1912-02-13

[Stage Direction]
House again in Committee on Bill (No. 88) to provide for the appointment of a Tariff Commission.-Mr. White (Leeds).
On section 4,-matters to be investigated.
Mr. GUTHRIE.: Would the Minister of Finance kindly explain the difference between subsection 2 and subsection 4 of section 4? In one case the commission may make certain inquiries under the direction of the minister and in the other when they are authorized to do so by the Governor General in Council.


Mr. WHITE (Leeds).: Both sections are purposely broad and designed to cover matters that have not been particularly specified. Take subsection 2. It is a matter of common experience in the Department of Finance for an application to be made for the lowering or abolition of the duty with regard for instance to certain machinery on the ground that it is not manufactured in Canada and is not likely to be. That is a matter of fact which might very well be referred by the minister to the commission for a report as to the probability of that certain article being manufactured in Canada. Subsection 4 is also designedly broad in its terms. It is fpr the purpose of covering more important matters, for example the chance of increasing trade with certain other countries and the effect that certain tariffs -might have. It is purposely broad so that the commission may be utilized, under the instruction of the Governor General in Council, to report upon matters of that kind.


Hugh Guthrie: I think the matter is practically all covered by subsection 1 with the various subsections. I do not see any object in giving the commission the general power in subsection 1 or giving the minister the general power in subsection 2 or giving the Governor General in Council the general power set out in subsection 4.
The minister has informed the House that this is not only to be a permanent tariff board, but, so far as it is possible to make it so, an independent tariff -board. There is no doubt that -he has secured for Sir WILFRID LAURIER.
it a reasonable degree of permanency, for under section 3 of the Bill it is provided that the -commissioners are to be appointed for a definite period of 5 years and cannot be removed except for cause. But I think that the independence of the members of the commission is challenged by every subsection of section 4. The board has no power to initiate anything, no power to take _ a single step without the special instructions of the Minister of Finance or the Governor in Council. I understood, when the Bill was first -brought in that the board, was an independent and permanent board of inquiry, and would be instituted to make, apart from any special instructions from anybody, the inquiries set out in subsection 1 of section 4. But when we come down to analyse the sections of the Bill, we find that the functions of the boiard are subject to the direction of the minister. They cannot enter upon an inquiry, they cannot make a suggestion, they cannot -do any of the things which the Bill contemplates they -should do, and which the public believe they are to do and which are made the main excuse for the introduction of the Bill. Now, I would suggest to the minister that the words in section 4, ' under the direction of the minister,' be struck out. The clause now reads:
4. In, respect o-f goods produced in or imported into Canada the commission shall, under the direction of the minister, make inquiry as to

But why limit it to the minister. Is it not just as has -been predicted in the earlier part of this discussion thiat this commission was designed by the government and tlie Finance Minister to aid its own purposes -and his own purposes in tariff matters, and is not for thie House or the public of Canada at all? Is it -not so that the whole -design and -scope of the Bill i-s to furnish the Finance Minister -and his party with, special information, in disregard- of the rights of the House and of the people in general to receive that information ? To im-y mind, the Bill would be far less objectionable if these words were eliminated as I have -suggested. Though the board must be, and I presume will be under -th-e Bill, established by the government, it should have a certain -amount of independence to be able to inquire here, there or elsewhere without any directions or instructions from the minister. If you give if that power, that freedom of action, it will -have a certain confidence, and, I think it will gain greater respect in the -country than it will otherwise achieve. Now, in passing t-o the concluding words -of subsection 1, I would suggest to the -minister that he also strike out the words ' and report to the minister.' Without such an amendment, see how this plan works out: Here is a board of commii-s-sioiners, -a permanent

and so-called independent board of commissioners who cannot make a move in gaining the information or facts which the government deems it important to know, which cannot even start an investigation without the positive direction of the minister. And when that investigation is completed, the report must be made to tire minister. The matter starts with the minister, and, so far as this clause goes, it ends with the minister. Now, if these facts are essential to he brought out, and if this information is necessary, and we want facts, we want information, the more accurate and fuller that information the better. But where do the members of this House come in; where do the people of the country come in? I am very strongly of opinion that if this commission is to report, it should report to parliament and not to the .minister. It may be beyond the power of members of this House either to get the result of the inquiry or the evidence on which the results are based if the Bill is allowed to go in its present form. It may be that a large fund of information will be available to the minister and his friends, but that surely is not the object of the Bill. It should not be the object, and if it is not, I hope the minister will consent to the elimination of these objectionable words. I ask him in all seriousness if he will consent to strike out the words in subsection 1 of section 4, ' undeT the direction of the minister,' and the concluding words of subsection 1, ' and report to the minister,' and in the latter case, replace the deleted words with ' and report to parliament.' Now, I can understand that if a commission of independent men, men properly selected-not such men as were suggested by my hon. friend from St. Antoine (Mr. Ames) but well qualified, independent men -the information gathered by them may be of the greatest benefit to every member of this House. We on this side contend for that. We agree that the government cannot go too far in obtaining accurate and complete information on the subject set out in these subsections; but we do object to these facts being elicited by any secret process and only by special directions. We object to any limitation placed upon the power of the commission to inquire. And I think we are all interested that the report when it is made, and the evidence when it is collected, shall be available, and that the report of the commission shall be a report to the parliament of Canada instead of to the minister. I think that is a businesslike proposition. I make it sincerely, and I hope the minister will give it his serious consideration. It may be necessary, if he does not take that view of it, to move in the matter, but I hope that the suggestion may meet with his approval. I would 'like to hear from him on the subject.


Right Hon. R. L. BORDEN (Prime Minister).: I would point out to the hon. gentleman (Mr. Guthrie) that a commission of this kind, and the duties that are allotted to it, must be under the direction of some minister not so far as their methods in making the inquiry are concerned-because in making that inquiry they will be acting independently of any direction from the government-but an inquiry into a particular matter might be more urgent, more insistent in the opinion of those charged with the duties of government than some other matter. Therefore, in view of such considerations it was entirely necessary that a commission of this kind should be under the direction of some department of the government. I would like to remind the hon. gentleman that his own leader, (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) yesterday told us that all this information could be better acquired by appointing statisticians in connection with one of the departments, that of Trade and Commerce, for example. It isi perfectly obvious to my hon. friend, I am sure, that, if he is in accord with the suggestion of his leader, these statisticians would be acquiring information which would be the exact equivalent of the information to be obtained by this commission. With regard to the publicity for which the hon. member is so anxious, the statistics acquired in the manner suggested by the leader of the opposition would be reported to the minister and wrould come down to parliament in the ordinary course. There is nothing more in the provisions of this section than what has been already suggested and' approved by the right hon. gentleman who leads the opposition. There is no provision in the Bill for any secrecy, 'except so far as the principle of secrecy has already been applied, by the late government and all preceding governments, with regard to the business affairs of this country. In respect of that provision, the Bill is only carrying out a well recognized principle of the- government. There is no such provision in the Bill as that which my hon. friend suggests.


Hugh Guthrie: I take issue with my right hon. friend's explanation of the section, and also with his statement in regard to the position of the right hon. the leader of the opposition. It is one thing to have a statistical bureau or a statistical branch of the Department of Finance under the eye of the minister. That is the proper course, and one which in this instance should have been adopted. That is the well established British way of obtaining statistical information. ' I have heard it stated that the trade statistics of Great Britain are the most convenient and most accurate published by any country in the world. They

are collated and published under the authority of the Board of Trade, the president of which is a member of the Cabinet. Why not adopt the British system in preference to this cheap Yankee device? You could adopt that system simply by establishing, in the Department of Finance or in some other department, a bureau manned with a sufficient staff to collect all this information. In that way you would have the .doctrine of responsibility fully carried out; you would have no independent commission to pass on matters on which thte -minister or the giovennment should pass. What is now proposed is a system modelled in fact upon the United States system. You'appoint a permanent board the members of which are not clerks in any sense of the word. They are commissioners with high standing; you have exalted and dignified them, and you are preparing to pay them handsome salaries; you are giving them very wide and high powers; but these men, an independent board appointed for the purpose of acquiring information, cannot move hand or foot until the Minister of Finance beckons to them what to do; and upon getting the word from him as to how they shall proceed, there is no doubt that they will proceed in accordance with his wishes and those of the government of the day. Why not let this board have powers broad enough to enter upon an inquiry without the direction of anybody? I can understand that cases may arise where information is required speedily. Subsection 2 provides for that, and the minister can get the special information he requires. But all that is contained in subsections ' a ', 'b,' 'c,' 'd,' 'e,' ' f ' and ' g ' should be open to the commissioners, and it should be their duty to enter upon the inquiry and continue it to the end, and make the result of that inquiry public, without instructions from the minister or the government. That is what we are establishing them for, and I think it would improve the Bill very much, in the judgment of the House and the country, if they were given that free hand. They cannot do anything but inquire and report. They have no power to make recommendations or to offer any opinion. We want the information; why not give them a free hand to start in, uncontrolled by the desire of the minister to send them on this expedition or that? The more I look into this Bill the more I realize the almost impossibility of obtaining the information which the government and the House would desire to obtain with regard to facts and conditions as they exist in Canada or elsewhere. Now, ' elsewhere ' is going to be the troublesome part of it. The Board of Tariff Commissioners in the United States have realized that.
They have had the greatest difficulty in foreign countries in getting satisfactory in-Mr. GUTHRIE.
formation, although the United States has a consular system in regard to trade and commercial matters superior to any of the consular systems in the world. In every country, and practically at every port, there has been located a United States consul. The duties of these officers are not so much diplomatic like those of British consular agents. They are to a large extent trade and commercial agents, and one can gain a great deal of information from a persual of the reports of the United States consular agents in Germany, France, Belgium and Holland. I had occasion to go through them two or three years ago in connection with a proposal in regard to technical education, and I found that they dealt almost wholly with trade and commercial matters. The United States consular system is well developed throughout Europe; but, for all that, according to the statement of the Chairman of the United States Tariff Board, they have found the greatest possible difficulty in acquiring accurate information as to conditions, the cost of raw material, wages, transportation and the like in European countries. The Finance Minister is going to be confronted wTith the same difficulty to a much greater extent than have the Tariff Commissioners of the United States. It may be a comparatively easy matter to send representatives to Great Britain and ascertain these facts there; it may be a comparatively easy matter to obtain fairly accurate information in this country. Greater difficulty will be experienced in the United States. There is no power to compel any one in a foreign country to give us this information, and United States manufacturers will not be the easiest men to deal with when the Canadian commissioners seek information from them. But when they go to European countries, where we have no consular agencies, and where we have few trade agencies, 1 believe the difficulties will be almost insurmountable, and the information obtained will be highly inaccurate and thoroughly unreliable. I do not consider that much information of value will be obtained from an investigation in foreign countries; but I do believe that a great deal may be obtained in Canada, in Great Britain, and possibly in the United States, which will be of benefit to us in the future in determining upon our tariff legislation. Now cannot that all be gone into by the Board of Tariff Commissioners without any direction from the minister or the government, or from any other person? It is their duty to do it, they are there for that purpose, and why not let them go ahead, without any special direction, and without limiting their report to the Minister of Finance, but giving it to the public in general?


Mr. AMES.: I think if you examine this clause 4 carefully, you will see that it proceeds from the lesser to the greater, that the first and second paragraph are more narrow, and more definite, and more specific than the 3rd and 4th paragraphs, and that the 5th paragraph really refers wholly to clause 4. Now let us see just how this works out in principle. Who is it that brings a Tariff Bill into this House, that presents the case for the revision of our tariff? It is the Minister of Finance. Clause 1 and clause 2 naturally give to the Minister of Finance the power of direction over that body of experts, that will collect for him the facts and information which he will need in order to make his draft Bill relating to the tariff, which draft Bill, I have no doubt, he submits to his colleagues which his colleagues, when satisfied with it, as a government, submit to the House. Therefore, whether we express it in the Bill or not, it will be the Finance Minister who will have the general charge and direction over that Tariff Commission, and it will be through the Finance Minister that that commission makes its report to the Cabinet and through the Cabinet to parliament. We may or may not specifically state in the Bill that it shall be under the direction and control of the Finance Minister, but whether we do that or not, that will actually be the case.


Hugh Guthrie: Why not say that the commission is independent?


Herbert Brown Ames: Now, as to making the commission independent, I think that hon. members will see that if there is anything that will lead to confusion and general dislocation, it is that proposition made by the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie). This Tariff Commission, if they are to accomplish anything, will have to take up the work in a regular and definite way, and naturally the way that they will go about it, is to take up in order such schedules in the tariff, as in the judgment of the government call for first and earliest attention. Now there is no other body but the government of the country who can take upon themselves the authority to say that the wool schedule, for instance, or the iron schedule, or the cotton schedule shall first occupy the attention "of this commission.


Hugh Guthrie: That is provided for by subsection 2.


Herbert Brown Ames: Therefore, I say it will be necessary for the government to say to the commission, we desire that an inquiry shall first be directed upon such and such schedules, and surely through no one but the Finance Minister will these commands actually be given to the Tariff Commission, and when they prepare their report, whether it is stated so in specific words or not, it will be actually made to the Finance Minister and through the Finance Minister to the government.


Hugh Guthrie: If the hon. gentleman will read subsection 2, would not that meet the very objection he is urging to my argument? That gives the Finance Minister the power, when he desires to bring in a tariff, to investigate certain things. But I want to point out this contingency: Suppose there is a demand on the part of the public to have a certain industry investigated, for instance, the shoe manufacturing industry, and the Finance Minister does not think it should be investigated. Should not the Tariff Commission of their own motion, be entitled to go into that questioh, under subsection 2?


Herbert Brown Ames: If anything is to be accomplished by this Tariff Commission in the way of gradually accumulating a library of facts and definite information that will serve as a basis, not only for the first tariff Bill, but for all subsequent tariff measures, they must proceed in an orderly manner. Naturally there will be but one authority to which applications for dealing with specific subjects will be made, and that is the government, and naturally there must be some special commission that will determine in the various claims which are made which claim is the most urgent and of' the most immediate importance. Somebody has to take the responsibility of saying to that commission; You will study such and such subject first, and such and such subjects next, and you will report to us from time to time as you complete your inquiries in these various categories, and then we shall determine what action to take, and as to whether that action shall be immediate or deferred. You will surely get into confusion if you sit here and say to them, Go away, start on any subject you like, take your own time, study any subject you please, and report at any time you please, and we in the meantime will go cn with cur business. This government will have to decide on what subjects they consider tariff legislation is of most urgent importance. Thei'efore, they will say to that commission:	Devote your energies first to such
and such a subject, and when you have dealt with that, go on with the other schedules. I think I am right in saying that in the course of two or three years every item in our tariff schedules, we may' reasonably expect, will be submitted to the consideration of this commission, they will send in probably a dozen volumes of reports in due course to the govern-ernment, and in due course these reports will reach this parliament; but the order

they will take will have to be determined by the government, and through the Finance Minister indicated to this Tariff Commission. Now clauses 1 and 2 deal with a limited, definite and narrow sphere of activity, in which the order would be determined by the Minister of Finance. Clauses 3 and 4 are much wider, they are of a general character, and in 3 and 4 the indication comes from the Governor in Council, and probably the report will be made to the Cabinet direct. Those are matters somewhat out of the routine, not a consecutive investigation of tariff schedules. Number 3, I think, relates to combines, 4 relates to trade treaties, and those, as they from time to time come before the House and require attention, will be referred to the commission only when the government think it is of sufficient imoortance to interrupt them in their regular work, and ask them to take up these special subjects from time to time as they arise.
Now, as to foreign countries, the hon. gentleman suggests that we shall be able to obtain no information in foreign countries. In the first place, let me point out that the United States is having no difficulty in getting information from a great many sources. That information can be obtained by us through consular assistance, we can get it through the assistance of the British Embassy. Further than that there is no reason why we should not avail ourselves of some of the information that has been acquired by other commissions of investigation; we will not be above taking advantage of any investigations that the American Tariff Commission have carried on abroad, which, in the opinion of our commissioners, will be of use to this government.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER.: The more we proceed with this Bill the more it becomes apparent that we are moving in a vicious circle. Everybody agrees that we should have information that will be of assistance to the government, as well as to the public generally, to enable them to form a correct judgment upon ' tariff matters. This is a general proposition to which nobody objects. There are two methods of obtaining this information. It was suggested from this side of the House that we might employ a statistical bureau to be attached to one of the departments, the Department of Finance or the Department of Trade and Commerce, and that this information might be collected, as it is collected in Britain, to some extent in this country, and to a larger extent in the United States.
A statistical bureau would have been under the jurisdiction and control of one of Mr. AMES.
these departments and would have done everything that is now suggested by the hon. member for Montreal, St. Antoine (Mr. Ames). But, this idea has been set aside. They are not satisfied to have a statistical bureau. The idea has been spread, and nobody has spread it more widely or solemnly than the hon. member for St. Antoine himself that we should have a big, independent commission composed of the biggest men we can find for the task. If we are to have such an independent commission, if it has been settled by the great majority, that we shall have such a commission, and that it shall not be merely a statistical bureau under ministerial responsibility, I take it that it should be a very high toned commission and that it should be composed of the biggest men, to use the language of my hon. friend, that the country can afford. Well then, if we are to have such a commission, if it is to have the character which the hon. member for Montreal, St. Antoine, wants to give it, is he of the opinion that this commission should be under the control of the minister as any clerk might be? That is what he wants it to be. He wants these big men, the biggest men the country can supply, to be placed under the jurisdiction and control of the minister, to obey his commands, as they might be given to any clerk in the Department of Finance, or in the Department of Trade and Commerce. I would have been satisfied to have had the work done by clerks as it is done elsewhere, but that is not the idea of the hon. member for St. Antoine. He has combated that idea, he wants the biggest men the country can afford to come here at $7,000 a year, and be under the control of the minister as any clerk might be. The idea which has been suggested by my hon. friend behind me (Mr. Guthrie) is that if we are to have such a commission, it should be an independent commission, to undertake this work and that the commands should go to the commission not from a minister but from parliament, itself, to do the work which it is suggested to do. It has to do what?-To collect information which would be reported to parliament, available to everybody, to the minister, of course, primarily, I admit, but to everybody else, also. The commission would -do that work and at the end of the year we would have a volume giving us all the information that it had collected. The command goes to the commission to do what?- to collect information regarding:
(a)	the price and cost .of raw materials in Canada and elsewhere, and the cost of transportation thereof from the place of production to the place of use or consumption;
(b)	the cost of production in Canada and elsewhere;
(c)	the cost .of transportation from the place of production to the place of use or

consumption, whether in Canada or elsewhere;
(d)	the cost, efficiency and conditions of labour in Canada and elsewhere;
(e)	the prices received by producers, manufacturers, wholesale dealers, retailers and other distributors in Canada and elsewhere;
(f)	all conditions and factors which affect or enter into the cost of production and the price to the consumers in Canada;
(g)	generally, all the conditions affecting production, manufacture, cost and price in Canada as compared with other countries.
If the character of this commission is to be maintained, as we conceive it should be, since we have discarded the other method which I mentioned a moment ago, I think the commission should not be subjected to the control of the minister or of the Governor in Council, but of parliament alone. It must collect that information, put it in book form, and report to parliament.


Mr. AIKINS.: Assuming that the government wishes to formulate a policy when parliament is not sitting, and that the information has already been collected by the board, to whom should the board report in order that the government might formulate its policy?
Sir WILFRID LAUR1ER. The commission will report to parliament, the government will formulate its policy upon it, and I shall have, like anybody else, as a member of parliament, the right to criticise the action taken by the government. What I contend is, that if you are to depart from the principle which has been adopted elsewhere, of having information of this character collected under ministerial responsibility by a statistical bureau, then the commission must be under the direct control of parliament. It should not be possible for the government to interfere with its work. If the government, as was suggested a moment ago by the hon. member for St. Antoine, wanted to have some particular information upon some point, the minister, under section 2, could say:	I
. want a special report upon this or that point. If somebody comes to parliament and asks to have some matter investigated if somebody comes, as was suggested by the minister a moment ago, and asks for a duty upon such an article, or the removal of the duty upon another article, and it becomes a question whether or not that article is manufactured in Canada, the minister may refer the matter to the commission, and get the information in that way. If the Governor in Council wants to have some information upon some other matter, then again, he can apply to the commission. What I suggest to my hon. friends is, that if they want to be consistent in this matter, and if we are to have all we expect to have from this commission and the work that is intended to be done
by it, and which is enumerated in clause 4, the commission should not be subject to interference by the minister. The commission should be primarily responsible to parliament. I repeat that this does not prevent the minister or the Governor-in-Council, if they want to have special information upon any matter, from applying to the commission, and securing that information, but I feel very strongly that if we are to have this commission as it is intended, and as we always understood it to be, an independent commission, it should not be liable to be controlled by the-I will not say caprice,-but by the authority of the minister. It should be under the control of parliament and of (parliament alone, primarily. My hon. friend to use his own words, states that this commission should be composed of the biggest men the country can give us. Does he believe that, if we have a commission composed of the most eminent business men of the city of Montreal, they will be satisfied to be treated as clerks, under the Department of Finance or the Department of Trade and Commerce? Is it not better, if we are to have the benefit of their business ability, training and knowledge, that they should go on untrammelled and prepare for the next session of parliament a report on these important subjects which are enumerated in section 4?


William Thomas White: My right hon. friend (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) has returned to the question of whether it is advisable to have a bureau or a Tariff Commission. One would think that the idea of a Tariff Commission had never come to the mind of my right hon. friend before. I desire to call the attention of the House to the report of a speech which my right hon. friend delivered in the City of Montreal in October, 1908, on which occasion Ire was the honoured guest of the Canadian Manufacturers' (Association, about, which we have heard so much during the last two days. I intend to read some extracts from what he is reported to have said. Discussing the woollen tariff he said:
As you know-you have referred to it, it has been part of your debates-you approached the government during the last session to have an increase in the woollen duties, and I will preface whatever remarks I may have to offer now by the fact that I was not a member of the Tariff Commission which prepared the tariff which was adopted in 1907.
That was a commission or committee of ministers.
The members of the commission were my colleagues, Mr. Fielding, the Minister of Finance, Sir Richard Cartwright, the Minister of Trade and Commerce, Mr. Paterson, the Minister of Customs and Mr. Brodeur, the Minister of Marine and Fisheries.
When they brought in their report, and when they embodied it in the form of the

Act of 1907, I think it was pretty generally accepted at that "time that they had reached about a happy medium, and taking it all in all, that the tariff was fairly satisfactory. But it so happened that in the course of a few months, the woollen industry, which it must be admitted has not been flourishing very much for the last few years, became embarrassed and was brought into very serious difficulties. Then we were approached to make some concessions to increase the duties.
I understood the right hon. gentleman to say yesterday that he was a free trader, or that he believed in tariff for revenue only, and if I am under a wrong impression as to that I would like to be corrected now. Well, at this time, the right hon. gentleman had been asked to consider the question of the tariff duties with regard to the woollen schedule, and he said to his audience further on in his speech:
Why is it that you cannot produce what is produced hy the British manufacturer? Well, Sir, if it be that the conscience of the Canadian manufacturer is too severe, that they will give only pure wool and nothing else, I say that is not business. I tell you I am not a business man, but the first rule of the business man is to give to his customer what lie wants to buy. And if that be true, why is it that you do not give him that cloth which he wants to buy? That is the reason and it seems to me to be a very strong argument. This was the answer which was given to me upon the very anxious inquiries which I made -the answer that was given to me was this -the British manufacturer can produce the cheap article of cloth from East India wool and from cheap waste which he gets at a price which the Canadian manufacturer cannot have. Well, Sir, that is a satisfactory answer, so far as I am concerned.
I am sorry my hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Clark) is not here; yesterday he said the end of production was consumption and I set out that doctrine of the hon. member for Red Deer against the statement- of the right hon. the leader of the opposition when he says that, so far as he is concerned, the answer is satisfactory :	v
If it he true that the Canadian consumer wants that cloth, if it he true that the British manufacturer can have the raw material of that cloth cheaper than the Canadian manufacturer can have it in Canada, that is a condition of things which is in itself one to be considered, and which cannot be overlooked.
Why cannot it be overlooked; what is wrong about the British manufacturer obtaining this raw material more cheaply than the Canadian manufacturer; if there is anything in the theory advanced yesterday by my right hon. friend, where is he concerned in the cost of the raw material to the British manufacturer? I say that this statement here does not square with the policy laid down by the right hon.


William Thomas White: 
Wilfrid Laurier: Please read again what I said before that.


William Thomas White: This is what my right hon. friend said:
There was a remedy at hand and that remedy was to send to England and to Germany a commission not of politicians, a commission not of party heelers, but a commission of good substantial business men.
[DOT]2953

My right hon. friend says ' hear, hear,' but let me ask him who was to appoint that commission? Why, of course the government would appoint that commission, and the arguments advanced here a3 to the kind of commission this government might appoint would apply equally to the kind of men my right hon. friend would appoint on his commission. Let us see what my right hon. gentleman says with regard to that:
Why, sir, I subscribe to that with both my bands.
There is nothing qualified about that; he has both hands up for it; he has both hands up for a commision of business men to investigate and report, so that his government, upon the report made by them may take such action as is necessary in connection with the tariff. And remember, these remarks of the right hon. gentleman are in reference to only one schedule of the tariff, and if the principle is correct with regard to one schedule, why not in connection with two schedules, or ten schedules, or twenty schedules for that: matter. Where is the difference in principle? Why there is no difference in principle at all. No hon. gentleman opposite would, I am sure, contend for a moment that there is any difference in the principle of the thing; it is only a question of what number of inquiries shall be -made by the commission. The right hon. gentleman says further:
Why, sir, I subscribe to that with both my bands if there is a case made out for investigation; but I have to say to my friend who has made tlie suggestion, that this very idea the Canadian government has already adopted. The last time that we received this delegation at Ottawa, some time in the mouth of July

That- refers to a delegation about this very matter of customs duties, and, as 1 indicated in my speed), delegations- and petitions come to the Minister of Finance from time to time on matters of tariff, and the first question that comes up is: what are the facts. The right lion, gentleman continues:
-in the conversation I had with my friend the Minister of Customs, when I told him that we must do something, or look into this case and see whether or not something should he or should not be done, he suggested himself that we should send at once a commissioner to England

In other words, the quest for facts that I have been talking about.
-he suggested at once that we should send a commissioner to England; not a. party heeler

The right lion, gentleman _is evidently afraid that in some way they might succeed in getting a party heeler on his commission.
t


Wilfrid Laurier: Hear, hear.


William Thomas White: My right hon. friend seems to suspect his own government because, remember, it was his own government that was to appoint this commission. He seems to have it in his mind, it was an impression probably based on past- experience, that there might be a party heeler on his commission and so he announces twice that there should not be a party heeler, and them he says:
Not a politician.
He is afraid also of politicians. The right hon. gentleman's own experience leads him to believe that there must necessarily be a party heeler or a politician on his commission, and from what lias been said by him it would seem to me there was reason for suspicion that possibly, in spite of his best intentions there might be on his commission a party heeler or a politician. Well, let me assure my hon. friend the leader o-f the opposition, that the same conditions will not obtain with this government as appear to have obtained formerly in that regard. He himself suggested in his speech that we should at once send a commissioner to England, not a party heeler, not -a politician, 'but a business man, an expert, just what we are contending for in this commission; a commission of experts, of business mien, of capable men, to obtain information upon which we may act rationally in connection with tariff 'matters. That is just what my right lion.' friend was aspiring to, only he did not carry it out as we propose to carry it out. The right hon. gentleman continued:
-not a party heeler, not. a politician, hut a , business man, an expert, and I have reason to believe, though I have not spoken to Mr. I'aterson since this expert has already been sent by him to England, and he is now doing the work. (Applause.)
That statement was followed with applause, as no doubt we would expect to have such -a statement followed with applause, when made by my right hon. and eloquent friend. He continues to say;
Gentlemen, I am not here to say that your demand is just or unjust; I am not here to say that your request is fair or unfair, that it is right or not right

Here, he is not in a position to pronounce, because he has not the facts. He continues:
-hut I am here to say that your complaints are such that they are entitled to the fullest consideration on the part of the Canadian government. We have not been willing up to the present time to disturb the tariff; it is only 24 months old, not even so yet; and therefore, if we are to have a principle of stability about the tariff we should proceed very leisurely upon all such inquiries. But at all

events there is a grave condition of things and we are prepared to meet it and to meet it in the manner which I have suggested.
And the manner be has suggested is, by appointing a commission to obtain the tacts upon which the government might act, and that is precisely the principle that is embodied in this Bill.
I hope that this will command the assent of every reasonable man, as you are all reasonable men at this hoard.
Now, if that commanded and should command the assent of every reasonable man, why is it unreasonable that we should appoint a Tariff Commission by this Bill to do precisely the same work as that which my right hon. friend has in view, and with precisely the same object, namely, that we might have information on which we can construct a rational tariff?


Mr. FOSTER (North Toronto).: What date was that?


William Thomas White: 1908.


Wilfrid Laurier: Not a bad speech, either.


William Thomas White: It was a splendid speech It is a lesson and a model, and I am only sorry that my right hon. friend has retrograded from the principles he laid down in that speech. It is one of the best arguments that I have run across for the appointment of a Tariff Commission, because it is based upon the desire of my right hon. friend for facts at a time when the question was up for his decision. My right hon. friend goes further, and talks of a permanent Tariff Commission. I wish to be fair to my right hon. friend: I do not . say that the commission of which he appeared to approve was precisely on all-fours with this proposed commission; but I am going to show from what he said that the principle of obtaining through a commission information on which the government would act is by no means a departure from the policy which he himself has laid down in the past. He said further:
There is just another idea as to which I want to have a word of expression. You have stated, Mr. Chairman, in your address that you desire to have a permanent Tariff Commission.
I must believe that my hon. friend was sincere in his address to this association, and was not merely flirting with them politically. He said:
I do not exactly realize yet what is meant by a permanent Tariff Commission; but I am free to say that if it be meant that you would have a permanent commission such as I think they have in the United States

What about that cheap Yankee device which we heard about from the hon. member for South Wellington?
Mr. WHITE (Leeds'
-to follow the workings of the tariff from day to day, to follow the incidents, to follow the effects upon the producers and the consumer, and its daily effects upon the community, I do not see any reason why such a commission should not be appointed.
My right hon. friend and the Canadian Manufacturers' Association were evidently in perfect accord after that historic dinner, which took place in October, 1908. How far he has modified his views since, and how consistent he is in his modification of such views, I leave this House to judge. A little further on he said this:
I must be careful.
What lie has said lie has said carefully, and I think he said a good deal. If ne had not in mind that he must be careful,
I do not know how much further he would have gone. He went on:
You know parliament was dissolved yesterday and we are in the heat of an election now. My second is Mr. Monk, a prominent member of the opposition, and I must not make any promises, because I don't know what will be the consequences. I make no promises, but I say the matter will be looked into very carefully by my associates any myself.
With regard to what the right hon. leader of the opposition, and the hon. member for * South Wellington have said with regard to the members of the commission being treated as clerks, either they have entirely misconceived the purpose of this Bill, which I can hardly believe possible in view of the explanations which have been given, or they are continuing to read into this Bill something that does not and never did exist in it. Now, what is the principle of the Bill? Hon. gentlemen talk about a Tariff Commission independent of the government. The principle of this Bill is this, and it cannot be anything else under our constitutional system: The government is responsible for the tariff, and that responsibility cannot be devolved upon an outside body. This commission is a body ancillary to the government, directed by the government to accomplish certain purposes, namely, to give us the information that we need in framing a rational tariff. The expression ' under the direction of the minister means simply this, that instead of letting a commission, who are not directly responsible to the people, as the government is, pursue any desultory investigation they desire, they must be under the control or direction of the minister, who must know what matter is more urgent than others.


Hugh Guthrie: Is not that provided for in subsection 2?


William Thomas White: No, it is not. The first clauses are general clauses. To say that a commission might start out and pur-

sue its investigation into anything here, there or elsewhere, would be simply to destroy the very purpose of a- commission, which is to accomplish results, to bring about efficiency, to give us the information that we need from time to time in order to frame our tariff rates, and in order to remedy defects in the tariff as they become known, and the minister, informed by public opinion in many ways, realizes that there are certain things that must be investigated before anything else, and he is responsible. This only means that the minister must give the commission direction as to the lines of inquiry it is to pursue in order that it may be'a useful part of the machinery of government for obtaining the information desired.
My hon. friend evidently has the conception that this should be an independent commission roving at its own sweet will in a desultory fashion about the country, not directed in any way, not responsible to the government, and bringing down reports and handing them to parliament. My hon. friend spoke about subverting the principles of the constitution. If the Bill were drawn along the line he suggests it would go very far to justify that criticism. The (purpose of the Bill is to enable the government primarily responsible, to obtain information upon which it might first make up its mind as to tariff changes and then bring them down to this House. As I have said, the information is departmental, it is contained in reports to the department and as such as subject to the orders of the House as is other departmental information. Let us assume that instead of a Tariff Commission, we had a bureau of statistics. A great deal of information would be acquired from time to time by that bureau. Does any hon. gentleman mean to say that if this House asked that the information accumulated by the bureau should be brought down, it would not be produced? It is preposterous, of course, it would be' brought down. There is no difference in kind between the information accumulated by the Tariff Commission and that which would be accumulated by such a bureau, as my hon. friend has referred to, it would be precisely the same kind of information obtained in one case by a tribunal and in the other by a sub-department of the finance department, by clerks or experts as my hon. friend has said. That being the case, all the arguments that have been brought forward by my hon. friend from South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) must fail of their effect.
Subsection 2 refers to other matters, as for example whether Canada is able or likely to manufacture certain commodities. This commission should in time, become skilled with regard to matters of this kind. What are the resources of Canada with regard to raw material, what would be the
effect of a certain change in tariff, anything that, as a matter of fact, relates to the tariff or is connected with its administration and not included in the preceding sections may, by virtue of that subsection, be referred by the minister to the commission for inquiry and report. Subsection 4 has been made very wide indeed to cover matters not specifically covered by the preceding subsections. I think the objections raised are fanciful, they disappear when we come to examine them.


Wilfrid Laurier: What we are discussing at this moment is what should be the character of the commission which parliament is now creating, should it be an independent commission or a commission ancillary to the government. My hon. friend (Mr. White), has endeavoured to fortify himself by opinions expressed in 1908 during a debate in which I discussed two questions, one of them being the woollen duties. I then said that I had no objection whatever to sending a special commission to Great Britain and Germany to investigate the matter. That is done by all governments at all times: The government have power now to appoint men for the very puupose of obtaining information upon certain matters. There was nothing extraordinary about my suggestion, but that is no precedent for what we are doing now. My hon. friend would have found something more to the point in the other part of my speech, in which I said that we might consider the advisability of having such a commission, as they then had in the United States. That was considered perhaps too ambitious. There was then in the United States no such commission as has been appointed by President Taft, they had something very much in the nature of a bureau of statistics that collected very valuable information upon prices, methods of production, Taw material &c., and I thought at the time that we might very well create a similar bureau. But this idea has been discarded, my hon. friend is not to-day introducing legislation to provide for such a commission as they had at that time, he is copying rather what has been done since under the administration of President Taft, he is really copying the Bill introduced in Congress, but not yet passed. We have discarded the idea I then had of having a commission ancillary to the government, a branch of the administration and we are appointing a broad and wide and big commission. The impression has been created in the public mind since the introduction of this Bill that my hon. friend is creating a very broad and independent commission. The commission ought to be one thing or the other, it ought to be an ancillary commission or rather a statistical bureau such as we have designed, under his own control,

or else a parliamentary commission primarily responsible to parliament. What is the objection of my hon. friend to this? He said that an independent commission could go at its own sweet will and do anything it pleased. I beg to differ from him. This commission could not go at its own sweet will, it would have to do what it was enjoined to do, to collect intormation on this, that and the other subject, upon the cost of production, upon raw materials, upon transportation, upon methods of manufacture, upon prices, and bring that information before parliament. That would be the first thing to be done, such a commission could not go out at its own sweet wili but would have to fulfil the duty imposed on it by parliament. My hon. friend in another part of the Bill very properly reserves to himself the power to impose certain work upon the commission and he reserves to the Governor in Council also the power to impose certain other work upon the commission. To say that under such circumstances the commission should be simply under the jurisdiction of the minister is not in accordance with the conception of the feature of the commission which would give it its greatest usefulness, that is that it should be an independent commission. The present government have appointed several commissions to deal with different subjects. These commissioners have been given certain powers, they have been instructed to do certain work. Does the minister believe now that it would be possible for the Governor in Council to go back to these commissioners, and say: You shall do your work in such and such a manner. Such a course is inconceivable. This is the same thing, this should be above all things a parliamentary commission, of course with power to the government to use it when they think it advisable to do so.


Mr. MACLEAN (South York).: In the creation of this commission and of previous commissions, I think we are taking rather the wrong method. We should not spend too much time here in discussing what the powers of the commissioners are to be, we should rather follow the example of the United States where the special commissioners are placed under the direction of the President or with us it would be under the general direction of the government. The Bills creating these commissions should riot go into details as does the Bill creating the Grain Commission.
But the responsibility should be on the government of directing the commission. The government having full responsibility, ought, in each case, to define the reference made to the commission. In that way, you would reach an ascertainment of the facts and a realization of the object of Sir WILFRID LAURIER.
the commission, far better than by detailed definition with regard to the commission under an Act of parliament. Rather than maintain the policy that we appear to have adopted here, I would see the powers of the commission made very general, the whole placed under the direction of some responsible minister, and then hold the government to responsibility. And the government ought to assume that responsibility and define the reference in every case. In the case of the Railway Commission, the work to be done is different. In that case you have to be more definite in outlining the powers to be exercised. But in the case of commissions of this kind which, as has been said here, are ancillary to the government, the definition ought to be broad and general, and the responsibility ought to be on the government. There will be cases that cannot be reached, even with all the care that we can exercise. My view with regard to these commissions is that we must have more of them, and that we are going to have more of them.
Sir WILFRID LAURIER, Government by commission.


William Findlay Maclean: Yes, I have no doubt that there will be more and more government by commission, but with it should go more and more responsibility on the part of the government for the work of the commission. What I wish to keep clear is the absolute responsibility of the government to the people. That secured, I am not so much concerned about the details. Our Statute-book is getting too large; we are taking up too much of our time with all these details. 1 contend that you would get a better administration ar.d a better investigation if you maintain clearly the responsibility of the government. It may be that after a while a commission of this kind will build up a practice and will have rules that will have the effect of law. The cou-ts that we have created, while they administer the law, have made rules that are particularly a part of the law, and that are observed and respected by every one. That is what we want to get into our commissions; we want to get a flexibility and yet an effectiveness that will be equal to the occasion, and this cannot be attained with too much limitation and definition. Create a commission with broad powers and under a responsible head-as they say in the United States, ' under the direction of the President.' 1 regretted to hear the discussion of details here in the matter of the Grain Commission. I would rather see a law creating a Grain Commission under the direction of the government to deal with

the grain trade of the country. I am not so much dissatisfied with the Bill now before us, but rather object to the discussions here of limitations in connection with the commission.
Sir \YILFRID LAURIER. That sort of doctrine would well have suited Charles I.


William Findlay Maclean: I am not talking the.doctrire of Charles 1, but the doctrine of responsibility to the people. And the way to maintain an effective responsibility is to give broad powers and then hold those to whom they are given responsible for the exercise of those powers. If you have that as you ought to have it, in this commission, something will be done.
What little study of the tariff I have made leads me to believe that the facts can be ascertained by some kind of inquiry, and that men outside of parliament, men authorized to do it, will get thost facts, will analyse them and present them. And these men will be a board or court where those who wish to be heard can be heard, and all the facts presented. That will relieve parliament. We are talking of parliament being overworked. If the threshing out of facts can take plaee outside of parliament, and if we can get a statement for the guidance of parliament, it will facilitate the work of parliament.


Wilfrid Laurier: Or dispense with it,


William Findlay Maclean: No, facilitate it. I know of nobody who did so much to take away the responsibility of government and the rights of parliament, as did the right hon. gentleman (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) himself.


An hon. MEMBER.: Explain.


William Findlay Maclean: 
George Eulas Foster: I would like to say a word; and first, to express a little faint surprise at the position taken ky. the right hon. leader of the opposition (bir Wilfrid Laurier) which I have heard here for the first time, not having had the pleasure of hearing him ithe other afternoon. I think it will help us in parliament and in the country as well to look a little at the genesis of this commission. What has given rise to the talk about a commission, and to the idea that such an instrumentality as the commission was necessary? It arose out of the practical difficulties met in obtaining information for tariff legislation and out of the general impression, not only with the ministers themselves, who had to gather information, but with almost every interest in the country, that the information gathered was fragmentary and was not in its width or accuracy information upon which a tariff should be based. Sometimes the committee of ministers that went around the country were referred to as the ' Tariff Commission. ' They were a tariff commission in no sense at all. They were a commission in. no sense at all. They were simply three or four gentlemen who having gone about certain portions of the country hearing people giving their various views for and against different phases of a tariff measure, tariff proposals, tariff wishes and wants, made up their minds as best they could.
But I think I am not violating any confidence, when I say, as a member of one of those so-called commissions, or better, committees of parliament, it was never satisfactory, and never resulted in what was intended. In fact, the ministers themselves, passing to and fro through the country, listening for an hour to-day end-an hour to-morrow to the divergent and different views, almost always sketchy, ended by having a more hazy idea than probably they had when they started out.
I went over this country from one end of it to the other, holding, in connection with my colleagues, open meetings, where everybody was welcome, and where we listened to what the people had to say. It resulted in this, that mostly you heard long-winded statements made by people who were fond



of talking, and generally people who had some particular fads to air. You could not turn them down, you were a committee of ministers, and the public was invited, and you had to listen to them courteously. You got another kind of information. You had carefully prepared expert statements by those who were advocating a certain interest, who came there to advocate a certain side of it, who would not look at arguments on the other side, who made as completely an ex parte case as they possibly could, and added to it their figures and their statements; a bulky document was filed away by your secretary, and taken along with you for the rest of the trip. Now, after that had gone on for one, two, or three months, or more, the ministers. came together to frame a tariff. What had they ? A lot more or less hazy impressions, where one blended with the other to such an extent that you scarcely had any clear idea of any one phase of the question; bundles, and bundles, and bundles of documents and statements, which you never afterwards looked at, which you were not able to digest, and which, when parliament called for them, were stacked up on the table so numerous that any man who looked at the outside of the package never thought of going into them. You had long statements, but no digestion or analysis of those statements. The ministers themselves were not able to digest or analyse those statements, the secretaries were not able to do it. It required expert men who understood that kind of thing, who made it their study, and had gone over them, had gone to the very bottom of them, and had added to the knowledge of them, knowledge gained otherwise, to make any fair analysis. I put it to my right hon. friend, and if his late Minister of Finance or his Minister of Customs were here, I would put it to them, whether what I am saying with reference to the modus operandi is not absolutely true. As a matter of fact, in the olden times my colleagues and myself came and sat down in the hurly burly of an approaching or a continuing session, hearing everybody; without having time to make investigation and making a more or less rule -of thumb tariff. Hoping that we might do what was the best in the main but hardly ever sure, and basing it upon no careful analysis of the conditions. I do not doubt for a moment, that if Mr. Fielding were here, he would rise in his rplace and say that his experience was much like mine. Out of that, the ministers began to feel, and the people of this country, especially the business interests, began to feel, that there was a better way to get at the basis of a tariff, namely to choose men whose whole business it should be, not to make schedules, not to lay down percentages, not in any sense to Mr. FOSTER (N. Toronto).
recommend that this should be protected or that should be protected, not to tell you that you ought to have a tariff here and you ought to have a certain tariff there, not to intimate to you what protection they thought was necessary in this case or that case; but men whose sole business and duty it was to get at the whole facts of the case, and place those facts before the government, before parliament and before the people at large. You say sometimes that this is to relieve the government. It is a very -poor idea of it, that, if you say^ it is to relieve members of parliament, it is a very poor idea of it, that. The business of making tariffs will be just the hardest, and most delicate, and responsible business, when you have a basis of facts that a good commission has gathered, that it has ever been in this country. No minister or -ministry will hereafter be able to shield themselves behind generalities. Parliament itself will be put in possession of every fact that the ministers possess; every one of the 220 members of parliament will be an efficient check upon the ministerial quota that are laying before them what they propo-se to do in the matter of the tariff, -and in the matter of charges. They will be able to judge. Heretofore a minister has been able to escape behind generalities, he has been able to shield himself behind the ignorance of parliament with reference to the real conditions of every item upon which it was desired to act. After this, if this commission is rightly appointed, and if it rightly does its duty, not only the members will be judging the ministers, not only will the ministers be put on their mettle, because they have got to come to the touchstone of facts, but the intelligent country outside will have a chance of judging of a tariff such as it never had before.


Hugh Guthrie: Is it my hon. friend's idea that these reports will be brought down to parliament?


George Eulas Foster: I never had the least idea that they would not,


Hugh Guthrie: Is there any objection to making the Bill definite in that respect?


George Eulas Foster: All these reports given in the line of what is called for, in getting information which is the basis of tariff measures, is the property, not only of the government, or of the minister, but of parliament and of the country. Nobody, I think in this House, has ever had any other idea of it.


Mr. EDWARDS.: The Minister of Finance distinctly stated that yesterday.


George Eulas Foster: I think we elaborated this matter in council. So far as I am concerned, I never had any

other idea of it than that. So I say that that will be the position of things. No one will be able to shield himself behind an ex parte statement, or behind lack of knowledge when the knowledge will be there, and every intelligent man will be able to draw his own conclusions.
Now I consider this to be another great effect of a Tariff Commission of this kin/d. A (basis of facts is what we want to get at It is invaluable for the legislator, it is invaluable for the minister who is framing a tariff, it is invaluable for the business man; it is invaluable in this respect, that it prepares and puts before the country a touchstone where competent and incompetent men meet, as it were, on common ground, when grievances are raised or are alleged. To-day men honestly think that the tax upon agricultural implements is too high, that the men who are making them are making fortunes, and that this tax ought to be lowered.
They get the best information they can and they cite that information as a proof that their assertion is right. The man who is making implements, knowing, perhaps a little more about the modus operandi and. about the business itself, combats the farmer and says: No, you are wrong in your information; it i3 thus and so. Both of these are ex parte statements, whatever else you may say about them. The farmer never wants to get rid of any fair proportion of taxes that he ought to contribute to the government and upkeep of this country. The farmer is willing to pay his proper proportion of taxes, but he wants to know that he is not paying more than his proper proportion of taxes. He does not want to shirk his taxes, neither does any other good citizen of this country. Now, in a dispute like that, is it not invaluable to have the absolute facts, as near as you can ascertain them by a commission or a committee of men, whose duty it is to get at the facts, who become skilful in getting facts and skilful in1 placing them in the way in which they can be most easily read and understood? Surely it is the touchstone to the farmer and the agricultural implement maker and their grievance is settled by reference to a standard of fact. But, if it is proved that, taking into account the whole business, its costs and charges; the tariff is too great upon that article, down it comes and no ministry can keep it up, because it is shown by the facts and the ministry could not find sup- ; port in parliament unless they were right 5 in that matter. Show that and it comes [DOT] down. Show the opposite and every fair- i minded_ man who believes in keeping the * industries of Canada intact, will surely say, i if it is not enough, let a little more be : added. But no commission dare say * whether it shall be lowered or whether it -94$
shall be heightened, whether it shall be 17 per cent, or 25 per cent, or 10 per cent. It is not their business .and they go outside of their business entirely when they attempt to do anything like that.
In addition to that, such a commission must have some directive power. It must have guidance. Who shall guide it? Shall parliament guide the commission ? You could not have a more bulky unmanageable guide than parliament to guide the commission. Parliament cannot discipline itself, cannot agree within itself; it is actuated by two entirely different ideas. The only way you can have correct guidance for a commission of this kind is by a committee of parliament which is responsible to parliament and responsible for its guidance of this commission. Why all these fanciful views as to what the government purpose to do or as to what will be done by this commission ? The government cannot shield themselves behind incorrect or wrong methods or methods which are not thorough in regard to this matter. Your commission is moving through the country in the sight of the world and of parliament, its results come-to parliament through the report which has been made to the minister. No ministry could successfully delegate their work to .a commission.
But remember that the minister is a politician. He is a Tory; he is a Grit; that is a fact, but there is neither Toryism nor Gritism in absolute facts, and this commission is told to go and get absolute facts A commissioner may be a Tory when he starts or a Grit when he starts, a protectionist when he .starts or a free trader when he starts-, but when he comes to the cost of cotton everybody knows that there is neither Toryism nor Gritism in determining the cost of cotton or wool, or leather, or the cost of the processes which are put upon them. Toryism or Gritism, free trade or protection, will have nothing to do with the matter; yet, you know that the men who get the results of the investigations of the commission will go to work and place upon these articles a tariff of so much per cent here and so much per cent there. It will be so whether they are protectionists, whether they are tariff reform men or whether they are free traders. This seems to me to be the simplest thing in the world.	I do not want to give mv
hon. friends advice; they are older in experience and certainly older in wickedness than I am; they do not need any advice from me, .but my wonder is that they have taken up .this position of absolute opposition to getting the facts. Liberals are not supposed to fear the facts. The time w-as in the years not long gone toy when we tried to lift the lid,, but the lid


Mr. SCHAFFNER.: Mr. Chairman, 1 only want to make a very few remarks on this important question and if I did not feel my responsibility in connection with the people that I have the honour to represent I would not perhaps trouble the committee at all. My right hon. friend (Mr. Borden) came west last fall and made the declaration that he would give the people a Tariff Commission. The more I have heard this question discussed in the House and the more I have thought over it, the more convinced I am that we aTe going to solve the problem of distrust between the two great divisions int-o which we might say the citizens of this country are divided. We can almost say that these two divisions are composed of the manufacturers on the one side and the agricultural -class on the other. So far as my experience goes, I think I can say without fear of contradiction that there has been for a great many years a feeling of distrust, of want of confidence, between these two great classes of citizens. Speaking for the west, I think I can say that we are almost tired and weary of the word * tariff.'


George Eulas Foster: Since I came to this House, the tariff has been a fpotent factor in our discussions. We read in history that one of the queens of England said that after her death the word ' Calais ' would be found written on her heart, and I believe. Sir, that if a post-mortem is ever. held on the members who have been sitting in this House for several years past, the word ' Tariff ' will be found written in their hearts. And, why is it that we have been so long in coming to a practical conclusion in connection with this great question. 1 have said that I believe there is distrust . and want of confidence between the manufacturing and the -agricultural classes in this country, and, personally I believe, as the Minister of Trade and Commerce has said, that that feeling has arisen simply because we fail to understand each other as is the case with regard to other questions which engage the attention of the people of this country. We in the west think we pay too much for our agricultural implements j I am mighty sure that the farmers in my constituency think so, at any rate. The manufacturers of Canada say, I suppose, that we are not paying too much, and who knows? I do not know, and one of the duties of this commission will be to find out. If we have the right kind of a commission, and I aim strong on that point of having the right kind of a commission, one of the utilities of that commission will be that they will give us such definite, such fair, and such independent information that you can place it before the farmers or any other class of the community and allow them to judge for themselves whether they are paying too much, or whether the manufacturer is asking too much. I have always listened with a great deal of pleasure and interest to the remarks of my hon. friend from South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) but I never heard him labour so, as he did the other day in this House, when he was trying to read into this Bill something which it absolutely does not contain. I say, Sir, if it contains what he and other hon. gentlemen opposite say it contains, I am opposed to it, and I go-further and I say that if it contains all that was read into it by my hon. friend from St. Antoine (Mr. Ames) I am also opposed to it. The great question is: who is this commission to serve. Hon. gentlemen opposite say it is going to serve the manufacturers.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Hear hear.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: Hon. gentlemen opposite say: 'Hear, hear,' to that, but my belief is" that it is intended to serve all classes of the community, and that is the kind of commission I want, and if we are honest about it, that is the kind of commission it will be. Once this Bill passes, then the most important question is as to

the personnel of this eommision. The Minister of Finance told us that no man would be appointed because of his occupation, and while that was a good thought, I would like if he had gone a little further, and said that no man would be kept off the commission because of his occupation. We want broad, big men on this commission, and, if the commission is going to do what I believe it can do, and what I hope, it will do, then we must have at least one member of it, whose environment has been amongst the great agricultural classes of this country. I believe that the men appointed on that commission will be fair, and will try to be fair-, but in order that we may get out of that commission all there is in it for the . best interest of Canada, we must have some man who understands the great agricultural classes of the community, and who is in sympathy with them. Now, as to whose charge this commission should be under. I have something to say, and there is no doubt that there must be somebody to run it, and by that, I do not mean to say that it is a machine.


Mr. TURRIFF.: I am afraid it is.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: I know my hon. friend (Mr. Turriff), is very suspicious, but I say to him that if we are to act in the best interests of all the people of Canada, _ we must get out of our minds this suspicion, and deal with the question fairly and squarely, as it presents itself to us.
^ Mr. TURRIFF. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Schaffner) has himself expressed more suspicion than any * gentleman who has yet spoken on the Bill.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: All right, if you believe so, but I am saying what I think. Of course, this commission comes very properly and very logically under the Minister of Finance, who has to do with tariff matters. The ^Minister of Finance must direct the commission, but, when I say that, I do not mean to be understood as saying that when this commission goes out to investigate any particular industry, the Minister of Finance is to direct the commission what to do. I would like to ask the Minister of Finance, if he goes that far, and' if he does, I am opposed to it. Supposing, for example, the farming industry of this country comes to the conclusion that something in connection with the tariff is bearing on them too heavily, and believes that it should be investigated, I do not take it that the Minister of Finance could or would prevent this class of the community from having this investigation into what they want to have investigated. I do not think he goes that far.


Hugh Guthrie: The Bill goes that far.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: I do not believe it does. The Bill says that the commission shall be under the direction of the Minister of Finance, but what part of the Bill goes any further than that?
Mr. OLIVER, Subclause 4 of section 4.
Mr. SCHAFFNER, What tjhat clause says is this:
It shall also be the duty of the commission to inquire into any other matter or thing in relation to the trade or commerce of Canada, which the Governor in Council sees fit to refer to the commission for inquiry or report.
Is that what the hon. gentleman refers to?


Hugh Guthrie: Suppose the minister does not direct, what happens then? We want to give the commission power to investigate that without the minister.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: I am not very familiar with responsible government; but it seems to me that the strongest point in favour of this commission is that it will remove the distrust to which _ I refer. While I am quite willing that the minister should direct the matter, I think that the agriculturists of this country who form a large proportion of the population, should be able to go to him and ask him to investigate any matter that they think should be investigated. I think that is a fair proposition, and I cannot think that the Minister of Finance would refuse such a request, whether it is provided for in the Bill or not. The whole object of this Bill, as I understand it, is to get information.
I am thoroughly in sympathy with the Bill.
I think it is the most progressive piece of legislation which has been, introduced into this House since I entered it, barring perhaps the Railway Commission, and I do not know but it is broader than that. I have always been in favour of the Railway Commission, and in my constituency I have given the right hon. gentleman who leads the opposition the greatest credit for establishing that commission, and have always recognized the good work it has done; and I believe that is an example of the good this Tariff Commission will do. I think that on both sides of the House we are reading into this Bill far more than it contains, because broad and big men aTe . not all in the manufacturing institutions, the railway institutions or any other particular institution. A broad and big man means a man familiar with the great work in which he is engaged, whatever it may be; and the personnel of this commission should be composed of men from at least two of the great classes in this country.


Robert Laird Borden: I think there has been on the other side of the House a great deal of misapprehension as to what these

words, ' under the direction of the minister ' are intended to convey. In subsection 1 of section 4, the character of the information to be obtained by this commission is set forth in considerable detail. Then, subsection 2, in order to make the scope of the commission thoroughly comprehensive, declares that ' the commission shall make inquiry into any otner matter upon which the minister desires information, in relation to any goods wnich, if brought into Canada or produced in Canada, are subject to or exempt from duties of customs, and shall report to the minister.' The third subsection deals with inquiries under the Customs /vet. The fourth subsection enables, not the minister but the Governor in Council, to direct the commission to make inquiry into any other matter or thing in relation to the trade or commerce of Canada. No one can deny that the scope of the commission is pretty comprehensive. In the first subsection the character of the information which the commission is to obtain is stated in considerable detail. The subjects in respect of which the commission is to obtain that information are not enumerated. Take, for example, the item of agricultural implements, which has entered into every tariff which we have had in this country for many years. In some section of the country an agitation might arise with respect to the duties on agricultural implements. The commission might be going on in the ordinary course, without any particular direction from the minister, to make inquiry into this or that or the other item of the tariff. It would be competent for the Minister of Finance, by virtue of those words 1 under the direction of the minister,' to say to them: Drop everything else, and Investigate the conditions with regard to the production of agricultural implements In Canada, and ascertain whether or not, having regard, to the conditions of production in this country as compared with the conditions in other countries, the tariff is too high. It is precisely for the very reason to which my hon. friend calls attention that these words * under the direction of the minister ' have been inserted in the Bill. The ministers of the Crown are responsible to parliament, and responsible through parliament to the people of this country; and if the people of any particular district in the country should find themselves pressed by conditions which prevail under the tariff as it may exist at any time, it should be open to them to make representations to the Minister of Finance, and it would be proper for him, having regard to those representations, to direct an inquiry into that particular grievance to the exclusion of everything else for the time being. That is the object of the Bill; and, as I apprehend the mat-Mr. BORDEN.
ter, the omission of those words from the Bill would prevent the Minister of Finance from directing the attention and energies of the commission to the matter to which I have alluded or to similar matters that might at once demand the attention of the government and the inquiry of the Tariff Commission. That is the whole theory, as 1 understand it. The people will have a commission which can make these inquiries, it will be the right of the people at all times to make representations to the government through the minister in charge; and it will he the duty of the minister in charge, upon these representations, to direct a proper inquiry to be made by this commission into all the conditions both in this country and in other countries which ought to control the framing of a tariff in that regard.


Mr. GERMAN.: Will the right hon. gentleman confirm what the Minister of Trade and Commerce stated, that the reports made by the commission would be laid before parliament on request?


Robert Laird Borden: That is entirely my apprehension of the matter.


Mr. OLIVER.: I think my hon. friend from Souris (Mr. Schaffner) is well advised in looking upon this Bill with some measure of suspicion. There has been so much protest as to what the Bill did not contain as to lead those of us who are, like my hon. friend from Souris, inclined to be suspicious, to think that perhaps after all there is something in it that is not disclosed on the surface; because often a Bill is important from what it does not contain rather than from what it does contain. I agree with my hon friend from Souris that the purpose in the mind of anyone who spoke in this country on behalf of a Tariff Commission was that it would give all classes of people in the country a fair deal. The hon. gentleman was particular to inquire as to where the farmers of the west came in, under the terms of this Bill. The right hon. the Prime Minister undertook to show him, but he did not find it and does not find it in the four corners of the Bill.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: He said he did.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend has just given this House an example of what this Bill is intended to do; as I said on the second reading, its purpose is to humbug the people of this country.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: I do not think so for a moment.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend is at liberty to have his own opinion, but I think the very statements he made to-day as to his understanding of the Bill and
[DOT]2973

as to what he understood the Prime Minister to say, is the evidence of that.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: That is your opinion.
Mr. OLIVER, Because there is not within the four corners of the Bill anything to show that there is any provision or that provision will be made or can be made under that Bill for considering the interests of the farmers in the matter of the tariff. It was open to the Finance Minister as to the Prime Minister to show where that is contained in the Bill. It is not contained.


William Cameron Edwards: In section 4.


Frank Oliver: It is a question as between my hon. friend and myself as to the knowledge of the English language, and I declare that in section 4 there is nothing which contemplates the consideration of the interest of the farmer by the Tariff Commission.


William Cameron Edwards: Then there is no part of the section that contemplates going into the consideration of the condition of any class, it contemplates a consideration of the condition of the farmer as well as of any other class.
Mr. OLIVER, That is where my hon. friend is entirely mistaken and it is another evidence of the success of the Bill and its promoter in humbugging the people of the country. My hon. friend has said no class is specified in this Bill. If he can find in the first eight subsections of section 4 anything but a direct allusion to the interests of the manufacturers of this country I will concede that he is right.


William Cameron Edwards: I think I can.


Frank Oliver: There is no need of our discussing the matter, I have expressed my opinion, my hon. friend has expressed his and our opinions are in the judgment of the House and of the country.


William Thomas White: Has my hon. friend's attention been called to the interpretation clauses of the Act:
' Goods,' means products, wares and merchandise.
And to the phrase in section 4:
In respect of goods produced in or imported into Canada,

In other words, to the fact that goods means products, the products of the farmer? I desire to tell my hon. friend that products were put in in order that there might be no doubt that this Bill applied to the products of the farmer as to the products of the manufacturer.


Frank Oliver: We are very glad to have the statement of the hon. the Minister of Finance (Mr. White) on the subject, but I would call his attention to the fact that this is the first time that any such interpretation has been put upon any provision of the Bill from start to finish.


William Cameron Edwards: In the interpretation of the word ' goods ' has he overlooked the specific mention of hoTses, cattle and other animals?


Frank Oliver: I am dealing with section 4 and with the discussion that has .gone on in regard to this Bill, and I say that by neither the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Trade and Commerce nor the right hon. the Prime Minister, my hon. friend from St. Antoine (Mr. Ames) or any other member of the House, who has spoken in regard to this Bill until the hon. member for Souris, has the question of the interests of the farming community been discussed or alluded to. It has been taken for granted by every one who spoke ill regard Jo the Bill that this was a Bill to deal with the manufacturing interests and with nothing else.


William Findlay Maclean: As they
affected the farmers too.


Herbert Brown Ames: Will the hon. gentleman allow me to correct his statement. At the beginning of my si leech he will find this:
Read the definition at the beginning of the Act. Goods are treated of throughout the whole Act, and what do goods include? They include products of the farm, horses, cattle and other animals, and everything that the farmer produces is just as highly subject and likely to be subjected to the inquiry of this commission in the interest of the farmer as are the goods which the manufacturers themselves produce.
Will my hon. friend please withdraw his remarks that I have not referred in any way to the farmer.


Frank Oliver: I regret that I had not the privilege of hearing my hon. friend speak, so I must apologize for having made that allusion to him, but I heard his speech quoted by other speakers, and I took it for granted that that expressed the leading idea of his speech, as I am certain it did.
i Mr. MEIGHEN. Might I remind him too that the other day I also referred to the same matter?


Frank Oliver: Of course I accept what my hon. friend has said, but I must admit that the fact is not in my mind as he has stated it. However, this Bill to provide for the appointment of a so-called Tariff Commission is a Bill to lay the foundation of a revision of the tariff upwards and everything that has been said on the other

side of the House on behalf of the Bill, must lead us absolutely to that- conclusion. There has been no suggestion that anything was likely to come out of the work of this commission that would tend to tariff revision downward. It is the farmer who is interested in tariff revision downward, and it is the man who represents the farmers and speaks for them, who is taking serious responsibility in supporting and advocating a measure which has no other purpose than to lay the foundation for a tariff revision upward, to lay more heavily than they lie to-day, the burdens of the tariff upon the farmer.
I am sorry my hon. friend from South York is not in the House. I wanted to agree with him as well as with the hon. member for Souris (Mr. Schaffner). The committee will remember how strongly he insisted on the desirability of retaining the responsibility of government, he thought we were paying too much attention to detail in discussing this Bill and that what we should do, was to provide a short Act that would place all power in the hands of the minister. We on this side are exactly at one with my hon. friend in this desire. What we want is that the minister shall take full responsibility for collec-h ing such information as he sees fit to collect and shall place it before the House on his responsibility when called upon to do so.
That is our idea of the proper way of collecting information upon which the minister is to base liis revision of the tariff-to collect that information on his own responsibility and that of the government, and place it before parliament when called upon as a report of the department and the government, for which he and his officials are responsible. But that is not what these hon. gentlemen want. What they want is that parliament shall take the responsibility for the collecting of information which shall be presumed to be independent and comprehensive information, and which shall to that extent be a fraud upon the people of the country, which shall, be partisan information collected at the direction of the Minister of Finance, taking such as he wishes to be taken, leaving out such as he does not wish to have taken. This information is to be placed before the country and before parliament, as occasion arises, as the report of a commission of parliament.
We do not object to information; we want information; we want the govern-metn to get all the information it can, and we want parliament to have all the information it can get, because in the last resort, although dhe government brings down a tariff measure, parliament has to support or oppose that measure. Each individual member must declare himself on that measure upon his responsibility Mr. OLIVER.
to his constituents. Therefore, every member of parliament is just as much entitled to the full information collected by a commission as the government is. And it' is because thisi means which is being taken by the government to collect information, is being taken in the name of parliament and under the name of a commission, when it is really, to all intents and purposes, departmental information, that we object to it. We say that if it is to be departmental, let it be departmental; and if it is to he a commission, let it be a commission. Let it be on the responsibility of parliament for the information of parliament, if this is to be a commission. But, if our friends opposite do not wish 10 give us a commission of that kind, then let them get their information as a department on their responsibility which it is within their right to do and which is just as proper a method of collecting information a3 the other;-under the responsible system of government it is a more correct method. Let them get their information that way; but let them not come before the country assuming to give the country an independent commission. An independent commission, if you please; when it is, in the last degree, a partisan commission directed by the minister, and reporting to him alone as if tiiey were the hired officials of his department. We say: Play fair; Play fair with the people; If you want to get credit for appointing a commission, if you want to claim that the information collected by this commission is impartial information, then let it be so. But do not come before parliament and the country claiming an impartial commission, when, as a matter of fact-,.you are doing neither more nor less than collecting information as though it were under the control, absolutely under the control, of the officials of the department.,
I would like to know how the position which is taken can be justified. They say that this commission is to be merely statistical. If so, there is no justification for the salaries that are to be paid. We are to have three commissioners drawing the same salaries as the members of the government-nay, the chairman draws a higher salary than the members of the government. And these commissioners, we are told, are to collect information; simply to collect infoimation. I say the price is too high; if the work is only to collect information they should not be paid ministerial salaries. But, if they are to be paid ministerial salaries, then their responsibility ought properly to be greater than merely to collect information. The position taken by the government is illogical and untenable in that regard.
But I want to have a word to say on my own account- in regard to the provisions
2977	FEBRUARY 13, 1912	2978
of the Bill contained in section 4. And I want to insist that there is something else t.o be considered by the government in connection with the tariff than merely the interests of the manufacturers.


William Findlay Maclean: Hear, hear.


Frank Oliver: There is something more to be considered than whethei a manufacturer is making a dividend or not, li this to be the purpose of the commission, then this commission is simply a means to enable the tribute-takers to increase their exactions. Remember, Mr. Chairman, that we are in this country at a very serious stage in the evolution of our affairs. We have had great development during the past few years, and with that development has come about a condition which is new, so far as this country is concerned, a condition which calls for the most careful attention of all representative men and certainly of the government of the country. I speak of the aggregations of capital which have come together as mergers, a new feature in the development of our country, a feature that has grown so rapidly and has became of such stupendous proportions that it claims the attention of our government; and particularly claims this attention in connection with any tariff adjustment that may be made. I find on reference to the ' Monetary Times '-and it is a good authority- that in the past three years there has been an increase of industrial capitalization by means of mergers from $125,000,000 to $335,000,000, and of this increase no less than $100,000,000 is capitalization that represents no actual investment. Now, the purpose of the merger is to earn dividends on the capitalization-otherwise there is no purpose in issuing that capital. And one way to secure the dividends is by manipulation of the tariff. And if this Tariff Commission, appointed by a government which owes its existence to these very combines


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.
Mr. OLIVER

which owes its very
existence to these very combines


Mr. BENNETT (Simcoe).: Where were the Massey-Harris interests in the last fight?


Frank Oliver: The Mas.sey Harris Company were with you, strongly.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does the hon. gentleman seriously say that Senator Jones and Senator Frost were supporting the Conservative party, and if so, where and when did they speak?


Frank Oliver: I will say certainly that they did not support the Liberal party.


Mr. MEIGHEN.: Who is the head of the cement trust he has so severely criticised in the House?


Frank Oliver: I could not say at the moment, but it does not make any difference who is at the head of any trust. I am not discussing persons, I am discussing facts and conditions, and I am trying to draw to the attention of the government the serious nature of these conditions.


Arthur Meighen: Does the hon. gentleman not remember that one year ago yesterday, when this subject was under discussion in the House a member of the government in which he had a place practically defended these mergers, and declared they were for the good of the country?


Frank Oliver: I do not really see what my hon. friend's allusion has to do with the question. I am dealing with a condition not with a theory; I am not dealing with what somebody else did at some other time or at some other place.


Arthur Meighen: You were a party to it.


Frank Oliver: Never mind. My hon. friend, if he votes for this Bill, is a party to an. undertaking to give value to the
over-capitalization of these mergers.


Arthur Meighen: I would be glad if you would show that now.


Frank Oliver: I have said that there is a hundred million dollars of stock issued for which not one dollar in money has been paid, and it is the purpose of the merger, by every influence it can bring to bear, to secure earnings on that common stock, that stock for which no money was paid. It is the business of mergers, and it is their interest, to secure such adjustment of the tariff as will bring about that result; and if section 4 of this Bill does not contemplate that inquiries of this kind shall be directed especially to the purpose of finding out just how far the taxation of the people can be increased so as to give earnings on that valueless stock, then I will admit that I do not understand the meaning of the English language.


Arthur Meighen: Just read the words.


Mr. LANCASTER.: Does not the section provide for ascertaining the facts, whatever they are?


Frank Oliver: For ascertaining the facts as directed by the minister. And who put the Minister of Finance in this House? Who does he represent in this House?


Richard Bedford Bennett: South Leeds.


Frank Oliver: He represents the interest
of the mergers, he represents that section of the Liberal party which was Liberal as long as Liberalism meant profit; but as

soon as Lib sralism meant principle was with the oth' r side.


Mr. PELLETIER.: Would the hon. gentleman be kind enough to tell us at what time Liberalism ceased to represent profit and began to represent principle?


Frank Oliver: The day that the Hon. Mr. Fielding announced the result of the reciprocity negotiations in this House so far as these people were concerned. It is to the Minister of Finance that we are to look for protection against the exactions that will be demanded from time to time by these mergers. The minister will excuse us if we have some suspicion as to the consequences. And we say again to him, he is in the saddle, he and his friends have secured the price, the responsibility is upon them. Let them take their price, but give us fair-play; and when he brings a Tariff Bill into this House let him do it on his responsibility as to the information upon which he bases it. Don't let him come here and ask this House to legislate to provide an independent commission that will be absolutely under his thumb. We want fair-play, nothing more; we want fair-play for the farmers as well as for the manufacturers.
Now I want to say that 1 am not here to represent the interests of the farmers as against the manufacturers; and in order to relieve the mind of my hon. friend from Portage la Prairie" (Mr. Meighen), who wants to know what my opinion is with regard to tariff questions, I will take the liberty of giving it. I believe the tariff is levied for the purpose of raising a revenue, and if it is not, it ought to be. That is the foundation purpose of a tariff, and when we have a tariff that is adjusted for the purpose of raising a revenue, it is not unreasonable that such protection as is incidental to that tariff should be enjoyed by whoever may be fortunate enough to come under it. What I wanted to say was that the tariff, in my judgment, ought to be established not for the purpose of raising a revenue, and -when the tariff is established not for the purpose of as the Minister of Finance suggested in his speech, of developing our resources or increasing our- industries, then, in my judgment, that is a perversion of the proper purpose of a tariff; because you cannot develop resources, you cannot increase industries by increasing taxation. I hope I have made my position clear in regard to the tariff. Hon. gentlemen on the other side declare that we on this side stand for free trade. For my own part I believe that free trade is the idea] way of carrying on the trade of the country, and that the revenue should be raised by direct taxation. But because I have a certain Mr. OLIVER.
ideal, that is not to say that I expect that ideal to be attained. I must accept conditions as they are, and I have stated to the House, frankly, exactly what my views are, and what are the views of hon. gentlemen on this side of the House.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman says he believes in protection incidental to a revenue tariff.


Frank Oliver: No I did not.


Arthur Meighen: I am in the judgment of the House. Will the hon. gentleman repeat his sentence in which lie used the term ' protection ' incidental to revenue tariff?


Frank Oliver: I say, I believe in a tariff so adjusted as to produce a revenue, and I am willing to concede, and it is not unreasonable to concede, that the incidental protection should go to the advantage of such interests as may be affected by it.


Arthur Meighen: Does the hon. gentleman say that there should be any protection incidentally, or does he agree with the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark) that there should be a tariff for revenue without any incidental protection.


Frank Oliver: I have tried to put to my hon. friend that my ideal is exactly the same as the ideal of the hon. member for Red Deer, but, having tried to show my hon. friend exactly how I looked at this question from a practical standpoint, I hope I have made myself clear although I cannot hope that I have altogether suited my hon. friend by my expression.


Arthur Meighen: What does my hon. friend understand by an ideal that we cannot enforce?


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend will pardon me if I just emphasise this point that when we have declared from time to time that there was such an ideal in our minds, we have not by any means, declared that that ideal is our policy. Our Bon. friends have been trying to humbug the public in trying to place us in that position. We are dealing with practical matters in a practical way, and I have told my hon. friend exactly what my view is in regard to that matter, a view which will, I think, be accepted by the large majority of the people in this country.
But what I want to deal particularly with is, the position in which our farmers in the western country are at present, by reason of the accession of our friends on the other side to office. I do not intend to go into the matter fully, but I just intend to give one or two facts to the House and to show to the Minister of Finance that it seems to me that, in the face of these facts and if he has due
. 2981

regard to the welfare of the country, he will be well advised to have his Tariff Commission go into these facts with the view, not of revising the tariff upward, but of revising the tariff downward. The committee knows that the reciprocity arrangement provided for the free entry of agricultural products into -the United States markets. That Iprivilege was secured by reason of certain concessions granted on this side. I do not know that it was ever contended that the concessions granted on this side were unreasonable, improper or injurious, but it was declared that it was not in the interests of the party that my hon. friends belong to that the agricultural products of Canada should secure free access to the markets of the United States. I will not trouble the committee at any great length on this matter, but I just want to place a few figures in the possession of the committee so that hon. members will know just how hard this country has been hit by the tariff policy that they stand for to-day. I have here the record of three shipments of barley from Carman, Manitoba, over the Great Northern to Minneapolis and the sale of the grain there. They are as follows:
Price in
Bushels	Minneapolis. Duty.
801	
$727	64	$241	221253	
1240	15	375	921243	
1155	54	372	96
I find on looking at the records of the Department of Trade and Commerce that something like a million and ia half bushels of barley have gone through the elevators at Fort William this season that the 1st September to the 11th December. If that barley had all gone to Minneapolis instead of to Fort William it would have netted the producer just $450,000 more than he got. On every million bushels of barley produced and sold in the west the men who produced that barley lost $300,000 by reason of the success of the tariff policy of our friends.


Mr. GOODEVE.: Is the hon, gentleman contending that the farmer would have got the additional price represented by the amount paid in duty for his barley?


Frank Oliver: Yes, I am contending that absolutely, Mr. Chairman.


Arthur Samuel Goodeve: Then, the producer, not the iconsumer, pays the duty?


Frank Oliver: The producer in this case is paying the .duty; there is no question about that. If there had been reciprocity the duty would not have been paid and the duty would have remained in the farmer's pocket. Then, to show what the farmer has lost on his wheat, let me give a few figures showing comparative prices:
No. 1 NORTHERN WHEAT, JANUARY 8, 1912.
Winni- Minnea-. peg.	polis.	Spread.May	..	..	$1,001	$1.07J	.071July	..	..	l.Olf	1.081	-061Cask	..	..	.94|	1.08J	L13J
I should mention that No. 1 Northern in Canada is not the same as No. 1 Northern in the state of Minnesota.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: Can the hon. gentleman tell ns what the spread was on the 19th and 20th of September last?


Frank Oliver: No.


Frederick Laurence Schaffner: It is very important. It was about a cent.


Frank Oliver: I do not think it is veTy important. What is important is that the spread is what it is now and what it is going to be. Just to establish my point that the price of No. 1 Northern as quoted in Minneapolis is not in proper relation to the price of No. 1 Northern quoted in Winnipeg, I want to give the facts with Tegiard to a number of cars sold in, on the Minneapolis sample market, samples from which cars were brought to Winnipeg, examined and valued by members of the grain exchange, the result of which is as follows:
Car No.	Price Minn.	Grade Ft. Win.	Price Ft. Wm.	Spread.
	s cts.		cts.	
34554	83	No. 5 tough.	64	lit71558	96	No. G	59	3717052	831	No. 5	69	14146593	1 00	No. 4 ..	79	2111786	99	No. 4 i.	79	2023040	1 OH	No. 3	85	16110918	87	No. 4 it	79	8"
This gives the committee some idea as actual price of wheat between Minneapolis to what is the actual difference in the and Winnipeg, and what the farmers of

the west have last by reason of not getting free access to the markets of the United States.
At six o'clock, House took recess.
After Recess.
House resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILLS.


[Stage Direction]
House in Committee on Bill (No. 16), respecting patents of Thomas Wadge- Mr. Aikins.
Frank Oliver: It is quite apparent that the ordinary member, having this Bill placed before him after it has passed the Private Bills Committee, is hardly in a position to decide on its merits. Therefor, I think whoever is in charge of the Bill should make a full statement of the reasons for it.


Arthur Meighen: I am not in charge of the Bill, but, in the absence of the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Aikins), I desire to state to the House what I understand to be the reasons for the Bill. It appears that Thomas Wadge purchased patent No. 73,790, being an improvement in grain separators, commonly called fanning mills. When Mr. Wadge purchased the patent through his solicitors in Winnipeg, Messrs. Metcalfe, Sharpe & Stackpoole, he had an investigation of the title made. Mr. Wadge understood, when he purchased the patent, that it had been taken out for the usual period of 18 years. This I understand was the statement of his solicitors. It was not until very recently, when he took possession of the actual letters patent, that he ascertained that an error had been made in the office of his solicitors, and that the fees had been paid for only 6 years. Under the patent law a patentee may pay the fees for a 6 years term, and, on the expiration of that term, may pay the balance of the fees for the whole life of the patent, which in Canada is 18 years. Consequently Mr. Wadge is under the necessity of applying to parliament for the continuance of the patent for the full term of 18 years. I have the affidavit of Mr. Wadge to the effect of the statement I have made to the House. I think I need not read this to the committee. It has been read in the Private Bills Committee, and they accepted it. I simply make this statement, from which it appears to me that Mr. Wadge is entitled to the relief asked for.


Mr. McKENZIE.: When did this patent first issue?


Arthur Meighen: I cannot give the date of issue. There are two patents-No. 73,789 and No. 73,790. It was on the 29th of


Frank Oliver: March, 1904, that Mr. Wadge purchased them from the Twin City Separator Company, and he at once proceeded t'o manufacture, and has been manufacturing on a large scale since, and it was not until July, 1911, that he ascertained that his patents had lapsed by Teason of the error I have stated. So that it would appear that the patents were taken out only shortly before 1904.	*


Frank Oliver: Where does Mr. Wadge live?


Arthur Meighen: The city of Winnipeg is the place of manufacture.


Mr. EMMERSON.: Has this Bill been examined by the Department of Agriculture? It has been customary in the past to have a report from that department in respect to Bills of this class, and that report has always had great weight with the committee. In connection with every Bill, so far as my observation has gone, the attitude of the committee has been: we should not do this, and it ends by saying, we will do it this time, but we will not do it again. But we have always required from the Minister of Agriculture some statement to the effect that the Bill is satisfactory to his department, which usually inquires to see whether there is some interest that may be affected, or whether there are patents of a like character that may become in some way prejudiced by the proposed renewal. While we certainly want to do justice to the one, we do not want to do injustice to the other. It seems to me we should have some representation from that department.


Mr. SHARPE (North Ontario).: As a member of the Private Bills Committee, I remember the Deputy Minister of Agriculture, Mr. O'Halloran, being present, and being asked his opinion with reference to this and other Bills of a similar nature. His reply was that the policy of the department was adverse to the passing of private legislation of this character, but that the Private Bills Committee', and the House invariably overrides the policy of the department in that respect, where the, negligence is that, not of the individual, but of the solicitor.


Henry Robert Emmerson: Suppose we tried the experiment of refusing to pass this Bill and forced Mr. Wadge to go back to his solicitors, would it have a good and salutary effect? Would that not have the salutary effect of reducing the number of these Bills coming, before parliament, would it not remind solicitors that they might be called upon to respond if they did not give attention to such matters?


Mr. CARVELL.: I understood the deputy Minister of Agriculture to say that once
[DOT]2935

you admit the principle of renewing expired patents there was no reason why this one should not be renewed. From the evidence there is no doubt that this is a going concern manufacturing large quantities and the proprietors would be damaged to some extent if this was not renewed.


Frank Oliver: We should have from the Department of Agriculture a statement on their responsibility that this is a going concern and that "there is no conflict of right between this establishment and some other of which we have no knowledge. I would be strongly in favour of passing the Bill on the merits as stated, but I think we should have some such assurance from the department.


Arthur Meighen: It has not been the habit of any department in relation to the Bills within its purview to go into the questions of fact and make itself responsible for such statements as that the concern is a going concern. That fact appeared to be established by evidence before the committee. The solicitors in charge of the matter are a very responsible, good and careful firm in Winnipeg. The head of the firm was recently appointed a judge of the Court of King's Bench by the late government. I would not like to have it go out from anything I have said that they were guilty^ in this case beyond what is inevitable in a large office occasionally. I think it would be a hardship to Mr. Wadge if the relief were not granted. As to the conflict of rights no one else could manufacture lawfully until the expiry of the patent and any one who has commenced the manufacture since its expiry is protected under section 2 of the Act.
Bill reported.



PATENT OF THOMAS D. RAMBAUT.

[Stage Direction]
House in committee on Bill (No. 84) respecting certain patents of ' Thomas D. Rambaut.- Mr. Ames.
Frank Oliver: I would again suggest that the member having charge of the Bill should make an explanation for the convenience of the committee.


Herbert Brown Ames: This Bill which was very carefully considered in the Private Bills Committee is one for keeping alive a patent now possessed by Thomas D. Rambaut. The circumstances in this case are very exceptional. The original patent was granted to William Ernest Cook, who in due course undertook to transfer the patent as he had a right to do, to Thomas D. Rambaut. Rambaut on legal advice concluded that his title-was not altogether good. He went back to Cook to get his title made good, but found Cook seriously ill, in fact on his death bed, unable to sign his name, or in
any way deal further with it. Cook died shortly afterwards and there then followed considerable litigation as to who were the heirs, and during this time Rambaut, not being certain that the patent was his, did not want to spend money on it. By the time he found that his title to the patent was valid, the period in which manufacture must be commenced in Canada had expired. He, therefore, made petition to the committee, the committee heard the claim and unanimously decided that the case was so exceptional that a further opportunity should be given to him to manufacture. No one has done any manufacturing or used the patents in Canada so it does not in any way infringe on any rights.


Henry Robert Emmerson: What is the device?


Herbert Brown Ames: A patent process for dessi-cating vegetables, and we have documentary evidence that if this patent is kept alive an important company is prepared to come into Canada, build a factory, and at once give employment in the manufacture of dried vegetables in the method herein described. We felt it would be an advantage to have the industry giving employment to workmen and giving an opportunity to farmers to sell their vegetables. No objections were taken to the Bill, even the departmental officers said that while they took generally an attitude of uncordiality towards requests of this kind there were no special reasons why in such a case as this the application should not be granted.


Henry Robert Emmerson: I see that Rambaut is a citizen of New York. Is there any suspicion underlying this that would in any way affect our constitution?


Herbert Brown Ames: I do not think there is any fear of the subversion of the constitution in this particular case.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: What was the result of the litigation, was it decided that Rambaut had the legal title to the patent, or would we be legislating away the rights that might belong to Cook's heirs?


Herbert Brown Ames: It was subsequently found that the transfer was legal, and it was with the full consent of Cook's heirs that Rambaut undertook to commence the manufacture. Then, after his death, when the estate was settled up, it was, with the full consent of the heirs that Mr. Rambaut proceeded to utilise the patent which came to him by regular transfer. -


Hugh Guthrie: When did the patent expire?


Herbert Brown Ames: My recollection is that it expired on the 16th February. 1911.


Hugh Guthrie: That is the expiration of the period for commencing manufacture?


Herbert Brown Ames: It was registered in the Patent Office, 16th September, 1911.


Henry Robert Emmerson: Is this legislation being secured with the knowledge and consent of the heirs of Mr. Cooke, the original patentee?


Herbert Brown Ames: Such were the representations made to us in the committee by the promoters of the Bill.


Henry Robert Emmerson: What was the character of the evidence submitted?


Herbert Brown Ames: I think the solicitor for Mr. Rambaut had with him documents to that effect. I know he said he was prepared to submit evidence for every allegation he made in connection with the Bill.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I must say as one member of this committee, I am not altogether satisfied with the explanation. This is a matter which is so perfectly plain. Mr. Rambaut controlled this patent from Mr. Cooke, and had the documents whatever they might be. There is no reason why Mr. Rambaut should not have begun manufacturing in Canada within the two years allowed, or have obtained the necessary extension of time which the department has the right to give under certain conditions. He did not do it. He remained asleep on his rights. This is not at all in the same category with the case of Thomas Wadge. In that case, we have a citizen of Canada, carrying on a legitimate business, who finds that, through the fault of his solicitor his patent has expired. But here we have a bunch of New York fellows. We don't know whether they are genuine or not. They have not spent a dollar in Canada, and probably will not. But they want to sell out and make some money. Why, if I had half the nerve that my hon. friend has shown, within the last year I could have made a lot of money. A man from the state of Maine came to me and wanted to get legislation to renew a patent which had expired under circumstances not nearly so barefaced as this. But I was so modest that I told him I could not ask parliament to renew his rights when those rights had been lost through his own carelessness. I do not think that the parliament of Canada has a right to grant such concessions to these people. Why, Mr. Chairman, you know we do not love Americans nowadays-


Henry Robert Emmerson: Under which flag?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I think there is strong reason for opposing the passing of this Bill.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: As I read this Bill, it does not affect the rates as be-Mr. AMES.
tween Cooke's heirs and Rambaut; it leaves the legal status of the parties where _ it was, simply revives the patent rates involved. The Deputy Minister of Agriculture was present in the committee and gave the same opinion with respect to this Bill as with respect to the previous one. Rambaut acted upon the advice of his solicitor which was that this assignment was valid. It is true that, under these circumstances, he slept on his rights. But when the matter was investigated, he found that he was out of court unless fie could get this special legislation. ' It seems to me that this is on all fours with the previous Bill.


Hugh Guthrie: I think that this is not on all fours with the previous Bill. In that ease manufacturers had already taken action to a very large extent, with a large capital outlay, and every evidence of bona fides. In this case, it looks a little like a speculation in patent rights, a kind of speculation more common in the United States than in Canada. It would appear to me that Rambaut had made a speculative purchase of certain rights, and, after the deal had gone through simply slept on his rights, not thinking it worth while to comply with the Canadian law, even to the extent of getting the necessary extension of time. I suppose that now he sees the chance to transfer his patent to some one else and make something out of it. He has spent no money in Canada, has done nothing to make good on this patent; and I for one take the ground that patents are not to be lightly renewed under these circumstances.


Herbert Brown Ames: Let us see what will be the logical outcome if the advice of the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) were followed. Hei'e is a concern that is prepared to come to Canada and make an investment for the manufacture of an important article, establishing an industry that will employ Canadian Labour and give a market for Canadian producers of agricultural products. Through no fault of his own, but through an error of his legal adviser, he finds he is debarred from using the patent which he has had assigned to him for valid considerations. Are we going to say that on that technicality we will deprive him of the opportunity of coming to Canada and manufacturing as I have suggested? Is it wise to do so? On the otlier hand, what interest is going to be injured by passing this Bill? No one has attempted to use this patent in the country. Either this man will use it or it will not be used. And by granting this legislation no one else's rights are infringed upon in the slightest degree.


Mr. NESBITT.: Will the hon. gentleman (Mr. Ames) say that he personally knows that these people are coming here to manufacture?


Herbert Brown Ames: There was filed with the commission by a thoroughly responsible party, a written statement to that effect, and that satisfied the committee unanimously, so far as I could see.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: But the hon. gentleman (Mr. Ames) does not know personally?


Herbert Brown Ames: I know Thomas D. Rambaut personally, and I know him to be a thoroughly responsible party.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: My hon. friend (Mr. Ames) would make this committee believe that if this man's patent is not revived, he cannot enter into the manufacture of this article. Why, it is the very reverse. Not only can Rambaut manufacture the article, | but any man in Canada can manufacture it. I would point out to my hon. friend that a man has the right to manufacture an article exclusively, under patent only when the law gives him that right. In the absence of the patent, everybody has the right to manufacture it. This is an improvement that is well known to the public. I presume it is patented in the United States; it has been patented in Canada for five years. So, the public know about it. How do we know how many men are standing up with capital ready to enter upon this manufacture and build up a business in Canada? I think the hon. gentleman is trying to prevent the carrying on of industries in Canada, rather than encouraging them. The strongest reason I have heard for opposing the Bill is the reason my hon. friend has given why we should pass it.


Henry Robert Emmerson: I would suggest that we act in this matter as the Railway Commission frequently acts; -where there is a pledge as to what they are going to do we require them to put up a deposit. We will take ' greenbacks ' in this instance, we won't require a gold deposit..


Herbert Brown Ames: I can't see what good object can be served in treating this Bill in a different wiay from what you are treating other Bills of the same character. This person has acted in perfect good faith from the outset. It was erroneous advice given him by his advocate, which he afterwards discovered to be inaccurate, that ted to his losing his rights in the matter. He was under the impression that his patent was not laltogether valid, and that it was necessary for him to secure additional signatures on the part of the original owner of the patent, Mr. William Cook. Immediately he discovered this fact he sought Mr. Cook, but Mr. Cook was in extremis and was unable to sign the papers necessary therewith. If Mr. Oook had been alive and well and the additional papers had been signed, the result would have been that *everything would have been complied with
by Mr. Rambaut, and there would have been no necessity for this Bill. But that is the way the case stands to-day. It seems to me tliat we would be creating a precedent in this Bill quite different from that we have followed in other cases, if we said that this Bill should not go through. I may say that the departmental officials that were present with us from the Department of Agriculture raised no serious objection to this Bill, any more than they would raise to any other Bill of a similar character. I have seen much more strenuous opposition to. other Bills than was taken in this particular case. I do not see why the opposition should deem it advisable to single out this particular Bill for slaughter.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think we had better let. it go through.


Frank Oliver: I take exception to the statement that this Bill is on all fouTS with the Bill we agreed to a few minutes ago. The conditions are absolutely different, and the reasons that made it proper to pass the other Bill are reasons which make it improper to pass this Bill. I;f this committee has any responsibility at all it should not permit legislation of this character to go through, unless there are better reasons given for it than we have heard As has been suggested by the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie), however good the intent of the applicant may be, on the face of the Bill it would appear to be purely a speculative investment, that f.e has not shown good faith, and is not entitled to consideration. The refusal of the committee to pass the Bill will not in any way injure the industries or the welfare of Canada, 'although it may do some injury to this man, who is responsible for his own undoing if he does not get what he wants.


Henry Robert Emmerson: In the previous case, the man had made an investment, he was manufacturing, and if you did not give him legislation, he would have been seriously interfered with, and perhaps his investment would have been depreciated in value. _ In this case, you do not affect any such right, but by refusing to this man the privileges which he seeks, you do not give him an advantage over others, who apparently, have just as much right to the privilege of manufacturing this {particular commodity for preserving vegetables, as would the gentleman named in the Bill, Mr. Rambaut. This becomes a serious matter when you consider that you may be depriving Canadian citizens of a privilege which certainly will be theirs if this legislation does not go through.


Hugh Guthrie: I do not want to block the committee in coming to a conclusion, but I think if ever, in my experience in this House, a case has been presented for the renewal of a patent which absolutely lacks

merit., it is this case. It is true that in the past we have been rather lenient in granting applications for renewal, where rights have lapsed. But in all the cases I can recall, there has been some merit to the application, there has been some investment of money, something has been done by the owner or the promoter. But here is a case, where peciple deliberately slept on their rights for four or five years, did not take enough interest in the matter to see whether they were the owners or not, until the time has lapsed during which they are entitled to manufacture goods in this country under a patent. It we grant this renewal, we grant to a body of United States patent speculators and promoters the right to come into Canada and manufacture on the basis of a monopoly, under a patent right, at all events. They have not made out any case strong enough to justify such action in this parliament, and I do not believe that hon. members opposite think they have either. Had they gone ahead with an investment, had they placed their money here within the last two or three years, as they might have done, and shown some bona fides in the matter, the case would have been entirely different. But if you grant this patent right to those New Yorkers, it excludes Canadians from entering into that line of manufacture in Canada, and I am opiposed to it on that particular ground. If other patents come up with no more merit than the present one, I will have no hesitation in opposing them also.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: On more careful reading of the Bill, I want to give another reason why I oppose it. It seems to me that it is the most vicious renewal of a patent right I have ever seen since I have been in parliament. This man some years ago bought a patent. He says, according to the member for St. Antoine (Mr. Ames), he was afraid that his rights might not be perfect, and he tried to get a new document from Mr. Cook.
He had rights in that, however, under which he could justify the manufacture of these goods in Canada. He did not do so. He went on for five years. Now, they come in with this Bill and they propose not only placing this man in the same position as he was in when he got the right from Mr. Cooke, but they give him two years in order to exercise the right of manufacture, and they do more than that because I am satisfied that, under clause 2 of this Bill, they are giving him rights which are not in his patent at all. They are bringing him under the provisions of that section of the Patent Act which gives tue commissioner the right to excuse him from manufacturing the article so long as he holds himself in readiness to grant the license to some other man to manufacture it and Mr. GUTHRIE.
pay him a royalty. The more you examine this clause the more you see that it is something which ought not to be granted to a Canadian citizen, let alone to a foreigner. Yon are placing this man in the same position as if he had come to Canada to-day for the first time, was the original inventor of this process and applied to the _ Patent Office in the ordinary course of business to get his patent. If he had done that they could not have given him one day longer, they could not have given mm one more advantage than they are giving him under this Bill. They are allowing this man to have slept upon his rights for five years, they are preventing the people from enjoying this invention, they are preventing people from entering into the manufacture of this article, they are placing this man in the same position as he would have been if he had been the inventor of this article and they are giving him rights and privileges which the original patent did not give at all. But, they give him something that is provided in the amendment which was made to the Patent Act in 1997. I think that if there ever was a ease in which an American citizen has come over here and presumed upon our innocence it is the case of this man coming here and wanting this patent renewed.
Section agreed to: Yeas 44; Nays 42.
On section 2, power to receive petitions and to make orders.


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER.: Shall section 2 be adopted?


Some hon. MEMBERS: Carried.
On section 3, saving of rights acquired.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Are you discussing clause 2 or 3?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Section 3.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: The chairman is sometimes so rapid in getting through these Bills that we have not time to object. I think, if it is necessary we may have to ask the Chairman to read the clauses. We do not like to be driven to that. I object to clause 2 particularly.


Herbert Brown Ames: Clause 2 is passed, Mr. Chairman.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No, i will take the ground that clause 2 has not been read, if my hon. friend wants to lock horns.


Herbert Brown Ames: The Chairman has declared clause 2 adopted and we cannot go back to it without the consent of the House.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Clause 2 has not been read.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understand that it is not necessary to read the clauses.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: But tli n rule of parliament says that they shall be read.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Unless the Chairman is asked to read them.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I am asking now to have clause 2 read.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: As I understand it has been passed and I was not asked to read it.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: If my hon. friend (Mr. Ames) believes that I cannot talk for three minutes, I think perhaps he is mistaken. I do not want to do this. I want to discuss clause 2 because I have a valid objection to it.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. gentleman can move to reconsider clause o.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I will then move to reconsider clause 2.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Now I will state my objection as briefly as possible. I would like the promoter of the Bill to give me some information as to whether the original patent is entitled to the provisions of the latter part of clause 2. Section. 44 of the Patent Act is as follows:
On the application of the applicant for a patent, previous to the issue thereof, or on the application within six months after the issue of a patent of the patentee or his legal representatives, the commissioner, having Tegard to the nature of the invention, may order that snch patent, instead of being subject to the condition with respect to the construction and manufacture of the patented invention hereinbefore provided, shall be subject to the following conditions.
Without taking time to read these conditions I may explain that they mean that the commissioner can absolve the manufacturer or the patentee from the necessity of manufacturing, so long as he will agree to grant a license to other people to manufacture. I would like to know if the original patent comes under that provision of section 44 of the Patent Act, chapter 69 of the Revised Statutes.


Herbert Brown Ames: I cannot tell the hon. gentleman that. I can only say that this is the standard clause which you will find in a great many other Bills of a similar character.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That was not in the Thomas Wedge patent which we just revived a few moments ago.


Herbert Brown Ames: It was not necessary in that case.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: It was not in it. and .it seems we are giving this man rights 95
which he is not entitled to. We are giving him a better patent than his patent really calls for. Surely, if we place him where he was before Bis negligence, he has no right to come to this country and ask for more; he has no right to ask us to put him in a position in which he may never manufacture this article in Canada or in which we may never have that industry so long as he holds himself ready to permit the manufacture and reap the benefit of the royalty from it?


Henry Robert Emmerson: It is a matter of serious moment as to whether or not we should place this man in a better position than he was entitled to at the incaption of his patent.
(The hour for private Bills expired.)



APPOINTMENT OF A TARIFF COMMISSION.

[Stage Direction]
House resumed in committee on Bill (No. 88) to provide for the appointment of a Tariff Commission.-Mr. White (Leeds).
On section 4.
Frank Oliver: When the House rose at six o'clock, I was discussing section 4, and pointing out that there were matters of serious importance in connection with the tariff that, in my judgment, were not contemplated to be dealt with by the commission appointed under this Bill. It was stated by the Minister of Finance that these matters did, as a matter of fact, come under the provisions of this section, but even admitting that statement to be correct, I still hold that so far as the reading of the section on its face is concerned, and so far as the discussion upon the Bill has gone, there is no indication whatever that this Bill was intended in any degree, to cover that side of tariff legislation, present or prospective, to which I was drawing attention. I was drawing attention to the loss that has been suffered by the producers of the west in the defeat of the reciprocity arrangement, under which they would have secured free access to the United States market. I gave a statement of the difference in price on barley and wheat as between Fort William and Minneapolis, and in the case of wheat I gave the price of nine cars actually bought on the Minneapolis sample' market, and the samples examined in Winnipeg by competent men and the grades and prices attached and it would appear that the spread or loss to the Canadian farmer between Fort William and Minneapolis ran from eight cents to thirty-seven cents per bushel. Assuming that the average loss is fifteen cents per bushel, and assuming on the statement of Mr. Thompson of the Ogilvie Milling Company that there are some fifty million bushels of grain in the west still to market, the western Canadian



farmer stands to lose by failure to secure free access to the United States market for his wheat, seven and a half million dollars.


Henry Robert Emmerson: When?


Frank Oliver: Since the 21st of September. This, it seems to me is a matter of sufficient importance to warrant the attention of the government and of the Minister of Finance. A dead loss of seven and a half million dollars, not in watered stock, but in actual cash value, cannot be contemplated without serious thought by any one who has regard for the wellbeing of this country. This loss of seven ' and a half million dollars on one-third of the farmer's crop which he has for sale in this bad year is equal to the prospective profit on the one hundred million dollars of common stock representing no value which has been loaded upon the industrial activities of -Canada by the merger interests within the past three years. The farmer is actually losing in this one year, on one-third of his wheat crop as much money as these people hoped in their wildest dreams to make on these stupendous speculative organizations that they have been going into for the past three years. I have said and I verily believe that the purpose of the government, the purpose of the Minister of Finance, and the purpose of the Bill, is to find some way whereby interest can be earned on that one hundred millions of watered stock of absolutely no value. The Minister of Finance is bending all his attention to that end; he is going to appoint a commission that will cost this country in salaries alone $24,500; which will cost no doubt an equal amount in ordinary expenses for the members of the commission, and there will have to be a staff added at what expense we do not know. In the case of the United States body, which he takes for his example, the latest report that we have is that their staff numbers over seventy, and if the Minister of Finance continues to follow along the lines of that organization, this country will be lucky if it gets out of this precious Tariff Commission with an expenditure of less than one hundred thousand dollars a year; and all with the ultimate purpose of giving value where no value was, and of laying that much of extra tax upon the shoulders of the people of this country. Now, he does not need any Tariff Commission, and he does not need any one hundred thousand a year expenditure; he does not need any expert evidence to find a means to save to the farmers of the west the seven and a half million dollars to which I have called attention.
There is to-day on the statute-books of the United States a law which says that if -and when the Canadian government iM. OLIVER.
makes provisions which are parallel to those of that law, it shall come into effect, and the effect of the law would be to put $7,500,000, at a minimum calculation, into the pockets of the producers of the western prairies, and through their pockets into the currents and channels of trade and industry and commerce and transportation all through the Dominion of Canada. May I believe that the suggestion is at any rate worthy of some consideration, which, so far as the form of the Bill or any indication of intent on the part of the government is concerned, has not entered into their calculations at all. But wheat is not the only grain affected. I might mention a little item which I gathered from the ' Pioneer Express ' of Pembina, North Dakota. which makes this statement-
From November 1 to December 20 there have been imported into this district from Canada 138,062 bushels of barley, which paid duty at the rate of 30 cents a bushel, which duty amounted to $41,418. The most of this barley is marketed direct by Canadian farmers who are contiguous to the line.
The barley crop of the western prairie provinces is estimated by Sir Byron E. Walker at 37,000,000 bushels this year. It is not to be supposed that the whole of that crop is for sale. A large part of it is grown for feed purposes, but it is a well-known fact that this year a considerable amount of the wheat of the western prairies is only fit for feed, while the barley is of good quality, and it would be a happy condition if we were able to-send our barley to the United States markets free of the 30 cent duty and use our feed wheat for the purposes for which barley weuld otherwise be used. I am informed that last year the United States used 150,000,000 bushels of barley, and there is every reason to believe that its market would absorb every bushel of barley the Canadian west could spare, and at prices which would not only give our people the United States only, but a handsome profit over and above the duty.


Mr. CLARK (North Bruce).: Mr. Chairman, I rise to a point of order. We are discussing clause 4, and the rule says that speeches in Committee of the Whole must-be strictly relevant to the clause under discussion. I submit that the hon. gentleman has for the last ten minutes been out of order.


Frank Oliver: We have been discussing the question of the responsibility of the government in regard to the commission, and I have been pointing out that the government, in the discharge of its responsibility, is not taking consideration of one of the most important features of the tariff. I think I am quite within the limits of the section, but I have not com-

pleted ray argument, and if my hen. friend will only have patience, I think I will demonstrate to him and the whole committee that every word I have said is absolutely pertinent to section 4.


Hugh Clark: I would ask the ruling of the Chair.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I think the point of order is well taken. It seems to me that the hon. member for Edmonton has travelled pTetty wide of the scope of the question, and I would ask him to keep his speech strictly relevant to the question .


Frank Oliver: I certainly will bow to the ruling of the Chairman if he says that I am not entitled to use the arguments I am making, but I certainly am well wdthin the example of other members who have spoken on different sections of the Bill, and I W'ould respectfully ask that I be not restricted more than other members. I claim the same privilege as other members, but no more.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I must admit that some hon. members have gone too far, but my attention has not been drawn to their cases. In the present instance, as my attention has been drawn to the matter, I have to rule.


Frank Oliver: Well, if I am not permitted to conclude my remarks, I shall have to bow to your decision, and give place to some person else.


William Cameron Edwards: As I have the honour to. represent one of the most strictly agricultural counties in the Dominion of Canada, I may be permitted to say a word in regard to this Bill. The Bill presented to this House by the hon. Minister of Finance is one of the most important as well as one of the most logical pieces of legislation which has ever been presented to the parliament of Canada. I believe that the carrying out of this idea of the appointment of a Tariff Commission as outlined in this Bill will result in great good to the agriculturists of Canada.
Hon. gentlemen opposite throughout this debate have 'endeavoured to make it appear that this Bill was designed entirely for the benefit of the manufacturers, that they were the only class who could be referred to by the Bill. The hon. gentlemen from Edmonton, Humboldt and Assiniboia, have all advanced this idea and they have aai object in view, that of trying to create the impression in this country that tire Conservative government is here in the interests of the manufacturers and is opposed to the farmers.


Mr. MACLEAN (Halifax).: I rise to a point of order. I assume that you are 954
anxiously waiting for some gentleman to call attention to the fact that the hon. gentleman is not speaking to the clause before the committee.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understood the hon. gentleman to refer to the Bill. He is apparently discussing the principle of the Bill. I would remind the hon. gentleman that he must speak on clause 4.


William Cameron Edwards: I fully expected this little act of courtesy from jny hon. friend the junior member for Halifax (Mr. Maclean). I should have referred to section 4, which is a very important section, it must be a very important section because it has been discussed at such great length by hon. gentlemen opposite. I have been surprised at the conclusions arrived at in the discussion of .section 4 of this very important measure. Some hon. gentlemen have drawn from section 4 of this Bill the conclusion that it was designed solely in the interests of the manufacturers. The hon. member for Humboldt made this assertion notwithstanding the statements previously made by the Minister of Finance. The minister said:
We do not desire to be relieved from responsibility with regard to the tariff, and all the Tariff Commission does, is to enable us to obtain information on which to act.
That was very explicit. He said further:
I think the report of the Tariff Commission should be available to every member of this House as well as to the ministers, and then no doubt it will carry great weight. But that is far from saying that it is absolutely conclusive.
The Finance Minister further said:
I would be the last man to suggest that the House of Commons should he denied the information obtained by means of the expenditure which they have authorized. There is no intention of that kind in this Bill. My hon. friends have been simply raising spectres with regard to this Bill.
Notwithstanding these very clear and specific assertions on the part of the minister, hon. gentlemen opposite have stated repeatedly just the opposite of what the minister has said. The hon. member for Edmonton could not see wherein this clause of the Bill had any reference to the farmer. One would infer from his remarks that farmers were not even thought of when the Bill was brought before the House, that there was no possibility of the farmer getting consideration of his wrongs. I do not think the hon. gentleman was justified in coming to that conclusion. Take the various sections of this clause, they clearly set out that in respect of goods produced in or imported into Canada, and you will note it does not say in respect of some goods,'but, in respect of goods, which has

the same meaning as if the word * all ' was prefixed to goods-in respect of goods produced in or imported into Canada the commission shall, under the direction of the minister, make inquiry, &c. The word * goods ' is very clearly defined in the beginning of the Bill and the definition makes it clear that this Bill is not confined to the consideration of manufactured articles. There is a great chance for the farmers to be benefited by the 'appointment of a Tariff Commission. Take, for instance, the question of wheat. There is a duty at present of 12 cents a bushel on wheat. ' The United States has a duty of 25 cents a *bushel on wheat- Is it mot right that information should he obtained as to the [DOT]cost of production, the cost of transportation, to the place of consumption; is it not right that the Canadian farmer should have, in fairness to himself, some protection against wheat produced, for instance, in Argentina?


Frank Oliver: Hear, hear.


William Cameron Edwards: Did I catch a whisper from the horn, member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) that sounded like ' hear, hear ?'


Frank Oliver: Hear, hear.


William Cameron Edwards: And yet the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) strongly supported on the 21st of last September a proposal which would have denied to the farmers of Canada the very thing that he says ' hear, hear ' for now.


Frank Oliver: In order that the hon. gentleman may not be under any misapprehension, 1 meant the ' hear, hear ' sarcastically.


William Cameron Edwards: I suppose the hon. member wishes me to regard even a little sarcastic reference from himself in the way of a compliment.
I assure the hon. gentleman that I have not that estimate of him, and cannot accept a word of his, even sarcastically spoken, as a compliment. Now, let us take the question of the production of win at in Argentina-rate of wages, 64 cents a day. Is not that a reason which, in all fairness, should be considered in framing a tariff for Canada. Is it fair that the farmers of this country who have to pay the rate of wages they do should be asked to compete on even terms with the farmers of Argentina who pay wages at the rate of 64 cents a day?


Frank Oliver: Mr. Chairman, I wish to ask what is the difference, in regard to propriety under the rules of order, between my hon. friend (Mr. Edwards) discussing the question of the cost of raising wheat in Argentina, and basing thereon a question of the duty on the wheat from that coun-Mr. EDWARDS
I
try, and my discussion of the duty on Canadian wheat going to Minneapolis?


William Cameron Edwards: Mr. Chairman


Frank Oliver: I asked for the Chairman's opinion.


William Cameron Edwards: I wish to know what the point of order is.


Frank Oliver: Well, if necessary, I raise the point of order that the hon. gentleman (Mr. Edwards) is not keeping within the proper discussion of clause 4, according to your ruling, Mr. Chairman.


William Cameron Edwards: Discussing the point of order, let me call to your attention that clause 4, and I assume that that includes the subsections-provides that the .commission shall investigate price and cost of raw materials in Canada and elsewhere. Am I within my right in discussing in the debate on that subsection, the cost of materials in Argentina? They are to investigate the cost of production in Canada and elsewhere. They are to investigate the cost of transportation from other countries to Canada. Am I within my right in referring to the cost of producing wheat in Argentina and transporting it? If I am not in order in doing this, it seems to me we cannot discuss the question at all.


Frank Oliver: Hear, hear.


William Cameron Edwards: That is vastly different from wandering from Halifax to Victoria as the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) was doing.


Frank Oliver: If my information is correct, Argentina is much further away than Minneapolis. I ask your ruling on a point of order, Mr. Chairman.


William Cameron Edwards: It. may be further if' you measure it in miles. But in application to this section, it is much nearer.


Frank Oliver: We will have the Chairman's ruling.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understand that if the hon. member (Mr. Edwards) goes no further he will not be out of order.


William Cameron Edwards: I did not catch the ruling.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: So far the hon. member is not out of order, provided he does not go further.
Mr, EDWARDS. I am glad to have been the humble means of providing a little much-needed information for the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver). I may say, lest he take that as a compliment, that I only mean it sarcastically.


Frank Oliver: May I make a suggestion?


William Cameron Edwards: If I am out of order, I will sit down; But, if I am not out of order, the hon. member (Mr. Oliver) is out of order.


Frank Oliver: May I make a suggestion to my hon. friend, with your permission, Mr. Chairman?


William Cameron Edwards: have the floor, and with all due regard for the hon. member for Edmonton, I do not think that any suggestion of his will add very- much to my knowledge or information in this debate. I trust he will not regard that as discourteous-it is spoken sarcastically. Now, I submit that there is every chance for the farmers of Canada to be benefited by the appointment of a Tariff Commission. The subsections of section 4 to which I have referred, at once direct the attention of any member of this House, coming from a rural constituency to the possibilities of good from a commission of this kind. As I pointed out, it does seem to me that, in investigating the position of the farmers of Canada they will consider the cost of producing wheat, for instance in Argentina-as they will have the right to do under the subsection-the rate of wages in Argentina-as they will have the right to do under the subsection-and the cost of tarnsportation from that country as they will have the right to do, under the subsection. And I firmly believe that when this Tariff Commission gets its information as to the various countries with which the farmers of this Dominion have to compete, their work must result in benefit to our farmers. There are many articles produced by our farmers on which, I maintain, they are not treated fairiy, and have never been treated fairly by either party in this coun-try,-and in making that statement, I only repeat what I have said before. I submit that it would be the right of the Tariff Commission, under the subsections of this section to inquire into the reasons why, for instance, American bacon should be allowed to come into this country paying 2 cents duty, while the duty on our bacon going into the United States is 5 cents; why eggs, butter, cheese, and various other commodities-


Frank Oliver: I must ask for your ruling again on the point of order, Mr. Chairman.


William Cameron Edwards: I maintain that this is directly in line with the subsections of section 4 and with what these subsections call upon the Tariff Commission to do.


Frank Oliver: May I insist upon my point of order. I was discussing exactly what my hon. friend is discussing and in exactly the same way, and I was called to order. And I must ask for the same consideration at your hands for my hon. friend as was accorded to myself.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understand that the hon. member (Mr. Edwards) is arguing that under section 4, the commissioners will have the Tight to investigate such and such matters. But I understood the hon. member from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) desired to make a long argument on the effects of reciprocity.


Frank Oliver: If I may be allowed, I beg .to say that my hon. friend from Frontenac (Mr. Edwards) is discussing the question of the mutual duties between Canada and [DOT]the United States on farm products. And that is exactly what I was doing.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: May I make a suggestion? I think the hon. member fox. Frontenac is perfectly in order.


Frank Oliver: So do I.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: And I think the hon. member for Edmonton was perfectly in order. I think it would be fair to permit the hon. member for Edmonton to resume his remarks.


Frank Oliver: No, Mr. Chairman, what I wished to say to the hon. member for Frontenac a few minutes ago was that I believe the discussion will be seriously hampered under your ruling, Mr. Chairman. Of course, I accept your ruling, and I do not wish to be disrespectful. As I think the discussion would be seriously hampered under that ruling, my suggestion would be that the hon. member (Mr. Edwards) be perfectly free to make his remarks as he sees fit on the Bill and that I be accorded the same privilege.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understand that the hon. member (Mr. Edwards) is in order.


William Cameron Edwards: That last suggestion of the hon. member for Edmonton was more in keeping with what should be expected. from one who occupies his position than some of his previous remarks. I thank him for his suggestion that I should be allowed to continue without these frequent interruptions.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I will assume that hon. gentlemen opposite, in discussing this very important Bill, are sincere in their expressions of opinion; I want to think .that of them, although I frankly confess it is a difficult thing to do sometimes. I was trying to point out wherein the farmers might be benefited by a Tariff Commission, and I was referring to certain commodities which they produce. I assume that under the powers granted to this commission by section 4, they will take into consideration the cost of producing these various commodities raised by the farmers, together with the cost of producing the same in the United States and other countries. I feel satisfied that if

3003
the Tariff Commission d-oes turn its atten- < tion to these things, they will see to it ] that the farmer, on these various commo- ' dities, is allowed a higher protection than ' he has at the present time. I do not- think < the farmer is properly treated at present, J X think he is entitled to more protection 1 on these various commodities I have i named than he is getting. I think if you i will look carefully into the matter you < will find that it really costs less to produce ' many of these commodities on the other ' side of the line, and in other countries, ' than it does here; and if we are to maintain our standard of civilization, our rate of wages, and all that sort of thing, the Canadian farmer must get more protection on many articles than he is getting at the present time Therefore, I say that under section 4 of this Bill I do not know of any class of the community who are more likely to get justice from this commission than are the farmers of the Dominion of Canada.
Now, Mr. Chairman, hon. gentlemen on the other side have assumed quite a lot , in discussing this matter. They have assumed that the Bill was designed exclusively for the benefit of the manufacturer, that the manufacturer was the only man who could possibly benefit by it. They have tried to make it appear that the Conservative party was antagonistic to the agriculturists of this country, that the Liberal party was the great friend of the farmers, and was the party to which the people would have to look for protection against the encroachment of the manufacturers. Now that contention is not borne out by the history of the Conservative party, or by the history of the Liberal party. I could refer to many acts and expressions in the history of the Liberal party to show that that was not the case. The duty on agricultural implements, up to 1907, was 20 per cent, and it was left there by the Liberal party as they found it in 1896. In 1907 the Fielding tariff was brought down, that was the year before a general election, and they reduced the duty on agricultural implements from 20 to 174 per cent. But at the same time they raised the value for duty purposes of binders, for instance, whereby they collected a duty of 17J per cent which amounted to more than they previously collected with a duty of 20 per cent. At the same time they appealed to the farmers for support on the ground that they had begun to carry out the policy they had advocated for IS years previous to 1896, the policy of destroying (protection entirely. That is only one of many instances that could be cited. When the manufacturers' delegation came down to Ottawa to interview the late gov-, Mr. EDWARDS
eminent, the right hon. leader of the opposition, in answering those gentlemen, said that there was one thing at least the Liberal party prided itself on, they were proud of the fact that they had been very careful not to do anything to disturb the manufacturers of this country. Yet we find hon. gentlemen opposite getting up here and trying to set class against class, trying to make out that the manufacturers are the enemies of the farmers, that the present government is disposed to favour the manufacturers to the detriment of the farmers. I remember the leader of the opposition stating in this House that the best friend the farmer had was the manufacturer. He will find that in ' Hansard ' of 1911, page 8459. That was his opinion then. Now the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff), in speaking all around, or about, or at this Bill, made use of this expression, a very remarkable expression, even for that hon. gentleman.
The Liberal party in this country is a unit on the tariff question.
The amusing part of it is that he made that statement after listening to several hon. gentlemen on his own side of the House. Let us see the position. The hon. member fur South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) believes in a tariff for revenue, with incidental protection, of course. Then the hon. member for Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt) says:
I am for reasonable protection.
That is quite elastic. Then we have


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I must remind the hon. gentleman that he is out of order and is not speaking on the Bill.


William Cameron Edwards: Then I will not continue that matter any further, as I do not wish to trangress the rules of the committee. Now, Mr. Chairman, there is one thing absolutely clear, there has been ample evidence during the last few years that the people of this country want something definite in regard to the tariff. For instance, there was a deputation of six or seven hundred delegates representing the dairymen of eastern Ontario and western Quebec asking certain things. There was another deputation of seven or eight hundred farmers from the west making certain requests. That was followed by a delegation of ten or twelve hundred fruit and vegetable growers. Then the meat packers also made representations to the government. All these delegations, it seems to me, warrant us in concluding that the people have not been satisfied wdth the tariff in the past, they have not been satisfied with the v-ay the late government handled the tariff.
I claim as evidence of this, the large deputations which have come here. In considering whether it is advisable to appoint , such a commission, take an article that I

have it in my mind to mention. I may hold the view, and. I will candidly say I do hold the view, that the duty on agricultural implements might be substantially reduced. That is my candid opinion. I have expressed it in this House before. I am sincere in holding that opinion, but I can conceive that there are hon. gentlemen in this House, who may be equally sincere in holding the opinion that the duty should not be reduced. How are we going to arrive at a conclusion as to what should be done? This very Bill and this very section which we are now considering, gives to the Tariff Commission the very powers which we want them to exercise in arriving at a correct conclusion in regard to the duties on agricultural implements as to whether these duties should be lowered or not. It seems to me that when they get that information, their figures will show that these duties should be reduced. Possibly I am wrong Poss'ibly those Who hold the opposite view may be right, but it seems to me to be reasonable, right and proper that a commission should be appointed to collect valuable information and especially when the responsibility of the government is not lessened thereby. They will be held responsible, and when the information gathered by this commission, is placed before the Minister of Finance and before the members of this House, and we have had the very emphatic and distinct statement to the effect from the Minister of Finance and other members-it does seem to me that we will be in a better position to judge with regard to this great question than we have ever been at any time in the past. I do not think it is worthy of hon. gentlemen opposite to assume the attitude which they have been assuming, in the discussion of this measure. From first to last on the face of it, in its veTy language, there is the utmost candour and the desire plainly manifested by the framer of this Bill, to give the widest opportunity to any and every class in this country, to the farmers as well as to the manufacturers, that justice may be done to all. I submit again that it seems to me that a measure of this kind is along the right lines. In stating that I am stating precisely what I said when my right hon. friend the leader of the government (Mr. Borden), last year in this House suggested the idea of a permanent Tariff Commission. I thought at that time that it was a wise suggestion. Personally, representing a farming constituency, I am more than ever impressed, especially after the able presentation of the case by my hon. friend the Minister of Finance, and other gentlemen who have spoken, that this Bill providing for a Tariff Commission is one of the wisest and most logical measures that has ever been introduced into this House. There are several other things
that I would like to take up without getting out- of order.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Go on, go on.


William Cameron Edwards: I would like to refer to some of the arguments made by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) in regard to barley, wheat and a few of the other items which he referred to. I would like to call his attention to cement and to ask him to look up and see what his party attempted to do by the reciprocity pact with regard to cement. They proposed a reduction of li cents per 100 pounds-that is all, notwithstanding the fact that there was strong evidence in favour of more decided action in the rise in price of from 40 to 50 cents a barrel while they had matters in their own hands. When these hon. gentlemen are out of power they interest themselves on behalf of the farmers. Yet, during all the years they were in power they (did not avail themselves of the standing offer of the United States for free trade in agricultural implements. The offer was there, they could have accepted it, if they had chosen to do so. They had the power and the opportunity. Did they do so? Not at all. Their record shows very clearly where these hon. gentlemen have stood for years, preaching, when in opposition, free trade, the destruction of the last vestige of protection and then, coming into power, and giving the lie to all their professions for the previous eighteen years by maintaining the policy which they had up to that time condemned. We had some gentlemen in the course of this discussion getting up and professing to be free traders while others favoured a tariff for revenue, and incidental protection. Such a conglomeration of political thought, or want of thought, on the other side I do not think this House has ever seen. They do not seem to know where they are at in regard to tariff matters; yet the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) says that the Liberal party is a unit in regard to the tariff. The hon. gentleman shakes his head but I am in a position to be able to prove by ' Hansard ' that he said just what I allege he said.


John Gillanders Turriff: Just read it will you please?


William Cameron Edwards: The hon. gentleman discussing this very matter yesterday


John Gillanders Turriff: I would like to hear it.


Hugh Guthrie: It was about the last speech in yesterday's ' Hansard.'


John Gillanders Turriff: The hon. gentleman need not look through my speech, because I did not make the remark.


William Cameron Edwards: I do not wish to misquote the hon. gentleman. I would not do so intentionally. I am quite sure I read

it in some of his remarks. It may have been the hon. member for Humboldt; I would not be certain as to that. It is immaterial at all events. One horn gentleman on the opposition side certainly did make the statement and if the hon. member for Assiniboia did not that is one sin less that he will have to answer for.


John Gillanders Turriff: It is true all right.


Frank Oliver: 
Robert Laird Borden: Why?


Frank Oliver: Because they are inapplicable and out of place.


William Cameron Edwards: 


Robert Laird Borden: I think they are not inapplicable.


Frank Oliver: I bow to my right hon. friend's judgment.


Robert Laird Borden: But I would like to understand your meaning?


Frank Oliver: I am only giving my hon. friend and the House the benefit of my poor opinion.


Robert Laird Borden: But what is the reason?


Frank Oliver: I do not know that it is pertinent to discuss the reasons for my arriving at the conclusion. That is the conclusion at which I have arrived and I am taking the liberty of informing the House to that effect, I hope I have that privilege. I say that when I undertake to read these words into subsection A, for instance, the result does not seem to me to be pertinent or applicable, and in my humble judgment the other sections oi clause 4 are in the same position. So much so, that on the face of it, according to the wording of the section, the intent and purpose of it, and the instructions to the commission, are instructions to make inquiry in regard to manufacturing industries only. That is the purpose as I read section 4. The commissioners are to be appointed by the government to work under the direction of the minister, and to report only to the minister, and every word uttered by the minister and by every member of the House supporting this Bill (until the speeches of the last two or three members who have spoken to-day), absolutely recognized that that was the purpose'of the Bill, and that it did not have even the most remote connection with the agricultural industry, or the adjustment of the burden of taxation on the agricultural industry so as to be for the benefit of that section of the community. What I further wish to point out is that this agricultural industry is of such importance, and the conditions surrounding it, at the present moment, are so urgent, that, if the intention of the Bill was to consider the agricultural industry on the same footing as the manufacturing industry, it should have so appeared on the face of the Bill, and it should not and would not. have been necessary to hunt for it in the interpretation clause, and to put, as it appears to me with all deference, a strained interpretation on that clause, in order to bring in any reference to the agricultural industry, i was trying to place before the committee the facts in regard to the extreme conditions prevailing and the urgency of those conditions in connection with the agricultural industry, as my argument why this clause should be framed differently if it was to convey the

intention of dealing with that industry as I wish to see it dealt with, and, in pursuance of that purpose, I was showing that in the case of wheat there was an opportunity before the government to secure access to the markets of the United States for the wheat of our prairies, to the benefit of the producers to the extent of seven and a half million dollars on that part of this year's crop that yet remains to be marketed. I was discussing the advantage that would accrue to the producer from access to the United States market for the surplus barley of this year, and if I might carry the matter one step further I would draw attention to the fact that on January 19th last, sixty thousand bushels of Canadian oats were sold in the New York market, paying the duty, and thus showing that there is a market for Canadian barley and for Canadian oats as well as for Canadian flax in the United States, and that to-day our oats and our barley are going * to the United States to a limited degree and paying the duty, and that the demand in the United States for the. products of our farms is such that if the duty were removed, as the duty might be removed so far as we can judge by the action of this government, that benefit would result directly to the producers of that region, and to the trade, and commerce, and finance, and transporta,-tion of this whole Dominion of Canada.
I have said something as to the magnitude of the case; may I say something now as to the urgency of the case. The Manitoba ' Free Press ' has been making an investigation of the conditions as to the marketable wheat in the prairie provinces, and I have before me the issue of February 10th instant, in which I find a despatch from Harris, Sask., a portion of which I shall read. I think when I have read it the House will agree that the matter is urgent and is worthy of the attention of the government in the most marked degree. The article reads as follows:
Harris, Sask., Feb. 7.-This afternoon at Harris I saw a sight that has surely seldom been witnessed on the western prairies. I saw 100,000 bushels of wheat piled in the railway yard like coal. It was in rough bin9 made of lumber. The bins have been built on the ground with no foundation but mother earth, and the only roof is a mantle of snow. Most of the bins contain from 500 to 1,000 bushels, but one of them, which looked from the outside something like a roofless rink or a large cattle pen inclosed 50,000 bushels of wheat. This wheat a local lumber company had had to accept from the farmers in lieu of cash. Besides the bins there were in the yards about a dozen grain wagons all full of wheat, and I am informed that every available nook and corner in Harris is stored with wheat.
A large quantity of lumber has been used in the construction of these emergency bins. None of them could have been, erected for less than $50, while the large one must have cost very much more. The idea, of erecting the bins is to have the wheat in hand the moment anything in the shape of a freight car presents itself at Harris. To-day the yard was as [DOT] bare of cars as Minitonas was of gold, and I understand that that has been the condition, of things for some days past. There were 141 cars on the order hook to-day, but that by no means represents the number wanted. Many farmers need three or four cars, hut cannot order more than one at a time. About 308 cars of grain, practically all wheat, have been shipped from here since the season opened. Last year only 192 cars were shipped from this point.
Since the middle of December all cars with the exception of four have been loaded from the temporary bins above described. Much of this wheat is tough. Worse still, there are at least 75,000 bushels of wheat lying on the farm in heaps, just as it came from the separator. Most of it is tough and will spoil if it. is not got out during the next few weeks. At present the cars are coming into Harris at the rate of four or five a week, a rate which is entirely inadequate, and which will mean heavy loss unless it is speedily increased. The three elevators have been full continuously. It is claimed by the railway company that only 7,000,000 were estimated for the Goose Lake line, whereas the actual crop has turned out to be nearer 14,000,000.
The business men of Harris are weary of waiting for cars which come not. In the meantime, there is financial constipation, or as one should say, ' nothing doing.' In all the stores and in the hotel notices are up, 'Positively no credit. We have closed our books.' If the grocery store adhered strictly to this rule, there would be actual starvation or suffering in the neighbourhood, hut it does not. In other stores the rule of ' No credit ' is closely followed. Clerks have little to do and pass the time chatting with farm hands who are waiting for the farmers to sell their grain and pay them their wages. I talked to-day to Thomas A. Stevenson, a Harris farmer, who told me that he finished threshing 2,000 bushels just before Christmas. His wheat had quite a bit of ice in it. After threshing it was placed in bins in the field. The wheat was still in the bins. He had put his name down for a car immediately after threshing, and there were still two pages of the order book ahead of him.
Now, I think I have established that the condition is one of stupendous magnitude, that it is a case of extreme urgency; and if our hon. friends say that the tariff has nothing to do with that condition, I can only reply that the tariff has everything t-o do with it-that had it not been for the tariff it would have been possible to have delivered every bushel of the wheat that is now left without shelter on those western prairies, safely at some terminal point, either Fort William, Duluth or Minneapolis, before the spring caime that

would destroy all the damp wheat that remained at that time.


Mr. BLAIN.: Is not that wheat permitted to go into the United States in bond to be ground for export free of duty?


Frank Oliver: No. At the present time the duty is paid, and it is refunded after the wheat is ground; but up to the present time the railway rates, in addition to the duty, have been such as practically to prevent that being done on any large scale. If the railway rates were suitable, no doubt a great deal of the grain could be absorbed in that way. But that is a very inadequate remedy for the terrible condition that prevails to-day. What was needed was that every possible avenue should have been opened, not only the privilege of grinding in bond, but the privilege of grinding for home consumption, and, what is more urgent, the privilege of entry for feed purposes. But that has not been done, and the condition which I have described prevails all over the western country. And my hon. friend the Minister of Finance brings down a Bill which absolutely ignores on the face of it the interests that are represented in that condition of affairs. I cannot agree that such a provision is satisfactory or is in accordance with the wellbeing of the country.


Mr. MORPHY.: Do I understand the hon. gentleman to say that a part of that grain was cut but unthreshed?


Frank Oliver: Yes.


Hugh Boulton Morphy: Well, how could you have got that grain out, no matter what the conveyances were like?


Frank Oliver: That could not have been got out until it was threshed; but will the hon. gentleman tell me what purpose a farmer would have in threshing grain that was standing in the stook when, after having threshed it, he would have to put it in "a bin where it would remain until it was heated and destroyed, because he could not transport it?


Hugh Boulton Morphy: Will the hon. gentleman allow me to ask him again-


Frank Oliver: Will the hon. gentleman answer my question?


Hugh Boulton Morphy: I am not answering questions. What government was in power that permitted such a disgraceful condition in the west without providing transportation facilities for carrying the wheat away?


Frank Oliver: It is the government which my hon. friend supports, which has been in power since the 21.st of September, and since this condition began to exist, and I have placed before the government to-night a course which they could and Mr. OLIVER.
should have taken in order to have remedied that condition.
But even yet if they would take that course it could well be remedied in some measure. However, I have no hope from anything I see in this Bill or from anything I have heard here spoken from the other side of the House that any such action will be taken. While the wheat, which is practically the gold of our country, upon which not only the western farmer but the trade and commerce and industry and finance of this whole country depend, is depreciating in value, and may, in large measure, be actually lost, this government (brings in a Tariff Commission Bill upon which they propose to found a tariff at some time in the distant future, and that is their answer to this condition that exists. My hon. friend thought that opposition to this Bill was something of a pillow fight, that there was not any sincerity in it. May I return the compliment to him, and may I say that the government and the Minister of Finance (Mr. White), who sits comfortably here in Ottawa, who spends more or less of his time in adjusting offices in the various departments of the public service while the country is in the condition that I have described, and it is in the power of the government to remedy that condition, stands in much the same position as Nero fiddling while Rome burned.
I do not want any member of this House to think that the conditions are exaggerated by me. I want the House to understand that these conditions are so serious that neither newspaper nor public man has dared to give full effect to the facts in regard to these conditions up to the present time, and I am at a loss to understand a government which sits quiet and still, knowing, absolutely knowing, that these conditions do exist.


Mr. STANFIELD.: If conditions are as bad as tire hon. gentleman stated, how is it that the merchants in the west are ordering more goods to-day than they did a year ago?


Frank Oliver: I cannot answer that at all; it may be that the people are hopeful for the future, and it is a matter of fact that there has been an immense increase in population and an immense increase of acreage in the past year. An enormous crop has been raised, even with the damage. But that does not affect the case of the thousands and tens of thousands of men who did not have a crop that they were able to ship out. My hon. friend reflects the attitude of mind, I am afraid, of the government in this matter. They say, as long as business is good, as long as we are able to collect interest on our mortgages, and as long as we get returns on the goods we have sold,

times must be good and things must be good in the west. But I am trying to give them actual inside information in regard to it; no, not inside information, information that is absolutely contained, letter by letter and word by word, in their own government reports, so that they cannot claim lack of knowledge, and my hon. friend, I say, actually reflects the attitude of mind of" the government when he says:	How
can business be in such a condition when the people are ordering more goods? I do not wish to lay too much stress on this feature of the case, I do not think it is wise.
1 only want to take this opportunity in the discussion of this Bill to say to the government how far they have fallen short of their duty in this case, how far this Bill falls short of meeting the requirements of this country in regard to tariff adjustment.
I said, this afternoon that we feared the influences particularly behind the Minister of Finance in connection with tariff adjustment. I think I am not going out of the way when I say that one of the strongest institutions behind the government of the day is the Ogilvie Milling Company, and that the milling interests of Canada, speaking generally, are amongst the strongest stays and supports of this government, I find that in an interview given in Montreal on January 11


William Cameron Edwards: What particular subsection of section 4 has this reference to?


Frank Oliver: I think I was fair to the hon. gentleman and he should be as fair to me. I am discussing section 4, I am trying to show that it falls short of the requirements of this country in regard to tariff legislation and that we are fearful, we are suspicious of the danger to the producing classes from this legislation. I am surely permitted to do that.


William Cameron Edwards: I was not permitted as much latitude as the hon. gentleman by several miles.


Frank Oliver: for the purpose <of giving them lower taxation	or trade	expansion,	is too	innocent	for	this	world. I	do not	thinkhe ever was a voter anywhere or ever will	be.	So,	my bon.	friends	fromthe west	and	from the	rural parts of
Ontario and from the rural parts of Canada generally, may have been able to fool the farmers in the past and before this Bill was brought in; but I give them warning now, that they will not be able to fool the farmers any more. And, more than that, they will not be able to fool the seventy-five per cent of the people who are really the burden-bearers for this country. They have not yet shown, and they will not show, how increased taxation and restriction of trade, how the boosting of the tariff at the dictation and in the interests of the mergers, trusts and combines, is going to help the labouring man to keep his family or the farmer to cultivate his land to better advantage. Cleverly though the Bill is drawn, smoothly though it is introduced, it is still a declaraton of policy; it is the challenge of the special interests to the people of Canada; and as such,, it is 'accepted.
M,r. GUTHRIE. Coming back from what may be considered a little digression from section 4, though on a matter of the greatest importance to the House and the country as stated by my hon. friend (Mr. Oliver), I have one or two amendments which I propose to move to section 4, and which I think I may now place before the committee, the matter having been pretty well discussed. But before doing so, I would like to make one or two references more particularly to the speech delivered this afternoon by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Foster, North Toronto). I am sorry that hon. gentleman is not in his place to-night. He rushed in this afternoon, flashed a few bright thoughts on the discussion-illuminative thoughts they were -rushed out of the chamber again and has not reappeared. But he discussed the section now before the committee in a manner in regard to which I can only congratulate him. I agree with the Toronto ' Globe ' of the 6th of January last, in part of the item, read last night by my hon. friend from Peel (Mr. Blain), in which the ' Globe ' goes out of its way to congratulate the Minister of Trade and Commerce on the stand he has taken throughout the whole discussion on the appointment of a Tariff Commission, as the buffer between the desire of the majority of his colleagues in the Cabinet to establish a Tariff Commission, giving it full power over our fiscal policy, and the more modest Bill which has been brought before the House. It is currently rumoured, and the newspapers have commented upon it, that but for the strenuous efforts of the Minister of Trade and Commerce, a Mr. OLIVER.
much more drastic piece of legislation would have been presented, one which would have deprived this House *of a great many more of its functions than does the present measure. I stated that the address of the Minister of Trade and Commerce was illuminative. It was. And I think it was instructive to his own colleagues. Fortunately or unfortunately the hon. gentleman (Mr. Foster, North Toronto), had not heard the Minister of Finance (Mr. White, Leeds), speak or the right hon. the leader of the government (Mr. Borden), this afternoon; and when asked by myself his interpretation of section 4 of this Bill, he gave an answer which coincided exactly with what I had said this afternoon, which had been challenged or contradicted by the hon. the Minister of Finance and by the right hon. the leader of the government.
That was in regard to the question as to whether this commission, when reporting was to report to the minister or to parliament. The Minister of Trade and Commerce said distinctly it was to report to parliament, for the use of members of parliament. That is the suggestion which I asked the Finance Minister and the Prime Minister to accept. When challenged on it, the Minister of Trade and Commerce said, certainly, that was his understanding of it when he discussed it with his colleagues. Passing from that point, the Minister of Trade and Commerce said to the House: Let us go to the genesis of this movement in favour of the appointment of a Tariff Commission, let us see wiiere this demand comes from. Now I ask any hon. member of this House to state where the demand does come from. Is there a demand at all, apart from one source? The Minister of Trade and Commerce premised his remarks by saying that there was a demand, and I will ask the Prime Minister now, where is the demand from? I ask the Minister of Finance, where does , the demand come from? The only answer they give is the resolutions and various discussions of the Manufacturers' Association. My right hon. friend says that he has spoken some forty times throughout Canada, and has mentioned it in his speeches. But I submit there is no demand, and there has been no demand; and I ask hon. gentlemen opposite to give us a chance and adjourn this debate for even two or three weeks, to allow the country to become familiar with the terms of the Bill, because I take it that ninety per cent of the electors know nothing at all about it, and ninety iper cent of the newspapers of Canada have never discussed it. If we could only have a respite of two or three weeks, the government would know what kind of a demand there was for or against it.
Now how does the Minister of Trade and Commerce justify clause 4? He says that

in his time, back before the year 1896, he and a number of his colleagues were sent from province to province to gather information, to hear deputations, to hear ex parte statements through deputations, accompanied by lawyers, by huge piles of documents and reports of evidence. He says that when he.concluded his peregrinations he knew less about the tariff than he did when he started, and was less able to produce a perfect document than when he commenced his investigation. Then he says he came down to the House with a tariff made by rule of thumb. That was the predicament he was in. He has never made the confession before, but he has been challenged to do so. Hitherto he has always _ justified that tariff, and told us how, with one stroke of the pen, he wiped out four .millions of taxation. Now he says that after three or four months travel throughout the country he came down with a tariff made practically by guesswork. Is it any wonder that conditions detrimental (fco Canada followed such a tariff as that, that the revenue went down and the expenditure went up, that there was business stagnation throughout the country under a tariff made in the manner described by the Minister of Trade and Commerce, made, as he says, by rule of thumb. Then he had the audacity to say that if Mr. Fielding was in the House he would admit that his tariffs were similarly made. I challenge that statement. If Mr. Fielding were in the House to-day there would be no stronger opponent of this measure. Mr. Fielding's tariff was not made by any rule of thumb, it was made after careful and critical investigation. It was made, it is true, after a prolonged course of travel throughout the country, after much thought and _ consideration. It was made after obtaining the facts and information which any Minister of Finance should obtain. His tariff stood practically from 1907, until the present moment, and take it year by year from the date upon which it was passed, and all classes of this country I believe will accord it united praise. It left Canada on the 21st of September last in such a good condition that the Prime Minister was one of the champions of that stock in trade remark during the last election, ' let well enough alone.'
Now the Minister of Trade and Commerce did disagree with me in regard to striking out the words ' under the direction of the minister.' I still hold to my opinion that these words should be stricken out; I still hold that the Tariff Board should be an independent board. If the Finance Minister will put in an alternative clause there, I will be perfectly satisfied, though still protesting against the general principle. If he will allow an alternative clause enabling, say, five or ten individuals to request the Tariff Board to make an investigation into this, or that subject, I will be satisfied. But if he leaves it in its present form it is most highly objectionable, because any board he may see fit to appoint will be his own creation, subject only to his own direction, men who cannot in tire very nature of things make what may be called an independent finding. Now, if the Minister of Finance is sincere, he will admit some alternative clause, or will consent to strike out these words, and rely upon clause 2, which gives him every power imaginable over the board. Then leave the commissioners free under subsection 1, or put in an alternative clause allowing five or ten individuals, whoi make a bona fide application, to have this, that, or the other investigation held by this Tariff Commission. I have tak'en advice of the Speaker with regard to this, and I understand I can move several amendments. My first amendment then will be to strike out the words I have mentioned in subsection 1; ' under the direction of the minister.' Then coming down to clause (g) of subsection 1, my amendment will be to strike out the two last words ' the minister,' and insert the word ' parliament.' At present it reads ' report to the minister,' and I think the wisdom of the House will be with me in my suggestion that the report ought to be made to parliament. The Minister of Trade and Commerce says that was his idea from the discussion he had with his colleagues in council.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: How would my hon. friend reconcile subsection 6 with section 5, where it speaks of confidential evidence that must not be made public?


Hugh Guthrie: We will have a good deal to say on that section.


Samuel Simpson Sharpe: Does the hon. gentleman expect confidential evidence to be submitted to the House?


Hugh Guthrie: I have a good deal to say on confidential evidence. I do not believe in confidential evidence in a matter of this kind. I believe the facts on which the government is going to act should be made public to everybody. But I do think, in all fairness to the individual members of this House, outside of government circles, that the report should come down to parliament to enable us to judge, and not be in the nature of secret departmental information to be given solely to the Minister of Finance.
The hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Foster) proved my case. He said that this was the forum for disputants to come to, both parties could meet, thresh

the matter out, all parties would know what the facts were and the facts would be public and come down to this House so that we could all examine them. Why not abide by that? The request is reasonable and if the request is not granted it makes me feel that there is an ulterior motive in the mind of the Minister of Finance in regard to this Bill and that our criticism that there is something behind the Bill is only too well founded.
Then, I come to the next amendment that I am going to move and that is to strike out subsection 3 altogether. Subsection 3 is the provision that this commission may investigate trusts, mergers and the like.' If we pass the subsection in its present form we are placed in this peculiar position; *we have not less than three forums in this country authorized to investigate trusts, combines, mergers and _ the like. We have the proceeding prescribed by the Tariff Act which provides that an investigation into combines and mergers may be held before judges and these investigations may be held upon the recommendation, appointment, or order of the Governor in Council. I think it would appeal to any reasonable man that the proper forum for such an investigation would be before a judge or judges of the courts of this country. I think the whole House will agree with me that the judges from one end of Canada to the other are men in whom the public have every confidence and for whom the whole nation entertains the very highest regard and respect. I believe that we could all submit such a matter as this is to the judges with absolute confidence that their views will be unbiased by any feeling of partisanship or by any school of thought in regard to tariff, high tariff, low tariff, tariff for revenue or free trade, and that before the judges and perhaps before them only, you can have, from beginning to end, a fair, square inquiry that will go to the root of things and a fearless finding of results. I think that the section in the Tariff Act is broad enough to provide for this inquiry taking place as it should take place. My suggestion a day or two ago was that a reasonable amendment to that particular clause of the tariff law would suffice. Appoint some gentleman as counsel on behalf of the people or the government and make him the active agent of the government in the prosecution, or in the inquiry, or examination into the affairs of these mergers and combines. That is the forum which I would approve. But, there is another forum. Under the combines Act, I believe, it is provided that any five or seven persons-I think it is seven-may make application for an inquiry. There are two forums. Now comes this proposal for a third forum. Is a third forum necessary or essential? Is there any reason why Mr. GUTHEIE.
one or both of those now existing should not be used in preference to the third? The third forum is to be the Tariff Commission appointed by this government and I have no doubt in my mind that the hon. -member for St. Antoine, was quite fair, quite candid, quite accurate in hie statement as to the qualifications of the men who will sit on that board. I do not think he took advice from the members of the government when he made the statement but I have not heard any of them repudiate the statement and I am satisfied that he stated the fact when he said that the commission will be conservative and protectionist. The commissioners will have to be men in sympathy with the protectionist feelings of the present administration. Would you not rather have a board of judges?' Would it not be fairer to have a board of judges to inquire into this matter? There are so many mergers to-day that one is almost afraid to count them up or to imagine what the actual capitalization of these concerns is as apart from the watered capitalization. When one considers the effect which they may have, or which they have to-day, upon the great question that is agitating the public mind in regard to the cost of living one sees the necessity at once of going before the tribunal which is most likely to go into the question fearlessly and fairly and to reach a proper result, Would it-' be this board of tariff commissioners or would it be a board of independent judges in the courts of this country? I have no hesitation in saying, as I said before, that the mergers of Canada would laugh at your Tariff Commission. Give them a chance of selecting the forum to conduct this investigation and they will select the Tariff Commission and not the judges.
Something has been said about mergers -I do not know that I shall go into it now -perhaps at a future time I may have an opportunity-but there is this to be said that, notwithstanding the statement made last night by the hon. member for Montreal, St. Antoine, who I believe, -said that if it could be demonstrated that the effect of the merger of the Ames-Holden and other companies had been to increase the cost of boots and shoes, the product of these factories, to the consumer, he would readily consent to have the 'present tariff wiped out.


Herbert Brown Ames: No.


An hon. MEMBER.: No, reduced 25 per cent.


Hugh Guthrie: Reduced. Well, I do not think it is necessary to prove that. My view of it is that with the over-capitalization of that and other companies and -prices are too hig-h to-day, it is not the question of increasing the price

or reducing the price to the consumer, who is the wearer of boots and shoes. It is so apparent on its face, that one hardly need state it in this House, or to make anything more than a passing remark with regard to it. Take a compamy-^I do not mean the Ames-Holden Company,-hut take any company in which there is an actual capital of $100,000 invested-that money has been paid into it-and the effect of these mergers that take place is to double, treble and multiply that capital, not by new money, but simply by the issue of new stock. A company with $100,000 invested in actual cash, may be recapitalized by the modern process into a company with $1,000,000 of bonds preferred stock, common stock and you see the result. In order to obtain five per cent, on the nominal capital, you have to earn $50,000 on the $100,000 that went into the business. You have to earn $50,000 on the actual investment in order to pay five per cent on the capitalization.


Herbert Brown Ames: I suppose the hon. gentleman is quite aware that many of these companies pay no dividend whatever on their common stock and will not pay any dividend until the water has been entirely squeezed out.


Hugh Guthrie: I know there are all sorts of processes in connection with these schemes and I will admit that the hon. member from Montreal, St. Antoine, is more familiar with practices of this sort than I am. Perhaps the Minister of Finance will give us both pointers.


Herbert Brown Ames: The only thing I object to is that this is criticised by men who know very little about it.


Hugh Guthrie: I am trying to give a few plain, blunt facts that appeal to me and it certainly appeals to me on the face of it, to be wrong in every sense of the word, to see the Aimes-Holden Company, or any other company into which a limited amount of capital has been placed, being capitalized up to two or three times that amount. That is a fraud on the face of it. While I do not know the various processes by which these ends are attained, I state plainly and bluntly that an investigation in regard to them should take place and while the Ames-Holden merger would very gladly submit their affairs to the Tariff Commission, they will be very reluctant to submit their affairs to a board of judges that were appointed under the Canadian Combines Act. [DOT]


Herbert Brown Ames: Will the hon. member allow me to give him one piece of information, because I know he always tries to do what is just and fair in debate, and I have not had occasion hitherto to criticise him on that point. He repeatedly has referred to this company with which apparently I have the
misfortune to be connected, and I shall [DOT] make one statement for his benefit because it is a statement that will be applicable to the allegations made by other honourable gentlemen on that side of the House. My statement is:	Every dollar of the bonds
and preferred stock of the Ames-Holden-Me Cready Company represents actual money invested. So far as the common stock is concerned, there has never been a dollar of dividend paid upon it, nor is there expected to be a dividend paid upon it until that also represents actual assets.


Hugh Guthrie: Well, Mr. Chairman, so much for that clause-


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh.


Hugh Guthrie: I know there are a great many gentlemen on the other side who applaud these mergers. I cannot find it in me to do it, and I know there are seated in this House many personal friends of my own who are very deeply interested in the question of mergers.


Arthur Meighen: Will the hon. gentleman permit me a question? Does the hon. gentleman not remember that a year ago, the day before yesterday, a motion was made in this House to investigate such mergers, and the government that the hon. gentleman supported, and he himself amongst them, voted that motion down.


Hugh Guthrie: I do not remember the question to which my hon. friend refers.


Arthur Meighen: I can tell you.


Hugh Guthrie: I say it is no part of the duty of parliament to investigate mergers; we have a law which provides a way in which they should be investigated and why not put that law in force now or at any time.


Arthur Meighen: Why not put it in force then?


Hugh Guthrie: Who made the complaint?


Arthur Meighen: The hon. member for Jacques Cartier.


Hugh Guthrie: What merger does my hon. friend (Mr. Meighen) refer to?


Arthur Meighen: I refer to the motion made by the hon. member for Jacques Cartier (Mr. Monk), now the Minister of Public Works.


Hugh Guthrie: I do not remember it at all. I do not know whether I was here, but even if I were here I probably would have voted against the motion because I have no doubt the motion was wrongly brought or it would not have been voted down by parliament. But, I find to-night, from the generous applause that greets the

question of mergers from the other side, that tihere is a tremendously strong feeling in their favour among the Conservative ranks in this House.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh.


Hugh Guthrie: Well, I have noticed the marked applause that greets the mergers from hon. gentlemen opposite. I heard the Minister of the Interior a few days ago make a distinct statement in regard to mergers, on the question of the cost of living. It was a very excellent statement. He said! that no question had given the government so imuch trouble or called for so much consideration from the government as that very question of mergers and the cost of living. I thought at the time that the Minister of the interior was serious, hut I do not know that he will make very much headway against mergers, trusts and combines with the present representation on the Conservative side of the House of Commons, because evidently there are only two questions brought before this House which they will applaud. One is: whenever the question of mergers is mentioned there is applause loudi and prolonged, and again, the only real cheer hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House can get out of them is when the sacred word 'protection' is used; 'protection ' cheers from the government side;
' high protection ' more cheers; and ' highest protection ' loud and prolonged cheers.


Richard Blain: If my hon. friend will permit me-


Hugh Guthrie: I do not wish to be interrupted again. There have been occasions in this House, recently, when there was anything but a government cheer. We did not hear much united cheering from the government side when the Ne Temere was up; we did not hear any united cheer when the government's naval policy, or lack of naval policy, was before this House, hut you talk, of trusts and mergers, then my hon. friend from St. Antoine (Mr. Ames) is cheered to the echo by his friends, when I am almost prevented from speaking because of interruption. When you talk of protection, or higher protection, or highest protection, then cheers from the government supporters ring throughout the walls of this Chamber. However, these remarks are a little beside the question and I 3hall get back to the clause. I now beg to move, seconded by Mr. Carvell:
That the words ' under the direction of the minister ' in line 2 of subsection 1 of section 4 of the Bill, be struck out.
Amendment (Mr. Guthrie) negatived, Yeas 40; Nays 76.


Hugh Guthrie: I beg to move, seconded by Mr. Carvell:


Hugh Guthrie: That the words ' to the minister ' in the last clause ' g ' of subsection 1 of section 4 be struck out and the words ' to parliament ' be substituted therefor.
Amendment (Mr. Guthrie) negatived.


Hugh Guthrie: I beg to move seconded by Mr. Carvell:
That subsection 3 of section 4 of the Bill be struck out.


John Gillanders Turriff: Before that amendment is put I want to point out this phase of it. It is proposed now to put the trying of these mergers and combines practically out of the hands of the judges in whose hands it is at present.


Robert Laird Borden: It is not so proposed at all.


John Gillanders Turriff: The object of this Bill, if it means anything, is that this commission shall be in a position to try such cases as have previously been tried by the judges. You appoint this commission for five years, and let us suppose that just before those five years are up, one of these combines ox mergers is complained of, and it goes before this commission for trial. This commission knows very well that the government is in favour of these combines and mergers, and is it likely to be in as good a position to try the case impartially 'as would be one of the judges of the Superior Courts? I think this clause ought to be struck out. We have already two tribunals before which these cases can be tried, and why appoint a third? To take the matter out of the hands of the judges and to put it in the hands of a partisan commission seems to me to be absolutely unfair.


Robert Laird Borden: We are responsible for the Bill, and not foT the hon. gentleman's understanding. There is nothing in the Bill that takes away the present power to have any such matter investigated by the judges. There is simply power to send it to this additional tribunal if so desired.


Wilfrid Laurier: But no
reason has yet been given why this second tribunal should be added to what we have already, or to show that it would be more in accordance with the public interest. Up to the present time we have had a law on the statue-book declaring that under certain circumstances an investigation, if it took place, should take place before a judge. Has any reason been given to show that the public interest would be better served or more justice done to the people at large if such an investigation took place before this commission? Although this is a new jurisdiction, I say it is not an improvement, but rather a deterioration. It is not possible to expect that mien who would he of the character stated by the hon. member for St. Antoine (Mr. Ames),

that is to say partisans, men in sympathy with the policy of the government, will do more substantial justice than men who are out of politics altogether. This is a very good reason why we should adhere to the present law and not adopt this amendment.


Robert Laird Borden: We have explained in the House, at least six times, that this tribunal, having practical knowledge and experience of such matters, is a very desirable tribunal to add to those already, appointed under the Customs Act. It does not seem to me that it would require a great deal of intelligence to understand that. The right Iron, gentleman asks questions about it. He might just as well ask, why did you add the judge of the Exchequer Court to the judges of the other courts ? The question would be just as relevant and just as intelligent. There is nothing taken away from tbe power to send an inquiry to any judge at the present time; but because a commission is to be established which will have knowledge and experience in these matters, we have thought it desirable to give power to send an inquiry to that tribunal if it should be thought best. Nothing is taken away. Additional power is granted to the government, which is responsible for these matters, and which will be responsible as to the tribunal to which they send them. That is all that is comprised in the suggestion that this commission shall be created as an additional tribunal; and there are other reasons which could be given.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: My right hon. friend is trying to draw a herring across the path of this Bill when he intimates that anybody is suggesting that he is trying to take away from the judges the power to investigate these combines. Nobody has made such a suggestion. My right bon. friend knows that the judges have no poweT to investigate combines until he and his council ask them to do so, and he knows that he is providing a tribunal to which he can send these complaints instead of to the judges, and that is what we are finding fault with. I wonder if the hon. member for St. Antoine (Mr. Ames) would not rather have his boot and shoe merger investigated by a commission of good Conservatives well grounded in the principles -of protection, than to have it investigated by a non-partisan judge, who will render .a finding in accordance with the facts. I wonder whether there is a trust in Canada which would not rather have its case investigated by a partisan commission such as this Bill provides than by the judges of the land. There is no use in trying to cloud the object of this Bill from the members of this House or to make the country believe that we do not understand what we are talking about. We know exactly 96
the object of this Bill, and we are trying to make it plain. We know that the object of this Bill is to take, not tihe power, but the actual fact of the investigation of these combines away from the judges of the land, and place it in a partisan commission which will without doubt give the kind of answer the hon. gentleman wants when he sends it to them.


William Thomas White: It is most amazing to me that all the mergers, combines and trusts in Canada have sprung up since the 21st day of September last. If they existed before that date, why did not the late government take advantage of this clause in the Customs Act, and take steps to dissolve them? We have had a good deal of talk from hon. gentlemen opposite, but better evidence of their real opinion is offered by what they did or refrained from doing than by what they say. All the capitalizations that have been spoken of to-day existed prior to the 21st of September last, and did the late government take any action on their own initiative to investigate these combines for the purpose of ascertaining whether prices wrere unduly enhanced or not? I heard some one say something about a paper combine. After 15 years of power, that was the solitary instance of governmental action in regard to combines. All I have to say is that no matter what hon. gentlemen opposite may say to-day, they were not, when in power, on unfriendly terms with the trusts, mergers and combines of this country.
I say that their actions then do not correspond with their words now, and I prefer as between words and actions to rely upon their actions rather than upon their words, although I do not mean in any way to be offensive, because 1 understand this is a debate and they are trying to give an appearance to this Bill that it does not fairly bear. We have heard talk about almost everything in the Heavens above, and the earth beneath and the waters under the earth in reference to this Bill. The hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) has traversed almost the known universe but has failed to debate this Bill on its merits and he knows it. I would do injustice to his intelligence if I believed that he was in his own judgment fairly interpreting that Bill this evening. He said that this Bill had been drafted without regard to the farming population. He is an intelligent man, and as I pointed out this afternoon in the interpretations clause here, which is taken from the Customs Act, the word ' products ' was deliberately added to the wording of the Customs Act in order that it might include the product of the farmer. I ask whether the word products does not include the products of the farmer. Is not ' agricultural products ' an every day



expression, is it not an ordinary use of the word ' product ' which, was put in expressly for the purpose of meeting the case of the farmer? I say that of all the people of Canada who will derive advantage from the information that will be collected by the Tariff Commission the farmers stand to benefit the most. Take the interpretation clause:
(d) ' Goods ' means products, wares and merchandise or movable effects of any kind, including, but without limiting the generality of the foregoing, horses, cattle and other animals.
Is there any merger or trust in horses, cattle and other animals? Are they not products of the farm? Do they not come within the provisions of this Bill and are not the farmers who raise these animat entitled to the benefit of the information which will be obtained by this commission? I would do injustice to the intelligence of the House if I assumed anything else.
Take subsection 4, in respect of the cost of production, and compare it with the interpretation clauses. It refers to the product of the farmer as well as of the manufacturer or of the company or combine, and the farmer is represented there. What do we wish to obtain? The cost of production in Canada as well as elsewhere for the farmer as well as for the manufacturer and merger. The cost, efficiency and conditions of labour in Canada and elsewhere in order that we will know what the farmer pays for his labour as compared with farmers in other countries. ' The prices received by the producers, merchants, &c. This clause includes farm products.


Frank Oliver: Is the minister going to fix the tariff on farm products on the basis of the prices paid by the farmer for the labour he uses?


William Thomas White: 1 say that labour enters into the price of the products of the farm just the same as of any commodity or the products of any factory in Canada, all conditions and factors which affect or enter into the cost of products. One of the great questions of the last campaign was the price of horses and cne advantage of the man on the plains over the Ontario farmer for the supplying of horses for northern Ontario. Is that not pertinent and important to the farmers who raise the horses? It is an absolute perversion to say that this Bill does not provide for the case of the farmer. This Bill meet3 the case of every class of people in Canada. It is designed to meet the cases of all the population of the country and it is an absolute perversion to read anyuung else into it.
My bon. friend this afternoon paid me the compliment of again saying that I Mr. WIDTH (Leeds).
was the representative of interests. Let me tell him that I am a representative of interests, I am here as the representative of the public interests, I represent the interests of the people of Canada, and while I am here I shall endeavour to discharge this trust and if the hon. member keeps as free from sinister influences as I do he will do well. I said before and I say now that I never have had and I have not now any connection with any trust, merger or combination, and I defy any man in Canada to prove that I have. Hon. gentlemen may find some fault with my capacity but I want them to understand


Frank Oliver: I never made any insinuation against the hon. gentleman.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


William Thomas White: He said from his place that I was the representative of the interests, of the trusts, mergers and combines.


Frank Oliver: I never made any insinuation against the hon. gentleman of having any interest in any trust, merger or combine.


William Thomas White: You said I represented the interests


Frank Oliver: And I adhere absolutely to that statement.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Take it back.


William Thomas White: I say I am not the representative of such interests, and that I am quite capable of discharging my duties m an impartial manner, and I think he might very well omit these suggestions although I take it from him that he has withdrawn anything in the nature of a personal allusion.


Frank Oliver: I never made any or wished to make any.


William Thomas White: You said it.


Frank Oliver: Not personally, no.


William Thomas White: To come down to the matter of this particular case with regard to the investigation of trusts, combines and mergers, as I have said, hon. gentlemen opposite lament that we are about to withdraw the privilege of submitting these cases to the courts. We are not withdrawing them, we are simply adding a tribunal. While hon. gentlemen speak in this way, yet in 15 years of power one single solitary instance is all that can be cited by hon. gentlemen opposite of their having recourse to the courts with regard to trusts, mergers and combines. They say it is a tremendous national loss that , the courts should be lost to them, and

yet to what extent did they use the courts? Let me state what my predecessor, a very able man, of whom I shall always speak with the greatest respect, said about trusts, mergers or combines:
In that shape the resolution passed the House, and is part of the tariff law to-day. While it imposed a check on the government, it had this disadvantage, that it provided a somewhat slow_ piece of machinery. Justice in the courts is somewhat slow; judges are busy, and men who thought there were combines, were slow to take advantage of the provision.
That answers my right hon. friend, it is from his righthand man, who said that justice is slow, and I add to that that justice is sometimes technical. We are not taking away from the court the hearing of these cases, not for a moment; we are adding a tribunal which can hold an inquiry in a very informal manner, which is not so bound by technical rules and which from the nature of the investigation into industrial conditions would be the best possible tribunal to inquire. That is all that we have in view in regard to this Bill. All this afternoon we have listened to iteration and reiteration as to keeping knowledge from parliament and yet if there is anything that has been made as plain as daylight, by every man who has spoken with responsibility, it is that parliament is to be entitled to all the information we may obtain. Nothing could be clearer than that.
The hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) said that the Minister of Trade and Commerce had agreed in the view; that this information should go to parliament. So he did, but it was precisely in the same sense that the rest of us agreed, it must come to parliament because my hon. friend said in his trenchant and clear way that parliament was not disciplined and organized to take the initiative at all and if any one will consider for a moment the principle of responsible government, he must realize as a matter of fact that the government which has to take the initiative, must have the information given to it m order that it may take the initiative. It is the government that takes the initiative, that brings down its tariff Bill.
The very purpose of this legislation has been explained time and again in this debate. Over and over again it has been stated that the government wants to get information on which it may rely when it is considering the tariff law. Now, I said the other day that my hon. friends opposite were creating bogeys. I say so now. They are reading into this Bill what does not exist in the Bill, what never was intended to exist in the Bill, and what I think most of them know, does not exist and was not
96*
intended to exist in the Bill. But they wish to make things different from what they are-it is not what things are, but what they may be made to appear, that counts. These hon. gentlemen were so long in power that they grew skilled in that kind of thing. They have not lost this skill, and they are using it to-day to try I to give a false appearance to the Bill. The Bill is precisely what it purports to be, a means of obtaining information, a means which my right hon. friend (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) endorsed in his speech before the manufacturers in Montreal, as I proved before. These hon. gentlemen are fighting bogeys which they themselves have raised. But all this will fail of effect when the work is in hand. It is measures and acts that count; and when the Tariff Commission is in action, my hon. friends will see that this is a beneficial measure. They will find it used for the best interests of the country. And, if it is not so used, the government is responsible, and the people will1 take care that a government is placed in power that will act in their interests through the Tariff Commission, and otherwise. That is the principle, and that principle has not been departed from in the least in connection with this Bill.


Mr. CLARK (Red Deer).: It seems to me a very significant circumstance that we have just heard from two ministers of the Crown, my right hon. friend the Prime Minister (Mr. Borden) and my hon. friend the Minister of Finance (Mr. White, Leeds). I am not naturally the best tempered of men myself; but I really cannot congratulate either of these ministers on the temper in which they have addressed the committee. My right hon. friend the leader of the government, whom I have always regarded with almost affection, referred to me and to other members on this side in terms that were hardly respectful. He said that 'any man of intelligence surely could see that.' The imputation was that nobody on this side of the House had intelligence.


Robert Laird Borden: I beg the hon. gentleman's pardon. He misunderstood me. I thought my hon. friends opposite did see it.


Michael Clark: Yet the right hon. gentleman knew they did not see it, for they had so declared. The Minister of Finance has shown an amount of temper that is a perfect surprise to me. He ha' been wreathed in sweet smiles since he came to this House. That hon. gentleman also is a lovable personality. Yesterday, he was complaining that we were only engaged in a pillow fight. Well, when at boarding school, I had pillow fights, but I am bound to say that I never saw a boy in a pillow fight get into such a state of

temper as my hon. friend has shown. There was no need for temper, no need for defending his personal character, because there has been no imputation on his personal character.


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Michael Clark: That is a pretty general interruption, but it is somewhat inarticulate. If I were charged as a farmer in this House with acting in the interests of the farmers, I should not take it as a charge that I had a personal object to serve or that I was occupied by my own personal desire for gain, being personally tied up to the farming profession. A public man-and really one has to say these things, for after all is said and done, we are all public men here, and my hon. friend the Minister of Finance, who is a very young parliamentarian must not take every charge made against him in his public capacity as a charge upon his personal character. I venture to say that to the hon. gentleman; and I think if I had had the opportunity to speak some such words before he rose, he would not have got so angry. I do not know what the cause of anger is in this case. But I must say it makes me apprehensive. If it be the statement of my hon. friend from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) well, that hon. gentleman always makes his statements emphatically. If it be that hon. gentleman's statements about trusts, mergers and combines that makes the Minister of Finance so angry I am apprehensive. For there is an old French proverb:	Qui s'excuse, s'accuse.
These hon. gentlemen are defending themselves with too much warmth on this subject of mergers for a western farmer to be quite comfortable. They make me fearful- not of their debate, because the man who loses his temper in debate is done-but fearful that there is a closer connection between the mergers and themselves, than they are willing to admit-I mean a public connection; the hon. gentleman must not be angry with me.
As to the amendment, the law as it is at present puts the initiative for examining these conditions into the hands of the people; that is my understanding of it. The anti-combines Bill enables any seven people to make an application to the Governor in Council for a court, and action is taken. The initiative is in the hands of the people, and that seems to me a very good thing. But I am afraid that the people are not going to get the consideration in these matters that they should have. I have explained in regard to the general matter my fears upon this question, and I have not heard in any of the subsequent parts of the debate anything which has cleared my mind of these fears. From the time of Magna Charta to the Lloyd George budget-


Michael Clark: 


Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


Michael Clark: The interruptions are still somewhat inarticulate, Mr. Chairman. From the time I first mentioned until the other day-perhaps it suits my hon. friend better to have it put *that way; his knowledge of history may be a little limited-the British peciple, who, after all, have laid the foundation of free institutions and parliamentary governments the world over, have fought for the right of taxation as the inalienable right of parliament. They have been most jealous of any interference with that right. They cut off a king's head to take away from him the power to interfere with them in that matter. And in the next generation they drove a king from the throne, still fighting for the power of the people to tax themselves through parliament and the executive government. And the other day, in Great Britain, the House of Lords had taken from it forever the power of veto of an Act of the House of Commons and the power to interfere with a money Bill at all. I take it that this reference, being met with laughter or smiles in many parts of the other side of the House, is an indication of the hollowness of the (professions of hon. gentlemen opposite of affection for the mother country and its institutions. My attachment to those institutions cannot be questioned,-never has been questioned; my attachment to the flag has never been questioned. But I am bound to say that there are hon. members here who seem to regard these institutions in another light from that in which I regard them.
Now the initiative in this thing arises with the people. It has been contended that the Tariff Commission is meant to get the information. Analyse the taxing pow-er of the people a little further, and our information has been got to guide parliament and government in their taxing power. What is the constitution of Canada, as in the United Kingdom? It is that on a wider or narrower suffrage parliament is elected, and from that parliament an executive government is appointed. In Canada there is a little difference. We appoint our Cabinet ministers in a different w ay than in the old country, and I cannot think that the innovation is a good one. But that is the constitution in both countries. In various departments of the government you have the whole power of the people, for the time that you are in office, to make each of your departments as powerful as you want, them to be, to spend all the money you like, to get what information you like. That has been the method of government from time immemorial in every country that forms a portion of the British empire. Now why have the British people gone through with that fight? Because

the power of the purse resting in parliament is the only thing which guarantees the liberties of the people. We fought in the past against the despotism of kings, we fought until the other day against the unrestricted despotism of the House of Lords; and it is a sad thing to me that I come here to be subjected to another despotism, forsooth of the representatives of trusts and mergers. I must say that the tyrants of the past had some dignity about them. They had some tradition, but the conscienceless millionaires of this country have neither dignity nor anything else; they are guided by one consideration and that is the support and strengthening of their own interest at the expense of the general public.
Now what do you propose to do in this clause? Both the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance have said that you are not restricting that power, you are introducing a new power, it is an added power, and it.is the knowledge of British history and of what we have had to do to establish the power of parliament that makes me fear this additional power. The Anti-Combines Bill, I did not know that it was likely to do much. When it was discussed in this House in the last parliament I described it as a pill to cure an earthquake. A bludgeon is the only cure for the diseases that arise from a tariff, and so far as this went it was thoroughly constitutional. \\hat does the Minister of Finance say about this added power? I hope I am quoting him correctly. He says: 'The power we have added, we think, will be the best possible tribunal.' Why, that is an extraordinary confession, it is a confession which justifies everything that has been said on this side in support of my hon. friend's amendment. If it is the best possible tribunal, why is it so? It is not that in the light of history, it is not that in the light of establishing the taxing power of parliament, it is the best possible tribunal because it is the instrument of the government. I am afraid to utter the next sentence, but I do it without any personal reflection; it is the best possible tribunal and the best instrument of the government, because the government is, I fear, the instrument of another power, another despotism-care I say trusts? The word might make them angry. It is the best possible tribunal, I repeat, because it is a tribunal which the government themselves are creating, it is their instrument, and I very much fear that they are using the forms of the old constitutions of this country, and of Britain, to put a buffer between themselves and the people, to put a buffer between themselves and their responsibility. That
is why I most heartily support this amendment.
My hon. friend the Minister of Finance said that actions count Well, I admit it. But after all, in discussing parliamentary measures we have to talk some. I remember an instance in British history of a great statesman who held the position of Chancellor of the Exchequer, a position analogous to that held by my hon. friend the Finance Minister. That statesman was William Pitt, he got there in a year and a half, and he got there by means of three speeches which at once marked him out as the most brilliant parliamentarian that had been seen in England for a century. So he went on and proved himself to be. I must say, for a man who discards any belief in words, as my hon. friend did, he is a pretty good talker himself. He speaks extremely well, and frequently. If he goes on as fast as he has since he came to the House, we will be able to remind him of his saying that it is actions that count and words are nothing. I told my hon. friend yesterday that I feel an interest in him, I ventured to describe him with the best of good temper as a man who had entered upon a rake's progress. I hope I was thoroughly wrong, and that his political history will turn him out as a man who will restrain those men behind him who are at present cheering protection to the echo. But I have my fears. However, I am here as a representative of the western farmers-who have no interest in this commission, of course. The real fact is that you cannot protect the farmers of this country, the great bulk of the farmers, for the simple reason that they produce far more than they can use, and have to send the overplus abroad. No protection to them is possible, that is why they are excluded from the operation of this Bill.
As a representative of the western farmers I can only say that I take the statement of my hon. friend that actions count as equal to an assurance of good conduct on his part. I take it as almost equal to an assurance that he will show us-I do not say in his next budget because he has not got his commission into working order yet-but in the budgets of this parliament some real and substantial reductions of taxation. I hug that hope to my heart and I need some soothing of my alarms because I am very much afraid tliat the result of this measure will be the raising of the tariff and not the lowering of it. In the meantime I will get such consolation as I can from the assurance of my hon. friend. I have very great pleasure in supporting this amendment.


Mr. COCKSHUTT.: One would hardly be human if he did not feel stirred by the outrageous abuse which has been hurled from the other side for many hours past at all men who may be considered as at all

connected with the manufacturing industries of Canada. I do not wish to pursue the argument in the vein in which hon. gentlemen opposite have pursued it but all I can say to them is that they are barking up the wrong tree in my judgment and that no party will stay long in power that attempts to pull down that which during the last thirty years has been built up-the vast industries of Canada. I want to tell these hon. gentlemen-and I have specially in my mind the two hon. gentlemen who are sitting on the second bench, the hon. gentleman who has just spoken, Mr. Clark (Red Deer) and the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie)-that they are not speaking for the people of Canada today. They say that the manufacturers number two or three thousand and that all this is for their benefit. These manufacturers are employing about 500,000 workmen who are dependent upon the manufacturers for their daily bread and they are just as much entitled to respect and to honour as are the farmers of Red Deer. I want to say to the hon. member for Red Deer-I have not had an opportunity of speaking with him before-that he is not speaking for the whole people of England to-night. I know a little about England as well as he does. I have taken part in two campaigns in England and I want to tell him that half the people in England are against his economic principles. I want to tell him that there is a greater chance of protection being introduced into Great Britain than there is of the policy of free trade being introduced into Canada. There is no doubt that the hon. gentleman has free trade at heart, but there is a doubt whether he understands the people of Canada to-day. We have been engaged for thirty years in building up this nation. We have employed in the factories to-day 500,000 workingmen. There are only 700,000 upon farms with 900,000 workers of all kinds who are not upon farms. Do not run away with the idea that this is a purely agricultural country and that every other industry must hide its head because the farmer says so or because those who profess to represent the farmers say so. The hon. gentleman has just told us that the farmer cannot be protected. Let me refer him to the pages of the Ottawa papers last week which quoted potatoes at $2.50 a bag. Is not that a fit subject to be investigated by the Tariff Commission? What is the cost of producing potatoes in Canada? Is it any thing like $2.50 a bag? The workmen have to pay that price and they pay it uncomplainingly. I take the ground that we are going to be a united people from end to end, a people who will give and take and this cry of mergers combines and so on is not going to down long tire people of Canada. These gentlemen Mr. COCKSHTJTT.
sat for fifteen years with these mergers and combines at their back and they did not make the least effort to put them down. But, as soon as they begin to pull down the industries of this country, they, will find that the farmer of Canada will suffer along with other citizens. We are all bound together in one common interest, and I say to these gentlemen who would endeavour to strike at the manufacturers because he only represents two or three thousand people, that when they hit at the manufacturer they hit at every man who is working for him, and I am proud to-day that the workmen of Canada are much more contented and much happier than are the workmen of the country from which the hon. gentleman who has just sat down (Mr. Clark) comes. Let him explain what is the matter in Great Britain to-day, when every great industry is threatened with strikes. What about the coal strikers who have voted by four to one to go on strike? What is that for? The hon. gentleman has given us no reason, and he cannot say that free trade has banished all industrial and economic ills. They have tried all kinds of quack nostrums in England under Lloyd George to cure the evils by which they were oppressed-their pension Bills, their old, worn-out insurance against unemployment, and that sort of thing-everything but giving an honest day's wage for an honest day's labour. The first right of a citizen is the chance to have an honest day's pay for an honest day's labour. Still, we have this hon. gentleman coming out from England to tell us that for thirty years we have been on the wrong track, that we do not know how our people are being wronged by tariffs, and taxes, and mergers and combines. These words flow glibly from the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver), the hon. member from South Wellington and others. The people of Canada are being well served by the manufacturers and the workman, and with all this howl about the farmer we have not heard one single word in the debate about the interests of the working men. They are struggling just as hard as the farmers. They have just as much right to live, and I believe that when the people of Canada look this question over they will tell these men that they are wrong. They will tell the hon. member for South Wellington, at least the people of Guelph will, if I know them, that he is not preaching sound doctrine. I do not wonder that my hon. friend the Minister of Customs (Mr. Reid) drew the line at allowing them a trip hammer the other day when they wanted one brought in without paying duty. There is a trip hammer there now and the Minister of Customs did not want another to get in without paying duty, and therefore my hon .friend will have to

pay the duty, and rightly so. If the manufacturers in other centres have to pay duty on trip hammers, why should my hon. friend be permitted to bring his trip hammer in free? What I ask the hon. member for South Wellington, the hon. member for Red Deer and the people of Canada to do is to look this question in the face. This measure has 'been brought down to better conditions. I am not prepared to say whether, in its working out, it is going to do all the things that are expected, but it means the searching for information, and if information is going to make any difficulty, it is the first time I have known it to make difficulty. The information that is to be searched for is to enable us to have a scientific tariff. Unlike free trade, a protective tariff is a science, not a fixed science, but an applied science, and the beauty of the tariff is that you can apply it to the conditions. Then the hon. member for Red Deer said that goods ought to be brought in more freely because the revenue is too high. That will produce more revenue. A reduction in the tariff has been known in times past to produce more revenue, and it may do so again. Why reduce the tariff if you want to reduce the revenue? Increase the tariff and stop imports, stop the hundred million dollars excess that is spent on imports from going out of this country to the other nations of the world and keep money in our own pockets. It is not as the hon. member for Red Deer or as the hon. member for South Wellington says, oversea commerce that counts-not by a long way.
To-day the test of a nation's success is tlm degree of efficiency and economy with which it can supply its own wants. Compare the United States, that great protectionist country, with Great Britain, that great free trade country, if you can call her so, and I say that the condition of the workingman and o.f the farmer in the United States is far superior to that of the corresponding classes in Great Britain. The hon, member for Red1 Deer (Mr. Clark) may question that, but I can point to the report of a commission which recently came from England to investigate the conditions in the United States, and which on its return sets forth that the workingman of the United States, with all your high cost of living, and your high tariff, is better off than the workingman in so-called free trade England. I tell the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark) that there is a great probability that in the near future, we will see a tariff for protection in the British Isles, land that no longer will it be pointed out that there is one great .free trade nation, and, equally true there is not likely to be any more. For fifty years free trade has been tried and
found wanting all along the line. If you take Great Britain as a sample of free trade, you will find if you look at her taxation, that She raises millions of dollars on tea and coffee and many other such things that are regarded as absolute necessaries of life, and which are staple articles of consumption by the 'workingman. L'et me ask the member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark), and I hope he wall be honest enough to admit it, what -class in Great -Britain to-day is anxiously demanding tariff reform; who cry the loudest in Great Britain for protection? Is it not the agricultural classes that are demanding tariff reform? I tell my hon. friend (Mr. "Clark) that tariff reform in the old land is coming without doubt, and that when it does come Great Britain will see an era of prosperity such as she never witnessed before. I appeal to hon. gentlemen opposite to now let this Bill go through, they have fought it for hours and hours and it is time for them to cease vain argument. These gentlemen opposite tell us that this Bill is for the manufacturers only, but we have not asked for it as manufacturers. 1 am glad to know that undeT this Bill the 'cost of living will be investigated, because if potatoes are sold at two and a half dollars a bag when they should be sold for one dollar or one dollar and twenty-five cents, the workingman may have a remedy; if eggs are selling too high at fifty cents a dozen, and if wheat, oats, -and barley are sold at too high -a price, there may be a drop, and so we will see to it in the cities that if you get after the workingman we will know what is the matter with the farmer also that he does not produce at a lower price than he now sells for. I tell hon. gentleman opposite that the whole thing is a question of live and let live. I would advise hon. gentlemen opposite to cease their denunciation of the manufacturers and the workingmen of Canada; I would advise them to let this Bill go into force, and then, if they have any complaint against it, I am sure it will not be found in the measure itself but in the working of it. I believe here will never be any fault to be found with this measure if the men who are appointed as commissioners are the right kind of men. The member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) shed big tears because no room could be found on that commission for a free trader. Certainly not; my view is that the man who goes on a board to handle tariffs must be a man who believes that tariffs must be handled.
My hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Clark) says that a bludgeon is the only thing that ought to be used on a tariff and my answer to him is that the man who sets out to handle tariffs, must be a believer in tariffs, and must not be a man who- would use a bludgeon on tariffs. I

would ask the Minister of Militia if, when he is going to arm the militia of Canada, he would select Andrew Carnegie or the Kev. J. A. MacDonald to select a fit and proper rifle to put into the hands o-f the defenders of our country. Surely not, because they believe in complete disarmament, and they would pick out a gun that would not go off. And, that is exactly what would happen if you put men of the calibre of the hon. member for Eed Deer (Mr. Clark) on a Tariff Commission; you would be arming the commission with a gun that would not go off, and that is exactly what we don't want to do. There is no chance of the Minister of Militia asking the Peace Society to step in and pick out weapons with which to fight our enemies, and there is no chance of anybody who would use a bludgeon on the tariff being able to decide as to what is a proiper tariff for this country. I would appeal to hon. gentlemen opposite to let the Bill now go through, and let the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) think overnight on it before he moves any further amendments.


Michael Clark: I am sure the House, during the time I have had the honour of sitting in it, has not had to complain of my occupying on the whole, more than my share of its time, and I ask for an opportunity to utter what I hope will be a few goodnatured sentences in answer to such direct appeals as have come to me from my hon. friend (Mr. Cock-shutt). I might tell the House, if I wanted to be critical or to get angry, that I found the speeches of my hon. friend (Mr. Cockshutt) very useful campaign literature when 1 first fought for a seat in this House in 1908. I had recourse to ' Hansard ' and I found on the whole no more useful speeches to me for securing my seat in the House of Commons than the speeches of my hon. friend. Now that I have heard him, I can understand that. I appeal to the right hon. the leader of the House to say that there has been no undue delay in the discussion of this measure. We must admit that this legislation its in the nature of an innovation; it is a new thing; it is a very large measure, and I do not think the time that has been spent over it has been unduly long as yet. I should be the last man to countenance in any way any form of Parliamentary obstruction. I know the tight we had against it years ago, in the mother of parliaments, and I should be the last to counsel it. But, I contend, there has been no need for such an impassioned appeal as I have just heard from my hon. friend (Mr. Cockshutt) for the immediate settlement of this question. That impassioned appeal reminds me that I will need a large stock of soothing syrup, if I have first to admin-Mr. COCKSHUTT.
ister it to the members of the Cabinet and then to take up private members afterwards. When my hon. friend (Mr. Cockshutt) began in so stormy a tone, I thought we were getting from bad to worse, and really my duties in the way of soothing hon. members opposite will soon come to be very onerous indeed. I want to say to my hon. friend (Mr. Cockshutt) that there is no man in Canada who wants to set class against class less than I do. I am a farmer; he is a manufacturer. I had explained in the few remarks I made to the House that, as a farmer, I make my living without protection. I have no protection. It is economically impossible for you to give it to me. I produce, or help to produce, more of the material of the farm than is needed in Canada, and I cannot be protected. I have got to sell every year what I produce; every thing that is ready for the market must go.
The manufacturer is in a different position. But the only point I want to put to my hon. friend is that I am protected, and I ask him, if he be so strong a man as his voice would indicate, to put himself alongside of the feeble Briton that he sees before him and live without government pap. Of course, I am under no illusions as to the early arrival of free trade in Canada; I know too much about fisealities to expect anything of the kind. I have argued again and again that the benefit of the western farmer is the benefit of the whole of Canada, and I honestly believe that what I am supporting is good for the whole of Canada and not simply for any class of the community. My life-long connection with the British Liberal party is a guarantee that I stand for the^ masses, and not for minorities of any kind, and my whole argument in this House will support me in that modest claim. I do not know whether my hon. friend was present when I spoke last night, or whether, if he was not present, he did me the honour of reading what I said.


William Foster Cockshutt: I read it.


Michael Clark: It has not had a very good effect up to the present. If he read it at all carefully, he would have found one statement which after all was an emphatic contradiction of something he has just said. He said he had not heard anybody mention the consumers in the country.


William Foster Cockshutt: I said the workingmen.


Michael Clark: Does the working man not consume? I have known a number of workingmen who had excellent appetites. I tried to make my argument clear that the consumers included everybody in the country. I would be loath to go into a discussion as to the com-
3041	FEBRUARY 13, 1912	3042
parative merits of the old country and Canada. A great many of us in this House love and respect both lands, and I do not think an acrimonious comparison of the two countries would be a good way to promote the sane imperialism in which we all believe. I would like to say in conclusion that I have never, in private or in public, said one word against Canada which was not justifiable criticism; but in parliament, as on the platform, we must discuss measures for the public good of the country in which we live, and it is only in that spirit that I criticise. If I did not do that, I would not be doing my duty to my constituents.


Mr. VERVILLE.: For the first time in this House we have a manufacturer proclaiming himself to be a great friend of the workman. He has not been a great friend of the workman all his life, if I am well informed. As he has said, there are about 500,000 workmen in the different industries of the country, and as he has brought the question before the House, I am in duty bound to say a few words in support of the workmen of the country. We have heard a great deal about a scientific tariff. I believe the 500,000 workmen that the hon. gentleman has mentioned regard that scientific tariff as a one-sided affair, because it is entirely in favour of the great manufacturers of the country. Protection, if I understand it aright, has the object of preventing goods from another country coming to this country without paying a heavy tax; that is for the benefit of the manufacturer. But what about the labour to manufacture those goods? Is there any protection for that labour? My hon. friend from Brantford knows that there is not. If there is no protection for labour, 1 claim that the tariff is a one-sided affair. In this House, and elsewhere, I have often heard men rise and say what good friends they were of the labour classes. In Brockville at the present time we find law-abiding Canadian citizens put out of work and strangers from the other side of the line puit in their places.


William Foster Cockshutt: Is there not an alien labour law that protects the labourer?


Alphonse Verville: I will cite to my hon. friend a case which was before the Montreal courts. The manufacturer, who was the Canada Car Company, stated that they could not get eoanpetenlt men in Montreal, which was untrue, but the presiding judge said that that statement by the manufacturer was enough, and we lost our case. There is the kind of protection we have, and it is a one-sided protection. My hon. friend is not satisfied with the expression ' trusts and mergers.' It is not my intention at present to discuss this question in detail, because I hope to do so in the near future. We talk about legislation, but if we were spending one-fourth of the time of this House to make legislation and three-fourths of the time to see it carried out, we would be doing better for tihe country. We are passing one piece of legislation after another, because I understand that this is an addition to existing legislation, and then we will probably have another piece added to it, to make it so that nobody can understand it.
My hon. friend f-om Brantford (Mr. Coekshutt) has no right to say that the working people of this country are satisfied, and the very remedy for tariff evils, the very remedy against the trusts and mergers, was presented before the people last year, on the 21st of September. Whether it was .carried or not makes no difference; it was presented, and if it had been presented and left bare as it should have been, without any waving of the flag or cries of all sorts, in fact if you were to take a referendum on that question alone to-day, I am convinced that a strong majority would pronounce in favour of that measure. I declare that nobody has the right to say the working people are satisfied. My hon. friend knows that very well, and if he had not said what he said to-night it was not my intention to take part in this discussion. 1 am not discussing the Bill, I am not a law maker, God forbid me from being a law maker of that kind. I am here representing the very finest division in the Dominion of Canada and the largest one. I have any number of manufacturers in my riding and it is not their fault that I now sit in this House. I claim that you can send your Tariff Commission all over Canada and abroad to make investigations a3 to the conditions of manufacture, but most of the information desired is now to be obtained in the Labour Department. The government will find there informa-*tion on the hours of labour, on the wages paid in different industries, on the wholesale and retail prices of goods. If it is desired to obtain information on the value of the plant of a manufacturer, will they be able to determine whether the manufacturer is overrating his plant? The fact that practically all the manufacturers and the mergers and combines were wholly against the measure submitted to the people in September last, is enough to show that that measure was in favour of the people. The hon. member speaks about potatoes at $2.50 a bag. What about butter at 40 cents a pound that was bought at 25 cents and put in cold storage until the merger raised the price to 40 cents? You can go to Ottawa stores and buy eggs

at 50 cents, out of cold storage. One grocer told me to-day that he had to sell the fresh eggs at the same price because the people could not afford to pay more. Does the farmer derive any benefit from the butter which he sells at 25 cents and which is retailed at 40 cents out of cold storage or from the eggs which he sells at 15 cents or 16 cents a dozen, which are now being sold at 40 cents? Where is the profit of the farmer in that? What about the third party in that case, the man who is responsible for the enhanced price? We don't seem to touch him at all.
I claim that this is done through the mergers! and the trusts and when the time comes I shall produce figures to show that we have 30 or 40 mergers and to prove their over-capitalization. I do not want a commission to find out the cost of living, I go from store to store and I have found exactly the real conditions of the cost of living in Montreal and Toronto, I will compare that with the cost in the United States and then we will have something to show to the members of the House the effect of the merger whether that merger has a right to exist, and whether the investigation thait we are now going to make into mergers will be beneficial to the masses or not.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: I have been astonished that any opposition to this Bill is received with great surprise by hon. gentlemen opposite, and that they have not exhibited the best of temper in replying to any objections urged against it. Supporters of the government speak of this measure as if it were of divine origin, as if it was perfect land not Oipen to criticism and amendment. The motion before the House is that clause 3 be struck out. The right hon. gentleman who leads the House stated in reply to the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) that the reason for subsection 3 of section 4 being in this Bill had been explained three or four times, but he did not give a single reason for its existence in the Bill. Nor did the Minister of Finance give any reason for the presence of that particular clause. The House is entitled to some logical reason for the existence of this clause in the Bill. The purpose of the clause is to empower the Governor in Council to authorize the holding of an inquiry by the proposed Tariff Commission under section 12 of the Customs Tariff Act.
Under section 12 of the Customs Tariff Act the Governor in Council was empowered whenever it deemed it to be in the public interest to inquire into any conspiracy, combination, agreement or arrangement alleged to exist among the manufacturers to unduly promote the advantage of the manu-Mr. VERVILLE.
facturers or dealers in any article at the expense of the consumer. That clause of the Tariff Act empowered the Governor in Council to direct an investigation by certain judges.
If the judges reported that there was a conspiracy, the government had the power to remove the tariff upon uae particular article. I would point out that a conspiracy in restraint of trade, a condition of things such as was contemplated under section 12 of the Customs Tariff Act, is a violation of the criminal law of this country. And the party guilty of any violation of that part of the criminal law is liable to a penalty of $4,000 as a maximum, and $200 as a minimum, or two years imprisonment. I contend it is quite clear that an investigation of this kind should take place before judges of a court, parties competent to make an investigation.
It may be said that under section 12 of the Customs Tariff Act, the penalty is not the one described in the Criminal Code. But, if the judges report that there has been a violation of the law, that a conspiracy exists, it becomes the duty of the Crown to prosecute the conspirators criminally. This is a serious matter and those powers should not be delegated to the members of this commission. We do not know wno they may be. They may not be members of the legal profession, or qualified to take evidence under oath or to reach true findings on the evidence. I am not trying to delay the course of the Bill, but I submit that there is fair room for a debate about this section, and the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance should not treat it in the way they do. The whole question is: Shall the commission have power to conduct inquiries or shall tney not? The hon. member for South Weiiing-ton (Mr. Guthrie) urged that the clause be struck out and that the power of investigate! be left as at present under section 12 of the Customs Tariff Act. I submit that in aii fairness, the amendment of the hon. member is a reasonable one and I think it sliouid be supported by the committee, at least until some reason is given stronger than arj we have heard from members of the government in support of the clause as it stursas.


Mir. PUGSLEY.: It seems to me that this i-s a matter of really (more importance than the Minister of Finance thinks it is. I was entirely unable to understand the reason why he objected so strongly to our criticism of this section and to our support of the amendment of the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie). I think it much against the proper administration of the law to have two or more different tribunals to try out the same matter. As has been pointed out we have a provision in the

customs law that reference may be made to a judge of the Exchequer court, or the Superior court or of the County court, and if such judge finds that there is conspiracy under which prices have been unduly increased the Governor in Council may reduce or abolish the duty. We have also the very excellent provision of the Combines Investigation Act. Section 1 of that Act makes provision almost in the same words as section 12 of the Customs Act that where, as the result of the investigation that is provided for, it appears to the satis-fection of the Governor in Council that there is a combine to unduly enhance prices, the Governor in Council may reduce or abolish the duty on the article.
That is a statute which may be invoked by the people-any seven residents of Canada may invoke it-and investigation takes place before a judge of one of the courts of the land. The Minister of Finance proposes that an investigation of a matter of this kind may be taken out of the hands of the people, or a iportion of the people, and handed over to the commission to be appointed under this Act. The hon. member for Brantford (Mr. Cockshutt) seemed to get very excited and urged that we were fighting the manufacturers, because we were supporting this amendment. What is the fair inference from the hon. gentleman's position? It is that he thinks that a tribunal like a judge of the Exchequer court or of the Supreme court will not be as favourable to 'the .manufacturers as the commission which the government is to appoint under this law. And I have no doubt that there might be cases when such an investigation would not be so favourable td a combine as would be the judgment of this Tariff Commission. Surely the Minister of Finance must see how objectionable it is to have two tribunals with authority to inquire into the same matter. The hon. gentleman has provided what _ may be in the nature of an appeal, giving the Governor in Council power to take the matter out of the hands of the tribunal. This may lead to endless confusion. It seems to me that the hon. gentleman should show some reason why the courts cannot be trusted to make these investigations. It is only within the last two or three years that combines and mergers have existed to any large extent in Canada. These organizations create a new situation in the country. We know that under the late government, after the Combines Act was brought into force, an investigation of the United Shoe Machinery company was undertaken at the instance of a number of 'people, who complied with the law. That matter is going on to-day; I believe the Minister of Labour took it up where it was left by his predecessor. Everybody admits that the Combines Act is an admirable law, well calculated to inquire
into these combines. That law is being tested. Nobody finds fault with it. We should not form another tribunal to take up cases which are already provided for.
Why should parliament be asked to ignore the tribunal which the law now provides, and give the Governor in Council authority to refer these cases to a tribunal which, from the very nature of its appointments, will be favourable to the manufacturers, to the producers, to the dealers, and. against the interests of the consumers? I fail to see any reason whatever for this Bill. We ought not to enact a law simply for the fun of the thing, we ought to have clearly shown to us that some evil now exists, and that there is a prime need for additional legislation on the subject. The government has wholly failed to present any reasons to the committee why this section should be adopted. Therefore, I am in favour of the amendment of the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie).


Mr. MARSHALL.: I have listened with much interest to the discussion on this Bill. I must say that, although I have been in the House for five or six years, I never saw so much time lost over a Bill a3 over this. The Bill certainly points in the right direction. The Dominion canners have been mentioned as robbers and thieves. It is a strange thing to say, that we got our charter from a Liberal government and we operated under a Liberal government ten years. During all that ten years I never heard any fault found with the Dominion canners until this Bill was brought forward, and now we are styled as robbers. I want to say that the Dominion canners are doing a great business in this country, we are giving employment to about 9,500 people. We are also furnishing a market for the products of our soil, many thousand acres. Hon. gentlemen opposite are entirely wrong in what they have said against our industry. If you compare our prices with the American prices you will find that ours are much lower, our goods are better goods. Owing to the condition of the labour market, it is impossible for us to put up goods as cheaply .as they were put up a few years ago. We are paying the farmers ten or twelve per ton more for peas than we were a few years ago, for the reason that they have to pay more for their help. It is this great northwest we have heard so much about that has taken away the help from our farmers, and we can scarcely get sufficient labour to harvest our crop.


Frank Oliver: They are the people who buy your oanned stuff.


David Marshall: Very true, and we are glad to sell it to them, and we aTe selling it to them at a reasonable price. The hon.

member for Regina (Mr. Martin) the other day said that we had raised the price of tomatoes to $1.75 a case. The committee will be surprised when I tell them that the manners sold their tomato pack last year for less than $1 a dozen. After the goods leave our hands we have no further control over the prices. We do not *control the whole packing business. There are thirty or forty other canneries in the Dominion with which our company has to compete. I am strongly in sympathy with this Bill, because I think it will do justice to all. I am astonished at some of the arguments I hear from the opposition, they seem to me very unreasonable. Speaking for my own company, I am altogether in sympathy with the Bill.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Shall section 4 be adopted?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I had an amendment that I wished to propose to section 4. If I may have an opportunity of bringing it up at a later stage, I would have no objection to allowing the section to pass at the present time.


Wilfrid Laurier: Carried.
On section 5,


Wilfrid Laurier: I think the time has come to adjourn.


Robert Laird Borden: We have had a great deal of discussion, and have made very little progress. If we are ever to get through the session we will have to get along faster than we have done. I would like to sit here for an hour or two longer and get something done, if it will be convenient for hon. gentlemen opposite.


Wilfrid Laurier: My hon. friend knows that the discussion has been perfectly legitimate, at least on out side* there has been no intention of delaying the progress of the Bill. It is now one o'clock, and I think we should adjourn.


Robert Laird Borden: The discussion may have been legitimate, I am not saying that it was not. All I complain of is that the greater part of it has been repeated ten or fifteen times.


William Pugsley: Does that remark apply to both sides?


Robert Laird Borden: It applies to any gentleman who happens to have been guilty of it; I am not discriminating.


William Pugsley: It does not apply to me.


Robert Laird Borden: If my right hon. friend is anxious that we should adjourn now, I will agree to it. But I want to say distinctly that if we are going to discuss matters in that fashion, we will have to sit Mr. MARSHALL.
later, or else the session will have to be prolonged, and I do not think any one wants to prolong the session.


Wilfrid Laurier: Nobody wants to prolong the session. But we have seen sessions lasting five or six months, and I think the hon. gentleman and his friends have contributed to prolong them. There has been no obstruction of this measure, only legitimate discussion. Our arguments may not impress the right hon. gentleman, and I am sorry for it.


Robert Laird Borden: I am not finding fault with the quality of the arguments, except so far as they may be controverted. But I do find fault with unreasonable repetitions. It is not only waste of time, but it is wearisome.


Wilfrid Laurier: I know it is wearisome, but I have been listening to just such arguments for fifteen years.


Robert Laird Borden: I have no way of preventing it. The only result will be that we will have to sit a little later, or else have a longer session. I know we are all anxious to bring the session to a close at a reasonable date. The other alternative seems to be the only one, namely, that we must sit later. At the request of my hon. friend, I will move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again, but with the understanding that if we are going to take so long with every one of the sections of this Bill, we must sit a good deal later.
Progress reported.
Mr. BORDEN moved the adjournment of the House.


John Gillanders Turriff: I would like to give notice to the hon. Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Cochrane) that on the first convenient occasion upon going into Committee of Supply I wish to bring up the question of freight rates.


Wilfrid Laurier: What will be
the business of the House to-morrow?


Robert Laird Borden: Order No. 20, Bill respecting National Transcontinental railway; Order No. 18, Bill to encourage and assist the improvements of highways; Order No. 17, consideration of an amendment made by the Senate to 'Bill (No. 66) respecting the publie archives; Order No. 13, Bill to amend the Civil Service Act, and after that Supply. My hon. friend the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Monk) will probably go on with his estimates.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, and the House adjourned at 12.52 a.m. Wednesday.
[Stage Direction]

Wednesday, February 14, 1912.