1910-04-08

[Stage Direction]
Mr. McCRANEY moved that the third report of the Select Standing Committee on Standing Orders be concurred in.
210i
Mr. SPROULE.: The Bill here referred to is the one I drew attention to yesterday, and the recommendation of the committee, is, as I understand, that in consequence of the fact that their notice in the 'Gazette' or the advertisement which has been published did not signify the intention of the incorporators to extend their transmission line into the province of Ontario, it was recommended -that they be not given the authority to extend the line into Ontario, but to confine it to the Quebec side entirely. I take it that if concurred in, it would be an instruction to the committee to amend the Bill in that direction, and to the House of course to accept the Bill as so amended. It brings up another question which might be worthy of consideration, but I do not know if it is the proper time to consider it here. If it is confined solely to the one province, then there is a question as to whether it should not be right of that province to incorporate the company instead of the federal parliament. But with this lecommendation to look into it carefully, 1 see-.no serious objection to the report being concurred in.


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Motion agreed to.

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Mr. SINCLAIR moved that the sixth report of the Select Standing Committee on Marine and Fisheries be concurred in.
Mr. R. L. BORDEN.: What' is it?


Mr. SINCLAIR.: They recommend that the proceedings of the committee on Marine and Fisheries be printed. On account of its importance to the commerce of the -country, they recommend that the evidence taken before them and the arguments of counsel should be printed for the use of the House.


Robert Laird Borden: Has the committee made any report on that Bill?


John Howard Sinclair: The Bill is still before the committee, the committee has not reported.


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Motion agreed to.

Mr. SPEAKER.: I have the honour to inform the House that I have received the following message:
Ottawa, April 7, 1910.
Sir,-I have the honour to inform you that the Honourable Mr. Justice Girouard, acting as Deputy to His Excellency the Governor General, will proceed to the Senate Chamber to-morrow afternoon at 3.30 o'clock, for the

purpose of giving assent to certain Bills which have passed the Senate and House of Commons during the present session.
I have the honour to he, Sir,
Your obedient servant,



C. J. JONES,

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Assistant Governor General's Secretary.
The Honourable,
The Speaker of the House of Commons.

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Mr. JAMESON moved for leave to introduce Bill (No. 199) respecting licenses to fishing vessels. He said; This Act relates only to vessels of Canadian register engaged, or intending to engage, in the Atlantic fisheries of Canada. It will be purely optional with the owners ol such craft to apply for license and so bring their vessels within the scope of the Act. But during the time any vessel is under license, her employment is limited to the fishing trade. The object of the Bill is to facilitate the movement of vessels employed in fishing, more especially those engaged in the fresh fish branch of the industry.
A Bill to be introduced concurrently with this one is intended to amend the Customs Act, and exempt vessels licensed under this Act from the necessity of reporting at the custom house, the two Acts being essential to that end. As the law stands, the skipper of a fishing vessel is liable to a penalty of $400 if he lands his fish or even drops anchor in harbour without reporting., This is a serious drawback to the fresh fish ' business, which cannot afford any unnecessary delays, which it is hoped this Bill will remove.
Motion agreed to, and Bill read the first time.

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Mr. JAMESON moved for leave to introduce Bill (No. 200) to amend the Customs Act. He said: This is a companion Bill to the one which I have just introduced.
Motion agreed to. and Bill read the first time.

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Mr. AYLESWORTH moved that the House go into committee on Monday next to consider the following proposed resolution :
That, in the opinion of this House, it is expedient to provide for the payment to four additional judges of the Superior Court in the province of Quebec, each $7,000 per annum, and to one additional judge of the Court of King's Bench in the province of Manitoba, $6,000 per annum.
James Kirkpatrick Kerr: He said: I have to state that His Excellency, the Governor General having been apprised of the subject matter of the resolution, recommends it to the House.


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Motion agreed to.

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Mr. GRAHAM moved that the House go into committee on Monday next to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to provide that the bounty of one and one-half per cent per imperial gallon payable on crude petroleum from Canadian wells, or from shales or other substances mined in Canada, authorized by chapter 52 of the statutes of 1908, may be paid to the owner or occupier of the soil through which it is mined or won, or to such other person interested or injuriously affected by the mining operations or works, as the Governor in Council may approve.
He said: I have to say that His Excellency having been apprised of the subject matter of this resolution, recommends it to the consideration of the House.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. FISHER moved that the House go into committee on Monday next to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to amend the Civil Service Act by providing for the appointment of temporary clerks for the compilation of any decennial census, who may be employed for a period not exceeding three years, and who shall be eligible for the annual statutory increases provided by the Civil Service Amendment Act, 1908; by providing that the salary of a temporary clerk employed under section 23 of the said Act shall not be greater than the minimum salary authorized for subdivisions B of the second division, subject to be increased as authorized by section 33 of the said Act; and for the payment to collectors of customs of a salary not greater than $1,500 per annum; and for the payment of officers of inland revenue salaries not o-reater than the following maximum, viz.: inspectors, $3,200; collectors, $2,800; deputy collectors, $2,200; accountants. $1,800; special class excisemen, $2,500; first, second and third class excisemen, $1,500; probationary excisemen, $600; stenographers and typewriters $700; messengers, $800; and for the payment of officers of the Post Office Department, as follows, viz.; Post office inspectors on appointment, $2,500, with an annual increase to a maximum of $3,500; assistant post office inspectors and superintendents of the Railway Mail Service on appointment, $1,600, with an annual increase to a maximum of $2,500, and to authorize the increase to the minimum of the salary of any such officers whose salary is at present less than the minimum; and assistant postmaster, on appointment, a salary of not less than $1,100 and not more than $2,800, and that the said salaries and increases shall be payable as from the first day of April, 1910.

He said: His Excellency the Governor General has been made acquainted with the substance of this resolution, and recommends it to the House.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day being called:
' Mr. THOMAS BEATTIE (London). Mr. Speaker, there is a very important matter that I would like to bring to the attention of the minister in charge of immigration. This unfortunate affair happened at Quebec towards the close of navigation last year. A most respectable family who had been engaged in farming in the old country. composed of a father, wife, son and daughter, were induced to come out to this country by a very prominent citizen of London. This old country farmer determined to sell out his holding in England, come out to this country and take up a farm. Feeling that these people were strangers in the country and that they might have trouble in landing at Quebec upon their arrival, this gentleman in London took the pains to go to Quebec to meet them. He met them on the ship, escorted them to the immigration shed, and left them there to be examined and to pass their baggage. After waiting for some time he looked for his friends, but he could not find them at all. He hunted for an hour around the landing stage at Quebec, but he could not get any track of these four people. Finally, one of the truck wheelers informed him that there were four parties confined in a room upstairs. He went upstairs and inquired, but the officials refused to open the door. But, as he happened to be a very large man, six feet four inches in height, he threatened that if they did not open the door he would put his foot through it. Thereupon the door was opened and inside he found the mother and daughter sobbing and saying that they had been locked up as prisoners without any reason having been given. He could not get any reason from them why they were locked up. The father of this family had no less than £200 of British money on his person, which he had unfortunately showed to the person in charge. I do not want to insinuate that the man was actuated by improper motives, but we know that such things do occur, that they have occurred in the United States, and that they may occur in Canada. No immigration officer is fit to be in such a position who would lock four respectable people in a room and give them no reason therefor. The only impression that the man got was that they were locked up with the idea of being taken somewhere else afterwards and there given an opportunity of getting rid of their
money. This is one of those cases in which respectable people should receive different kind of treatment. This man was pretty well to do in England, being a small farmer there, and he sold out his holding and brought all his money with him. He had £200 in British money on his person, and the balance he had in the form of a draft. Being an Englishman and being accustomed to regard public officials in uniform with confidence, he no doubt placed the same confidence in the uniformed officer at Quebec. This is a very serious matter, this gentleman has been speaking to me several times with Tegard to it, and I think it should be brought to the attention of the minister, because, if there are officers of that description in the employ of the government and if inquiry substantiates the case which I have presented to the minister, they should be dismissed immediately. There was no possible justification for locking up this respectable man, his wife, son and daughter without giving them some reason why they were detained. It is so extraordinary that I cannot account for it. I have crossed the Atlantic sixty or seventy times myself and I have never known a case of that kind. I have my suspicion that the officer, seeing the money, thought there was a chance to get these people some place outside where they might be relieved of it more readily. However,
I do not make that charge. The minister should find out who that officer was, although. I suppose, it would be rather difficult. I just bring the case to the attention of the minister, and I would be very glad if the minister would make an inquiry or inform the head inspector and have him report on the case.
Mr. OLIVER.: I am very sorry to hear of an occurrence such as my hon. friend (Mr. Beattie) has brought to the attention of the House. I only regret that it was not brought sooner after the alleged occurrence took place, so that we would be more certain of a satisfactory investigation. I can assure my hon. friend that his statements, as they have been made, will receive every attention at the hands of the department, because I can assure him and the House that the last thing that the administration wish is to in any way hamper or impede immigration of the character that my hon. friend has mentioned.


Mr. BEATTIE.: I did not hear of the matter until ten days ago. I happened to meet this gentleman and he mentioned it to me. Otherwise I should have brought it to the attention of the House before. I am quite sure that the Minister of the Interior will do all that is possible to inquire into the matter and see that this condition is remedied.


Mr. M. CLARK.: Before the House leaves the matter which has been brought to the attention of the minister by the hon. member for London (Mr. Beattie)-and I think he has placed the House of the country under an obligation by bringing the matter before the House-I wish to state that during the Easter holidays I was called upon by a farmer delegate returning from the duties to which he had been assigned in the old country by the Minister of the Interior. He told me that he noticed that a large number of immigrants who happened to come over on the' same boat with himself were being treated with very scant courtesy by the officers of customs at the port of landing. He went and remonstrated with some of these officers, with the result that there was an immediate amelioration in the way that they handled some of the immigrants. This Is, of course, one of the minor evils of a custom tariff, but _ in consideration for those who are coming out to be citizens of this country and in many cases with capital, although I do not think that should make much difference, I hope that the minister will look into this matter and not pass it off with the assurance that he is very sorry. It seems an inconsistent thing to be bringing immigrants to this country and then make them the victims of a circumstance like this, which only happened to reach us in the case of those who chanced to be travelling on the same boat as a farmer delegate returning from his duties in the old country.


Frank Oliver: I wish to again assure the hon. gentleman (Mr. Clark) that it is the intention and desire of the Immigration Department that their officers should treat immigrants with every possible consideration. Of course the duties of the immigration officers are imperative, and must be discharged without delay. There is no time for lengthy discussion, and promptitude may have been understood as incivility. While I would ask for the immigration officials every consideration in the discharge of their sometimes unpleasant, and always very hurried duties, I want to assure every one that the intention of the department is that every immigrant, whatever class he may belong to and whoever he may be shall be treated with due courtesy by the officers of this government. I will be glad to have any instances of the infraction of that rule brought to our attention at the earliest possible date. I would mention to my hon. friend from London (Mr. Beattie) that we would like to have the name-not necessarily for ' Hansard '-but we would like to have the name, and about the date of the occurrence, and also in the case mentioned by my hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Clark) we would like to have what information we can.


Thomas Beattie: 


Thomas Beattie: I shall be very pleased to give the minister the name of the person. I may say that my reference was to a most respectable person who is in very good circumstances.



QUESTION OF PRIVILEGE-MR BARKER.

Mr SAMUEL BARKER (East Hamilton).: Mr. Speaker, before the orders of the day are called I wish to direct attention to an item appearing in the Toronto ' World ' of Monday last which I had not seen until my attention was called to it. It is one of a series of items commenting upon certain political matters at Ottawa, and it reads:
One outstanding mistake of those who controlled the affairs of the party some few years ago was the acceptance of a salary by the leader of the opposition. Mr. Barker, of Hamilton, negotiated this matter with the Minister of Justice at the time, and Mr. Borden was cognizant of what was going on. The ' Globe ' has been taunting Mr. Borden ever since and saying that in some way he was bound to be subservient towards the administration.
Now, Mr. Speaker. I would not personally have taken any notice of that; I pay very little heed to anything that appears in that paper because it is my opinion based on pretty general knowledge of the people where those connected with that paper are best known, that very little reliance can be placed upon what appears in it. But, it imputes inpropriety to the then Minister of Justice as well as to myself That may not appear so clearly on the face of this particular item as if you read it in connection with the speeches of the manager of that paper, who is a member of this House, and his public utterances throughout the country. To those who perhaps may place some little trust in such speeches my silence on this occasion might be taken to be some confirmation of the charge of impropriety as against the then Minister of Justice, who is now absent filling a most important mission in Europe on benalf of the British empire. So I do not think it would be right for me to allow that item to go without a remark. The manager of that paper has again and again alluded to the Act of 1905, (which deals with the indemnity of all members of this House, and of the Senate, and some other matters, including the indemnity to the leader of the opposition) and he has spoken of it as a reward for the betrayal of the people. And, taking the whole of his speeches from time to time he alleges that the betrayal has been of the very broadest character by members of this House. That gentleman has spoken of public men who had wrought iniquity, and who by that Act of 1905 had voted themselves public money in

salaries, in pensions, and in indemnity, as a reward for their treachery to the people. And in connection with it he in Effect charges in that item that I, and the then Minister of Justice, negotiated that little-what I suppose he would call financial transaction-intended to reward public men for a betrayal of the interests of the people of this country. It is one of these 3kilful items which this gentleman indulges in. I do not mean to refer here so much to the gentleman who wrote the item, as to the man who inspired it, and I have no doubt who that was, and I am sorry he is not here to-day.


Mr. HUGHES.: He will swear he was here to-day, though.


Mr. BARKER.: Now, that he has made that charge, and that 1 have called attention to it I desire to give it the most unqualified contradiction. There is not a word of truth in it, and if I may be permitted to say so, I believe the man who inspired it, whoever he may be, knew he was telling a wilful lie. I have reason to say that; I have good reason to say that he knew better than one would imagine from that false statement. He charges me with having negotiated one feature of what he calls the reward for treachery that was provided by the Act of 1905, and he does that squarely. Now, I have no doubt that most members of this House recall very well what took place in 1905. Up to that time the indemnity to members was $1,500 -it had been placed at that amount in 1901. There was a great deal of agitation in the House owing to the very long sessions we had had for two or three years, and that was so especially in the case of gentlemen who had come from the Atlantic and Pacific shores, and practically had to stay here throughout the sessions without ever returning to their homes or their business during a session. It was considered a very great grievance indeed that these men should come here, and give up their time to the public service, and receive only $1,500. Rightly or wrongly, they had that grievance, and the first I heard of any action being taken was when I was told that a round robin was being circulated. Although I had never seen it, I was asked would I sign it. I said, no, I had never signed a round robin and I would not now. But I do not mean it to be supposed that I was opposed to the increase. I said I was in favour of a proper increase. The round robin was, I believe, presented to the leader of the opposition, and I presume to the leader of the government. At all events the result was, so far as my knowledge goes, that the leader of the opposition called into conference members of his party from every province which was then represented in the Conservative party. The question was discussed frankly, and freely and openly in all the relations of that Act to the members of this House. It was what I may call a conference of the party. There was no secrecy, no concealment, it was all open and plain. The first question before us we on our side all agreed upon, and that was that the indemnity then allowed to the leader of the government was wholly inadequate to the obligations of his office and position. There was not a worl of doubt on that; no person hesitated for a moment. It was equally the opinion of those of our friends on the Conservative side, who were thus consulted, that it was unfair that the party in opposition should be asked to collect subscriptions or themselves pay the subscriptions towards the official expenses of the party leader; and that it was equally unfair that he should travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific on the many duties of leadership at his own expense. I do not think there was one present who doubted that. The only one I have any recollection of who hesitated was the leader of the opposition himself. My own opinion was clear and undoubted that it was a proper thing, and I could never see, and do not yet see how the acceptance of a grant from parliament, by the leader of the opposition, makes him a servant or in any way obedient to the government of the day. I never could understand it, and I cannot understand it now.


Samuel Hughes: It is the peoples' money.


Samuel Barker: It is not the government that pays that money. The government could not pay it, it could- not draw the money out of the public treasury without the authority of this House. The whole House votes it. The highest official in this land gets his salary just the same way. I presume our constitution is not shaken by the fact that the man who stands above the government is paid in the same manner. However, that was one of the questions before us. There was also the question of the indemnity to the members, and the proposition that it should be increased met I think with general approval. The result of it was that a conference took place between some members on the government side, and some members on this side. I presume that conference was arranged as such meetings on matters of public moment are usually arranged for. I know I was one of those who attended. That meeting also was as public as anything could be that is not published in the press. There were some eight, ten or twelve members present from both sides, and they sat in the room and discussed this whole question, and talked over what was reasonable, and what was right and proper. The result was that

I think every gentleman present was of the opinion that the indemnity which had been paid to the leader of the government up to that date was insufficient. There was no difference of opinion as to that. The same view was taken in regard to the indemnity to the leader of the opposition. I do not think there was any dispute or difference of opinion as to that. Well, now, all I can say further with regard to that matter is this: That I was there simply as a member of this House, as I have been on other occasions when conferences took place in regard to important subjects that can best be thrashed out in that way. There was no seciecy about it; no negotiations, nothing 0f	was discussed just as it
would have been discussed if every member ot both parties was there. All I had especially to do in connection with that committee, or whatever you might call it, was that I was requested to act with Hon. Mr. Brodeur, Minister of Marine and Fisheries in revising some of the clauses of the old Act. It will be in the recollection of this House that there had been something like a scandal throughout the country, and in the House with regard to the payment of indemnity to members. It was alleged on apparently most excellent grounds that one or more members; certainly one _ was notorious for getting from the public treasury payments rather tor .ns absence than for his presence. I assert that. And the chief object of the mission which the_minister and I undertook was, in the public interest, and for the protection of the public chest, to try and improve the checks upon such payments. Prior to that tiriie the member who claimed his indemnity made an affidavit at the end of the session-whether it lasted four or five or six months-in which he stated by a solemn declaration-the statute declaring it to be in law a declaration upon oath-that he had been present or absent so many days. Well, we thought, at all events I thought, that it was perhaps^ taxing the memory of the member of parliament too severely to ask him to make out that declaration after six months, and to say how many days during the previous six months he had been present in the House or absent from it. It occurred to us that it would be fair to the individual who had to commit himself to this statement upon oath that he should do it once a month when his memory was fresh, and when there would be no danger of his misrepresenting his presence or his absence. Sc. we made that important distinction as to the new affidavit as against the former one, and I think on the whole the change has had pretty good results. We changed the Act so that the affidavit is made at the end of each month, so that a man who had been Mr. BARKER.
present say five days, and absent fifteen days out of twenty days sittings of the House would not be likely to make a mistake, and declare that he was present every day. I think we acted wisely in that. That was the whole work I had1 to do in connection with the business. I had no negotiations with anybody about indemnities or anything else; I was simply asked to join the Minister of Marine in improving that clause of the old Act. I do not know whether the fact that I took part in that has had anything to do with this item in the Toronto ' World ' ; certainly I have from beginning to end had no connection with the matter that should arouse the ire of the hon. member of whom I have been speaking except that one thing. There were two changes made: One I have mentioned, by the other we cut out the old practice, a very pernicious one, of a gentleman showing his face at a committee room door, and then going away, and being able to make his affidavit that he had attended, because under tht old Act you were allowed to count attendance upon a committee as attendance upon the House. We struck that out, and so attendance at a committee does not count under the present Act. We brought it down to as nearly as possible what the people of the country expected to pay when they are paying a man for his services in this House. I do not know that I can recall one circumstance that would give the slightest excuse to that paper or to the man who inspired that item for dragging in the name of the Hon. Sir Charles Fitzpatrick. I think that is an outrage. The only time I addressed a word to * Sir Charles Fitzpatrick during the whole of that matter was when the Bill was in committee. Sir Charles Fitzpatrick was watching the Bill through committee of the Whole House as Minister of Justice, and once or twice, as I had had a hand in drafting the clause, he called to me, and I went over to see that some proper verbal corrections were made. That is the one and only instance in which Sir Charles Fitzpatrick, and I addressed each other on the subject matter of thet Bill. Therefore I have asked the privilege of making this statement quite as much, indeed far more on his behalf in his absence, than I do on my own. I repeat that the statement in this newspaper is an absolute falsehood.



INQUIRY FOR A RETURN.

Mr. G. V. WHITE.: I desire to ask the Minister of Public Works when I can expect the return ordered with reference to the Georgian Bay canal?


Mr. PUGSLEY.: Probably next week.



REGULATION OF HORSE-RACING.

Mr. T. G. WALLACE (Centre York).: Mr. Speaker, before the orders of the day are ealled, I desire to bring to the attention of the House and especially of the Prime Minister (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) a matter of great public importance. For the last two days, we have been discussing what is popularly known as the ' Miller Bill/ the measure proposed by the hon. member for South Grey (Mr. Miller) fox the suppression of the evils of race-track gambling. From the fact that this measure was given two days of the time of the House at this stage of the session and has been adjourned^ and from the wide public interest it has aroused, it is evident that there is a strong desire on the part of parliament and of the public to at least lessen the evife associated with horse-racing in this Dominion. I have a measure on the Order Paper, known as Bill (No. 81) an Act to regulate horse-racing. The effect of this measure would be to strictly limit the number of days to be devoted to any race-meet in the Dominion. In view of the importance of the question and of the desire of the public to have this evil dealt with in some way, I would ask the Prime Minister to afford time for the discussion of the Bill standing in my name, and, for that purpose, to fix a day when it may be brought up. I believe that the Bill would not occupy much time, as it is one upon which hon. members will be likely to agree without much discussion. I ask the Prime Minister to extend to me this privilege.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER.: We have given a good deal of time to horse-racing this session, and I do not feel inclined to give any more just now.



BOUNTIES ON ZINC ORES.

[Stage Direction]
, Mr. TEMPLEMAN moved the third reading of Bill (No. 182) respecting the payment of bounties on lead contained in leadbearing ores mined in Canada, and to promote the production in Canada of zinc. He said: In the discussion on the second reading of this Bill, I promised my hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) that I would give more information with regard to the production of lead as a result of these bounties. I have obtained statistics from the Trade and Commerce Department. The bounty system came into effect in the year 1904. As will be seen from the table which I shall read, the average production for the two years preceding 1904 was about 20,000,000 pounds, or 10,000 tons. Immediately after the coming into effect of the bounty there was a marked increase in the production of lead, and the figures show that the result of the bounty has been to encourage lead production to the extent of two or three times the former quantity, the
beneficial results of which will be obvious. The following are the figures showing the production:

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Calendar Year.
1902		
1903		
1901	
1905	
190<i	
1907		
1908		
1909		
Pounds of Lead. .. 22,956,381 .. 18,139,283 .. 37,531,244 .. 56,861,915 .. 54,608,217 .. 47,738,703 .. 13,195,733 .. 45,857,124
Thomas Simpson Sproule: These figures seem to show that while the average production before the bounty was 20,000,000 pounds, the average production since the bounty has been about 44,000,000 pounds. Within the last two or three years the production has gone down again. This would seem to indicate that the increase of the previous years may have been due in part to incidental causes outside of the bounty. My object was to learn to what extent,the lead industry had been stimulated, and I am glad to have the figures the minister (Mr. Templeman) has quoted.


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

[Stage Direction]
Mr. FISHER moved the third reading of Bill (No. 193) to amend the Meat and Canned Foods Act. He said: My hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) asked as to the definition of ' farmer ' under this Bill. I consulted my officers, and they assured me that the definition in the Bill was as drafted by the law clerk, and that they believed that it was as clear as it could be made.
Thomas Simpson Sproule: If the law clerk holds that opinion, of course his opinion ought to be of more value than that of a layman like myself. There was another question which was brought to the attention of the minister when the Bill was under discussion, and one that seems to me to be worthy of consideration, and that is whether it would be advisable to introduce a clause to limit the time during which food may be kept in cold storage. I still think, especially in view of the information we have been receiving from the United States within the last few months, that this is a desirable subject of legislation, and one that should receive early attention from the minister and the government. I would ask the minister if the government have made up their mind to introduce legislation, for this purpose at any time in the near future?


Mr. FISHER.: I have not sufficient information yet to justify me in coming to a

decision on that matter. During the recess, I shall try to learn facts with a view to deciding what legislative action, if any, should be proposed.


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

[Stage Direction]
Mr. FISHER moved the third reading of Bill (No. 185) respecting the Commission for the Conservation of Natural Resources.
Robert Laird Borden: What was done with respect to the amendments that were suggested?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: If the hon. member will read the reprinted Bill, he will see that we incorporated the amendments proposed by my hon. friend from East Lambton (Mr. Armstrong), making them apply to the officials, but not to the members of the commission.


Robert Laird Borden: My recollection is that there was one portion of these amendments which, it was thought, might be made to apply to the members of the commission.


Sydney Arthur Fisher: I understood that the hon. member for Brandon and the hon. gentleman (Mr. Borden) had a discussion on that matter privately, and they thought there would be some * difficulty in making that apply. The hon. member for Brandon so reported to me, so I did not carry out that suggestion.


Robert Laird Borden: I think it was suggested that provisions of that kind might be considered by some hon. gentlemen on both sides of the House, and presented as a further amendment next session.


Mr. ARMSTRONG.: Is it understood that a committee should be appointed for the purpose of arranging some, kind of an amendment to the present Conservation Act whereby the commissioners would be in a different position from the one they now occupy?


Sydney Arthur Fisher: It is understood that an attempt will be made to frame an amendment of that kind.


Robert Laird Borden: I do not think the suggestion was that a formal committee should be appointed, but that a number of gentlemen on this side of the House who are interested in seeing this legislation in the best possible condition, would meet some members of the government, or other gentlemen opposite, and endeavour to frame a suitable amendment for the purpose.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Thomas Simpson Sproule: 



THE FRENCH TREATY.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. FIELDING moved the second reading of Bill (No. 126) to correct a clerical error in the French Convention Act of 1908. He said: Repeating the explanation I gave at an earlier stage, this Bill is to correct a clerical error as respects a single figure in the French Convention Act. In one of the schedules of the treaty, reference is made to certain wines of a strength up to 26 per cent. In the French version of our statutes it is correctly printed; in the English version it reads absurdly, it reads from 23 to 23 per cent instead of from 23 to 26 per cent. But being correctly printed in the French version, it is already law. However, to remove all doubt it is better to correct this error in the English version.
Mr. HENDERSON.: I would ask the Minister of Finance, as we may have occasion to use some of these schedules that were prepared at the time the French treaty was discussed, whether any of these printed schedules, giving the rates of duty, both of goods going into France and their rates converted into dollars and cents, are still available?


Mr. FIELDING.: If I find any available I will be glad to send them to my hon. friend. But I may remind him that the French Chambers recently made a revision of the French tariff, and I think some of the items concerned have been somewhat changed. There are certain rates on both sides which are not specially mentioned, that is to say that, we get the French minimum rate and they get the Canadian intermediate rate. Both countries have the right to change these, and the French legislature has exercised that right in some respects in the revision of the tariff which is just about being completed. But I will send to my hon. friend, if I can get them, these printed documents, though it is possible that in some respects they may have been varied by recent changes.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, Bill read the second time, considered in committee, reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Bill (No. 195) respecting Currency, read the second time, and House went into committee thereon.
William Stevens Fielding: I sympathize with the view expressed the other day by the hon. member for Halton (Mr. Henderson), that when we are making any numerous amendments to a Bill it is much to our advantage to re-enact, if not the whole Bill, the clauses which are to be materially changed. I think there is a convenience in that from the layman's point of view, and even from the lawyer's point of view. In this case we 1 are proposing to amend the Currency Act,

and we do it in the form of a revision. While the Act is somewhat lengthy, it is for the most part merely a re-enactment of the existing law. The important changes ate those which I explained to the House the other day with respect to the gold standard; that is practically the only important change in the Act'. The House, while it may wish to follow the various sections, may feel sure that the important changes are those to which I have already called attention. The clauses that are amended are all printed in italics, so that attention may be drawn to them. Though we may pass the Bill through committee today, if it is desired that it shall stand for the third reading, I have no objection.
On section 3,


Mr. DANIEL.: Is that the gold standard of the English sovereign?


William Stevens Fielding: No. My hon. friend, I suppose, was not present the other day when I explained this. Our currency is on a gold basis with the British sovereign of the fixed value of $4.86f. We have also another Standard with a fractional difference, because the American gold* coins are legal tender in Canada. It might be assumed that as we have these two standards the value is relatively the same, but in reality there is a fractional difference. If we should now, in making our gold coins, produce a $5 gold piece on the basis of the British sovereign, the result would be that we would have a coin intrinsically worth less than the American five-dollar gold piece. What we propose to do is to make our five-dollar gold piece exactly equivalent in intrinsic value to the American five-dollar gold piece. There is a fractional difference as between that and the British sovereign, but it is not important enough to affect any commercial transaction. It amounts to the one hundredth part of a cent on a five-dollar gold piece. It will never be of serious importance to any commercial transaction, but I am sure hon. gentlemen will see that it is rather desirable that our coins, being of the decimal currency, should be in every respect equal in value to the American gold which may be placed in competition with it.
On section 4:	value and currency of
standard goods, silver and bronze coins. &c.


William Stevens Fielding: I am going to make an amendment to that section to which I wish to call the attention of the committee. It will be observed that our silver coins comprise a fifty cent piece, twenty-five cents, ten cents, five cents, and there is a bronze coin of one cent. I propose to insert the provision to authorize us to make a silver dollar. Hitherto, I have not viewed it with much favour and have not thought it necessary, but representations have been made to me, chiefly by hon. gentlemen from British Columbia on, both sides of the House, that a silver dollar is desirable. In eastern Canada where we have the dollar note-and I am glad to say that we have it in a more cleanly condition than it was in former times-the dollar note is very satisfactory. It is a curious fact that on the Pacific coast-I suppose it is because metal is so much in evidence out there-they do like to handle the coin. I know that I have attempted to get small notes on the Pacific coast and could not get them. If our British Columbia friends want the silver dollar we think that they had better have a Canadian silver dol-far than an American. There is some difference of opinion as to the need of it, but, at all events, I propose to take authority to coin the silver dollar.


John Waterhouse Daniel: That would be a very large coin would it not?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, it corresponds with the American dollar. I think it is rather an inconvenient coin, but people in the east and the west have different ideas, and I am doing this at the instance of two or three hon. gentlemen from British Columbia on both sides of the House.


David Henderson: What would be the weight of a Canadian dollar as compared with the American dollar? I think that our dollar perhaps would contain more silver and less alloy, and consequently would not be so cumbersome as the American dollar, which, has not as much pure silver in it. What would be the difference in weight?
Mr- YIELDING. I think my hon. friend (Mr. Henderson) is mistaken, and in any case the difference would be so trifling that it would have no effect in business usage. As a matter of fact the American silver dollar is worth a little more intrinsically than our silver dollar will be as our silver coinage is not based upon its silver value. It is only token money anyway and the weight or fineness of the coin is not a matter of any importance. When we come to gold coin, of course, the object is to make the coin equal to the bullion, but, in the case of silver, it is only a token and one grain more or less is of no consequence.


David Henderson: As a matter of sentiment it is of a good deal of consequence.
I think we have an opinion in Canada that our silver coin contains more actual silver than the American. I am rather surprised to hear that the reverse is the case. With regard to coining a Canadian dollar, I am going to raise no objection to it whatever, although I do think that paper money is

more convenient. It is a matter of choice whether a man pays or receives a silver [DOT] dollar or a dollar in paper money. This will simply give permission to the different provinces to use the kind of money they want. I have no particular objection to it but I would rather have paper money myself.


Mr. BURRELL.: I would like to ask the minister if he has any information as to what amount thev are now issuing silver dollars in the United States or whether they are coining very many of them. W e got a great many of them a few years ago.


William Stevens Fielding: I am told that while they are still coining them they are not so generally used as formerly. I find that the silver dollar is the dollar most largely in use on the Pacific coast. I found it so myself when I was there. I remember on one occasion on the United States Pacific coast trying to get paper money; I found that I could not get small notes but they had plenty of silver dollars. That is the tendency of the Pacific coast in ttm United States and it extends to the British Columbia section.


David Henderson: A sort of Chinese money.


William Stevens Fielding: No, it is not Chinese money.


Mr. GOODEYE.: As representing the associated boards of trade of British Columbia I may say that I waited on the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) and urged upon him the coinage of this silver dollar I did so at the instance of the associated board of trade, comprising thirteen boards of trade in southern British Columbia. The reason they have asked for it is because of the use of a very large number of American dollars all through the west, particularly in British Columbia, and along the border, and they have thought that if we had a Canadian silver dollar it would probably, to a very large extent, do away with the American dollar. The minister gave me the same explanation as that which he has made to the House, that personally he felt it was not a desirable coin owing to its weight, but if there was a real demand on the part of the western provinces he would be pleased to meet that demand. We felt that it would be an advantage in that way. The Americans there are accustomed to it, and some prefer it to the bill, although I agree myself personally with the attitude taken by the minister. We are accustomed to the Canadian dollar bill, and find it perhaps the more convenient, but there is no question that there is a very large circulation of American coinage through a very large part of the Kootenay country; how much
it is difficult, without accurate statistics to say, but a very large part of the change below five dollars is made in these silver dollars. A merchant will have in his till a greater proportion of American silver dollars than any other coin. Therefore, we felt that the introduction of this coin would be an advantage. Further, as the minister truly stated, there will be a certain profit in coining this money that will accrue to the government, the intrinsic value not being equal to a dollar in value. It would be desirable to have a limited quantity of that coin.


Mr. BLAIN.: I would like to ask the Finance Minister what amount has been paid to the banks for collecting American silver and_exporting it to the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: I gave that the other day. I have not the figures at hand.


Richard Blain: I will find it in ' Hansard '. May I ask the minister if any effort has been made by the government to collect defaced silver, there being a considerable amount in circulation in Canada at the present time? It is very troublesome, lhe government are making an effort to collect American silver, and have it sent back to the United States, and I think a similar effort should be made to collect defaced silver which gives every person who has any-, thing to do with it a great deal of trouble. As I understand, when a government bill becomes torn, or defaced it may be taken to the Receiver General's, or the deputy Receiver General's office, and a new dollar bill will be given in exchange. Why could not some arrangement of that kind be made so that the people of Canada would not be troubled by the continued circulation of coins that become more defaced every time they are changed. One other point. United States bills circulate freely in Canada, and are accepted by all classes of people at par, especially corporations and banks. But when our Canadian people go to the United States, they find considerable trouble in getting Canadian $1 bills exchanged, even in the frontier towns. If they go into the interior, it is next to impossible to get the Americans to accept our $1 bills at all. Why could not thi3 government enter into correspondence with the Finance Department at Washington and endeavour to have some better understanding, and obtain some slight endorsa-tion of the Washington government, so that when Canadians go into the inner parts of the United States with Canadian money they would be able to have that money accepted by the American people at its face value, and teach them that if we are free to accept their money they should accept ours.


William Stevens Fielding: I quite understand the ground which my hon. friend has taken,


David Henderson: but I am afraid the matter is something we cannot deal with by legislation. If we do not want American bills in Canada, we need not take them. If we take them, it is because it suits our convenience to do so.
I noticed quite recently that one of the large American cities, the city of Portland, Oregon, by arrangement with the banks and clearing houses, has decided to accept Canadian currency generally at its face value. I would hope that its example may be followed by other cities. It is hardly correct to state that our notes will not be taken anywhere in the States. At any of the large business establishments, where they are accustomed to- deal with Canadians, they will take our Canadian currency at its face value.


Richard Blain: I think that is confined to cities along the border.


William Stevens Fielding: No, I know that in some instances in Boston and New York, the larger establishments will take our Canadian money at par. In one instance I remember-and this illustrates what is done in a large way-tendering a Canadian bank note at an American railway office and being informed that they could not take it, although it was a note of one of our largest banks. When I entered into conversation with the ticket agent, he told me that they had instructions to accept Canadian government currency, but as regards the banks, he said: We know nothing about them. That occurred not far from our boundary.


Richard Blain: Were these instructions from the government?


William Stevens Fielding: No, from the railway company. In many places in the United States they do accept our currency; but I should hope that when we have our gold currency, when there is no question possible as to its intrinsic value, some such arrangement as my hon. friend suggests might be carried Out. As respects silver, I do not think it possible to bring about what my hon. friend desires except by the voluntary action of the banks, the boards of trade and other commercial associations. With respect to worn or defaced silver, I am not quite sure to which my hon. friend referred, but perhaps he referred to both.


Richard Blain: Yes, I had in mind more particularly Canadian silver because in the main American silver is in good condition.


William Stevens Fielding: Canadian silver, as a rule, is in good .condition, and there is no British silver circulated in Canada-in the ordinary sense of the word. It is a very inconvenient coin and practically not circulated.


Richard Blain: What I meant was the circulation of silver bearing our label rather than silver of the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: Sometimes an Englishman coming out here finds that the British shilling is not welcome, and he may imagine that there is something disloyal in that. But the explanation is that the British silver is an odd coin which does [DOT]not correspond to our Canadian coin and is inconvenient with regard to its value. As regards Canadian silver, we have made provisions for the redemption of worn silver. That is silver simply worn by abrasion in time. A great deal was m circulation, and we are endeavouring to have it recoined into fresh, clean silver.


Richard Blain: What about the ordinary holder having $5 or $10 worth?


William Stevens Fielding: Let him take it to the banks. The government cannot deal with every individual. Through the banks we accept that worn silver and have it recoined, and we are very anxious that the banks should assist us.


Richard Blain: Do they accept it at par value?


William Stevens Fielding: They accept worn silver. I want to distinguish between worn silver and defaced silver. The worn is simply silver which has served its day and veneration and suffered something from usage. It is only right that we should redeem that at face value. But defaced silver is a different problem. The defacing and mutilating of coin of the realm is a misdemeanour. It would be hardly consistent for us to declare that a crime and then to proceed to redeem the mutilated coin. Recently, however, with a desire to collect worn and defaced silver and recoin it, we have strained a point and agreed to take a lot of the defaced _ silver at a small reduction, until such time as we shall have the defaced silver now in use recoined and be	able to
start with a clean issue.	We are,
of course, open to the charge of having first declared the mutilating of a coin to be a crime and then proceeding to encourage that crime by redeeming it. But we must do that until we get a clean start and then will discontinue the practice.


David Henderson: You do not take defaced" silver at full value?


William Stevens Fielding: No. I would like to ask the hon. member for Kootenay (Mr. Goodeve) who spoke of American silver coming across to this country, whether the merchants and other business men accept that at par, or do they take in at a discount from those who bring it over and then deal it out at full value to their customers?


Martin Burrell: The American silver or gold which, comes to onr side of the line is always taken at par, but when we take our money over there, they charge a discount. That is one reason why our own money should be in circulation in our own country, and American money deported as soon as possible.


Richard Blain: On the question of worn and defaced silver, I rather commend the government for its action; but while it is important that no man should have the right to deface our silver, an effort should be made by the government, even at some sacrifice, to gather in this silver and not allow it to continue in circulation. I do not think that the public generally know that they can take this silver to a bank and that the banks will accept it. If some regulation to that effect could be put in force and made generally known, the public would willingly take it to the banks. In my own section of the province of Ontario, that is not understood, and this worn and defaced silver keeps continually in circulation, very much to the annoyance and disadvantage of the public generally.


William Stevens Fielding: As regards worn silver, that will adjust itself very quickly. For defaced silver, we give 75 cents on the dollar, but the man who has a dollar's worth, wants to pass it at par, and, therefore, the public do not readily respond and send in their defaced silver. There is a curious fact I might mention, as we have been considering moral questions the last day or two, and that is that most of the defaced silver is found in the church Sunday contributions, and requests for its redemption have chiefly come from church treasurers.


David Henderson: To what church does the hon. gentleman refer?


William Stevens Fielding: I could not say that without making undue discrimination.


Mr. RHODES.: 
William Stevens Fielding: I admit that the Newfoundland currency is undoubtedly an inconvenience, but we have such close and intimate relations with that colony that it is inevitable there will be a considerable amount of its currency circulated in our country. The 50-cent pieces of Newfoundland are not so much trouble as the 20-cent pieces, but of course there would be more profit in our making these pieces out of our own silver instead of having them made in Newfoundland. As regards the 20-cent pieces, they are frequently mistaken for our Canadian quarters, and thus cause loss and annoyance to many people. There is an impression that these 20-cent pieces are Canadian coin, but I have always found that they have the Newfoundland face. In order to avoid this confusion, I wrote the Prime Minister of Newfoundland several years ago suggesting that they might probably find it satisfactory to coin 25-cent pieces instead of 20-cent pieces, but they_ were wedded to the 20 cents, which suit them for some reasons I cannot remember, and we could not bring about a change. With regard to the issue of nickel and silver coins, we are now coining Cobalt silver to the extent of our demands on the mint. No doubt manv of the coins made to-day are made of Cobalt silver, but the nickel problem is not so easy. Nickel is a Canadian product, but it is doubtful whether it is a satisfactory metal to be used for coin. The difficulty is that nickel is a white metal and easily confused with silver. A Frenchman would not make the mistake, which is very common on the part of tourists in France, of taking a 25-centime piece for a franc, because the Frenchmen are accustomed to the difference, but there is a constant disposition on the part of tourists to confound the two.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: There is absolutely no necessity for mistaking the two in France, as the silver coin has a milled edge and the centime has a smooth edge. But they go even further than that in Belgium. There they make a hole in the centre so there is absolutely no difficulty in distinction between the two. In other countries thev make the nickel coin square in shape instead of round.


William Stevens Fielding: Going back to the oriental- design.


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: But since nickel is a distinctly Canadian product, I would like to see a coin produced from it.


William Stevens Fielding: Our coins are distinctively Canadian as we use Canadian silver and copper, and we hope to~ use Canadian gold.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I think there is a distinct advantage in having as few varieties as possible. We are quite familiar with what we have, and copper is Canadian just as much as nickel is. With regard to the dimensions of five-cent pieces, the change would make them more like the American and be objectionable in that respect. But I rose more particularly to draw attention to the question of redeeming defaced and mutilated currency. The hon. minister has said that one of the objections is that we made it a punishable cffence to. deface silver, and it did not seem consistent to provide for the redemption of such silver. But it seems to me there is a strong reason for its redemption and that is this. If a man gets a mutilated half dollar and he cannot get it redeemed, is not that a strong temptation for him to pass it off on some one else, espe- ] cially when he gets it by accident. The hon. minister says that there is a large supply of mutilated money collected in the churches and they desire to have it redeemed. Is he going to put a temptation before the churches to get rid of it in some other way if the government will not provide for its redemption? I think that, in the interests of morality and honesty, the government should redeem it; there should be some means for its redemption. I would not make the discount very great.


William Stevens Fielding: That is exactly what we are doing. We are receiving it at a discount, and in so doing we are paying more than its intrinsic value. I do not want to lay that down as a permanent policy, but rather as a policy to be carried out until such time as we have collected that mutilated silver and put an issue of clean currency in its place.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Where can you get it redeemed? If you go to the banks they refuse it, and it would not be practical to send it to the Finatnce Minister.


William Stevens Fielding: The banks generally are aware of our willingness to take it and no doubt they will co-operate. We cannot of course reach the individual. The banks are the great channels of circulation, and when we arrange with them to take the worn silver at its face value and the defaced at 75 cents on the dollar, we are going as far as we ought to.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: Is that being done?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, we are getting it in and are re-coining it. Whether there is
still a great quantity in circulation, I could not say. My reference to the churches is due to the fact that applications for this have come from the churches. The churches, for some reason or other, seem to get more of it than other people. We are doing what my hon. friend has suggested.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: To my knowledge some of the banks refuse this kind of silver. If there is an understanding between the Minister of Finance and the banks to that effect surely they should redeem that silver at the price fixed.


William Stevens Fielding: My recollection is that we issued a circular to all the banks informing them that we were to redeem that silver at the value I have stated, and if the banks are not receiving that silver and sending it to us we expect that they would do it. No doubt the discussion to-day will have a good effect in giving the information to the public that we are redeeming the silver. The Finance Department does not advertise itself and probably the fact was not as generally known as it should be.


Richard Blain: I have in my mind a bank that refuses to take defaced or mutilated silver. I would have very grave doubt that there is any bank in any centre of population in Canada that would voluntarily accept this defaced silver and send it back to the Finance Department.


John Waterhouse Daniel: Except in quantities.


Richard Blain: They may take it in quantities, but I think the man who wants to. exchange a small quantity of these silver coins should have the privilege just the same as those who do it on a larger scale. The government should make specific regulations so that the banks would bring this matter to the attention of their customers. If the banks refused defaced or mutilated coins on the conditions specified by the government, then if there was a regulation, the customers could draw the attention of the bank to it. Now, as to the churches, I think the' statement of the Minister of Finance is rather a reflection on the church-going public. May I ask the hon. gentleman if he thinks the church-going public of Canada have been influenced by the general conduct of the government towards the moral questions of the day. If so, the hon. gentleman should pay attention to it and try to bring about a little improvement. Judging by yesterday's proceedings in the House the government is not likely to take any strong position in support of a moral question, but, however, that may be, on behalf of the church going public of Canada, I Te-sent the insinuation thrown out by the Minister of Finance. There may be some

people in Canada who will put a defective coin on the collection place, but I do not think the church-going public as a rule,, would do such a thing. If any such thing does occur it is well to look for the source of the evil and perhaps it would be a hint to the government to change their attitude with regards to questions of moral reform.


William Stevens Fielding: I resisted the application at first, but I can tell my hon. friend that it was made again and again by the treasurer of a church. However, I shall not tell my hon. friend what church it was nor in what part of Canada it was located. As to the broader question, the fact that we have redeemed a very large amount of this silver coinage shows that some of the banks are carrying out our policy. If my hon. friend (Mr. Blain) will give me privately the name of the bank he refers to, I will communicate with them and see if we cannot persuade them to co-operate with us.


Richard Blain: I shall be glad to do so. Does this arrangement cover all the chartered banks of Canada?


William Stevens Fielding: The government has expressed its desire to do this through the Bankers' Association and we have asked for their co-operation. I think we might reasonably expect them to co-operate.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: You could make it an obligation on them.


William Stevens Fielding: I do not think that would be necessary.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: We give the banks of this country very large and valuable privileges, and it is not too much in return to put an obligation of that nature upon them.^ I can see no objection in the world to this being made compulsory on the banks, if it becomes necessary to do so.


Mr. GEORGE TAYLOR.: I would suggest to the Minister of Finance that he should issue a circular to all the banks stating what the government proposes to do. The government might issue a uniform notice which should be posted in all the banking houses of the country and then the customers would know about it.
I believe that if notices were sent to the head office of each bank for distribution to all the branches the banks would readily comply with the wishes of the government and in a very short time our defaced silver coins would be got rid of.


William Stevens Fielding: The suggestion of my hon. friend (Mr. George Taylor) is a good one. My impression is that the banks have already been informed in general of ' Mr. BLAIN.
our desire, but I will look into the matter more carefully.


Mr. LENNOX.: You need not ,expect the banks or any one else to voluntarily do work for nothing, and if the Minister of Finance wants to have decent silver coins in circulation in Canada he would have to compensate the banks for receiving that silver and transmitting it to the government. Or in consideration of the many privileges the banks enjoy-not all of them by any means for the general advantage of Canada-I do not think it would be too much to enact that the banks should receive this silver and transmit it to the government under regulations specified by the Minister of Finance. However, it seems inconsistent that the government should make it a crime to mutilate coins and at the same time redeem those coins. I do not understand that if a young lady is presented with a bangle made of coins upon which there is inscribed an initial letter, the object of her devotion should be considered as guilty of a crime. I think the consistent way of looking at it is that it is the circulation of that which is not legitimately a coin that should be considered a crime.


William Stevens Fielding: After the bangle was presented it would cease to go into circulation.


Haughton Lennox: I think all coins that are not properly and legitimately a medium of circulation should be recalled by the government in the most effectual way, and if instead of redeeming these coins at 75 cents on the dollar they were redeemed at 90 cents it would help a great deal to enable us to get rid of these defaced and mutilated coins. Anyway, I do not think that a 50 cent piece is of the intrinsic value of 50 cents when it is issued brand new.


William Stevens Fielding: The silver coin is a token coin and does not represent the face value.


Haughton Lennox: Unless the mutilation consists of abstraction of portions of the material in a coin the intrinsic value of the coin itself does not came into question at all.


William Stevens Fielding: It would be reduced in value by punching a hole in it.


Haughton Lennox: Making a mark or indentation on a coin would not decrease its intrinsic value. If the government redeemed these coins at 90 per cent of their face value it would help very much towards their withdrawal from circulation.


Robert Laird Borden: Is there any systematic defacement of our coinage in Canada, or is it most purely accidental?


William Stevens Fielding: I do not think it is systematic with intent , to defraud, but, of course, if you punch holes in a large number of silver coins you could make money on the business. However, these defaced and mutilated coins have never been redeemed, and so there has been quite a large number of them in circulation. I am not aware that the thing has been done systematically for fraudulent purposes in Canada.


Robert Laird Borden: There was a practice of that kind in other countries years ago, against which were directed important provisions of the Criminal Code, but I have never heard of anything of the kind taking place in this country. Has any decision been come to by the government as to the design on the new gold coins?


William Stevens Fielding: The designs are Jn course of preparation and they are being finally prepared at the Royal Mint in England.


Robert Laird Borden: Will they be submitted to parliament?


William Stevens Fielding: If they are ready before the end of the session there would be no objection to showing them. Of course, on one side there must be the sovereign's head, as is the case with all British coins, and the present idea is to use the arms of Canada, with the value of the coin, and the date, as the main design on the other side.


Robert Laird Borden: The minister referred the other day to some difference in fineness between the gold coinage of the United Kingdom and the gold coinage of the . United States. How does it happen that there is this difference between the gold coins of the two countries?


William Stevens Fielding: The British standard differs from the standard of almost every country in the world. The Americans have adopted the standard of continental European countries, and which, was first adopted by France. In pont of fineness the British gold coin is somewhat better than the American in the percentage of fine gold in it, but when it comes to weight the relative value is in favour of the American coin.


Robert Laird Borden: The value is determined by the actual weight of pure gold in the coin?


William Stevens Fielding: Quite so.


George Taylor: 1 understood the Minister of Finance to say that if holes were punched in coins a certain amount of the material would be removed. I can assure the hon. gentleman that such is not the case, and if he gets some officer 211
in his department to examine these coins which are punched he will find that 99 per cent of the punching does not take out a one-sixtieth part of a hair in weight. The whole material is left there, and it is simply expanded by driving the punch through.


William Stevens Fielding: That is quite correct, but there formerly was a practice in other countries of punching holes in coins so as to get the material and make a profit. I am not aware that there is any complaint of that kind in Canada at present.


Richard Blain: Are the banks supposed to redeem mutilated copper as well as mutilated silver?


William Stevens Fielding: No complaint has been received respecting the copper. If the evil prevailed in connection with our copper coinage it would be dealt with in the same way.


Richard Blain: There is a very great deal of defaced and worn copper coinage in circulation. That is not so often rejected. Still, I think it is a matter that should receive some attention, and, when the order goes forth that the banks are to receive defaced and worn silver. I do not think it would be out of place that a similar order should go foTth with regard to worn and defaced copper also.


William Stevens Fielding: That point has not been brought to my attention hitherto. I will make inquiry about it.
On section 4, subsection 3, standard fineness and weight of coins of other denominations-remedy allowance-least current weight of gold coin.


Robert Laird Borden: Some technical expressions are used here. Would the Minister of Finance please explain?


William Stevens Fielding: The ' remedy ' is the variation that may be allowed from the mathematically accurate weight of the coin. The mint authorities say that it is impossible, no matter how perfect the machinery you may have, to turn out a coin that will be absolutely the same weight as the standard. The variation may be an extremely small fraction, but it exists. Besides that, when a coin is in current use for a time it becomes worn, and the weight is changed. Of course, if it falls below a certain point, it ceases to be a valid coin.


Robert Laird Borden: If it falls below that variation it would not be issued?


William Stevens Fielding: No, but, after being issued, if it falls below a certain standard it ceases to be valid coin.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: What becomes of it then? Suppose that it were refused? *


William Stevens Fielding: We should have-to deal with that, I suppose, by special legislation. Up to a certain point, we have the right to redeem, and we are redeeming, silver even at depreciated value. The English practice is, when a coin falls below what is called the ' least current weight ' it may be sent in, and recoined, and the treasury bears the expense.
At one o'clock, committee took recess.
Committee resumed at three o'clock.


William Stevens Fielding: With the consent of the House, I would like to refer again to section 4. A question was asked before the recess, and I am not sure that I gave the answer as clearly as I could wish. It was in regard to the remedy. The remedy, as the term is used there, refers to the condition of the coin at the time of its issue. There is a limitation within which it may be lawfully issued. Outside of that limitation it will not be issued, for the remedy has application to the coin at the time of issue. Then after the coin has passed into circulation, and becomes worn, we have what is called the least current weight. If the coin falls below that least current weight, which is set forth in the schedules of the Act, it ceases to be legal tender, but in that case it can be presented to the government and recoined, the government bearing the consequence of the ordinary wear and tear of the coin. That is the practice of the English mint, and we would naturally follow the English practice.
On section 6,


Robert Laird Borden: The bullion out of which these coins are produced will be Canadian gold?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes. Circumstances might arise when we would require to use other gold, but all things being equal, we will give the preference to the Canadian metal.
On section 9, British sovereign and gold coins to be legal tender.


Mr. E. L. BORDEN.: This is a new section?


William Stevens Fielding: We have always regarded the British sovereign as a legal tender, and that was the intention of the Act. The present clause makes it more clear that the sovereign shall be legal tender at the rate of $4.86s.


Robert Laird Borden: That does not precisely correspond to our own standard in gold coin.


William Stevens Fielding: The sovereign remains precisely of the same value, and we think it is not wise to make any change, although there is, as I have already explained, a Mr. SPRODLE.
fractional difference between that and our own gold coin.


Robert Laird Borden: Why not fix the value of the sovereign so as to make it correspond exactly with our own standard?


William Stevens Fielding: The difference is so slight that we think it is well to adhere to the old established value. This has been the value attached to the British sovereign for generations, and we think it is well not to disturb it. The difference is so fractional that it could not be conveniently expressed in figures. To be exact, the figures would be $4-8665 with various other figures to be added to give the correct expression. The recognized value is so near the real value that we do not think it worth while to make a change.


John Waterhouse Daniel: The Bill allows gold coin of Canadian mintage to be a legal tender for debts up to any amount, but that is not the case here with regard to the sovereign. A man cannot offer more than a certain amount of sovereigns in payment of a debt, whereas he can offer the full amount of gold coin of Canadian mintage.


William Stevens Fielding: The sovereign would be legal tender at the value fixed to any amount; there is no limitation.


David Henderson: But if the British sovereign be at all times a legal tender at $4,866 does not something depend on the rate of exchange? I understand there is a certain rate of exchange where the value would be $4.86f. But if it falls below that or goes above it, there is a variation.


William Stevens Fielding: The question of exchange does not enter into the value as respects transactions within Canada. We have a fixed rate, and all transactions within Canada would be based upon that rate, irrespective of the question of exchange which might arise in relation to other countries.


David Henderson: I suppose gold always remains at one value?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


Mr. J. HAGGART.: Gold does not remain at one value. It may have one value in this country to-day and have another value in another country. It all depends on where you want to send the greatest quantity of it to. Suppose that you owe gold in London, you have to pay the difference in the carriage of that gold over to that country. It may be 4-86, 4-87, or perhaps less, according to where the balance of exchange is, or what is virtually required to carry the gold to where the payment has to be made.


William Stevens Fielding: That is entirely correct as respects gold in any transaction abroad,

but it would not affect a transaction within Canada.


John Graham Haggart: But my hon. friend was talking about payments in Great Britain.


William Stevens Fielding: This Bill does not pretend to regulate exchange.


Arthur Samuel Goodeve: Is it the intention of the government to issue a Canadian sovereign, or will the five-doll ar piece be the only gold coin issued?


William Stevens Fielding: There is no such thing as a Canadian sovereign. We have made some sovereigns at the Royal Mint. The regulations establishing the Royal Mint contemplate the use of our gold to be turned into sovereigns if the owner of the gold should so desire. I know that in several instances gentlemen having gold produced in Canada desired it to be converted into sovereigns, and as the operation was not a very exjiensive one, and the refining apparatus was equal to it, we have turned it into British sovereigns. We shall continue to do so upon the application of any owner of gold who desires it, but we do not intend as a general thing, to make British sovereigns.


Arthur Samuel Goodeve: Not for general circulation?


William Stevens Fielding: They are British sovereigns minted under royal regulations, and they have in every respect throughout the world the same value as British sovereigns minted in London.
On section 10, foreign gold coins, proviso as to gold coins of the United States.


John Waterhouse Daniel: What is the meaning of the words * tolerance or remedy ' in that section?


William Stevens Fielding: Tolerance is the American name for the remedy or variation which will be allowed. The only material change in this clause is that formerly American coin was declared to be legal tender at a specific weight. The American laws allow a variation within a certain limitation in the case of these coins, but our Act did not take notice of it. Hence it was possible that we would refuse to receive the coin as legal tender even though it might be in full conformity with the standard of the United States. We make this slight change allowing for tolerance, or variation, or remedy, so long as the coin conforms to the established law of tire United States.


Mr. J. A. CURRIE.: When we are fixing a legal standard of gold, I think it would be just as well to maintain our own legal standard, which is a fiat standard, and not establish a fiat standard for foreign coins Gold coins would then be purchased exactly by weight. Everybody knows that gold 211J
is a commodity. This fixes an American coin as having a certain standard of value with our own. That means that unless there is a certain diminution of value by abrasion, &c., that money is a current coin in Canada. It makes an American five-dollar gold piece a current coin in Canada, irrespective of whether it is worn or fresh I do not think that any of the great countries of the world standardize other country's coin by giving it a fiat value. Gold is bought and sold like any other commodity. It is not a coin of each country having a standard of fineness like fiat money. I do not wish to oppose the Bill in any way, but I think the minister will agree with me that it would be well to have it as I suggest.


William Stevens Fielding: I think it is arguable, that if we had had gold coins in Canada in quantity in the past, American coins might never have been made legal tender, but they were legal tender in the old province of Canada, they continued as legal tender under the laws of confederation, and they so remain. I think that at the present time, at all events, it would not be wise for us to disturb that condition. Currency matters require to be very delicately handled. I would imagine that it is quite probable that within a few years, if we had our own gold in Canada in general and abundant circulation, it might be well to remove this clause from our law, but for the present I think we would do well to keep the American coin as a standard, just as it has been ever since the beginning of confederation.


John Allister Currie: Do they propose to accept your coin as standard?


William Stevens Fielding: No, we do not put it in
to please them; we put it in to please ourselves.


John Allister Currie: They will not take a British sovereign as standard.


William Stevens Fielding: I think it is quite possible. No country can be condemned if it establishes its own laws in that respect. We are not doing this to please the American authorities. They would not object if we struck it out. I am not sure but that if we struck it out they would not approve, because every country likes to keep its own gold within its own borders. Inasmuch as American coins have been legal tender in Canada since the beginning of our country as a Dominion, it would not be wise to make a change now, but when we have gold coin of our own in abundance, perhaps the need of this American gold being taken as legal tender will cease.


Robert Laird Borden: I would think it would be a rather advantageous thing if the coins of one country could be received in the other. Of course, we have no con-

trol over that. Any one who has travelled in Europe knows that in many cases the gold coinage of one country is^ received at its face value in other countries. French gold coins and notes are received at their face value in Switzerland.


William Stevens Fielding: That is one of the reasons why, as I have already explained, I thought it desirable that our gold coins should correspond in intrinsic value with the American gold coins so that they would be interchangeable and there could be no objection on account of their value. The two coins will be alike in value, and if there be any objection to ours, it will not be on account of its value.


David Henderson: We have heard what the minister has said about our gold being refused in the United States. He seems indifferent as to whether the Americans should take it or not. It is a matter of very considerable importance. We know there is a great deal of trouble in connection with this matter. Persons travelling in the United States cannot make use of Canadian money. The Americans refuse to accept [DOT] it. Even the great railways that ought to know that our $5 and $10 are guaranteed by the government, and are just as good as our Dominion currency, do not seem to toe familiar with that fact. It would toe a great convenience to people from Canada travelling in the United States if it were understood that our gold as^mint-ed here in Ottawa was legal tender in the United States. While the minister is negotiating in other matters with the people of the United States, he might bring this about.


William Stevens Fielding: Such an interchange would certainly be desirable, and it is quite within the bounds of possibility that it may be brought about. But the^ first thing is to get our gold coin established and "let other people realize that it is just as good value as their own. Then we might ask them to accept these coins at their par value.


John Allister Currie: The method of weighing adopted by all other nations except the United States, Great Britain and ourselves is the metric method, and I think that ought to be adopted here. I understand that the metric system is legal in this country. Why not add the metric equivalents to that of Troy weight in the schedule? All assay calculations, in the matter of gold and silver are made on the metric system.


William Stevens Fielding: We are following the example of the royal mint, and in matters of this sort, we will do well to follow as closely as possible the practice of the British mint.


John Allister Currie: That is quite right, but the metric system is legal in this coun-Mr. R. L. BORDEN.
try and not in England. It would facilitate the work of the mint if our standards were fixed by metric equivalents as well as by Troy weight. I think the assay officers would tell the hon. gentleman that.


William Stevens Fielding: In the preparation of this Bill we consulted the officers of the mint and endeavoured in all respects to adapt ourselves to the modern practice, and our officers take that view of the case.


John Allister Currie: If the hon. gentleman would ask his officers, I think that what I suggest would be a great convenience. I know that all those scales for weighing assays are based on the metric system. An assayer can calculate much more rapidly by metric system than by Troy weight.


William Stevens Fielding: That may be possible. We have had a message from the Deputy of the Governor General informing us that he will be in the Senate at half past three for the purpose of assenting to certain Bills. I would therefore move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again this day.
Progress reported.



THE ROYAL ASSENT.

[Stage Direction]
A message was received from His Honour the Deputy of His Excellency the Governor General by the gentleman Usher of the Black Rod as follows:
Mr. Speaker, His Honour the Deputy of His Excellency the Governor General, desires the immediate attendance of your honourable House, in the Chamber of the honourable the Senate.
Accordingly, Mr. Speaker, with the House, went up to the Senate Chamber.
And having returned,
Mr. SPEAKER informed the House that his honour the deputy of His Excellency the Governor General had been pleased to give in His Majesty's name, the Royal Assent to the following Bills:
An Act respecting the Algoma Central and Hudson Bay Railway Company.
An Act respecting the Erie, London and Tilsonburg Railway Company.
An Act to incorporate the Weyburn Security Bank.
An Act respecting the Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada.
An Act respecting the Montreal and Southern Counties Railway Company.
An Act respecting the Northern Empire Railway Company.
An Act respecting the Dominion Atlantic Railway Company.
An Act respecting the Calgary and Fernie Railway Company.
An Act to amend the Exchequer Court Act.
An Act respecting the Ottawa, Brockville and St. Lawrence Railway Company.
An Act to amend the Government Annuities Act, 1908.
An Act for the relief of Archibald Laurie.

An Act for the relief of Bernard Shea.
An Act for the relief of Clara Louise Holden.
An Act for the relief of James Albert Green.
An Act for the relief of Alexander Augustus Bartlielmes.
An Act for the relief of Cecilia Marie Pringle.
An Act for the relief of Ada Ann Reed.
An Act to incorporate the Independent Order of Rechabites.
An Act respecting the Richelieu and Ontario Navigation Company.
An Act respecting the British North American Mining Company.
An Act to incorporate the Saskatchewan Central Company.
An Act granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the public service of the financial year ending the 31st March, 1910.
An Act to incorporate the Pine Pass Railway Company.
An Act to incorporate the Ottawa, Montreal and Eastern Railwav Company.
An Act respecting the Bay 'of Quint e Railway Company.
An Act to incorporate the Catholic Episcopal Corporation of Timiskaming.

[Stage Direction]
House in committee on Bill (No. 195), respecting the currency.-Mr. Fielding.
On section 12, no other coins to be legal tender.
John Allister Currie: I would again urge the minister to change the five-cent coins, because it is a universal complaint that the five-cent piece we have is so small that it is easily lost, and whilst it is a very nice coin it would be a far greater convenience if we employed base metal and adopted some system such as they have in other countries for that class of coin. I also think the one-cent piece contains far too much metal. There is no intention on the part of the government to say that the copper contained in it bears any relation to the value of the coin, and it is exactly the same size as a 25 cent piece, so that it is difficult to distinguish them. Each denomination should be of a different size, so that the coins can be distinguished by touch. Every one has been looking forward to a change when the minister was revising the Currency Act, and I think public opinion is strongly in favour of such a change.


William Stevens Fielding: I have not heard much evidence of a general desire to make these changes, and I must confess that I have in some respects what I may describe as a wholesome conservatism and' adherence to old established things. My hon. friend's touch is not as keen as it used to be; I have put the 25 cent piece and the cent together and they are not the same size.
Mr. SPROULE I have been spoken to in respect to this once or twice in view of the expected changes, and my experience is the reverse of the hon. member for
North Simcoe (Mr. J. A. Currie). I would doubt the wisdom of making any change from the coins we are familiar with.


John Allister Currie: I do not know of any country with such a small silver coin as ours. The Americans abolished it.


William Stevens Fielding: They have in England a three-penny piece about the same size.


John Allister Currie: It is a very rare coin.
On section 21, appointment of assay commissioners, examination, and test, &c.


William Stevens Fielding: In England they have what is called the trial of the Pyx which takes place at Goldsmith's Hall, and they utilize for this purpose the services of the Goldsmith's Company. This is a trial to test the correctness of the coin. We have not in Canada a corresponding organization, and we propose once a year to appoint three gentlemen who shall test the coin, and guarantee to the public that it is of correct weight and quality. It follows in substance the English practice, but the method is different, because we have not the same organization here.


John Allister Currie: To whom do they report?


William Stevens Fielding: To the Governor in Council, and I suppose like any other public document it would be brought before parliament.


John Graham Haggart: What is to be their remuneration?


William Stevens Fielding: The compensation for this service in England takes the shape of a public dinner at Goldsmith's Hall, but we have not yet determined the compensation to be paid to the gentlemen in Canada.	i


Robert Laird Borden: Give them a dinner at the parliamentary restaurant.


William Stevens Fielding: That might do.


John Allister Currie: Is not the test made in the presence of the officials of the House of Commons, and the House of Lords, is it not rather a state function in England?


William Stevens Fielding: I think it is the dinner that is the state function.
On section 22, Dominion standard Troy ounce to be standard of weight, weights to be verified and approved.


John Allister Currie: Where is this standard Troy ounce to be checked or verified? In Great Britain? I understand that the American standard Troy weight has recently been tested and found a little off. Will our test be in Goldsmith's Hall in England. 1 or what is t-o be the standard?


William Stevens Fielding: The Minister of Inland Revenue (Mr. Templeman) is nof present, and -so I cannot offer any explanation further than that we refer to the standard weights of the Inland Revenue Department as established by the Weights and Measures Act.


John Allister Currie: But would the standard weights of the Inland Revenue Department, such as are used ordinarily throughout the country, be sufficient for the purposes of the Finance Department? I should think that the standards in this matter should be under control of the Finance Department.


William Stevens Fielding: The Minister of Inland Revenue has these standards for all purposes, and we simply declare the standards thus established shall be accepted for the purposes of our department.


John Allister Currie: And where is this Troy weight fixed?


William Stevens Fielding: I can only say that it is fixed by the Weights and Measures Act. Further than that, I cannot answer.
On the schedule,


William Stevens Fielding: I want to make an addition to the schedule to correspond with the decision already reached by the committee respecting the creation of the silver dollar. In the schedule as it is at present, there is no reference to that point, and, as the silver dollar is to be made, it must be provided for in the schedule, like the rest. The amendment I propose is to insert in the schedule the following:
Under denomination of coin-silver ; one dollar, standard weight 360 grains; remedy allowance-weight per piece; 1-50 grains; mil-lesitnal fineness, 4.


Mr. PERLEY.: May I ask the Minister of Finance why it is he wants to coin a silver dollar?


William Stevens Fielding: We have already had quite a discussion on that point. In brief, representations were made to me by hon members from British Columbia both in this House and in the Senate, that the creation of a silver dollar was very desirable from a British Columbia point of view, and I have found by experience that there is a taste for the American silver dollar on the Pacific side. I see no reason why, there being a demand, we should not supply it, rather than use the American dollar. If our dollar note is not sufficient, and there are people who want a silver dollar, I think it is good business to furnish it.


John Allister Currie: I would suggest to the minister the coining of the Mexican dollar, as it is called, with a view to enable Canada to export silver to China, Japan Mr. J. A. CURRIE.
and other eastern countries. Hong Kong or Mexican dollar is the standard in silver countries. And, as we hope to take a prominent place in the trade of the Orient, if we are to have a silver dollar, I think we should have a coin that will be of use in that trade. We are large producers of silver, and these eastern countries will furnish a great market. I think it would be much better to make a coin of the exchange value of the Hong Kong or Mexican dollar than one that would be useful in exchange only in Canada.


William Stevens Fielding: I am not much enamoured of the silver dollar. At present we want to confine ourselves to the use of it in Canada. The other question that the hon. member has raised is a much larger one and one upon which I would not care to enter at present.


George Halsey Perley: I do not wish to take up time if this matter is already decided. But I may remind the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) that in the United States silver dollars are piled up unused- they cannot circulate them.


William Stevens Fielding: I can assure niv hon.
friend (Mr. Perley) that the law of supply and demand will govern that. We have no desire to coin them unless there is a demand for them, and I realize that that demand may arise only on the Pacific coast.


John Graham Haggart: Perhaps the information I am about to ask has already been given. I would like to know what profits the government made last year from the mint, and how these profits compare with what we should have made if we had not had a mint. It is mainly on the silver coins, I believe, that we make a profit in the minting operations. Formerly, we had an arrangement with the imperial authorities that they were to coin for us. Had we not changed that and established a mint here, what would have been the difference in our profits?


William Stevens Fielding: The information asked for has not been given to-day. But a return was brought down some time ago, and will be found in the records, which, I think, covers the whole matter. In general terms, the position is this : while there is a large profit in the operation of the mint, it is undoubtedly a fact that if we were content to have our coins made as in former years, in England, we should make a larger profit. That I state unhesitatingly. But, on the same principle, no doubt, we could get our Dominion notes printed more cheaply in England than here, yet it was thought that there were good reasons why we should have an establishment for that purpose in Ottawa. The same reasons extended to coinage lead us to think it is better to have Canadian

coins made in Canada. The making of them is profitable, not as regards gold- there is no profit in coining gold-but in the silver coins and bronze coins. But, as a mere matter of profits, we should do better by having our coins made in England.


Mr.  J. A.@: CL'RRIE. The current impression is that the coins of this country were formerly minted at the royal mint in England Is it not a fact, however, that many of these were coined by British contractors . in Birmingham and other places who make coins for other countries, and not in the royal mint?


William Stevens Fielding: Our orders were invariably sent to the royal mint. But in several instances, because the royal mint was too busy or for some other reason, they turned our orders over to contractors in Birmingham. So, in that sense, the hon. member's statement is practically correct.


George Halsey Perley: Has the hon. minister considered any design for the gold coins?


William Stevens Fielding: The design is not finally adopted. It is being prepared in the royal mint in England! The elements will be, first, the King's head, as a matter of course, and the arms of Canada, will be used as the chief features in the design. These, with the designation of the coin, the word 'Canada', and the date are the elements of which the design is being made up.


George Halsey Perley: It is necessary that we should have some name for the $5 gold piece, and the design has a good deal to do with the name. Every country has a special name for its ordinary gold piece, and we should have some short- name.


William Stevens Fielding: What do you call the sovereign?


George Halsey Perley: I call it a sovereign. It is called a napoleon in France, an eagle in the United States, a crown in some parts of Europe, and there must be a short name for the $5 gold piece in Canada, for instance, the beaver.


William Stevens Fielding: The design at present proposed is the King's head and the arms of Canada. While the beaver has elements of value as an industrious animal, I am not quite sure that it is a thing of beauty.


George Halsey Perley: The minister may be sure that the general public will give a name of its own to the new gold piece, and he might keep that in mind when forming the design, if he does not like the beaver.


Mr.  J. A.@: CL'RRIE. Is it the intention to follow the new American practice in the
die? The old American coinage is always in relief. They have reversed that in the new coin.


William Stevens Fielding: I believe it was found that the American gold piece, while beautiful in its design, would not stack, and for certain purposes that was a defect in the American currency.


Air. JAMESON.: When the minister speaks of the arms of Canada, does he mean the arms of Canada before confederation, or does he mean the arms of the Dominion as they now exist?


William Stevens Fielding: On a matter of so much importance as a coin, we would have to use the authorized arms, and for the present we would not include a representation of all the provinces. But no doubt before long we will have to have a new issue in which the new arms will be used. For the 'present we only take the authorized arms.


John Allister Currie: I would suggest to the minister that a wheat sheaf on the gold coin would be a good advertisement for the country.
Bill reported, read the third time, and passed.



SUPPLY-THE FRUIT TARIFF.

[Stage Direction]
Air. FIELDING moved that the House go into Committee of Supply.
['And, forgetful of their duty to Canada they surrendering to the United States.\nThe hour for private Bills having expired, the House resumed in Committee of Simply.']
Air. BRADBURY.: Before you leave the Chair, I desire to call the attention of the Alinister of Finance to a matter of considerable importance affecting the gardeners of Alanitoba, and I presume of all Canada. I am in receipt of a letter from the reeve of the municipality of Kildonan. in my county, who is also the secretary of the Agricultural Society of that municipality. He writes as follows:
You will notice by the papers that the wholesalers of the west have petitioned the government to remove the duty from fruit and green vegetables coming into Canada between December 1 and July 31. Our gardeners protest against the time being extended past June 15, as our stock grown here is in by that time. If this goes into force it will put a lot of our gardeners out of business. We are sending a small petition against it to the government to-day. As the time is short we cannot wait to go to everybody. AYe want you, when it comes up, to do what you can for us, and we think the 15th of June should be the latest. Will inclose article out of paper.
I have the inclosed petition here, which I presume the minister has received from the wholesalers of the wrest, and I will read a part of it. It is addressed to His Excellency, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, making, as you will see, a little mistake at the beginning :

Sir,-Your petitioners represent the principal fruit and vegetable importing concerns in western Canada.
Little fruit is raised in western Canada, and the western cities are dependent upon the United States for all the earlv fruit and vegetables. These come from as far south as Miami, Florida. During the several months of the year before it is possible to grow vegetables or fruits, a large quantity of both are imported; but the freight charges coupled with the duty, place the consumption beyond the purse of the average householder, and these products become a luxury when they are really a necessity.
Our desire is-and we believe it to be a reflex of that of the western country at large- that the duty be removed from these products at such times when they cannot possibly come into competition with home grown articles. YVe believe that the adoption of the following schedule would be of distinct advantage, supplying the people of western Canada with some of the necessities of life which the country, by reason of its geographical position, is not able to provide at those times.
Schedule.
Peaches, pears, plums and apricots on free list from January 1 to October 1.
Cherries, on free list from January 1 to June 30.	[DOT]
Grapes, on free list from December 1 to August 31.
Tomatoes, and green vegetables, cabbage, cucumbers, celery, asparagus, rhubarb, green bea,ns, cauliflower, on free list from December 1 to July 31.
_ It is this last paragraph, Mr. Speaker, in which I am most interested, because it affects the great garden industry in our part of the country. I may say that two-thirds of the gardens in the west are situated in my own county. The gardeners have a large amount of money invested in this industry, and while the wholesalers are petitioning apparently in the interest of the consumer, I have grave doubts, if their petition was acceded to, that the general consumer would benefit very much. You simply place in the hands of the wholesaler a power to force the gardeners of our own country to sell to the wholesalers at a reduced price when their stuff comes into the market. I want to protest strongly against the government acceding to the request of the wholesaler as regards the admission of tomatoes, green vegetables, cabbage, cucumbers, asparagus, rhubarb, green beans and cauliflower being placed on the free list from December 1, to July 31. The gardeners seem to be quite willing that they should be placed on the free list, but not later than the 15th of June, and plied with these articles by our own gardeners. All the way from Winnipeg down to Selkirk the gardeners have established a very large business. The gardener really makes his profit on the early vegetables, and the wholesalers apparently want the duty removed so that American stuff may be brought into competition with our garden Mr. BRADBURY.
stuff just at the time when there is any money in it for the gardner. I appeal to the minister on behalf of the gardeners of Manitoba and, I presume, the whole of Canada that they shall receive fair protection against any foreign importation of vegetables. Last year the question was broached by some of the gardeners about asking the government to put an increased protection on some of these vegetables that come from the other side-cabbage and such like-and I hope the government will take this into their serious consideration and see that the [DOT] American producer is not allowed to interfere with the gardeners of this country.


Martin Burrell: I am quite persuaded that the minister or the government would not accede to or deal with a proposition of that kind lightly. We are aware of that and certainly I would utter a very strong protest if a matter of that kind were dealt with without the fullest consideration of the other side of the question. As a matter of fact a disturbance of the duties referred to by my hon. friend would interfere decidedly with the enormous acreage of fruit in our own province of British Columbia where we are building up .a tremendous industry and considering that the whole schedule of the American tariff is against us so strongly that we cannot send any of these commodities into the United States it is quite palpable that we could not, without the strongest protest, have such a recommendation as that listened to without the fullest consideration.


Mr. STAPLES.: My hon. friend from Selkirk (Mr. Bradbury) says that he represents two-thirds of the market gardeners of Manitoba. He may have something that will support that statement but I represent a constituency that comes up close to the city of Winnipeg, and I think that possibly there are as many market gardeners in the constituency of Macdonald as there are in Selkirk. Therefore, I want to endorse what my hon. friend from Selkirk has said on behalf of the market gardeners of my constituency.


William Stevens Fielding: I have received, within a few days, a copy of a petition dealing with the condition explained to the House by the hon. member for Selkirk. The petition was from the importers. It was followed somewhat rapidly by a communication from the fruit growers of the Niagara district protesting in the strongest terms against what was proposed by the importers of Winnipeg, and now we have the additional protest of the hon. gentleman. What has been said to-day indicates clearly that it is a much disputed matter, to which there are certainly two sides, and I can assure my hon. friends that at this stage of the session we would not undertake to make any disturbance of the tariff

on that matter. What has been said wil. be a fair matter for inquiry and for any future action, but nothing will be done at. the present session.


John Allister Currie: If the Minister of Finance is going to listen only to the views of the importers of this country the rest of the people might as well close up shop and go out of business. The importers are interested in importations and not in the local or native industries, and the minister on these matters apparently is prepared to give the importers a more attentive ear than the poor man who is trying to make a living. The chief grievance of these fruit growers of the Niagara district applies to all the growers of small fruits and the market gardeners of this country. These men of Canada are just as much entitled to justice as are the importers of Winnipeg or any other city who are endeavouring to make a big lot of money out of importing foreign fruit in cold storage. This is a matter of placing the handling of all our vegetables and fruits in the hands of the cold storage trusts, and I think we should stand by our own people on a question of this kind and not in favour of the importers as the minister does.


Richard Blain: I would like to add a word or two on behalf of the market gardeners of my county and to urge that no action may be taken without an opportunity oi being given the gardeners of that section to lay their case before the government. I am quite sure that no action will be taken. I desire to say just one thing further and that is that the people of Canada must bear in mind that the market gardeners are producing many things now that we never thought would be produced in Canada many years ago. They are producing large quantities of products now that heretofore were imported from the United States. Within this very year, in my own time, some men have given up their ordinary avocations, have taken up pieces oi land and are going especially into the market gardening business for the purpose of raising early products which are used in our houses and have a large sale in the early part of the year. Therefore, I would ask that the government, in the consideration of the tariff question as it affects the farmers and market gardeners of this country, would keep in mind the fact that both farmers and market gardeners are able to produce a great many things to-day that in years back they could not produce at all, and I am quite sure that so long as matters are left steadfast they will produce everything at almost any time of the year that the people of this country will require.


Robert Laird Borden: I would like to ask the Minister of Finance when we may
expect the information which was asked for with respect to the' proposed changes in the tariff?


William Stevens Fielding: It is being printed and I would hope to have it on the table on Monday.
Motion agreed to and House went into Committee of Supply.
Civil government-Post Office Department- salaries, $546,260.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Does the Postmaster General intend to increase the salaries of the railway mail clerks, and if not, why not?


Mr. LEMIEUX.: That question was put by the hon. member for Toronto (Mr. Mac-dpnell) yesterday, and my answer appears in ' Hansard/ Last year I gave a general increase to the lower classes of the outside service, sorters, stampers and labourers, and this year I thought we should give an increase to the higher classes, who had not received .any increase since confederation. Some years ago the railway mail clerks received a substantial increase, and as there is a general demand for higher salaries on the part of the city office sorters and clerks, the question arises whether we should increase the one and not the others. I have decided, after the session, to examine the various merits or demerits of the claims put forth, and at the beginning of next session, I hope to be able to introduce legislation on the matter. My intention is to bring the outside service in the larger city post offices under the Civil Service Act. We can do so under an order in council, but pre-' liminary to that we have to adjust the salaries so that the different classes of employees may fall into a proper salary classification.


John Waterhouse Daniel: Is the minister in a position to state now that he will bring the outside post office service under the Civil Service Act and rearrange the salaries?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Speaking for myself personally, it is my intention to do so. The department is studying the problem, which is a very difficult one.


William D. Staples: What action has the minister taken in regard to the application for a post office at Kilmant and Shacleton, which are situated outside of Winnipeg? In 1906, this post office was recommended by Mr. Riddel, who being the defeated candidate, apparently had the patronage, and every year since the minister has -had it brought to his notice. Last year the minister assured me that he was going to give the people of that district a post office, and that it would not be necessary for me to bring the matter up in the House. A post office is certainly required in that locality. There are no post offices, from Winnipeg west about 15 miles, on the south side of the river, and while there are post

offices on the other side of the river at certain seasons of the year, the people cannot cross and cannot get their mail unless they go through the city of Winnipeg, a distance of 8 miles. A. return which has been brought down, gives the correspondence addressed to the minister as to the necessity for this post office. The whole trouble has been over some little political disappointment, and the person who had the patronage of that constituency advised that there should not be a post office there. There is no doubt in my mind; there cannot be any cloubt in the mind of the minister if he has read the correspondence, that there is great necessity for a post office at that point. Is the minister going to give the people of this locality a post office, which they have so long been asking for? Might I also ask, now that Dr. Thompson, the defeated candidate, is dead, who has the patronage of that locality? As the defeated candidate has passed to his reward, might I, as the representative of that constituency, have a little to say in the distribution of the patronage and towards securing what the people really require?


Rodolphe Lemieux: I should have informed my hon. friend about a fortnight ago, that a report had been sent to me by Post Office Inspector McLeod, of Winnipeg, which I have approved. At the request of the hon. gentleman (Mr. Staples) I asked for a special report as to the necessity of the office referred to, and the inspector recommended the opening of an office, which, I think, is at Kilmant Park, but I do not know that the office has been opened under that name, but from Mr. McLeod's report, the new office, which has been opened, will serve the hon. gentleman's purpose, and especially serve the needs of the patrons in that neighbourhood. We have closed one office on the other side of the river, and by equalizing the distances between the neighbouring offices, according to Mr. McLeod, we are giving satisfaction to the patrons concerned. If the office has not been opened, it will be in a day or so.


William D. Staples: I have had no advice that the office is opened, but I am pleased to know that the minister has given instructions that it should be opened.


Rodolphe Lemieux: As regards the patronage,
I know that Mr. Thompson, who was the Liberal candidate, is dead, as we generally do in all these matters, we referred the question to the inspector. Of course, when a postmaster is to be appointed we generally ask our political friends, we are human enough for that, but as to the location of a post office or its necessity we take the advice of the post office inspector.


Richard Blain: Has mv hon. friend also a patronage list?	'


William D. Staples: 


Rodolphe Lemieux: I do not know of any in the department. My hon. friend himself *asked me last year to open an office which he thought was necessary in his constituency. I looked into the case,, got a report, and opened the office at his request.


William Pugsley: Perhaps he is on the list.
.Mr. BLAIN. I appreciate very much the kindness of the department and" the minister in opening an office in my county, and I may say that lids friends as well as my own appreciate that very much. It would not be open to criticism from any class of people, it is meeting the wants of the people,. and I am sure the opening of that office will stand to the credit of the government. I suppose my hon. friend does not put any advertisements in newspapers?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Yes, I think we do.


Richard Blain: How .is that list?


Rodolphe Lemieux: I could not give it offhand. We could not have a patronage list, properly speaking, for the very reason that according to law I am obliged to advertise in each case when there is a new mail contract to be awarded, if it is for more than $200, unless when a contract has been going on for some years to the satisfaction of the department and a renewal is to the interest of the department. I could not give a list of the papers in which the advertisements appear because that is done through the Department of the Secretary of State.


Richard Blain: Does my hon. friend lay down a principle that where a paper has the largest circulation in a district, advertisements should be inserted in it regardless of its politics


Thomas Simpson Sproule: He advertises by posters.


Richard Blain: Oh, no; he inserts these advertisements in the newspapers as well.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Very little, we advertise very little; as the hon. gentleman from Grey pointed out our advertisements are placarded in every post office and country store and in Quebec at the church doors. I may say that if perchance there is an advertisement to be inserted I am human enough to give the preference to a good Grit paper.


Richard Blain: Why?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Because I am a man and not an angel. I must say, however, that the absence of a Grit paper would necessitate the advertisement being put in a good Tory paper, and that has happened on more than one occasion.


Richard Blain: I am referring to advertisements calling for tenders for the renewal of contracts or for new contracts. I can

produce Reform newspapers from my own county containing advertisements calling for tenders to be sent in to the department. When my hon. friend states that the custom is to print a circular and post it up in the post offices, and that is the sum total of the advertisements, I hardly think he will venture to say that it is the government policy.


Rodolphe Lemieux: That is generally what we do.


Richard Blain: It would be interesting to have a list of the Conservative newspapers in which he has inserted Advertisements in the past year.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I have two in my mind just now. In the northern section of the Ottawa district, some new contracts were awarded to change the service from biweekly to tri-weekly, and from tri-weekly to daily. There are only two papers in that district, one English, and one French, and both Conservative-the Pontiac ' Advance ' and ' Le Pionier de Nominingue '. I did not know that these papers were in existence, I have not time to read them, but my hon. friend from Labelle (Mr. Major) stated very frankly that there were no other papers in that district, and advised me to send the advertisements to these two. Here are two Conservative papers to which I sent advertisements. The list is not very long, and I mention these from memory."


Richard Blain: That is a very frank admission and I may congratulate the hon. minister on his list. It is larger than that of the Department of Public Works, which was handed across the House the other evening, and which was blank. My hon. friend required to advertise, and finding there were no Reform newspapers in that locality, he gave the advertisements to the only two papers published there. That is a little better than the record of the Minister of Public Works, and therefore, I offer the hon. gentleman my congratulations.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The district is a large one, sparsely and wildly settled.


William D. Staples: I would like to know who the postmaster is to be.


Rodolphe Lemieux: There are two St. Charles, and I am afraid to confuse the two. One was abolished to make way for the other. If my hon. friend will put a question on the order paper, I will give him the information.


William D. Staples: Did you call for tenders?


Rodolphe Lemieux: If the service is opened, we must have. If my hon. friend will put a question on the order paper, I will give him an answer.


William D. Staples: The minister cannot give information as to whether he called for tenders or not, but simply states that he is going to establish a post office there.


Rodolphe Lemieux: We may not have called for tenders if it is the extension of an existing contract. In that case the contractor takes the new contract at a pro rata rate.


William D. Staples: The people of that district have been suffering for the want of a post office. They had the promise of the minister a year ago, and now he tells us he is going to give that post office. I presume, therefore, that beyond doubt there will be a post office established immediately in that district.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I have not the papers under my hand just now, but I can assure my hon. friend that not later than two or three weeks ago I approved a report signed by Mr. McLeod, of Winnipeg, our inspector, in favour of the establishment of a post office such as was requested by my hon. friend at the end of last session, and I know that we decided to dispense with one of the St. Charles post offices. Thera were two post offices, and there was a quarrel on that side of the river as to the location. Following the suggestion made by the inspector, I dispensed with one of these and equalized the distance between the two, so as to give the people the office they wanted.


William D. Staples: Then we may take it for granted that beyond doubt that post office will be established immediately. I would like to ask the minister what action he has taken in response to the petition I sent him a short time ago from the citizens of Rose-dale asking that a daily mail be established in that district. The present service is largely temporary, and has only been triweekly, or possibly twice a week for Lev-ingham. The minister has that petition in his hands at present. The people are. anxious to have a daily mail service put on that branch line.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I will see that my hon. friend is satisfied.


Mr. EDWARDS.: I do not know that I want to oppose the necessary increases to salaries, but inasmuch as the hon. the Postmaster General has said that he accepts the reports of his inspectors of districts, as to whether or not a post office should be granted, or a more frequent service, I must assume that with regard to the petition which I presented to him asking for a better mail service in the county of Fron-tenac, he was influenced in his decision by the report of the inspector of that district. If I am right in that conclusion, the sooner he gets a new inspector for the district the better for the people. I want to point out to him that in my judgment his department is giving more attention to the mail service in the cities and large cen-


Rodolphe Lemieux: What do you estimate as the additional cost?


William Cameron Edwards: The cost of a daily instead of a tri-weekly service to Latimer will be less than the department has been paying if you take into consideration the fact that you are going to get the mail carried for less this year than last, because of the fact that the mail contractor in tendering for the contract lowered his price $50 because of the abolition of tolls on the-road. But I want to direct attention strongly to the point that the Latimer post office, with a tri-weekly service, is giving a revenue of $74.25 a year, and I think it reasonable to conclude that if they had a daily service the revenue would be increased, a little at all events. I know whereof I speak when I say that you can get the mail carried from the stage to the Latimer post office for $90, the same as you are paying for carrying the mail from the stage to Glen-burnie post office. You have only a difference of $15.75, if we assume that you would have no increased revenue from a daily service over a tri-weekly service.
Now, I want to call attention to another post office. The Postmaster General, in answering a letter of mine in regard to the Latimer post office, said that he was of the opinion that, even with the limited amount of post office business transacted, the triweekly service was reasonable. Now, I say again that if he bases that opinion- I know he cannot keep in touch with every office-if he bases that opinion on any report sent by the inspector of the Kingston district, then the sooner he gets a new inspector the better for the department and for the people in general.
I want to call his attention to another case in my county, the case of the Wil-liamsville post office. A great many years ago, before letter-carriers were appointed in the city of Kingston, Williamsville was within the city limits and was made a post office. It was supposed that Williamsville would supply the people of the upper end of the city as well as the people in the county adjoining. Since then, letter-carriers have been appointed to carry the mails to the people in the city of Kingston, and they even carry the mail to the postmaster who keeps the Williamsville post office.
I have asked that the Williamsville post office be moved up the street about three-quarters of a mile to the border of the city with the county. Now, that seems to me to be reasonable. It would be about 150 yards away from the school house, and the change would not cost 'one cent, because the same stage which drops the mail off at the Williamsville post office, the Kingston and Newburgh stage, would pass up the street and drop it off at a store in the upper part of the city. Look at the advantage it would be to the people. Children going to school in the morning could post their letters, and after school at night they could call at the post office and get their mail before going home. It would be a great convenience to the people of the surrounding country in that vicinity, and petition after petition has been sent here by the people of that section asking for this to be done. Would it be any detriment to the people of the city of Kingston? Not one particle of detriment, because the letter-carriers in the city take the letters right past the Williamsville post office and all around through th'at part of the city, and three-quarters of a mile up the street to the boundary between the city and the county. Why should that not be done? I did not ask, and do not ask now, to move the post office out into the county. I am willing that the member for the city of Kingston should have the privilege of saying wffiere the post office should be established, and of naming a person living in the city to keep the post office. But I repeat that it does seem to me extremely unfair to the people in that section of the country that they should be deprived of a better mail service when they could get it without doing any harm or causing any inconvenience whatever to the people of the upper part of the city.
I want to call attention to another request which I made for a post office. I asked the deputy minister to establish a post office midway between Maberley and Sharbot Lake, at a place called Fall River. A largely signed petition was sent down here asking for that convenience. The nearest any person in that locality is to a post office is four and a half miles, they have to go from four to seven miles in . order to get their mail. They asked for a mail twice a week only. There is a cheese factory and quite a settlement, and they only ask for a mail twice a week. What is the answer?	That it
would cost $70 a year to take the mail

in there, and that the postmaster's salary would be $35 a year, that is $105, and that the revenue would possibly be no more than. $10.


Rodolphe Lemieux: To carry the mail between what two points?


William Cameron Edwards: The minister's letter stated that the location would be about four miles and a half from Maberley, but it does not lie in a direct line between Sharbot Lake and1 Maberley. If you take the point where they want a post office established as one point, and Sharbot Lake as another, and Maberley as another, they would form a triangle, so you cannot * exactly say that the point where they want the post office is midway between Sharbot Lake and Maberley. Now, 1 am sorry the minister takes the view that, because this office would only accommodate, as he says in his letter, some twenty families, he cannot afford to expend that amount of money per year in the county of Frontenac and give those people a mail service twice a week. I want to express my view very strongly that the Postmaster General has no right to one dollar of surplus in his department. The money that he gets in his department comes from the postage stamps and post cards purchased by the people, and that money should go' back to the people in the way of mail service. I think it speaks very poorly indeed for the Post Office Department if they cannot afford to expend in that county a small amount like that.
Now, I want to add to what I have said, that I do not think the Postmaster General is treating the province of Ontario as fairly as he is treating other provinces. I am not going to say that he is doing that intentionally, but nevertheless, I think he is treating the province of Ontario unfairly, and I can prove, that from his own report. From 1895 to 1909, the number of post offices in the province of Ontario increased by some 17 per cent.


Rodolphe Lemieux: On what page?


William Cameron Edwards: I have only the report for 1909 where the number of post offices in each province is given. The report for 1895 shows that there were 3,138 post offices in Ontario while the report for 1909 shows that there were 3,694 post offices in Ontario. The number of post offices was increased in the different provinces from 1895 to 1909 as follows:
Increase Percentage in	of
number, increase.
Ontario	
556	17Quebec	
669	41Nova Scotia	
349	22New Brunswick	
235	20Prince Edward Island.. 77	20British Columbia	301	122Manitoba and the Territories, including Yukon 1,440	198


William Cameron Edwards: I can readily understand that in British Columbia and Manitoba there is a great need for an increase in the number of offices. The population has been increasing very rapidly, much more rapidly in those provinces than in any other, but I can understand also that apart from the consideration of the increase in population, there would be reasons why post offices v'ould have to be established in that country. The population is scattered. There are little sections here and there, and there is no doubt a necessity for even more post offices than you would naturally expect looking at the lump figures of population. But, there has not been such a great difference in the increase of population in the older provinces as would be indicated by the difference in the figures regarding the increase in the number of post offices. The figures of the census of 1901 do not show any such great difference in the increase of population in these provinces as would be indicated by the increase in the number of post offices. There is nothing to lead one to the supposition, for instance, that the population of Prince Edward. Island has increased to such an extent that the number of post offices had to be increased by 20 per cent while the population of Ontario increased to such an extent that the number of post offices only had to be increased by 17 per cent. The census of 1901 compared with the census of 1891 shoivs a decrease in the population of Prince Ed-w'ard Island. If the postmaster would consider the need for post offices as indicated from the amount of business done and from the standpoint of letters, post cards, registered letters, third and fourth class matter handled he would find no reason for any discrimination against Ontario; in fact, so far as third class matter is concerned Ontario furnishes 58 per cent of the total of the Dominion and of fourth class matter 61 per cent and compares favourably with the older provinces with regard to letters, post cards and other mail matter carried. I give these figures to the hon. gentleman because I want to show him that he would be justified in increasing the postal facilities of Ontario. Those figures show conclusively that in all fairness, if you consider population and business done, Ontario is entitled to a far greater number of post offices than it has at the present time, and I believe I have made good the point that Ontario is entitled to more post offices in order to put it on an equal basis with the other provinces. Then, I v'ant to impress upon the minister that there is a particular part of Ontario that is peculiarly entitled to his consideration and that part is the county of Frontenac. That has been the object of my argument here. I did not get up simply to find fault

for I am willing to say, as I believe, that a great deal has been done to improve the post office service of Canada. I am willing to give the Liberal party credit for the reduction of from 3 to 2 cents in the postal rate, but I do not believe the Postmaster General and his department are giving the rural part of the country the attention which it deserves. If the Postmaster General is depending solely upon the reports of inspectors of the various districts and if the inspector of the Kingston district has reported unfavourably on a daily service at Latimer post offices for instance, where they have a tri-weekly service, I think he has not given due' consideration to all circumstances. I am willing to depend upon the minister's judgment of'the matter and if he will consider it fairly and squarely I do not see how he can refuse to give these people a daily instead of a triweekly service. If the inspector of that district has reported to him against an increase in the service of that post office I say that he has proved thereby that he is not fit for the job he occupies. In the matter of carrying the mails I could give a great many instances from my own county where the people are performing a service for the public for practically nothing. For instance, take the Harrowsinith-Sydenham line. It is four miles there, four miles back, eight miles, six trips a week, forty-eight miles altogether and that service is performed for $48 a year. It is not costing you very much, Mr. Postmaster General. You are not going down in your pocket very deeply to pay for that service and I ask you to take that into consideration. But, I am pressing my claim on behalf of other parts of my county to have more frequent service than they are getting now. I could give many instances similar to that.
Let us take the Kingston-Sydenham line, 18 miles, 6 trips a week, 36 miles each day, making 216 miles. That man travels over
10,000	miles in a year, and he receives $257 for it. I think I am perfectly justified in asking that the cheapness of the service in the county of Frontenac should be considered in connection with my request for an extension of the service in the different parts of the county. I would also inform the minister that he can greatly improve the mail service in the county by increasing the number of accounting post offices and give them the right to issue and pay money orders. These accounting post offices are of very great convenience to the people of the country districts. I have collated the following statistics in reference to the accounting offices in Frontenac-the revenue received from them for the year 1905 was $5,900. salaries paid $3,904, postal notes and money orders paid $27,220, and postal notes and money orders issued $84,028. I give these figures to show that a considerable postal business is being done in the county, and I wish to tell the minister that if he increased the number of post offices in the county, it would correspondingly increase the amount of postal revenue. Many of these offices in Frontenac county are in centres where there are cheese factories and cheese business, and it would he a great convenience to the people if they were made accounting offices. I trust that the minister will give special attention to Latimer and Williamsville. I am satisfied that so far as the Latimer office is concerned, that a daily service will not add one cent of extra expenditure, because the increased revenue will pay the extra cost.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I agree with the hon. gentleman that Accounting offices are very convenient for the public, and where there is business enough to justify their establishment, the department as a rule does not object to them. I look upon the establishment of such post offices as a facility for the trade and industry of the country. As to the small amount paid to the mail-carrier, the hon. gentleman is aware, I suppose, that there are - many would-be mail-carriers who are dissatisfied because they did not secure the contract. As a rule we advertise these contracts, and we invariably accept the lowest tenderer, and I suppose the contractors know best what price they can do the work for. Now, I think my hon. friend (Mr. Edwards) should have confined his remarks to the county of Frontenac, and should not have alleged that preferential treatment was given by the Post Office Department as between different provinces. I can tell my hon. friend that I would be ashamed to preside over a department that would make any discrimination between one province and another. Every one knows that the banner province of the Dominion is Ontario.it is the richest, it is one of the oldest, it is the most populous, and it is entitled to all consideration from the Post Office Department, and from all other departments of the government. It has never entered into my mind that I should differentiate between one province and another. But we must admit one thing, the province of Ontario is an old and well settled province, offices have been in existence there for more than a century and there are fewer demands from that province for new offices than there are from the newer provinces. My hon. friend will be surprised to hear that in one constituency in Alberta, Medicine Hat represented by my hon. friend (Mr. Magrath) in the last year or two I have opened more than 80 post offices. Every one understands that, it is a new province, the distances are immense and there are groups of settlers established here and there and we must provide them with postal facilities, whereas Ontario is an old-established prov-

ince and therefore, fewer new offices are opened there. My hon. friend may say that fewer offices proportionately are opened in Ontario than in some of the newer provinces. True, I open fewer new offices in Ontario "because fewer are needed there as it has been so long settled, but when I am asked to increase the mail services in the rural sections of Ontario I always take into consideration in favour of that province its population, its wealth and its standing in the confederation. If my hon. friend will add together the various amounts represented by the mail contracts in Ontario he will see the difference there is between Ontario and Quebec for instance. At all events this question of differentiating between the several provinces does not enter my mind, and I should be ashamed as a public man to be guided Ly such considerations when the question of expenditure comes un. I take each case and judge it according to its own value, and to the best of my judgment in all conscience and honesty. My hon. friend mentioned a moment ago the Latimer post office. 1 rb.T''- Lie statements he made about thf jusj eetor are unwarranted.
At six o'clock, House took recess.
After Reee s.
House resumed at eight o'c! x.k.



[Stage Direction]
House in committee on Bill (No. 115) to incorporate the St. Lawrence Power Transmission Company, Limited.-Mr. Pardee.
Thomas Simpson Sproule: I would suggest that this Bill be not taken up, as there are several hon. members absent who desire Jo be here when it is being considered. It is therefore not likely to get through to-night, and it would be better to have the committee rise and report progress and dispose of the other Bill


Mr. PARDEE.: I think that all members of the House knew quite well that the Bill was going through to-night and I can see no, object in postponing it. It has been discussed frequently and various amendments have been proposed. It is quite well known what those amendments are and what the object of the Bill is. As I understand it, the amendment proposed by the hon. member for North Ontario (Mr. Sharpe) is quite satisfactory, and the Bill may go through on that understanding.


Samuel Hughes: If there is any intention, and I believe there is, on the part of the government, to deal fairly with this measure, and as the right, hon. the leader of the government has already consented Mr. LEMIEUX.
to a very important amendment which will prevent any possibility of damming the St. Lawrence without the House being consulted, I would suggest that the amendment agreed upon be taken up before we proceed any further.


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: I have no objection to that whatever. The amendments proposed by the hon. member for North Ontario (Mr. Sharpe) and the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Borden) are perfectly acceptable to the promoter of the Bill, who is quite content to allow it to go through with those amendments added.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I have always understood that there are a number of members who think that this Bill should not pass in any shape; and voicing their sentiments, I think it would be the part of wisdom to allow it to stand and dispose of the bills on the paper.


Samuel Hughes: The sentiment expressed bv my hon. friend from East Grey (Mr. Sproule) was undoubtedly that of, not only the opposition, but a large number of government supporters in the earlier part of the debate. Knowing that this Bill, coupled as it was with the St. Lawrence Power Act, would make a very dangerous position,, and that to kill this measure and let the St. Lawrence Power Act stand unamended we still leave the rattle snake, as it was called, alive and vigorous, an amendment was proposed which would destroy that danger. The danger is in the St. Lawrence Power Act of 1901 rather than in this Bill, and the right hon. the Prime Minister has consented to amend the Act of 1901 by a clause in this Bill, -which would rather effectively kill the rattlesnake


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: If the hon. member from Victoria and Haliburton (Mr. Hughes) thinks there can be absolutely no objection to allowing the Bill to go through, if every thing is killed that was objectionable, there ought to be no objection to our putting it through to-night.


Mr. S. SHARPE.: There has been a great deal of discussion in connection with this Bill both in the Private Bills Committee and in the House. Having taken quite an active interest in opposing it in the Private Bills Committee, I was very anxious to have the objectionable features removed. The fact that the right hon. the Prime Minister has accepted the position taken by the hon. the leader of the opposition, removes, I think, the main objection-not that this Bill had anything to do with the damming of the St. Lawrence per se, but it added to the rights and privileges of the latter company, and consequently we decided on Monday last that, in according these additional rights and privileges, there should be some con-

cessions made by the company which was incorporated in 1901. There has been a good deal of play of words as to whether these two companies are identical. True each has a different corporate existence, but both are practically controlled by the same individuals. That was practically admitted by the hon. member for Lambtou (Mr. Pardee) when he introduced this Bill and agreed to amendments modifying the other. It was also admitted by the fact that the amendments proposed by the opposition were acceded to because they modified the Act of 1901. Unless the same promoters were behind both measures, the promoters of the present Bill would have no right to accept any amendments modifying the Act of 1901. There can be no doubt that the same individuals are behind both measures. The opposition was well timed and its efforts have been rewarded with a great deal of success. The integrity of_ the St. Lawrence river has been maintained by the opposition to this Bill. The hon. the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Pugsley) had made up his mind to accede to the demands of the St. Lawrence Power Company, and so had the International Waterways Commission.


William Pugsley: Nothing of the kind.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: There cannot be the slightest doubt that the three engineers of the Public Works Department condemned the scheme in 1908, in the strongest terms. If that was the case why did they modify their verdict in 1910, unless they were open to representations from the Minister of Public Works.


William Pugsley: A very sad reflection upon the engineers.


Haughton Lennox: Worse on the minister.


William Pugsley: If he had made such representations, it would be worse.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: These engineers have been often reflected upon. They were three engineers of the department who brought in a report on this Bill. One of them was Mr. Lafleur, chief engineer of the Public Works Department, on whom many reflections have been cast on account of dredging contacts which he justified as fair and reasonable, and which the Public Accounts Committee showed was clearly an imposition. Another is Mr. W. P. Anderson, engineer of the Department of Marine and Fisheries. Everybody knows that that department has not stood for efficiency in the past. Anything connected with it is rather suspiciously regarded by the public.


Samuel Hughes: Not Mr. Anderson's branch.


Mr.   .S. SHARPE@: There was Mr. Butler, a very eminent man, but when we consider that it was in his department the 212
Aylesworth canal was inaugurated, and put through, these men cannot be relied on as independent engineers.


Mr. GRAHAM.: Nonsense.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: Mr. Butler was the head of the Department of Railways and Canals.


George Taylor: It was not Under him that canal wa3 started.


Mr.   S.@: SHARPE It was under him it was perpetuated, and he still defends the whole enterprise. The whole discussion shows the necessity of an independent .board of engineers, occupying the same position as the Auditor General, so that they would not be subject to the suggestions or dictates of any minister, and could bring in an independent report the same as does the Auditor General.
. Mr. GRAHAM. You do not know the engineers.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: The mere fact that the Minister of Public Works, when we had an all night session, said that he would see that tire public were protected, showed his inclination to support the enterprise.


William Pugsley: I said in case there was any need for it.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: It showed his leaning towards defending the whole proposition, and his anxiety to put it through. And I am inclined to think that, when the board of engineers brought in a modified report favouring the whole proposition- practically favouring it-that shows that there was some influence brought to bear upon them to amend their previous judgment. In 1908, they had condemned it in the strongest possible terms, but their second report reads as if they were trying to excuse and suggest a way around the difficulties presented in their previous report. However that may be, the acceptance of the amendment of the leader of the opposition (Mr. R. L. Borden) removes the greatest objection to the Bill. It is true, there are still other objections. But I think the country will owe it to the opposition in this House that the integrity of the St. Lawrence river is maintained.


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: Will the hon. member (Mr. S. Sharpe) move his amendment?


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: In a moment. Last Monday, I suggested that, inasmuch as this same company was asking for privileges and powers from the government they should consent to a modification or revision of their rates by the Railway Board. I have given notice of an amendment that the rates of the St. Lawrence Power Company, incorporated in 1901, shall be subject to revision and supervision by the



Railway Board. I think that removes the other main objection. There is already a provision in this Bill giving the Board of Railway Commissioners control over the rates of this transmission company. But, if they had to pay high rates to the power company for their power, they could not give the public low rates. I understand that the promoters now are willing to accede to the request and make the rates of the power company subject to the control of the Board of Railway Commissioners. With these two amendments, I think the main features of the Bill are not so objectionable. I think the hon. member for West Lambton (Mr. Pardee) will agree with me that when the Bill was discussed in the Private Bills Committee it was agreed by Mr. McCarthy that they would buy their right of way and would not ask for easements from the farmers, as it vpas argued by the hon. member for Grenville (Mr. J. D. Reid) that the farmers would be interfered with and their crops might be injured if only easements were secured. This point should be made clear in .the Bill.


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: That is quite clear now.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: In that case, there need be no objection to it. But some hon. members think it is not clear. There were two other amendments suggested. One was that the consent of the municipalities should be obtained before the company should have the right to construct their lines, and the other was that the assets of the province should not be expropriated without the consent of the province. I understand that the promoter of the Bill refuses to accede to these amendments. Of course, in that event, the government will have to assume the responsibility, so far as this House is concerned, of passing the Bill without these amendments.


Haughton Lennox: If it passes.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: Yes, if it passes. But, in m.v opinion, the main obieetionable features have been removed by acceding to the amendment of the leader of the opposition, and by the regulation of the rates of the power company. These two amendments, so far as I am personally concerned-and speaking for myself alone and no other hon. member-I have no objection to the Bill going through.


Mr. GERMAN.: It has been suggested, as I understand, with references to this Bill, that the expectation of the company is to take power from the St. Lawrence Power Company which company it is claimed, has the right under the Act of 1901 to put dams in the St. Lawrence river at the head of the Long Sault rapids.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: 


Samuel Hughes: At the foot of the Long Sault?


William Manley German: Yes, at the foot of the Long Sault. I have thfe Act of 1901 incorporating the St. Lawrence Power Company. Now, I may read this statute quite wrongly, but as I read it, I cannot see that the St. Lawrence Power Company has any right whatever under the Act to construct any dams in the St. Lawrence river at the foot of the Long Sault rapids, or that it has any powers whatever, for it seems to me that the company is functus officio, not having carried out the provisions of its Act of incorporation. The Act provides:
The company may-	_
(a) manufacture, use, supply and dispose of electricity, water and gas, and water, hydraulic or other power by means of wires, cables, pipes, conduits, machinery or other appliances; and construct, maintain and operate works for the production, sale and distribution thereof, and for the purposes aforesaid may construct, acquire, use, maintain and operate canals, water-courses, raceways and water-powers in or adjacent to the St. Lawrence river on the north side thereof at any points eastward from Hoople's creek, in the county of Stormont, in the province of Ontario, to the eastern end of the Sonlanges canal.
That certainly does not give the company power to put dams in the St. Lawrence river at the foot of the Long Sault rapids.


Samuel Hughes: Then these amendments will do no harm.


William Manley German: Certainly. not. Further, I cannot see-and I would like the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Pugsley) either now or at some other time, to explain the matter-how this St. Lawrence Power Company can construct dams at the point referred to. Section 13 of the Act provides:
The powers granted by this Act shall cease and he null and void unless works of the company capable of producing at least one thousand horse-power are completed within three years from the passing of this Act, and notwithstanding anything contained in any Act of parliament.
This company has not only not completed 'any works, but it has not begun any works. Surely, so far as the powers granted under this Act are concerned, this company is dead-it is finished. They would have to revive the Act, and for that purpose, to come to parliament.


George Taylor: Have they not constructed a portion of their works?


William Manley German: This company has constructed nothing. They did buy, I believe, some plant and property from Mr. M. P. Davis. But, surely, that is not a compliance with the provisions of this Act. The power plant which they bought from Mr Davis at the Long Sault rapids, and the power granted to this company is to con-

struct works at the Soulanges canal, which is a long way


Samuel Hughes: Where is Hoople's creek?
Mr. GERMAN-I presume that it is somewhere near the Soulanges canal. But I do not know.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: It is fifty miles away; it is west of the Long Sault rapids.


Samuel Hughes: Above Dickinson's Landing.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: So, this Act gives them power, so far as the parliament of Canada can give them power, to construct a dam at the Long Sault rapids, because the territory covered by their Act extends about 54 mi)es along the river.


William Manley German: Then, if they have complied with section 13, which I do not think they have done


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: They say they have.


William Manley German: I do not know what works they have completed for the development of 1,000 electrical horse-power. If they comply with that, then they are a live concern and can go on and develop power, a,nd _ if they can, my opinion is that this parliament should prevent them from putting dams in the St. Lawrence river, and tying up that river to this American corporation, allowing them to build their powerhouses on the American side of the river where this government cannot touch them. If any one suggests that this government can in any way control the output of power of that company, whose power-houses are on the United States side of the line, I fail myserf to see where any restriction can be imposed by this parliament. You can put any clause in the Act you like, they can violate that clause and use all the power on the United States side of the boundary line, and the only possible way of dealing with the situation would be for this government to blow up the dams with dynamite. I lor one am absolutely opposed to this company putting dams in the St. Lawrence river for that purpose, as long as we have ample powers in Canachk ;whieh are now being developed, and can be developed, to supply the necessities of this country.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I understood the hon. gentleman t-o say that in that Act they have not pow-er to construct any dam on the St. Lawrence. What construction does he put on clause 8, which reads as follows:
To construct, maintain and operate works for the production, sale and distribution (of electricity) .... and for purposes aforesaid may construct, acquire, use, maintain and operate canals, water-courses, raceways and water-power.
Now, how could they construct and make a water-power without a dam? If they have *212i
that right, surely it carries with it the right to dam the stream out of which the power is made.


William Manley German: All I can say is that if they have got that power, they should not have it, and that no plans submitted by them to the department should be approved of


Mr. GEO.: 'TAYLOR. I was not present to hear the Minister of Railways, but I read in the ' Hansard ' that he was strongly in favour of this Bill for the purpose of granting power that might be carried to the town of Brockville, where there is a large number of industries. I may say that I am largely interested in industries in the town of Brockville, employing some three or four hundred men the year round, and so far as our company is concerned, though we would be glad to get cheap power, we would be strongly opposed to getting it at the cost of great injury to the country and to other priavte interests. One of those interests is the Richelieu and Ontario Navigation Company, a tremendous concern, having stock spread all over the country. If a dam was constructed that would injure the scenic beauty of the River St. Lawrence and the Long Sault, their stock would depreciate fully 50 per cent from the day the Bill was passed. The first report of the engineers said that it would damage the country away down to the city of Montreal. For this and other reasons, although I am largely interested in getting cheap power, I feel it my duty as a public man to oppose this Bill.


George Perry Graham: My hon. friend has perhaps not read all I said. This Bill has nothing to do directly or indirectly with damming the St. Lawrence.


George Taylor: As I read these Acts that are now in force, and this one in conjunction with them, it gives them that full power.


George Perry Graham: Not at all. My hon. friend is altogether mistaken.


William Manley German: I would like to know how this company is to get power to transmit electricity over its line unless they take it from the St. Lawrence Power Company? They have got no power plant in Canada excepting the power plant which they purchased from M. P. Davis, and which they would not assume to send, I apprehend, to Montreal. So what object can there be in giving this company the right to construct a transmission line when they have got tio power to send over the transmission line?


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: Did the hon. gentleman read the speech of the Minister of Railways?


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I want to say that I am opposed in toto to the passage of this or any

similar Bill. One reason is because we have no right to lock up the water-powers of the country, and give them to any private individual or corporation. I think that is radically wrong and improper. Another reason is because the province of Ontario is developing this new policy with regard to water-powers, and if this or any other Bill passes, no matter with what restrictions, we give them corporate powers that will enable them to do something to hamper or interfere with that law against the interest of the province. Another reason is because it is an improper interference with provincial rights, and we have had too much of that lately. We have another Bill submitted to this House to-day for the incorporation of another power company between here and Montreal, and which I regard as equally objectionable with this one. We have had a great many of these Bills during the last two sessions, all aiming at getting control of the water-powers of this Dominion. And strange to say, all those men who are endeavouring to acquire that power or that control, when we analyse their companies, and get to the bottom of them, are Americans. If the information we have received be correct, they are part and parcel of a great combine that is trying to get control of every water-power in the United States and Canada, that they can lay their hands on. I think that is wrong. I never could understand why parliament should make or allow such a contact to be made as this government did with Mr. M. P. Davis, selling to him all the power of the Cornwall canal for a thousand dollars a year, a canal which is capable of generating several thousand horse-power, and then buying it back at $63 per horse-power, first binding this country for twenty-one years, and then extending that contract to eighty-four years. Consider how we are binding the interest of posterity. What right has parliament to tie up the property, the assets, of the province for that length of time, practically giving it in fee simply because there is a provision in that contract which enables them to renew it after that time has expired. After that contract was made, and extended in that way this Bill of 1901 was passed as a complement to it. The men who were interested in it control the two Bills to-day, and this Bill now before us is a complement of those two, and they desire to get it through for the purpose of using the same powers. If the information be correct that Mr. Davis has capitalized that contract, and sold it to Americans for a very large amount of money, according to reports all the way from $700,000 to $1,000,000, and they desire this Bill to help them to realize more out of it, and divide up what belongs to the country among Mr. SPROCLE.
themselves, then I say we are doing radically wrong when we give them the right to do that. Therefore, in my judgment, we ought to object in toto not only to this Bill but to any other Bill that has for its purpose to take over or control or utilize the water-powers of any province in the Dominion or to lease them for a great length of time. The province should do that, and should get whatever beneficial interest there is in these water-powers. These water-powers are the natural, inalienable assets of the provinces, and they should have the benefit of them. This federal parliament should not deprive them of this right, and we should not- give to any corporate body a right to interfere with or control them in any way, and for that reason, although in my judgment the amendments that are proposed would materially nullify some of the baneful features of this Bill, still I think we ought to allow no Bill of this character to pass, and I am just as much opposed to this as to any other Bill of a similar kind. I think we should oppose them all, and that we should not allow a single one to pass this House.


Haughton Lennox: Before section 1 passes I want to say a word or two about this matter. The 'other night the right hon. Prime Minister (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) replied very vigorously to some remarks that were made on this side of the House with reference to the position of the Hydro-Electric Commission. The First Minister seemed to think that it afforded a fruitful subject for vigorous retort because some hon. gentlemen on this side of the House thought well to point out that among other reasons why this Bill should not pass there was the fact that the province of Ontario has formed a scheme for supplying cheap power to the people, had worked upon that, had developed power to a very large extent in the west and that they were intending to develop it in the east as well. The Prime Minister argued very forcibly against creating such a monopoly as this would be. If a monopoly is advantageous to the people as this one is, it is not the kind of a monopoly that we should oppose. The Prime Miimter is quite right in saying that means should be afforded to the people to get power; if it does not interfere with navigation, at a cheap rate and if there is in any province no scheme inaugurated by the government to develop power it might be wise and right to allow a private company to develop that which manifestly would not otherwise be developed within a reasonable time. But in any province where they have inaugurated a scheme and actually put it in operation to supply power to the people every hon. gentleman in this House knows that no company can or will develop that power, and bring it to the people as cheaply as

will a properly conducted enterprise such as the Hydro-Electric Commission of the province of Ontario. It is the province of Ontario to-day, it will be the province of Quebec, or some other province to-morrow, or next year, and what I would urge upon the Prime Minister and the government is, that all things being equal, it is the duty of the federal power, instead oi opposing the provinces and setting themselves in opposition to them, as representing all the provinces, to afford every reasonable facility to them to develop power in the interest of the people. The province of Ontario has bona fide gone to work, and I think that, the other provinces will follow its example, to develop power and carry it to the people at cost price.


Frederick Forsyth Pardee: They have not developed it in the east.


Haughton Lennox: They are going to develop it in the east and I will guarantee they will develop it just as rapidly in the east as will this company' once they secure this monopoly. The St. Lawrence Power Company have had a good deal of time for developing but they have developed very little except schemes, one of which is the scheme that we now have before the House. Instead of coming to parliament under their own name openly and honestly and asking for an amendment to their Act they come under a subterfuge, under a disguised name and ask for powers which can be coalesced with the powers they got in 1901, and so, by the union of the two, get that which they otherwise could not get. The proposition we are up against now is this :	Shall we enact anything
that will enable these people more fully to accomplish a purpose which, if we had been alert in 1901, we would not have granted them the right to carry out. We never should have given them any powers, whatever and what I urge now is that we should not do anything that will entrench these people in a more formidable position than they occupy to-day. They dare not come to this House and ask for an amendment such as would represent, in effect, the Bill now before the House. They know perfectly well that if they came to this House and asked for any extension of their privileges, for the power of expropriation such as they intend to get under this Bill, the parliament of Canada dare not accede to their request. But they come under false pretenses, under an assumed name and they try by that means to deceive the public. I, for one. do not, any more than is unavoidable, intend to be a party to allowing these people to get by indirect and dishonest means that which they could not get and which we would not give them if they came honestly and openly and asked for it. If this coni pany came and asked us for such an extension of their rights as we will give them
by reason of this Bill, came and asked us for amendments which will give them in effect the rights that they will secure under this Bill, no gentleman, I venture to say, in this House, having regard for the interests of the people, would increase the evil that we created in 1901 by extending these additional privileges to this company. If we would not do that I-venture to say that it is not wise for us, it is not doing our duty, by these means to indirectly give this company rights which they could not get by way of an amendment if they came here asking for it. I was referring a moment ago to the question that even if the province" of Ontario were coming here we should not give them the right to dam the St. Lawrence river.
Even for the honest object of supplying the people with cheap power, we should not consent to the damming of the St. Lawrence. But when the province has entered on a scheme for supplying power to the people of Ontario at cost, and when we must recognize that the greater area and the greater the number of customers the cheaper can they supply that power, it is the duty of this parliament to see to it that we shall not set- up in competition a private company whose action in dividing the market must necessarily be to increase the cost to the people, by preventing the Hydro-Electric Commission from developing power as cheaply as they otherwise would. To test the honesty of this transaction, I say that if the promoter of this Bill will consent to put its expropriation provision on the same footing as in the former Act, we would then have an additional guarantee that this company would not by a side wind attempt to get an additional advantage. I tell the Prime Minister that the time will come and soon, when we will have to buy back from the company the rights which we injudiciously gave them in 1901. Just as wm will have to expropriate the Laurier hotel sooner or later, and pay an enormous price for our blunder in giving that park to a private company, so. sooner or later the people of Canada will demand that the company we authorized in 1901 to encroach upon the rights of the people, shall be expropriated and the people restored to their rights. If the government will persist in enforcing this Bill, and so entrench the St. Lawrence Power Company more firmly than they are entrenched under the Bill of 1901, then I shall have to demand the opinion of the House as to whether we shall have a provision controlling the rights of expropriation and the rights upon highways and the rights of entering upon private properties, which were limited in the Bill of 1901. That these two companies are identical there is no doubt; the argument has been' abandoned that they are not. They are the same people, but un-

fortunately they come to us under an assumed name. They have withheld as far as they could the knowledge of their identity, but step toy step, sometimes accidentally, we have developed our knowledge of them. Day after day and hour after hour as we have .been discussing it, more light has been shed upon this transaction, until we now know the _ fact, that these two companies are identical, and, worse still, that the backbone of the whole concern is an American institution which is exploiting this company, mainly in the interests of the United States. I can prophesy with almost certainty that in a year or two we will find we are making to-day a greater blunder than we made in 1901, and that these people will have a huge monopoly in the United States over the water-powers of the river St. Lawrence, interfering with our navigation and probably involving us in international disputes. And, Sir. we do not have to go far back to know how liable this government is, when it becomes an international issue, to bend the knee to the United States. It is only a month ago, since, figuratively speaking the Minister of Finance sat upon me because I tried to suggest that if the government went on with the French treaty they would likely be involved in complication with the United States. Our warning was set aside, and but a few Sundays ago we had these same gentlemen opposite, who so lately defied the United States, wending their way to Albany on that fateful Sunday morning.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Time.


Haughton Lennox: And, forgetful of their duty to Canada they surrendering to the United States.
The hour for private Bills having expired, the House resumed in Committee of Simply.



SUPPLY.

[Stage Direction]
House again in Committee of Supply.
Post Office Department-salaries, $543,232.
['Private Bills will be the first order and after that the Naval Bill will be taken up.']
Samuel Barker: I desire to call the attention of the minister to a petition which has recently been presented to him by, or on behalf of the outside .service of the City Post Offices. This petition is different from that discussed this afternoon, but It is quite as serious. I do not know how far the minister has yet been able to consider the matter, but I do hope that in justice to the large body of deserving civil servants who thus ask for justice, he will give favourable consideration to their petition. I am not in the habit of accepting petitions to present to this House without making some inquiry as to the merits of the cases involved, and with regard to the one Mr. LENNOX.
of which I am now speaking, I have taken some trouble to ascertain whether there was anything in reason in support of that petition in relation to the city, a portion of which I have the honour to represent. I do not for a moment say that because demands are made upon one of the departments, a member of this House should support those demands, but I really think there is a grievance here which is well deserving of the minister's favourable consideration. We have had in the past a great deal of discussion with reference to what has appeared to be a rather discriminating view taken of the rights of men of the inside service, as compared with those of men in the outside service. We know that in Ottawa, there may be a man in the inside service receiving for seven or eight hours' work a day a much larger salary than is received perhaps by his own brother in the outside serviec in this same city. It may even happen that the man in the outside service is the better man, but we constantly find that men in the inside service receive more for shorter hours than men in the outside service for longer hours. That has been demonstrated here over and over again. There may be reasons for this which the ordinary mind cannot grasp, but the fact exists. This discrimination exists in Ottawa, in Montreal, Hamilton, or any other city. That is at the bottom of the complaint that I wish to lay before the minister. I have looked into the cases of some 10 or 12 clerks in Hamilton, and I wish to present these to the consideration of the minister as an example of what is considered an injustice. If the minister can satisfy himself that there is no injustice, we must submit to that; I am simply laying these facts before him for his consideration, and I am sure that when he has considered them, he will endeavour to do justice. I have found that as regards certain employees, and I take long service men of good character in the post office at Hamilton-they are to-day in a class the maximum of which, under the statute, is $1,500 a year. I am prepared to admit that that may look a very nice salary to many people; thousands and hundreds of thousands in this Dominion would be glad to attain to that position. But I find that of all the men who have attained to two-thirds of that salary, $1,000, the majority have served in the Post Office Department for 30 years. After 30 years' service, they receive a salary of $1,000, and they are buoyed up by the wild hope that they may live long enough to get up to $1,500. That $1,500 is supposed to be a solace to these gentlemen, because there is a possibility of attaining it, there are great expectations before these valuable civil servants. I have here one man who for. three years has been receiving $1,000 a year. Before lie got to the $1,000 a year stage, he had served

*for 27 years. How would hon. gentlemen in this House, if they were starting life, care to look forward to 30 years of steady, good and faithful service with the hope that they might then get to $1,000 a year, and perhaps ultimately to $1,500 a year? I have here the names of men who have served for 28 years, 25 years, 30 years, 28 years, 28 years, 26 years, 25 years and 34 years. Of all these men, the highest stands to-day at $1,000. That man has served for that length of time after arriving at manhood. What expectation has he of ever reaching the maximum? 'Surely there must be something wrong in holding out an inducement to such a civil servant in the department that he may arrive at a salary of $1,500 a year. If, after 30 or 40 years, he receives only $1,000 a year, he must be a hopeful man if he thinks he will ever arrive at the maximum. These are the men of that class in the Hamilton post office, and I am taking the highest salaries in the class.
There are other men who have served 26 years, and have got to $900, others have served 24 years and 23 years and have reached $800; I just present these facts. I have no desire to take up the time of the House by commenting on them, but I ask the hon. minister to look at these men, not with bowels of compassion, because they are not beggars, they are just as good -men as those who sit in this House, just as honourable and well educated men, who have served their country faithfully, and who deserve better consideration-I ask the hon. minister to consider these men fairly as they would be considered by any wealthy employer, just as they would be considered by a big railway company, or any large institution of that kind. I think it might be well for the departments of this government to conduct their business as is conducted the business of our great corporations. The Postmaster General has on his staff a very good body of officers, the local inspectors, and I have no doubt that these do a great deal of work, and when men are to be promoted, their future, and the future of their families, so far as these depend on their salaries, is largely in the hands of these inspectors. I know that these inspectors are good respectable men, and capable officers, but there is precisely that same class in any large company. Every large company has that class of men who are the intermediaries between the employees, and the head of the department, just as those inspecting officers are the go-betweens between the staff and the minister, yet we all know that the president of a railway company, or the general manager systematically goes from year to year over the whole work from end to end, and gets in touch himself with the men who are reported upon by' these local inspectors.
I do not ask that the mighty minister of a
great Dominion should do this, but if it were possible for the minister, or his capable deputy, such as the Postmaster General has, to, season by season, go through the country, and get into touch with these people, see how they live, know what it costs them to live, that might do a great deal in harmonizing these differences and having justice done. I do not suppose that anybody understands better than the minister that since these scales of wages were arranged, there have been tremendous changes in the cost of living. Rent and food, and everything they have to pay for have gone up tremendously, far more 'than their wages, and I think that ought to be considered by the minister fairly and equitably. This country cannot stand extravagant salaries, but can stand justice to the men who serve it, and I hope that by some means it may be found possible for the deputy, or the minister himself, to get more in touch with the people who serve him, than has been the case in the past.


Mr. RUSSELL.: During'last session the hon. the Postmaster General brought down a Bill increasing the salaries of the letter-carriers, and the reason he gave was the increased cost of living. At that time I spoke in favour of increasing the pay of the railway mail clerks, and was assured by the hon. gentleman that during this session he would bring in a Bill regarding them. I have here a clipping from the Toronto ' Globe ' of February 10 last on that subject
Claims of Railway Mail Clerks.
The claims of the railway mail clerks is being pressed upon the government of Canada those claims are reasonable and urgent. For public service rendered in discomfort and danger the scale of remuneration is indefensibly low. The service is of such importance as to demand at all times physical vigour, intellectual alertness and training, moral integrity, and the strictest devotion to public duty.
The ceaseless strain of the work, due in part to the utterly improper type of mail cars in use on the railways, as the Civil Service Commission declared, ' tends to the shattering of the nerves and leads to other physical diseases, and to early disability.' Unless the remuneration is greatly increased it will be growingly impossible, under present conditions of service, to secure the type of intelligence and capacity made necessary by the examinations and required for the duties imposed. AVitk the cost of living steadily rising, the present low salaries will increase the temptation to dishonesty, a thing unjustified in any public service. Devotion to duty joined with capacity for service can find such abundant rewards in other positions that the mail service will be left for the culls and the derelicts unless reasonable increases are made.
Tiie f Globe ' does not hold to the view that civil service positions should in all things compete with the service of private corporations. But that does not mean that the salaries of those who carry on the public services should be held as near as possible to the star-

ration point. Those salaries should be reasonably adequate in all cases. In cases of special discomfort and of exceptional risk and danger, as with the railway mail clerks, the salaries should be even liberal. At the present time $400 as a minimum and $1,200 as a maximum is penurious for men doing responsible public service under conditions unattractive, uncertain, and full of peril. Substantial increases are due.
I think that when we expect to get any kind of good service from men in the position these occupy, a minimum salary of $400 is not in keeping with their work. A man commencing in the position of letter carrier to-day would earn in the neighbourhood of $600 per year, and I think that an increase to them, of say, $200 a year all thrpugh, and raising their pay from_year to year, so as to allow them to go to the same limit as first-class clerks in the Post Office Department, namely $1,500, would be only a fair thing to do. Would the Postmaster General be good enough to let us know whether he can take that up this session or not.	_


Rodolphe Lemieux: Let me outline briefly what has been the policy of the department with regard to the proposed increase. First. I must say to my hon friend from Hamilton (Mr. Barker) that he does not appeal in vain when he prefers a request in favour of that class of the post office employees to which he has referred. As a matter of fact when these hon. members press me with regard to'the status of the post office employees, or any other employees of the government for that matter, they are speaking to a convert. I have already stated in this House that I am mvself the son of an old civil servant, who has been in the active service for now over forty-seven years and who has raised a family of ten children. I happen to know something about the increased cost of living during the last 25 years and what changes have taken place in every-day life. I may say that, since I took office in 1906, I have done my little share toward improving the condition of the employee. The House will remember that when I was made Postmaster General, the minimum salary of our postmasters was only $25 I made an increase and brought the minimum up to $35. Last year, at the request of several hon. members, and of the civil servants themselves, I went very carefully into the condition of the humbler class of post office employees, the sorters, stampers and labourers employed in the city post offices. I gave them an increase of salary, and I believe, from the accounts I have received from the post office inspectors that there exists amongst that class of employees general satisfaction. As regards the letter-carriers, they have ex-Mr. EUSSELL.
pressed publicly on several occasions their deep sense of gratitude to the government and to the department in particular to the very substantial increase which this parliament voted last year in their favour. This year, as I have stated, I endeavoured to look after another class of employees, the post office inspectors, the assistant inspectors, the superintendents of railway mail clerks and the assistant postmasters in large city post offices. They are, as T stated yesterday the marrow of the whole service. They are the leading men in the service. They give to every post office and to every postal district the right direction; they teach every postmaster his business; they are men upon whose efficiency, conscience, and honesty the whole service depends. Their salari.es have not been revised, many of them, since 1874, and I thought the time had come when we should give that very efficient class of civil servants an increase of salary. The House was kind enough, yesterday, to accept my views on the new scale of salaries for that class of employees.
But now I am confronted with another request, from the hon. member for East, Hamilton (Mr. Barker), my hon. friend from East Toronto (Mr. Russell), and, I may say, from nearly all the members-who represent the larger postal districts in Canada. Petitions have poured in upon the department, during the _ last two months, asking that the railway mail clerks should receive a substantial increase. Since these petitions began to come into the department, an agitation has gone on amongst another class of employees, the clerks in the city post' offices. These clerks do exactly the same work in their respective offices as the railway mail clerks, with this difference, that the railway mail clerks receive what we call a 'mileage allowance' and have certain days of the week when they are exempted from duty. The employees in the city post offices claim that, on the whole, the railway mail clerks receive better treatment than they do. I am not saying whether the railway mail clerks' case is preferable to the other, I am only stating the facts in order to show that it is somewhat difficult to pronounce immediately upon the respective merits of each case. I have stated, and I repeat, that, in my judgement the members of the outside service in the larger post offices, such as those of Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal, Halifax, Quebec, Vancouver and Victoria, should be placed on the same basis as tire members of the inside service at Ottawa. That is my personal view, and I know that it is shared by a large number of members of this House. But; for the present, all I can say is, that, in my opinion, the day

is not far distant when all those who serve in the outside service in these large city post offices will have to come under the Civil Service Act as introduced in this House two years ago and is now wTorking so well for the Civil Service at Ottawa. I intend, during the recess, with my deputy and my officials, to prepare a classification in order to bring in the members of the outside service in these large offices. I believe, with my hon. friend from East Hamilton (Mr. Barker) that there is no difference in the work done by the members of the inside service and the members of the outside service. If there is a difference, it is in "favour, probably, of the outside service, because they sometimes have to serve longer hours than the members of the inside service. So, as I have said, I intend, during the recess, to work up a proper classification, which will give adequate increases to the outside service and bring them, if possible, into the inside service. That is my judgment, that is the policy of the department, and I will do my best to carry it out.


Joseph Russell: Would it be possible to incorporate in the Bill that the Postmaster General is bringing in a provision to increase the salaries of me railway mail clerks? Four hundred dollars a year to commence with is very low. Monied men such as they are have to wait for another twelve months, and before they get what is really due to them they will suffer a hardship. No doubt the Postmaster General is aware of the increased cost of living, and I think it should not take long for him to look into the matter and find out that these men are really deserving, and he should provide for them in the Bil'


Martin Burrell: The minister said he was in favour of classifying the outside service, and carry into effect the principle of promotion. I wish he would be able to say that he would go a step further and appoint to positions of postmaster men who have proved to be deserving officials, who have steadily worked up in their business, and have become highly qualified. If he would do this instead of appointing political hacks, he would be following in the line of a, true reform of the Civil Service.


Rodolphe Lemieux: My hon. friend would find it difficult in my place to take men from the service, and appoint them as postmasters in rural sections, it would be impossible.	[DOT]


Martin Burrell: I am not speaking of rural sections, I am referring to large cities where they have gradually qualified themselves for the work.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I do not think, as a rule, there are any complaints against our
postmasters in the larger cities. Take, for instance, the city of Victoria, from which my hon. friend hails. We have there a very old and efficient postmaster in the person of Mr. Shakespeare, quite a literary na*ne, an old member of this House, who is a credit to the service. He had been in the House for many years, and was appointed by the Conservative government. We have now at Vancouver a gentleman who represented the city of Vancouver in the last parliament, Mr. Macpherson. I must say this to the credit of Mr, Macpherson, that he went into that office a new hand, and he has proved himself already to be one of the best postmasters in the Dominion. My hon. ^ friend knows that Vancouver is a growing city, and that the business is complicated in view of the many races that are represented in the population of Vancouver. It is true that Mr. Macpherson has been in polities, but I must say this on behalf of the politicians oil both sides of the House, that when they leave polities and accept positions of that kind, they generally prove to be the best servants that the public can have.


Martin Burrell: The minister's point was neatly taken, he knows how to put up a pleasant argument. But I think he missed the point here. I am not concerned as to whether the postmaster of Victoria is efficient or not, or as to whether he was appointed by a Conservative government. Nor am I here to dispute that Mr. Macpherson is making a good postmaster; I do not know whether he is or not. But I think the minister will agree that if we are on the path of reform, surely a man who has qualified himself by a long term of service, and has become thoroughly familiar with the work of the office, should be promoted when higher positions are open. I think the minister will assent to that, and I would like that he himself would have the courage to attempt a reform of that kind.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I must say that I am not a greater man than Sir John Macdonald, and he used to say that the office of postmaster of Toronto, or Montreal, or Winnipeg should belong to one of his faithful followers in the House, that the man who had served his party faithfully for years was just as competent, Just as honest, as any one else. Of course a postmaster in a large city is sometimes only a figure head, he is a real worker. At the same time, if we take the postmasters of those three largest cities to-day we find that they are doing Very effective work; but the bulk of the work falls generally on the shoulders of the assistant postmaster. The hon. member for Hamilton was speaking a moment ago of the post office in that city. The postmaster of Hamilton to-day is Mr. Adam Brown, who was

for a great many years the member for Hamilton in this House. He had been in politics for forty years, he was the father of this House. Now, Sir, I consider it a credit to my department that we have in its service Mr. Adam Brown.	.


Richard Blain: My hon. friend has not made many selections of that kind.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I have appointed Mr. Macpherson, who was a very able member of this House; I have appointed to Montreal Mr. Harwood, who was for fifteen years the member for Vaudreuil in this House, and who is one of. the most creditable members of the outside service. We must not discredit our profession.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: The hon. Postmaster General said a little while ago that the advertisements were carefully looked after. I have before me a little country paper with eleven advertisements on one page, from. the Post Office Department, all mail contracts. One of them is in Lincoln county, one in Simcoe, one in Durham, one in Muskoka, one in Halton, one in Ontario, one in Grey, one in Wentworth, two in York, another in Muskoka. These advertisements call for tenders to carry the mail from one point to another, and they are all in one paper, the Canadian ' Farmer.' It looks to me to be a waste of money. Now I have a few questions to ask the Postmaster General. On page 1 of his report we find he has a surplus of $809,000 at the end of the year. I am sure that he could not help thinking that the railway mail clerks, who have been so ably championed by the hon. member for Toronto (Mr. Russell) and also by the hon. member for Hamilton (Mr. Barker), are at least justified in asking that the minister investigate thoroughly their complaint, and see that at least they receive reasonable and fair remuneration for their services. We also find that there was a reduction in the drop letter rate in cities.
A greatly desired reduction was made in August, 1908, in the rate of postage on letters posted for delivery in cities and other places having free letter carrier delivery service. The former rate was two cents per ounce; the present rate is one cent per ounce.
On the next page we find that there was a reduced rate on papers and periodicals of one half cent a pound. I want t*o ask the Postmaster General whether he has taken into consideration the fact that, in the United States, within this year, they have thoroughly investigated the second class mail matter that is being carried in that country through the post office and they find that that class of mail matter is being carried at a loss of $64,000,000 to the people of the United States. I want to ask the Postmaster General if he will Mr. LEMIEUX.
be good enough to tell us whether he has made an investigation to see whether he is losing at such an enormous rate and whether the reduction that he is making in the rate on these papers is justified, or whether he investigated the question before making the reduction. If he will look at page 22 he will find that the increase in postal stores amounted to $93,000. Would he be good enough to explain why that extra amount was needed? I do not expect to go very fully into a criticism of the smaller items in the Auditor General's Report, but I desire to call his attention to one or two points in connection with the increase in the expenditure. For instance, we find that the total receipts from the Yukon amounted last year to $18,000 while the expenditure was $135,000, leaving a deficit of $116,000. In the city of Dawson the revenue of the post office is only $13,000 and the minister spends for salaries and rent over $29,000. Should he not take into consideration the amount of money that he is spending and receiving in these different places? Taking the number of employees in that office I find that I. J. Hartman, postmaster, gets a salary of $5,000 and an allowance of $900; clerks at $210 per month: N. J. Caron, $2,520; B. F. Craig, $2,520; G. D. Edwards, $2,520; W. R. Hamilton, $2,520; F. H. Hartman, $2,520; J. W. Wilson, $2,520. The attention of the minister has been called to the fact that Ontario requires further consideration. I have no doubt that several of the older provinces require similar consideration, but let us look at Ontario. We have listened this afternoon to members who have been anxious to tell the minister of the districts that are in need of post office facilities, and I have no doubt that others will telll him of other places before the evening is through. The revenue of the province of Ontario last year was $4,231,775 while the expenditure in that province was $957,000, leaving $3,273,000 to go to the general post office fund and to assist to a large extent the development of postal facilities in other parts of the country. While I do not <say that the province should have any thing like the amount of money expended in it that, is collected, yet, when you find districts such as the member for Frontenac and other members have brought to the attention of the minister and which are urgently calling for increased postal facilities, you can readily understand that the minister requires to give a good deal more attention to the province of Ontario. When the minister is extending the rural free mail delivery system he should take into consideration the fact that the thickly settled rural population and the cities are paying into the post office treasury over $4,000,000 and that he is expending $900,000 in that

province leaving a surplus from that province alone of $3,273,000. While the minister has in the past few years increased the advantages of the people living in cities, towns and villages in Ontario those living in the rural districts have not received the consideration that they should receive at the hands of the Postmaster General. I would like the minister to tell the committee why it is that the total expenditure in 1902 only amounted to $3,888,000 while in 1909 it was increased to $7,401,000, or an increase of nearly half within the past seven years. The expenses of the Post Office Department have practically doubled. There ought to be some good reason for that. The minister last year increased the number of post office by 650. He also increased the annual expenditure by $586,000 or nearly $1,000 foi every new post office opened. He does not need to tell us that these 650 post offices that he has established cost anything like the amount of money that the total incre.ase in the expenditure represents. Let him give us some good reason why the post office expenditure has increased until to-day it is $3,523,417 more than it was seven years ago. There are some suggestions that I wish to make to the Post Office Department, and which 1 feel justified in making because they are in the public interest. There should be a system of rating post office employees as to efficiency and faithfulness.
Then the salaries should be rated on the basis of the quantity of the work the employees perform, their accuracy in doing it, and their compliance with the postal regulations. office rules, and conduct, their punctuality and regularity in attendance, and their familiarity with the regulations, and instructions regarding their duties. How important it is that in our towns and smaller cities these officials should be put under some form of discipline. Then, it has been brought to the attention of par' liament that post offices are built in this countrv without the knowledge of the Postmaster General, and without consideration of the postal needs of the district. The svstem now is that the Minister of Public Works receives petitions from his followers. and if he deems it wise in the interest of the Liberal party in the district, he erects a post office without any regard to the proportion between the income received from the place and the cost of the building. I believe that in the erection of post office buildings, the Post Office Department should have a voice. The Post Office Department has trained agents who should be familiar bv experience and observation with the requirements of the postal service in all directions, and it is the post office officials who should select the site and arrange for the interior equipment of the building. Sites for public buildings to be
used exclusively for the Post Office should be selected by the Postmaster General, and in case a building is erected for the joint use of the Post Office and other departments, the approval of the plans and the specifications and estimates as to space, interior arrangement and equipment should be furnished by the Postmaster General. That is the common sense business way of looking at the question, but instead of that the Minister of Public Works, who knows little or nothing about the needs of the postal service, proceeds to erect post office buildings which are beyond the require-ents of the post office district, and the Postmaster General knows nothing about it. A further suggestion which I have to make is that the mails should not be delivered by city carriers except at residences and city-offices where approved mail receptacles are provided at the door or entrance. This would effect a. great saving, because the delay in city delivery is one of the obstacles which the Post Office has had to contend with. It has been estimated that there is a loss of 15 seconds at each place of delivery, and if there are 336 stops, which is the average number, there is a loss of one and a half hours a day for each carrier. Hence a quicker delivery by the means suggested would save to the country many thousands of dollars. Then, another suggestion is that when the writer of a letter on which the postage is prepaid shall endorse on the outside his name and address, such letter shall not be advertised but shall remain uncalled for at the office to which it is directed the time the writer may request or the Postmaster General would prescribe, and it shall be returned to the writer without additional postage, and if not delivered treated as a dead letter. Then, another important suggestion is that no employees of the Post Office shall canvass or solicit votes, accept the position of poll clerk or scrutineer, and that they shall not in any way encourage or take part in a political campaign under the penalty of losing their business. I have a letter here from an eastern town in which the postmaster appears to have been dismissed because he did not solicit votes for the Liberal candidate. In the recent by-election in the city of Ottawa, I am told on reliable authority, that A. Vallee. letter-carrier. Ot->
t.awa South, was outside scrutineer at polls 22 and 22a, and I understand that he wore his official clothing. If the Postmaster General allows his officials to act in that way right at his own door, what can he expect from officials away out in the western provinces, and, I have been informed by hon. members from the west that no post office official need expect favours unless he has faithfully served the Liberal party. If the Postmaster General would prohibit such1 conduct on the part of officials, he would

66S8
raise himself in the estimation of the people of Canada; he would have a more efficient postal service, and his department would not be subject to the criticism it now' deservedly receives. I urge upon the Postpiaster General that he should devote his best energies during the coming year to carry out the suggestions I have ventured to make. Then again, another suggestion is that there should be an investigation as to the cost of the service in its different branches. During the last year the United States government have been looking into that question, and they have discovered all kinds'of waste.
Does the minister know whether or not the railway charg-es are reasonable? He may say they are reasonable, but investi-[DOT]gation shows that he is paying over $500000 more to rail-ways than he was a few years ago. What is the' rent of the average railway car per annum? Would it be cheaper for the government to put a 200 pound mail bag in the seat of a Pullman car and tack on it a regular first-class ticket to pay its fare than to pay what is now paid. I doubt if the minister could tell whether it was or not. Is it true that the government pay more to the railways for carrying the mails than is charged the express companies for carrying similar packages in the next car? The government pay $1,600,000 for steamship subsidies and subventions; if the minister would investigate and see whether he is receiving any reasonable or valuable return for that amount, he would be doing a public service. The principal sources of revenue are the postal charges on all classes of domestic and foreign mail, the fees on a registered letter, money orders and special delivery. Has the Post Office Department any reliable data on which to base, calculations? Has it data as to the cost of different classes of mail, the special delivery and money order service? The United States postal authorities thoroughly investigated the subject recently, with the result that they found it possible to make enormous savings by improvements. On second class mail alone there was a deficit in the United States of $64,000,000, and on third class mail, $3,000,000. When the minister says it is impossible to give the people of Canada rural free mail delivery he ought- to consider whether the many' divisions of his department are not capable of saving a large amount by being thoroughly reorganized. Second class mail on the other side provided a revenue of only one cent a pound, while the cost of handling and transportation averaged 9 23 cents a pound. Magazines and cither periodical publications, exclusive of daily newspapers, comprised about 60 per cent of the second class mails. The average haul of the magazine proper was 1,000 miles, while that of other periodicals not including daily newspapers, ranged from 550 to 1,000 miles. ' Mr. ARMSTRONG.
The daily newspapers averaged less than 300 miles
The weekly newspapers have still complaints to make as to their- unfair treatment in this country. The minister made a serious blunder when he placed the weekly and daily newspapers under the ban he did some years ago, and was compelled shortly afterwards to take out of the treasury tens of thousands of dollars so that the daily papers might be placed in the position they were in previous to that blunder. Up to this time he has not placed the weekly papers in the position they ought to occupy. He will find that these weekly papers are constantly protesting against the unfair position in which they are placed in regard to circulation. I have here an editorial from the Hants Journal, of Windsor N. S., which voices the sentiment practically of nvery weekly paper in Canada. That paper says:
That Postal Burden.
A subscriber, in paying for the ' Journal/ says, I inclose post office order for $2, but owing to the matter of postage on papers to the United States imposed by your Liberal
overnment (so called), a good deal of it will
e taken up by arrears of postage. I hope, however, it will be sufficient. I still follow with a great deal of interest all the happenings in my old home town. I hope that in spite of the postage embargo your United States subscribers have not fallen off/
We regret to say that a good many names have been struck from the list since the boycotting resolution came into force.
The Ppstmaster General seems to care little if anything as to how he injures the business of Canadian weekly newspapers bv his burdensome postal imposition; tlie members of parliament, Tory and Grit alike, make no effort to get relief for the papers which stand by them and the parties they represent; and the daily newspapers, happy and contented so long as they do not suffer, say not a word on behalf^ of their confreres who are not fortunate enough to run big establishments and issue daily newspapers. Were the members of parliament less selfish they would rise as a body and demand that this injurious postage resolution be expunged; and if the gentlemen of the daily press would lend their aid and urge the government to do a simple act of justice to the country press, we should not nave to complain much longer about this postal burden. But they are all so taken up with the Naval Bill and Dreadnoughts, that such a matter as that of injuring the business of the country press never occurs to them as one needing their attention, and so it is allowed to slide. There's lots of protection in evidence all over the Dominion, but none for the men who run country weekly newspapers, and who, perhaps, deserve greater consideration than many who rake in goodly profits under the fostering care of the government.
If our rulers refuse to grant us simple justice, perhaps relief may yet come from another source, for only a short time ago we read that President Taft, the great head of the country to the south of us, has been looking into this matter, and the views he entertains lead us to think that perhaps help may come to us from the neighbouring republic.

The Postmaster General knows that year after year we have called his attention to the fact that the weekly press throughout [DOT] this country had been most unfairly dealt with, and while he may say he has stopped to a certain extent some of the papers coming in from the other side, at the same time lie has let down the bars and allowed in some of the most corrupt literature from the old land, and cheap publications of different kinds. At the same time he has shut out valuable magazines and periodicals of an educative character that would be of great help to our people. The Postmaster General has absolutely forgotten the use of the mails. The franking privilege, as used by the departments, is open to serious criticism. The Postmaster General remembers that the franking system in force under this government has received very serious criticism from members on this side. Tons of political mail matter leave the departments to assist and promote one interest, the continuance of this government in office. The Post Office Department should make every other department give a definite statement of the amount of mail matter sent -out by it. I might go on making suggestions, but I merely wish to devote the rest of my time to a matter which I believe is of greater interest to the people, especially those living in the rural districts. In the Saturday Evening Post, of February 19. 1910, that paper said:
Rural free mail delivery lias proved to be the most popular and beneficent branch of the whole postal service.
I know that if the Postmaster General had investigated the benefits derived from rural free mail delivery in the United States, Germany, France and England, he cannot come to any other conclusion than that the day is not fat distant when he will be compelled to take a different position on this question. Instead of saying we will have to wait until we have a population of 20,000,000, he will find that in a very few years demands will come from the people in the thickly settled portions of the different provinces for this great convenience. To-day the minister cannot fail to see that the people are anxious that this service should be granted them. I know that all kinds of letters are pouring into his department and all kinds of criticisms are showered on him because of the paltry system he has now under way. That system simply means that the mails will only be delivered on existing mail or stage routes, and then only to certain portions of the country. But have not the people on the other concessions just as good a right to the advantages of rural free maii delivery as those who reside on existing mail or stage routes? Whv should the men on these routes have their farms increased in value, as they undoubtedly are, by their
enjoyment of the advantages that come from the delivery of the mails at their very door, and the people who live a mile or so away, perhaps in a more thickly settled portion of the country be deprived of these advantages? Let us look at what is being done in this regard. The Minister, on November 30, stated that he had 302 routes in operation, as I understand from the return on page 5883 of ' Hansard.' Last year I received a return on J anuary 27, in which the minister distinctly stated that the 44 rural mail routes then in operation only cost this government $663.50, or -an average of about $15 per route. Multiply the 302 routes not existing by 15 and you have an expenditure of only $4,530. Let us see where these 302 routes are located. In little Prince Edward Island there are 33; in New Brunswick, 15; in Kingston district, 23; in Toronto district, 38; in London district, 104; in Winnipeg district, 28; and I find away up in Edmonton, 13. How then can the minister hope to make the people believe that the system he has inaugurated has taken out of the Post Office Department any large amount of money-$4,530 according to that estimate. He does give an estimate here showing that the total increase in the cost of the mail service, including the service of rural delivery boxes for four years-I cannot understand why he puts in the four years-amounts to $55,000, when, according to his estimate of last year, the cost was only $4,500. I am well aware that if he will give rural free mail delivery as it ought to be given to the thickly settled portions in the older districts of Ontario and the other provinces, he will find that the expense will increase. But he will also find that in these provinces there is no great extent of territory that can be possibly covered by it. In the United States .this system is governed strictly by regulation. It is impossibly to have a route established there unless there are 100 families in the 24 miles, which is the standard route, and the shorter routes are compelled to have a proportionate number of families. 85 out of that 100 are compelled to distinctly contract to take the mail delivery at their do-ors and erect the boxes there. But I need not go further in the discussion of this subject as that has been gone over so many times before, but I want to call the attention to the fact that the time has come in some of the older provinces when the population is decreasing yearly instead of increasing in the rural districts. Take the province of Ontario, the deputy minister of that province made the statement that while in 1889 the population w'as 1,108,874 in 1899 it was only 1,047,016, showing a reduction of 61,858. The cities have increased in numbers but not the rural districts, and many people from the rural districts have gone to the Northwest where they can get the advantages which they do

not enjoy in the older provinces, and which advantages are a great inducement to people to remain on their farms. I appeal to the right hon. the Prime Minister to investigate this subject in so far as the thickly settled districts are concerned. We are not asking for rural free mail delivery in the partially settled districts nor are they asking for it in those districts in the United States, but the day is at hand when we must give to the people in the rural districts every advantage to induce them to remain on the land-not only telephones and electric cars, but free mail delivery at their doors. The expense of running a farm is far in excess of what it was years ago, and takes a lot of money to get the mails, especially when wages are so high as they are at present. Rural free mail delivery will bring the farms and rural communities in closer connection with commercial centres. It encourages the improvement of country roads, and by making rural life more attractive it stimulates agriculture. It has been the means of increasing the value of farm lands and has materially reduced the number of postoffices throughout the United States. While in the United States the number of post offices in the year 1900 was 76,688, this number has graduallv been reduced, until in 1909 the United States has only 60,155 post offices. Therefore when the hon. gentleman talks of the deficit in the United States postal revenue and says that is due to rural free mail delivery, lie should also take into consideration the great reduction in the number of post offices. While in the Dominion the number of post offices has increased, we find that in the United States, with its increasing population, the number has been cut down this last year by some 1,100 post offices. They saved, thereby, as distinctly stated in their report, $92,000. But the minister, with his present system of rural mail delivery cannot cut off any post offices, apparently. Taking the average increase in post offiees previous to the establishment of rural free delivery there would be at present upwards of 100,000 post offices in the United States. The annual saving made through the reduction in cost of buildings, maintaining the 40,000 post offices with postmasters would still further reduce the deficit attributed to rural free delivery to something like $5,000,000. The installation of rural free delivery is followed by an increase in the amount of mail delivered, and collections. Such increase is not credited to rural free delivery. Additional evidence of the increase of the amount of mail passing through rural delivery is furnished in the fact that only 992 routes handled 25,000 or more pieces of mail during the three months ended June 80. 1907, and 3,232 routes
25,000	or more during the three months emjed May 31, 1909. In 1907, 27 routes Mr. ARMSTRONG
handled more than 50,000 pieces of mail, during the quarter ending June 30. In 1909, 95 routes more than 50,000 during the quarter ending May 31. On 35 of these routes the value of the stamps on mail collected for the period indicated exceeded	$200. On 24 routes this
item exceeded the carriers' salary. Page 4 of the fourth assistant Postmaster General's report gives a list of these routes showing the number of pieces handled, and the value of postage on mail matter collected during the three months ended May 31, 1909. On June 30, 1909, the service was in operation on 40,628 routes, and 40,499 carriers were employed. During the year 4,115 new routes were established. In 840 counties in the United States the service had been adjusted on June 30, 1909, so as to furnish rural delivery to the greater portion of the rural population. During the year 1909, 1,149 post offices were discontinued, the patrons of which are now served by rural free delivery, thereby effecting a reduction in the expenditure on the postal service of $92,000. There has been unprecedented improvement in the condition of roads traversed by rural carriers due to the intelligent and well directed interest of postmasters and carriers. The average increase of mail handled on rural mail routes of the United States in the last four years was 55 per cent in the average number of pieces of mail handled by a" carrier. It is estimated that the daily travel of the carriers on routes now in operation aggregates
980,000	miles. Rural free delivery serves 20,000,000 people. The annual expenditure in 1905 for services in the post offices, salaries of postmasters, salaries of clerks, &c., city delivery not including railway mail service, or rural delivery service, or transportation, amounted, in 1906, to $51,000,000, while in 1909 it was over $102,000,000, an increase of $51,000,000-just double. The rural free delivery was not responsible for the increases in any of the branches I have suggested.
Last year, the minister said that 44 routes had been established in Canada, and the cost to the department had been only $663 per annum. The minister must remember that our largest immigration is coming from the United States, a country almost completely covered with rural free delivery routes. And if he will not undertake this work of free rural delivery these people will naturally hesitate before leaving the many advantages they now enjoy to be compelled to live in a country where such advantages are not even recognized. Let the minister appreciate this fact, that the United States has 40,000 rural free delivery routes in operation serving 20,000,000 of people. The system covers one million miles of road; the carriers cover 200,000,000 miles of road

each year, and handle over 200,000,000,000 pieces of mail.
I do not wish to take up further time, though the subject is such an important one. The present system of rural free delivery established by the Postmaster General merely leads to the creation of contention and strife in the rural districts. If he will go into the rural districts where these routes are in operation to-day, he will find that the people using them would not think of parting with the service, on the contrary he would find dissatisfaction and discontent in the districts that are not receiving these valuable services.
I trust the Postmaster General will take into serious consideration tlie suggestions I have made, and also that he will go throughout our land and investigate this question-not only the complaints he has heard here to-day, but will go into the rural districts and learn, as he surely will learn there, that the thickly-settled portions of the older provinces are most emphatically and earnestly ready to receive rural free delivery.


Mr. STEWART.: I desire to say a word on behalf of the clerks employed in the city post offices, whose case has been already referred to by the hon. member for Hamilton (Mr. Barker), the hon. member for East Toronto (Mr. Russell), and others. I think there are no clerks in the Civil Service so poorly paid as the clerks I have referred to. I agree with the Postmaster General (Mr. Lemieux) that the Bill brought down last year dealt pretty fairly with the letter-carriers. But when the Postmaster General passes over the clerks employed in the city post offices and gives increases to the inspectors, assistant inspectors and men of that class-I am not finding fault with these increases; I am glad these gentlemen have got them-but when the hon. gentleman failed to remodel the salaries of these clerks he passed over a class of civil servants who much more needed an increase. I was much pleased to hear the Postmaster General himself admit that these clerks were not sufficiently paid, and state also that he intended at some future time to consider an increase for them. But they are not a very numerous class, and I do not think it would mean a very big task for his department to take into consideration the increase of salaries for that class of clerks. Some of these men have been in the service for from 25 to 35 years and are receiving now only $1,000. In the Hamilton post office there are among the clerks there men qualified to hold any position which might come their way, some of as clever clerks, I think, as can be found anywhere, and yet kept at a salary of $1,000. after, perhaps, 35 years work. The railway mail clerks are asking
for an increase, and I should be glad to see them receive it. But I think that the clerks to whom I have referred are entitled to as high a salary as the railway mail / clerks, who are off for one, two or three days in the week. I think that if the Postmaster General would take into his serious consideration the advisability of giving an increase to this class of civil servants he would be easily able to see his way to doing it at this time. I hope the minister will consider it and not put off the granting of this increase to another session.


Samuel Hughes: Some time ago I wrote to the Postmaster General, inclosing copies of the 'Air Brake' magazine, a publication purely educational in the interests of railway men. The air brake, as the minister knows, is The apparatus which controls the speed of trains. Those in charge of this magazine believe that every railway man should have all possible information and instruction concerning this device. If these magazines' were admitted free of postage into Canada, or under reduced postage rates, they would reach a large number of railway men who would be in a position to take advantage of the instruction the magazine contains. Has the minister finally decided what he will do in the premises?


Rodolphe Lemieux: If this publication, the ' Air Brake Magazine,' which I am sure is very useful to railway men, comes under the ordinary regulations, it should be admitted at one cent a pound. I am glad my hon. friend has brought this1 matter to my notice. I take a great deal of interest in these technical magazines, because of their educational character, and I desire to encourage their reading. I will have further inquiry made into the matter, and give my hon. friend an answer on Monday. I see nothing in the character of the paper which would prevent it from Cuming under our classification, which would admit it at the special rate existing between the two countries. Now I will say to my hon. friend the junior member for Hamilton (Mr. Stewart) that the question of raising the salaries of post office employees has been occupying the attention of the department for several weeks. We have dealt this session with the class of employees I referred to last night. The resolution giving another scale of salaries to superintendents, railway mail clerks, post office inspectors, assistant inspectors, and assistant postmasters has been accepted by the House. This is as much as we can do this sftsion. But I have pledged myself that between now, and the next session of parliament I will see that a proper classification is made of the outside service in the larger cities, and will try to bring them' under the very efficient legislation known as the Civil Service

Act which was introduced two years ago by the Minister of Agriculture.
Now, Sir, I will not attempt to answer all the questions raised by the hon. member for Lambton (Mr. Armstrong) this evening, because he has evidently prepared a very able brief on the' whole range of postal questions. I must congratulate him on his address, and on his industry. Evidently he has found inspiration in the literature published in the United States. It is part of my duty to read that literature carefully. My hon. friend makes a mistake in comparing the two countries, especially on that vexed question of second class matter. I know as a matter of fact that a long investigation has taken place in the United States as regards the transportation of certain second-class matter by railway companies. My hon. friend asked whether I knew that in the United States something like $69,000,000 have been charged to the United States exchequer, to the dismay and surprise of the Washington authorities, because it had been practically a robbery from the people. Well, my hon. friend has unwittingly made a mistake in comparing Canada with the United States as regards second class matter. The system we have in this country is entirely different from that in the United States as regards the transportation of second-class matter by railway companies. That matter in the United States is transported according to weight, at one cent a pound, whilst in this country we have a mileage basis. For instance, a baggage car service costs the country four cents a mile, a postal car service costs eight cents a mile. That is the basis of the expenditure for the transportation of second-class matter from one end of the country to the other. Is our system much better than the United States system? Certainly it is, from a post office point of view. I have here an extract from the evening 'Journal,' of New York, of February 5, 1910, in regard to the investigation which was recently held in that country. The title reads, ' Another polite question to Mr. Taft.' .
Mr. Taft, our president, said that the people were subsidizing magazines because the mail carried magazines for a cent a pound, and he said they actually cost the government nine cents a pound to carry the magazines.
That is where the robbery takes place, it is done by weight, whilst in this country we have a uniform basis of a mileage system with the railway companies.
We would like to ask Mr. Taft one question. You say that the United States government loses $64,000,000 a year because it carries second-class mail matter, magazines, and so on, for one cent a pound. Do you know that in Canada the post offices carry second-class mail matter for a quarter cent a pound and makes a profit of a million dollars a vearr Mr. LEM1EUX.
That is the opinion of an American newspaper on the two systems.


Mr. U. WILSON.: Is it true?


Rodolphe Lemieux: It is perfectly true, so much so that at present the railway companies of Canada, the Canadian Northern, the Canadian Pacific railway, and the Grand Trunk railway are knocking at the door of the Post Office Department in order to obtain a new basis of mileage. They say they are losing money, that to-day their mail cars are filled with such matter, and that they receive only the same amount of money as if they were empty.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Are those roads running to the west on long hauls through the western districts, filled with second-class matter?


Rodolphe Lemieux: If my hon. friend could see them at this season of the year, when immigrants are coming into the country, or during the Christmas season, and the Easter season, if he could see the mail cars of the Canadian Pacific railway, and the Canadian Northern he would be surprised. The system is completely different in the United States, and the tendency in that country to-day is to adopt the Canadian system. Once more they have to come to Ottawa to learn something in business management.


Uriah Wilson: How are the railway companies paid for carrying mail matter- by the car or by the pound?


Rodolphe Lemieux: They are paid on a mileage basis.


Uriah Wilson: You pay no more for a full car than for one half full?


Rodolphe Lemieux: No.


Uriah Wilson: You have the use of the whole car if you want it?


Rodolphe Lemieux: W'e have the use of the whole car.


Uriah Wilson: And you pay so much per mile whether the car is empty or full?


Rodolphe Lemieux: I said a moment ago that we paid four cents a mile for a baggage car and eight cents a mile for a postal car. Some of the companies carry mail at the rate of two or three cents a mile. This rate is given under old contracts which were made before confederation and which have been continued since, but the regulation to-day is four cents a mile for a baggage car and eight cents for a postal car.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I wish to ask the minister a question with reference to mail-cars. He says that we are charged eight cents a mile for a postal car. It should be a postal car, in my judgment, up to a certain standard where the occupants would be comfort-

able and would have suitable conveniences to enable them to do their work. How many new mail cars have been built and placed on railway postal routes in Canada during the past five years? Where are they in use? What reports or complaints have been made to the department or superintendent of the railway mail service by railway mail clerks in regard to the unfitness of the mail cars during the last year, or the last six months? Have there been any, and, if so, how many complaints that the health of the railway mail clerk suffers from the unsuitableness of the cars they occupy while discharging their duties? Have complaints been macjg as to the imperfect. heating of these cars, and are the railway companies building, with any degree of rapidity, new and suitable cars for the mail routes that are used to-day?


Rodolphe Lemieux: A similar question, perhaps not so complete, was asked the other day, and I gave the answers. It is on ' Hansard.'


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I put that question, but it was very much narrower.	,


Rodolphe Lemieux: If the hoi), gentleman will put his question on the order paper, I will be very pleased to give a proper answer. I know that the railway companies ha,ve improved the standard of the mail car. We have made representations to them during the last three or four years. When I was Minister of Labour I did remonstrate with some of the companies which really were not giving our railway ftiail clerks the accommodations that they were entitled to as human beings. There are a number of difficulties which cannot be easily overcome. For instance, the railway mail clerks were asking that the mail car should be placed at the end or the centre of the train instead of next to the locomotive. Well, that is a difficult question. The mails have to be delivered at a certain point on the platform, and it would create delay and cause trouble in the service. But, as regards the hygienic conditions, the railways have manifested a very sincere desire to improve the condition of the cars. I cannot state the number of cars built on the new system within a year or two, but I will get the statistics at a later stage.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: I merely read these questions so that they will be on ' Hansard,' and so the minister will be enabled to answer them later.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The hon. member for Lambton opened his remarks by stating that advertisements were appearing in a paper called the ' The Canadian Farm.'1 I am glad that my hon. friend brought that paper to the notice of the House. The ' Canadian Farm ' is owned by a well known Conservative in Toronto, and it has 213
a large circulation amongst the farmers of Ontario. It is a proper medium in which to insert advertisements of the post office for rural services in the districts adjoining Toronto. I do not think that fault should be found with our department for choosing that medium for advertising purposes. The hon. gentleman says : You have a surplus; cannot you give some increase to your railway mail clerks? I think I have answered that question to the satisfaction of the hon. gentleman. My hon. friend spoke of the expenditure in the Yukon district, and compared it with the expenditure of other sections.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: In Dawson city.


Rodolphe Lemieux: In Dawson city. Well, we must take a broad view of this subject. It is all very well to say that we draw hardly any revenue as compared with the expenditure in the Yukon territory, but
1	claim it as a matter of pride for Canada that one can send a letter from Halifax to Dawson at two cents whilst a letter sent from Dover in England across the channel to Calais would cost five cents. It is true that we do not derive a large revenue from the Yukon district, but the Canadian mails are just as safe in that district today as they are in the city of Toronto or the city of Ottawa. In the Yukon district we have a large settlement composed of miners. We have a service equal to that in any other section of the country. With the fair surplus we have I think it is only right that we should give our hardy Canadians who have been settling and opening that district to civilization a proper mail service. It costs some money-$140,000 a year. For the railway mail service alone across the White Pass we have to pay something like $60,000 a year. That is the only accessible route through which our mails can pass, and I must say to my hon. friend that not only is the Yukon service a service for Canada but partly for the United States. We are spending some money in Dawson. We pay the postmaster $5,000 a year but Mr. Hartman, the postmaster, with $5,000 receives less than some postmasters who are paid $2,000 or $1,500 in this section of the country. My hon. friend knows that rental, provisions and clothing in the Yukon cost twice and thrice as much as in other sections of this country. My hon. friend says that there has been an increase in the expenditure. That I do not deny. It must be remembered that the inland letter rate has been reduced from 3 cents to 2 cents; the letter rate from Canada to the United States reduced from 3 cents to
2	cents; the letter rate from Canada to Great Britain and all other portions of the British empire reduced from 5 cents to 2 cents, and the rate on drop



letters for city delivery reduced from 2 cents to 1 cent, which is the lowest rate for this service in any country in Europe or America. Then again, the rate on Canadian newspapers and periodicals sent from publishers in Canada to subscribers in Great Britain and every part of the British empire has been reduced from 3 cents per pound to \ cent per pound, and the rate on Canadian newspapers and periodicals sent from publishers in Canada to subscribers in Great Britain and every part of the British empire, has been reduced from 2 cents per pound to I cent per pound, and the rate on Canadian newspapers and periodicals sent by the general public in Canada to correspondents in Great Britain and all parts of the British empire has been reduced from 8 cents a pound to 4 cents.	The reduction in the rates on
newspapers sent by publishers in Canada to subscribers in Great Britain tends to a wider dissemination of Canadian newspapers and other publications and has made better known to the world the wealth and industries of Canada. Then, the parcel post rate between Canada and Great Britain formerly provided that a parcel not exceeding 3 pounds in weight would cost 1 shilling and the scale ran up to XI pounds for 3 shillings. Now, on Canadian parcels to the United Kingdom the rate is brought down to 12 cents a pound. The Canadian 'Gazette' commenting on these reduced rates says:
Those reductions are a welcome sequel to the penny post, and must^ cut yet deeper the channels of closer connection.
My hon. friend (Mr. Armstrong) spoke about the rating of our post office employees and I may tell the hon. gentleman that every man is traced in the Post Office Department from the day he enters it to the day he leaves. As to the city post offices we have monthly reports from our inspectors and I think it may be said that we follow very closely our employee. I may also tell my hon. friend that I have given notice as publicly as possible that the employees must not take part in politics; that they must do their duty towards the country that pays them and that they jeopardize their positions if they take an active part in politics. My hon. friend knows, my views on rural mail delivery, and I think it may be said that our system has made fair progress since its establishment. We have made a modest beginning and we are proud of it because it is working smoothly and well. We have quite a large number of routes in the province of Ontario. I do not believe that we should have supplied the farmers with free boxes because I think it would be imprudent on our part and it would be beneath the dignity of the farmers to accept Mr. LEMIEUX.
them on such conditions. Under the present condition the farmer pays the cost price of the box and he gets a good service. Let me point out to the hon. gentleman that in the United States last year the postal receipts amounted to $203,000,000 and the expenditure to $221,000,000. My hon. friend says that the rural mail delivery has done away with many post offices in the United States, and while that may be true the fact remains that in the United States, with their very extensive system of rural mail delivery, they rolled up last year the handsome deficit of $17,441,000. I do not think we can afford to follow the example of the United States in maintaining such an expensive luxury. We are going on quietly and gradually in Canada and I think we are on the safe side. . The time will come when we will have a large population in this country, and if the Post Office Department is administered as well then as it is now it may be taken for granted that we will have King Edward boxes at the door of every farmer in Ontario and the western provinces. Our post office revenue last year was $7,401,000 and our expenditure $6,592,000. For my part I would rather keep within these conservative lines than go the pace they have gone in the United States which would no doubt result in a comparatively equally large deficit.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Does the minister seriously think that with our population of 7,000,000 and their population of 90,000,000 Ve would lose in proportion the same amount of money as they did?


Rodolphe Lemieux: We have a small population and a small revenue compared with the United States but we have at the same time a larger territory than they have. The expense is not in the box itself, that is a very small matter, but it is in the laying of the route, in getting new routes and new couriers, and giving out new contracts to cover that immense territory. That is where the cost comes in. From the figures I gave the House the other day, my hon. friend will find that the increase in the expenditure under the head of rural mail delivery in my department comes from the fact that we have been obliged to do away with the existing mail service as between one office and another office and replace it by another service to cover each box on the route. That costs three times as much. As our territory is as large as or larger than the United States, if we were to go on with the system as lavishly as the United States has gone it would cost the country too much money and I wish to remain on safe lines.
In conclusion I wish, to say that this department has been well administered by my predecessor, Sir William Muiock,

and it shall be my ambition in the future to administer it as well as he did; my only ambition is to follow in his footsteps.


John Howard Sinclair: The method of rural delivery is not applicable to all parts of the country. I have in mind routes in my constituency where the route is from 40 to 50 miles in length, and a good deal of the travelling by the courier is done at night. It would be impossible for him to open the boxes along his scattered route and deliver the mail to the people and reach the end of his route in any reasonable time. Where the country is laid off like a checkerboard and thickly settled and the routes short the system may be applicable, but I do not think it can apply to certain districts I have in mind. Of course this is our misfortune, but I think some consideration should be given to the distances between post offices. I have been told by officers of the department that the rule is to place post offices not closer together than four miles. Two miles is a long distance for a farmer to travel every day for his mail. If it is impassably, to accommodate these people by rural mail delivery, I would suggest that the minister should increase in those places the number of post offices. It does not cost much to furnish a post office and it is a great accommodation to the people, because it lessens the distance to be travelled. I find that it is difficult to obtain the rural mail delivery because one applicant does not count, you must secure a large number. I believe a majority along the route, to apply for the accommodation . before you can get it. Take for example a route 50 miles long with 100 or 200 families living along it. Who is to organize the application, who is to find out h'ow manv people will take the boxes and join in the system? It is an impossible task for the individual farmer or resident who desires to secure the accommodation. I have had applications of that kind and have had to tell the people that they must get a majority along the route to join before they could get the accommodation of rural delivery boxes. It would take weeks and months to canvass and ascertain if it would be possible to secure that number. I trust the minister will take into consideration the necessity of revising his rules with regard to the distance between post offices. So as to give the people in the country districts more accommodation.


Mr. J. D. TAYLOR.: What is the department doing in the matter of a largely signed petition from Central Park asking for an inquiry into the circumstances connected with the closing of that post office? This petition was addressed to the department in February last, and bore 175 signatures of persons who had been deprived of 213*
their mail facilities by the action of the department.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The facts are not fresh in my mind.


James Davis Taylor: I think this matter should receive the minister's personal attention. Last summer I wrote a personal letter to the minister and Mr. Cowan also wrote. To these letters we received no reply, except an acknowledgment from an official of the department, saying that the letters would be submitted to the minister on his return. That post office had been established for 14 years, but now it has been closed, depriving about 300 families of their postal facilities. I know that the-facts have been misrepresented to the department, and it was because of that knowledge that I addressed a personal letter to-the minister. I regret to find from the minister's lack of knowledge to-night that the matter has never come to his attention at all ynd that he knows nothing about the subject. The matter originated through a comniaint from residents of Central Park against the management of the post office there. For several years the inspector has been reporting to the department that the post office was mismanaged. For at least four years these complaints went on without action, the then postmaster was allowed to continue in office and the dissatisfaction continued; but finally last summer the matter seems to have been brought to a crisis by the receipt of a largely signed petition asking the Postmaster General to investigate the matter. Then the Postmaster General wrote, not to the inspector or to any person in authority there, not to the member for New Westminster or the member for Vancouver, whose districts this post office serves, hut to a gentleman whose existence I heard denied in this House this afternoon. This letter was addressed by the deputy minister to this gentleman, who, we were assured this afternoon, had ceased to exist-the administrator of the patronage of the department for the district of New Westminster.
Post Office Department. Ottawa,
June 28, 1909.
Robert Jardine, Esq., .
New Westminster.


An hon. MEMBER.: Who was he?


James Davis Taylor: He is the gentleman who aspired to the position I occupy just now, hut whose aspirations were disappointed :
Dear Sir,-I beg to draw your attention to the communication addressed to you on the 25th ult., on the subiect of the postmastership of Central Park, and asking you to nominate some suitable person who could be appointed to the position. Kindly advise me in the matter at your earliest convenience.
Yours very truly,
R. M. COtJLTER,
Deputy Postmaster General.

This was written following an advice from the post office inspector recommending, not that the post office should be changed from Central Pai-k, but that the Post Office Department should act on his advice frequently tendered, and appoint a new postmaster. The answer to that was as follows:
New Westminster, June 24, 1910. Hon. E. Lemieux,
Postmaster General.
Dear Sir,-Referring to your 29755, I beg to recommend Mr. A. K. Farquharson as postmaster of Central Park. The district served by this office is rapidly filling up. and it has been urged that the office be moved to a more central location. I will take up this matter with the inspector, who will, no doubt, make recommendation regarding to same.
Yours faithfully,



[Stage Direction]
As regards the importance of Central Park district, I might say that the department had received information from its own inspector that the district was growing rapidly, and he urged, therefore, that attention might be paid to his complaint. Here we have for the first time from this Mr. Robert Jardine, the. administrator of patronage for the Westminster district, the suggestion to the Postmaster General that he should close the office at Central Park, and remove it to another place. That was the origin of the closing of that post office which had been established for fourteen years. That suggestion was interpreted by the department, in the answer made by the hon. minister as:
Representations made to the department that by changing the location of the post office and establishing a post office at Colling-wood east, the interests of the majority of the residents would be best served.
Following this, and without the people interested having been given any information on the subject at all, when they went to their post office at Central Park, one Saturday evening, they found a written notice along side the delivery wicket as follows:
This post office will be closed to-night. After to-night you will get your mail at Keefer's.
Yet the Postmaster General told us that the Central Park post office was not closed, but that the post office had been merely removed to Keefer's. I would like to tell the hon. gentleman where Keefer's is, as he should know what is being done in his name in that district. Nearly all the people at Central Park have to make their living in Vancouver, which is six miles away, and in going to Vancouver they pass the Central Park post office every day. Keefer's is one mile further away from Vancouver than is Central Park, and none of the residents of Central Park have occasion to go to Keefer's in the ordinary course, and they would never go there unless compelled by the department. From Vancouver the settlement extends out Mr. J. D. TAYLOR.
six miles to Central Park, and there is a post office at every mile on the way out. The Central Park office is the pioneer of them all, and is one mile from Collingwood East.
Rodolphe Lemieux: You say that post offices are established between Central Park and the city of Vancouver.


James Davis Taylor: Yes, at Grand View, Cedar Cottage, Britcola, and Collingwood East. Then comes Central Park, the oldest and most thickly settled place, and the pioneer of them all, and the post office there was arbitrarily closed. Some 312 persons who used to get their mails there regularly were deprived of that advantage, and they petitioned the department, asking the Postmaster General to give his attention to the matter. As evidence that the public were not being served by the change, the people of Central Park got up a large public meeting, the largest ever held there. They first telegraphed the minister as follows :
Vancouver, British Columbia,
August 2, 1909.
Postmaster General, Ottawa.
Large public meeting at Central Park tonight protest against removal of post office to Keefer's. Resolution and petition following. MAXWELL SMITH.


JAMES MACMASTER, EUGENE CLEVELAND,
[Stage Direction]
Committee.
I may say that I attended that meeting by invitation, and that meeting was the largest ever held in that district. A resolution was there carried unanimously as follows:
That this public meeting of tbe residents and ratepayers of the Central Park district duly called and assembled this 2nd day of August, 1909, do hereby endorse tbe petition to the Postmaster General just read, protesting against the removal of the Central Park post office to Keefer's or any other point more than 500 yards from the present Central Park station. And be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be forwarded along with the petition to the Postmaster General; and be it further resolved that a telegram be sent to-night to the Postmaster General advising him of this action; and be it further resolved that copies of this resolution and the heading of the petition be forwarded to the local post office inspector and local members of parliament.
I would like to read the letter which 1 addressed the Postmaster General at that time:
New Westminster, British Columbia.
August 9, 1909.
The Honourable the Postmaster General, Ottawa.
Dear Sir,-As member for this district I have been requested to address you in connection with the closing of the post office at Central Park and the opening in its stead of an office at Keefer's, more than a mile distant from the late office, which was central to the population to be served. I have expressed to

these people at their public meeting my confidence that the facts of the case could not have been before the department when the order for the closing of the post office at Central Park was issued, and I trust your action on the petition now before you will bear out this view.
Offices are needed at Keefer's and at East Collingwood as well as at Central Park; but so long as there is only one office authorized Central Park is the natural place for it.
Faithfully yours,

[Stage Direction]
Mr. Cowan also communicated with the Postmaster General as follows:
Vancouver, August 4, 1909. The Hon. Eodolphe Lemieux,
Postmaster General, Ottawa.
Sir,-A committee appointed bv the residents and ratepayers of Central Park to protest against the removal of the post office from that point, have asked me to communicate you my views on the subject.
This settlement is centrally located between the cities of Vancouver and New Westminster, on the interurban tram line. It was one of the first, if not the very first, settlements between the two cities, and is growing very rapidly. Many of its residents have located in business and established their homes there, just because of such public conveniences as the post office. Owing to the contour of the country and the present direction and state of the public roads, the removal of the office from Central Park to Keefer's must result in rendering it practically useless to the Central Park residents, and for the present, at least, of service to a much smaller number of the public. At any rate, whatever the public needs at Keefer's, they would seem to me to be such at Central Park, as without a doubt require retention of the post office at that point.
I am taking the liberty of writing you because I am confident that vou will look into the circumstances and do what is in the publio interest in the premises.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,

[Stage Direction]
I am sorry I weary the minister. But I assure him that the people affected by his action have been made a great deal more tired than he can possibly be made by this recital. Backing up these protests by the public meeting and the two parliamentary representatives of the district, there was forwarded a petition to the minister, bearing the names of 312 persons affected. The attention paid by the department to that appears to have been nil. To each of the communications so sent the stereotyped answer was given that, in the absence of the Postmaster General the letter is acknow-
Rodolphe Lemieux: There are 15,000 post offices in the country and I do not pretend to remember every particular case.


James Davis Taylor: I would like to say that the only reasons the minister got for that removal were got from Mr. Jardine, administrator of the patronage of the New Westminster district. This patronage that was said to be defunct is not defunct, so far as my riding is concerned, nor so far as his department is concerned. The patronage in New Westminster district alone I would like to make plain to members of the House, is worth to the person administering it, more than the salary of a cabinet minister, and it is to gratify the desire of the administrator of the patronage to establish at Keefer, and in the house of a supporter of his party a post office which would take the name, and therefore, I suppose, the salary attached to the Central Park post office, this cruel injustice has been done to all these people. I say it is a most callous misuse of the authority of the department. I say that, if the minister could visit Central Park and see for himself, and be put'in possession of the circumstances of the case, I feel satisfied that he would *not allow the present state of affairs to continue for a moment. I may say to the minister that there is in his department much more information than I have given because the people went to the trouble to get a landscape photographer to make photographs of the district of Central Park, to show that this was Teally a town, and photographs also, I believe, of the new post office at Keefe# to show that Keefer was only an ordinary rural settlement, with rthe residences widely scattered and that there was no comparison at all between the two locations. But all this effort seems to have gone for nothing against the recommendation of the administrator of the patronage, and the endorsement, the sole endorsement received, of two gentlemen calling themselves the Liberal Association of Central Park. These two gentlemen do not represent even the Liberals of Central Park.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Who are they?


James Davis Taylor: I do not wish to read their names. It is a shameful thing that they have signed their names to the resolution of the association as given in the return.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Read the names.
ledged, and as soon as the minister returns the matter will be brought to his attention. It seems to me that it has never been brought to his attention.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Yes, it has.


James Davis Taylor: When I asked the minister about it just now he evidently knew nothing about it.


James Davis Taylor: I do not wish to read them, because it is a cruel thing they have done to their neighbours and have caused the Postmaster General to do. The answer that has been made is that there is a report from the inspector favouring this change. I wish to say that this report appears to have been dragooned out of the inspector. Before he saw the administra-
^707

tor of the patronage he had a very different idea of the local situation from that which he had afterward. Before he saw this patronage monger, on the 10th May he wrote recommending the appointment of a new .postmaster and saying:
Central Park is becoming rather an important place

Yet that is the place the Postmaster General has wronged by closing the post office.

and I therefore consider that it would be
both in the interests of the general public and ' the department if, as recommended in my report, No. 164, of the 5th August, 1905, 'The office be declared vacant and a new appointment made.
I have the^honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,


JOHN R. GREENFIELD,
[Stage Direction]
Post Office Inspector.
Now, Mr. Greenfield appears to have been touched some time later. On the 2nd July, some seven weeks later, he writes:
Sir, I have the honour to report that on the 28th ult., I received a telephone message from Mr. Robert Jardine, advising me that in connection with a proposed change in the Central Park post office he had informed the department that a suggestion had been made to change the site of the post offic.e to Keefer's Station, and that he would ask me to furnish a report in the matter.
When I inquired about the matter in the House, I was told by the Postmaster General that this change was made at the -suggestion and on the recommendation of the post office inspector. Although that is true in a sense, it is not accurate, it is misleading, because, #hile the post office inspector was dragooned into committing himself to the suggested change, he makes it perfectly clear that Robert Jardine had informed the department that the suggestion had been made:
I therefore visited the place on the 29th ult and fully discussed the matter with Mr. Alex Kerr Farquharson, whom Mr. Jardine requested me to see
[Stage Direction]
The trail of the serpent is over it all.
with the result that I found that there was a very strong feeling.
A strong feeling on the part of Mr. Alex. Kerr Farquharson, who as it turned out, got the job and presumably the salary, because the salaries are based on last yearjs business. The minister says this is the' same post office, though the two places are a mile apart, the one called Keefer and the other called Central Park, and there are two or three other places with different names between the two. The minister says it is the same post office, although it is not even on the same road. One is on the main road, and the other is on a crossroad. I say this, not to reflect on the minister's integrity, or to in.timate that he deceived the House because of desire, hut I Mr. J D. TAYLOR.
do say that those statements which were put into the mouth of the Postmaster General to deliver to this House to do so, are not in accordance with the facts. This report is the product of the direction he received from the administrator of the patronage in that district, and is not at all in accordance with his previous reports. One would think that these people were themselves the best judges of whether the Postmaster General had conferred a favour on them. I have a letter addressed to me on the 16th of February, 1910, which reads as follows:
Dear Sir,-Herewith I have the honour to send you a petition from the residents of this neighbourhood, which I feel sure will have your earnest attention. It is by no means as complete or as large as it could have been, as many men are away from home when called upon. Nevertheless, I am inclined to think it is of such importance as to call for a full inquiry, which I trust will have the result of the re-establishment of the post office at Central Park. From a perusal of the doings in parliament at Ottawa, I notice it has been stated that the above post office has not been abolished but only removed to a more convenient position in the same district. This is a misleading statement, as you will be able to point out, knowing the district as you do. In fact, I may say that some of ns contemplate having our mail addressed Vancouver City, as that, although six miles away, would be more convenient than the present arrangement. I further venture to suggest that three offices are more needed now than was one which was established fourteen years ago.
I am, Sir, very sincerely yours,

[Stage Direction]
That accompanies a petition addressed to the Postmaster General as follows:
Sir,-We, the undersigned, have the honour to respectfully approach you with regard to the abolition of the post office at Central Park. We have heard through Mr. Lister that you are unable to re-establish the said post office, and that you were induced to act as you did upon, information given you.
We have the honour to request that an official investigation be held as to the facts of the case, and we are respectfully confident that you will then see fit to reconsider our request.
This is signed by 175 residents injuriously affected by the change. Now it would have cost the Postmaster General about $200 a year, at the outside, to have established a new post office at Keefer's, which the growth of that district calls for, and to have left the post office at Central Park as it was under new management, in charge of the competent person recommended in one of these petitions by the residents of Central Park. I ask why he should do so cruel an act as to destroy the convenience, and the happiness of those people of Central Park with the result of saving to his department only $200 a year? I am glad now to see that the Minister of Inland Revenue has come into the House, as he is the minister in this government repre-

senting British Columbia. No more eruel wrong has ever been done to any one than has been done by his colleagues in this government. The Minister of Inland Revenue is the minister who will be blamed for this when he appears again in that district. I am quite sure that when he does visit that locality he will be just as earnest as I am in saying that this office never should have been closed, and he will admit, once he becomes conversant with the facts, that if he had known them, and had been able to post the Postmaster General, nothing of the kind would have occurred. In conclusion I wish to urge upon the Postmaster Geenral to act upon this petition addressed to his department in February, and cause an inquiry to be made into tne whole case, and if he will do that I feel sure the immediate result will be the reopening of the post office at Central Park.
Rodolphe Lemieux: I wish not to speak long, because the hour is so late. But I cannot let pass the statement made by the 'hon. gentleman that I was kept in ignorance of the facts concerning the Central Park post office. My hon. friend will be in office some day, and he will probably know that it is difficult for a minister to keep fresh in his mind every report which comes before him. This question is not new to me, and I know it better now that my hon. friend has laid the facts before the House. When I gave the answer to my hon. friend in this House some time ago, I imparted all the facts which were in the department. I wish to state to my hon. friend that it is hardly fair to Mr. Greenfield, our very able post office inspector in British Columbia, to state that he might have been influenced by Mr. Jardine or any one else in making his report to the Post Office Department. My hon. friend knows that Mr. Greenfield is not an appointee of this government, he was appointed by the late government. I am well acquainted with him, and have travelled with him on the Canadian Pacific Railway, and I know he is one of the most conscientious men there is in the post office service of this country, and he would yield to no pressure. Therefore, when my hon. friend insinuates that he had been influenced by Mr. Jardine


James Davis Taylor: He says so.


Rodolphe Lemieux: No, my hon. friend has read only two lines of the report. I think it is only justice to Mr. Greenfield that the whole report should be read, so that the facts may be fairly put before the House. As they say in French it is a 'querelle de clocher', it is a village quarrel.


James Davis Taylor: No, it is not a village quarrel.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Well, it is a town quarrel.


James Davis Taylor: At Central Park there is a large settlement, it is to all intents and purposes a town, but at Keefer's there is no settlement. The people of Central Park do not travel towards Keefer's at all. It is just as if you told the people of Ottawa to go to Brittania for their mail.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Here is the report made by Mr. Greenfield:
Post Office Inspector's Office,
Vancouver, July 2, 1909.
Sir,-I have the honour to report that on the 28th ult. I received a telephone message from Mr. Robt. Jardine, advising me that in connection with a proposed change in the Central Park post office, he had informed the department that a suggestion had been made to change the site of the post office to Keefer's Station, and that he would ask me t<5 furnish a report in the matter. I therefore visited the place on the 29th ult., and fully discussed the matter with Mr. Alexander Kerr Farquhar-son, whom Mr. Jardine requested me to see, with a result that I find that there was a very strong feeling in favour of the change, and by changing the site of the post office to the McKay road, the name of the railway station being r Keefer's/ it would he more central and convenient for the whole neighbourhood. It would also more evenly distribute the offices between New Westminster and Vancouvi, along the line of the British Columbia electric railway, which are as follows:	Grand,
View, Cedar Cottage, Britcola, Collingwood East (proposed, see report to Postmaster General, No. 135, 9th June, 1909), Central Park, and ' Edmonds/ a report on which I hope to forward in the course of a few days.
I wish to state here that my hon. friend and the neighbourhood of his constituency are not so badly treated. We find a post office at every mile between Vancouver and New Westminster.


James Davis Taylor: We need them.
Mr. LEMIEUX-(reading).
As it is now, the proposed office at Collingwood East is rather too close to Central Park, hut by changing the site to Keefer's, the two offices would then be a mile and three-quarters apart. The change would also he more convenient for the people living on the Jubilee road, who have on two occasions applied for a post office (see reports No. 886 of the 29th June, 1908, and No. 101 of the 6th May last). The proposition is to change the site of the Central Park post office, without change in name, from the present site, to the residence of Mr. Alex. Kerr Farquharson, lot 14, subdivision of block 15, McKay road, which by the road is about three-quarters of a mile southeast of where the office is now located, as shown on the accompanying map. It is reasonable to suppose that the few people now residing immediately contiguous to the present site will oppose the change

Here comes the village quarrel; yet this is a change that is recommended by Mr. Greenfield without any prompting from Mr. Jardine.

-but considering tlie question as a whole, and from a strictly post office point of view, I consider that the change is advisable, as it will provide more convenient accommodation for the greater number of the settlers in that locality, and I, therefore, respectfully beg to recommend the change in site of the post office as herein set forth.
I have every reason to believe that the present postmaster will oppose the change, and place as many obstacles in the way as possible, and as he is contractor for the conveyance of mails at Central Park, he will require the usual three months' notice at the termination of his contract, should the proposed change in site meet with your approval, and I therefore beg to ask that I be advised of the intention of the department in the premises at as early a date as possible, so that the postmaster may be notified accordingly. -'lr, I arquharson will be willing to carry on *the service between the proposed site' and fleeter s Station on the same terms and conditions as it is now being performed for at Central Park, so that the change will not involve any additional expense to this department.
1 have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
(Sgd.) JOHN R. GREENFIELD,
Post Office Inspector.
Suppose _ that the hon. gentleman is in my place in the Langevin block. I am not a resident of British Columbia-I know a little of Vancouver and New Westminster-but I receive a report, framed as this report is, signed by Mr. Greenfield, one of .the most conscientious officers of the whole service.


Mr. CAMPBELL.: He must be a Conservative.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He is a good Conservative. There are lots of good Conservatives -who denies that? I am put in possession of this report and I am asked to act. I have to act. What shall I do? Will my hon. friend say that with such a strong report as that which I have read just now I should fold my arms, and say: I will not act. I take the whole responsibility of the change. *


James Davis Taylor: Why?


Rodolphe Lemieux: I take the whole responsibility of the change on the strength of the^ report furnished to me by my officer, Mr. Greenfield. I must rely upon some one. I must take the responsibility I trust my officials. If Mr. Greenfield has done contrary to what he should have done, if he is at fault it would be a different thing, but I do not believe he is at fault from the report which he has written.


James Davis Taylor: What about the petition?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Well, in every case where there are changes I receive petitions and counter-petitions and finally 1 accept the verdict of the post office in-Alr. LEAIIEUX.
spector who is, as my hon. friend admits, a man above suspicion. I must accept guidance from the officers who are on the spot and who are the best judges. That is what I have done in this instance. I bear no ill whatever. I do not, know Mr. Jardine and I do not know the people of Central Park.


James Davis Taylor: But you give him the patronage.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I do not give Air. Jardine any patronage. There is no harm in consulting a man of Air. Jardine's reputation as regards an affair of this kind.


James Davis Taylor: The people of Central Park think there is.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Does my hon. friend think that Air. Jardine is not to offer any friendly advice in a case like this?


James Davis Taylor: Friendly to whom?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Friendly to the community.


James Davis Taylor: Friendly to Jardine.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What benefit does Mr. Jardine derive from a change of this kind? Has he any pecuniary interest?


James Davis Taylor: As I told the minister the administration of the patronage in the New Westminister riding is worth mere than the salary of a cabinet minister.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Aly hon. friend makes a very serious charge there


James Davis Taylor: Absolutely correct.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Against Mr. Jardine.


James Davis Taylor: Against the government.


Rodolphe Lemieux: No, but against Air. Jardine because Air. Jardine would be the man who would illegally and unlawfully profit by any such rake-off. I understand that this is the meaning of my non. friend's language. I do not believe that on second, sober thoughts my hon. friend would insist upon stating that Air. Jardine makes any such rake-off as that out of this patronage if you can call patronage the advice given as to a change in the site of a post office.
I believe my hon. friend (Mr. J. D. Taylor) is exaggerating a little, but I think after hearing the report of my officer he will come to the conclusion that I personally could not take any other course than I did. I do not wish any injustice to be done to the people of Central Park and so I shall take the file again .and look

over it closely and see that justice is done.


James Davis Taylor: I am much obliged to the minister for his promise that he will look into the circumstances of this case, and if he does there can be only one result. I have known Inspector Greenfield for many years; I knew him before he and I ever were in British Columbia, and knowing him as I do I am all the more surprised to hear that report.
I would remind the minister that he has numerous reports from Mr. Greenfield about the Central Park post office, among others the one I read to-night dated so late as last May, and in none of these reports has he given any intimation that that office should be closed. On the contrary, in the very last report before the one read by the minister, he points out the growing importance of Central Park. The Postmaster General should not confuse Central Park and Keefer's, because Keefer's is not Central Park any more than Aylmer is Hull or Ottawa. It is a station on a by-road while Central Park is on the main road between the two cities. No resident of Central Park would be called on to go to Keefers for any business purpose, whereas on the other hand the people of Keefer's would go to Central Park. However, the settlement is large enough to have a post office at both places, and as I have said it would cost the Postmaster General only $200 a year to leave Central Park open and establish a new office at Keefer's. As to patronage I wish to reiterate in all sincerity that while it is impossible to say what the rake-off is on any single transaction, and while there must be transactions with no rake-off because the administrator of the patronage like any other administrator must do many 'thank you' jobs, yet I state in all sincerity that in my riding the administration of the patronage is worth more than the salary of a cabinet minister. Who pays? Who but the public? If the patronage were abolished the public would save in that riding alone that amount of money every year. The minister will notice that the inspector never reported any suggestion of a change until he was approached by Mr. Robert Jardine. We know the position that such an official is in. If he dares to go contrary to the advice of the local administrators of the patronage, promotion of all kinds is closed to him, he becomes immediately persona non grata, his official career is ended; he is dragooned by the system now in vogue into following just so far as he can the direction of the local nabobs to whom this government trusts the administration of affairs. I am perfectly certain that if Mr. Greenfield had been left to himself and if it had not
been put up to him that this was a matter of necessity he would not have made that report which the minister has read. Mr. Greenfield like every other man is only human; he is an official of this government, he must carry out the wishes of this government if he is to have any standing in the service at all.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Does the hon. member suggest that in this matter tnere is any rake off?


James Davis Taylor: I do not. When the Central Park post office was removed to Keefer's would the postmaster be paid on the basis of the business done at Central Park the year before? At Central Park the salary would be larger than at Keefer's.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The postmasters in such offices would be paid commission on the basis of the actual revenue.


James Davis Taylor: He would not get a salary this year at Keefer's on the basis of the business last year at Central Park.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He gets no salary at all.


James Davis Taylor: Yes, I find by the Postmaster General's Report that at Central Park the postmaster gets commission on money order business and on postal note business, and a salary of $195


Rodolphe Lemieux: Oh that $195 is the percentage he receives. It is put under the head of 'salary,' but it really is a percentage. There is no fixed salary.


Mr. FRASER.: Before this item is carried, I wish to say a few words as to the post office service in the province of Prince Edward Island, and especially in my own riding. Let me say that I have no specific fault to find with the administration of postal matters, but I wish respectfully to call the attention of the Postmaster General to the necessity for increased mail services. As we all know the statistics show that the province of Prince Edward Island is settled ten times more densely than any other province in Canada; in fact, the whole province is entirely settled, and as times goes by, the people feel the necessity for this increased accommodation. I am glad to say the Postmaster General is granting this accommodation, but perhaps not so rapidly as to satisfy the people. We have now a great number of free rural mail delivery routes and we ought to have in a very short time a complete System of rural mail delivery. But the principal thing I wish to urge is that in some places, perhaps not more than five or six miles removed from a railroad or a central point, which have only tri-weekly or semi-weekly mail delivery, a daily service should be oiven. I have received many petitions on

this subject, and I am sure that the department has received many asking for a daily delivery. I was glad to hear the Postmaster General say that his wish and his instructions to the different postmasters was to keep this matter entirely free from all politics. I feel that his predecessor in office did a great deal for the Post Office Department and put it on a fairly high plane, and I only hope the Postmaster General will be able to carry out his wishes as he expressed them to-night and continue to keep the post office on a high plane, because it is a service fraught with great consequence for good or evil, according as it is properly administered. Would "the minister tell me either now or at another time the revenue of the Post Office Department from the province of Prince Edward Island, and the expenditure in that province?


Rodolphe Lemieux: I will give him the information in a day or so. Whenever any reasonable request is made for the Island it will always be my pleasure to meet the wishes of the representatives of that province.
Some resolutions reported.
Mr. FIELDING moved the adjournment of the House.


Thomas Simpson Sproule: What business will be taken up on Monday?


William Stevens Fielding: Private Bills will be the first order and after that the Naval Bill will be taken up.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and House adjourned at 12.08 a.m., Saturday.
[Stage Direction]
Monday, April 11, 1910.