth in

regard to this Bill. In a new matter of this kind some excuse may reasonably be urged; but the main objection to the Bill is that it places too much power in the hands of the minister, and takes away entirely from parliament that control which parliament should have and is bound to exercise on all occasions in regard to the rights of the people.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: Far be it from me to wish to arrogate to myself or to any minister or to the department any powers which are not proper or for which there is not a sufficient precedent. The form of this Bill is the form which has been adopted in regard to agricultural associations of all kinds. If the hon. gentleman will take the trouble to look at the various Acts dealing with agriculture and live stock societies, he will find that the principles embodied in this Bill are practically the same as those which have already been crystallized in legislation, not only of this but of local parliaments dealing with similar work. There is no new proposal in arrogating authority to the minister of the department in this Bill. Various suggestions have been made which are of considerable value. The hon. member for Lanark (Mr. Haggart) and the hon. member for Toronto West (Mr. Osier) have made suggestions which can he incorporated in the Bill, and I would ask that the committee rise and report progress and ask leave to sit again in order that I may prepare one or two amendments suggested and which it will be desirable to insert in the Bill.


Mr. GILMOUR.: Is this Bill merely for the purpose of registration, or does it go further ? Will it give powder for the sale of seeds ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: No, it is merely for the purpose of legislation.


Haughton Lennox: Will there be any fee for the certificates ?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: That will be decided by 1lie association itself just as is done in the case of registration of live stock.


James Gilmour: How can you compare the two ? Live stock continues, the animals registered are continued, but the seed must perish before being reproduced. We should know the conditions under which registration shall be continued. They ought to be set out in the Bill.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: It would make the Act very cumbersome indeed to embody in it all the by-laws and regulations under which certificates can be issued.


James Gilmour: I think it absolutely necessary. This gives very wide powers,' and we do not know where we are going to begin or end.
Progress reported.


SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES.
Thomas Simpson Sproule: I understood that we were .to have the supplementary estimates today.


Haughton Lennox: Will the hon. Finance Minister tell us when he is going to lay them on the table ?


William Stevens Fielding: In the preparation of the estimates there is always the possibility of delay, and I doubt if they will be down until to-morrow. I cannot promise definitely, but I hope to lay them on the table to-night or to-morrow.
At one o'clock, House took recess.
House resumed at Three o'clock.


WEIGHING OF DAIRY PRODUCTS IN MONTREAL.
Hon.  W. S.@: FIELDING (Minister of Finance) moved that the House go into Committee of Supply.


Mr. RUFUS H. POPE.: Mr. Speaker, be fore you leave the chair, I wish to call tlm attention of the House to a subject of great importance to the farming community, especially to that portion of the farming community that is engaged in dairying. And I shall conclude my remarks with a motion. For many years there has been a great grievance with regard to the manner of weighing dairy products shipped from the port of Montreal. This grievance i felt especially by the eastern townships and by the eastern portion of the province ot Ontario. The urgency of the case was made apparent to the government some) three years ago, when they issued a royal commission, addressed to W. G. Parmelee, Deputy Minister of Trade and Commerce, for the investigation of this matter. At the beginning of the session I endeavoured to get some information in connection with the matter. Over two years have elapsed since Mr. Parmelee held this commission. It was felt-and rightly felt-by the farming community who are interested in the sale of dairy products that their affairs are handled in a neglectful way, not at all in keeping, with their importance. For two years this matter has been hanging fire since Mr. Parmelee was appointed. Early in the session I took the opportunity to put the following questions
1.	Was there a commission appointed to investigate the weighing of butter and cheese ?
2.	If so, when was this commission appointed, and what was the name of the person or persons who constituted the commission ?
3.	At what places, if any, did the commission hold sittings ?
4.	Did they take evidence, and were reporters and newspaper representatives admitted ?
5.	Has the commission reported ? ^f not, why not ?
6.	At whose request was the commission appointed ?
This question was answered as follows :


Rt. Hon. Sir RICHARD CARTWRIGHT (Minister of Trade and Commerce) :: 1.	Yes.
2.	The commission was dated the 7th December, 1901. Mr. W. G. Parmelee, Deputy

Minister of Trade and Commerce, was the person appointed.
3.	Sittings were held at Montreal, St. Hya-cinthe, Victoriaville, Brockville, and Cowans-ville.
4.	Evidence was .taken. Reporters and newspaper representatives were present during the sittings at Montreal. None appeared at any of the other sittings.
5.	Yes.
6.	The commission was appointed in consequence of numerous complaints having reached the government re the weighing of butter and cheese.
You will notice, Mr. Speaker, that the Tight hon. Minister Of Trade and Commerce {Sir Richard Cartwright) stated that reporters and newspaper representatives were present at the sittings in Montreal. I had heard that that was not the case, that they were not permitted to be present. And so when I received this answer from the Minister of Trade and Commerce I took the opportunity of communicating with twc newspaper men in Montreal, the first was the reporter of the ' Gazette ' on that occasion. I received his answer as follows :
Reporters were not admitted, but were handed a prepared statement by Parmelee after the examination was over each day.
I also applied to Mr. Paul, of the ' Star,' and received the same answer in the shape of an affidavit. So it is evident that the answer given me by the Minister of Trade and Commerce is not in accordance with the facts. As the right hon. gentleman told me that the report had been made by Mr. Parmelee, I wrote to the right hon. gentleman (Sir Richard Cartwright) and asked him if he would be good enough to send me a copy. The right hon. gentleman replied That he would be very pleased to do so, but that the report was not in his hands ; it was in the hands of the Minister of Agriculture, and I would have to apply to that hon. gentleman. At that time it was rather surprising. But since then we have been afforded an opportunity to learn how the departments are being run in couples, so we are not at all surprised when we are sent from one department to another for information. So I wrote to the Minister of Agriculture. And, on the 27th May, eleven days after my letter to him, I received the following answer :
Department of Agriculture, Minister's Office, Ottawa, May 27th, 1904.
Dear Sir,-Yours of the 16th Instant would have been replied to earlier but that the report for which you asked was one in the Trade and Commerce Department. I have obtained it and have had a copy made so as to afford you the courtesy of receiving it before the order of the House Is passed as by your motion. I may add that I shall be very glad to facilitate the passage of the motion when it is reached.
Yours truly,


SYDNEY FISHER.
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R H. Pope, Esq., M.P.,
House of Commons, Ottawa.
The motion referred to was one calling for all the documents in connection with this matter. The only thing I have received in answer to that motion Is a copy of that report. However, we on this side are accustomed to treatment of that kind from the government. Of course, the government is necessarily the custodian of documents relating to public matters. When we, as an opposition, seek to perform our duties in criticising the acts of the government, and those for whom they are responsible, we can only do so on the information contained in documents in the charge of the government. It is evident that in the public interest that information should be furnished promptly. But that is not the treatment that has been accorded to the apposition by the government of the day since they came into power. On many occasions we "have had to piece out the information as best we could, or wait until the government was pleased to furnish it. I presume that I will have to wait until next year for full information with regard to that matter to be forthcoming. However, there is sufficient in the report of Mr. Parmelee to warant me in the conclusion that the government have been neglectful of the best interests of th >
farming community. This matter was very earnestly brought before the government and the people of Canada by Mr. Bull, a gentleman with whom the Minister of Agriculture was acquainted, for I found that that hon. gentleman gave Mr. Bull a certificate of character. So far as I am concerned, I have practically no acquaintance with Mr. Bull. I met him here once when he called attention to this matter, and he furnished me with certain information he had received from the Minister of Agriculture and others, as well as with many letters to him congratulating him on making the move in the matter five or six years ago. The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Fisher) said of Mr. Bull in 1902 :
Having known Mr. Bull for a long time personally, although not connected with him in any business way, I gave him that letter of introduction. Mr. Bull appears to have presented the letter to the High Commissioner's office and to have received a letter from Mr. Colmer, secretary to the High Commissioner, introducing him to certain people with whom he wished to open business relations.
He also said :
He has been a produce dealer there, and has done a good deal of buying and selling of butter and cheese in Montreal. He informed me that he wished to open direct communication with the old country and it was for that purpose that he asked from me a letter of introduction to the High Commissioner, so that when he went to England he might have somebody to whom to refer. Mr. Aaron Bull, whose name is mentioned there, is one of the most respectable and substantial farmers of my county, a gentleman whom I could trust and rely on in every shape and way ; an old Quaker, if I may use the term, whose
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Dame is noted for integrity and substantial standing in the community in which he lives. Mr. Charles A. Bull is his son, and he is a young man who, as I say, went to Montreal some years ago to enter business, and who, as far as I know, has conducted himself in a proper and trustworthy way.
So I take it for granted that Mr. Bull, being a trustworthy person, according to the Minister of Agriculture, I may have confidence in statements he may have made to me. It is not necessary for me to put on record all the letters and copies of letters from the various parts of the dairying sections of Quebec and eastern Ontario in order to show the absolute need of this investigation and of some change in the law. That would take a long time and would serve no good purpose. Sufficient to say that they ' are here in any number. The existence of them is known, no doubt, to the Minister of Agriculture and those who take an interest in this question. I find that the Minister of Agriculture, in 1900, in replying to the letter of Mr. Bull, said :
About the city weighers. I am not sure 1 could appoint a man to weigh the butter. I could, however, perhaps authorize somebody like Ruddick to be a referee in cases of dispute. If you or anybody else will work up a case such as you describe in general terms there is no doubt we could make such a row about it that either the local government or I would have to appoint a weigher. Instances such as you give me, if in detail as to dates, &c., and accompanied by such certificates carefully prepared and tabulated, would present such a case before the dairy associations or before the Butter and Cheese Board that they could not help acting.
That was the opinion of the Minister of Agriculture in 1900. He felt that he was corresponding with a man of some consequence and worthy of his confidence. This is further shown by the fact that it was since then that the minister gave Mr. Bull the certificate of character to which I have referred. Now, we find that, on 27th March, 1901, he says :
I have yours of 25th March. It is of the utmost importance that you should send me at once all the papers on the short weight matter.
So, back in 1901, three years ago, this was a matter of urgency in the best interest ot the farmers of this country, and deserved immediate attention. And when I read this report, although the evidence upon which it was based was taken behind closed doors, without any of the frankness about the investigation that ought to have been manifested, it becomes clear that enough was known to warrant the commissioner in making this report, and to warrant the government in seeking to make a change in the system of weighing. However, after three years there does not seem to be the same urgency about the matter. The minister says in another letter to Mr. Bull :
Rufus Henry Pope: Department of Agriculture,
Ministers's Office,
Ottawa, April 20th, 1901.


Charles A.: Bull, Esq.,
441 St. Paul Street,
Montreal.
My dear Bull,-I have yours of the 16th. I find your statement and the papers you sent me so-utterly inadequate that I will have to try and work it out with you personally if I can in any way succeed in getting a definite or clear statement from you. I have not had a moment's time in which I could do it this week. As soon as I have it I will send for you, but there is no use of your coming up here when I can't see you. In the meantime, I have written to the Board of Trade asking for a list of those authorized to-weigh. I have looked up the law and found just who is empowered and authorized to appoint all weighers in Montreal. I find that McLeod is not so authorized. I have written to him asking on what authority he puts his advertisement in the paper and weighs butter and chee3e. I am-moving in the matter as fast as I -possibly can, and the reason of any delay that there is, is because you have not been able to give a clear and definite statement which would be of any use in a public discussion in a matter of this kind.
Yours sincerely,



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Consequently he still feels on the 20tli of April, 1901, that there is reason for immediate action. We find again in April of the same year :
I am now in a position, after correspondence with the various authorities to state that Mr. John McLeod has no official status.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, notwithstanding that this man has no official standing and has no right from a legal standpoint to do so, he is allowed to continue to weigh butter and cheese from that time to this; and when this parliament is just closing, and without action on the part of this government, that man who has no status, that gentleman who is paid-so I understand it, by the men who are actually buying butter and cheese, the man who has no reason to favour the farmer and has every reason to favour the gentlemen who are handling that product at the expense of the farmer- that gentleman still keeps on weighing. The correspondence w-il-1 show, as I proceed, the unfairness of the system under which this product is handled, and I shall convince every lion, gentleman in this House that it is a shame that this parliament closes without giving some relief, and some better assurance that the farmers will be treated honestly. I find this report is dated the 22nd of October, and it gives a list of the names of all those men who are entitled to be weighers, and it does not include Mr. McLeod. Then on May 11, the minister writes to Mr. Bull :
I have yours of the 10th In regard to the meeting at Brockville. I have really nothing to add to what I have already stated. My statements are categorical and I defy anybody to challenge their accuracy. I have

*written to Mr. Hodgson on exactly the same lines as I wrote yourself and Benham, with the exception that in my letter to him I replied to his letter to me and consequently may have used some words slightly different, but the sense is the same as I wrote you. I have already said that the only legal and official weighers are Mr. Cameron and his assistants and that nobody else has any official or legal standing. The law authorizes nobody but the Board of Trade to make these appointments. I therefore cannot make an appointment without a change of the law.
He recognized on May 11, 1901, that we should have a change in the law. Of course this correspondence is very unsatisfactory, as you can understand, because I have not the letters that Mr. Bull wrote, I have not the arguments he advanced, I am not in possession of the information that warranted Mr. Bull in writing as he did to the Minister of Agriculture. But as I proceed you will see an estrangement taking place between him and the Minister of Agriculture. This is very near the beginning of it, when he writes him this peremptory letter. But he admits' here that there should be a change in the law. Then on October 5, the minister writes to Mr. Bull :
I have yours of the 1st October. I have not been able as yet to see my colleagues about this matter, consequently cannot give you any information.
And that was previous to his taking charge of the Department of Militia. You can imagine how busy he has been, when he has the care not only of his own department, but the management and superintendence of the Department of Militia. Then his private secretary writes under date of October 19 :
Referring to your letter of the 18th, I write to inform you that Mr. Fisher left yesterday for Knowlton to return here only on Wednesday next. If the matter of short weights is of immediate importance to you, you had better address him there, although I doubt whether he could attend to it before he returns.
Perhaps he is too busy selecting officers down at Knowlton. The minister writes on October 30 to Mr. Bull :
I beg to acknowledge receipt of yours of the 18th October. I expect to see Sir Richard Cartwright in connection with subject-matter of your communication in a few days
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' This was on October 30, 1901, and it has taken him a year to go across and see Sir Richard Cartwright, although he recognized in the very beginning that this was a matter of importance, a matter of urgency that should be attended to immediately.
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when I will write you the result of our
interview.
Then his secretary writes on November 22, to Mr. Bull :
Mr. Fisher left here this morning for his home to return probably on Tuesday, when your letter of the 21st will be laid before him.
I fear you are acting too hastily, if you are espousing the best interests of the farmers concerned. Mr. Fisher is at the present time actively engaged upon the very matter which you wish to give prematurely to the public. Communications of the greatest importance are actually passing between him and the Department of Trade and Commerce
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Think of that.
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with a view to finding some substantial:
solution.
Two ministers putting their heads together, working determinedly on November 22, 1901, and we are talking now in July, 1904, and nothing done yet. This is the friend of the farmer, the practical farmer advertised by his leader throughout the country, working industriously as a farmer knows how to work, coupled with the ability of the Minister of Trade and Commerce-two great departments working yoke in yoke ; and still at the end of four years we are precisely where we were when we began, excepting that Mr. Parmelee has made a report. He reports on the number of pounds of cheese that this system is cheating them out of, and has been for several years :
Mr. Fisher expects to have before him upon his return to Ottawa a reply from Sir Richard Cartwright
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Sir Richard is going to write him. Is'nt it funny ?
-in answer to his own letter of the 18th.	!
Is'nt that splendid ?
It would indeed be a pity to have his well directed efforts marred even ever so little-by such an ill-timed communication as you seem prepared to give to the press. '
This gentleman, after working two or three years, is getting uneasy when he realizes the farmers' loss through the delay. He knew of the complaints against the system by which the farmers were being cheated out of their money. He was aware of it, no man in a better position to know, no man, according to the certificate of character and integrity given by the Minister of Agriculture, had any better right. Then on December 4:
I have yours of December 3rd.' You will have to learn patience. Royal commissions are not issued in a day, in a week or in a month, very often.
Think of the little minister writing that.
The government has a good deal else to do. This is a matter I have been trying to bring, before the government and have it arranged for. As it happens, I think it is now completed, but until it is completed I am not going to tell you or anybody else what is being-done
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Secret.
-nor can I, as that is a matter which is confidential and cannot be talked about.
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Cannot be talked about. Silence. The farmer can be beaten all this time, no trouble about that, and it was not a secret.
a mess and make a very bad appearance before the commissioner. I hope that you will take care about this.
As soon as anything can be told I will tell . you.
Yours very truly,

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This is lovely. Now December 16, 1901 :
C. A- Bull, Esq., Gould Cold Storage Building, Montreal.
He has got frozen by waiting, December is a cold month.
In order to prepare for the work of the commission when it sits, Mr. Fisher would like you to be good enough to supply him with a list of those who have made complaints in regard to the weighing of butter and cheese, together with their addresses. When Mr. Fisher returns from a trip which he is just undertaking to the maritime provinces he will probably address a circular letter to those complainants and probably to others.
That is if he has time, if he is not too .severely pressed, if he does not have to attend to military matters, if he does not have to conduct correspondence with the Minister of Trade and Commerce, if he has not anything else to do lie may address a circular in the interests of the farmers of this country, to somebody.
Perhaps you can have this ready before the return of the minister to Ottawa, say next Thursday or Friday. In making out the list of complainants you might give separately the names of corporate bodies, as a different circular letter will probably have to be written to them.
Then on December 16, the minister writes to Mr. C. A. Bull, Esq., Gould Cold Storage building, Montreal.
My dear Bull,-An Order in Council of December 7 appoints Mr. Parmelee. Deputy Minister of Trade and Commerce, a commissioner for the purpose of investigating the matter of weighing butter and cheese in Montreal and elsewhere. Mr. Parmelee will not be able to take the matter up until the month of January some time. In the meantime you and those interested must prepare yourselves to come before him where the advertisement of his sitting as commissioner is made. I need not insist upon it to you that you must be prepared with a good case or else things will go against you.
All right.
You will have to move your people to prepare themselves to give their evidence concisely and clearly. As a matter of friendly advice you yourself ought to write out every word you wish to say. You cannot speak clearly when you come to speak to other people. You get excited and are liable to be misunderstood. I therefore would strongly urge you to prepare what you want to say, "write it over and work It over, correct it and condense it, and then read it when you come before Mr. Parmelee. If you do not do this, knowing you as I do, I know you will get into Mr. POPE.
An hon. MEMBER.: Who says that 7


Rufus Henry Pope: This is signed by ' Sydney Fisher ' writing to his friend. Well, he did not make any mess of it because I have a letter from Mr. Parmelee the member for Shefford in which he says :
Your evidence is splendid and I am going to publish it. I got Cleary to go in. Others have promised to go into Cowansville. I fancy we will be able to make out a case strong enough to justify remedial legislation.
Evidently this poor man, thanks to the kindly advice of the hon. Minister of Agriculture, got through with the ordeal with credit to himself. Then, on January 4, we find the following :
Ottawa, January 4, 1902.
My dear Bull,-I have yours of the 3rd instant and thank you for the information contained therein.
The chief reason our eastern township's beef is worth so much less on the market is that it is from dairy stock and only half fed. The western beef is nearly all from the beef breeds and consequently is more suited for that object. This we can hardly help, as our live stock work is chiefly dairy work, but dairymen might feed their animals better and get them into better shape.
As to Mr. Parmelee's investigations-I hope to see him within a few days and let you know just what he is going to do. Be sure and be ready for him when the time comes. I got your letters all right.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER.


Mr.  C. A.@: Gould Cold Storage Building,
Montreal, P Q.
That was in 1902. Time moves on. From one year to another we go and this cor-lespondenee is the only means of relief. I think I shall have to send this bundle to the farmers of Canada to show them the measure of relief which they have obtained within the last few years.
Ottawa, January 8th, 1902.
'My dear Bull,-I have your letter December 26th Inclosing list of complainants, for which accept my thanks. I will see Mr. Parmelee as soon as possible and find out when he will be able to hold the meeting.
I am sorry to hear of your illness, but trust you are all right again.
Yours sincerely,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER. Charles A. Bull, Esq.,
Gould Cold Storage Building,
Montreal, Quo.
Then, this is the circular that is spoken of in these letters.
Ottawa, January 16th, 1902.
Dear Sir,-Borne time ago a number of complaints were laid before me in which statements were made as to the weighing of butter and cheese in the city of Montreal. These complaints

appeared to be of such a serious nature that I, as Minister of Agriculture, felt it my duty to look into the subject.
I found that the question at issue seemed to be more nearly in the domain of the Minister of Trade and Commerce, who in a general way has charge of the inspection of goods in Canada.
He never thought of that in the beginning.
I therefore consulted with Sir Richard Cartwright and with others of my colleagues. Various things contributed to delay action, but a short time ago an Order in Council was passed appointing a Royal Commission co investigate the whole subject, with a view to ascertaining the exact facts, and if necessary making a recommendation based on these facts which would guide the government and parliament in future action.


Mr.  W. G.@: Parmelee, Deputy Minister of Trade and Commerce, has been named Royal Commissioner. He has arranged to sit for the purpose of investigation in the city of Montreal in the officfe of Mr. Craig, chief grain inspector, Room 42, Canadian Pacific Railway Telegraph Building, corner of St. Francois-Xavier and Hospital streets, opening his investigation at ten o'clock on the morning of Tuesday, January 28th, continuing, if necessary, on Wednesday the 29th. He will also sit at St. Hyacinthe on Thursday the 30th and at Vietcfriaville on Friday the 31st, at Brockville on Tuesday, 4th February, and at Cowansville on Tuesday the 11th February ; commencing at nine o'clock in the forenoon in all these smaller places.
As you have submitted some views on this matter I must request you to take pains to appear before the commissioner and give expression to your views and any facts which bear upon the subject, and if amongst your acquaintances and friends or neighbours there are any who can give information of value bearing upon this subject, I must ask you to urge their attendance, so that the fullest possible information may be obtained in an accurate and trustworthy form.
The subject is one of great consequence to the producers of dairy products and all those engaged in these goods. It is, therefore, of the utmost national importance that the whole truth in regard to this matter should be obtained, as otherwise some mistake might be made in future legislation or departmental action. Relying on your interest in the matter and public spirit to induce you to appear and give what information is at your command.
Mr. Speaker, that Information was given away back in 1902 and we are now going on towards the close of 1904. The question that was of national importance as the hon. Minister of Agriculture said in his circular to these people has been neglected to this hour. We are fit the closing of this session. Yet no legislation has been proposed and these wrongs that have been perpetrated upon the farming community for all these years are to continue for another year and indefinitely so far as the farmers of this country are aware. Then, the next letter is as follows :
Ottawa, Jan. 18, 1902.
My dear Bull,-In reply to yours of yesterday, if Mr. Parmelee requires more days to appear in Montreal he will take them later on, but he will judge of that himself when he
goes there. Do not go into too many details in the evidence, although of course you must take steps to show anything that is wrong for which there is fair complaint.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER. Chas. A. Bull, Esq.,
Room 8, 17 St. John St.,
Montreal, P.Q.
He says to Mr. Bull that if you know anything wrong which is a subject of fair complaint why tell it, but be careful and not tell too much. To show you the character of this investigation I will now read a statement signed by Mr. A. C. Cross as follows : WHITEWASHING.
To the editor of the ' Witness.'
Sir,-In to-day's issue of a morning paper it is announced that the Deputy Minister of Trade and Commerce is to proceed this morning with an inquiry into that long-standing controversy about the system of weighing cheese.
Those who do the weighing will see the notice, and, by taking a few steps, can appear before the commissioner. The farmers whose cheese is to be weighed, will probably know nothing about the inquiry until it is over. Under such circumstances, what else can be expected but the time honoured whitewash of the Butter and Cheese Association, followed by lots of cheap denunciation in parliament of those who assail the honour of reputable Montreal citizens.
Perhaps we shall hear some support of these reputable Montreal citizens to-day.
I now learn that the commissioner has just announced that newspaper reporters are not to be admitted to the sittings because the apartment in Mr. E. F. Craig's office is not large enough.
When I asked the right hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce if such was the case he said that they were there but when X asked the gentleman who represented the papers, they said that they were not allowed in, that they were only furnished with a prepared report. Well, there is evidence in that of a want of veracity in this country.
This is not the way to satisfy farmers that when they sell a hundred pounds of cheese they will be paid for a handred pounds instead of for the number of pounds which the purchaser chooses to say that there are according to a rule of his own making.
Mr. Parmelee says to Mr. Bull :
Ottawa, Feb. 26, 1902.


Mr.  C. A.@: Bull, Esq.,
17 St. John St., Montreal.
Sir,-I have yours of yesterday's date asking to send you the report of the Butter and Cheese Association.
I do not find it in my possession-I presume it is among Mr. Broderick's papers which I cannot get at present. When it turns up I will send it to you.
Yes, I am going back to Montreal but I cannot state at what date.
I have the honour to be, sir,
Your obedient servant,
(Sgd.) W. G. PARMELEE,
Deputy Minister-

Mr. Broderick seems to have disappeared with his papers. I do not know whether Mr. Parmelee ever got them back or not. There was some difficulty, I believe, in connection with the secretary of that commission. He took occasion to disappear.
Ottawa, March 7th, 1902.
Dear Mr. Bull,-Mr. Fisher has handed me your letter of March 5th, requesting me to send you the pamphlets on the food products of Canada, as you request. This I have done.
In regard to the transmitting of the notes of the Royal Commission, not much progress has yet been made, but the matter is receiving Mr. Fisher's daily attention.
Tours sincerely,
(Sgd.) KEVILLE DOHERTY, Private secretary.
C. A. Bull, Esq.,
Room 8, 17 St. John St.,
Montreal, P.Q.
This letter was written on March 7th, 1902. We are now in July, 1904. The hon. Minister of Agriculture was, as far back as 1902, giving his daily attention to the transcribing of these notes and still the report of that commission Is not yet printed or published for the benefit of the farmers of Canada. He must be working over time. Then there is another letter :
Ottawa, 27th March, 1903. Chas. A. Bull, Esq.,
117 King St., * Montreal.
Sir,-In answer to yours of yesterday's date, I beg to state that I am in hopes to be able to make up a report on the investigation in question at an early date.
It is true Mr. Fisher, before leaving, requested me to have a report ready as soon as possible after the meeting of the House ; but so far it has been an utter impossibility for me to devote the time to it necessary. Every moment has been taken up. The parties so anxious for a report will have to abide with patience

Patience began away back in 1900, it is continuing on the 27th March, 1903, it still continues and the farmers of this country must abide in patience while these people dock their cheese and butter to an extent that no other country would tolerate.
The parties so anxious for a report will have to abide with patience until an opportunity presents itself when I can get a day or two to spare which will be used in going through the papers again and making up the report, which really should have been made up some time ago.
I have the honour to be, sir,
Your obedient servant,
(Sgd.) W. G. PARMELEE, Deputy Minister.
I should think it ought.
Ottawa, July 8th, 1903.
My dear Bull :-I have just received your letter of the 7th July, and I must say that I am very much surprised at the tone of it.
I would just like to see that letter ; I suppose it is one of those patient letters Mr, POPE.
that the minister had been asking him to write.
I have done all I possibly could, both for you and for the cause which you have worked in.
Think of that, and he did not do anything.
I count upon you to do everything you can to prevent any party capital being made from it.
Eh ? Cute ; see him smiling.
The matter of the report is such that I cannot force it on, although I am trying my best to get Mr. Parmelee to bring it to a close. You can do a good deal no doubt to allay any difficulties which may arise and it would be very unfortunate if you were to try to raise any.
Yes ; he kept these farmers waiting while they were beaten on every box of cheese and butter, and he advised them to be patient, resting calmly in the serene satisfaction that they had him for their representative and it would be all right.
What you say in regard to Mr. Parmelee I am sure is quite unjustified, as he is a true friend to farmers and the dairymen, I am sure that you have misjudged him in what you say in regard to him.
This is not a personal matter as between you and anybody else, but is a matter of consequence to all farmers, and must be dealt with in a broad and proper way.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER.
What a shame for the Minister of Agriculture to sit there, who has no right to be there except as a farmer, and yet dabbling In many tilings he has no business to stick his nose into. I am now reading a letter dated July 8th, 1903, two years after the investigation and three years after the Minister of Agriculture himself acknowledged that it was an urgent matter of national importance. You can see by the letters I have been reading, that if we had the whole of this correspondence it would be more interesting. Mr. Bull, who lives down there, and can appreciate things that we do not know of, knows that it is rumored in our section of the country that the great exporters of this produce brought a strong influence to bear, to suppress the report, and Mr. Bull goes so far as to say that it was an improper influence. I am not in a position to say that it was an improper influence, but I know that some extraordinary influence was brought to bear of a political character in order to prevent this report coming out as it ought to in the interests of the farmers of this country.
Ottawa, July 23rd, 1903.
My dear Bull,-I just have yours of the 22nd instant in regard to your business matters.
The fact is I am very ignorant in regard to banking and the necessary commercial security to give for accommodation at banks. I do not know any bank manager in a business way


He was awfully lucky.
-and I cannot make a suggestion to you in regard to the matter.
Answering the last paragraph of your paper. Certainly do not try to trap people in the way you suggest. It would only make trouble for yourself in the future, and I do not think it would do any good to anybody, besides being a business I would not advise you to have anything to do with.
I will try to give you the names of some fruit men with whom you can communicate.
I am still trying to get Mr. Parmelee to make his report, but he is an old man, and it seems difficult to get him to move. He has a good deal to do during the session in his departmental wrork, and I suppose is putting that off.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER.
Wliat next ?
Dear Mr. Bull,-I have yours of July 28th.
I do not understand your reference to what you lost, as it is not at all clearly stated. I do not see from your statement that it has anything to do with the report of the government. I do not think it is possible for that report to be out in a week. You undertake in this letter to practically hold me up, as we commonly say, on such a matter. If this is the case I have nothing further to add.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER.
Here we have evidence of that warlike disposition that has induced the Minister of Agriculture to dabble in militia matters. He is brave behind his own pen in his own office, and he cannot understand that this gentleman, not a farmer, but representing the interests of the farmers, should say that a loss has been caused to the farmers by the action of the government. Talk about Mr. Bull holding him up ; it was the Minister of Agriculture who was holding the farmers up.
Ottawa, Aug. 7th, 1903.
Dear Mr. Bull,-I have just received your letter of the 5th August, and am making inquiry in regard to what you say in regard to Mr. Woodard.
In regard to the second paragraph of your letter, in which you seem to imply that the Ottawa authorities have been holding back the report on the weighing because of money having been paid to them-this is unworthy of you or anybody else. You ought to know that there is nothing of the kind in it. As to what you did in the matter, you know perfectly well that you did it of your own free will and of yourself. I tried to advise you as to what to do, but in many instances you did not follow my advice, and I cannot hold myself in any way responsible for what you did. Certainly at the time you did it I thought a great many of the things you did were ill-advised and not likely to accomplish any good.
Mr. Bull was only reporting what was current in Montreal.; How much direct evidence he had it is not for me to say, but he is a trustworthy man, as can be shown by the pedigree given him years ago by the Minister of Agriculture. Mr. Bull comes of
a trustworthy family ; he can be trusted beyond all question of doubt, and he writes thus to the Minister of Agriculture, and the minister is indignant :
Ottawa, Sept. 23rd, 1903.
Dear Sir,-I have yours of the 31st of August. I note that you did not speak to me the other day because you understood that I had hard feelings against you, and have expressed such in confidential letters to people.
No hard feelings ; I don't believe the Minister of Agriculture ever had Hard feelings against anybody.
I must say that this is not in any way true. I do not know what your authority is, but on the contrary I am very glad to do anything I possibly can within reason to help you. Many requests you have made to me are unreasonable and I cannot undertake to meet them.
In regard to your threat of the ' hotter time ' that I will have in the next election, I can tell you frankly it has no effect on me. I am not accustomed to submitting to such threats. I can assure you they have no weight with me in any way whatever.	.
Yours truly,
(Sgd.) SYDNEY FISHER.
No matter how much the farmers would suffer ; no matter how long they are kept waiting, the Minister of Agriculture is above everything of that sort. He is above attending to his official duties as Minister of Agriculture, but he is not above sticking his nose in the departments of other ministers. Now, Sir we will come to the report itself, and fhere is a letter to the Rt. Hon. Sir Richard Cartwright, G.C.M.G.-I don't see anything of the farmer in that title.
Sir, the undersigned having been, under authority of the Royal Commission, hearing date the 7th of December, 1901

And we are now speaking in 1904.
-appointed a commissioner ' to investigate, inquire into and report upon complaints and difficulties in connection with the weighing of butter and cheese,' has the honour to hand you for *the information of His Excellency the Governor General, this his report upon the result of such investigation ; the conclusions arrived at and his recommendations in connection therewith ; together with a copy of the evidence taken under oath or affirmation in the course of such investigation ; all as required under the terms of the said commission.
Of course we have not a copy of the evidence, as the documents were not brought down which I asked for. However, we are accustomed to that sort of treatment, and just as long as the people will put up with this treatment of their representatives, will that practice continue of debarring members from getting the information to which they are entitled and which they require in order to make their arguments conclusive.
Regular sittings were held at Montreal on the 28th and 29th days of January, at St. Hyacinths on the 30th, at Victoriaville on the 31st of the said month, at Brockville on the 4th, and at

Cowansville on the 11th days of February, 1902, at which places some forty-eight witnesses were duly sworn and examined touching the complaints referred to, and of their knowledge of the practices in vogue in connection with the weighing of butter and cheese at time of marketing the same.
Other written, as well as oral, information was sought and obtained, which, not being under oath, was not therefore transcribed or embodied in the evidence herewith submitted.
It does not say where that evidence conies from or on which side of the question it was.
It was at the time the intention of the undersigned to hold other sittings and investigations with a view to obtaining further evidence corroborative or otherwise of the sworn statements made and correspondence upon the subject, but circumstances prevented until too late in the season and such action was eventually abandoned as not being strictly necessary.
If it was necessary, there is no reason why it should have been abandoned because he had over a year in which to obtain evidence before making this report.
The complaints as set forth in the copy of the Report of the Committee of the Honourable the Privy Council alluded to as accompanying the Royal Commission are to effect that difficulties have frequently arisen and continue to arise in connection with the weighing of butter and cheese ; that the Butter and Cheese Association at Montreal has in its employ as a weigher a man not duly authorized under the statutes to act as such, and insist that his weights must be taken as correct and payments accepted on the basis thereof ; that his.weights are not always correct and that therefore the vendors being forced to accept such weights are at the mercy of the association and are compelled to accept less than their proper due were the weighing correctly done.
It is a well known fact that an old weighing beam was in use there for years. Whether it is in use now or not I cannot say, but it was in use for years, and it is well known that it was incorrect. The weigher had a new one made, but they thought it cost too much and they would riot take the trouble of putting in a new beam, so that they may still be continuing the old imperfect system.
The man referred to is Mr. John McLeod, who, it appears from the evidence submitted, styles and advertises himself a ' public weigher '-
But he Is not legally a public weigher, as shown by the letters of the Minister of Agriculture produced in his inquiry two of three years ago.
-and states that he was appointed as such by the Montreal Butter and Cheese Association in January, 1894, and who produced a notice of such appointment signed by the president, vicepresident and the secretary of the association.
These men who are handling that butter and cheese , because forsooth they chose to select this man to do the work for their personal benefit, styled him a public weigher.


Rufus Henry Pope: Would you, Mr. Speaker, think of shipping butter and cheese from the interior to Montreal when you know there is no fair arbitrator between the producer and the shipper ? The lack of such a fair arbitrator is sufficient in itself to breed discontent, dissatisfaction and mischief, even were the weighing correct, and we have very good reason to know it was not. In fact the very system adopted of making calculations is hound to make the result unfair to the men who are producing butter and cheese.
The present officials of the association deny any knowledge of such appointment. The president of the association, when under examination, styles Mr. McLeod a ' licensed public weigher, licensed by the city ' (vide pages 55 and 56 of evidence).
Which of course we have not got.
In a letter of date the 27th February, 1901, from the secretary of the association he points out that the public weighers are not appointed by the association. The president of the Montreal Board of Trade, nnder date April 15th, 1901, states that Mr. Duncan Cameron is the official weigher appointed by the council of the board and gives a list of his sworn assistants, among which does not appear the name of Mr. McLeod.
Pie is not even an assistant to the man recognized there as the weigher for the trade. He is not, I believe, as he should be an official of this country above suspicion, an impartial arbitrator between the farmers and the purchasers. He is not even an assistant to the man who holds the position there of weighmaster. Still he goes on from year to year :
Under date of the 23rd April, 1901, Mr. McLeod states that he was appointed deputy weigher for Montreal in May, 1878, and in a letter from the then president of the association of date the 1st April, 1901, it is stated that Mr. McLeod was sworn as assistant to Mr. Muirhead, Mr. Cameron's predecessor, in 1878, and has acted as an independent weigher since Mr. Muirhead's death in 1882 ; and that on the. formation of the association in 1893, it was deemed expedient to formally recognize both Mr. Cameron and Mr. McLeod as competent weighers, but their public position was not conferred on them by the association and it had not control over them.
It appears to the undersigned that notwithstanding the formal appointment of Mr. McLeod by the association in 1894, and the denials of such appointment subsequently made, the association has and does recognize Mr. McLeod as an official weigher

Think of that ! Between two and three million packages. Imagine.what a variation of a pound or two or even of a fraction of a pound means when you come to the handling of two or three million packages. No one can calculate the amount of money that has been lost to the farmers during the summer which is now in progress, though the government had this report dated 22nd of last October, showing the urgent need for a change. The recommendations of this report are not sufficiently strong. Still* they 231


REVISED
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are in the right direction. And, although this report was before the government on the 22nd of last October, they allow these thousands upon thousands of packages of butter and cheese to go out of this country, weighed by a man who has no official standing, who is repudiated by the dairymen of the province of Quebec and eastern Ontario, a man whom we do not believe to be honest whether he is or not.
Iu the handling of the immense quantity of butter and cheese that passes through the port of Montreal annually, say between two and three million packages, it Is only natural to expect that mistakes will occasionally occur, aside from which in numerous instances the weighers are accused of giving short weights, when upon investigation it is shown that the fault was not theirs but rather of the makers and shippers from country points who are prone to regard a cut in weights given by the weigher as a discrimination against them in favour of the Montreal buyer or consignee, as the case may be.	.
We do not need this official report to make us appreciate that, Mr. Speaker. We all know that when cheese is shipped too green it will lose in weight. We know that if it is shipped in dry boxes the boxes will absorb the moisture, For all that allowance can be made. But, when I come to read a clause or two further on, you will see under what system they arrive at the average weight. When you speak of butter, however you speak of a commodity which loses weight but very little in such handling as it is necessary to give it. It is packed fresh, handled fresh and shipped fresh. No matter who the man may be who makes the statement that butter loses materially in weight the statement is not correct. Butter is shipped from the creamery this morning and weighed in Montreal to-morrow, and it should move the balance in Montreal about the same as in the creamery.
The most prevalent cause of loss in weight is unquestionably that of the practice throughout the' butter and cheese producing sections of the province of Quebec and the eastern portions of Ontario, of shipping their cheese too young or green. There is such competition between makers to show a ' record ' that cheese is largely shipped before it is ten days old and in some instances direct from the hoop, and shrinkage en route to Montreal is, under such circumstances inevitable.
Everybody understands that.
It appears in evidence that in so far as regards western Ontario the cheese is not shipped until from fifteen to thirty days old, that the shrinkage in weight is much less, and therefore has not been the subject of com-: plaint.
The same reason holds good In a minor sense with regard to butter, where, in order to show a record of production, it is sometimes shipped, especially when in tubs, containing more moisture than the average, and consequently loses somewhat through evaporation and soakage.

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Very little, when it is hermetically sealed.
There is a rule o£ the Montreal Butter and Cheese Association which the undersigned cannot but consider unfair to the factory men. and that is
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Now, here is the whole story.
-in connection with the manner in which cuts for short weight are made under rule 2 as adopted by the Board of Trade, July 10th, 1901. There is no objection to the first paragraph of the rule, but there is to the second which reads :-
Now, I would call your particular attention to this.
Actual weights must be shown on certificate, but no gain shall be applied against losses in the average ; gains of 2 pounds and over shall be governed by rule 3. A further rule provides that not less than five packages of cheese nor more than ten per cent of each particular lot shall be weighed.
Why, Mr. Speaker this shows that the butter and cheese are not weighed at all. It would not stand law for a minute. Say there are fifty packages of cheese" and you weigh only five of them. You go before the court and the judge asks you, ' Did you weigh that cheese ? ' and the answer is ' I weighed five packages and averaged the rest.' Why he would send you back with instructions to weigh forty-five more. And yet this kind of thing goes on for years and is still upheld. We have had an investigation, or rather we have had the mockery of an investigation with none of the benefits of it. All the benefits of the situation have been left to flow into the coffers of those who are handling our butter and cheese in the city of Montreal.
The effect of this is that, supposing that there is a lot of fifty packages, five of which would be weighed and, supposing the first package showed a loss of one pound, the second a gain of one pound, the third O.K., the fourth a loss of one pound and the fifth a gain of one pound, a cut is made of two pounds in every five packages of the whole lot, that is to say, of twenty pounds, whereas the average shows no loss whatever.
In other words you get no credit for your overweights, and you are cut when you are short;-' Heads I win, tails you lose.'
Under the system of weighing in force and allowances insisted upon, it too often happens that at least one package in every lot is judged short weight. Therefore, all is cut accordingly. And it appears that frequently not sufficient care is taken to note the overs, it being claimed that the scales are set at the weight marked at the package and if the beam goes up sharp it is too often registered as O.K., and no particular pains taken to note the amount of' overweight.
Now. is not that a nice state of affairs ? These deductions have been made in the handling of between two and three million packages. The results of the farmer's labour are handled in this fashion as they Mr. POPE.
go through this great port, and, though the government, on the 22nd October had these facts before them, no action has been taken. And, though the investigation was held two years ago no report was submitted until last October. Sir, if ever there was a time when a resolution of want of confidence in the government and in one of its departments should be moved, I am justified in the motion I Shall present to you in a few moments.
This practice is a source of great annoyance and is looked upon by the factorymen, to speak mildly, as fraudulent.
Well, they are kind.
This rule is insisted upon by the buyers for the purpose, as they explain
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Of course they would have an explanation. Can you imagine a set of men banded together in an association handling between two and three million packages of cheese and butter not being able to give an explanation why they cut the farmers for shortage and never give them credit for overweight ?
-of avoiding cuts for short weight at the point in Europe to which they ship.
Do they know how they will weigh out in Europe ? If they do and if there is a shortage why do not they provide for it in the price they pay the farmers for the cheese and not take this underhand, unfair, dishonest means of getting even-and better than even-with the farming community of this country. Why, they admit the whole thing. They say that they are guessing at what the goods are going to weigh out in Europe. They intend to cut the farmer enough to pay for the shrinkage that may take place not only between his factory and Montreal but between Montreal and Europe. They buy the goods and surely they should be willing to run their own risk, instead of transferring to the farmer that risk of handling between this country and Europe as well as the risk between the factory and Montreal. That is a safe way of doing business, but it is mighty hard on the man who milks the cows and makes the butter and cheese.
This the undersigned looks upon as entirely another transaction for which the country maker should not be held responsible.
Mr. Parmelee is quite right-but the farmers are suffering just the same. And these hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House, by their neglect, by their indifference to the interests of the people, are permitting the farmers to be imposed upon by these men. And for what purpose ? The Minister of Agriculture told Mr. Bull to be careful to do nothing to disturb matters and create party capital, because that capital would be against his own party the one that he loves so much and serves so faithfully.
This is the Minister of Agriculture, who is

so much beloved by his party. I could well understand his writing that letter to Mr. (Bull, warning him to take no action that would hurt his party, but, on the other hand to let the farmers suffer, let them be hit, let them be bit. After he had warning, so much warning that he was obliged to take action, he went to work ; but when these gentlemen said: Stop, we are Liberals; we belong to your party-Mr. Ayer and all those gentlemen who are supporters of this government in Montreal, nine-tenths of these exporters belong to that party, perhaps nineteen-twentieths of them-1 say when these men interfered they received instructions to stop. The reports were slow, at last they came, and now they are pigeon-holed since the 22nd day of last October, and the farmers of this country continue to be cheated since that time.
The rule and the practice, the undersigned thinks, should be cancelled, and when a lot averages lull weight the maker should get the benefit thereof, or should get credit for all over weights instead of being mulct on the whole when a portion only is under weight.
This is the report of the commissioner whom this gentleman appointed. This is the man who represents the farmers, the practical farmer of this government. He has had time to frame his legislation here, but to-day we heard him spending his time trying to make political capital, getting up nothing more than campaign literature out of an organization of seedsmen. He had better spend his time in framing legislation to protect these men, instead of trying to reconstruct the Militia Department of Can ada. He should devote some more of his time to the farmers of Canada. There are many farmers in the counties of Missisquoi, Brome and Shefford who are suffering from the application of this tariff, who have suffered for years, and he knows it. He can spend time in interfering with the political part of a militia organization, but when it comes to the defence of the farmers' interests he has no time at his disposal, he is over-worked, he is too tired, he cannot get a move on. The farmers of this country must suffer from it.
Most of the butter and cheese is sold on Montreal weights, therefore the maker must rely on the integrity of the weigher, as he has usually no opportunity of seeing the packages weighed on their arrival, and for this reason there is a strong demand for the appointment of official weighers at the point of shipment. This in a general sense, the undersigned thinks impracticable as butter and cheese is shipped from nearly every railway station in Canada, and it is manifestly impracticable to maintain an army of official weighers to do the work.
The butter and cheese is usually sold at the various boards, but the delivery is not made at such boards except in so far as regards such as may have been manufactured in the immediate vicinity thereof, or nearer thereto than to any other station, so that even the appointment of official weighers at such boards would not afford the relief demanded.
The maker has the remedy in his own hands by declining to sell on Montreal weights and perhaps in some sections the competition between buyers is so great that they might come to terms and accept under certain conditions the factory weights, but the undersigned is of the opinion that such a course would only have the effect of creating dissatisfaction on the part of the buyer instead of the seller, and lead to as much friction, if not more, than at present obtains.
In conclusion the undersigned has the honour to suggest that the Act 28 Vic., chapter 6, be so amended as to provide for the appointment of weighers of butter and cheese by His Excellency the Governor in Council, instead of permitting such appointments to be made as at present, by boards of trade. This would give the weigher a status that he has not at present and would go far towards regaining the confidence of the factory men who now are aware that the weighing in Montreal is not in all eases done by an official weigher, but rather by an appointee of the butter and cheese association, which association is composed of buyers, some of whom might be, under the circumstances, regarded as exercising undue influence over a weigher when their own appointee.
Respectfully submitted,
(Sgd.) W. G. PARMELEE. Sir, that is the conclusion of this report vindicating the appeal of all these people from time to time for relief from the distressing conditions under which they found themselves placed. Mr. Parmeloe found he did not have to go very far ; he did not have to make a second or third visit to Montreal, his first touch at these centres showed him that there was something wrong, that there was something unjust, that there was something unfair towards the farming communities who shipped to Montreal, and that they were being deprived of money they ought to receive as the result of their labour. Mr. Speaker, I think I have said enough to satisfy every hon. member of this House that the government have been criminally neglectful, have been careless, and have been indifferent to the best interests of the dairymen who, in the eastern part of Canada at least, have been wronged i; the report practically tells us	so.	It tells us that	the
system of taking all and giving nothing in return is not business, it is not law, it is not honest, it is not fair to those men who are working day after day and producing the dairy product of this country and shipping it to Montreal. It is not fair to them, and it is not creditable to this government that three years should have been taken up in getting out a report, and that when the report is out relief should not be given to these people, although recommended by that report, at the first meeting of parliament that takes place after the report is made. I say the Minister of Agriculture has been neglectful of his duty to the dairymen. He had enough evidence of this wrong before he ever appointed Mr. Farmelee, he had no need to appoint him. He did not need a roval commission to act, but the truth is that he was afraid of somebody, he
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did not dare to act off his own bat, because he had been told by these gentlemen in Montreal more than once to be careful how lie proceeded, his political friends warned him not to go too far. Consequently, when he really did appoint Mr. Parmelee, the latter only gave in his report last October. I say that it is unfair, it is discreditable on the part of this government, it is unjust to the farmers of eastern Ontario and of Quebec, who have been deprived of hundreds and thousands of dollars which they are entitled to, and would have received if their products had been fairly weighed in the city of Montreal, In view of all these facts, I beg to move :
That all the words after the word ' that ' in the proposed motion be left out and the following substituted therefor :
Iu the opinion of this House the dairy farmers of Canada have wrongly suffered great loss for many years through the system allowed to prevail by the government in regard to the weighing of butter and cheese at the port of Montreal and for the government's neglect to provide any proper system for such weighing as shown by the investigation and report of Mr. W. G. Parmelee, Royal Commissioner, bearing date 22nd October, 1903 ; and this House regrets that since the date of such report no action has been taken by the government to remedy the state of affairs shown thereby.
Rt.   H@: Mr. Speaker, I do not know that I can blame the hon. gentleman (Mr. Pope) very much, because, apparently, his speech was chiefly directed at my hon. friend the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Fisher), but I may just say that it was only at three o'clock that I was aware that the hon. gentleman was going to move in this particular question, and 1 have hardly had any opportunity, except from his own speech, of examining the facts in detail. I think it will have struck hon. members of this House that despite the very great zeal the hon. gentleman may have for the interest of the farmers of Canada, whether east or west, his desire if possible to cast discredit upon my hon. friend the Minister of Agriculture is evidently greater than his zeal for the interests of the farmers of Canada. A great many things that he said, I think might very well have been spared. I think that everybody from one end of Canada to the other who has paid the slightest attention to the operations of the Department of Agriculture since my hon. friend became the head of it, is aware that no Minister of Agriculture in the past has ever done a hundreth part as much for the welfare of the people of Canada and for the benefit of the farmers of Canada as the present Minister of Agriculture has done, and as between himself and the hon. member for Compton I do not believe that in the hon. gentleman's own constituency on a ballot vote he would find one man in ten to say that my hon. friend the Minister | Mr. POPE.
of Agriculture was not the zealous and firm friend of the farmers of Canada.


Rufus Henry Pope: May 1 ask the right lion, gentleman if he was ever in my constituency 1


Sir RICHARD CARTWRIGHT.: It is a good while since, I am bound to say.


Rufus Henry Pope: I thought so.


Richard John Cartwright: A good while since, but I know something of the feeling of the farmers of Canada and I have the honour to represent a constituency which contains as many good farmers as are to be found in the county of Compton, and which is one of the very largest cheese exporters at this moment in the whole Dominion of Canada.
Mr. i'Oi'E. They are getting rid of you.


Richard John Cartwright: I do not think, if the hon. gentleman chose to come up to the constituency of South Oxford and to encounter me there he would come to that conclusion. Others have tried that experiment and they have retreated in considerable discomfiture. In respect to some of the statements that the hon. gentleman has made, I wish to state, on thevinfor-mation given to me by my department, that reporters were allowed to be present at tlie meetings held by Mr. Parmelee. I took the trouble since this debate commenced to inquire of that gentleman whether this was the case and I am informed that the reporters were permitted to be present. I have no personal knowledge of the matter, nor do I suppose the hon. gentleman has, hut I leave it at that. The statement of my deputy is that reporters were invited and were present.


Rufus Henry Pope: According to the affidavit they were not.


Richard John Cartwright: I think Mr. Parmelee's word is quite as good as any statements put in the hands of the hon. gentleman whether supported on affidavit or unsupported on affidavit, and I for one would accept Mr. Parmelee's statement quite as freely as I would the Sworn testimony of all the reporters the hon. gentleman can collect together from one end of the Dominion to the other.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: That is hard on the reporters.


Richard John Cartwright: I know my deputy and I know perfectly well that he is incapable of making a misstatement of any kind.	In respect to the delay in
connection with this particular matter in regard to which the hon. gentleman addressed the House for an hour and a half I would point out that during the greater portion of the years 1902 and 1903 the De-

puty Minister of Trade and Commerce was incapacitated by a very severe and dangerous illness, involving liis absence for many months from Ottawa, and this was the reason why the delay of which the hon. gentleman complains took place. As to the allegation which the hon. gentleman has made, on what evidence is best known to himself, that improper influence was brought to bear to prevent the production of this report or the laying of it before the House, I give it the most unqualified contradiction. No sort of improper influence was brought to bear on me or upon my deputy and so soon as Mr. Parmelee's health permitted, this report was brought forward. I am not aware that there have been any complaints recently. I think that these complaints, if my memory serves me, extended over a number of years and extended to the time of our predecessors as well as to that of ourselves. But,
1 may observe in reference to this matter that in the course of his report Mr. Par-melee points out, what is no doubt the case, that a great deal of the difficulty that has occurred, has arisen from the simple fact that in those portions of the country to which the hon. gentleman more particularly refers there is a habit of packing-cheese and butter without giving the product sufficient time to dry and that in consequence there is a very considerable shrinkage from time to time which naturally results in disputes between the buyers and sellers. I was at pains to make inquiry in western Canada, as was also Mr. Parmelee, as to what the difficulties were which they experienced, and I found that in the western section of the country a sufficient space of time was allowed for the natural shrinkage to take place and that they had very little complaint to make as to the weighing of cheese or butter in Montreal. In the eastern section, I am informed, although I have no knowledge of the subject myself, that there is considerable difficulty owing, as I have said, to the fact that the cheese is hardly given a sufficient length of time to enable it to be properly dried out, or at least properly free from moisture befpre its submission to the weighers. Under such circumstances there will be considerable friction and difficulty. As for the recommendation of Mr. Parmelee, I have some doubts, although I cannot give expression to any positive opinion on the subject, as to whether it is desirable or wise that the government should take the matter entirely into the hands of the department and appoint official weighers themselves. That is a matter upon which my hon. friend beside me (Mr. Fisher) may desire to consult with his colleagues as it is his bounden duty to do. Mr. Parmelee pointed out also, and that was one result of his investigation, which was worth something at any rate
to the producers, that they were not in any way bound to accept Mr. McLeod's weighing and that the remedy was very largely in their own hands if they chose to exercise it. No doubt there was one point which the hon. gentleman made and which has been alluded to by Mr. Parmelee which I am free to say requires consideration and which perhaps calls for a remedy, and that is the practice of charging farmers for the loss and not crediting them with the gain in the case of special packages.
1 am free to say that that is a matter which deserves and should have due consideration. Since the report came out I fancy that these complaints are not as frequent as before, although the hon. gentleman may be better advised on that subject than I am. But the allegation he has made that reporters were excluded and the complaints that he has made as to the extraordinary time that has elapsed are really unfair and unfounded. The delay was not due to any improper influence, but to the fact that Mr. Parmelee was reduced almost to a condition of imminent danger for a period of many months during which I was obliged to give him leave of absence. That is the real cause of the delay that the hon. gentleman has spoken of and I think that when the facts are stated the House will have no difficulty in coming to the conclusion that the hon. gentleman's zeal has outrun his discretion in this special matter.


Mr M.: AVEItY. Let me say, Mr. Speaker that the farmers of this country have been literally robbed by the system of weighing cheese in Montreal. I went down there myself to see what the trouble was and I found that the cheese were cut one pound per box and sometimes six or seven pounds on fine cheese. I thought that it might be possible that the cheese makers were not giving us proper weight and so I had the cheese weighed myself, but notwithstanding that I found that the weights were again cut in Montreal. I believe these men in Montreal club together to make something out of each farmer and that is the way we are robbed. It is time that the Minister of Agriculture and the government should look into this matter and protect the farmers of the country. He was informed of this grievance on the 13th of October last and yet he has done nothing up to this moment. I suppose if the opposition did not press this matter now, the Minister of Agriculture would still rest on his oars and do nothing. It would become him a great deal better to look after the interest of the farmers and not go around meddling with the appointment of officers to a militia regiment. He should leave the Pickels of Sweetsburg alone and try to get the farmers out of the pickle they are in. If this thing goes on it is time to change the Minister of Agriculture and put some one in

liis place who will discharge the duties of *Hie office.
PAIRS :
Ministerial.
Opposition.
House divided on amendment (Mr. Pope).
 YEAS :
Messieurs
Alcorn,	Ingram,
Armstrong,	Johnston (Cardwell),
Avery,	Kidd,
Barker,	Lancaster,
Bell,	LaRiviere,
Bennett,	Lennox,
Birkett,	Leonard,
Blain,	McGowan.
Boyd,	Morin,
Broder,	Osier,
Bruce,	Pope,
Carscallen,	P.orter,
Clancy,	Richardson,
Clare,	Robinson (Elgin),
Clarke,	Roche (Marquette),
Cochrane,	Rosamond,
Donnelly,	Smith (Wentworth),
Earle,	Sproule,
Fowler,	Thomson (Grey),
Ganong,	Tolton,
Gourley,	Vrooman,
Henderson,	Wilmot,
Hughes (Victoria),	Wilson.-46.
 NAYS : Messieurs
Archambault,	LeBlanc,
Bazinet,	Lewis,
Bdland,	Loy,
Blanchet,	Macdonald,
Bourbonnais,	Mackie,
Bruneau,	MacKinnon,
Bureau,	MacLaren
Carbonneau,	(Huntingdon),
Champagne,	Macpherson,
Christie,	McGugan,
Copp,	Mclsaac,
Costigan,	McLennan,
Davis.	Malouin,
Delisle,	Marcil (Bagot), _
Demers (Ldvls),	Marcil (Bonaventure),
Demers (St. John),	Matheson,
Emmerson,	Mayrand,
Erb,	Mignault,
Ethier,	Mulock (Sir William),
Fisher,	Oliver,
Fortier,	Parmelee,
Gervais,	Paterson, '
Gibson,	Puttee,
Girard,	Riley,
Gould,	Roche (Halifax),
Grant,	Ross (Yukon),
Harwood,	Rousseau,
Holmes,	Russell,
Hughes (King's, P.E.I.) Scott,	
Hyman,	Sifton,
Johnston (Cape Breton)Sinclair,
Johnston (Lambton), Kendall,
Lapointe,
Smith (Vancouver), Stewart,
Talbot,
Laurier (Sir Wilfrid), Thompson
Laurier (L'Assomption), Lavergne (Drum. & Artha.) Lavergne (Montmagny),
(Haldim'd & Monck), Tolmie,
Turgeon,
Wade.-75.
McEwen,	Sherritt,
Cowan,	Pringle,
Dyment,	McCormick,
MeColl,	Ward,
Cartwright,	Tupper,
Lovell,	Kendry,
Tobin,	Ball,
Lang,	Hackett,
Gallery,	Kemp,
Beith,	Hale.
Borden (Sir Frederick),	Brock,
Campbell,	Calvin,
Fitzpatrick,	Casgrain,
Heyd,	Seagram,
McCool,	Northrup,
Prefontaine,	MacLaren (Perth),
Sutherland (Essex),	Culhert,
Calvert,	Taylor,
Logan,	Lefurgey,
Harty,	Reid (Grenville),
Wallace,	Tisdale,
Sutherland (Oxford),	Haggart,
Wright,	Lavell,
Haszard,	Daniel,
Gauvreau,	Monk,
Fielding,	Borden (Halifax),
Bickerdike,	Roddick,
Brodeur,	Gilmour,
Dugas,	Tarte,
Guthrie,	Maclean,
Law. -	Kaulbach,
Morrison,	Robinson (Northumberland)
Ross (Rimouski).	Halliday.
Amendment negatived.


Mr. TAYLOR.: The hon. members for Durham East and Nicolet have not voted.


Mr. WARD.: I am paired with the hon. member for West Northumberland (Mr. Me-Coll) or I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. BALL.: I am paired with the hon. member for Richmond and Wolfe (Mr. Tobin). Otherwise I would have voted for the amendment.


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Motion agreed to, and House went into Committee of Supply.
Immigration-Salaries of agents and employees in Canada, Great Britain and foreign countries, $135,000.
Mr. WILSON.: Before this vote is passed, I would like to make a few remarks in a general way about immigration. We have been increasing our vote from year to year until it has reached a very large amount. At the last session of parliament, we voted $595,114, which was covered by five items in the estimates. For some reason or other, the hon. the Minister of the Interior, who has charge of this department, does not see fit to divide up this vote as is done in other departments. This year we are asked to vote $150,000 more, which will make the total $745,014. In addition there has been spent on immigration buildings during the past year $41,764, which is a considerable item, and which makes the total expenditure for the year on immigration alone $7S6,-


Mr. AVERY.: 993. I do not suppose that any one would particularly complain of the size of the vote when taking into consideration the fact that this is a new country and that its territory is almost boundless, provided we were getting value for our expenditure. But the difference of opinion between that side of the House and this is that we consider we are spending a very large amount of money and not getting an adequate return.
It is true that we are getting a good many immigrants, but it is equally true that some of those are not desirable. The character of the population we are bringing into the country is a matter of very great importance. We consider that at present we have a population which will compare favourably with that of any other country in the world, and what we require to do above everything else is to keep that standard up, and that we can only do by being very particular as to the class of immigrants we bring in. While our laws in this respect have been improved quite considerably within the last few years, they are still not up to the mark, and it is in the recollection of every member of this House that a large number of Italians were stranded in Montreal a few months ago. Had outlaws been what they ought to have been and had they been rigidly enforced, that could not have happened. We had 3.500 to 4,000 Italians landed in Montreal without any apparent means of support, and who were a great burden on the people. That was so noticeable that even the Toronto ' Globe ' could not pass it by, and pointed out how our laws were inefficient both as regards immigration and alien labour, and insisted that they ought to be amended. On that occasion. the '.Globe' in its issue of the 16th of May, 1904, used these words :
The stranding of a great force of Italian labourers in Montreal shows serious defects in our immigration and alien labour laws. It is stated that 5,000 more of the same class will be brought to Canada during the present season.
Well, Mr. Chairman, would you believe it. that in the annual report of the Minister of the Interior, there is not a single Italian mentioned as having come to this country. I called attention to this in the committee and pointed out to the deputy minister how we ought to have a true record in that report of the nationalities of all our immigrants, and I think I had his promise that in future that would be done. These things ought to be on record, so that we would know from time to time from what nation-rdities we draw our immigrants. In addition I find that the Montreal ' Star ' said last spring that the poor law guardians in the old countt-v had pauper children to the number of 7,000 which they thought were good enough to pass inspection in this coun-trv and which they intended sending over. Whether they have come or not, I am not aware, but these are matters we should
seriously look into, and if possible not allow any one to enter this country who would become a charge on the public as a pauper or who would be likely to swell our criminal classes. Then we had a steamer which came from the far east on board of which a man had died on the passage out and was buried at sea, and which our quarantine officers reported as all right. But one of the passengers landed in Vancouver had smallpox and died in a few days and the people of Vancouver gathered up the remaining passengers and quarantined them in that city. It will be recollected also that a railway train carrying passengers from that steamer, was quai-antined at North Bay which caused a great deal of expense to the province of Ontario. And all this might have been avoided if the quarantine officers in charge at Vancouver had done their duty and discovered that there was a man on board suffering from small-pox.
We find that the city charities of Montreal during last year deported 113 people, some of whom were sent to the United States, some to England, and some to their homes in Canada. Then. I have a report from Mr. Macpherson. the agent of the Dominion Steamship Company at Quebec, in which he says that a large number of diseased persons have been allowed to land jj.ii this country. He says that one of the clerks in this own office, as a result of mingling with those people, took trachoma, and that in the country north of Quebec there are many people affected with the same disease. He says that on the authority of the doctor. He also says that out of 80,000 immigrants who landed at Quebec fully 10 per cent were diseased persons. I do not know whether this is true or not ; but it is reported in the Montreal ' Herald ' of December 26. 1903, and that is a paper which is favourable to the government, and which would not make such report if it were not true. Then we have a report from Mr. Macdonald, an architect in the city of Winnipeg, who states that many of the immigrants who came out on the same ship that he did, came from sections in Scotland where there was small-pox, and that when they landed at Halifax and it was reported that there was no disease on the ship, thev were allowed to go where they pleased without any examination, until they got tickets to travel by the railway to their destination in the west. He also says :
Then there are a certain class of city street loafers from Glasgow, Edinburgh, London and Liverpool, who should never be encouraged to come to Canada. They are only a detriment to this country. On the boat that I came over on there was a large number of English not fit to settle here.
I do not know whether the law is strong enough to prevent such a class of people from landing on our shores. If it is not, it certainly ought to be made so, because we

have quite enough of that class of people In our cities and towns, even in a country so good as ours. No matter how scarce 'labourers and mechanics may be in the country, those men are always too busy to want a job ; and in the winter time their families have to be cared for. and they themselves have to be fed by people who are charitably disposed. We do not want to increase that class in our country. I have a letter here which was written by Mr. Parker, who was in the employ of this government during the whole of the fiscal year of 1903, and who reported up to the end of December of that year. The report which has been brought down to this House in a return which I moved for, says that Mr. ,T. H. M. Parker brought in 413 immigrants for whom he was paid $978 in the fiscal year 1902-3, and that from the 30th of June to the 31st of December 1903 he brought in 334 persons, for whom he got $761. Mr. Parker writes to the public press-I find this in the ' Mail and Empire ' of the 30th of January-that there	is three times	as much	moneyspent	in the United	Staes	for	immigrants as there should be, and that not half as many people are brought in as ought to be brought in for one-third of the money. He goes on to say that out of 17 immigrants who are there on salary,	only five are at	work ;	the	otherssimply	get agents to work for	them and
they are paid by commission. He says there was an agent in Indianapolis for five years who sent only three men into this country. I do not know whether that is strictly true or not ; but I know that Mr. Scott, in his evidence before the committee this session, said that Mr. E. P. Holmes was appointed to Indianapolis on the 12th of January, 1900. that he was there until June. 1902, and that he did not report that he had sent any immigrants into this country from that place.


Mr. DAVIS.: Is that Captain Holmes ?


Uriah Wilson: 
Mr. SCOTT.: What started them ?


Mr. HENDERSON.: We did.
Mr. WKLlSON. At any rate, 1 do not think it was my hon.- friend (Mr. Scott) who started them. Of course, if that hon. gentleman claims that the government made the good times, I can only say that I trust wre shah have no more bad ones ; for, surely the government are not so wicked as to punish all the good people iu the country merely to injure some wicked Tories. Surely w*ef

shall have good times if It is in the power of the government to make them. However. I think that hon. gentlemen have too good sense to claim that they are the authors of the good times. The good times come from the increase of population in the Northwest, resulting from the good advertising that country has had. We have plenty of good land in that country, and when a man can get 160 acres of land for nothing, in a region where the crops have been splendid for a number of years, and reports of whose fertility have been spread broadcast all over the world, is it any wonder that people are coming to a country like ours ? Is it anv wonder that people take up land when they can begin ploughing the morning after they reach it ? It is not as it was in Ontario, Quebec and the other provinces, where the forest had to be cleared before anything could be planted. That land is ready for the plough. Moreover, the opposition in this House is not decrying that country, as was the custom of hon. gentlemen-opposite when they were on this side of the House.
Now, I desire to say a word-I do not wish to detain the House long at this late day of the session-as to the treatment of immigrants by the United States. The United States has many restrictions upon .immigration. For instance, it is a i>enalty under the law for any one to land a person in the United States who is not entitled to be landed according to law. And agitation is being carried on with a view to making that law more stringent. I have before me a Bill which was introduced in the last session of Congress, under which the penalty for the offence' I have referred to is made imprisonment for not less than three months and not more than two years, with a fine of $1,000. This shows the view that the people of the United States take of immigration. I understand, of course, that they are in a better position to refuse immigration than we are, having already a_ very large population. It is true they have lots of vacant land, but their population is multiplying very rapidly. They are spending more money, I think, in keeping immigrants out of their country than we are spending in bringing them in. Of course, they get a great part of that money back from the steamship companies or the immigrants, for every one has to pay $2 a head-man, woman or child-who goes into the United States as an immigrant. They have 116 officers along our southern border to prevent the entrance into the United States of undesirable immigrants. They rejected last year about 5,000-some for diseases and some for other causes. We deported, according to a report which covered about a year and half, something over 400. What became of the rest ? Are they still in our country '! It seems to me that persons that the United States will not receive because they are diseased, or paupers, or likely to become paupers, should not be allowed to stay in our country. We may have all the feelings
of sympathy that we like, but we must remember that we have a duty to ourselves and to the world, to make our country great and strong, and to do that we must protect our citizens against the contact of this kind of population.
Now, I wish to refer for a few minutes to the reports of the farm delegates who were sent to the old country. Some of these delegates, I dare say, were good men, while some were not so well adapted-I should judge from the reports-for the work required of them. I think it unfortunate that the minister should have selected all these men from one party. I do not say he should have selected a large number from the opposition. but, for the sake of the influence they would have in the old country, he should have chosen men all of whom were fairly well adapted to the business in hand, instead of choosing men to be sent to the old country merely to give them a trip and allow them to do pretty much as they like. There were 27 of these agents, and we find that they were pretty liberal with the public money so far as tips- are concerned. They paid $450.S6 of our money as tips. They paid out over $100 for accident insurance. Now, I would like to know why we should pay the accident insurance of any gentleman in this country. I have made a few extracts from the reports of these agents. I do not wish to weary the House, so I shall not read them all. The first one is that of Mr. P. Campbell. He concludes his Report by saying :

In conclusion I would advise the government not to be in a hurry to fill up this country with foreigners

I do not know whether he means Scotchmen or not.
-but to keep the land for our own people as there are thousands of British subjects who would be only too glad to come to this country.
That is about the most intelligent^ thing he says. And for that we paid $506.95. Mr. Campbell paid in tips $18 ; advertising, $121 -he must have been pretty well advertised -besides $22 for printing ; board and lodging, $172.85, and sundries, $34.65. So for sundries and tips he paid over $50. The next, gentleman we have is Mr. A. L. Hail ; he cost us $578. He says he had a good time. His board and lodging cost us $249 I will read a paragraph of his report:
While in England I had a very pleasant although busy time. I was kept moving from one town to another and in that way saw a good deal of the country. Everywhere I went I was treated with the utmost courtesy and found people very anxious to come to Canada, a great many more would have come but did not have the means.
Now that is about as important as any part of the report. I think it should have been the duty of a gentleman representing the government to the people of England, to

make a full report of what he did. But a good many of these gentlemen did not think it their duty to do so. The next gentleman I come to is Mr. M. Watts. He cost us $319, and if you add the $150 that we paid to aH of them but one-there was one the government seemed to favour beyond all others, for they gave him $250-but to this gentleman they gave $150, making $465. Here is the way he winds up his report :
The farmers there wanted the cattle embargo lifted as they want our cattle for stockers, and they want the privilege of getting our beef cattle upon arrival to feed them for three months. This would create a better price for our beef cattle.
I imagine this gentleman forgot that he was immigration agent, he thought he was representing the Department of Agriculture, and he was trying to make a place to send our cattle too, instead of getting people to come to this country. This gentleman cost this country $467 for his trip. Then we have a report from Mr. S. L. Head. He cost us $415. He says, making several recommendations :
First, that only men who have had a practical experience should be engaged as lecturers.
I do not know whether he meant that as a reflection on his colleagues. If you are going to send men, that is not the kind you ought to send.
Second, that the work should be done during the fall and winter.
Third, that a much greater effort should be made to induce the British farmers to come to Canada, and that the chief energies of the department be expended along that line.
In this matter he differs entirely with Mr. Preston's statement of a few years ago. Mr. Preston said it would not be prudent to advise farmers who were well situated in the old country, to come to Canada, because, he says, they would be generally disappointed, they would not be able to make a success in this country. He said he did not feel like encouraging that kind of immigration. As a matter of fact, I think we in Canada look upon that class of people as being the most desirable, because they are men of means who would develop the country in the right direction. Besides that, they would make good settlers, and exert the right kind of influence in the country. Therefore, I would differ materially with Mr. Preston in that matter. Next we have Mr. Robert Forke. This gentleman, while he spent $430, seems to have been economical in a good many things. But here is what he says :
In connection with my visit to the old country under the instructions of the Department of Immigration, I have the honour to report as follows :
The meetings of which there were seven were all well attended and very successful, receiving a good notice in the local papers at the differ-Mr. WILSON.
ent places visited. There was usually a pretty steady stream of callers seeking a personal interview-, and I had the privilege of hearing many expressions of approval of the steps taken by the Dominion government to disseminate ininformation about the country.
These seven lectures seem to have cost the country a good deal, each lecture cost $61. I do not know anything about this gentleman. He may be a very eloquent man or he may not; he may be well fitted for his position, but certainly his report does not indicate it. I think the minister will agree with me that these reports ought to have pointed out more fully what these gentlemen did as servants of this country in Great Britain when they are sent over there to get immigrants. We ought to have a full detailed report of what they have done. Then we have Mr. John Kennedy. He lived pretty well while he was in that country, and seems to have spent $225 for board and lodgings. Here is what he says:
I inclose the account of my expenses of the trip to the old country, which is correct to the best of my knowledge, and I hope it will give satisfaction.	,
That certainly is a very important part of the report so far as he is concerned, and I presume his account has been settled. I will read the balance of his report:
I would say as far as I was concerned the trip was satisfactory, as I found the people eager to hear from Canada on immigration. I had eighteen meetings and stood the1 rest of the time in office at Belfast. I would have had more meetings, but I had to stay in the office on account of Mrs. Kelly going to Dublin. The time was too short, we ought to have been one month earlier.
Now that is the whole of that gentleman's report, for which we paid $456. I will refer to one more of these gentlemen, Mr. John Dougan :
As requested I forwarded a few of the impressions the trip made on me.
Advertising was not well done, owing to the friction amongst local shipping agents.
The work does not seem to have been well done because the agents in the old country were not agreed about it. I suppose the minister will dismiss those who made the trouble.
Some of the places selected for the delegates were unsuitable, two of my places were in barber shops with no accommodation for visitors. Where the speakers preceded the delegates, the delegate's quarters were crowded for several days from morning till night. On the whole I think good will come of the visit. Many people told me they would take the first opportunity to sell their belongings and sail for our country.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I want to call your attention to another matter here. There were two or three others, but I do not think they made any recommendations whatever. Then there was Mr. Arthur Kilburn who was allowed $250 for his fee. Would the

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hon. minister tell us why Mr. Kilburn is paid $100 more for his services than any of the other delegates. It seems to me that he was simply like the other delegates yet the other delegates in that class only got $150. There were just a few of these delegates who spent any money in advertising. .1. H. Medcalf spent $121.05, Rev. J. L. Brown, $6.93; .Tames Dale, $24.33; John Cowan' $4.87; D. MacVicker, $26.07, and W. H. Bryce, $37.48, making a total of $221.43. We find that these gentlemen paid out in tips $448.29, for sundries, $315.61, and for accident insurance over $100. I do not think that these people should be allowed to insure their lives at the expense of the people; neither do I think that they should be allowed to spend money freely in sundries and tips. If they want to be generous they should be generous out of their own pockets. We sent over fifty-four delegates and we spent upon them $25,000. I think the deputy minister told us in the committee that he had heard from one of these delegates that he had been instrumental in bringing ten or twelve people to this country. He did not say that he had heard from any more of them. That one delegate brought in ten or twelve people, and we have paid a little over $25,000 for them. I presume that some other hon. gentlemen will have something to say, that the hon. minister will have something to say, and I expect to have something more to say on the items as they go through.	.


Mr. WM. ROCHE (Halifax).: Before my hon. friend (Mr. Wilson) sits down I would like him to explain whether the impression I have is correct that he has adduced as proof of the greater stringency in the regulations against immigration into the United States the fact that they charge $2 a head for admission to that country. If so I would like to ask him whether that is a novelty or not.


Uriah Wilson: It is not a novelty for the last two or three years. Before that it was only $1 a head but there has been an effort to make it more than it is now even as the hon. gentleman will know if he has paid any attention to what the United States people have been doing. There is a very strong feeling in the United States, if I can judge from what I read in the newspapers and from the report of the Immigrant Department at Washington, against allowing any but the very best class of settlers into the country.


William Roche: I merely beg to say that this has been in force for forty years.


Uriah Wilson: What, the $2 tax 1


William Roche: Yes, I paid it myself in 1867 while passing through Portland on my way to Ottawa.


Mr. SIFTON.: I ought to he indebted to my hon. friend for giving the committee so much detailed information in regard to the affairs of the Department of Immigration and with a good many of his remarks I And no fault. I was glad to hear my hon. friend say that he is not disposed to quarrel with the amount of the expenditure.


Uriah Wilson: I would like to state that what I said was that we would not feel disposed to quarrel with the amount if we felt sure we were getting value for it. We have some doubt about that.


Clifford Sifton: If my hon. friend takes that position I am prepared to take the position that we do get value for it and I think there is no great difficulty in showing that. As to a number of points which my hon. friend mentioned, being mere statements of fact as to which there is no dispute, such as questions of expenditure, salaries and that sort of thing, they require no special intention on my part because they are matters of record. But, my hon. friend referred to the question of permitting immigration of such a character as is illustrated by the employment of the Italians, who came to Montreal a few months ago. I may say that such a movement is in no sense a result of the work of the immigration department, and that in the present state of the law the immigration department has no power whatever to deal with a case of that kind. In the case of persons who come into the country as they came, not by way of steamship, although a few came by steamship, but by rail as the majority of them did come, there is no power under the law at the present time to interfere with these people or to prevent them from coming into Canada. As to the extent to which we should exercise the principle of exclusion that is a matter for serious consideration. It is not a matter which particularly belongs to the discussion of the immigration question or one which is connected with the work of the immigration branch. When the facts in regard to that particular matter were brought to my attention I asked my hon. friend the Minister of Labour (Sir William Mulock) to detail an officer of his department to make an investigation, not having an officer in my own department whom I thought particularly fitted for that kind of work. Mr. King, the Deputy Minister of Labour, was accordingly sent to make an investigation. He made a report and as a result of his report a further investigation was directed to be made.


Uriah Wilson: May I call the hon. minister's attention to the fact that the other day the hon. Minister of Labour said that he did not make a report, that he simply gave him a memorandum.


Clifford Sifton: The memorandum was the report. I do not know why my hon. friend desires to draw a distinction between a

memorandum and a report. I do not know the difference between a memorandum and a report. Perhaps my hon. friend will explain what he means. I w-as not here when the statement was made. However, Mr. King was sent down for the purpose of ascertaining the facts, he communicated them to the minister and as a result a further investigation was directed. While X am on that point I may say that the whole subject as to the extent to which exclusion should be practised in connection wTith that class of people, that is to say persons who are not of criminal antecedents, persons wTko are not exactly in the ordinary sense of the word paupers, persons who cannot be excluded by medical examination, but persons who by reason of the fact that they may, on account of their condition and circumstances shortly after they arrive here, become a charge upon the public, is a subject that we have under consideration at the present time, and my hon. friend the Minister of labour has a Bill upon the Order Paper- I think it has been introduced-with which it is proposed to deal with the subject.
The question of the appointment of inspectors to carry out such exclusion as may be decided upon by parliament, is one which will come rather under his supervision than under mine. I believe the system of medical inspection at the ocean ports at the present time is as strict as it is practicable to make it. Dr. Bryce, formerly of the Board of Health. Toronto, has been appointed chief medical inspector of the department and under his system the immigrants landing at ocean reports are iput through a very careful and thorough examination. Under the Department of Agriculture we have the quarantine service in charge of Dr. Moutizam-bert, and under that service persons are detained for what are called quarantinable diseases. After the ships pass quarantine as having a clean bill of health, the passengers are then permitted to land, but under certain restrictions, and each passenger is required to go into a room where he is submitted to a careful medical inspection by our medical inspectors. Each man, woman and child wt1io lands in Canada, personally passes through the hands of the doctor and must be certified to as being free of disease of such character as would warrant us returning them. If persons are afflicted with disease of a somewhat trifling character, but still of such a nature as would not justify the physicians in letting them pass, we have erected a detention hospital where they are treated at the expense of the transportation companies, who pay that expense proportionately.


Mr. CLARKE.: What proportion of the expense is borne by the steamship companies ?


Clifford Sifton: At the end of a certain period an account is made up setting forth Mr. SIFTOX.
the proportion of the expenses chargeable against each transportation company.


Mr.   CLARICE@: How is that ascertained ?


Clifford Sifton: By taking the total cost of treatment of all the passengers detained. I was about to say that the general expense of supervision, the salary of the chief inspector for instance, is not charged against the transportation companies. But the expense of the treatment is charged-


Mr. BOYD.: Is the minister correct in saying that the expense of the detention of immigrants is paid by the transportation companies ?,


Clifford Sifton: The expense of treatment is.
Mr.'IIOYD. The expense of treatment and detention ?


Clifford Sifton: The expense of treating a patient at the detention hospital while he is there is charged against the transportation company that brought him, and if he turns out to be incurable, the transportation company is required to take him back. My hon. friend will understand that there are defects in all human arrangements. We cannot calculate the expense of a matter of that kind to a copper, but that is the general system that is carried out as carefully as it can be. It is only within the last year it has been whipped into shape and no doubt it is still susceptible of improvement, but I doubt if it is open to very much improvement so far as the actual inspection is concerned. Whatever may have been the case in former years ; and while we had a fairly good system of inspection, since Dr. Bryce took charge and got his organization into shape, the medical examination at the ocean ports is now as complete and as satisfactory as we can make it. My hon. friend from Lennox (Mr. Wilson) referred, to some statement made by a man named Parker in a letter to a Toronto paper reflecting upon the immigration service in the United States of America. The explanation of that letter is the fact that Mr. Parker's services were found unsatisfactory and were dispensed with, and as is not uncommon under such circumstances he endeavoured to take satisfaction by rendering what he thought was an unfavourable account of the work of the department in which he was no longer an official.


Edward Frederick Clarke: How long had Parker been in the service of the department ?


Clifford Sifton: Two or three years :	he
was a sub-agent paid by commission.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Where was he operating ?


Clifford Sifton: In the neighbourhood of Duluth. My hon. friend will understand that in the case of these sub-agents who are paid on commission and who have the power of giving certificates to persons in-

tending to come to Canada, the department is in considerable danger of being defrauded. and notwithstanding the greatest possible care and closest inspection, we occasionally find we have an agent who is unsatisfactory, or who, even though we cannot prove it, we may suspect has defrauded us. We had one or two cases in which we suspected a sub-agent of giving fraudulent certificates, and while it was difficult to find absolute evidence of it, yet we did what a private individual would do if he strongly suspected that he had a dishonest employee, we got rid of him as quickly and as quietly as we could. As to the agent at Indianapolis, the particular results of the work in Indiana did not come to my special attention, with regard to this matter, but I may say that the work- in Indiana for some time was not very successful. That is one of the states in which we found it extremely hard to encourage the movement. We sent a large number of sub-agents to the different states and carried on an active propo-ganda, but I am not prepared to say that they were all equally successful. In some cases the agents were successful ; in some places they were not, and in some places after they had been working for a considerable length of time success came all at once.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Did I understand the hon. minister to say that the system of inspection is so efficient now that every immigrant landing in Canada is inspected by our officers ?


Clifford Sifton: Yes.
At six o'clock, committee took recess.
After Recess.
Committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Clifford Sifton: When the committee rose at six o'clock, I was speaking of the medical inspection of immigrants at the different ports. I was saying that at the beginning of this season we had inaugurated a system of inspection which I have reason to believe is about as perfect as we can make it. Some difficulties have been experienced from the landing of very large numbers of immigrants on the same day. We haj thought that we had abundant accommodation. but it has proved for this reason to be somewhat insufficient at Quebec and Halifax. There have 'been one or two cases in which it has been somewhat difficult for the officials to handle the numbers arriving; but I can safely say that during the present season the inspection has been pretty thorough and careful. I would be quite pleased to receive suggestions for improvement from any members of the committee who have given the matter any attention ; but the matter has received the most careful attention from the medical inspector and the deputy of the department, and the
result of their efforts has been fairly satisfactory. We are making preparations for the purpose of securing further accommodation at Quebec, Halifax and St. John, and by next season I think we shall be amply equipped for any possible demand that may be made upon us. Some remarks were made by my hon. friend from Lennox (Mr. Wilson) in regard to the immigration from the United States. My hon. friend expressed the opinion that the agents in the United States were not the cause of the very large and satisfactory movement of farmers from the western and northwestern states of Canada. I readily admit that if the country for which they had to work did not offer very great inducements, it would be quite impossible for any agents, however vigour-ous or active or faithful they might be in the discharge of their duties, to bring about such a movement of population as we have recently seen. But I do not think any person who has given close or careful attention to what has been going on during the last few years, will say that the movement would have taken place to any considerable extent if the work of acquainting the people of the western and northwestern states of the conditions in Canada had not been attended to. I need not repeat what I have said to the committee on former occasions in regard to the different methods adopted in carrying on that work. The lack of knowledge which formerly existed among tile farmers of the western and northwestern states in regard to conditions in northwestern Canada was almost incredible. The most remarkable ideas on the subject prevailed amongst those people, although they were at a comparatively short distance from the boundary line. Systematic and determined efforts had to be made and were made for the purpose of acquainting them with the actual advantages of the Northwestern Canada. The people of the western states have now become fairly well informed as to our country ; but the natural result of the work that we have been doing has followed, and the American railways which are interested in preventing the movement of people to northwestern Canada, have inaugurated a very vigorous campaign. a campaign attended with the expenditure of considerable money and a great deal of energy on the part of their agents, for the purpose of checking as far as possible the movement which our people have inaugurated. We have no doubt received considerable assistance from land and colonization companies engaged in the work of selling lands in the Northwest ; but it must be remembered that most of these companies came there only two or three years ago, purchased their lands and interested themselves, because of the movement which had been inaugurated and the | information which had been supplied in the western states. From the seed thus sown they expected to reap. ?nd T have no
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doubt have reaped, a very valuable reward. But I am quite clear that if we desire to maintain the movement of population from the United States to Canada, we will have to continue our organization there and make as vigourous efforts as in the past.


Uriah Wilson: I would like to know whether the immigration from the States is as large this year as last.


Clifford Sifton: Not quite. Up to the present the difference is about 4,000 in favour of the last calendar year.


Uriah Wilson: Are any of the states or the Washington government interfering to prevent our agents doing their work there ?


Clifford Sifton: I have no information except what I have seen in the press despatches indicating that the Washington government purpose calling the attention of the British government to the fact that we have an organization in their country for the purpose of attracting settlers to Canada. Until representations reach us, I cannot say how authentic the information is or not or what shape the representations will take. But up to the present we have received nothing but courtesy from any of the United States officials with whom we have come in contact. I took a trip to the United States a year ago last January, and found no disposition on the part of the municipal authorities or prominent people of the different localities where our agencies are stationed, to prevent the operations of our agents. In the last eight or nine months however, there have been some indications that efforts have been made to get the Washington government to take action in that direction. I am not aware of any law of the United States which would enable the Washington government to take any action at present, but the committee will understand that any representations from that government, even supposing there' was no law on the statute books, would have to receive very careful consideration from us. For myself, I think that everybody who is familiar with affairs in the Northwest will agree that the movement of population from the western states to our Northwest has been of a most valuable character. Even should it fall off materially in the near future, still an enormous amount of benefit has been done to our Northwest by the settlement in that country of those industrious and progressive farmers, and the testimony of our people is universal to the effect that the class of settlers we have Teceived from the western states is of the very highest quality. With regard to the general question. I may say that any movement of population is of more or less uncertain and varying character. We find that people in one of the states are on the move this year. Next year the people of the adtvPI Tw move disnoon-d to rno-'-e:
and we find that after we have been getting [DOT] Mr. SIFTON.
settlers from any particular locality for two or three years, the flow of settlement from that district is likely to decrease, because the supply of people who are disposed to move has been, to some extent, for the time being, exhausted. In England, for instance, last year the majority of immigrants came from the neighbourhood of iLondon, and this year the larger portion came from the north of England and Scotland. The flow of immigration varies in that way, so that we have to keep continually working to have the movement kept up to its present dimensions. Respecting the work done by our farm delegates, to which reference was made by the hon. member for Lennox, the delegates were not sent to England for the purpose of making reports to us on the conditions there. Of course they did make such reports when they came back, but that was not the purpose for which they were sent. But the idea was rather, and it was well carried out, to furnish the agents we have there with men who could go into the country and talk with intending settlers, so that intending settlers might have an actual idea of what Canadian settlers were like and ir. what sort of way they carried on their operations. It was for that purpose they were sent over, and the testimony of our agents is that their work has been most valuable and that to it is due a great deal of the increase in the movement from the British Isiles last year. Of course in work of this kind, we have to vary our operations just as in certain lines of business. What is effective one year may not be another, and different methods have to be adopted from time to time to suit changing circumstances. Up to the end of the fiscal year 1903-4, the number of immigrants from all sources exceeded the number of the previous year bv something like 2,000, but I am under the impression that at the end of this calendar year the number will be slightly less. Our agents in the United States attribute the falling off in immigration from that country this year to the unfavourable season. .The season when peonle move to a new country, the early spring, turned out to be unfavourable. The spring was late in the Northwest and the means of transportation in some places were congested, and there was difficulty in getting the transportation which intending settlers require, and the reports sent back by those resulted to a considerable extent in checking the movement in the early part of the season ; and once the movement is checked, it is very difficult to make up the falling off in the later months.


Edmund Boyd Osler: Is any record kept by the officials on this side of the immigrants rejected by the United States authorities and turned back upon this country ?


Clifford Sifton: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Osier) means those rejected by the United

States inspectors along our boundary ? No. We have no way of checking that.


Edmund Boyd Osler: I asked Mr. Sargent, the Commissioner General of Immigration of the United States, whom I met a few months ago, as to the undesirable class of immigrants seeking entrance to the United States and the efforts of his department to prevent their entrance. I asked him if he would send me a statement of the number of immigrants rejected by his department as coming from Canada. On the 5th instant. I received a letter from Mr. John H. Clarke acting commissioner. This letter is addressed to Mr. Sargent and is forwarded to me. *It says :
Number refused admission to the United States at various Canadian border stations from June, 1903, to 31st May, 1901 : total number rejected 2,141, causes for which such exclusions were made being as follows : likely to become public charges 961, contract labourers 305, afflicted with dangerous contageous diseases 663, temporarily detained and not appearing for re-examination 11, to prevent separation of families 61. aliens seeking admission minus certificates 112, idiots and insane S-making the total of 2,441.
In view of the minister's statement just before we rose at 6 o'clock, that every immigrant coming into this country was medically inspected as to his fitness, this letter is a very serious one.


Clifford Sifton: If my hon. friend (Mr. Osier) will permit me-I explained that I /referred to this year, and that I was not prepared to make that statement with regard to past seasons.


Edmund Boyd Osler: This statement is for the present season up to 31st May 1904. It does not include the last month or two, which ' (probably would show a larger number of immigrants. Now, one or other of two things must be deduced from the statements made in this letter. Either this inspection as not being carried out as the minister [DOT]ttinks it is, or-very much more serious- we must have in Canada a class of people who are immigrating, or we must have among our own people an enormous number afflicted with contagious and dangerous diseases who are leaving our country for the United States. I hope that the former is the case, for that is something that may be remedied with comparative case. But, if fit is the latter, and if we have among our population a sufficient percentage of people afflicted with dangerous contagious disease [DOT]to supply an emigration of 653 in ten months, that is something that will require the most serious attention of the government and a very close investigation. I am always accused of speaking from a railway point of view. So, I suppose I cannot be accused of wishing to restrict immigration [DOT]into this country. No one believes more strongly than I do the necessity of proper
immigration into Canada. But I think that no one realizes more than I do the absolute necessity that that immigration shall be of the right class. . In the United States, with one boundary on the southern ocean, they [DOT]have all varieties of climate. They have the natural conditions which will enable them to assimilate with comparative ease Italians and other people from the southern parts of Europe. We cannot do that. We cannot gain any advantage by bringing *to this country weaklings from the south of Europe. If the immigration is to be successful, we must have people from the northern countries, from the strong nations of Europe. The' government, I think, owe it to the country and to themselves to take every possible precaution that, neither through their immigration agents nor-what is more dangerous as to this class of persons-through the various steamship companies, which receive a bonus for immigrants besides their passage money, are people of this class landed in this country. iAs I have said, we are very much more bound to discriminate as to the class of immigrants than is the United States. If they reject these diseased people, we ought to reject them with tenfold stringency. But, we do not seem to be doing that. We are not taking care to keep out of Canada the people who come from the southern parts of Europe, many of them afflicted with diseases which are not only dangerous to themselves but are dangerous to the people of this country by reason of their contagious character.


Mr. KENDALL.: Before this item passes. I would like to say a word as a medical man. I have henrd no more ridiculous criticism expressed in this House at any time than the criticism made _in regard to the health of the immigrants brought into this country. I would like to say to the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat (Mr. [DOT]Osier), that if he would refer to his own .distinguished brother, who is probably the greatest medical man that Canada has ever produced, he would find his opinion on this matter different from that which the hon. gentleman has just expressed. I wish to tell him that if this parliament had the courage it should have, it would at once take up certain questions of public health and deal with them. They are matters of [DOT]momentous importance to this country, whereas the matters to which he refers are mere bagatelles.	.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I have not the advantage possessed by the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat (Mr. Kendall), of being a medical man, and of being able therefore to speak with authority as to the seriousness of the charges that have been made by my hon. friend on my right (Mr. Osier), and as to the inadvisability of allowing dis-I eased persons to become residents of this ' country after they have been pronounced

unfitted to become residents of the United States. The hon. gentleman probably knows more than the corps of expert medical men who have been appointed by the United States government to pay special attention to this very matter. I think I am justified in concluding, without meaning any disrespect to the hon. gentleman, that if the United States medical authorities entertained the same opinion that he does they would not go to the annual expense of maintaining along our border and in some of our principal cities groups of expert medical examiners to inquire into the physical condition of those who are seeking admission into the United States, and of rejecting them for reasons which, in the hon. gentleman's opinion, are a mere bagatelle. I have stated before in this House, and I repeat it, that the facts which have been disclosed show a disgraceful condition of things. I do not desire to throw the entire blame upon the Department of the Interior ; I rather commend the vigilance of the United States authorities. It is to me most regrettable that we have presented to us in the official reports of the Commissioner General of Immigration of the United States an annual statement showing the number of immigrants destined for the United States, who have been booked by our Canadian route, but who are not permitted to enter the United States because of phy-sicial disability. I do not know how many dozen officials the United States have stationed along our borders. I believe 116 is the number. In addition to these they have their officials stationed at Montreal and elsewhere in our country ; and these gentlemen have it in their power to say whether immigrants who come thus far on their way to the United States shall be permitted to continue their journey and enter the United States, or whether they shall be debarred at Montreal or some other Canadian (port, and be obliged to remain in this country. I appreciate the difficulties of the situation, and commend whatever the Minister of the Interior is doing to put a stop to this unsatisfactory condition of things. But I am afraid that the hon. gentleman was not speaking advisedly at six o'clock when he said that every immigrant landing in Canada was carefully examined by expert medical men.


Clifford Sifton: I referred to people who come by seaports, we have no means of checking those who come in by rail.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I am speaking of those only who come across the ocean, the immigrant class who land at our ports. I understood the hon. gentleman at six o'clock to say that all these were carefully examined by our own medical men. Of course I am not in a position to dispute that statement. But I do make the assertion, that if the statistics which my colleague has presented Mr. CLARKE.
to the House are reliable-and they are official documents bearing the approval of the United States government officials-then I say that the examination made by This government must be lax, or else the examination made by the United States medical officers must be much more rigid than that which our officials make when immigrants land at our Canadian Atlantic ports. I do not think the fact that immigrants are poor, are destitue, as long as they are mentally, physically and morally fit. should debar them ; I do not think their poverty should prevent them from getting a chance to make a living in Canada. But I do say that people who are rejected because they are suffering from loathsome diseases-


Arthur Samuel Kendall: What diseases ?


Edward Frederick Clarke: I cannot tell the hon. gentleman ; loathsome diseases, the classification is ; and are not fit to become citizens of the United States, ought certainly not be permitted to remain here and become a charge upon the people of this country. If they are permitted to land and proceed as far west as Montreal on their way to the United States, they certainly should not be permitted to remain in Canada if they are rejected by the United States authorities and not allowed to enter that country. I think that is a reasonable proposition and one that will commend itself to the Minister of the Interior. Two months ago I read a statement in the House from the last official report of the United States Commissioner General of Immigration, showing that some 4,000 immigrants were debarred from entering the United States at our various border ports. I asked the Minister of the Interior what became of these people, and he promised to make a statement, if my memory serves me, when these estimates were being considered. We have not had that statement from him to-night. I cannot understand by what machinery or method these people, whose destination is the United States, are permitted to come( thus far on their journey, are then prevented from continuing their journey, and are left upon our hands, especially if they are suffering from loathsome and dangerous diseases. This matter ought to engage the attention of the minister and he ought to endeavour, if possible, to devise some means whereby these people will not be allowed to come so far on their journey. If they are not fit because of their physical and mental disabilities to enter the United States, they certainly ought not to be permitted to land in Canada ; but if they land in Canada they certainly ought not to be permitted to remain here if their condition is such as is stated by the United States offi-I eials. Now I have a report for several | months of the present fiscal year, showing the number of immigrants debarred from i entering the United States from (Canada. The return is made by ports, and I would like to

draw the attention of the minister to these statements. If he wishes I will give them to him so that he can see for himself what is contained in them, and decide what remedy might be applied to put a stop to this state of things. In July of last year, the first month of the fiscal year 1903-1904, this report shows that there were landed at Quebec and St. John 3,241 immigrants, and of this number 77 were debarred, and of these 57 were suffering from loathsome or dangerous contagious diseases-these are the words used in the heading. I do not know what these diseases are. I do not know who the persons were ; but these are official returns from the United States immigration department. Now what I am drawing to the attention of the minister is the fact that year after year there is published a statement showing the number of these immigrants from Europe wending their way to the United States through Canada, who are prohibited from continuing their journey and who are left stranded in Canada.
What is to be done with these people ? Can there not be an improvement made ir the medical examination ? Can that medical examination not be made more rigid, so that they will not be allowed to land at Halifax, St. John or Quebec, or whatever the port is ? I will not weary the committee by reading all these returns that I have from month to month up to the 1st of May, but f want to draw the hon. minister's attention to the fact that in these monthly statements there are figures showing the number rejected at Vancouver as well as at Quebec and St. John. The figures for the other ports are not given in these tables. In some of the months the number rejected at Vancouver is considerable. In the month of July the number rejected was 6, in August the number rejected was IS, in September the number rejected was 25, and I may tell my hon. friend from Cape Breton that of the 25, 11 are classified as suffering from loathsome or dangerous contagious diseases. In October the number rejected was 18, in November 28, and so on. These tables show that in the six or eight months for which I have returns' hundreds of immigrants have been rejected, have been debarred from entering the United States because they have been physically unfit. 1 do not know whether the diseases from which they are .suffering are loathsome and contagious-I hope they are not for the sake of this country, because these people are left here-but I repeat the statement that they are debarred because of their physical condition. because they are classified as suffering from loathsome or dangerous contagious diseases, and it is not right that these unfortunate people should be maintained at the expense of the taxpayers of Canada, when they are immigrants destined for the United States, who are prevented from entering that country by the corps of United States officers who are doing duty at the 232
ports of Canada and along our border. We have brought this matter to the attention of the hon. minister again and again, and while we recognize that he has been appointing some medical gentlemen to intercept the flow of. these people, yet from the statement which my colleague has presented to the House, and from the figures contained in the statements which I have in my hand, there is certainly a great deal more to be done in this matter. I am sure the hon. minister will admit that if these figures are correct the situation is not a satisfactory one. We Should be able to exercise as rigid a supervision over the immigration coming into Canada as is exercised by the United States officials over the immigration going into that country. People who are debarred because of their physical disabilities, and who are not fitted to become citizens of the United States-who are not good enough, if I may be permitted to use that expression without intending to use it in the offensive sense, to become citizens of the United States-are certainly not good enough for Canada. It is quality that we should aim at rather than quantity, but if we are to have quantity-and we have room for a great many immigrants in this country-ws should certainly see to it that the necessary moneys are expended to enable us to make our medical examination of all immigrants as rigid as it is possible to make it. There is another phase of this matter, but probably I had better leave that until the discussion of this question is concluded. I shall be glad to place these statements in the possession of the hon. minister, and if I have misappr-hended what their purport is, I shall be glad to be corrected ; but in view of these statements, and in view of the statements which my colleague has presented, I think there is a screw loose yet, and I hope the hon. gentleman will see how urgent is the necessity that our system of inspection shall be equal to that which prevails along the border on the part of the immigration officials of the United States.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I do not wish to be misunderstood. I fully agree in all the arrangements that are made to provide necessary quarantine at the ports of debarcation, but I repeat that if the few scores or few hundreds of infected people who came into this country are really, from the point of danger, o bagatelle compared with the amount of contagious disease which we, as a parliament and as a civilization, permit to stalk broadcast through the land. I do not think there is any medical man in this House who will question that. I may say that it is a popular thing, perhaps, in the United States, as it is here, for lion, gentlemen in parliament to make a loud outcry against the possibility of the importation of disease from foreign countries. It is a very popular thing, but I submit that the medical associations of this country are probably the bodies best qualified to judge of what the



danger to Canada is from the importation -of disease from outside, and I do not think that up to this time the Department of Agriculture and tlie Department of the Interior have had any very strong recommendations from the medical bodies of Canada on this point. I speak, of course, subject to correction, but I again assert that we permit year after year loathsome and contagious diseases to be propagated in this country, and we have not the courage to take measures to prevent it.
Mr. CDSiLER. The doctor has touched on a very delicate subject. He refers to the diseases which have been a curse to civilization as far back as civilization goes. He, as a member of the medical profession, and all of his brothers, are unable to suggest any remedy for these diseases, and although he makes the accusation that we in this parliament are making a loud outcry about a small number of contagious cases, whether they are from the outside or not, I do not tnink that he will take the responsibility of bringing a law into this House to check the evil to which he refers, bad enough as it is. But that does not prevent us from doing what we can to prevent an evil which is checkable. The other is not checkable, in so far as civilization has not been able to suggest a remedy, but we are dealing with something which is checkable ; and if he, as a physician, says that the fact that 080 persons suffering from dangerous and contagious diseases have been refused admission to the United States is something that does not affect Canada, I think he is making a mistake. That is a statement that laymen will not agree with, no matter how much doctors may endorse it.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I did not say that certain cases should not be kept out. I do not wish to toe misunderstood in that.


Edmund Boyd Osler: The hon. member said that this was simply a bagatelle, and that I was talking trash.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I said it was a bagatelle compared with the great evils that are stalking unchecked through the country.


Edmund Boyd Osler: May I suggest to the hon. gentleman, as a member of the very honourable profession of medicine, that he take it up and bring in a measure to check the evil resulting from the diseases to which he refers ?


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I admit that I have not the courage to deal with some of the evils to which he has referred, some that probably will not be mentioned, but take the case of consumption, of tuberculosis-we have not the courage to deal with it, and it is a disease which is a hundred times more important to the health of Canada than any of the ordinary contagious diseases that we refuse entrance to at the ports.


Mr. PUTTEE.: I am not a member of the Agricultural Committee, and I understand Mr. KENDALL
that committee has been gathering a good deal of information regarding the immigration of the past year. As the report of that committee is not available to us, I will have to ask the minister for some information. I find in the report of the deputy minister the following short paragraphs
In connection with the work of the department in the old country, it may be interesting to note that all booking agents represent the department and are -paid seven shillings for each whole -ticket and a half of that amount for half tickets on all agricultural settlers coming to Canada.
In addition to this the department has a large number of local agents, most of whom are booking agents. They are paid at the rate of twelve shillings for each whole ticket, and half that amount for half tickets on all agricultural settlers.
From that statement it is evident that we pay to the agents a fee for every agricultural settler that leaves Britain for Canada. If that is the case I suppose there must be receipts for the payment and tabulated statements of the number we pay for, and consequently the number that come to settle in. Canada. Can the minister give us that statement ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I wish to refer to the statement of the member for Cape Breton (Mr. Kendall) and more especially because lie is a medical man who would be expected to appreciate at its full value what it means to import diseased individuals into Canada and scatter them throughout the country. The hon. gentleman state-d that the number of diseased immigrants was a mere bagatelle compared with the total, but wbeu we know that one diseased person may affect 125 or 175 persons, we ought to be able to appreciate what it means to import contagious or infectious disease. Tlie report of tiie chief commissioner of immigration for tlie United-States, tells us that in 1903 they deported at the Canadian line no less than 1,439 immigrants who were affected with contagious and infectious diseases.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: What were they ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: It does not specify the disease, but it says they were dangerous and contagious diseases, and that is sufficient for a medical man to understand the danger. Now, as the Americans deported 1,439 to -Canada, and as we sent back to Europe and the continent only 300. it stands to reason that over 1,100 are left iu Canada suffering from dangerous contagious diseases. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Kendall) says that you do not hear the medical men complaining about this ; but lie must have been in the House last year or the year before when an eminent medical man from Montreal drew attention to the fact that many of these diseased persons were drifting into the hospitals and into the thickly populated portions of the community, and that they were also found in the country places

amongst farmers. For three years in succession attention has been drawn to this in the House, and each year the government state that it is exercising every vigilance. This year the Minister of the Interior says he has commenced to take precautions, but last year and the year before he said t'ke same thing. The minister has told us that in the present state of the law he cannot interfere with immigrants coming into Canada if they are cot diseased, but who might be otherwise undesirable. Well, it is the minister and his supporters, and not the opposition, who have ilie power to change the law to make it effective, and why do they not do so ? I believe there is great room for improvement in our quarantine regulations. I have noticed that* in Ontario a very common disease is trachoma or granular eyelids, which is regarded as very contagious when chronic, and patients suffering from it have been admitted into the hospitals at Toronto and at Montreal. Does that not verify the statement made by the American Commissioner of Ini migration, that whereas they have turned back 1,439 diseased persons to Canada. we have sent back only 300 ?


Arthur Samuel Kendall: Were these all trachoma?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I do not know and I do not care so long as the disease is dangerous and contagious.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: Does the hon. gentleman not know that in a shipload of immigrants with a few cases of trachoma on board, the disease might spread and not show for some days after the immigrants were landed fcere% How could the medical inspector turn such people back ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: There is no doubt the disease might spread on shipboard, but it would only be a few days until it would become evident, and any intelligent medical man could recognize it. If he found one case of trachoma he would know the others who associated with the sufferer and continuing in his inquiry any intelligent medical man could tell very readily what the nature of the disease was. That being so, caution s'hould be exercised to prevent these people going through the country and mixing with other people. All who are brought here are not quarantined. Some are kept for a short time for treatment, and then allowed to go. But there is that undeniable fact, that many must be in the country somewhere, and to that extent the quarantine efforts of the department are a failure.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: Will the hon. gentleman answer me this question ? Is it within human power, unless a whole shipload of immigrants are quarantined for a certain length of time, for any medical man to sav that a certain number will not develop the disease after they leave the ship ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: That might happen.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: It might not only happen, but it has happened again and again.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: When are these people examined ? They are all examined at once when they cross the line; and yet 1,400 have been sent back by the American quarantine officers. Surely our Canadian professional men are as intelligent and can detect the disease as readily as the Americans. There are undoubtedly many other cases in the incipient stages of the disease which are not detected by the American officers, and these would add to the number for the year. The fact that our inspectors did not send these cases back suggests to me that our Canadian regulations are not as strictly enforced as they should be. I want to say a word or two with regard to the other immigration that has been coming in of late ; I notice that our country of late years has been overrun with a large number of people whom I regard as undesirable immigrants. I do not know whether they are Russian Jews or Italians or what they are, but you will find them wherever you go throughout the country. Only two weeks ago, when I was at home, I made a trip of about twenty miles, and in that distance I met no less than half a dozen of these men whom I call Russian Jews, pedlars with packs on their backs, some of them lying and resting in fence corners. I do not say that these are the worst class, because they are not as bad as diseased people ; but to my mind they are not a very desirable class. They do not enter into the industrial activities of the country. It is true, they carry on a trade, a sort of Jew trade. I sometimes think they may be allied with others and have something to do with the robberies that occur from time to time. They go into houses and ply their trade with an assiduity which is peculiar only to themselves. They are a filthy-looking class of people. In summer they may be seen in every direction ; in winter they are 'found around hotels and railway stations plying their trade. They are not the class of people likely to elevate the society or the civilization of the Canadian people, and they are not likely to assimilate with our people to any advantage.


Clifford Sifton: What would my hon. friend suggest to prevent them coming in ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I would suggest a stricter regulation at the frontier, the same as the Americans have ; if necessary, I would put a poll-tax on every one of them; and I would deport those who are likely to become a charge on the charity of the people as soon as they land. There is no reason why we should be obliged! to accept the riff-raff of every other country in the world, and tax I the charity and generosity of our people to ! maintain not only those who have moderate

730C
health. but those who are affected with incurable diseases.


Arthur W. Puttee: Can the minister give me the information I asked for ?


Clifford Sifton: We can readily give information as to the number of people to whom we paid bonuses and the places where they were paid. The bonuses are paid to the steamship agents in the British Isles and on the continent of Europe. The statement comes from them to the department here, it is sent to the office at Winnipeg to be checked, it is brought back and adjusted between the department and the office of the steamship company. If my hon. friend would like a statemeiit, I can have it laid on the table to-morrow.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I would like to ask the minister if we are paying for the immigrants who' come in and settle on the lands of the colonization companies. For instance, we are informed that a number have settled on the lands of the Saskatchewan Valley Laud Company. I was told that many of these come in as immigrants for which the agents in the United States were paid $3 a piece, and then the land company takes advantage of them, and reports them as having been brought in by themselves ; and for that the land is given to the colonization company.


Clifford Sifton: The only check we have upon the people who come in and are reported by our agents as having been sent through their efforts, is the fact that the agent gives a certificate to the intending immigrant, and upon that certificate the bonus is paid. That is checked by our inspector." Of course, there is no possible system under which at times we are not liable to be defrauded to some extent. The only thing we can do is to watch the inspection as carefully and closely as we can. There may be a few people to whom the bonuses are paid who are not sent by agents, but they are only a very few.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: When are these certificates collected ? Have you not information as to where the person is located ?


Clifford Sifton: The certificate given by the agent entitles the intending immigrant to reduced fare. It' is presented to the railway company, which returns it to us, and upon receipt of the certificate the bonus is paid.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Suppose a man in the United States wants to make a trip across the line and go back again, he can get one of these certificates, I should think, without much difficulty. How do you know that there is not one such in every ten you are paying for ?


Arthur W. Puttee: 
Edward Frederick Clarke: Are they paid by the Canadian government ?


Arthur W. Puttee: As far as I can see, the only way they could get paid from the government would be by checking these men through as settlers and through government agents. I do not believe however that they were paid by the Canadian government. I am not going to deal with the question of the difference in the cost of immigration which the taking of this fifty percent off the settler immigration would make. Last year we spent three-quarters of a million dollars on immigration, and if you take the number of immigrants who went on farms and divide that into the amount of dollars, you can say that each immigrant cost so much. And I believe it would be fair and just to cut off fifty per cent of the immigration, which would make the average cost of each' immigrant considerably higher. But what I want to deal more particularly with is this immigration which is not brought in for farming purposes, but which serves its purpose, and which the labouring men of the country warned the people against, and the labouring men have seen their prophecies fulfilled. I am not going to deal with this question either in opposition to or in favour of the immigration policy in respect to the settlement of land. I appreciate the fact that there is in Canada a scarcity of farm labour, that this question is a large one and growing. and that it looks as if it were going to be more serious in the future. The difficulty so far is one to which we have not attempted to apply any remedy, and the government have settled on no policy as to how we are going to supply the farmers of Canada with labour by the month or the year. I believe we have not properly started on that problem yet, and it is a serious one. But what I want to point,out is that the wage-workers, the city workers, should not be expected to bear the whole brunt of carrying labour on the labour market for nine months in order that the farmer may use it for two or three months. There is this practice in vogue in Canada among the majority of farmers. In Ontario it is used to a considerable extent and in the west to a large extent. Our farmers require labour just in about the same proportion as they require binders. They require it just when their crops are ripe. They want it for a
short time and at a reasonable wage for that short time, and then cast it over on the general labour market for the rest of the year. It is not fair, nor is it a solution of the problem, to imagine that by filling the cities with labour for nine months in the year, the farmer can get relief for two or three months. I am not going to advise the farmer, but if he does not run his business in such a way that he may employ labour all the year round, perhaps he is not managing it as it should be. And it is possible that farms might be run here as they are in other countries, where the farmers can offer employment by the year. Some hon. members, especially from the west, may say that there are positions offered on the farms by the year. No doubt there are, but this, advice is always given to the men : It will be better for you to work by the year at five dollars, eight dollars or ten dollars per month than spend your time during nine months looking for work, and work during a couple of months at $35 or $40 per month. But the question I am dealing with is the question of immigi-ation, which is not settler immigration, and I do not want to mix it up with the other at all. I do not want to exaggerate any condition of affairs, and am not going to rely altogether on my own judgment. I wish however just to read a paragraph from a Winnipeg paper, written just after a large work had been started there a few months ago. It is headed :
' Unskilled Labour Cheap ; common labourers are being paid 15 cents per hour.'


Edward Frederick Clarke: What paper ?


Arthur W. Puttee: The Winnipeg ' Free Press.'


An hon. MEMBER.: That is not a good authority.


Arthur W. Puttee: I am simply quoting nfews matter and not editorial matter.
Common labourers are being paid 15 cents per hour, which is the present rate in the city tor unskilled labour. Some surprise was expressed by the reporter for the ' Free Press ' at the low scale of wages, but the manager of the employment agency said that there was no difficulty in securing Galicians and Hungarians at this figure. On inquiry from other sources this statement was confirmed, as several large employers of rough labour say that they can get any amount of unskilled labour at the price stated. One employer said that this was the lowest rate he had paid in the last three years for the same class of labour.
That gives an idea of the demoralized state of the labour market, so far as the wage-earner is concerned in Winnipeg and the west this year. Fifteen cents an hour for unskilled labour means a drop of 74 cents . and I will risk my word that skilled labour, in most instances, took a corresponding drop. Now, this is a serious thing. The labourer cannot possibly live decently on

what he earns at fifteen cents an hour. It is a serious matter for every wage-earner in the country. And. perhaps, I may be permitted to point out the contrast. When wages are at this low rate it means that all hope of enjoying the prosperity of the cpun-try is gone so far as concerns the man who sells his labour for wages. It was complained all last year, and for some time past in fact, that some people in other countries were-as it is called-dumping goods in Canada. That means, our manufacturers say, that others were actually selling goods to the people of Canada for less than it cost to produce the goods. And this was supposed to be-perhaps was, but I will only say supposed to be, as it is not necessary that I should deal with that question now-a serious state of affairs. That was the manufacturers' complaint. It looked like being an issue in this country. But it was forestalled; it was headed off. We have this session the dumping clause and we are told by the Minister of Finance that it is one of the most radical propositions ever adopted by any parliament, and that this government and this parliament are leading the way. But the case here is worse than dumping, for dumping is sending goods into this country and selling them here at less than it costs to produce them. But we are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of public money every year, and other parties in this country are spending many thousands of dollars of money that does not belong to the government to bring in Canada, not farm settlers, but skilled workmen and labourers of all kinds to depress and break down the labour market in Canada. Is that fair to the worker ? We declare that our principle in Canada is protection. Protection indeed


Mr. ROSAMOND.: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Puttee) is mistaken. Skilled labour is scarce in Canada.


Arthur W. Puttee: 
Richard Blain: Who advises that ?


Arthur W. Puttee: That is published by ' Yours faithfully, Canadian Labour Bureau, Louis Leopold, Secretary.' This matter was brought strikingly to my attention the last time I was in Winnipeg. The fact is I could not stay in the office and attend to anything I wanted to do by reason of the men who came in in numbers showing me the guarantees issued by this Leopold. And these same guarantees of employment have some bearing on the question, which I will deal with later on, as to who it is that wants these men. Here is one of these guarantees which was given to me by one of the men who brought it out from Eng land. It is headed ' Canadian Labour Bu reau ' and then comes the coat of arms of Canada :
13 Charing Cross, London, S.W.,
8th April, 1904.
My dear Sir,-This will serve to introduce to you Mr. W. J. Boorn who is proceeding to *Winnipeg with a view to taking employment as a carpenter. I shall be grateful if you will advise him in his best interests and if you will give him suitable work, or if you will address him to a firm who are in need of his class of help. I beg to commend him to your kind consideration and to thank you in anticipation for anything you may do on his behalf.
I am, dear, sir,
Yours faithfully,
Canadian Labour Bureau, LOUIS LEOPOLD, Secretary.
The President,
The Manitoba Construction Co., Madomock Block, Port St.,
Winnipeg.
That was brought to me soon after it had been presented to the foreman of the construction company, and the foreman told the man who delivered this, that there had been 150 of them there that day, and advised him to go back and sue Louis Leopold for bringing them out under false pretenses. The hon. gentleman asks who he represents. I believe that in this business he represents more particularly the Canadian Manufacturers Association, but financially he represents Louis Leopold himself. He had
reason lately to cause the publication of a letter in Winnipeg in which he states :
It may interest the representatives of the Winnipeg Trades and Labour Council to know that the position in this building has added largely to the result of my business, and that the government officials have even tried several times to get me out of it, but have failed, as I have secured the premises on a long lease.
This agency is in the same building as the Canadian government agency, and he boasts here that this brought him a great deal of business, though he says that the Canadian government cannot get him out. But the point I am trying to drive home is that when it comes to the manufacturer asking for anything we can take such radical steps, but when it comes to the workingmen asking for anything, the furthest we can go is to put an advertisement in the English papers saying that we are not responsible for this man's doings. I think that the authorities should find some effective means of stopping this matter where it is now. I brought the same matter up last year ; if it had been effectively dealt with then we would not have been overrun, as we have been overrun, with a lot df deluded mechanic immigrants this year. I have here the prospectus of this Louis Leopold Company, and'I have a tremendous list that was sent over of so-called vacancies in Canada-list after list, giving the number, not only in each trade but in each particular branch. There are also a number of letters that have been sent to me by men to whom Louis Leopold gave them, sending them to various members of the Manufacturers Association asking for work. The Manufacturers Association of course is the body that asks for 25,000 workingmen. I have here a bunch of these recommendations, and every one of them is addressed to a concern in this country that had a strike on at the time. Why, under this same rule it would be just as well if the Sydney Steel Works were to telegraph over to Britain now that they wanted 2,000 men in Sydney right away, that business was so pressing that they wanted the men. Of course they have locked out their men, and so have these other concerns to whom recommendations are sent. In view of this list of vacancies, I may mention that in to-days papers there is a further statement from the Canadian Manufacturers Association in which they claim that over 7,000 vacancies are existing now, giving the numbers, province by province, and in some cases the- trades are given. That is the kind of statement that leads people who are not working for wages and who are not in touch with those that are, to imagine that there is a scarcity of skilled workmen in Canada to-day. If that statement to-day is honest and fair, I say that the one of last year was not, and I do not believe that this one is either. If it is, 1 if their intentions are right, instead of say-


Edward Frederick Clarke: What do you mean ?


Arthur W. Puttee: That he is made an agent of the Immigration Department for the sake of recommending Canada and selling tickets to Canada rather than to other countries. I notice, for instance, that the commissioner over there, Mr. Preston, recognizes it; in fact I imagine that there has been trouble there, he evidently recognizes that there might be, though he states the contrary. He says :
Very many of the booking agents on account of this financial advantage accruing to them, were believed able to exert some influence in cultivating public opinion in their own localities in favour of the Dominion. In doing so, even if they found such a course financially advantageous, they have not been guilty of conduct which any business man has the slightest occasion to be ashamed of.
I draw the inference that there have been some pretty shady dealings with ticket agents using the stationery of the Dominion government. It may be said to be necessary for Mr. Preston to appoint ticket agents in Great Britain to be immigration agent so that they could put in a good word for Canada when the undecided immigrant comes along, but see how it connects the department generally with this mechanic immigration which has been coming out. Here is a bill that was given to me by a man who brought it in his pocket believing that its presentation would give him work at 55 cents an hour. It is headed :


CANADA WANTS MORE MEN IN THE BUILDING TRADES.
Edward Frederick Clarke: What is the date ?	.


Arthur W. Puttee: It would be published in the spring. Its last quotation is dated January 1, 1904. From what I know of the conditions of the building trades in Canada,
I would say that the tremendous difference between the building trades in a Canadian city and the building trades in the cities where the men are to whom these circulars are sent out ought to be pointed out. I know a great many men who have worked in the west, in Winnipeg, for twenty years in the building trade who have their records showing what their incomes have been and I am assured by them that in years gone by their records show that the actual number of working days only averaged from 114 to

135 iu the j'ear. The Britisher knows nothing about this. It is hardly one day in three. Even at $5 a day it gives a man an income of about $050 a year, not an extravagant income, but to state the fact that the building trades are so highly paid in Canada and to put it before the mechanic in the old country without any explanation and with the seal and endorsement of the Canadian government misleads. This circular proceeds :
Statement by the Government Emigration Commissioner.


Mr.  W. T. R.@: we have had large Immigration expenditures for many years we have reduced them during some years and there did not seem to be very much difference in the results in those years and I am bound to say that the conditions existing in other countries have as much as anything else to do with the settlement of our lands. I do not for one moment interpose any objection to having agents in other countries publishing and distributing authentic information, or to have agents looking after the interests of the country, but it looks to me to be a dangerous thing to have so many agents in other countries often idle hands as they have proved to be. We have had many instances of it already, as the letter that is now on the ocean addressed to our commissioner in London proves as the report-it *is only a report- that Washington will interpose proves, and as the protest from Ireland against our agents there proves. I believe we are making friction where we should not make it : I believe we are spending a great deal of money we need not spend, and I believe it is unfair to the wage earners in Canada to leave unchecked this system of bringing in labour to pauperize the labour market, and at the same time listening always to propositions to increase duty and make goods dear.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I draw the attention of the hon. member for Cape Breton (Mr. Kendall) to some statements which appear in the last printed report of the United States Commissioner General of Immigration ; and perhaps he will not treat these stateihents as flippantly and as lightly as he did the statements made by my colleague as to the quality of some of our immigrants. At page 40 of the last printed report of the United States Commissioner General of Immigration you will find this statement:
In the year 1903 the number of officers engaged in preventing these undesirable immigrants from entering the United States from Canada was increased from 66 to 116.
It was found necessary, in order to preserve the United States from the undesirable immigrants from Canada, to increase the number of officers to that extent. The report says, at page 46 :
During the twelve months ended to-day many persons have applied for admission to the United States via Canada whose personal appearance and ceneral conditions shoull have precluded the possibility of their having been allowed to embark on any vessel designed to carry passengers under conditions of health and comfort.
It is only necessary to relate that in some instances the filthy conditions have been so abominable as to render it impossible for our medical examiners to give them the attention required by our laws and regulations. The Bureau, like myself, will have to leave it to conjecture how fellow passengers huddled together in the close quarters of an Atlantic liner have endured the contaminating presence of such persons.
Mr. PL'TTEE.
Admission to the United States has been invariably denied to such applicants and in some instances it has been deemed unwise to return them to Canada, and deportation to Europe has been effected.
These immigrants were so bad that the United States officers feared to send them back to Canada, because, I presume, they would make attempts to re-enter, and so they shipped them home via New York. The report further says, at page 48 :
Covering a direct line of more than 4,000 miles of frontier including three ocean ports, and inspecting more than 100 trains daily and a large number of ferries, * sound steamers,' and the growing fleets that ply the Great Lakes, these inspectors, in all kinds of inclement weather, and frequently under most trying circumstances, have boarded every train, met every ferry and every steamer, Whether iby riven, lake or sound, and have prevented the amazing total of 5,158 diseased and otherwise objectionable aliens entering the United States, and have done all this without causing a single complaint on the part of the travelling public.
Then follows a tabulated statement of the number of arrests made along the border of persons trying to smuggle undesirable immigrants into the United States. Year after year we on this side of the House have told the Minister of the Interior that we are prepared to assist him in making a reasonable appropriation to ensure a more-efficient medical inspection than that which takes place at the present time. How is it possible that hundreds and hundreds of immigrants who reach Montreal from St John or Halifax are so diseased as not to be admissible to the United States, if a right medical examination was made at the port of landing ? How is it possible that such immigrants are allowed to land at Quebec and Montreal ? What we demand is a more rigid medical examination. These immigrants should not be permitted to embark on the other side of the Atlantic, but if they contract disease on the voyage they should De sent back at the expense of the steamship companies which bring them out. If the statements of the United States officers are reliable, such immigrants should be rigorously kept ojit of Canada. It is extraordinary that we should have the opposition and criticism of hon. gentlemen opposite rather than their sup-port, when we draw the attention of the Minister of the Interior to this matter. We are as anxious as he ought to be to secure eligible immigrants, but we enter our emphatic protest against the laxity of the system which permits hundreds and hundreds of immigrants to remain here who are excluded from the United States. We have just as skilled medical men in Canada as they have in the United States, and' if they are able to successfully grapple with the difficulty, so should we. I believe that in some cases the United States employ Canadian medical officers, which is a compliment to our professional men, and if that ho so, we certainly should have no difficulty

ourselves in finding a sufficient number of suitable inspectors to protect our frontier and ocean ports against the incursion of these immigrants. My bon. friend from Lennox (Mr. Wilson) drew attention to the conditions prevailing in Montreal last spring, when thousands of destitute Italians were permitted to come into this country, and we have not so far been able to place the responsibility for their admission. Some of these poor immigrants became a charge upon the good people of Montreal. The Minister of Labour did not know whence they came. He sent his deputy, a very able and a very clever man, to make inquiries, but he gave it up as a bad job ; and now we have an investigation going on by one of our county judges. Surely there must be something wrong in the machinery of the Labour and Immigration Departments when this untoward condition of things is allowed to go on. We have to call in one of our judges to ascertain where these people came from, under what conditions they werei brought to the country, and what has become of them. It is certainly a very serious problem, and it is our duty to raise our voice in protest on every available occasion, until we are satisfied that the plan of the Minister of the Interior is the most efficient and most rigorous method that can be devised to exclude diseased and undesirable immigrants from Canada. My hon. friehd from Winnipeg (Mr. Puttee) has referred to the methods adopted on the other side of the Atlantic to induce people to emigrate to Canada. Last fall, through the co-operation of a friend in England, I secured a large number of circulars issued by Mr. Louis Leopold, advertising situations vacant, &c., and I sent them to the secretary of the Dominion Trades and Labour Congress so that he might see what was going on. My correspondent found the office of Mr. Leopold in the same building as the office of the Canadian immigration agent at London ; he found these circulars bearing the Dominion eoat-of-arins, with the words ' Canadian Labour Bureau ' ; and he found all the surrounding circumstances calculated to mislead the ordinary intending emigrant to believe that if be came to Canada through the instrumentality of this bureau, he was coming under tthe auspices of the Canadian government itself.
As I have said, I gave these documents to the secretary of the Dominion Trades and Labour Council, that he might see for himself what was going on, and take the necessary steps to try to awaken the people of the old country as to the misrepresentations that were being made to induce people to come to this country under the promise that immediate permanent employment could be procured. The last time I was at home I had a visit from a friend of mine, who left me two or three papers which I will take the liberty of reading, and I will then pass
them over to the hon. minister that he may take steps to put a stop to these misrepresentations which are still going on. Three Scotchmen, named Ferris, Brown and Allan, were induced to come to Canada, and were assured of immediate permanent employment at their trade. These men were represented to me to be miners, men who mined the stone of rock surrounding the coal seams. They had splendid letters, I am told, from those by whom they had been employed for many years, and would have made excellent citizens if the representations made to them had been carried out. They were told that if they came to Toronto they could find employment at once. I need not tell the hon. minister that there is no employment for miners in the city of Toronto ; and they looked in vain for work. They were engaged, when my friend called on me a couple of weeks ago, in helping to clear away the debris at the scene of the recent fire. The following letter is to Mr. Ferris :
Canadian Labour Bureau,
Shipping Agency, It Nelson Place, Stirling, 16th April, 1904.
Dear Sir,-I have now pleasure in sending you herewith three boat and rail tickets to Toronto tor yourself, Geo. Brown and John Allan, also a supply of luggage labels for each. Inclosed you will also find two very good letters of introduction, so that you are all sure of employment. You should he ready to embark at Plantation Quay, south side, Glasgow, on 23rd April, at 2 p.m. The balance of the passage money to be paid at 25 Bothwell Street, Glasgow.
Send luggage to reach Glasgow the day before sailing.
I shall he pleased to furnish you with any other information you may desire.
Mr. Ferris was also given a letter by this same Mr. Louis Leopold from the Canadian Labour Bureau, 13 Charing Cross, S. W-
Canadian Labour Bureau,
London, S.W., 14th April, 1904.
My dear Sir,-The bearer of this letter^ is Mr. John Ferris, who Is desirous of getting work in Toronto. He is a brickmaker by trade and X should esteem it a favour If you would advise him as to where he is likely to obtain suitable employment. He is willing to take any work for the time being until he can get a berth in his own line. Thanking you in an-ticioation for anything you may do on his behalf.
I am, dear sir.
Yours faithfully,
Canadian Labour Bureau, LOUIS LEOPOLD,
Secretary.
This letter is addressed to R. J. Younge, Esq.. Canadian Manufacturers Association, Toronto, Canada. Now, Mr. Chairman, there ought to be some means devised to prevent men from being deceived in tills way by agents who represent themselves, and who would appear from the heading on

tlie letter paper, to be agents of the Canadian government. I believe tbe government has recently published in the old country papers an announcement respecting some of these people ; but that to my mind it not sufficient. There ought to be some effort made to secure the co-operation of the imperial authorities to stop this work, which is engaged in. I presume, by those who get a commission from the steamship companies to induce people to come to this country. These men, I believe, two of them at least, are married men who left their families behind them, expecting to bring them out in the fall. They will leave Canada in the *autumn and return home, and they will not act as very earnest advocates of immigration to Canada after their own experience. If this kind of work is permitted to go on unchallenged, a great deal of damage will be done to Canada. As the hon. member for Winnipeg has said, many misrepresentations have been made to induce mechanics to copie to this country. These men have not been able in many cases to get the employment or the wage they were told they could get, and many of them have become dissatisfied and are writing to their friends in the old country denouncing the misrepresentations under which t'hev were induced to come to this country. This is no doubt a difficult matter to deal with, but I do not think we on this side of the House would be doing our duty if we did not point out to the minister the conditions that exist, and I can assure him that he will have our co-operation in any steps he takes to put a stop to a condition of things that is most disgraceful. The effort made by the Department of Labour to keep people from coming in here cannot be regarded as successful. Apparently the machinery used by the Minister of the Interior is not all that it ought to_ be. We are ready to assist him in perfecting that machinery, because we believe it needs perfecting, and in applying the precautions that ought to be taken. The number of immigrants may be somewhat smaller in years to come, but a better class of people will come to our shores, and the result on the whole will be much more beneficial than if the existing condition of things is permitted to continue.


William Roche: The hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat mentioned, if I heard him correctly, that there had been some 5,000 undesirable immigrants who presented themselves on the frontier of the United States and were rejected or deported. My hon. friend also mentioned the port of Halifax and the pol't of St. John as having contributed to that number. I would ask him if he has any number that he could give of these undesirable people who have been traced to entries through the port of Halifax. I know that the inspection by the United States authorities at Halifax is' very rigid, and Mr. CLARKE.
they have rejected all suspects that came under their scale. I also know that the inspection for admission into Canada is equally precise and rigorous. The two inspections are conducted in the same building and almost under the same conditions. Therefore I would like to ask my hon. friend if he has the information at hand, how many of those who presented themselves on the frontier came through the port of Halifax.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I presume all of them came through the ports of Halifax, St. John and Quebec. I do not know of any other ocean ports through which immigrants come to Canada by the Atlantic.


William Roche: I would ask him if he knows that one of them came through the port of Halifax ?


Edward Frederick Clarke: I suppose probably a percentage of them came to St. John, to Halifax and to Quebec.


William Roche: I want to get exact figures on that point, because it reflects on the inspection at that port.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Surely the hon. gentleman would not expect me to inquire from the United States authorities how many came through Halifax, how many through iSt. John and how many through Quebec ? I have given the statement of the commis-'sioner general of immigration of the total number deported, and not permitted to enter the United States, who were going to the United States through Canadian ports. He can determine himself how many came to Halifax, St. John and Quebec. My hon. friend from Lennox .points out to me on page 53 of the report a tabulated statement which I will pass over to the hon. gentleman if he likes. This gives the grand total of rejections and deportations as 5,158. The number going to Halifax was 9,573, of which 9,443 were admitted. 130 rejected and 83 deported to Europe from the border. That was by the Dominion Line. The number that came by the Allan Line was 3,399 examined ; 3,368 admitted, 31 deported to Europe, 22 deported to Europe from the border. By the Hamburg-American Line, examined 1,775, admitted 1,746, deported to Europe 29, deported to Europe from the border S9. Then the returns are given from the other ports of St. John and Halifax. I will send the table over to the hon. gentleman.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I must protest against any effort to misrepresent my attitude on this question of the quarantine against infectious or contagious diseases. I took no such stand as the one attributed to me. The hon. member for Grey (Mr. Sproule) told us that a distinguished surgeon, representing Montreal (Mr. Roddick), again and again brought the attention of the committee to the undesirable quality of immigrants

arriving in Montreal, many of whom were suffering from contagious diseases, and were moving freely around the city and enviorns.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: No, the hon. member has got all mixed up.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I do not think so.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I am sure, because 1 know what I intended to say. I said that it was stated in the Montreal papers that these people had found their way into the hospitals and into the private homes of the country, that we had time and again drawn attention to the danger in this House, and that the hon. member for Montreal (Mr. Roddick) had spoken of it as well and had referred to the fact that these people were to be found in the hospitals and must have come in through our Canadian ports.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: That is just what I said.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: No, the hon. member said that an eminent physician of Montreal, who has a seat in this House, had time and again drawn attention to it. As a matter of fact, he did not. I said that it was in the papers time and again, that time and again we had drawn the attention of the government to the fact, and that the hon. member for Montreal (Mr. Roddick) had spoken of it in the House.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I went through the 1 Hansard ' for the last three years and could not find any evidence that Dr. Roddick had referred to.this matter.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: If the hon. gentleman will look through ' Hansard ' more carefully again, he will find it.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: If there is one hon. member in this House, who is well qualified to deal with the subject, it is the hon. member for Montreal (Mr. Roddick), and if there was great danger to this country, that gentleman would have been here and have rung the changes on the matter again and again. He would have pointed out the defects of the quarantine stations in Montreal, Grosse Isle and other places in such a manner that there would have been no doubt as to the 'danger. And I submit that when he did not take that pronounced stand on this question, we are probably magnifying the danger that does exist. I do not deny that there is danger, but I say that in our criticisms of the arrangements to prevent the importation of disease at these points, we are straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel. There is one way in which the House and the country can reach a fair conclusion. It has been suggested to the .medical men in this House that on the t.next occasion when a large immigration steamer comes from Europe, they should take the train and go to Grosse Isle and watch the inspection ; and I can assure the hon. gentleman, from the knowledge I have
of the port of Halifax, that the medical men in charge there are men well qualified. One is a very distinguished surgeon and the other is a physician of very large practice and high respectability. I am sure that the inspection there is very thorough, and I do not doubt that in Quebec and Montreal the inspection will be found equally thorough. Instead of harping about imaginary evils, it would be far better for the medical men on both sides to go and observe really what is going on at these stations, and we would then be in a better position to discuss the question to advantage.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: The hon. gentleman rose to set right the impression in this House that he was antagonistic to the quarantining and the prevention of contagious diseases, but now he attacks the opposition for harping on an imaginary danger. Is it an imaginary danger when the American inspector draws attention to the fact that owing to the diseased condition of these immigrants, over 1,300 had to be sent back at the Canadian border ?


Arthur Samuel Kendall: They have done just what hon. gentlemen opposite are doing- straining at gnats and swallowing camels.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Is the hon. gentleman engaged in professional life at all, or in freezing bait for the purpose of catching fish ?


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I am not running a small drug store at a country cross-road.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I did not catch what the hon. gentleman said. But if he were a medical man and practiced at all, he would appreciate what it means to import contagious diseases. One or two cases of small-pox will cost hundreds and thousands of dollars, not taking into account the very severe trouble that people are subjected to by its (introduction into their neighbourhood.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: With the hon. gentleman's (Mr. Sproule's) permission, I would like to ask him a question. Will the hon. gentleman or any of his friends produce evidence of contagion from a case of trachoma?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I ask the question again. Is the hon. gentleman (Mr. Kendall) a medical man at all ? The question naturally suggests itself when he talks in that fashion. No medical man would waste his time in answering such a question as the hon. gentlemaki has asked. If he wishes to quote authority-certainly I do not, because every medical man knows it-let him go into the library and bring out any book and read it. These matters are on record in our own debates, for the authorities were quoted a few years ago in this House, to satisfy just such" incredulous people as the hon. gentleman. There is not an author who does not say that it is contagious.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: We all know it is contagious ; I did not say it was not.
*7319


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Then, what more is required ? Will the hon. gentleman (Mr. Kendall) say that is a proper thing that a person affected with a contagious or infectious disease should be brought in and planted in a community in our country on the plea that there is no danger ?


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I did not say so.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: The hon. gentleman says that we are dealing with imaginary difficulties. He says : ' I haye heard no more ridiculous criticisms than those of the opposition regarding the health of immigrants.' These are the hon. gentlemen's words. Now, what has brought about the quarantine regulations that are being enforced to-day but the criticism- ridiculous criticism, the hon. gentleman would call it-from this side of the House during successive years ? It was frankly admitted that there was comparatively speaking no restriction upon these immigrants coming a few years ago. But, year after year, we drew the attention of the House to the matter and criticised the inaction of the government. The result was that the government introduced the system which they are carrying out to-day and which they declare to be almost perfect. Yet, an hon. gentleman on that side speaks of our criticism as ridiculous. Is it ridiculous on the part of the representatives of the people to seek to prevent the importation of contagious and infectious disease ? The hon. gentleman says we have enough of that at home. So we have-and far too much. But do we lessen what we have at home by allowing the importation of disease promiscuously from abroad. Would our government be doing its duty in allowing that ? Woud they be carrying out the quarantine regulation that the country expects them to carry out ? The hon. gentleman suggests that if we want to see what this really means, let the medical men of this House go down to the port when an immigrant ship comes in. No doubt if that were done, extra effort would be made to show that most admirable quarantine regulations were being carried out. They would be on dress parade.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: If the hon. gentleman saw one or two shiploads of immigrants he would be able to judge how much of this is serious and how much trivial. I say that the bulk of these cases are trivial cases, and it would be a gross injustice to these immigrants and to Canada to refuse them admission. Of course, a number of these cases are dangerous and should be quarantined.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: No man who knows anything of medical science can speak of contagious disease as being trivial. A case of small-pox may be imported from across the line, and before we are done with it, it may cost us thousands of dollars and the same Mr. KENDALL. '
is true of scarlet fever and of trachoma. It is hard to know when it is stamped out. It may spread to only one or two or it may spread to a hundred. You take a case of trachoma and keep the patient for weeks and months, and even years, and you may have the disease on your haqds still. You may get it apparently cured, and still the patient will relapse, becoming unfit for any employment and a danger to the whole community. And yet the hon. gentleman speaks of it as being insignificant and trifling.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: No.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Trachoma is an infectious disease and these reports show it is the most common of infectious diseases among immigrants. Yet the hon. gentleman, who professes to be a medical man demands to be told of an instance in which this disease has spread. Looking at it as medical men do we not know what the results of a contagious or infectious disease is when planted in a community ? That disease may spread, and it cannot be regarded as an insignificant thing, nor can we afford to relax our efforts to prevent its importation. And are we of the opposition doing less than our duty when we call attention to it and urge upon the government to improve and carry out carefully their quarantine regulations ? AVhy, it is the opposition who should have credit for this system which the government have adopted and which they declare to be perfect. Instead of being abused by hon. gentlemen opposite, and especially by the medical men among them, the opposition should be given credit for their efforts to protect and promote the health of the community.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I venture to say that it my hon. friend the junior member for Cape Breton (Mr. Kendall) will inquire in the library he will find thy t within the last twelve months some protests have been made -I cannot say that I remember the particulars-from medical associations regarding the importation of diseased immigrants. I will endeavour to find them for him. I am satisfied that protests have been made on that subject by some of the medical organizations of this country. Let me point out that, if the opposition are wrong in their criticism, they certainly do not desire to be wrong, or to take up the time of the committee in pressing upon the government precautions against dangers which may fairly be regarded as of trifling importance. It is because they regard them as more than a bagatelle, which, I think were the hon. gentleman's words.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: If the hon. gentleman will allow me-I was comparing the two dangers. I said that one was a bagatelle compared with the other. I did not say that it was a bagatelle in itself.


Edward Frederick Clarke: We are glad to hear the hon. gentleman's explanation. But ' Han-

sard ' to-morrow will tell of tlie flippant way in which my hon. friend (Mr. Kendall) dealt with the statement presented by my hon. friend and colleague from West Toronto (Mr. Osier). Of course, we accept the statement of the hon. gentleman (Mr. Kendall). But let me draw his attention as a medical man to a statement I have here. The immigration into the United States last year reached the enormous total of 857,046-almost a million people. Of that number 35, 920 came through Canada-less than five per cent of the total. Now, at page 59 of Mr. Sargent's own report, this extraordinary statement is made :
As specially indicative of the value of the system of inspection conducted through the agency of the Montreal office, attention is directed to the number of rejections on account of communicable diseases, 1,439 as compared with the grand total of rejections on the same account at all the seaports of the United States, 1,773.
Through the one port of Montreal, as a result of the rigid medical inspection made by the United States officers, there were within 350 as many undesirable and diseased immigrants detected and sent back as were found in all the United States ports. Surely, the hon. gentleman (Mr. Kendall) will not think that any criticism directed to prohibit the importation of these people into the country was trifling-was a bagatelle ?
Surely we are in the line of our duty in endeavouring to impress on the minister that every reasonable precaution should be taken to stop the inflow of these people into this country in their endeavour to get into the United States ? As the hon. gentleman knows, and as these reports have shown from time to time, the steamship agents who induce immigrants to come from the continent have got on to tlie fact that the inspection is extremely rigid in the United States, and they have been diverting the flow of immigrants through our ports into the United States. The Minister of the Interior has taken some steps to bar them from coming in, and now we are presenting him with the report of the Inspector General of Immigration for the United States, showing tlie conditions which he declares still exists, and the rejections he is obliged to make to keep out of the United States undesirable immigrants. I think we ought to have the help of my hon. friend the junior member for Cape Breton in impressing upon the Minister of the Interior that he is not doing his duty to the people of this country in allowing these diseased Immigrants to come in here on their way to the United States, and when they are stopped at the border, being left in this country as a charge upon the taxpayers. If they are still permitted to come into Canada, the steamship companies should be responsible for their maintenance while in the country, and they
should be sent back at the expense of these steamship companies to the country whence they came. If the minister will promise that these matters will have his careful attention we will let the item pass.


William Roche: I beg to call the attention of the member for Toronto (Mr. Clarke) to the statement in the book he has sent over to me, on page 53 of the report of the Commisisoner General of Immigration for the United States. In this report it is stated that 4,542 persons presented themselves at the frontier for admission into the United States. Out of that number 1,002 were rejected because they had no certificates, 1,575 because they were paupers or persons likely to become public charges-that is more than half. In addition, a few were rejected for other reasons, leaving out of the whole 1,430 who had dangerous contagious diseases. So the magnitude of the number left here is not so vast as the hon. gentleman says. Now I may allude to the port of Halifax. The statement is here given of the number of immigrants that were deported from tiie shins side at Halifax, and that fills up the whole. The total is given, those admitted and those deported, and there is not a single individual who came through ports of Halifax or St. John who is put down as having gone through to the United States by the frontier.


Edward Frederick Clarke: I gave the hon. gentleman the report to read ; he evidently has not completed his task. If he will turn up the number who came by the Hamburg-Ameri-can Line he will find that there were deported from the border, 59.


William Roche: Not one is given as- from the port of Halifax.


Edward Frederick Clarke: If the hon. gentleman will look at it again he will find that I am correct and that he is mistaken. I will send the book back to the hon. gentleman. However, Mr. Chairman, there is no use in continuing to argue with a gentleman who speaks in a trifling way of 1,439 cases of dangerous and contagious diseases having been kept out of the United States, out of the total border rejections for all causes of 4,542. Will any hon. gentleman seriously contend that that condition of things is satisfactory, when 1,400 or 1,500 people, afflicted with contagious diseases, whose destination was the United States, are barred on Canadian soil and left here stranded by American officials ?


Thomas Walter Scott: What became of them


Edward Frederick Clarke: God only knows. I have been trying to find out for the last three or four years.


Thomas Walter Scott: Did you ever meet any of them ?


Edward Frederick Clarke: Yes, I am sorry to say I have met them. I say that it is with the desire of assisting the government to put a stop to this condition of things, which is disgraceful, that we have raised these questions from year to year. I am sure the Minister of the Interior will bear testimony to the fact that in offering these criticisms for years past we have pledged ourselves to give him any reasonable assistance we can to inaugurate a thorough medical inspection that will keep this class of immigrants out. I will send the book back to my hon. friend from Halifax (Mr. Roche) so that he can read it again.


William Roche: I did not say one word as to whether it was desirable that these people should be allowed admission to the United States, or even as to whether they should be allowed to come into Canada. The hon. gentleman coupled the ports of Halifax and St. John, and I took the trouble to look Up the numbers that came through those two ports, because his statement reflects on our inspection there. I know the inspection is very rigid. In that column of figures, my hon. friend will see that the total number of admissions is given and the number that were deported. If these two items were added up the total would show there was no remainder to represent any who could have presented themselves at the border, They are not put down in that column as having presented themselves at the border. I did not speak of the desirability of allowing these people to come in, or of what means should be taken to prevent them.


Mr. OLIVER.: Before the item passes 1 would like to say a word in regard to a matter concerning which I heard some adverse criticism earlier in the day, that is, ns to the measures taken by the Immigration Department during the early spring of this year and the year before to induce a proper class of immigrants to come from Britain. The department sent over last spring and the spring before a number of practical farmers to different parts of the old country for the purpose of inducing a proper class of agricultural immigrants to come to Canada.
I was sorry to hear that system criticised adversely this afternoon. I wish to put on record my view that it is the most effective method which the department has yet adopted for the purpose of inducing a desirable class of British immigrants to come to this country. I think we all agree that the system previously followed of resident agents in the old country was very largely a failure ; and we must admit that the practice of paying a bonus to steamship companies was largely a failure. Both these systems were failures for obvious reasons. I believe that by bringing in contact with the agricultural population of the British islands successful farmers of this country, there is a reasonable probability of securing Mr. SCOTT.
the class of immigrants we most desire. I do not know whether the department intends to continue this system, but I would not like this item to pass, after having heard the somewhat adverse criticisms that were made, without giving my strong endor-sation to that system which has been adopted recently, and which I am satisfied has already been productive of very good results. But still we can reasonably expect that it will be productive of very much better results as time goes on if the system is continued, and as the agricultural population of the old country become more intimately acquainted with the actual farmers who have made a success of farming life in our western country. I do not know but that it would be a good idea to include in these excursions farmers from eastern Canada as well as those from .western Canada ; but. speaking of the west, 1 would certainly, as a western man, wish to endorse most strongly that system of inducing immigration, and I do not consider that the expense so far incurred is at all out of proportion to the benefits likely to accrue ; in fact, I think that a very large part of the money which has been hitherto spent for immigratioi purposes in the old country, both in the employment of permanent agents there and in paying bonuses to steamship companies, was money absolutely thrown away, or worse than thrown away, and that whether this amount that is now spent be large or small it is for a good purpose, and there is every reason to Relieve that it will produce a good result.
. Mr. BLAIN. May I ask the hon. minister if it is the intention of his department to send farm delegates over this coming year 'r
Mi-. SIFTON. I understand my hon. friend refers to the sending of delegates in the fall. I have not come to any conclusion in regard to that. We certainly will not send, over any large number.


Richard Blain: Will the hon. minister state how these delegates were selected last year ? Did the department make the selection lliemselves or were they selected on the recommendation of members from the west ?


Clifford Sifton: I selected from my own constituency some men whom I knew personally, but in the selection of men from other counties I took the advice of my hon. friends who were acquainted with these men, and who recommended them.


Mr.  W. J.@: ROC-HE. In reference to immigration literature, I believe there was a harvest number of the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' issued specially for immigration pur poses. Will the hon. gentleman say how many copies were distributed, and what it. cost the department for distribution and printing ?


Clifford Sifton: I am not sure that I am certain as to the publication to which the hon. gentleman is referring.


Mr. W. J. ROCHE.: There was a special harvest number of the ' Free Press ' gotten out last fall. I think there were 170,000 or
200.000	copies.


Clifford Sifton: In 1903 ?


William James Roche: October 7, 1903. J desire to bring this matter to the attention of the horn, minister, because I think it was an injudicious and very unwise distribution of this kind of literature, and one more calculated to injure the country than to bring immigrants to our shores. I think there were somewhere in the neighbourhood of
200.000	copies printed and distributed. My information is that after they had gotten out a certain number of copies and they had been put into general circulation there was found to be an error of judgment on the part of some one, they were withdrawn from circulation and other copies were sent out in lieu thereof. I brought this matter up in the Agricultural Committee, and I asked the commissioner if this was the case. He said there were some statistics which were incorrect, and that that was the only reason why the original distribution was called in and suppressed. I have a copy of each edition, and I find that there was only a very slight difference between the two copies. In the first copy that was gotten out I notice that there are several placards. Here is one representing Uncle Sam standing on one side of the fence looking over into Canadian territory. This placard reads as follows :
We wish to own our own farms in Canada.
Upwards of 50,000 Americans gone to Canada within the past year.
This is one of four placards in the first distribution, or I really believe this is the last edition. It is headed as a sample copy. The one bearing date of October 7th I believe is the second edition, and if so, I think it is more injurious than the first, because I find that two of the placards appearing in the first were changed to read as follows :
None but the trusts deserve the dough.
Here the protective tariff makes the farmer sweat.
This was for distribution on the other side of the line, and was designed to induce 'American citizens to come over and settle in Canada. I think that would be more apt to antagonize an American citizen than to encourage him to come and settle in Canada. I know that if literature of that kind were circulated in Canada to induce citizens of this country to settle in the United States it would be regarded more as an insult than as an invitation to go there. Not only do I find it injudicious in that respect, but I have taken some sample clippings from this distribution which are calculated to injure our own country. We had a bad storm last September, I think about the 10th or 12th, a storm of almost unexampled severity in the history of our country. Though there 233
was a severe snowstorm, there was no reason for publishing that all over the world, and no reason particularly for publishing it in the United States, where we expect the bulk of our immigration to come from. Still, these are some of the quotations taken from this literature :
' As a result of the big storm.'-' The usual drawbacks occur, danger from frost and drought.'-1 Small yield from poor farming, from gophers and bad effects of weeds.'-' In the latter place (Southern Alberta)

I am sure my hon. friend from Alberta (Mr. Oliver) will resent these specimen statements-
-come suddenly and as no shelter is provided, often ninety per cent of a drove is lost in a single storm.'


Edward Frederick Clarke: Where is that' statement made ?


William James Roche: That is in this document prepared for distribution, and this is the character it gives to the constituency represented by my hon. friend (Mr. Oliver).
' The recent storm had lowered the grade of the wheat.'-' This locality suffered from the drought.'-' Late wheat has suffered some damage from frost, and some that was cut early is slightly sprouted.'-' Bad weather.'-
' Raging storm of the 12th instant (September).'-' Notwithstanding the severity of the storm.'-* The past storm.'-* The wheat buyers pronounce that your wheat is frozen.'-
' Wheat is really frozen, the snow lying so-long on the stooks injured the kernel, and the frost following really injured the wheat.' -' The wet) weather has deteriorated the value about 4 cents per bushel.'-' Off colour by reason of the damp weather.'-' the big storm.'-
* The wheat was not fit to market.'-' There was no snow here, so the wet has not soaked Into the stacks as much as It otherwise would.' -* The snow is nearly gone.'-' The grain is in a very bad condition and will all have to be cut one way. Some say some of it will not cut at all.'-' The recent storm.'-' The big storm.'-' Severe wind storm, with its accompanying fall of snow did considerable damage.'-' By the force of the wind and the weight of the snow oats were prostrated to, the ground. Farmers think they will raise sufficiently to be cut at least from one direc-tipn.'-' Heavy rain.'-' Damage by the recent storm.'-' The big storm.'-' Continued bad weather.'-' Storm was the worst ever seen by the oldest settlers.'-' Since the snow storm.' -' The snow has injured the crops.'-' The storm.'-'It will never he cut though, as it is lying down never to rise again.'-' Rain, snow and frost.'-' All grain uncut is frozen." -' Damage done by last Saturday's storm.'- ' The storm of the third week of May was a very disastrous one-hundreds of the young, cattle perished. Then followed the month of -June-no rain at all. The rain-has retarded, operations-cattle are backward on account of the wet weather in August.'
Storm and bud weather are mentioned forty-four times in the issue, and the references include all seasons of the year, all sec-I tions of the country, and all kinds of grain



in one general defamation. Does anybody suppose that that kind of literature is calculated to attract settlers to our shores ?


Mr. TALBOT.: What is my hon. friend reading from ?


William James Roche: I am reading extracts taken from this issue sent out by the department as immigration literature. These are reports of correspondents sent to the ' Free Press ' all over the country. We do not wish to deny that we had a bad storm, but why should we pay $7,000 to the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' to advertise that to the world. True, it was simply so much pap for the political organ of the Min ister of the Interior, but I think every candid man will admit that those of us who reside in that part of the country have a grievance ; that the people of Canada should be called upon to spend so much money to advertise a thing in a special edition gotten out for the express purpose of sending it broadcast through the American union. We spent $800,000 on immigration last year, and the question arises : Are we getting sufficient value for that both in quantity and in quality-and quantity is not the most essential thing by a great deal ?	1
was surprised to hear the member for Cape Breton (Mr. Kendall) minimize the danger we are subjected to through the importation of' persons suffering from contagious diseases. He seemed to think that this was rather a trivial matter. I do not deny that we have many of these contagious and infectious diseases within our own borders, but when we have so much of the home grown article is it not doubly astonishing that we should add to it by importation ? The hon. gentleman from Cape Breton seemed rather to resent our criticism, but I think the Minister of the Interior will himself admit that the criticism of his policy from this side of the House in years past has in some measure urged on him the necessity of improvement, and I give him credit for that.


Arthur Samuel Kendall: I do not think the hon. gentleman (Mr. W. J. Boche) wishes to misrepresent me. My position is, and I have stated it several times ; that we cannot be to particular to keep out certain diseases, but I said that certain contagious diseases were trivial, that a large proportion of these cases referred to are trivial, and that we would do an injustice to this country and an injustice to the immigrants if we rejected them on that account.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: These blunders take a lot of explanation.


Mr. INGBAM.: Does the minister decline to give an explanation of the circulation of this literature ?


Clifford Sifton: This literature was bought by an officer of the department because it was considered desirable literature. I was in England when the arrange men,: was made, and hon. gentlemen know that a minister in -Mr. W. J. ROCHE.
charge of the Immigration Department cannot read every publication that is bought and circulated on behalf of the department. I am not prepared to say at this moment ihat if I had read through that publication and had found the statements to which my hon. friend (Mr. W. J. Boche) has referred to be a true account of unavoidable circumstances in the North-west, I would take that as a reason why it should not be distributed. From the time I have taken the immigration work under my charge, we have considered that the truth was good enough to be told with regard to the Northwest, and in telling the truth we have succeeded in this at least: that the people to whom we addressed our literature, believe the representations made in it. If I found in a document which my officers thought was desirable literature to be circulated, that the truth was told as to a storm or anything of that kind, I am not at all sure I would (have rejected it simply because that which happens in every agricultural country was shown to have happened in Northwestern Canada. I can express no opinion about it; it was not my own personal act. but I venture the statement that the people who read that paper were not prejudiced against Canada, by reason of that statement, because any one who knows anything about agriculture in all countries, knows that conditions of this kind arise at times. I have been asked for an explanation and that is the only explanation I can give.
My hon. friend from Winnipeg (Mr. Puttee) referred at some length to a number of things which have been explained before and in respect to which the position of the government has remained absolutely clear, and it seems like foolish repetition to keep repeating the same explanation over and over again. However, inasmuch as my hon. friend (Mr. Puttee) has the appearance and earnestness in urging some of these points, perhaps I might say a word in regard to them. So far as his statement is concerned, that the labour market in Winnipeg is in such a state that ordinary unskilled labour is bringing only fifteen cents per hour, I say at once that I positively refuse to accept that statement as being a correct description of the labour market in Winnipeg. I do not think it is correct, and I will require more evidence than the hon. gentleman's remarks before I accept it as correct. I was in Winnipeg before my hon. friend (Mr. Puttee) represented that city, and I have seen the workingmen of that city packing their grips and travelling out because there were no people coming in ; because the country which is tributary to Winnipeg and of which Winnipeg is the entrepot, was not being settled up. I can tell my hon. friend that the reason why this $6,000,000 worth of buildings is going up in the city of Winnipeg now is because of the successful immigration policy carried on under this government. If my hon. friend's constituents are prosper-

ous and if the city he represents is prosperous, it is the immigration policy which j my hon. friend has done his best to prevent and discourage which is largely responsible for that prosperity. With regard to the point to which attention has been drawn at great length, respecting the misrepresentations which have been made in the old country, I can only say that that is one of the things which is going to take place under any system of encouraging the immigration of agriculturists. No one ever saw an army without camp followers, and no one ever saw a great movement of population without a certain residium following it, and certain things happening as a consequence of the movement having been inaugurated. It is quite true that certain persons have taken advantage of the immigration movement from Great Britain to Canada, of the advertising we have done, and of the dissemination of information which has taken place under this department, for the purpose of making money in a cheap and easy way by making false representations to mechanics and other people in order to induce them to come to Canada. But the government of Canada is not responsible for that, and I repudiate any responsibility for any false representations made by any one in the United Kingdom. Until this parliament assumes the responsibility of placing on the statute-book a law to enable us to deal with cases of that kind-and I doubt the possibility of parliament placing any such law on the statute-book-I am not disposed to hold myself responsible for anything done in that way. As to the labour bureau setting itself up and making false representations as to the condition of the people in Canada, that is the responsibility of the people making them. We have no law whereby we can prevent any person who sees fit to place a heading on his letter paper which leads an uneducated person to suppose that he is, an agent of the Canadian government. We have no law by which we can prevent or punish him. That which we can do we have done. We have sent to a large number of the British newspapers a distinct statement warning the public that the people who are making these representations are not authorized agents of the Canadian government. We have endeavoured to get rid of that office in Charing Cross, but so far without success.


Edward Frederick Clarke: What steps have been taken to get rid of it ?


Clifford Sifton: We have taken the step of calling the attention of the joint landlord of these people and ourselves to the fact that this man was making false representations and was giving us trouble, and that it was very much desired by ourselves that his tenancy should be terminated. But we are informed that his lease has not expired 233i
and he has as much right in that building as we have.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Has his lease the same term as that of the Canadian government ?


Clifford Sifton: I do not think so. When my deputy minister went to England some months ago, one of the things which I discussed with him was that he should make an effort to get those people out of that office ; and my recollection of the conversation I had with him when he came back was that representations had been made to the landlord, and that the landlord had promised to do the best he could to meet our wishes. My deputy minister says that Mr. Leopold expressed his intention to resist every attempt to put him out. My hon. friend knows enough about the law of landlord and tenancy in England, to know that he cannot put a man out at a very short notice. I do not recollect the length of the lease, but the possibility is that it will be some time at least before we can get rid of him.


Edward Frederick Clarke: What length has our lease to run ? It might be easier for us to go out and leave him there.


Clifford Sifton: It might; but if mv hon. friend saw the building, I hardly think he would advise that. With a great deal of care we 'have selected an office which everybody who has visited England is pleased to see as the office of the Canadian government. It is in a most desirable locality, and we have gone to a great deal of expense to have it fitted up in an attractive way. We have taken workmen from Canada to fit it up with Canadian wood ; it is heated with a Canadian furnace ; everything in it is representative of Canada, and the location is regarded as a desirable and satisfactory one from the standpoint of Canada. I doubt very much if the fact that this man has an office upstairs and is carrying on the propaganda he does, is a sufficient reason for us to move. I have little doubt that in a short time he will find it unpleasant and unsatisfactory to continue, and the difficulty will be terminated.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Is the minister aware that the officers of his department send men upstairs to this man to book their passages ?


Clifford Sifton: I do not think that is the case. If my hon. friend has any information to that effect, I would be very much indebted to him if he would send it to me. and I will promise, if he so desires, to regard the source from which it comes as confidential. The instructions which I have given have been most explicit, and there can be no possible excuse for any officer of the department, either directly or indirectly, in any shape, form or manner, being connected with or encouraging the traffic these people are carrying on.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Is this immigration office which we are complaining of on the floor above the ground floor ?


Clifford Sifton: It is a little office on the floor above a portion of our office, which Is on the ground floor. There is a stairway going up to it, and the entrance to the stairway is alongside the entrance to our office.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Is there a lift ?


Clifford Sifton: Yes. There is an elevator and also a stair. The office to which reference is made consists of one little room.


Edward Frederick Clarke: They hook passengers there, and that is about all they do 7


Clifford Sifton: Apparently. This man Leopold is a steamship agent, I believe ; but, as I have said, everything we can do for the purpose of making it clear that the Canadian government is not responsible for this work has been done.
I want to say a word or two with regard to the subject of medical inspection. From the time Dr. Bryce took charge,
I think I can say the inspection became effective. The changes which he brought about became effective about the 1st of April, and since that time I think the medical inspection has been as effective as it can be made. I cannot imagine any way in which it could be made more effective. If my lion friends will take the trouble to go and see the method by which this inspection is carried on, they will be satisfied that the fault does not rest with our officials at the present time. In the first place, we have an inspection for quarantine purposes conducted by the Department of Agriculture. We do not depend on that at all, because the quarantinable diseases do not include all the diseases of an infectious or loathsome character. At the port of Quebec, for instance, the immigrants are landed on the dock, and are sent to a passage way in a building and are ranged off in such a way that they cannot get away. They are brought through a narrow passage which leads through a turnstile into the room where the doctor is waiting to inspect them. There the examination is made and the immigrant has to pass inspection to the satisfaction of the doctor. There is only one possible way in which the inspection can fail to be effective, and that is if the doctor is incompetent ; and as the agent and officers of the department are present and take charge of the immigrants as they are put through the inspection, it is next to Impossible that the doctor could be incompetent without some one being aware of the fact. During a short visit I paid to the station at Quebec, no less than -2 400 people passed through the hands of the inspector during that day. In the twenty-four hours there were no less than three steamers arrived loaded with immigrants. It is possible Mr. SIFTON.
of course that two or three or a half a dozen of this large number might have got through who were affected, not with any serious disease, but with some skin disease of an apparently trifling character ; but taken on the whole, we have a system which I think is effective. I fully recognize the paramount importance of making whatever system we mav adopt as effective as possible.
I want to add further this remark, that I think my hon. friend, after a little reflection, will admit that no matter what kind of inspection we may have in Canada at the seaboard and all along the border-of course we have none at present along the border, and that would be a very large question of policy to consider-you would still have large numbers of people rejected by the American inspectors as unfit to enter the United States. Take the case at Sault Ste. Marie. For years people have been coming across from northern Michigan in small groups to work in the woods where pulp-wood is taken out. Many of these people are Canadians who had gone to Michigan and who were returning from that state. When the lumber mills were closed in Michigan for lack of logs, a considerable number of people who had been engaged in that business crossed our border ; and when the time came when many of them wanted to go back, the Americans had established a most rigid system of inspection at the Sault. Under that system many of the people were prevented going back. Our agent tlieie told me personally, in answer to an inquiry regarding the number of people who had been stopped there, that the excuses under which people were rejected by the American inspectors were in many cases absolutely ridiculous. One man was rejected on the ground of deformity, simply because he had one-Iialf an inch taken off one of ins fingers, and that man had come in from the United States in that condition. These inspectors placed along the line will find excuses for rejecting a considerable number of people, and however thorough our system of inspection may be, there will be more or less of that sort "of thing all the time.


Edward Frederick Clarke: What we object to is that in a city like Montreal there shall be stationed medical inspectors representing a foreign government who shall winnow the immigrants who landed at Atlantic seaports and passed our inspectors.


Clifford Sifton: If my hon. friend can tell me any better way of putting an end to this than having a rigid system of inspection of immigrants as they land, I shall bd happy to consider it.


Mr CLARKE.: The American officers should examine them at the port where they land and give them a certificate through to the United States.


Clifford Sifton: That is done where it can be.


Mr CLARKE.: The immigrants are brought to Halifax and ,St. John, and from there by rail to Montreal, and at Montreal the great bulk of them are rejected.


Clifford Sifton: When they are ticketed to the United States, they are examined at the seaport by the American doctors and there dealt with, but the cases to which the hon. gentleman refers are those of people who have landed at a Canadian seaport from a foreign country and are not ticketed to the United States. These have passed our inspection, and we cannot watch every man who passes the inspection and send some one with him to see what he does. All we ican do is to make our inspection as strict as possible.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Those people who are re-jeeted by the United States officials ought to be sent, at the expense of the United States or of the steamships which brought them over, back to where they came from.


Clifford Sifton: That is a fair question for consideration. It is a system of checking ' the rejections by the officers of the United States, and it is one we have not yet adopted. It will involve great expense.


Mr CLARKE.: The hon. gentleman knows that our Canadian steamship companies have to pay $2 a head to the United States officials for the cost of examining these immigrants.


Clifford Sifton: In many cases when persons are refused admission to the United States at points such as Detroit and Sault Ste. Marie, if these people came lately from foreign ports and the American inspector cam ascertain that fact, they are taxen Straight to New' York and shipped from there back to where they came from, and the cost is charged to the steamship company which landed them in the first instance. But in order to check the rejections by the United States inspectors, we would have to watch the operations of each Amer-[DOT] ican inspector, and that would require a considerable amount of organization and expense. That is a point I have had under consideration with the Minister of Labour, and in respect of which we will have to ask for some legislation as well as an appropriation of public money in order that it may be effectively dealt with.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I want to allude for a moment to this paper that the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. W. J. Roche) was kind enough to send over.


George Taylor: The $7,000 paper ?


Thomas Osborne Davis: Yes. I find that the hon. member for Marquette has gone through this paper and selected a line here and there and read it to the House to try and make the House believe that it is decrying the country. Now, you can take the Bible and
you will find where it says there is no God.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Thomas Osborne Davis: Yes. ' The fool saith in his heart, there is no God.' But if you leave out the words ' the fool saith in his heart,_ vou will find that it says ' there is no God. This hon. gentleman has garbled this article right through. This, to my mind, is a very fair article. I do not think that an} person in this country wants to lead people to believe that we do not have frost occasionally, that there is no rain, that we do not have a little wind. There would be no use in it because people coming in from the United States are travelling all over that country, and they are communicating with their friends. Now, this writer is speaking of a portion of Saskatchewan and he says :
The crops of this eastern part of Saskatchewan have been good and better, never good and poor-the old settlers say they have never kno-wn a failure ; last year and this year have shown very fine crops, both in quantity and quality.
And he underlines this :
The usual drawbacks occur, danger from frost, drought, small yield from poor farming, from gophers, bad effects of weeds.
But lie leaves out the following :
But in no part of the Northwest, and therefore In no part of Canada Is a yearly crop 'Of wheat, oat, barley or flax more assured than in the Saskatoon district.
The hon. gentleman has picked out a little piece in the middle where the writer says there are the usual drawbacks, such as are to be found in any country. But, taking the whole article I think it is a very fair one. I would not object to it going out. It is written about a part of my constituency, and I have no objection to it whatever. I believe in telling the truth about these matters.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I am not alluding to the gentlemen of medical knowledge who raised the question in the House a couple of years in succession about the danger to the country from deceived immigrants. I suppose the hon. member for East Grey (Mr. Sproulei alluded to the hon. member for St. Antoine, Montreal (Mr. Roddick) who is an eminent medical man. I took the trouble to go over that hon. gentleman's speeches, and I found that he had not referred to the matter at all.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I never made that statement. I have already denied that I made it and the hon. gentleman (Mr. Davis) lias no right to repeat it. I said that this matter had been repeatedly brought to the attention of the government and, amongst the sources from which information came, I mentioned the fact that the hou. member for


COMMOXS
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Montreal, St. Antoine (Mr. Roddick) bad spoken of it.
Thomas Osborne Davis: Last year.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: No, I was speaking of tne last two or three years. I am not sure that it was last year, but I am sure that I am right in my recollections of what was said.


Thomas Osborne Davis: If the hon. gentleman (Mr. Sproule) will hunt up ' Hansard ' I think he will And that the hon. member for Montreal West never mentioned the matter.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I will take the trouble to look and satisfy myself, although I am confident that I was right.


Thomas Osborne Davis: 
Edward Frederick Clarke: Read what he says further on.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I suppose the part the hon. gentleman (Mr. Clarke) refers to is that which I have read with regard to Alberta. Now, he gives his reasons :
In the latter place blizzards come suddenly, and as no shelter is provided, often ninety per cent of a drove is lost in a single storm.
* L ANC Y. Does the hon. gentleman (Mr. Davis) think the government should send out literature which it takes so much time to explain ?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: 


Thomas Osborne Davis: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Clancy) can take the paper and read it and he will see that there is nothing wrong about it.


James Clancy: The hon. gentleman is taking twenty minutes to explain it.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I can remember when hon. gentlemen opposite sent out literature when they were running the immigrartion affairs of this country, and that literature had very little effect in bringing in immigrants. The complaint raised about it is that it did not tell the truth.
Why, as I am reminded by an hon. friend near me they even sent out campaign literature last session which they had to withdraw. For my part, I do not see anything wrong with this article. It tells the truth and that is what we want. There is no use making things out different from what they are. Why, fault is found because this writer speaks of frost. You have frost in Ontario or in Quebec


Rufus Henry Pope: Never.


Thomas Osborne Davis: There will be a political trost in the province of Quebec about the time of thfe next general election. I hope it swill not strike my hon. friend from Compton (Mr. Pope), but it may even extend that far. Now, the hon. gentleman (Mr. W J Roche) speaks of the cuts in this paper. Well, here is one of these cuts. A wall is represented and behind it the United States is pictured in the well-known figure of Uncle Sam. There is a placard showing that farm lands there are at from $70 to $150 an acre, and that there is no more government land'. Another placard says: 'None but the trusts deserve the dough.' What is wrong about that ? Every one knows that in the United States they have followed a system of excessive protection such as hon. gentlemen opposite would like to foist on us and so have built up trusts that are driving the people out of the country.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I would like to ask the hon. gentleman a question. He tells us that he believes in stating the truth in these matters. That cut shows that there is no more government land in the United' States, let it was stated by the Minister of the Interior that one reason whv the immigration was not greater was that in the United States they had a lot of unoccupied' government land that they were offering to the settlers. Does that paper tell the truth there ?


Thomas Osborne Davis: My hon. friend must remember that they are constantly opening up , Indian reservations and so on and there might not have been any government land when this paper was published. The part my hon. friend from Marquette objects to-is this : ' The protective tariff makes the farmers sweat.' He says that that is poor advertisement for the United States for it

is running down their country. Well, 1 have a lttle knowledge of the people who are coming over from the United States, and I think that ninety per cent of the men are coming to get away from the high protective tariff and the trusts that are fostered by that tariff. Then, on the other side of this cut, Canada is represented with the placard ' Millions of acres free.'


William James Roche: How much did these American immigrants get for their land before they came to Canada ? According to that newspaper cut, land there is worth from $75 to $100 an acre. That is the effect of high protection.


Thomas Osborne Davis: Surely the hon. gentleman does not say that it is high protection that has made the land worth $75 an acre. High protection has not made land worth $75 an acre. If high protection made land dear, it is strange that in 1896 farm lands in Ontario had gone down so far that you could'nt sell them for enough to pay the mortgage. Since the duty has been reduced farm lands have gone up 50 per cent.


Rufus Henry Pope: That is a false statement, and you know it.


Thomas Osborne Davis: It is true in Ontario, and in the province of Quebec, too.


Rufus Henry Pope: It is a common lie.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I will venture to say that in the constituency which the hon. membe'' for Compton (Mr. Pope) represents there were a great many houses with slats on the windows in 1896.	.


Rufus Henry Pope: That is the old story repeated by the Minister of Agriculture fifteen years ago. You ought to get somebody else to post you.


Thomas Osborne Davis: A lot of people were living in houses that were nailed up with slabs, because they were so poor that they could not buy window glass. Is there anything wrong in saying that we have millions of acres of land to give away free to settlers in the Northwest ? It says that settlers' effects are brought in duty free. Anything wrong about that ?


James Clancy: Is that new ?


Thomas Osborne Davis: Is there any reason for concealing it, because it is not new ? Did you do it in 1896 ?


James Clancy: Yes.


Thomas Osborne Davis: When you brought over Jew pedlars that we had to arrest in the Northwest Territories and put into jail ? I heard some gentleman complain about the miserable class of immigrants we are getting at present. When the hon. gentleman's friends were running the immigration machine they spent a great deal of money and got very little results. The immigrants were like gophers, dodging into one hole and dodging out of another ; they came in on one train
and out on another. They said they brought in 16,000 immigrants in one year ; but if they did, I venture to say there were 25,000 went out-the census shows that.	The census shows that in a certain number of years they were supposed to bring into this country something like' 1,000,000 people, and they got the money to do it with, but when the census was taken all these people had evaporated, and the natural increase had gone as well.


James Clancy: Because the hon. gentleman and his friends were telling the world that this country was not fit to live in.


Thomas Osborne Davis: The member for Marquette is doing the same thing at present ; he is putting on ' Hansard ' a matter to show that the country is no good. To show how far afield the hon. member for Marquette had to go, how hard pressed he was for something to say against the government, he selected out of a whole page one line and garbled it to bring an accusation against the government. He read this paragraph :
There was very little number 1 hard in 1902, and while the prospects for this grade were good a few weeks ago, as a result of the big storm

He underlines these words, ' As a result of the big storm.'
-there will be not much more this year, or in other words, the grades will compare equally for the two years.
If there had not been a big storm I do not know what the hon. gentleman would have done for some ground on which to criticise the immigration department. Everybody knew there was a storm last year, and that it reduced the grade of wheat. It was no use for the hon. gentleman to try to hide that when we had thousands of people travelling all over the country examining it and writing to their friends in the United States. One of the reasons for which the minister has been so successful is in the character of the immigration literature. In all the immigration literature that has been circulated by this government in the last five or six years there has been a fair statement of the conditions which we have in this country. People do not come in under false pretenses, they know the length of the winter, they know we have good seasons and occasionally we have bad seasons, and when they come they find that we have given them nothing but facts. The fact that we had 125,000 immigrants last year shows that our immigration literature has borne good fruit. These people who came in last year do not come empty-handed ; whereas, in 1896. the hon. gentlemen opposite brought in people that had not much money. These people who came in last year brought in six or seven million dollars in cash or goods. They also brought in with them a lot of money of which we have no account at all. I suppose when the immigration officials ask


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a man how much money he has got, he says I have $100, $200 or $300. That is the record that the Minister of the Interior gets. But when a gentleman comes into that country with $300 in his pocket, he looks over the country, he makes up his mind that it is a good country to settle in, and he immediately writes back to his agents and tells them to sell out his holdings. Those are sold for $6,000 or $7,000, and that money is all sent across the border and deposited in a Cana dian bank, but the Minister of the Interior lias no record of that at all. So it is impossible for us to arrive at an estimate of the amount of money these people have brought in. The manager of the Union Bank at Saskatoon told me that when he opened business there the head office instructed him to be very careful about making loans, told him to keep his loans inside his deposits. He started out with the idea that he was not going to do much business but he was not there one month until he could not loan out half the money he was getting in on deposit from these people that were coming into the country. I say that to-day we have a record of some $6,000,000 or $7,000,000 these people have brought in. but they have brought in millions more besides. A lot of wealthy people came in from the United 'States. Hon. gentlemen talk about the vast public debt, some $35 per capita. Now, every one of these 125,000 is helping to reduce that debt, they are all taking a share of it on their shoulders. In bringing in 125,000 people you bring in six millions of money, and you get all that by an expenditure of $650,000 on immigration. I think it is pretty good business, and if the minister keeps on the people of this country will be pretty well satisfied.
Richard Blain: I am sure the Minister of the Interior will be grateful to the hon. member for Saskatchewan (Mr. Davis) for coming to his rescue in defence of the campaign literature that he is circulating under the guise of immigration literature. I do not know whether the literature my hon. friend has read is correct or not, but I think it is fair to say that it is not in the best interests of the people of Canada. We complain that the Minister of the Interior selects the leading political journal of his province and pays out of the public treasury $7,500 to circulate it under the guise of immigration literature for the purpose of inducing people to come to.Canada. I have no time at this late hour to enter into a discussion of the matter contained here. The hon. member for Saskatchewan has gone over this paper very minutely this evening, and I do not intend to follow his example, but I will just produce one illustration. I have here some reports of the farm delegates that were sent to the old country by the hon. Minister of the Interior last year for the purpose of telling the people there of the grandeur of the Northwest of Canada. One of these gentlemen has made a reference to this kind of eam-Mr. DAVIS.
paign literature, find perhaps he would be a good authority. Mr. W. H. Bryce, who was one of the farm delegates selected by this government, says :
The information that is given in the literature that is distributed is not what the people want. They do not believe what is printed.
That is what this gentleman says about this kind of literature. I repeat the statement that I think the hon. minister should consider the expenditure of money a little more carefully. I say that it will always be open for discussion and that some portion of the Canadian people will have some right to condemn the hon. gentleman if he is going to subsidize one of the leading political organs in his own province for the purpose of inducing old country people to come to Canada.
I want to say one or two words in respect to the old country delegates, and if it is the policy of this government to continue sending successful farmers from the Northwest to the old country I would like to direct the hon. gentleman's attention to the fact that there was practically no preparation for these gentlemen when they arrived in Great Britain. The evidence of that fact comes from these gentlemen themselves. I will turn to the evidence afforded by some of these gentlemen to show why I make this statement. Mr. E. J. Thomson, delegate-to Scotland says :
One suggestion I omitted at its proper place was this : The delegates should be met at the port of landing and instructed as to his district and to proceed to it direct, and at once and thus save the expense of going to London or elsewhere.
Here is a delegate who was sent to the old country. There was no preparation made for this gentleman and he asks that some preparation should be made so that the delegate could go to work immediately without travelling hither and thither in the old country. Another gentleman, Mr. H. C. Whellams, in his report to the government, says :
On the third of March I went to Gloucester, and I was at first somewhat disappointed to find no advertising done'. I at once arranged with the papers for a thorough and complete system of posting and advertising through the columns of the local papers, also by means of hand bills posted throughout the country.
Here is a gentleman sent to the old country to tell the people about the Northwest and when he arrives at his destination he finds that no advertising has been done. Nobody knows that he is in the old country at all. He makes this complaint in his report to the government. Mr. Hugh Mc-Gillivray another of these delegates says :
I started at Aylesbury, the county town, and visited all the principal towns, taking a town each day on market days. I advertised in the local papers ahead and on my arrival would put
.TTTT.Y 9,1. 1904
up posters furnished by the department that I *would be at a certain hotel all that day and [DOT]evening.
When he went' to the market town he would take the posters in his pocket and after lie had arrived at the town he would announce that he would be in that town all day. These are some of the points that I W'ould bring to the attention of the hon. minister if it is the policy of the government to continue sending these gentlemen to the old country. I am sure it cannot be said that we are not spending enough money on Mr. Preston and his colleagues in the old country. Surely these gentlemen would have an opportunity of making some preparation for the delegates that we sent over there and who cost the people of Canada $25,000. These gentlemen direct the attention of the government to the fact that no preparation was made for them and how does the hon. gentleman expect that he is going to do a great service to the people if some preparation is not made for these delegates and if the people in the old country who are desirous of coming to Canada and occupying our lands are not notified that these gentlemen will visit their localities and tell them about the advantages of the Canadian Northwest Territories ? How did the hon. gentlemen, expect that they would find these delegates when they only remained in these towns from one to two days ?
I would like to ask the hon. minister what the policy of the government is in respect to the scarcity of farm hands in Ontario and eastern Canada or if the government has any policy upon that question. Is the hon. gentleman going to give that question any consideration or not and does he propose putting any amount in the estimates so that the people of Ontario and eastern Canada may be better supplied with farm hands ? I did hear the hon. gentleman make the statement that there was no complaint of that kind made during last year. The hon. gentleman has been misinformed because several complaints have been made and the complaint I think is as great as ever it was in the central part of Ontario and in Quebec. Yet the hon. gentleman seems to give it no attention. In view of the fact that this condition has existed for so many years and that there has been coming to the government year after year a universal complaint that farm hands in Ontario and the eastern part of Chnada were scarce, it is time that the hon. gentleman gave some attention to *this question so that the farmers of eastern *Canada might derive some advantage from the very large expenditure of money that is being made for immigration.


Clifford Sifton: We have been giving the subject attention for the last two years. We sent some thousands of labourers to the province of Ontario who were distributed amongst the farmers in that province. I am informed that a very considerable number have gone this year. I am quite satisfied that a larger number could have been absorbed and profitably placed in the province of Ontario if a more effective system of distribution were adopted. There is a system of distribution through the officers of the government of Ontario centralized at Toronto. In my judgment a thoroughly effective system of distribution for Quebec and Ontario would be' to provide agents at the port of debarkation so that the labourers would be taken charge of when they landed at Quebec and distributed from there to the point where they were to be employed. I am giving that my attention and I hope with the cooperation of the governments of Ontario and Quebec to adopt a system that will be effective.
I am bound to say that a great deal of caution is necessary in dealing with a subject of that kind. It would be very undesirable for the depai-tment to dump a large number of labourers either in Ontario or Quebec and find that the system of distributing them was not effective so that a considerable number of them were left without employment. We could not take a risk like that, we have to consider a variety of things such as the housing of the labourers while they are getting employment, and in Quebec and Ontario these present a good deal of difficulty. We have our establishment at Winnipeg and the people there have got into the habit of sending to the provincial and Dominion agents so that the resu't is that the work of the two governments together results in a very effective system of distribution. Both last year and this year we have sent a very large number of labourers and have supplied a very pressing demand, and we hope to be able to make it more effective as time goes on.


Rufus Henry Pope: In our section of the province of Quebec we have received kind consideration from ilr. Marquette, the provincial immigration agent at Montreal, but we have not been able to get the number of labourers we require. In eastern Canada we can utilize not only immigrants who are suitable as farm labourers, but our industrial development there is capable of employing many who would not be suitable in the' west, i f it were arranged that the public who desire servants would know where to apply for them, they would very soon all be placed. We have this advantage, that one or two years training on a farm in eastern Canada, would be very useful for these people if jthey should afterwards go west. Our farmers' sons are rapidly going to the west, and the farmers find themselves short of labour. There is thus an opportunity of developing the usefulness of these immigrants as suitable settlers in the west.


Mr. FOWLER.: The extracts read from this issue of the 'Free Press' contain a serious libel upon the district of Alberta as


Frank Oliver: I am sure the House will excuse _ me of responsibility for a lack of mentality on the part of the member for King's (Mr. Fowler). The fact that he does not understand something has nothing to do with the case. If any statements were made depreciative of the district of Alberta, it would have been an occasion for me to protest, but the hon. member for Saskatchewan did not read, or make any such statement. He read a letter addressed to the Free Press from a resident of the district of Saskatchewan, in which it was said that the correspondent had heard that certain things occurred in Alberta. I will not take upon myself the responsibility of contradicting everything that every body in Canada has heard in regard to the district of Alberta. If any of these gentlemen opposite will get up and make a statement derogatory of Alberta, I will be prepared to talk to him.


William James Roche: Did not the member for Saskatchewan back up that statement ?
Mr. ()i.I \ ER. These gentlemen opposite are very absurd. The correspondent from Saskatchewan was claiming superiority for Ms country as a ranching district, because they did not ranch there at ail but stabled their cattle which in Alberta were kept out during winter, and he said he had heard that the cattle in Alberta had suffered great loss.	,


Rufus Henry Pope: Ninety per cent.


Frank Oliver: He had heard that.


Rufus Henry Pope: Do you say that ?
Mr. OLIVER, No, I do not say that. I am not responsible for what this writer heard.


George William Fowler: 


Rufus Henry Pope: Will you contradict it ?


Frank Oliver: No, I won't. I would not be so foolish as to contradict every idiotic rumour a man may hear.' The district of Alberta is not in need of defence against absurd rumours. The * Free Press ' did not say that cattle in Alberta had suffered a loss of ninety per cent, and when the hon. member for King's said it did, he was not telling the truth. It was exactly in line of the attitude of the member for Marquette (Mr. Roche) who deliberately undertook to mislead this House and to mislead this country in regard to these reports having appeared in the ' Free Press ' and for which he was brought to task by the member for Saskatchewan (Mr. Davis). If it would be a crime against this country, had these statements appeared in the ' Free Press,' supposing they had been as the hon. member for Marquette said, how much greater crime it was against this country, against the district of Saskatchewan and the district of Alberta, that these statements should be embodied in ' Hansard,' and become a part of the permanent records of this country, as they have been as the result of the hon. member's efforts. If the facts were -as the 'hon.. member for King's said they were, Iwhen they were not, then he committed a (greater offence against the welfare of this (country than the man who wrote them or the man who published the paper, because he made them a part of the official record of this country on his responsibility as a member of parliament.
Mr. FOWLER, I would very much prefer being accused of lack of mentality than to be proved out of my own mouth of an absolute lack of honesty and lack of candour, and that is the position which the just now ferocious member for Alberta occupies be-lore this House. The hon. gentleman listened to-night to an attack by one of his colleagues on the district he represents, and he sat there dumb as an oyster apparently not daring to open his mouth ; and when I challenge the hon. gentleman to stand up in his place and defend the district from which he comes, he tries to draw a herring across the trail and accuses the hon. member for Marquette of defaming the Northwest when the hon. gentleman for Marquette very properly drew the attention of this House to the fact that this government was spending over $7,000 of public money to disseminate in tne United States absolute libels and falsehoods respecting the country.


Thomas Walter Scott: The hon. member for Marquette did not say they were libels. He said they were probably true, but they should not be circulated.


George William Fowler: The hon. gentleman for Marquette did characterize them as libels. He drew the attention of the House to the publication of that sheet for the purpose of showing the wrong that was being done.

to this country. Because a storm had occurred in the Northwest only once in twenty years, the people to whom the paper was sent, which did not mention that fact, would suppose that it was the usual occurrence, just as the writer of that article A-efiecting on the district of Alberta as a ranching country did not say it occurred only once in twenty years, but would have the impression go forth that it was the usual occurrence in Alberta, and that the district around Saskatoon was preferable for raising cattle. Speaking of Southern Alberta, the paper said :
. It is said by those familiar with both places that Saskatchewan is a better and more certain ground for ranching than southern Alberta. In the latter place blizzards come suddenly, and as no shelter is provided, often ninety per cent of a drove is lost in a single snow storm.
The hon. gentleman who represents the district of Alberta sat silent when the statement was made about his country ; and yet he pretends to be an honest representative of the people of that district. In the Agriculture Committee, because he forms an unfavourable opinion of Mr. Macoun, he wants to fight everybody in sight. The hon. gentleman had better confine himself to his own district, and not wander so far afield.


Thomas Osborne Davis: You had better do that yourself.


George William Fowler: The district from which I come does not need any defence. But I have some interests in that very country about which I am speaking.


Thomas Osborne Davis: Not very much.


George William Fowler: I think they are pretty extensive ; from my standpoint they are at least ; and I am interested in not havifig that country defamed. That is my excuse for speaking on this occasion, if any excuse is needed. The wrong in this attack is that this paper goes out with a stamp of government approval. I was a little surprised tonight at hearing the hon. Minister of the Interior, in speaking of this matter, try to shift the responsibility on his officers ; but he did not say that he would see that the officer who was responsible for allowing that paper to go forth in that shape would be castigated or even reprimanded, as Mr. Preston was for having written that letter. Notwithstanding that, he said it was perfectly right that these statements should go forth. You want to induce farmers from tile United States to settle in the Northwest Territories, and you do it by saying that in Southern Alberta, one of the most important districts of the Northwest, ninety per cent of the cattle are destroyed by reason of the blizzards that often rage throughout that district. It seems to me the hon. member for Alberta has to-night given a most pitable exhibition in sitting silent and not until the lash was applied to him would he
rise and say a word on behalf of the district which had been so abused and maligned by the documents which had been distributed by the government of which he is a supporter, a thick-and-thin supporter- an hon. gentleman who professed at one time to be an independent member, and who has developed into one of the most ardent thick-and-thin supporters of the government that can be found within their ranks. He wanted to inflict violence on those who; disagreed with him in the Agricultural Committee in regard to what was said by Mr. .Macoun with respect to the little-known and sparsely settled Peace River district, and yet to-night he sits mild as a cooing dove and listens to this abuse of his own district of Alberta.


Frank Oliver: The hon. member made some reflection on my candour. He said he would rather be accused of lack of mentality than lack of candour. I think he has given evidence to-night that he is as lacking in candour as in mentality, and that he is absolutely lacking in both. I am sorry that my conduct in this House has not the approval of the hon. gentleman ; but as I did uot come here under his approval, I will try to suffer under his disapproval. I am here at the approval of the district of Alberta, the district which he says has been maligned by the reading of a quotation from the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' by the hon. member for Saskatchewan. If there could be anything more absurd than that statement, it would be the whole attitude and action of the hon. member himself and the part he has taken in this debate to-night. The hon. gentleman is surprised that I sat silent. Well, certainly this House would be surprised if he sat silent and also more greatly surprised if he talked sense when he did not sit silent.


George William Fowler: I do not think the hon. gentleman has succeeded in saying anything very clever, although of course he drew, forth a cackle from the back benches over there. So far as mentality and candour are concerned, I would be prepared to be judged by a competent jury, but I would hardly consider these gentlemen on the back benches as competent to give a verdict. In neither respect would I care to be reduced to the low level of the hon. gentleman, and I am confident that a comparison of the speeches made by both of us, as shown in the * Hansard,' would prove that the hon. gentleman has occupied at least ten times longer the time of this House during this, or any other session when we both occupied seats in this House, than I have.
I would go still further and would guarantee that in the one-tenth of the time I have talked, as compared with the .time the hon. gentleman has taken up, I have talked a thousand times more sense than he did in ten times longer time. No one has yet been able to discover in any speech the horn

gentleman lias made one single, solitary, minute portion of sense. He is looked upon by the great majority of this House, not excluding a great many of the members on the other side, as a sort of mountebank.


Frank Oliver: I only wish to refer, not to what the hon. gentleman has just said, but to the allusion he made to my action in the Agricultural Committee. He said I was anxious to use physical force in that committee. I want to say here and now that in that committee, in defence of the district I represent and the people I represent against attacks made by an officer of this government and other members of that committee who sit before me, I was compelled to risk the application of physical force to myself by those hon. gentlemen and take chances upon it or else to submit to just such bullying and just such abusive language as the hon. gentleman has undertaken to deal out to me tonight. I want him and his colleagues to understand that neither in this House nor in the Agricultural Committee shall I submit to hear the country or the people I represent slandered or insulted by any members of this House, whether they are capable mentally or not.


Andrew B. Ingram: I would like to bring a witness to bear out the statement of my hon. friend and see whether or not all the blame attaches to members of the opposition. I find that in its issue of April 23rd last, the Montreal ' Witness,' thus speaks of the hon. member for Alberta :
Mr. Macoun, who is one of the best known of the staff of the Geological Survey-


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER.: This discussion is out of orler.


Andrew B. Ingram: When you reach the danger point, you raise the alarm.


Peter Macdonald: I would ask the committee to keep to the question before the House and not introduce a personal controversy. Neither is it in order to discuss what took place in the committee, the report of wThioh is not before the House.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Before this discussion came up, I asked that the report of the committee be presented to the House in order that we might deal with it, and we were told that we could deal with it at anv length without its being laid on the table.


Andrew B. Ingram: When I was interrupted, I was about to quote from the Montreal ' Witness ' and I propose to continue my quotation :
Mr. Macoun, who is one of the best known
of the staff of the Geological survey	
This would come home with especial force to Mr. Frank Oliver, M.P., for Alberta, and we can quite appreciate his bitter disappointment with Mr. Macoun's report, especially as he has been responsible for much vaunting of that Mr. FOWLER.
country abroad. Such disappointments, however, and however much he may disagree with the report, does not justify him in charging Mr. Macoun with deliberate misrepresentation of the facts. . . . But if Mr. Macoun s report is doing any great injury, it must be principally because of the great publicity it has received owing to the disgraceful scenes this week in the House of Commons Committee of Agriculture, for which Mr. Oliver is
principally to blame	There seems in
this case to have been at least none of the aridity referred to above as one of the drawbacks of the climate. Who can tell that better luck may not come to these settlers as it did to those of Manitoba ? It is at least better to hope so than to threaten to horsewhip Mr. Macoun and call him a liar as Mr. Oliver thinks it the proper thing to . do.


Thomas Walter Scott: Do you say that is a true report ?


Andrew B. Ingram: Yes.


Thomas Walter Scott: Did tbe bon. member for Alberta ever threaten to horsewhip ?


Andrew B. Ingram: Certainly he did.


Frank Oliver: I rise to say I did not.


Andrew B. Ingram: I say he did.


Peter Macdonald: It' is out of order to quote from any newspaper any reference to a committee, and I decline to allow any one to bring in any matter that happened in the committee until the committee has reported.


Mr INGRAM.: I believe, Sir, you are quite right. I fully agree that we have no right to discuss the report, but what I am proving is that the opposition are not open to the charge made by the hon. member for Alberta and I am substantiating the statement made by my hon. friend from King's and am quite in order in doing that.
I have in my hand an article which perhaps the hon. member for Alberta may have read. The Toronto ' News ' had the hardihood to express an opinion about that hon. gentleman, and I find in the Edmonton ' Bulletin ' language of this kind. I do not say that the hon. member penned the article, but after I read it, perhaps hon. members will come to a conclusion as to who is responsible. Speaking of the 'News' the ' Bulletin ' says :
Its reputation based on its short and not over brilliant career under its present management Is that of a cross between an attempted bandit and a would-be thug. That is one who-speaking in a literary sense would rob for profit and murder from principle-always providing the opportunity were favourable.
I do not say that the ' Bulletin ' is the hon. gentleman's paper. If it is not, he is in a position to deny that it is.


Frank Oliver: Does the hon. gentleman deny the description given there of the Toronto 'News'?


Andrew B. Ingram: All I have to say Is this, that the editor of that paper is in my judgment as competent to edit a paper as the hon. gentleman is. I can tell him more, that the leader of the great party he is supporting will corroborate my statement.


Mr OLIVER.: I notice that the hon. gentleman's answer is entirely non-committal.


Andrew B. Ingram: I thought I was answering fully and fairly. I think that the management of the Toronto 'News ' is quite capable of answering any editorials that appear in this paper. In respect to the immigration litei'ature-or campaign literature, for it seems to me to be about the same thing nowadays-I find that the Department of Immigration has paid the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' $7,000 for a paper issued by that concern. Now, if the Department of the Interior were doing its duty.
It would not allow any literature intended to be used for immigration purposes to be sent out without scanning every line to see whether the circulation of it is in the interest of this country. So, I say that when the hon. member for Alberta (Mr. Oliver) allows the government to circulate at the public expense a newspaper which states as a mere rumour something derogatory to his constituency, he is not doing his duty to those who sent him here, nor is he displaying the energy which he displays when Mi\ Macouh. a government officer made a report about his part of the country. Is that lack of energy due to the fact that there are a couple more senatorships being' given to the Northwest, or is it because there is an edition of 5,000 immigration pamphlets being published by the Edmonton ' Bulletin ? ' This pamphlet, the newspapers tell us, comprises 80 pages profusely illustrated with scenes from the. district and business places of Edmonton and with portraits of many of the leading men of the town. I wonder if the hon. gentleman himself would be included. These pamphlets, I understand, are to be distributed in the United States and Great Britain. So we have $7,000 for this edition of the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' and we have an edition of 5.000 copies coming from the Edmonton ' Bulletin ' Office. Is there anything for the Regina ' Leader ? ' Would the hon. gentleman (Mr. Scott) say that there is any of this patronage for the ' Leader ? ' Now, is this system in the interest of the people ? Is it in accordance with sound policy to dole out payments for immigration literature as patronage to favoured people in the Northwest Territories ? The government has its printing bureau here. If they would furnish that printing bureau with better facilities why could not all that work be done there ?


George William Fowler: Then, what would become of the papers ?


Andrew B. Ingram: I do not know, but I do know what would become of some of the
independent men of this House. Instead of their submitting to the discipline mentioned by the hon. member for Halton (Mr. Henderson) we should find them with the old frankness and outspokenness of the hon. member for Alberta, not moved by considerations of immigration pamphlets or senator-ships.


Frank Oliver: I do not know whether hon. gentlemen opposite think they can (lo in this House as they thought to do in the Agricultural Committee, prevent me from expressing myself and defending my position bv bullying and interruptions They were not successful there, nor will they be here Nor will they succeed by piling up misstatements in regard to myself or throwing out vile insinuations, a thing ot which we find them to be very capable. Though they may judge other people by their own standards we have to consider where these things come from. In regard to the state meats made deliberately by the hon. member for East Elgin that in the Agricultuial Committee I threatened Mr. James M. Ma-coun with horse-whipping I wish to say that that statement is absolutely untrue.


Andrew B. Ingram: I say it is true.


Frank Oliver: I said that Mr. James M. Maeoun deserved horse-whipping, and I say so still. But I did not say that either I or anybody else was going to horse-whip him.


An hon. MEMBER.: You knew better than to try it.


Frank Oliver: That is a sample of the argument placed before the Agricultural Committee, during sitting after sitting, in support of Mr. James M. Maeoun in discrediting a large and important section of the Northwest Territories. I am glad these hon gentlemen have brought the discussion into this House, so that the country may be well informed of the position.


Peter Macdonald: I would draw the attention of the hon. member (Mr. Oliver) to the fact that I have ruled that the discussion that took place in the committee cannot be referred to here. We have to deal with the items before us. What took place in the committee is past and gone and we have nothing to do with it.


Frank Oliver: I will observe your ruling, Mr. Chairman. Now, I may refer to the insinuations of the hon. gentleman as to the pamphlets printed in the ' Bulletin Office. I am connected with the Edmonton * Bulletin.' This is a matter not worthy the consideration of this committee, but seeing that an hon. member has brought it forward, I suppose it is only fair that the facts should be known. The connection of the Edmonton ' Bulletin ' with the pamphlet is this : Mr. Sutter, who is the Immigration agent at Edmonton has seen fit to get up an immigration pamphlet as a speculation

of his own. That pamphlet, I understand, is being paid for by the merchants of Edmonton who are taking advertising space in it. The 'Bulletin' was successful in getting the contract for the printing of the pamphlet from Mr. Sutter. The 'Bulletin' does not know the government in the transaction in any way, shape or manner, and I am not aware that Mr. Sutter knows the government in the transaction in any [DOT]way, shape or manner.


Rufus Henry Pope: Is he a government employee ?


Frank Oliver: He is, but I am not aware that he is getting government assistance in getting out this pamphlet.


George William Fowler: Are you aware that he is not ?


Frank Oliver: No, it is none of my business. But I know that he has solicited a considerable amount of support from Edmonton business men to get out the pamphlet, which is designed, I believe, for free distribution. It is a custom in the progressive towns in the Northwest to get out pamphlets in just such a way as this and place them where they will do the most good, distributing them amongst the government immigration agencies as far as *possible. That is what, I understand, lias taken place in regard to that pamphlet. So far as its being a matter of government patronage, I am not aware that the government have anything to do with it. I am only aware of it to this extent, that I understand the ' Bulletin ' had to compete for the work of printing the pamphlet.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I would like some statement from the minister on that point. It seems there is being a pamphleL got out for distribution for immigration purposes by a government employee at Edmonton, Mr. Sutter, and that it is being printed by the Edmonton ' Bulletin.' I would like to know if the government are purchasing that pamphlet or paying any consideration for it ?


Clifford Sifton: I do not know anything about it. I never heard of it before. *


Thomas Osborne Davis: The opposition seem to be in a jubilant mood to-night; there efforts have been great in the last two days. They have talked a great range of subjects ; they have discussed dog-tisli. a live earl, fat chickens and sore eyes, and now they want to talk blizzards. Now with reference to this discussion about the district of Alberta, my hon. friend from King's, N.B. (Sir. Fowler) tried to make out that I had said something disparaging to the district of Alberta. I want to say that I did nothing of the kind.
I merely read a portion of an article that was written by some resident of the district of Saskatchewan living close to Saskatoon. The hon. member for Marquette took exception to this supplement in the Manitoba J Free Press ' that has been circulated, say-


Frank Oliver: ing it cast reflections upon the country. This is an article written about the Calgary and Southern Alberta district. It was doubtless written by some resident of Alberta Here is what this article says :
Calgary, September 20th. One week of steady, fine weather, such as sunny Alberta is famous for, has settled the crop question which has been the leading topic of conversation in this territory for many a week.
Here is where the member for Marquette gets his work in. He underlines the following :
The lateness of the season was alarming, but after the fall storms

He stopped at the ' fall storms.'
-there has come the usual fall sunshine, during which the grain has ripened bountifully, and the farmer has harvested with ease. The climate of Alberta is once more vindicated and the crops are fully up to expectation. The districts around Calgary, from Innisfail to the northern frontier, have harvested their 400 bushels of wheat, 1,500 bushels of oats and 200 bushels of barley, all of an excellent quality, to the quarter section.
Why did he not read that part of it ? He underlines again the following :
The slight frost of the last storm

And stops there, he did not read the next line.
-is found to have done very little damage.
He took good care to mention the frost, but he did not take such good care to say that there was no damage done by that frost.
The production of wheat is light because in the country around Calgary the cultivation of it has been almost given up, although the yield per acre averaged much over 20 bushels.
I submit that is a very good article about the district of Southern Alberta. I do not see anything wrong in that.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Does he mean to say that an article stating that they have almost given up the cultivation of wheat is a good article to distribute amongst intending immigrants ?


Thomas Osborne Davis: I have not heard of any immigration agent advising any person to go to Calgary 'to raise wheat, they advise people to go there to raise cattle. It is a good ranching country as well as a good wheat country. The writer of this article goes on to say :
The farmers simply found that other grain was more profitable.
They went out of wheat raising, because they could make more money growing barley and oats.
As to oats, there will be many phenomonal crops. Some farmers claim as much as 75 bushels to the acre.

Does the hon. gentleman want anything better than that ?
-but the average appears to be really about 40 bushels to the acre. The barley is pronounced all right by those farmers who arg least disposed to boast of their wealth. There has been an immense Increase in the acreage over past years, but for obvious reasons of the large immigration as well as of the progress accomplished by those previously settled, it will be much larger next year.
The whole of that article is a good article. This writer mentions frost, of course. He says there was a slight frost, but it did no damage. The hon. member for Marquette read there was a frost, but he left out the part that said there was no damage.


William James Roche: I placed on the ' Hansard ' more than what is underlined there, as the hon. gentleman will find on reading ' Hansard ' to-morrow. I read out a great deal more than he has read himself now. There is a great deal underlined that I did not read.


Thomas Osborne Davis: If he was quoting from this paper, I hope he did not read anything that wasn't in it. I think that Is a very good article about Alberta. I don't think any one could write a better article. But the hon member for Marquette garbles the article, he reads a portion and leaves out a portion. He does not read the portion where the writer says it did no damage. He has picked out a few lines to serve his purpose. A man may make a paper say almost anything by picking out a few words here and there. The Bible says there is no God, if you only read a portion of it.


Mr. WILLIAM ROSS (Victoria).: The Bible does not say that. It is the fool who says that.


Thomas Osborne Davis: I say that you can read out of the Bible that there is no God. But, take the line before that aud the Bible says :
' The fool hath said in his heart there is no God.' My hon. friend from Marquette takes this paper, leaves out a few lines here and a few words there, and garbles its contents for the sake of earning for himself, I suppose, a little kudos in his own constituency, but he must be hard up for an argument against the hon. Minister of the Interior or the immigration branch when he can find nothing better than that. If there were 200,000 copies of that paper circulated and if they cost this country $7,000 I think, judging from the number qf desirable people who have been brought into this country the money was well spent and I do not think that it is open to any person to say anything against it. The hon. member for King's New Brunswick (Mr. Fowler) tried to place In my mouth words that I did not say by attributing to me the statement that I said something derogatory of southern Alberta when he knows that I did not say anything of the kind. I merely read an extract from
a letter written by a gentleman who is enthusiastic about the southern district of Saskatchewan and who says that southern Saskatchewan is a better district in which to raise cattle than any other part of the Northwest Territories.


George William Fowler: I said that the hon. member for Saskatchewan read this from the paper for the purpose of contrasting the two districts and he has done the same thing now. That is what I said as ' Hansard ' will show.


William James Roche: I wish to draw the attention of the committee to the statement made by the hon. member for Saskatchewan and to compare it with that made by the hon. member for Alberta. The hon. member for Saskatchewan has stated that he approved of the publication of these 200,000 copies and of scattering them broadcast throughout the American union to be paid for by Canadian money. As to the storm what did he prove by that ? I would draw his attentiou to the fact that the ' storm ' does not refer to the storm of the 12th September alone but refers to storms occurring in May as well and that this paper refers to storms, frosts, &c., more than forty times in the same issue. While the hon. gentleman says that is perfectly true, what does the hon. member for Alberta say ? He says that he would not take up the time of the House in denying such an idiotic rumour, that it was absurd, that he dismissed it as unworthy of credence, a statement written by some anonymous person from the Saskatchewan district which he did not think it worth while to make a denial of in this House. Yet the hon. member for Saskatchewan says it is absolutely true. When he quoted this letter from Saskatchewan he also backed it up by stating distinctly that it was true that in some of these storms seventy-five per cent- I remember particularly that he got fifteen per cent below what the correspondent had put it at-of the cattle perished.


Thomas Walter Scott: Is that true or not ?


William James Roche: It is absolutely untrue and I am condemning the government for distributing this literature and paying $7,000 for. the purpose of libelling the country. While the hon. member for Alberta states that I am more responsible for having had it placed in ' Hansard,' even if it were true and denounces me for it it was this hon. gentleman who wrangled by the hour and contended that it was quite in order to have what he called libellous statements published-and distributed broadcast in reference to his own Peace river country. How very consistent that hon. gentleman is ! The hon. gentleman will acquiesce in using public money for the purpose of paying $7,000 to the Winnipeg ' Free Press ' when there was no necessity for that edition, scattering it broadcast and telling the people

735$
of the United States that there was a most exceptional storm on the 12th September,
that the crops were damaged and that the farmers conld only cut their grain if at all in one way. He is prepared to justify that. If we are spending our money for immigration literature we do not desire to say what is untrue or to publish a libel on the country. Although that hon. gentleman would not defend his constituency to-night, although he would not say that this statement is untrue 1 say that it is untrue as far as my knowledge goes. Although not a resident of the district I have a sufficient knowledge of it to know that there have been no storms In it in which ninety per cent of the cattle were destroyed. Again I say I denounce this statement as untrue and I say that it is to be regretted that so many thousands of dollars of our money were paid out for the purpose of sending broadcast through the American union a libel upon our country which could only injuriously affect the immigration which we expect to get. In proof of that I have only to say that the hon. gentleman who placed those papers before me stated that he had a letter from a family in the United States who wrote that they had intended to emigrate to Canada until they read the .description of this storm in that literature.


Frank Oliver: The anxiety which hon. gentlemen opposite show for the welfare of Southern Alberta is very touching. I am sure it will appeal to the people of that favoured district very much. It would be a very sorry thing for southern Alberta as well as the Northwest Territories if they had to depend upon hon. gentlemen opposite for good will or good report. In regard to the' results, of the publication of this $7,500, copy of the ' Free Press ' and the fear that is expressed by the hon. member for Marquette it may relieve his mind on that point if I tell him that the immigration to Southern Alberta this year, according to the best information given to me, is larger than to any other part of the Northwest Territories not excepting Northern Alberta, so that if there is any application of this edition of the ' Free Press ' to the district of Southern Alberta that suggestion and that allegation made by the hon. member for Marquette and other hon. gentlemen have been absolutely disposed of by that fact.


William James Roche: They could not have read it.


Frank Oliver: Showing that the argument they have adopted was as unfounded as their intention was unfair. I here make the statement once more that this hon. gentleman has on his responsibility as a member of parliament representing a western constituency placed upon the pages of ' Hansard ' statements which are deliberately garbled and wffien read in * Hansard ' will lead any person to believe, if they believe Mr. W. J. ROCHE.
the hon, gentleman at all, that the country is not the country that it is or ought to be in order to attract settlers. The hon. gentleman has taken that position in this House, he has taken it deliberately and with malice aforethought simply and solely for the purpose of attacking a member of the government who has done so much to make the Northwest


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Mr. Chairman, I rise to a point of order. The hon. gentleman, as I understand it, makes a statement that my hon. friend from Marquette (Mr. Roche) deliberately and with malice aforethought did so and so.


Frank Oliver: Exactly.
Mr. SrROULE. Is such a statement in accordance with parliamentary rules of debate ?


Peter Macdonald: If the hon. gentleman (Mr. Oliver) did state that another hon. gentleman had made a statement deliberately and for the purpose of misleading it is certainly unparliamentary.
Mr. OLIVER, Even if it is true ?


Peter Macdonald: Yes.


Frank Oliver: Well, I will withdraw it even if it is true.


William James Roche: As a usual thing I pay little or no attention to the Billingsgate that the hon. member for Alberta usually furnishes this House with. I do not propose to descend to that.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Order.


William James Roche: I do not think I am out of order at all.


Frank Oliver: Is the hon. gentleman in order in using the word Billingsgate ?


William James Roche: I am quite in order and the hon. gentleman (Mr. Oliver) should be the last man in the House to take exception to my remarks.


Peter Macdonald: The rule is that an hon. member cannot say to another hon. member, anything other than one gentleman would be supposed to say to another.


Frank Oliver: I presume the hon. gentleman (Mr. Roche) is not subject to that rule.


William James Roche: If there is any man in this House who indulges in offensive language to members on this side, it is the hon. member for Alberta. When any one differs from his views, the hon. gentleman (Mr. Oliver) cannot combat it in ordinary ianguage, but he must descend to such language as the hon. member (Mr. Ingram) read from the Edmonton ' Bulletin ' in reference to the Toronto ' News.' The hon. member (Mr. Oliver) has changed, his

opinion in regard to the ' Free Press.' He defends it to-night, but a short time ago referring to the ' Free Press ' in the Edmonton ' Bulletin, ' he referred to it as a journalistic prostitute. In view of the language he can indulge in, I do not think there is any lecture coming to me from the hon. member for Alberta.


Andrew B. Ingram: This all proves that the Department of the Interior should carefully scan every line of literature that is circulated for the purpose of promoting immigration. The hon. gentleman from Alberta (Mr. Oliver) accused the member for Marquette of deliberately garbling this literature, notwithstanding that my hon. friend (Mr. Roche) denied it.


Frank Oliver: I don't think he denied it.


William James Roche: I will deny it now, if you are not satisfied.


Andrew B. Ingram: If we who indulge in honest criticism can take exception to language in this literature, how very likely it is that those opposed to immigration to Canada will use it for their own purpose. I understood from the Minister of the Interior that he rather approved of this literature.


Thomas Osborne Davis: The hon. member for Marquette stated that he did not want to publish an untruth, but at the same time he did not want to publish the truth.


William James Roche: I absolutely deny that I said anything "of the kind.


Andrew B. Ingram: I have no hesitation in saying that under certain circumstances it would not pay us to spend public money-to publish the truth about such things as this.


William Ross: I was eight years in the parliament of Nova Scotia before confederation ; I have been a representative in this House for a number of years, and I must say that the style of debate I have heard to-night is no credit to either one side nor the other. Surely we ought to remember that we are gentlemen in this House, and that these contradictions from one side to the other should be avoided. This style of debate is sickening.


Andrew B. Ingram: The Minister of the Interior says he has never heard of this publication by the Edmonton ' Bulletin. ' What we want to know is whether it is the intention of the department to pay for the whole or any portion of this literature.


Clifford Sifton: I answered I had never heard of it before.


Andrew B. Ingram: That is not an answer to the question.	.


Clifford Sifton: Will the hon. gentleman wait till I get through ? I said I never heard of it before and that we had no intention of paying for it.


Andrew B. Ingram: I am glad to hear that statement.


Clifford Sifton: I made it before.


Andrew B. Ingram: Is it the policy of the department to allow one of its agents to issue literature for circulation abroad,_ promoting immigration to any particular section ?


Clifford Sifton: I see no objection to that. Of course if it were brought to our attention we would not permit a statement derogatory to any other district.


Andrew B. Ingram: That is after the literature is published. You would lock the stable door after the steed is stolen. Unlike the Liberal opposition before 1896, there is not a gentleman on this side of the House who objects to voting money for a wise expenditure on immigration. When we placed items for immigration in the estimates before the Liberal opposition told us that the expenditure was too large.


Thomas Walter Scott: Because you got no results from it.


Mr. COWAN.: You paid for literature before it was printed and it was never circulated, although the man got the money.


Andrew B. Ingram: Please give an instance.


Mahlon K. Cowan: Prior to 1896, when the exmember for Assiniboia was proprietor of the Regina ' Leader,' you paid him $2,000 and you were to receive several thousand copies of his paper to be circulated abroad. You paid him the $2,000 before it was printed. You never got a paper to circulate abroad, and he charged at the rate of $22 per column for inserting in connection with the fair held at Regina, the breeding of the different horses that were entered in the speeding ring at the horse races. I remember that one item calculated to attract immigration to the Northwest Territories was the entry of a race horse named Skyscraper, bred out of Thunderbolt and sired by Spinaway. This thing was investigated by the Public Accounts Committee, and there are members opposite to-night who opposed the commissioner's report censuring that sort of thing.


Andrew B. Ingram: Is that the whole truth ?


Mahlon K. Cowan: Absolutely, because I examined the witnesses myself before the committee and the evidence is on record.


Andrew B. Ingram: Is the hon. gentleman as truthful about this as he was about the duty on corn.


Mahlon K. Cowan: I was truthful about the duty on corn and I am truthful about this. The hon. gentleman was mistaken about the duty on corn, but I thought I had given him enough information to make him wise.


Andrew B. Ingram: The answer of the government he supports contradicted his statement, and bore out my statement on that matter!


Peter Macdonald: I hope hon. gentlemen will not get on the corn question now.


Andrew B. Ingram: The hon. gentleman has made a statement in regard to the Regina ' Leader ' and the contract with the late member for West Assiniboia. I understand that that gentleman sold out to my hon. friend who is now the honoured representative of that constituency.


Mahlon K. Cowan: He did not sell out until long after.


Andrew B. Ingram: My hon. friend from Regina, I understand, bought that paper from the late representative of West Assiniboia, with that contract included ; and when the hon. gentleman took over the plant, he did not include the contract.


Mahlon K. Cowan: The hon. gentleman is mistaken. That was concerning the printing of law reports.


Andrew B. Ingram: Perhaps it may be as stated by the hon. member for South Essex. My toon, friend from West Assiniboia is here, and he will bear out whether it is correct or not.


Thomas Walter Scott: If I may be permitted to say so, I do not very much relish this item which has been brought into the discussion. As far as that is concerned, except as to the amount, the statement of the hon. member for South Essex is absolutely accurate. I think it was $400 or $500 in place of $2,000.


Andrew B. Ingram: I am afraid my hon. friend is cornered again. What I want to find out from the Minister of the Interior is the policy of the government in issuing immigration literature. The hon. gentleman to-night noticed a discussion in which certain members of this House are charged with garbling immigration literature. I want to ask him if he allows his agents to issue immigration literature in any town in the Dominion of Canada without first submitting it to the hon. gentleman or his officers ? If anything is wrong in that literature, how can he conscientiously right the wrong that may be done by having the literature circulated. The hon. gentleman says he has no objection to any immigration agent providing any literature.


Clifford Sifton: We have no rule in regard to the matter to which my hon. friend has referred. I believe there have been three or four oases in which agents of the department have assisted in preparing literature for the district in which they were doing the work. Mr. Sutter, the agent at Edmonton, is a very capable and satisfactory agent, and if he asked to be allowed to prepare a pamphlet, I would not have the slightest objection to his doing so. If afterwards he said something in the pam-Mr. INGRAM.
phlet which was improper or incorrect, he would be censured for it in the same way as any other officer.


Andrew B. Ingram: I think that is a very dangerous policy to adopt. If the immigration department had strong opposition from the railway companies of the United States, some of the employees might be tempted to issue immigration literature t[iat would be very injurious to Canada. Every line of immigration literature prepared by any officer of the government should be submitted to the department and the department should be held responsible for the issue of proper literature. The policy at present pursued is a dangerous policy.


David Henderson: I quite endorse the statement made by the hon. member for East Elgin. I think a great deal of care should be exercised in the selection of the literature that is published and sent abroad either to the United States or Great Britain, so that only proper literature shall be sent out. I deprecate the idea of allowing private individuals to prepare matter of this kind. But we some times find objectionable literature issued even under the superintendent. I hold in my hand a volume which has been sent out from the Interior Department with the compliments of the superintendent of immigration at Ottawa, and on one page of this volume I find this :
Corby's IXL Rye Whisky, Purity Rye Whisky, Canadian Rye Whisky, Three Government Standards ; Corby's Famous Whiskies, distilled and bottled in bond by H. Corby, distiller, Belleville.
Is it necessary to have this kind of matter put into immigration literature ? I do not think it is worth while to use the money of the country to pay for literature of that kind.


Clifford Sifton: What is the name of the book to which my hon. friend is referring ?


David Henderson: The ' Canadian Year Book ' for 1904, distributed by the Immigration Department. I merely point this out to show that the Immigration Department is not exercising, a proper superintendence over the literature it is sending out. This book contains a great deal of useful information, but this is not the kind of literature which should be sent abroad through the government.


Clifford Sifton: This is a sort of a year book issued by a private individual. I -do not remember seeing a copy of it before. I remember at the time it was issued we paid something for an advertisement in it.. I think that that is the extent of the connection the Department of the Interior had with it. The circulation, I think, was guaranteed to be so many, and we paid something for the advertising. I am quite unable to see anything improper in that. It

is not departmental duties. The hon. gentlemen are suffering apparently for want of ammunition if this is all they can discuss.


Richard Blain: I suppose we will have to submit to the hon. gentleman's statement, but I want to draw his attention to this. The paper was issued May 24, 1904, and the bottom part of the paragraph says it is designed for the use of immigration agents in the United States and in the old country, an edition of 5,000 being printed for this purpose. It is only fair to the committee that a gentleman who is in the employ of the government should submit these documents for the consideration of the committee. I do not think it is right that an agent in any part of Canada should have the right to get up an advertising medium under the guise of an immigration pamphlet and send it out to all parts of Canada, the United States and Great Britain, without the department or somebody authorized by the department examining into it and finding out whether it is in the interests of the people this document should be sent out for immigration purposes. Will he say to whom in Ottawa this agent sent some copies, because no doubt it is in circulation at present ?


Clifford Sifton: I do not know. I have not seen the document, I do not know what is in it. I am not responsible for what appears in the Edmonton ' Bulletin.' As my attention has been called to the statement that the pamphlet has been written by Mr. Sutter, I will give instructions to have him written to. But I am satisfied to have him write a description of Alberta and the department may be just as responsible as if it had been prepared here in Ottawa in the department itself. I have every confidence in Mr. Sutter's ability.
Contingencies in Canadian, British and foreign agencies and general immigration expenses, including salaries of extra clerks at head office, $533,000.


William James Roche: I understand that the Brandon immigration buildings were destroyed some time ago-one by fire and one by a windstorm. Is it the intention to rebuild ?


Clifford Sifton: Yes.
Some resolutions reported.


ADJOURNMENT-SIR ELZEAR TASCHE-REAU.
Hon.  W. S.@: FIELDING (Minister of Finance) moved the adjournment of the House.


Edward Frederick Clarke: Before that motion is carried I would like to draw the attention of the hon. gentleman who is at present leading the House (Mr. Fielding! to a
234 i
cablegram in the Montreal 'Star' of yesterday-July 21, as follows :-
Sir Elzear -Taschereau has left London unexpectedly for Canada. He sails from Liverpool by the * Ionian ' to-day.
It is not known whether this sudden change of plans is due to a summons from Ottawa, but it necessitates his breaking important private and public engagements here, including the hearing of an important Dominion redistribution appeal before the Judicial Committee.
I would ask the hon. minister if he is aware of this, and whether any communications have passed between the Chief Justice and the government, and if the government were made aware of Sir Elzfear Tas-chereau's intentions to leave England as suddenly as he seems to have done ?


William Stevens Fielding: I have no information on the subject, but I think it highly improbable, as the government have no authority over the judges of our court.


Edward Frederick Clarke: And the government are not aware of the action of the Chief Justice ?


William Stevens Fielding: I cannot say absolutely. If the hon. gentleman wants definite information, I must ask him to give notice in the usual way. The government have nothing to do with the judges of the Supreme Court.


Edward Frederick Clarke: But does it not seem an extraordinary thing for the Chief Justice who is over in England for the purpose of hearing these cases to leave London before the cases are heard ?


William Stevens Fielding: Judges sometimes do strange things.
Mr. SPItOULE. What work shall we take up at the sitting to-day ?


William Stevens Fielding: The House will be moved into Committee of Supply and the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Fisher) will take up his estimates.
Motion agred to, and House adjourned at 1.30 a.m.-Friday.

Fkiday, July 22, 1904.