1914-04-22

QUESTIONS.

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)

Mr. PROULX:: 
Mr. BORDEN:: A copy of the resolution alluded to, without any covering letter, has been received by the Prime Minister. No reply has been sent. The Government does not feel called upon to offer any opinion in reply to the third and fourth questions.


PROTECTION OF CANADIANS IN MEXICO.
Mr. COCKSHUTT:: 1 In the event of war between the United States and Mexico, will the Government take any precautions to insure the safety of the lives and property of Canadians in the latter country?
2.	If so, what action will be taken?


Robert Laird Borden: During the past eighteen months representations' with regard to the matter alluded to have been made to the imperial Government on several different occasions. In case further representations should be deemed necessary from time to time, they will be made without any delay.


CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY IRRIGATED LANDS.
Mr. BUCHANAN:: 1.	In the agreement made between the Government of Canada and the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, whereby the latter company was enabled to get their land grant m one block for the purpose of establishing the present irrigation system east of Calgary in Alberta, was a minimum price fixed which the company

could charge for irrigable lands? If so, what wag the price?
2.	Is the Government aware whether the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, which now hold these lands, is adhering to their agreement in this respect?


Mr. ROCHE:: 1.	No.
2.	Answered by No. 1.


COST OP DRILL HALLS AND ARMOURIES.
Mr. SINCLAIR:: What is the total sum expended in drill halls and armouries in all the provinces of Canada between October 10, 1911, and December 31, 1913?


Mr. S. HUGHES:: The total cost of
drill halls and armouries constructed by the Department of Militia and Defence between October 10, 1911, and December 31, 1913, is $1,063,000, including those under construction at the latter date.


INTERCOLONIAL RAILWAY PROPERTY PURCHASE AT MONCTON.
Mr. TURGEON:: 1.	What Is the sum total of the cost to the Intercolonial railway to date of the so called P. S. Archibald property in Moncton, N.B., including original purchase and all expenses in connection therewith and the securing of title thereto?
2.	What Is the monthly rental paid for the use and occupation of said property by P. P.
Brady, general superintendent of said railway, and what does said rental charge include? '
3.	Is water, light, fuel and ice furnished free to the said occupant or tenant?
4.	What is the yearly salary paid to the said P. P. Brady as general superintendent, what expenses are allowed him in addition and what do they amount to yearly?


Mr. J. D. REID:: 1.	Total cost to date, $28,042.60.
2.	A monthly rental of $25 per month is collected, including water.
3.	No, with the exception of water, which is included in monthly rental.
4.	Yearly salary $7,500; no expenses in addition are allowed.


MANITOBA SCHOOL LANDS.
Mr. NEELY:: 1.	Has the Government sold any school lands in the province of Manitoba since October 1, 1911, to March 1, 1914, other than bv public auction after proper and sufficient advertisement?
2.	If so, what parcels and to whom have they been sold?


Mr. ROCHE:: 
FENIAN RAID CLAIMS INVESTIGATION.
John Howard Sinclair: Has the legal adviser of the board who investigated the claims of Fenian Raid veterans, been paid for his services? If so, how much?


Samuel Hughes: Yes; $3,615, as fixed
by the Department of Justice.


EMPLOYMENT OF CHARLES McPHERSON.
John Howard Sinclair: On what date was Charles McPherson appointed postmaster at North Riverside, Guys-borough county, N.S. ?


Mr. PELLETIER:: On the 30th September, 1911.


TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILWAY COALING PLANTS.
Mr. MACDONALD:: 1.	Who were the tenderers and what was the amount of each tender for the mechanical coaling plants proposed to be erected at Monk, Bridge, Fitzpatrick, Doucet and- O'Brien, on the Transcontinental railway?
2.	What was the address of each tenderer?
3.	When were tenders called?
4.	When were they awarded?
5 What was the name and address of the tenderer to whom the contract was awarded?


Mr. J. D. REID:: 1. Kennedy Construction Co., Montreal, Que., $183,605; C. O. Bartlett and Snow Co., Montreal, Que., $169,700; John King, Fort William, Ontario, $166,410; Williams and Wilson, Ltd., Montreal, Que., $152,250; The Eastern Steel Co., Ltd., New Glasgow, N.S., $110,250; Williams, White and Co., Moline, 111., $109,578; Roberts and Schaefer Co., Chicago, 111., $107,931; Republic Structural Iron Works Co., Cleveland, O., $106,646, with wet excavation as an extra, which may mean from $10,000 to $15,000 extra; Ogle Construction Co., Chicago, 111., $96,386-this is a lighter proposition, two 1-ton buckets instead of one 24-ton bucket as called foT, wet excavation algo considered as an extra; Canadian Fairbanks-Morse Go., Ltd., Montreal, $95,000. Elevating capacity 14 tons only, while our specification calls for 24 ton elevating capacity. They also reduce the width of the plant some 4-ft. 2-in., which would make it too narrow.
2.	See answer to No. 1.
3.	November 3, 1913.
4.	January 26, 1914.
5.	Roberts and Schaefer Company, McCormick building, Chicago, 111.


NEW HARBOUR BREAKWATER.
Mr. SINCLAIR:: 1.	Was a report made prior to September, 1911, by resident Engineer Millidge, regarding the proposed extension of the breakwater at New Harbour, Guysborough county, N.S.?
2.	If so, did the engineer advise that the extension be made?
3.	What was the estimated cost?
4.	Was the money voted in 1911 to build such extension? If so, how much was voted?
5.	(a) Were tenders asked for? (b) If so, when?
6.	What are the names of the tenderers and the amount of each tender?
7.	Was the extension ever built? If not. why was it not built?


Mt. ROGERS:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Reported that the extension would be a great convenience to the thirty fishing boats now using the harbour.
3.	$27,000.
4.	Yes; $10,000.
5.	(a) Yes. (b) Tenders were called for from 19th September to 18th October, 1911.
6.	No tenders were received.
7.	No, as provision is being made for more important works.


SAMPLE MARKETS.
Mr. NEELY:: 1.	Has the Board of Grain Commissioners recommended to the Government the establishment of sample markets in Western Canada?
2.	If so, what date did they recommend for the establishment of sample markets and at what points?
3.	Has the Government passed any Order in Council respecting the matter, as required by the Grain Act?
4.	If so, what dates were fixed and what points were selected for the establishment of these sample markets?
5.	If such Order in Council was passed, has it been given effect? If not, why not?


Mr. G. E. FOSTER:: 1.	Yes.
2.	September, 1913. The board afterwards changed the date of their recommendation to December 15, 1913; Winnipeg and Fort William.
3.	Yes.
4.	December 15, 1913, but subsequently indefinitely postponed; Winnipeg and Fort William.
5.	No. The crop of 1913 was of unusually high quality and remarkably uniform. It was harvested early and placed rapidly upon the market. By the date set, most of the wheat had passed out of first hands, and the farmers therefore would have got little if any advantage from putting the sample market into operation.


BOAR'S HEAD FOG ALARM.
Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: 1.	Who was the contractor for the erection of a building for a fog alarm at Boar's Head, Long Island, Digby county, N.S.?
2.	What was the amount of the same?


Mr. HAZEN:: 1.	Messrs. Maynard C. Denton and Maurice A. Condon, of Digby, N.S.
2.	$3,350.


LUNENBURG COUNTY MAIL DELIVERY.
Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: 1.	Who has the contracts temporarily for the conveyance of mails between Martin's Point post office, Lunenburg county, N.S., and the railway station at Martin's river, N.S. ?
2.	What amount is he paid?
3.	Were tenders asked during the present year for this mail service? If so, who was the lowest tenderer, and what was the amount of the same?
4.	Is it proposed to accept the lowest tender? If not, why not?


Mr. PELLETIER:: 1.	Fred Shupe.
2.	$375 per annum.
3 and 4. Tenders were invited and the lowest tender has been accepted. The name of the lowest tenderer and the amount will be given when the contract has been signed.


MORNING SITTINGS.
Robert Laird Borden: That on and from Monday next, the 27th instant, and until the end of the session, the House shall meet at 11 o'clock in the morning, and that in addition to the usual intermission at 6 o'clock p.m., there shall be an intermission from one to three o'clock p.m.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: In point of
time this motion may have come at the proper moment, but we should be informed as to the nature of the business which the Government has yet to bring before the House. My right hon. friend is aware that, according to the practice invariably followed, this motion to hold morning sittings is never brought before the House until all the business of the Government has been laid before us. There is a rumour, which is persistent and for which, I believe, there is some foundation, that the Government is going to introduce some very important legislation with regard to the Canadian Northern railway. If it foe the intention of the Government to introduce such important legislation as is surmised, it will not be opportune at the present time to hold morning sittings. The moment we commence to sit in the mornings there will be no time for hon. members to give thought or consideration to legislation, or even to the study of matters placed before us. Therefore, I hope my right hon. friend will not press this motion, if T am

correctly informed that the whole business of the House is not before us.


Robert Laird Borden: Without committing myself one way or the other to. the report upon which my right hon. friend has based his observations, I may say that there will undoubtedly be legislation which does not appear upon the Order Paper. In view of that, and having regard to what my right hon. friend has asked, I will not press the motion to-day, but will let it stand until to-morrow.
Motion stands.


QUEBEC HARBOUR APPARATUS.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day being called:
Mr. LEMIEUX:: I wish to draw the attention of the hon. Minister of Marine and Fisheries (Mr. Hazen) to the following item which appears in the Quebec. Telegraph of April 15, in regard to the works in the harbour of Quebec:
Mr. S. George Boswell, chief engineer of the Quebec Harbour Commission, who has just returned from a six-weeks' trip to the old country, accompanied by Mrs. Boswell and Miss Maud Boswell, was interviewed by the Telegraph this morning.
The object of Mr. Boswell's trip was the inspection of the new apparatus for the Quebec harbour, now under construction on the other side. This includes a crane, a dredge, a floating grain elevator, and a service boat.
The fifty ton crane is being built by a well known Glasgow firm, and the dredge which is of the ladder pattern, is being constructed in the same place by Wm. Simons and Company.
The service boat, which will be a 125 foot, 1,000 h.p. craft, built on similar lines to the tug 'Sir Hugh Allan,' used by the Montreal Harbour Commission, is being built by the Smith Stock Company, of Middlesboro, as is the floating grain elevator.
The grain elevator when completed, will be capable of taking a load of 35,000 bushels, and will be able to load in about four hours.
All the new purchases are expected out here in the month of June, and with the exception of the crane, all will cross the Atlantic on their own steam. The crane will probably not be assembled until it arrives in Quebec.
I am calling the attention of my hon. friend to this matter because I am informed that all this work could have been secured from Canadian firms, such as the Westing-house Electric Company, the Steel Company of Canada, the Hamilton Bridge Works, at Hamilton, Ont., the General Electric Company, the Poison Iron Works Company, at Toronto, the Collingwood Ship Building Company, at Collingwood, the Western Dry Dock Company, at Port Arthur. Were these firms given an opportunity to tender on these works ? The policy of the Government, according to de-

elarations made by my hon. friend in previous debates and declarations made by my hon. friend the Postmaster General the other day in Quebec, has been that as much of such equipments for Government business as possible should be built in Canada.


Mr. HAZEN:: I shall be happy to get the information from the harbour commissioners and give it to my hon. friend as soon as I receive it.


RIVER VALLEY RAILWAY.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day being called:
Mr. EMMERSON:: On the 15th of April,
I asked the Government whether or not any action had been taken in regard to additional assistance for bridges in connection with the River Valley railway in New Brunswick. The Minister of Trade and Commerce answered on that occasion that a proposition or application was before the Government and was under consideration. Has any decision since been reached by the Government or any action been taken ?


Robert Laird Borden: The subject is under consideration. Any necessary announcement will be made in due course.


RANCH FOR CAVALRY REMOUNTS.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day being called:
Wilfrid Laurier: The other day I asked the Government for information as to a grazing lease to a certain firm for the purpose of establishing a ranch for cavalry remounts. I was told by my hon. friend the Minister of Militia that the matter was not completed. Can he give me any further information on the subject?
Mr. SAM. HUGHES: It has not yet been completed.


TRENT VALLEY CANAL.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day being called:
Mr. GRAHAM:: By yesterday's despatches I note that a statement was made in the Ontario Legislature by one of the members of the Government that the Dominion Government had handed over or was about to hand over to the province of Ontario all the water-powers developed by the construction of the Trent Valley canal. Is that statement correct ?


Robert Laird Borden: If I remember correctly, there is some litigation pending. I am not able to give my hon. friend definite information at the moment. So far as I am aware, no arrangement has been concluded within some months past.


George Perry Graham: There is some litigation pending in the Exchequer Court, I think, as to the rights of the provinces and the Dominion concerning these water powers.
I could not see how the water powers could be handed over in the face of a suit pending.


Robert Laird Borden: That is my recollection, but I am not fully advised.


THE BUDGET.
[Stage Direction]
Consideration of the motion of Hon. W.
T. White (Minister of Finance) for the House to go into Committee of Ways and Means, resumed from Tuesday, April 21.
Mr. E. W. NESBITT (North Oxford):: Mr. Speaker, I did not have the pleasure of hearing the hon. gentleman who preceded me in this debate, and therefore I shall make no special reference to his remarks, but shall immediately apply myself to a consideration of the Budget speech delivered by the Minister of Finance. Any remarks I shall make will be purely personal, and I do not wish it to be thought that they bind any one else.
The Minister of Finance, in reviewing the economics of the present money stringency, said:
There is no doubt that the severe and prolonged financial stringency through which the business world has passed and from which it i3 only now emerging marked the culmination of one of those so-called trade cycles well known to economists. The phenomena of these cycles are well known. First a surplus of loanable capital attended with easy money conditions and low interest rates, next commercial activity promoted and sustained by abundant supplies of such capital resulting in profitable trade and rapid extension of enterprise, next, in consequence of such rapid extension, an undue proportion of the money supply of the world finding its way into fixed capital, then shortage of liquid resources among financial institutions, followed, as a matter of necessity in order to rectify conditions, by advancing rate of interest with curtailment of credit and consequent restriction of trade. When this last condition is reached and has prevailed for such time as is necessary to permit of the accumulation of loanable capital in sufficient surplus to bring about easy interest rates another cycle.
That is the position in which we are at present. Considering the views held by the Minister of Finance with reference to economic cycles, I cannot understand why he, last year, when these loans fell due and it was necessary to borrow money to carry on the capital expenditure of the country, should have made such long-date loans at high rates of interest. I quite agree with him that after the stringency takes place,
[DOT]2790


William Foster Cockshutt: Will the hon. gentleman please tell me how much the Woodstock post office cost under the late James Sutherland?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: It cost $37,000. And that is the kind of a building that ought to be built in every case-in accordance with the population and the revenue.


William Foster Cockshutt: And how much did the drill hall cost?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Fifty thousand dollars.
And the other night an estimate of $120,000 was up for the construction of a building in the town of Amherst, N.S., a place about the size of Woodstock. It is represented by a very excellent supporter of the Government, and a very nice fellow; but that is no reason why the expenditure on a drill hall should be made $120,000 instead of $50,000. And let me tell you, the armoury in Woodstock will be good enough for Woodstock when it has a population of 25,000, if it ever gets there. There is no possible necessity or excuse for such expenditures. And here is an item for a drill hall in Port Arthur, $99,000 voted last year, and $100,000 to be voted this year. Now, with all due deference to my good friend from Port Arthur (Mr. Carrick), I ask the members of the Government, I ask the Finance Minister if he does not think that $199,000 for a drill hall in Port Arthur is simply absurd. In my opinion no other word applies to it. And I tell you that the people of this country will not stand for such silly and extravagant expenditure by any Government, whether it be Liberal or Conservative. There is reason in all things, but there is
none in that. This is where our money has gone, and this is why the Minister of Finance had to borrow money this year to pay his way, in the face of a surplus of $36,000,000 above consolidated revenue expenditure, which was ridiculous, and in the face of surpluses of $93,000,000 in two years. Now, whether the Finance Minister agrees with me or not, I am sure that the public agrees with me, and if he is to be the watch-dog of the treasury it is necessary for him to watch his colleagues and brother members on that side of the House more closely than he has done in the last two years. If he does not, it will be unlimited expenditure, expenditure gone mad, as we saw last year when the Estimates went through. Nobody could listen to the discussion on the Estimates and not agree that it was expenditure gone mad.
Now, I would like to say a word with reference to our immigration policy. I have thought for some time that while we have an excellent Immigration Act, and while that Act has been properly administered, yet it is wrong in some ways. We bring the unfortunate immigrant to this country and dump him at the port of entry, and that is the last attention we pay him. He does not know what to do; he does not know where to go. My idea is that the Dominion Government should make some arrangement with the several provincial governments-I do not know what it should be, this is only a crude idea of mine-and these immigrants should be taken in charge by the provincial government who should see to it that some occupation is found for him; and that as much as possible the Dominion Government should confine their attention to immigrants who are capable of going on the land.
It is absurd to bring to this country persons who know absolutely nothing about farming; the cities and towns do not want them, because they would have to face the possibility of providing for them if the winter weTe long and cold. It would take such persons all the rest of their lives, perhaps, to learn all they ought to know about farming; a farmer does not want to employ that sort of help. I know from experience that immigrants of this kind are of absolutely no use to the farmer, who would rather pay a man who is accustomed to farming, and who does not have to be instructed, $25 a month than pay another, no matter how able-bodied he might be, $5 a month. If it is impossible to avoid bringing that kind of people heTe, I would advise that the provincial and

27 aa
Dominion Governments establish some sort of farms where these people eonld receive a smattering of education in farming processes before they hire out to the farmers in various parts of the country.


Mr. BLAIN:: Does my hon. friend not understand that the policy of the Government is to assist only domestic servants and those who go upon the farms?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I do not know; that may be the general policy of the Government, but it is not followed out in practice. It does not matter what a man's policy may be; it is what he actually does that counts.


Richard Blain: I understood my hon. friend to be condemning the Government for bringing to this country what he regarded as a poor class of immigrants.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I was not condemning the Government; I was suggesting that they should improve their immigration policy by looking after these people in some way after their arrival. I do not believe, of course, that the Government is purposely bringing such immigrants to this country, but they take charge of a great many of them after they do come here. However, I was not specially finding fault with the Government in the matter.
I now come to the question of the tariff. We on this side of the House have listened to hon. gentlemen opposite telling us that we closely followed and did not change the National Policy of Sir John A. Macdonald. Let me point out that the introduction of corn, free binder twine and free fence wire resulted in a saving to the farmers of this country of millions of money. Large quantities of these goods are brought into Canada, so that the tariff saving in this regard would assume enormous proportions. If the late Administration had done nothing else but that, they would still deserve the thanks of the country. But, as has been pointed out many times during the course of this debate, they also introduced the British preference. I quite believe that the English manufacturers did not take as much advantage of that preference as they could have taken if they had sent men over to see what they could do under that preference. I am pleased to see, however, that during the last few years they have sent men into the field, and the result has been that we have bought more English manufactured goods.
My hon. friend the Finance Minister said that speaking generally it is not advisable that one nation's tariff should be so ar-
[Mj\ Nesbitt.]
ranged as to fit into the particular features of that of another nation. Speaking generally, that may be quite true, but let me point out to the House that you cannot very materially change nature by tariffs. I mean that it is natural for us to trade with the United States. Even with the tariff our business with the United States has increased constantly for a number of years. Our friends on the other side tell us that after we came into power we upheld the protective tariff principle as against the United States. It was as natural and proper for us to do that as it was for us to breathe, for the simple reason that the United States had a very high tariff against us and owing to our close connection with the United States we could not be expected to lower our tariff and let the United States put up a high tariff against us. But things have changed in the meantime; the Government of the United States have seen fit to lower their tariff against us. No matter what we do, we naturally follow the course pursued by the United States. It is all very well for hon. gentlemen to say that we should have no truck or trade with the Yankees, but, as a matter of fact, we copy the Yankees even in the matter of dances and ladies' dress- and, so far as I have been able to judge, they are not a bad sort of people to copy, after all. The tendency in the United States is to have lower tariffs; recently that tendency was so pronounced that the Government of the United States were forced by the people to lower the tariff. The tendency in this country, if I read the signs aright, is to lower tariffs. We are forced to have due regard to the raising of revenue, because, whether or not it is proper to collect revenue by imposing tariffs, that is the policy we have been pursuing for a number of years; that is the policy that we are likely to pursue, so far as I am personally concerned, that is the policy that I am going to advocate that we should pursue. At the same time, having due regard to the revenue of this country, which we have to raise, and having due regard to all interests that may be affected, we should make our tariff as low as possible; we should make it as nearly as possible a revenue tariff.
I quite appreciate the statement of the Minister of Finance that we should pay regard to infant industries and assist them in getting started in this country. The minister says that that is a policy which we should pursue to as great an extent as *ve can without hurting other industries. But there aire industries in this country that

have been assisted by the tariff for a number of years and are now in such a position that they oan compete with the rest of the world; it is on the products of such industries that the tariffs should be decreased to a certain extent. The infant industry starting off in this country has a veTy great handicap. In the first place, we are a country three thousand miles in length with only eight million people. Thus we are not very thickly settled, and the consequence is that to establish an industry from end to end of this country, to get it on its feet and make it a paying proposition, takes a great deal of work, a great deal of time and a great deal of cost; and in making a tariff I think we should consider that to a very large extent. I quite appreciate that it is a very difficult thing to make a tariff suitable to all sections of this vast country. Then, too, our interests personally clash. I regret the feeling that sometimes arises in this country .and is assisted sometimes even by members of Parliament, the class feeling. There is also a locality feeling that should not arise in this country. The interests of all are the same. But I particularly regret the class feeling that it is sometimes attempted to work up by newspapers. Class feeling, in my judgment, is far worse than party feeling although too much party feeling, that is blind party feeling, is a great injury rather than a benefit. The class feeling and class discussions in the newspapers are a great curse, speaking very strongly, to a country, and should not be encouraged by members speaking in this House or by the newspapers of this country. After all there is no difference of interest between the farmers and the manufacturers of this country or the middlemen. The so-called middleman gets a good deal of blame that he does not deserve. We must have the retailer in this country just as we must have the professional man. It will not do for us all to be farmers. A good many of us would starve to death as farmers and many of us would take the rest of our natural lives to learn to be good farmers if we tried ever so hard. But there are a lot of people in this country engaged in other occupations which are just as legitimate, although I confess I do not think are as nice as farming; but these people have as much right to a living as the farmer and that is why I deprecate this class discussion which sometimes arises in this country and for which there is no possible necessity. So far as I understand there is no difference between the farmers west of Port Arthur and those east of Port Arthur
in reference to the tariff. The farmers, so faT as I have heard from them and so far as my personal knowledge goes, are quite in accord, the farmers of Ontario 4 p.m. are quite in accord with the requirements of the farmers of the West. I think that the Government, in framing the tariff, should endeavour to satisfy the bulk of the people as far as it is possible to do so, at the same time paying due regard to the interests of all classes and all established businesses.
I would like to comment for a moment or two on some of the changes in the present tariff. Take the steel duties. I suppose that the steel duties were changed at the solicitation of the steel corporations of Canada. We must bear in mind that while we are anxious to help all industries, we cannot help any of the industries too much at the expense of the whole country. I understand that we paid the steel industries of this country in bounties something in the neighbourhood of $16,000,000 in the last few years. That should have been quite sufficient to have established this steel industry, if it is at all natural to the country, on a paying basis. Take the Dominion Steel Corporation. I am not one of those who are opposed to corporations by any manner of means. This blind antagonism to corporations simply because they are corporations I have no sympathy with, because the industries of this country have largely been built up by corporations. That is to say, few individuals in this country have means enough to start a business of their own, and they employ the corporation agency by bringing in the money of the various people to whom they can sell stock, and by that means build up a strong corporation. I am opposed absolutely to over-capitalization of corporations, and I would like to see some system adopted by which all corporations would have to submit their propositions to some power that could find out what the capitalization * was going to be used for. Take the Dominion Steel Corporation. It is in the minds of everybody here who has followed commercial industries in this country, that it was in two separate companies at one time, the Dominion Steel Company and the Dominion Coal Company. We know that both companies issued very large amounts of stock. I am not saying anything against them, I wish them all success, and I would not have any criticism to make here this afternoon excepting that they are coming to the Government

of the country for favours. I am not a stockholder of these corporations, and therefore it would be none of my business how they were incorporated or what they did, but when they come to this Parliament and ask for favours, it becomes the business of all of us to investigate, and at least we have the right to criticise. After the merging of the two corporations, with an enormous capitalization, we continued to pay them bounties for some years, and they paid a dividend on their common stock. Now I say that if the company had been properly managed, with due deference to the position of the shareholders in the company, they would not have attempted to pay a dividend on their common stock until they had accumulated a sufficient reserve to warrant them in doing so. If they had pursued this course no criticism would have been made this spring when they did not pay a dividend on their common stock. But they had no right to do it before because they must have used the bounties to a certain extent to assist in paying dividends in place of putting them in an operating position capable of competing with the rest of the world.
Let us now look at the Steel Company of Canada which, as we all remember, is a very recent amalgamation of several wire and nut companies and smelting companies and similar corporations in this country. They also started with an enormous capitalization. I will not go so far as to say that the capitalization is more than may be required in the interests of the business at some future time, but it was certainly an enormous capitalization for the genuine assets that they held when the amalgamation took place. Let me read their annual statement which was published in the press and is fresh in the minds of all. They did not do so badly, as you will aee, even without any assistance from the tariff:
Steel Company of Canada report for 1913 shows net profits, after expending $516,084 for repairs, maintenance and improvement of $1,640,011, Which compares with net profits of $1,547,039 at the end of 1912, an increase of about $93,000.
So they could not very well come to this Government with a poor mouth. In my judgment they were doing fairly well. The report goes on:
Of this amount $480,000 was taken by bond interest, $454,741 by dividends on the preferred stock, $137,500 was credited to the fund for depreciation, renewal and improvement of plants, $56,738 was written off plant account, and $511,621 was carried to credit of profit and loss.

The report states that since December 31 the directors have disposed of $850,000 of the first mortgage bonds of the company, and the working capital has been increased by the proceeds of that issue.
I do not know what they are going to do with the proceeds of the $850,000 worth of bonds unless it is for betterment. The report, in my judgment, does not show that the company needed assistance to any great extent.
Let us look at some other items. I wonder why the minister put a duty on caustic soda. Every soap maker in this country uses caustic soda. We on this side of the House use soap, therefore we are interested in caustic soda. There is only one factory in this country making caustic soda and it is in the riding of my hon. friend from North Essex (Mr. Wilcox). I have nothing to say against that firm. I hope they will increase their output and make a profit, but I do not think they should be allowed a duty at the expense of the soap manufacturers and of the ordinary people in this country who use soap. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, there are several people besides the gentlemen on this side of the House who use soap.


Wilfrid Laurier: Hear, hear.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think it is poor tariffmaking to put a duty on caustic soda. I now come to item 546:
Jute cloth or jute, canvas, uncoloured, not further finished than cropped, bleached, mangled, or calendered.
The tariff on that is 74 per cent preferential, 10 per cent intermediate and 10 per cent general. Why is a duty put on jute cloth? Jute cloth is not made in this country. It is used in the manufacture of all kinds of bags, such as flour bags, cement bags, grain bags-I need not enumerate the whole list, but jute cloth enters into the manufacture of nearly all kinds of bags used in this country; so why put a duty on jute cloth? To me it seems absolutely absurd. If we are ever going to ship grain by the Panama canal it will have to be shipped in bags, not in the loose state. I understand that this duty on jute cloth will increase the cost of a carload of sacked oats by $10. I hope the minister will reconsider that item, also the duty on caustic soda, which would help one firm in this country, at the expense of the whole people.
As to the steel duties, possibly these people could not have got along without a9

high a duty as $3 on wire rods. But they could have taken other courses. I am quite -sure they could have reduced their capitalization, for instance, and they could have put their brains to solving how they could successfully compete with other manufacturers. Why should not the Dominion Steel Company compete? They have the ore almost at their door. They get it by boat from Newfoundland, which is practically at their door. Coal is actually at their door. I am sure that nobody in the world can beat them, so far as their proximity to coal is concerned. They get their ore cheaper than any similar industry in the United States. The ore used in the Cleveland and Pittsburg steel works is got from the lake Superior district. It has to be taken down there by boat, and ore destined for Pittsburg has to be transhipped; as regards Cleveland, the ore is taken right into their yard. In both cases, however, the ore has to be carried much further than in the case of the Dominion Steel Company. I do not think a concern of that size should be encouraged to come to the Government clamouring for' assistance. They have had assistance from the public for several years, and should now be in a position to compete with the *world.
That brings me to the question of agricultural implements. The minister has made a reduction of 5 per cent on mowers and binders. That means 5 per cent on the valuation of a binder or mower entered for duty. In the case of a binder, that would mean a reduction of about 3 per cent on the selling price and about 7 per cent on the material and labour cost.
Everybody in the manufacturing business knows that the manufacturer does not reduce or increase his retail price on account of a saving or an extra cost respectively of five per cent on his raw material. It would be too much trouble for him to change his price list. The minister could easily have strained his conscience to reduce the duty by at least seven and one-half per cent on these implements and I see no reason why he should not have reduced the duty on several other items of agricultural implements, such as cultivators, ploughs, horse rakes, seed drills and manure spreaders, without doing harm to the industry. Potato diggers are not manufactured in this country. Double corn-planters-I do not mean double corn cultivators-are not manufactured in this country.
Mr. -COCKSHUTT:	I think they are
manufactured in Canada.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: There may be some manufactured in Canada; but, if so, their manufacture has been commenced very recently.
I was very much surprised first at the hon. the Solicitor General (Mr. Meighen) and the other day the hon. member for South Pe^th (Mr. Steele) quoting what I said at a meeting at Woodstock. I did not think I would get any notoriety outside of Woodstock and I thought I had- very little there. They stated that I had said at a public meeting that we had in the proposed reciprocity agreement taken two and one-halif per cent off the duty on wagons and five per cent off other articles; that I thought the Bain Wagon Company could compete with the rest of the world with that two and one-half per cent taken off; that I did not think the Government would reduce the duties any further, and that I thought the farmers should be satisfied. I repeat that exactly this afternoon. If we were to take all the duties off all agricultural implements this afternoon, it would be only a circumstance in comparison with what the farmers would have received under the reciprocity agreement. There would be no cry in the West to take the duty off agricultural, implements if the reciprocity agreement had passed. The farmers of the West would have been perfectly satisfied to pay more for their agricultural implements if they had had an open market in which to sell their goods and they would have had the money to pay for these implements. I do not believe there would be any such agitation for the duty to be taken off agricultural implements if reciprocity were in deration. I firmly believe that the farmers of Ontario and the West would have been absolutely satisfied with the reciprocity agreement as it was framed. At the time of that agreement I, as a brother manufacturer, told the manufacturers, publicly and privately, that I thought they were the most short-sighted people in this country. They were the people who raised class feeling, because they made an unnecessary attack on the benefit that the farmer was to receive under the reciprocity agreement. The manufacturers of Canada were not affected by that agreement. I told them then, and 1 tell them now, that they made a great mistake when they opposed reciprocity, and they will sooner or later find out their mistake. I am speaking now as a manufacturer as much as a farmer. I am as much interested in manufacturing, according to my means, as any man in this House.

Under the reciprocity agreement we took 2$ per cent off the duty on some implements, but we took 5 per cent off the duty on a list of implements, which is more than my hon. friend has done. In addition to that, we gave the farmers the opportunity to trade with the world and, so far as I know from a farmer's standpoint, that is what they ask for and that is what they are going to have.
Mr. A. DeWITT FOSTER:	Why was 24
per cent taken off only two implements and 5 per cent off others under the reciprocity agreement?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Because the others had
a higher protection; and that is why some of the others could have stood a further reduction under the present proposition, because they have a higher protection and also because the manufacturers of some of these implements have recently increased their output in this country so much that they can compete successfully with the American manufacturers. It does not always follow that because a tool is cheap a man is going to buy it. Farmers exercise discretion in buying, just as a man will do when buying a suit of clothes. If I were going to buy a plough, I may say that I would buy a Cockshutt plough, even if I had to pay $5 more for it. I am not sure that I would not buy a Massey-Harris binder-I think I would. It does not necessarily follow that, because the duties are taken off, the manufacturer of agricultural implements cannot compete or that he cannot get a market in the United States. I am interested in a little industry that makes tools approaching agricultural implements, and we have sold them in the United States against a very high duty. Unless we get information to the contrary, I feel that, without hurting the agricultural trade, we can take the duty off certain classes of agricultural implements for the benefit of the farming community of this country.
I have no objection to offer as to the Massey-Harris people, and I have no comment to make on them, because, like the Cockshutt people, I am personally proud of them as enterprising Canadian manufacturers. I would be very sorry ,to see them hurt in any shape, manner or form, but I think they can compete with other manufacturers without any favours being extended to them. They are competing in Australia, in New Zealand, in Russia, in France, and 
sometimes I believe they have even butted into Germany. I am endeavouring to speak in the interests of the country at large, without any prejudice against any human being or any industry in Canada, and I do not see why these people cannot compete in Canada against other manufacturers, when they can compete with them in the open markets of the world. It is said that the freight rates from Chicago to Winnipeg or Calgary are against the Canadian industry, but not having these rates before me I will not be certain as to that. We must, however, bear in mind that they get a drawback on their steel and iron, and that they have that advantage over other Canadian industries.
Let me refer to the question of free wheat. I must say that I was never more astonished in my life than when the Minister of Finance announced in his Budget speech that the Government would not give the western farmers free wheat. I see no possible reason why they should not be given free wheat. They have demanded it; they are the people interested, and in my opinion they should get it. I admit that there are some arguments against it, but so far as the farmer is concerned there can be no two opinions but that it would benefit him. If the farmer wants free wheat, I do not see why he should not have it. So far as I know the farmers of Ontario, they are perfectly willing that the farmers of the West should have free wheat.


Mr. BEST:: You do not know the farmers of Ontario very well.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think I know them better than you do, and I think I know them as well as any man in Canada does; and, speaking absolutely from the standpoint of the farmer's interest, and my own personal inclination, I am perfectly willing that the farmers of the West should have free wheat, and I raise some wheat myself. As a matter of fact, the farmers of Ontario may be selfish, because they do not grow much wheat for sale, and they do not care whether they sell the wheat they grow, or not. If my hon. friend (Mr. Best) lives in a section of the country where they are depending upon selling their wheat crop, I wish he would come up and visit me and I will take him around for a week and board him for nothing, and I will show him where farmers do not need to grow wheat for sale, and I will guarantee they are making as much money as are the farmers in his section of the country. We

grow wheat in our section of the country more for the straw than we do for the wheat.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: That is funny, is it not ?


An hon. MEMBER:: It is.


John Best: The country will know now the class of farmers you have up in your section of the country.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Yes, we want the straw for bedding. There is not a farmer in my section of the country who grows wheat for the purpose of making money out of the sale of it; there is not a farmer I know of in my section of the country who would sell wheat at less than eighty cents a bushel, and there are some of them who would not sell it for ninety cents a bushel. They feed their wheat, and at anything less than eighty cents a bushel it does not pay them to sell it. If my hon. friend (Mr. Best) is sufficient of a farmer to keep track of what it costs him to raise pork and what it costs him to raise wheat, he will find that if he has not to sell his pork at less than seven cents a pound, and his wheat is anything under eighty cents a bushel, he had better feed his wheat to his hogs.


John Best: I made money on pork at five dollars a hundred.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: No you do not; you would starve to death selling it at five dollars a hundred.


Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: He is not a farmer.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I do not think he is.
Let me state another reason why the Government should have provided that wheat should toe free. The western farmer tells us that the United States markets are open for their wheat, but a number of hon. gentlemen opposite have said: What is the use of trying to make a market for our wheat in a country which is a wheat exporting country itself. That sounds reasonable, but at the same time I heard the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Aikiins) state the other night that wheat was three or four cents a bushel higher in Minneapolis than in Winnipeg, and he also read letters to show that wheat that graded No. 1 in Minneapolis, graded only No. 2 or No. 3 in Winnipeg, so that there is a spread of from three cents to five cents a bushel between No. 1 and No. 3. One of the best farmers in Canada, and one of the largest farmers in Alberta, authorized me to state that he himself had sent a sample to Minneapolis and a sample 177
of exactly the same wheat to Winnipeg, and the Minneapolis sample was graded No. 1, whereas the Winnipeg sample was graded No. 3. Under such circumstances why not let the farmer have the better opportunity?


Richard Blain: Did the hon. member nolici* the quotation given in this House last night as to the prices of wheat in the United States market and in the Canadian market, as quoted in yesterday's Toronto Globe and in the Mail and Empire?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: That is for July option; I am not a gambler.


Richard Blain: In Minneapolis the price of May wheat was eighty-nine and a half cents, and in Winnipeg it was ninety and a quarter, and in Minneapolis the price of July wheat was ninety and three-fourths cents and m Winnipeg ninety-two cents.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The citation the hon.
gentleman gives us does not prove anything, for the simple reason that it only refers to the conditions existing at this time of the year. We have got to have in Ontario a certain amount of western wheat to mix with our softer wheat, and we have to pay the price for it, no matter what it is. After the rush in the fall of the year, the wheat is held to a very great extent at the present time, not by the original farmer, but by the buyer, and the buyer naturally must have his profit on the wheat. In October, November and December, when the great rush of wheat is coming out, that is the time when the farmer himself is interested in the price, and not the buyer or the warehouseman, but at this time of the year the probabilities are that Winnipeg is quoted higher than Minneapolis, because fresh wheat is coming into Minneapolis.
There is one thing of which I would like to warn the growers of the West, and they might as well face it fairly, because it is coming, whether the Government wants it to come or not. If there is free wheat between the United States and Canada, the Ontario millers will buy American wheat, at certain times they will buy Kansas wheat when it comes in. So also will the large millers in the West be able to buy American wheat if they want to. That is for the farmers of the West to take into consideration. They must bear in mind that if they get themselves into a position to hold on to their grain until the best market offers- that is what we do in Ontario-they will have competitioni, with the American wheat coming into Ontario and perhaps coming in for the use of their own millers in the West. The Minister of Finance says that



the millers are opposed to free wheat. Well, the millers may be surprised very much. I know that the millers of Ontario are cl anging their minds on that subject very materially. For the millers of Ontario have stopped exporting flour; they cannot export it and compete. England, we know, takes wheat from all over the Footstool wherever it is to be had for trade. As I recollect it, England has five-sixths of the carrying trade of the world. She has to trade with the people who trade with her, and if any country has export wheat for sale and England expects to sell her manufactured goods, then England must take that wheat. But the English miller has got so wise that he can take these wheats and wash them and mix them to make as good a flour as is required in England, or as good as we could make in this country out of our better-class wheat.


Mr. ALFRED THOMPSON:: Would the hon. gentleman inform the House what class of millers have changed their minds with regard to the export trade?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think the Ontario
millers are changing their minds.
Mr. THOMPSON- You think they are?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I know they are.


Alfred Thompson: Who are they?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The hon. gentleman dees not want me to name all the men who have mills-it would take all afternoon. The point is that the small mider in Ontario cannot compete in flour in the English market. He recognizes that. Here is a letter from a friend of mine:


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: A miller?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Yes.
I am unable to continue the export business, in fact, have practically severed the connection with my Glasgow people. We have not been able to compete with their home millers on Manitoba flour, and buyers are able to get Australian winter wheat flour much cheaper than Ontario. Australian flour costs, delivered in Glasgow, $4.20 per barrel, while our Ontario wheat flour would be worth $4.62 per barrel.
Now, Ontario millers, as I have said, will buy American wheat, in my judgment. Today, Manitoba wheat at lake ports is quoted at 964 cents for No. 1, and 94| cents for No. 2. The Ontario miller has to pay freight from Georgian bay ports to his mill, and he can grind that and ship in on to the Maritime provinces at the same rate plus two cents for stopover-he grinds it in transit, as it were. So that is wb at I want

to warn my western friends of-that American wheat, in my judgment, will come into direct competition with them. If, in the face of that, they still want free wheat-and I think they will-why should not we give them their way? They are the judges; they are not fools; they know what they want; wh-y not give them what they want?-what harm would it do the rest of the country? Let me explain that in speaking of Ontario millers I do not speak of such mills as the Maple Leaf, but of the smaller millers. The Maple Leaf may be able to compete in the English market. It has one of the best mills in Canada, and particularly well situated at Port Colborne. Being at the foot of the lakes it is favourably situated both as to bringing in wheat and sending out flour. Somebody said the other day that the flour shipped to England was not as good as the flour here. I came down on Sunday night with a baker who pretended to know all about this business, and he claimed that the flour in England is as good as the flour here. He said that the English consumer demands as good a flour as ours, but different-not as dry a flour. They seem to know their business, anyway, and I suppose they have just as good bread in England as we have in Canada.
As to the large millers and their ability to compete, I have never heard an argument that has convinced me that these large millers of western Canada cannot compete. I do not see what is to prevent them. They are right on the ground; they have means to buy wheat and store it in the fall and carry it over. That is the trouble with the Ontario miller-he has not the means to carry over wheat, and he has no storage facilities. If he had, it would not cost him nearly as much as it does to buy, not from the farmer but from the dealer who, at a certain time of the year, as now, raises the price whether at Winnipeg or lake ports. Large western mills, such as the Ogilvies and Lake of the Woods, have storehouses and elevators, and I do not see why they should not compete. They say that the ocean rates keep them from competing with the English mills. But if that is the case, it has nothing to do with this question, because it would be the same whether there was free wheat or not. I read in the North Western Miller that the American millers complain that their export trade is falling off, that they cannot compete with the English and Swiss millers. As statements have been made as to the profits of these large flour mills, I think I had better put the exact

facts before the House. Here are the headings of recent reports:
Ogilvie profits show good gain-Increase of $55,303 reported with earnings on common 13.27 per cent-in a strong position-properties show surplus of $2,000,000 over book values-Goodwill reduced to $1.
So, it was not 30 per cent or 60 per cent, as I have heard it stated, but 13'27 per cent on the common stock. I know nothing about their capitalization. Here are the headings respecting Lake of the Woods:
Lake of Woods had good year-Earnings at rate of 30 per cent on preferred and 15.46 on common-Best since 1908-09-Profits 20 per cent higher than last year-After liberal writing off good surplus was carried forward.
They made a fair profit, and the probabilities are, I think, that they will be able to compete in the British market.
The Minister of Finance, in explaining why he did not grant free wheat to the people of the West, told us that we were building two transcontinental railways and soon would have three such railways for operation. That is onj thing which would, I think, solve the problem of freight rates. You cannot make me believe that the Americans can carry that wheat first south and then to the seaboard cheaper than we can carry it direct. I think that the mere allowing of open shipments-that is, allowing the western people to make the best arrangement they can as to freight rates to the seaboard- would be the means of settling this very vexed question of transportation. I believe the railways can compete; I would be the last one to raise my voice in support of anything under which the railways could not compete.
That brings me to the question of railway expenditure. The Government started to assist in the construction of a transcontinental railway which was to be built for the sole purpose of relieving the congestion in the West and lowering freight transportation charges. I believe that had the road been built as it was first decided to be built, it would be quite possible to reduce freight charges and still have a profit on the road. The expenditure of a few millions of dollars would not have made any great difference, in view of the vast traffic that will be built up in the West. It is not right to say that the farmers of the West will not get better prices for their wheat if the market is opened to them and to say at the same time that the wheat will 177}
be carried south; that is utter folly. If the farmers do not get better prices for their wheat in the south they will continue to ship it to the east. The Minister of Finance said that after the market is open for a day or two the prices in Minneapolis and the prices in Winnipeg will meet. I quite agree with that, but I do not agree with his suggestion that the price in Minneapolis would lower the price in Winnipeg. I do believe that the two would meet, but I think that the price in Minneapolis would raise the price in Winnipeg to a considerable extent; that is what happened in connection with the cattle shipments to Buffalo and Toronto. Any one who follows the market knows that when the United States duty was taken off cattle the price in Toronto jumped from 50 cents to $1 per hundred; the price in Buffalo decreased considerably, but not to the extent of meeting the Toronto price by any means. The prices met half-way, or a little better in favour of Toronto. I have heard good farmers in my section of the county say th it the removal of the duty on cattle going into the United States was equal to an increase of $5 an acre in the value of land in the county of Oxford. How they made that estimate, I cannot say, but I do know that free access to the United States market would increase the value of land throughout Ontario.
The hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Aikins) the other day gloried in the fact that the present Government is building the Hudson Bay railway, and he eohdemned the late Administration for not building it. Let me say that if there is anything which I shall be proud of in the future it is the fact that we were not stupid enough to build the Hudson Bay railway. From what I have read of the Hudson Bay route I cannot see how it would be possible to lower the freight charges by the transportation of grain by that route. I am told that the road cannot be considered as a colonization road-that there are no lands to colonize there-and if that is the case I am quite sure that it is not worth while building a railway at enormous cost merely for the purpose of transporting the fish that may be caught in Hudson bay. It would be cheaper to assist the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario to Teach Jaimes Bay and let that railway carry the fish to the thickly-settled parts of the country where they are required and where the people pay very high prices for fish even at the present day.


Mr. LALOR:: Is it not a fact that the
late Government committed the country to the building of the Hudson Bay railway?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Quite right; they we^-e
foolishly committed by the violent clamour of the people of the West at that time to the building of the Hudson Bay railway. I hope to live five or six years longer, and if I do you will find that I am absolutely right when I tell you that the Hudson Bay railway will never pay for the carrying of that fish 'from Hudson bay; it will never pay as a route for the transportation of grain. We have three transcontinental roads without it, and the construction of this road will involve an expenditure of $150,000,000 of public money for which we will receive no benefit. I was pleased to hear the Minister of Public Works announce this year that he was going to appoint a committee of business men to inquire into the commercial value of the Georgian Bay canal. This inquiry is, I understand, to be made not from an engineering standpoint -because engineers can do almost anything nowadays; they will be trying to build a road to Mars one of these times-but from the standpoint of its commercial feasibility, I tell the minister that if he appoints a committee not for political purposes-a committee of genuine commercial men who know something about business conditions, they will report against the Georgian Bay canal, just as they would have reported against the Hudson Bay railway, to the cost of which there is practically no limit, and which is a pure chimera.
When, our friends on the other side talk about the home market, surely they do not pretend to say that they would not sell to anybody outside of the home market. They do not pretend that they would not export if they had the opportunity to do so; that would be ridiculous. Nor do we pretend that we would not sell at home; that we would not take advantage of the home market as well as of the export market. What we want to do is to encourage the country to produce, and to sell all we can produce in the best market. I have the following clipping as to the demand on the continent for Manitoba wheat:
Montreal, April 20.-There was an increased demand from the continent for April spring wheat in nearby positions, and as the prices bid were fully three cents per bushel higher than those from the United Kingdom, some business was worked.
What do we care whether the market we obtain is on the continent, in South Africa, or in China-with which country the hon.

Minister of Trade and Commerce says he is trying to work up trade-so long as we can sell our goods in the best market and to the best advantage? If our hon. friends are consistent in the theory that protection is the only policy for this country, then why not put back the protection on corn, fence wire and binder twine? My hon. friend from Essex (Mr. Wilcox) the other day, speaking on corn, advised the Government to put a duty on corn-and I dare the Government to put a duty on corn or binder twine or fence wire.


Mr. WILCOX:: Does my hon. friend think it fair that there should be such discrimination in freight rates that the producer of corn in the United States has the advantage of the Canadian market by four cents over the farmer who produces com in the county of Essex?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: 'Certainly not.


Oliver James Wilcox: That is the condition.
Mr. NESBITT; I quite agree with the hon. member that that is not right.


Oliver James Wilcox: I sometimes pay a great deal of attention to what is said by the ex-Min ister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Graham). He said that Mr. Mabee had been sent to Washington with a view to arranging an international commission, that under present conditions the Board of Railway Commissioners for Canada did not have jurisdiction to adjust a rate between a point in a foreign country and a point in Canada. Therefore, under present conditions, a rate is established from Chicago to a point in Ontario over which the Board of Railway 'Commissioners has absolutely no jurisdiction, and the only way we can have that matter rectified is by a duty.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The hon. member will not say that Mr. Mabee was not right in trying to get an arrangement between the two countries?


Oliver James Wilcox: Absolutely right, but he did not get the result, and therefore we are under that disability.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: We try so many things that we do not get; but we were on the right track, and Mr. Mabee did try to secure an arrangement between the board and the Interstate Commerce Commission of the United States to control the international freight rates.


Oliver James Wilcox: I am glad that Mr. Mabee made the attempt, but no result

was obtained, and therefore we are labouring under that disadvantage.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: That is for our present Government to continue and try and get the result. We did the best we could, and I hope my hon. friend from Essex will urge the present Government to try and get any such discrepancy as that rectified. It is absolutely unfair.


Oliver James Wilcox: I intend to.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I still adhere to what I said in the first place that we want a tariff for revenue. We want to assist all we can new industries, but there are industries that do not require assistance, and it is absolutely unnecessary for us, at the expense of the ordinary citizen, at the expense of the general consumer, to impose unnecessary duties on any articles, and thus increase his burdens. Let me warn the Finance Minister that there is nothing so dangerous for a government as an over-surplus and it is not legitimate for the government of a country to take too much of a surplus out of the pockets of the people. It is legitimate for them to collect sufficient to pay the legitimate expenses of the Government, not silly expenses as I pointed out. But it is not legitimate for the Government to collect from the people more than is absolutely necessary for the service of the country, and that is the sort of tariff we want. We want a tariff, in my judgment, that, while it assists as much as possible the growing industries, will not be a burden to the whole people of the country. I hope with all my heart that the Government will be wise enough to grant the people of the West what they want without stirring up this local feeling of-West against East, which is absolutely unnecessary and uncalled for.


Alfred Thompson: 
Edward Walter Nesbitt: I did not say that I was m favour of some free agricultural implements.


Alfred Thompson: I think the hon. member was a little unjust in his reference to the policy of this Government with regard to the Hudson Bay railway. If my memory serves me aright, this country and this Parliament were committed to that policy toy the predecessors of the present Government. That project was launched in 1910 and was referred to in the Speech from the Throne of that year. It is one of the legacies that have come down to this Government from their predecessors, along with the Grand Trunk Pacific and a few more.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: A good many more.


Alfred Thompson: Several, but I will
not stop to enumerate them. Canada has stood the strain remarkably well, and I desire to congratulate the Minister of Finance on the condition of our finances during the past year. When we consider that the financial depression was not local, but affected every civilized country in the world, I think we may congratulate ourselves on the way Canada stood the strain. What are the facts? The past decade has been a

period of great expansion. We have spent money in public buildings from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Money has been invested in private enterpn'ise.s and in the expansion of our manufactures. We have borrowed money from the markets of the world for bur municipal and railway enterprises. Some of those enterprises immediately produce revenue. Far instance, the money spent on private enterprises and manufactures, if successful, is immediately productive. But there is a class of investment which does not immediately return a revenue. I refer to the money invested in municipal improvements-streets, sidewalks and the like. Such improvements are not for this generation solely, but will be used by the generations to come. The same is true of our investment in transcontinental railways. We do not finance them for one decade, but for several generations. When we consider that Canada has borrowed largely from the world for enterprises productive and partly productive, I say that the condition of our country is one which every Canadian, Liberal or Conservative, should be proud. An enormous amount of capital has also beeen invested in unproductive real estate throughout this country, particularly in the West. Millions of dollars have been absorbed by unproductive land in the citie-s and towns throughout the country, and until prosperity returns those investments will bring no Teturns. It is times such as we had last year that test the props which support the country and the material upon which we have built our civilization. Canada has come through the test well, which shows how sound are the foundations of our prosperity. Notwithstanding the pessimistic note which pervades some of the speeches of horn, gentlemen opposite the keynote of Canada to-day is optimism. The people of this country have a profound faith in Canada. Hon, gentlemen opposite may cry * wolf, wolf,' and 'blue ruin,' but I tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the foundations of this country are secure in our great national resources. The Minister of Finance sounded that note of optimism in his excellent speech. He said that the beacon light could already be seen in the harbour of prosperity, and that in a short time we should again experience a period of prosperity. As I said, the depression last year was world-wide, and to produce a world-wide result there must be world-wide causes. The causes are easy to discern:	over-production and over-

expansion, which used up the surplus capital. Because of the easy manner in which people to-day can travel from one country to another, money was got in the borrowing centres of the world for various enterprises. The over-expansion and overproduction used up the capital, and, as we say in medicine, that had a cumulative effect. Trade slackened and municipal improvements ceased for a time. Our railways are not earning what they were; but the operation of that law is not confined to Canada. It applies universally. It is only a phase in the financial cycle through which Canada and the whole civilized world is passing, and this Government is no more responsible for that phase than it was for the appearance of Halley's comet a few years ago. I clipped the following figures from the Ottawa Evening Journal a day or so ago. The New York Central railway has laid off 25,000 men, the Pennsylvania railway 40,000 men. The latter road has also cut off 118 trains, and many other railways in America are doing the same thing. Surely financial conditions in other countries are worse than in Canada. Our national resources are illimitable and immeasurable. The basis of our wealth is our four great resources: our farms, our mines, our forests, and our fisheries. The fluctations in real estate do not really affect the foundation of our wealth at all.
It is to administer and develop that vast heritage of resources that our Government must address itself. The point is, which policy shall we adopt to develop that heritage ? The issue between the two parties is distinct and clear. There is nothing like having a good clear battle-cry when you are going to fight. The Minister of Finance placed the policy of his party fairly and squarely before the people of Canada. He stands, and the men behind him of the Conservative party stand, for a moderate protection. Let me read what he said. He enunciates the creed of the Conservative party so clearly that it stands out in relief:
We believe it is the best, indeed the only and in a sense the inevitable policy for Canada, situated as it is geographically and in the existing fiscal conditions of the world to-day. Under that policy Canada has prospered in the past and will continue to prosper in the future. We believe it to be the true policy for Canada and for every part of it if we are to regard as desirable stable business conditions and a diversified national life throughout the Dominion.
That has been the policy of the Conservative party since 1879, and it is worth while to note that in 20 of the 35 years since 1879 the destinies of Canada have

been governed by this party and by that policy. This party stands or falls by the policy of moderate protection. Where do our friends opposite stand ?


Mr. SCHAFFNER:: Anywhere.


Alfred Thompson: I will admit that their policy is a little vague, a little tenuous and shadowy, and in places almost impossible to trace. In passing, it is worthy of notice that the financial critic of the Opposition, the junior member for Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean), declared for free trade in food products. The hon. member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig) does not want to encourage mixed farming in the West because the products of the West would compete with the products of the farmers of Ontario.
I am giving, in passing, some phases of the Liberal policy. The hon. member for South Cape Breton (Mr. Carroll) out-herods Herod in the protective side of his speech, because he wants a bounty put on steel; he wants protection, on diamonds and free trade in everything else; and incidentally he read the Hon. Mr. Sifton out of the Liberal party. Every one knows that we have no duty on diamonds because it is so easy to smuggle them into the country, that the Government decided that the best thing to do was to put them on the free list; but my hon. friend would encourage smuggling by having the duty reimposed. The ex-Postmaster General (Mr. Lemieux) frankly admitted that he was a moderate protectionist. It is well known in this House that my hon. friend the member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark) is an out-and-out free trader. But of all the hon. gentlemen on the opposite side of the House who have spoken I wish to refer particularly to the hon. member for Westmorland'(Mr. Emmer-son), who is exceedingly penitent. It is surprising how a few years in the cool shades of Opposition modify the sentiments of some hon. gentlemen. He is now rather radical. He says:
For all these reasons, and because of their greed, the manufacturing and industrial interests are the enemies of democracy.
That is from one who was Minister of Railways in the Cabinet of my right hon. friend. Again he says;
I am an out-and-out free trader and I wish circumstances permitted the adoption of free trade. I am to-day where I have always been.
Has he always been there? Was it a free trade Government in which, he served? I do not think ,so. My hon.
friend's present position reminds me very much of the little verse on the illness of his Satanic majesty:
When the devil was sick the devil a saint would be;
When the devil was well the devil a saint was he.
But where is the distinguished gentleman who leads the Opposition? So far as free food is concerned, he has crossed the Rubicon. He advocated free food at Hamilton; he voted for free wheat and tree implements. Where does he find himself to-day? It is well known that, when my right hon. friend was captain of our ship of state and walked the quarter deck as Premier of Canada, there was no division in his ranks as there is to-day. How does this happen? Is it because the patronage is not present? Why is it that so many different opinions are expressed to-day by hon. members of the Liberal party? It is because that party has no policy. My right hon. friend to-day leads a divided party, a party which is as much without a plan or a policy as it is without power. This is what the News-Advertiser of Vancouver says of the Liberal party to-day:
The fact is that there are two Liberal parties with quite different principles. One is the party when in office, the other is the party when in Opposition. The former is protectionist, the latter is free trade. The former acts; the latter talks. Opponents of the National Policy have nothing to hope from either of them. The Liberal party in Opposition is powerless to abolish protection; the Liberal party in office is powerful to maintain it.
The different policies propounded by our hon. friends on. this great question show that they are divided. To-day the Liberal ship finds itself in a troubled sea sailing without a compass, without a chart and without a course. This country is no Utopia, no New Atlantis or other ideal state conceived in the mind of some philosopher; this is Canada in the twentieth century, a country that requires a strong policy with a strong party to advocate it and to carry it out. Such is the policy which we have in Canada to-day, and we have a party in power to carry out that policy. So far as we on this side of the House can distinguish, the policy of our Liberal friends has been crystallized up to date in free implements, free wheat, and-although they have not yet seen fit to bring in a resolution advocating it-the leader of the Liberal party has outside this House expressed himself as in favour of free food. I represent a constituency whose chief output is gold.
In the Yukon we have three exports: gold,

copper ores, and furs. Our chief export is gold; and, if there is any section of this country that should favour free trade, it is the territory which I have the honour to represent, because we produce there the medium of exchange. We have no difficulty at all in marketing our products; everybody wants them. During the last fifteen or sixteen years we have produced very nearly $200,000,000 worth of gold; in the year 1913 we produced a little over thirteen tons of the yellow metal. Although we might therefore be supposed theoretically to be free traders, we are not; we are Canadians who believe in a policy for the whole of Canada as well as for the Yukon. We have to come to this federal Parliament to get the grants necessary to develop that territory, 4,500 miles from the place from which I speak, and we know from experience that the moneys of this Government cannot be got except by encouraging the industries and the trade of this country. That is why we are protectionists; because we believe that protection is the best policy for Canada and therefore the best policy for the Yukon.
The Yukon territory is huge in extent,
200,000	square miles, and the last page in its history has not by any means been written. There is in Russia a province similar to the Yukon in area and climatic conditions, the population of which is over one and a half million people; and the Yukon	territory	is capable of
supporting a very much larger population than it has at the present time. Its development	is only beginning. The
United States Government has recently voted $35,000,000 for railway development in Alaska, and it is only a question of time when we shall come to this Government and ask for the extension of the Grand Trunk Pacific through the northern portion of British Columbia and Yukon to connect with the Alaskan railway system at the boundary line.
With regard to free wheat, these are the arguments which the Minister of Finance has submitted and which have as yet been unanswered by the Opposition:
1.	High prices in Minneapolis are due to a local demand for hard wheat. This condition would disappear as soon as our wheat went in free, as the demand is limited.
2.	Canada and the United States both export wheat. Therefore the Liverpool price governs.
3.	Canadian wheat shipped to the United

States would lose its identity, which identity is an asset.
4.	The millers have to pay duty on their machinery; and if flour were free, they would be better off under free trade. This is logical, and shows us where the Liberal policy takes us. The policy outlined to-day by the Liberal chieftain tends directly to free trade for Canada.
5.	Different latitudes yield early and late wheat, giving an advantage to the wheat of the United States over ours.
6.	It would kill the milling industry in Canada.
7.	There is no permanence in the United States tariff, and therefore we would not be warranted in incurring the necessary expenditure in developing the market.
8.	Mixed farmers need the by-products, which are said to be dearer in the United States, and therefore, if the duty were removed, they would be dearer in Canada.
These are powerful arguments for keeping the duty on our wheat, and I have yet to hear an hon. gentleman opposite answer categorically the arguments of the Minister of Finance. These arguments seem sound to me, and, until I hear better arguments in opposition, I intend to accept them. What he said was, that we were building two transcontinental railways, and opening up the Hudson Bay route, and he asked the people of the West to wait until it was known what effect these new transportation routes would have upon the export trade and the transportation rates. Reasonable protection for our industries has been the tra^ ditional policy of Canada ever since the abrogation of the reciprocity treaty between us and the United States in 1866. We have been bending all our energies for nearly fifty years towards the development of this home trade, and what the Liberal party wants now is, at one fell swoop, to destroy this structure to the erection of which the best men who have ever adorned Canadian statesmanship have in the past devoted their talents.
We have 9,500 men employed in the agricultural implement industry, and -there are
50,000	people depending for support on the labour of these men. Our friends opposite advocate free trade in agricultural implements, with the probability of wiping out this Canadian industry, and it is reasonable to ask them why, if they think it is a good policy, they did not put it into effect when they had the power, and why, now that they are in opposition, they wish to take a scythe and cut down this great industry. What

oaTe they now for the prosperity and wellbeing of 50,000 of their fellow-Canadians, so long as they think they can, by advocating such a policy, gain some votes in a certain part of this Dominion. In the textile and other industries there are many women employed, but let it be remembered that in the agricultural implement industry the employees are mostly men who support families and maintain happy homes. Is it not a serious thing to propose to wipe out such an industry? If you take the duty off agricultural implements, it would be illogical to leave the duty on the raw material, and as I understand the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Clark) is to speak in this debate, I would draw his attention to the fact that the logical outcome of the policy now advocated by his political friends must be free trade for Canada. That is a doctrine which I will not and cannot endorse. I would also invite my hon. friend's attention to a speech made in this House on December 3, 1912, in which the hon. member for Wentworth (Mr. G. C. Wilson) pointed out that when the Liberals took the duty off binder twine there were fifteen factories manufacturing binder twine in Canada; that fourteen of these were abolished and that only one remained, while the price of binder twine is higher to-day in Canada than it was before the duty was removed.


Mr. MICHAEL CLARK:: Then, why does your party not put the duty on again?


Alfred Thompson: I am propounding
these questions to the hon. member for Red Deer, and when he comes to address the House he can give an explanation of them. I point out to him further that the same thing happened when the duties on barbed wire and coal oil were removed.


Mr. LOGGIE:: The hon. gentleman
surely knows that the increased price of the article he refers to is because the raw material has very much advanced in value.


Alfred Thompson: That is not what the grain growers in the West say.


William Stewart Loggie: Oh, well, I know it is so.


Alfred Thompson: What the grain growers in the West say is that the price is advanced because of the monopoly which exists in the United States, and the grain growers of the West know that to be a fact. And yet these gentlemen opposite would wipe out this great industry, with the result as the Minister of Finance well said, of
placing Canadian farmers in the maw of a great United States trust.
Another thing which hon. gentlemen opposite speak of is free food. When they adopted free food, England went free trade, and so must Canada adopt free trade if we are to follow the policy of the Liberal party. Let me point out that this policy of free wheat, and free agricultural implements, and free other things, originated in the West, and I shall address a few observations to what I think is the cause and cure of the situation existing in the West. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, the people have practically no diversity of employment; their efforts are devoted almost altogether to raising the products of the soil. Where did the Liberals meet with the losses last election which placed them in opposition; where did they gain seats, and where did the Conservative party make the gains which put them in power? In actually every province in Canada, except Saskatchewan and Alberta, the Conservative party made gains. And why? It is because the people of Canada are.protectionists to the core; because in these older provinces we have diversity of employment and prosperous industries which have contributed in a large part to make Canada the great country it is to-day. In Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, manufactures are not developed to the same extent as they are in Ontario, but still in the Maritime provinces the Conservative party made gains. In the province of Quebec, where manufacturing industries are developed to a high state, the Conservative party made remarkable gains.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The naval question
made the gains there.


Alfred Thompson: I am glad the hon.
gentleman has drawn my attention to that. I have a profound faith in the genius of the people of Canada to govern themselves; I have profound faith in the optimism of the Canadian people; and I have a profound faith in the judgment of the people of Canada, and I believe that arguments directed to local prejudices and race passions do not appeal to our people. Examine the pages of our political history, and you will find that when the people of Canada tire of a government they do not turn it out piecemeal, but they wake up one fine morning and completely annihilate it.


Mr. PROULX:: They will soon annihilate this Government.


Alfred Thompson: This Government will go down to defeat in time, but not so long as hon. gentlemen opposite are divided on the trade policy, as they are to-day. The usual course is for the people of Canada to put a government in power with a large majority, and to let that government govern the country, but as soon as the government does not legislate to suit them, they turn that government out of power in good shape, as happened in 1911. The moment the late Liberal Government attacked the traditional trade policy of the country, that very moment the people said, we want none of you, and out you go. In the great province of Ontario, the central province of Canada, where manufacturing has been carried to its highest state of development, there is where the Conservative party got their chief support. The result of the last elections, taking them generally, show that where you have diversity of employment and established industries, the people believe in protection. British Columbia, which has coal deposits, fisheries, horticultural lands, farm lands, diversified climate, diversified employment for the people, did not want reciprocity, and the seven members who represent that province are to-day supporters of the right hon. the Prime Minister. In Manitoba, where manufacturing is developed to a certain extent, but not to the same extent as in the eastern provinces, the Conservative party made gains also. In Saskatchewan and Alberta, in one case there was no change, and in another case there was a loss of two seats. Why was this? The people of these provinces are interested in only one industry, and, having no diversified employment, they require a large number of working people at certain times of the year, but have no employment for them at other times. The people of these two provinces, it is said, want free trade. But, Mr. Speaker, if I judge the people of Canada aright, on the whole they are decidedly opposed to free trade, and it is for us to find where the trouble is with these provinces, and if there is a remedy to apply it. I believe, Sir, that if there were manufacturing communities scattered throughout Alberta and Saskatchewan, you would no longer hear from the people of those provinces any talk about free trade. You will find that these people will be protectionists, the same as the people in eastern Canada. Why are these people not . protectionists to-day? For the lack of two things: they have not cheap power and they 
have not cheap transportation. But these are some of the things to which this Government might well address itself. I will attempt to show the House how this problem may be solved, in my judgment. There are great water-powers in Canada, and one of the causes that will yet make Canada industrially great is to be found in the splendid water-powers scattered throughout the length and breadth of this country. Within a few miles off the city of Winnipeg theire is a waterfall capable of developing
500,000	horse-power. Now, one horse-power to five people is about what they require for an industrial city. lSo, in that waterpower on the Winnipeg river alone we have the means to keep going am' industrial city of 2,500,000. Now, the public domain in these western provinces belongs to this Government-coal lands, water-powers and everything else. I say to this Government: Address yourself to that question; find out ' where the water-powers are; develop them and sell power, cheap power, to Manitoba and the other provinces. My hon. friend from Calgary (Mr. Bennett) knows that about 50,000 horse-power awaits development on the rivers within fifty miles of that city. At five people to each horse-power, this would furnish power for a city of 250,000 people.
It so happens that nature in dealing with Canada has been prodigal with her gifts, she seems to have placed things just where we require them. I have shown that at Winnipeg and Calgary we have these water-powers. There are other sections where water-powers do not exist and cannot be developed. But there we have another natural resource w'hich can be converted into energy-I refer to the great beds of lignite coal underlying the soil of these prairie provinces. Any one who has paid attention to mechanics during the past few years will have observed that the gas producer for low-grade coal is a fact. It produces what is known as producer gas at a low rate of expense. The lignite coals of the West are such as can be successfully used to create that gas, and that gas will not only produce power, but it can be made the means of beating homes and factories.
It is not very good for lighting, though it can be used for that purpose. So, I say to this Government:	Continue the examination you are making into the lignite fields of the West; find out where the industrial centres are or are to be; find out how to

develop the power of lignite coal and sell it at a cheap rate thus encouraging the people to go into manufacturing. If you do this, you will have no more worry about free trade. In advocating this, I am simply pointing to the same course which has been followed in the East, for the East grew by developing its natural resources. I received in this morning's mail a booklet from Nova Scotia. The foreword is as follows:
The position to-day of the manufacturing
industries of Nova Scotia is shown in this nic-ture-story. This country with its half million inhabitants affords a typical example of modern industrial growth.
That is the example I am attempting to picture for our prairie provinces of the West, with their great hidden natural resources.
At one time exclusively a farming and fishing region, the province now possesses 1,480 manufacturing establishments, paying out $11,000,000 yearly to 38,000 employees. The industrial ascendency of Nova Scotia is broad based upon its immense deposits of coal, its great forests, its farms, its fisheries, its water-powers.
That can be duplicated in the West, and if we pay proper attention to these great natural resources it will be duplicated in the West. Besides the power which can be generated from lignite coal, there is a byproduct in the form of nitrogen, which can be combined with sulphuric acid to make ammonia sulphate, which is most useful as a fertilizer and for which there is an endless demand.
These are some of the things which the West can do. As an example of what can be accomplished, I need not go farther than this province, in which we can point out what has been done in the development of water-powers. Consider what has been accomplished at Niagara. Did you see, Mr. Speaker, the vast delegation that came here the other day to ask this Government to subsidize radial electric railways in Ontario? Could such a thing have been thought of before Niagara had been developed? Not at all. Niagara power has made possible for this province this and many other things, and if its water-powers are developed, the same thing will come to pass in the West.	,
As I say, the policy of our friends opposite tends directly to free trade, and my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier)-for whom, let me say, I have profound respect; he has carved high his nitch in our temple of
fame-can hardly deny that his policy tends directly to free trade. We have in biology a condition known as ' reversion to type.' A man may inherit the qualities possessed by a progenitor of several generations back, which qualities, after being latent for a time, may develop strongly. Atavism this condition is called; and the distinguished gentleman who leads the Opposition is a case of political atavism- he is reverting to type.
I have some material on the cost of living, but this I will not submit, because I do not wish to occupy too much time.
I wish to say a word about the progress made since my hon. friend from Red Deer (Mr. Clark) came to this country. I congratulate him on the number of converts he has made, judging by the speeches made in this House. He frequently refers-and I give him great credit for being an expert dialectician-to the economic progress of England and the doctrine of free trade. Mr. Speaker, the doctrine of free trade apparently suits the people of England-though we must not be too sure of that. But to hear the hon. gentleman you would think that England had always been a free trade country. England had a greater protection system than Canada ever had, and she had it for 500 years instead of for thirty or forty years, as Canada has had it. When we reach the same stage of economic development as they had reached in England, we may have free trade, too. In England they did not adopt free trade until they had developed an artisan to compete successfully with the best artisans in the world. Let me point out that England in former times had a double protection, not only the protection of import duties, but the protection of her trade guilds as well; and if ever there was a protectionist institution it was the trades guilds of England. They were close corporations. England in time developed this great industrial machine, and not until then did she adopt free trade. And she adopted that policy at a most fortunate time, before the great industrial nations, Germany and the United States, became what they are to-day. She adopted it at a time when practically the whole world was at war, and we know what war does for a country; it paralyses commerce and industry and destroys everything except the fighting spirit of the people. Following the adoption of free trade in England, came the war between Germany and Austria, paralysing the industrial energies of those two countries.


Mr. LEVI THOMSON (Qu'Appelle):: Mr. Speaker, I trust that my hon. friend and namesake who spoke last (Mr. Alfred Thompson) will not feel at all hurt if I undertake to refer to some of the arguments advanced by him, even although he himself is under the impression that no person of less ability than the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Michael Clark) should be considered as a fit opponent, as a foeman worthy of his steel; and apparently he thinks that even the hon. member for Red Deer requires a great deal of education from him before he should place himself in so important a position.
My hon. friend made some very serious complaints against the late Government because they had put certain things on the free list. I think the articles he referred
to were binder twine, coal oil and cream separators. He thought the late Government were guilty of a terrible iniquity because they put and left these articles on the free list. The hon. gentleman is now supporting a Government that still leaves these articles on the free list, and has done so for the last two and a half years.
My hon. friend thinks it a terrible thing that any two persons on this side of the House should have different opinions on anything; it is simply horrible. Does he not see that he is digging a pit for his own feet when he says that; as he must see that things which he condemns in unmeasured terms are approved of by the Government which he is supporting?
My hon. friend was very much aggrieved because wicked Grits on this side of the House and an equally wicked majority in the Senate would not allow a tariff commission to be appointed. Surely my hon. friend knows there is nothing in what he says-that it would be impossible for us on this side of the House to prevent the Government from passing and putting into force such legislation if they chose. Surely he knows that the Senate, even that terribly wicked Senate, never attempted to prevent the Government having a tariff commission. All the Senate said was that if the Government appointed a tariff commission they should not consider any application to increase the tariff unless a certain investigation was held and certain information obtained. My hon. friend says that the party with which he is associated is a party wliich stands for moderate protection. If the party which he supports stands for moderate protection I do not see what better commission they could have than that suggested by the Senate. Our objection to the proposed tariff commission was that it was being appointed to raise the tariff out of sight, as one hon. gentleman said, to raise it higher than Haaman's gallows. The only reasonable objection to the amendment suggested by the Senate was that it would prevent the present Government from carrying out such a policy. No one has ever suggested that there was any objection to the amendment proposed by the Senate except that, unless it be the difficulty as to form, which troubled the Minister of Finance; but of course that could easily have been rectified by some arrangement. My hon. friend says the party he supports stands for moderate protection. That is an exceedingly convenient term.


George Perry Graham: Almost like 'adequate.'


Levi Thomson: Almost like adequate, as my hon. friend says; but no one on this earth can give ns a definition that will be accepted generally of the meaning of either of these terms. The man who believes in a 5 per cent tariff will say that 5 per cent is moderate protection. The man who believes in a 100 per cent tariff will tell you that that is moderate protection; and even the gentleman who at one time said he was in favour of a Haaman's gallows tariff would probably say the same thing. I am not at all in favour of protection of any kind.


Mr. BURNHAM:: What about police
protection?


Levi Thomson: 
Michael Clark: Whenever they have an early harvest.


Levi Thomson: Exactly. According
to the argument of the Minister of Finance we should not ship wheat to England as at times it exports a considerable quantity. That shows the absurdity of his argument. It is quite true that at times the United States exports a certain quantity of wheat, and at other times it has to import just the same as many other countries. But even when the United States does export wheat, is it the kind of wheat that we sell? That is a point worthy of consideration. Even if it did export the sort of wheat that we sell the objection would amount to very little; and if they do not export the sort of wheat we sell the objection does not begin to amount to anything. I have carefully followed the market reports in the English papers during many sessions, and I have yet to find a report showing the price of American hard wheat. Every time you see the market reports, the price of Manitoba hard is quoted. If the Americans are shipping hard wheat to the English market, why is it not reported?


Mr. W. H. SHARPE:: Cam the hon.
member give the comparative prices on the English market of the wheats that he speaks of?


Levi Thomson: There can be no comparative prices when there are no prices quoted. I cannot answer that question, neither can my hon. friend.


William Henry Sharpe: The kind of wheat quoted on the British market?


Levi Thomson: I have seen quotations of American wheat, but the spread was tremendously large. I cannot tell my hon. friend now what it was.


William Henry Sharpe: Which is the higher, the Canadian or the American?


Levi Thomson: 

which show western expansion. In the year 1900, according to the official reports, we had under crop, including land raising cultivated hay, fodder, and roots, as well as grain, 3,597,691 acres. Five years later we had nearly double as much under crop, namely, 6,298,288 acres, an increase of 2,700,597 acres. During the next five years our acreage under crop very much more than doubled. In 1910 we had under crop 14,412,588 acres, an increase of 8,114,300. In 1911 the increase still continued, and we had that year 17,136,414 acres, an increase in that one year alone _ of 2,723,826 acres. Unfortunately at that time, there was a cheek in that expansion. I think it was unfortunate, although some hon. members apparently do not think so. In 1911, we had reached a stage where it was quite plain that we were producing a3 much grain as the markets open to us called for, and it became evident that we would either have to find broadier markets or that the expansion should cease. The Eight Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, then leader of the Government, saw that this condition existed, and he took the necessary steps to increase our markets, and so he affranged with our friends across the border that we should be allowed to export our grain to the United States free of duty. He made an arrangement whereby we would have a free market for not only our wheat, but our oats, our barley, and other natural products. Unfortunately, our honoured leader was unable to carry out that arrangement, because of a combination between the Conservative party, and the protected manufacturers and the capitalists of the country, including many Liberals. I venture to predict, Sir, that when the future historian writes the history of Canada for that period, there will be no more honoured name than that of Sir Wilfrid Laurier who made the attempt to carry out that arrangement. I venture also to predict that the brightest history in the pages of that period will be the pages which show the tremendous efforts the right hon. gentleman made against tremendous odds, to give the people of Canada, the farmers, the consumers, and the working-people, their rights. I believe that our respected leader was as great in defeat as ever he was in victory.
Let us continue, for a moment, with this record .of expansion in the West. In 1912, we had under crop in these three western provinces, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and

Alberta, 18,889,260 acres, an increase that year of 1,752,846 acres, or an increase that year of about one million acres less than in the year before, which shows a very serious check.
But the last page in that record is the blackest of all, for in 1913 we had in crop only 18,963,200 acres, an increase of 73,940 acres, or about 3 per cent of the increase during the last year when the late Government was in office. What is the effect of this upon Canada? I think we must agree that the effect of checking western Canada is serious, not only for western Canada, but for every part of the Dominiion.
As I have said, the hon. member for Brandon dealt with free wheat. He told us that he held a brief for the farmers of western 'Canada. And the newspaper reports say that the hon. gentleman, after he made his argument with regard to free wheat, magnanimously said that he was prepared to bow to the will of the majority. He is not in his place or I would ask him to tell us to what majority he referred. Was it to the majority of the people of Canada or the majority of this House? If the former, how does he know that the majority are opposed to this extension of our market. I am getting a little suspicious, if this report be correct, that he may go back on us after all his fine argument. If he refers to the majority in this House, how is he going to learn what the majority think unless every member votes as he thinks. My hon. friend from Brandon quoted a maxim to my hon. friend from Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff):	' It is not what
is said but what is done that is regarded.' If my hon. friend from Brandon and other hon. friends from the West are disposed to go back on us in this question, I would remind them that there is something in that maxim that they should take to heart-it is not what they say but what they do that will be regarded when they go back to the West.
Now, I desire to say a few words with regard to the implements tariff reduction. Generally, while tariff reductions are an important thing to us in the West, yet, in comparison with the removal of restrictions on our trade, they are of little importance. We have often been told in this House, and were told again by my hon. friend from South Perth (Mr. Steele) that between 1878 and 1896 the Conservative Government made tremendous

reductions in the tariff duties. How did they succeed in reducing these duties? Why, first they laised them and then they took them down-. If they wished to get credit for reduction on that basis, I wonder that they did not put the duties up to one hundred per cent before knocking them down to twenty. Surely it would look better to say that the duties had been reduced by eighty per' cent than to say that they had been reduced by fifteen per cent. But what did the friends of hon. gentlemen opposite do when they were in power during the period referred to? I think I am right in saying that they found the duties on agricultural implements generally at seventeen and one-half per cent and they put them up to thirty-five per cent, and left them there during nearly all the time they were in office. They did make a reduction in some of those duties, hut not all. Some they reduced to thirty per cent, some to twenty-five per cent and some to twenty per cent. It is a simple thing to make claims of this kind, but it seems to me that those who make them must be laughing in their sleeve as they do so. When the late Government came into power they found the duties on agricultural implements ranging from twenty to thirty per cent. They reduced these duties generally from twenty to seventeen and one-half per cent and others from thirty per cent to twenty-five or twenty per cent. There may be some particular items of which that is not true, but speaking generally it covers the facts. You must remember also that the late Government made an effort to reduce these duties, some by two and one-half per cent and some by five per cent, but through the operations of the big interests and the efforts of those who support the present Government the changes were not made. If the duties were not reduced it was not through the fault of that Government but through the fault of their opponents.	*
We hear something of the reductions proposed in this Budget, and comparisons are made with the object of making us believe that these reductions are far more important than those that would have been made under the reciprocity arrangement. The present reductions refer to three items only-harvesters,- reapers and mowers. The reciprocity arrangement covered, I think, seventeen or eighteen items, and the reduction on all these excepting four was five per cent, the same as is proposed under this Budget, and a very few other items 2J per cent. We were told at that time 'l.at the 178i
reductions under reciprocity were insignificant and were of no use to the people. But now even less reductions are said to be very important. I find that for the year ending March 31, 1911, we imported harvesters, the most important item effected by the present arrangement, to the value of $215,129. But of ploughs we imported six or seven times as much- $1,371,234. But the duty on ploughs is not affected by the reductions proposed under this Budget, while there was to be a reduction of 5 per cent under the reciprocity arrangement. The same is true of threshing separators, of which we imported $2,176,077 worth-more than ten times as-much as we imported of binders. In the face of these facts, I do not see how any one can claim that the reductions now made are to be compared with those which would have been made under reciprocity. We were told that the reductions under reciprocity were valueless, that they were so insignificant as not to be worth considering. If that be true, how much more valueless are the present reductions? 1 do not admit that they are valueless; I think we should be prepared thankfully to receive small mercies from the present Government, because I am sure that that is the only kind of mercies we will ever receive from them. We are thankful for the little things that they have done for us, but we would be more thankful if they would do something worth while. While I say that we are thankful for these things; while I say that we would be glad to have a further reduction of the duty on agricultural implements and other articles, I want to be distinctly understood as saying that nothing of that kind can be accepted for a moment as a substitute for that to which we are entitled-a free market for our produce; an opportunity freely to market, without restrictions, our wheat, our barley, our flax, our oats and other produce wherever the people of any other country are prepared to receive them.


Mr. DONALD SUTHERLAND (South Oxford):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to congratulate the Finance Minister on the presentation he has made to the House of the condition of the finances of Canada for the past year. Notwithstanding the settled gloom and evidences of despair apparently existing in the minds of hon. gentlemen opposite; notwithstanding the depression that they claim exists from one end of Canada to the other, the Minister of Finance has been able to report a surplus.

i
The last speaker (Mr. Levi Thompson), or the one who proceeded him on the other side (Mr. Nesbitt), admitted that there had been surpluses during the last three years aggregating over $93,000,000, and this was the only complaint he had to make with regard to the financial condition of our country. I can imagine what a wail would have gone up from our friends on the other side had there been a deficit-but we are glad to know that there has been a surplus. In view of a legacy the like of which few governments have had handed down to them-a legacy of years of reckless and wanton extravagance-I think we are to be congratulated on the financial condition in which we now find ourselves. As a result of this legacy which has been handed down by hon. gentlemen opposite, we are confronted with a problem such as has, I believe, never confronted the people of this country before; one that will give the Government serious concern, but one which, I have no doubt, they will be able to adjust satisfactorily.
I have been- very much impressed with the tone of the debate so far. Almost without an exception the members from western Canada get up in their places in this House and discuss the questions before the people of this country to-day from the standpoint of their province alone, practically ignoring the other portions of Canada. I am sorry that we have not sufficiently advanced in this country to feel that we are a united people with a common object in view; with an ideal before us that we are all striving to realize and work out in the very best interests of the people as a whole. Naturally, we must give and take; we must make sacrifices for the interests of the country at times, but in the end I have no doubt that they will redound to the benefit of the whole country. As I have said, I regret the tone displayed by quite a number of hon. gentlemen opposite in discussing these questions before the House. The same attitude characterized the hon. member for Qu'Appelle, who even went so far as to say that the people of western Canada will grow grain for eastern Canada and for other countries of the world as well. Apparently the whole aim and object of the hon. members from western Canada is to grow grain to feed the people of Europe. They utterly forget that the people of Canada have to be fed; they utterly forget that we have a market here in Canada that is being supplied by the very people with whom hon. gentlemen

have been clamouring to enter into closer relationship. The best market in the world is our home market; let us never lose sight of that fact. We have permitted the people of New Zealand to send us butter-yes, we have permitted the people of Ireland to ship potatoes here to feed the people of Canada. In the United States they are growing mutton which is being consumed by the people of Canada; they are raising horses which are being used on Canadian farms. Yet we placidly get up and say:	Let us grow wheat;
wheat is the aim and object of our existence; if we only had free markets, see what we would do. And then there comes the wail: but we cannot grow wheat at the prices that we are getting at the present time. I was somewhat surprised this afternoon to hear the hon. member for the north riding of the county which I represent (Mr. Nesbitt) say: we in North Oxford grow wheat for the straw; we do not grow it for the grain at all. Wheat is not such a very important commodity after all; it is the straw we grow it for in Oxford. Let me tell the hon. gentleman that in 9 p.m. Oxford we grow the finest wheat that is grown anywhere; we grow from 35 to 40 bushels to the acre and we are getting $1.01 a bushel for it at the present time. Hon. gentlemen say:	Remove the tariff on our
wheat and in Ontario we will get our wheat from Kansas. That is exactly what we will do, but in Ontario we do not want Kansas wheat; we want our own wheat and we want more than that; we want the byproducts of our wheat to remain in this country. I want to say to the hon. gentlemen who are so anxious to grow wheat that growing wheat is not the only requirement of a successful agriculturist. Growing wheat is not the basis of agriculture in this country; if you follow the history of agriculture in all European countries you will find that it was when the people departed from grain growing as a specialty and went into mixed farming and stock-raising that they began to realize greater profits. Oh, our western friends say; you must not say anything about that to us; you people in eastern Canada do not know anything about conditions in the West. I think it was the hon. member for PTovencher (Mr. Molloy) who, in discussing this matter some time ago upon the motion for free wheat, said: you people down in eastern Canada may go into mixed farming, but we do not propose to be tied up to any business which requires attention from January to January and

which necessitates your getting up early in the morning and sitting up late at night. We want something easier than that, and we are going to grow wheat. With our friends from the West it is wheat, wheat, every day of the year. I have heard this wail from people who have been in western Canada only a few years. They have gone there and, finding the land ready for the plough, they have mined the fertility that has been stored up there for centuries, without any regard to the result which that course :s going to bring about.
Let me tell the hen. gentleman that that system is bound to bring poverty to this country. But, as the member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig) said: If you do not let these western farmers get their wheat into the United States, they will go into mixed farming, and what will happen? They will be raising hogs and cattle; they will be coming down here by thousands and tens of thousands, and they will overrun the province of Ontario with these products. If they come, we will have great game anyway, if we do not have anything else; but I do not anticipate any trouble in that respect. The hon. member for Qu'Appelle complains that he cannot get his wheat into the United States. He can get his wheat into the United States to-day without paying any duty on it whatever. He does not need to worry about that. But let him get busy like other farmers in Canada and pay close attention to his business; let him show that he is a proper farmer and not a miner of the soil, and then he will find that he has not' such difficulties to contend with. What do you find? Sir, you find, notwithstanding their weary wail about what we would have had under reciprocity-


Levi Thomson: I would ask my hon. friend if he has ever been out in the West, and if he has seen my farm ? Will he undertake to say that he farms better than I do ?


Donald Sutherland: I am not talking
about your farm; I am talking about your arguments, and I am telling you you can get your wheat into the United States and get more money for it if you want to without paying any duty. You can feed your wheat and send your stock over there and you do not have to pay any duty on it. They talk about wider markets in the United States, and all that sort of thing. You have to-day, under the present United States tariff, all the advantages that you would have had under reciprocity and you have not any of the disadvantages, yet they
ignore all these things. No, it is wheat, wheat, wheat, nothing else but wheat. Let me say that we in Ontario grow considerable wheat, and we do not grow it simply for the straw either. But we find there are other branches of farming that pay much better than growing wheat, and for that .reason we do not grow anything like the wheat we used to. But I will admit that the virgin soil of western Canada is rich and fertile.
I was rather struck with the remarks of Professor Robertson before the agricultural committee here last session, or two years ago, pointing out what the Conservation Commission had observed with regard to the farms of whose production they were keeping a record, that in the old settled districts of Manitoba there was an actual decrease from year to year in the production of the farms. This is only what you would naturally expect, and if by any means the price of wheat should drop so low that the people in western Canada cannot make it pay I have not any doubt that the genius of those people, because I know a great many of them, will find a way out of the difficulty. You have in western Canada, I will admit, as fine a class of people as you will find anywhere. You have the youth and the brawn, and many of them from the province of Ontario, and I know their object and aim in many cases their plan to get cheap lands of the West and they hope by growing wheat for a few years, by the increase in value of the land they can realize sufficient profit to dispose of their land at a profit and move out of the country again. That is an unfortunate state of affairs. I believe that after they have been there for a number of years they will change their ideas. Western Canada is not a country for people to desert. There are many things about western Canada which appeal to every one, and I would be the last one that would put a straw in the way of our friends in western Canada that would be considered as detrimental to their interests.
On the mattter of free wheat the member for Qu'Appelle stated that the Americans shipped bran into this country. I have here a clipping from the Toronto Globe of January last which says that the price of bran is $2 to $3 per ton mure in the United States than in Canada, and that is correct. In my own county, notwithstanding the wheat straw that we grow up there, we import thousands of tons of bran and shorts every year that are fed there in order to increase our dairy produce. I

suppose ours is one of the largest importing counties in Ontario of these commodities and they tell us. we cannot mill in Canada, that the United States mills are the proper places to mill our wheat. I say that what the people of the United States can do Canadians can do if you will only give them time to do it. It would be, I consider, a calamity if we were now to lose our mill feed and all these things that go to build up the agricultural industry of the country. We are handicapped, I will admit, in not being able to grow corn as easily as they do in the United States, with the exception of a few counties in western Ontario. The county represented by the member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig) can grow as fine corn as can be grown anywhere but we have had illustrations of our ability to raise the finest kind of stock. Western Canada has demonstrated it. You have had stock in Chicago in competition with stock from all over the world and have demonstrated that the grains grown in western Canada are sufficient to produce the finest beef that can be grown in the world. I have not the slightest doubt that in a few years all these things will be remedied.
I cannot understand how the hon, the junior member for .Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean) in his speech claimed that we could not compete with the millers even in' Great Britain, in the manufacture of flour. With the splendid water powers that we have here, with the cheap facilities for grinding I cannot understand how it is possible that we cannot do that. But I believe that one of the reasons why that is claimed to be the case is on account of ocean rates which discriminate against us. If the grievances of hon. gentlemen were the ocean rates they would have something more reasonable than what they are complaining about to-day.
I was also a little surprised the day the Budget speech was delivered by the Minister of Finance to find that the Toronto Globe came out on the first page with statements to that effect and the further announcement that he was to be followed by the junior member for Halifax, who was going to move an amendment that wheat and agricultural implements should be put on the free list. I was somewhat surprised when no amendment wa3 forthcoming and still more surprised when that gentleman, instead of going on with his reply to the Minister of Finance, asked leave to adjourn the debate until after the Easter holidays. 
However he was granted the privilege of adjourning the debate for that day. I do not know what conferences have been held by hon. gentlemen opposite or what they are going to do. If I did not know them so wiell, I believe I would almost come to the conclusion that they did not intend to move any amendment at all; but now I suppose, in order to save their faces, they will move some kind of an amendment even if it is only their policy just for the moment. We all remember the negotiations that took place at Washington between two members of the late Government and representatives of the United States Government. Our friends were invited down there, and no doubt were as generously entertained as our neighbours to the south knew how to do. Afterwards, during the campaign of 1911, we quoted statements that had been made by prominent men in the United States during the general election. We were told that those statements were not correct at all. I may say now that I am, and have been, surprised that hon. gentlemen opposite consider that they have not received their dues even after the people have expressed their views on the reciprocity question in the contest-no, I will not say the contest, but in the election of 1911. We have been told that so far as Ontario is concerned the issue was not reciprocity at all, and that passion and prejudice influenced the people there. During my experience covering a number of years, I have never known an election where one single issue was before the people, and everything else wiped to one side to the extent it was in the election of 1911. Reciprocity was the issue, and upon that issue the people of western Ontario, at all events, pronounced. The statements that have been made by prominent men in the United States as to what their object was in that reciprocity agreement have been confirmed to the very letter. By whom? By no less a person than the ex-President of the United States, Mr. Taft. Fortunately for us, we know just what the object of the United States Government was when they invited these two innocents to Washington to put it all over them, as they certainly did. I just wish to quote a paragraph from ex-President Taft's letter to Colonel Roosevelt, which ex-President Taft himself made public on April 25, 1912.
I am sure we are all anxious to refresh our memories as to the real object of the then President of the United States. President Taft in this letter said:

The adoption of free trade would rapidly increase the cost of labour in those parts where it is cheaper in Canada, so that the conditions would be the same. It might at first have a tendency to reduce the cost of food products somewhat; it would certainly make the reserve much greater and prevent fluctuations. Meantime the amount of Canadian products we would take would produce a current of business between Western Canada and the United States that would make Canada only an adjunct of the United States.
It would transfer all their important business to Chicago and New York, with their bank credits and everything else, and it would increase greatly the demand of Canada for our manufactures. I see this is an argument against reciprocity made in Canada, and I think it is a good one.
Col. Roosevelt, in his reply to Mr. Taft, dated January 12, 1911, said:
Dear President,-It seems to me that what you propose to do with Canada is admirable from every standpoint.
In the heat of the last presidential contest we got at the real object of the United States in desiring this treaty, which was arranged with representatives of the Government of Canada. The Liberal party afterwards endeavoured to force that treaty upon the people of Canada without giving them a chance to say whether they wanted it or not. Thanks to the determination displayed by the right hon. the present Prime Minister, they did not have a chance to do that. They were forced to the country, and the people have pronounced their verdict on the treaty, and now gentlemen opposite are not sportsmen enough to stand up and take their medicine like men.
I want to make a few references to another matter with regard to the United States market. The hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt)-you have noticed, Mr. Speaker, that he poses as an authority on almost everything that comes up-this afternoon made an attack on the Minister of Finance for his lack of foresight in not anticipating cheaper money in a short time. He says: In my own business in the city of Woodstock we loan money-he is a money-lender, you understand-and we anticipated cheaper money. And he criticised the Minister of Finance for negotiating long loans when possibly he might have	had better success
later on.	The	hon.	member then
posed as a manufacturer, and stated that as a brother manufacturer he told the manufacturers in Woodstock that they were making a great mistake in opposing reciprocity. In the same address he also posed as a farmer-a farmer that grows wheat for the straw. I will not weary
the House with any more quotations from his speech this afternoon, but I wish to refer to a speech that he delivered on the address in reply to the Speech from the Throne. He said: The farmers-I know them, I am one of them-do not want free trade or anything of that kind. He is reported in ' Hansard ' as follows:
They are not afraid of the duties being taken off; they are perfectly willing to have them removed. What they ask for is the open market and cheap transportation. What will happen the cheese industry?
Only last week at Watertown, New York, 3,000 boxes of cheese were offered and sold for 121 cents per lb., while right across the line Canadian buyers were paying 131 to 131 cents, and as high as 131 cents per lb., which means $1 to $1.25 per box. That is, Canadian cheese brought 1 cent to 11 cents per lb. more than American cheese. Yet the hon. member asks what would happen to cheese if we had free trade! He also said that we send milk to the big cities in the United States. I admit that, if within easy access to the cities of the United States, you can sell your milk and get a big price for it, but unfortunately every farmer is not so situated. We have millions of dollars invested in the cheese industry in this country, and our cheese has a reputation in the old country that justifies buyers paying from one cent to one and a half cents more for Canadian cheese than for United States cheese. Is not that reputation worth cherishing? I do not think we can afford to lose it, nor do I think, notwithstanding the arguments of the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. L. Thomson), that we can afford to let our wheat lose its identity. He says, if we get the price why .should we care about the reputation? But how long should we get the price if we did not have the reputation? Notwithstanding the hundreds of millions of dollars that we have expended on transportation facilities in this country,^ hon. gentlemen opposite are prepared to let all that go and to divert traffic to the United States, thereby helping the industries of that country. Then they come to free agricultural implements, and rail at the iniquity of the prices charged the farmers in western Canada. I remember when for the old style of reaper we used to pay as high as from $200 to $225. To-day for a binder, up-to-date in every respect, the cost of the whole outfit is $140. The policy that has developed those industries

in this country was referred to yesterday by the hon. member for Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil), who spoke as follows:
I want this Government to live up to their so-called National Policy, as it was intended by their great leader Sir John Macdonald. They are not very generous, our friends opposite, they will not believe that we have improved the National Policy to a great extent.
The National Policy that has now been in existence for about 35 years, is the policy that has developed in this country the manufacturing industries that we have here to-day; that has created one of the best markets that we have in the world, and I believe that the Canadian manufacturers of farm implements are not charging the people an exoribant price for their goods.
If hon. gentlemen opposite were consistent with their attitude of last year, they would not be crying for free agricultural implements. When the Naval Bill was before this House, they protested day and night, week after week, against the iniquity of having dreadnoughts built in the old country, notwithstanding the fart that they could be built there for one-third less money than they could be built for in Canada. My hon. friends opposite were great protectionists then. They said that these dreadnoughts must be built in Canada; that the money must be spent in Canada; that nothing else would suit them. To-day they are prepared to let the American manufacturers supply us with agricultural implements. I cannot understand any party committing political suicide as the Liberal party are endeavouring to do. I do not think we should take them seriously; I do not believe they take themselves seriously; I think they are just waiting, Micawber-like, in the hope that something will happen. I believe they would be tickled to death if some great calamity were to overtake the people of Canada, so that they could point to it as a result of the election of the 21st of September, 1911.
My hon. friends opposite seem to be very much afraid of mixed farming. I gee the hon. member for West Kent (Mr. McCoig) smiling. I do not believe he was in earnest in anticipating that this province would be overrun with those wild hogs from western Canada. What has happened? During the contest of 1911, I said that undoubtedly there were some things for which we would receive a higher price in the United States than we would receive here; but that taking it on the whole, we stood to lose by the reciprocity treaty. The time had come 
in the history of this country when protection was of some tangible value to our farmers, and it was not until that time had arrived that there was any disposition on the part of the United States to enter into a reciprocity arrangement. When the old treaty was abrogated by the United States without a moment's warning, after we had developed trade between the two countries, we had to find new channels of trade. While doing that, we had undoubtedly a few years in this country when reciprocity would have been favoured by the Canadian people; tout if that treaty had not been abrogated at that time, I am absolutely sure that Canada would have before this become an adjunct of the United States, and we would not have had the manufacturing industries in this country that we have to-day.
Hon. gentlemen opposite will question whether the United States or Canada is the better market. I will give the figures for
1912	and 1913 on a few items of agricultural products that are sold between the two countries under the present tariff. In 1912, we imported from the United States 19,830 horses and we sold them 4,160. We were told what a great market we had in the United States for our horses, whereas they were coming across the border in spite of a heavy duty and filling the market which we ought to have supplied ourselves. In
1913	16,813 American horses were sent to
Canada and we sold to the United States 1,770. I remember well, when American sheep were being sold in Toronto and other markets during the reciprocity campaign, the Liberals said:	Why, that is a Tory
scheme; they are sending the sheep over here to beat the Grits, and are selling them in Ontario at a loss. What happened in the next two years? In 1912, we brought from the United States, 192,530 sheep and we sold them 10,940; in 1913 we bought from them 229,713 sheep and we sold them 5,340. Of course, these figures will not appeal to a man who is bound to grow wheat whether he does it at a profit or at a loss; but they are facts which the farmers of this country realize, notwithstanding the hot air handed out to them from time to time by my hon. friends opposite.
In 1912, we bought from the United States 1,665,893 lb. of mutton and lamb and we sold them 31,993 lb.; in 1913 we bought from them 4,284,300 lb. and we sold them 34,340 ib. In 1912 we bought from the United States 11,223,961 lb. of bacon and ham and we sold them 82,240 lb.; in 1913 we bougnt from them 13,501,726 lb. and we sold them 154,630 lb.

The hon. member for Huntingdon (Mr. Robb) the other night in dealing with the question of butter, pointed out the splendid market in the United States for our butter and cream. I asked him if he could tell us how much butter had been imported into Canada from the United States, but he could not tell me. He was only giving one side of the ledger. I am giving both sides and you can draw your own conclusions. In 1912 we bought from the United States 929,318 lib. of butter and we sold them 590,480 lb.; in 1913 we bought from them 1,100,431 lb. and we sold them 304,503 lb. In 1912 we bought from New Zealand 2,139,944 lb. of butter and from Great Britain 700,900 lb. of butter.
All this is being sold in Canada; and yet some people are crying out for another market. What the farmer of Canada wants above all to-day is protection, which will shut out the cheap products and the cheap labour of other countries. 'I was delighted in the Agricultural Committee to-day to see the Minister of Inland Revenue present for consideration a Bill providing for the enforcement of the Pure Food law in Canada, in regard to maple products, and a few weeks ago the Minister of Agriculture sent another Bill to that committee, which would prevent the sale of imitations of our butter and other products. I commend the Government for this legislation promoted in the interest of the farmers of Canada.
It is well to take stock of ourselves occasionally to find out where we stand or where we are drifting to. Canada has a heritage in its vast area of fertile lands such as few people possess, the opening up and development of which requires a wise and careful management to avoid unnecessary waste and to secure the best results. If there is one lesson taught by history it is that the permanent greatness of any nation must ultimately depend more upon the character of its country population than upon anything else. It would be a calamity to Canada to have our farms occupied by a lower type or standard of people than now occupy them. It is impossible not to notice the feeling of unrest that has existed among the farming population of the older provinces for a number of years past. Take for instance the province of Ontario, where I am more familiar with conditions than in any other. The census returns for the past two decades point only too clearly to a condition of affairs that should not exist in a province so richly endowed by nature with all the advantages that should inure to prosperity and content. Having been born
and brought up, and having lived most of my life on a Canadian farm, I have watched very closely the attitude of the late Government, and also of the present one, regarding their desire to promote by legislation the interests and welfare of the farmers of Canada. I have noticed the various policies that have been adopted by the right hon. leader of the Opposition, and the party now in opposition. I remember quite well his free trade policy previous to the general election of 1896, and the appeals that were made to the farmers of Canada at that time, which is indicated by the reference to the right hon. gentleman's speech in Winnipeg a short time previous.
I also remember the statements that were made by the same right hon. gentleman before a Toronto audience on February 21, 1906, as reported by the Toronto Globe. These are the statements of the Liberal party, who now advocates for the moment a policy of free food for the benefit of the farmers of Canada, which is apparently endorsed by his party.
I remember, when Sir Richard Cartwright represented the riding I now have the honour to represent, how he went from one end of the constituency to the other railing against the protective tariff, but yet a protective tariff remained in existence during the fifteen years the Liberals were in poweT. I have before me a clipping from a Winnipeg paper which contains a report of the address delivered in that city by the right hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, in 1894, when he said:
When the Liberal party are in power they will at once give a measure of freedom of trade and step by step they will follow it up, and if God spares our lives we shall progress steadily until we have it as full as Great Britain has it. X come before you to-night to preach to you this new gospel of free trade. I denounce to you the policy of protection as bondage, yes bondage, and I refer to it as bondage in the same way as American slavery was bondage. Sir, our policy is freedom of trade such as exists in England, such as is practiced in Great Britan.
That was the Liberal policy in 1894, and apparently, judging from this speech of the right hon. gentleman, he had gone back to his old love. But the Liberals came into power, and strange to say things drifted along practically unchanged as far as the tariff was concerned. In 1904, on October 14, the Liberals of western Ontario gave a banquet to Sir Wilfrid Laurier in Toronto,, and at that banquet there was an address delivered by Mr. T. C. Robinette, one of the Liberal candidates, who said:


'2822 COMMONS
[Stage Direction]
There can be no full measure of prosperity in Canada unless we have a tariff permanency. I would oppose with all my might as most dangerous and undesirable a reciprocity treaty with the United States, and, however estimable our neighbours may be as individuals, we have had our experience in dealing with their Government that has left in our memories the impression that it would be unsafe, otherwise, in fact suicidal, to make a trade treaty with a Government that might be abrogated in 24 hours by the caprice of a Government swayed and ruled by popular feeling.
I do not believe that truer words were ever uttered than these words of Mr. Robinette.
Edmond Proulx: He must have changed
his mind because he approved of reciprocity in 1911.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: It is not strange for a man on your side of the House to change his mind.


Donald Sutherland: Mr. Robinette, after delivering that speech, was followed by the Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who did not denounce the doctrine preached by Mr. Robinette, his candidate; and the only conclusion one could come to from that circumstance was that the right hon. gentleman was heartily in accord with it. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, at that time, was trying to convince the people that the Transcontinental railway from Winnipeg to Moncton would only cost to construct $61,000,000, and that every cent the people of Canada would have to pay on account of the construction of that road, would be somewhere between $13,000,000 and $14,000,000. Two years later, in 1906, Sir Wilfrid Laurier delivered an address in Toronto, and in that manufacturing city, dealing with the tariff, he sang a different song from that which he sang in Winnipeg twelve years before. He said, as reported in the Toronto Globe:
Everybody will agree with me -the business men of Toronto more than anybody-that in a fiscal policy such as we have, where we derive our revenue chiefly from customs duties, it is absolutely essential to the capitalist, to the workingman, to the business man, to the industrialist, that he should know exactly the conditions under which he invests his capital; that he should know that it will be invested under a condition that will not be likely altered.
After referring to the changes that had been made in the tariff by the Conservative party he continued-
But I am proud to say that under our regime the manufacturers always sleep soundly and never fear interference with the tariff. We have made very few changes in the duty.
Here, Sir Wilfrid Laurier was trying iby every means to get the votes of the people [DOT]
of Toronto, and his remarks seem to confirm the statement then made on every platform in the country that while he was preaching his free trade doctrine there was an understanding between the Liberal party and the manufacturers of Canada, that if the Liberals came into power the tariff would not be interfered with. I wish now to refer to an address delivered by the hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt) in the city of Woodstock on March 4, 1911. That hon. gentleman stated this afternoon that he, as a manufacturer, had told the manufacturers that they were very foolish to oppose the two and one-half per cent reduction in the duty on agricultural implements. That speech of his is reported as follows by the Toronto Globe.:
He could not see that the manufacturers would be touched very much, as few articles manufactured in Canada were affected. He was sure the Bain and Woodstock wagon companies would compete in the world's markets even with 2 J per cent reduction in the tariff. He thought the manufacturers opposed reciprocity because of what might follow, the ' thin end of the wedge ', but he had been assured by Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Mr. Fielding that nothing of the sort would follow. They had gone as far in the farmers' interests as they would.
That statement was apparently confirmed later on, by the right hon. the leader of the Opposition in this House. ' Hansard ' of 1910-11, page 5742, contains this statement by the right hon. gentleman:
The statement made by the hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt) was quite consistent with our policy, it was nothing new, and he had perfect authority, not only he but every member of the Liberal side, to make that statement.
Mr. Foster:	Did the Prime Minister and
the Minister of Finance authorize the member in question to make that statement?
Sir Wilfrid Laurier:	I have answered that
already. It is perfectly true. The hon. member for North Oxford and every Liberal member had such authority. He was not kept in ignorance of our policy in this matter, and knew it well. He only stated what is our general policy.
Now, what are we to understand? For myself, I do not believe, in the face of the statements that have been made by hon. gentlemen opposite, that they intend to move an amendment for the reduction of any of these duties. I think they have been just jollying along, talking along this line without any definite idea of what they are going to do. Possibly, later on, they will come to some conclusion as to the course they will pursue. I was a little disappointed that the Liberal authority in our province, the Toronto Globe, fell down in its prediction that the hon. junior mem-

her for Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean) -would move an amendment. I wish also to point out with regard to this agitation, which is taken part in by a number of our friends in western Canada, that Ontario, notwithstanding all the hard things you say about it, contributes very generously to the revenue of this country. In 1912-13 Ontario contributed $44,808,000, or about forty per cent of the total revenue of Canada. That is not a small item. And as to agricultural production, notwithstanding the claims made about the enormous value of the wheat crop of western Canada, the farmers of Ontario are doing a good deal along that line. The fact has already been referred to by other speakers, that the field crops, of Ontario almost equal those of the three western provinces put together. Surely, this is a record to be proud of. And with the policy we have in effect in this country to-day, the movement of the people away from the land, has come to an end so far as the province of Ontario is concerned. If you 'leave the protective tariff which the farmer now enjoys, with very slight alterations, you will find that the movement will be from the city back to the land. For, let me tell you, notwithstanding the splendid country you have in western Canada, the lands of Ontario are cheaper than any in the Dominion of Canada considering their actual value and the comforts and conveniences we enjoy. The movement has already begun, and nothing has been more conducive to that movement than the fact that the prices of farm products have increased.
And now I wish to say a word with respect to this free food fetish of hon. gentlemen opposite and also^ with respect to the commission that is now investigating what is termed the high cost of living.
Mr. A. Iv. MACLEAN: Did I understand the hon. gentleman to say that the high *cost of living is a fetish?


Donald Sutherland: I spoke of the free food fetish. Now, I have here a report published by the United States Senate of a committee that was appointed in 1910 to inquire into this matter. That committee -came to conclusions, some of which I will quote:
Increased cost of production of farm products by reason of higher land values and higher wages.
Increased demand for farm products and food.
Shifting of population from food-producing .to food-consuming occupations and localities.
Immigration to food-consuming localities. Reduced fertility of land resulting in lower average production or in increased expenditures for fertilization.
Increased banking facilities in agricultural localities which enable farmers to hold their crops and market to the best advantage. This results in steadying prices, but also tends to advance prices.
Reduced supply convenient to trasportation facilities of such commodities as timber.
Cold storage plants, which result in preventing extreme fluctuations of prices of certain commodities with the seasons, but by enabling the wholesaler to buy and sell at the best possible advantage, tend to advance prices. Increased cost of distribution.
Industrial combinations.
Organizations of producers or of dealers. Advertising.
Increased money supply.
Overcapitalization.
Higher standard of living.
I have here the evidence taken by that committee. They had reports from United States consuls in many European countries. These reports show that the increased cost of living is not confined to any one country but is general throughout the world:
Germany has long since ceased to be an inexpensive country, popular opinion to the contrary notwithstanding. The subjoined tables show conclusively the steady advance of the cost of living all along the line, an advance which is explained not only by the phenomena which accompany the enormous increase in the world's production of gold, but by profound changes which are taking place, which have already taken place, in the social fabric of the German people. Rapidly accumulated fortunes and increasing national wealth have created new standards and new requirements. Shorter hours of labour, higher wages, old-age and accident insurance, abundant tables, better homes-these are among the contributing causes of the higher cost of living, not merely as respects commodities, but as respects total per capital expenditures.
Then, as to Russia, the following is from the report of Mr. John Grout, Consul at Odessa:
During the past ten years there has been a gradual increase in the cost of almost all articles that enter into living requirements in this consular district and city in particular.
And the consul for the district of Havre, France, Mr. James E. Dunning, reports:
The cost of living in France has considerably increased in the past ten years and is the subject of constant comment and continual complaint on the part of those whose salaries remain unchanged. Moreover, there is every indication that the augmentation will continue, and that ten years hence we shall be paying still more for the necessaries of life than today.
Indeed, the modern Frenchman could very well say:	1 Give us the luxuries of life and
we will dispense with the necessities.'
Wo may say the same thing of Canada. That is one of the reasons why the cost of

living has gone np. And if food products are put on the free list in this country, if you are going to allow the countries which produce with cheaper labour than Canada, countries where other conditions may be more favourable, to send their products in-* to Canada free of duty, if you are going to allow the surplus of other protected countries to be unloaded in Canada, you are going to do something that will injure Canadian agriculture. For if there ever was a country under the sun that ought to be termed an agricultural country it is Canada; and it is a shame and disgrace to the country that we have to import from Australia, New Zealand, South America, the United States or any other country the millions and millions of dollars worth of stuff that is being consumed by the people of our own country.
I have spoken at greater length than I intended to, but this is too serious a question to be treated in a frivolous manner. Tariff changes cannot be considered lightly; we must consider what the effect of any proposed change is going to be in the country that we are a.11 so anxious to see prosper and fulfil the destiny which we believe is in store for it.


Mr. ROBERT CRUISE (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, it- is not my intention to take up very much of the time of the House, but I feel that it is my duty to say a few words in this Budget debate. As the representative of a constituency in western Canada I propose to deal more particularly with the matter of free wheat and free agricultural implements and I would first like to reply to some of the arguments which have been advanced by the horn, member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) to-night.
The hon. gentleman claims that the members from the West talk about nothing but free wheat, and he advocates a home market. I would like to ask him where he would find a home market for the surplus wheat that was grown in the Canadian West last year? We raised last year 199,821,586 bushels of wheat and exported 95,311,802 bushels. I do not see any reasonableness in his advising the western farmer to feed his No. 1 Manitoba hard wheat to his chickens, hogs and cattle. When settlement in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta was first begun, the main industry was the' growing of wheat, oats and barley

and until Winnipeg attained its present size there was no market for the West except that which was afforded by the incoming settlers. Half the wheat that is raised in the West cannot be consumed in Winnipeg; it cannot be consumed in Ontario, so the people of western Canada will have to export large quantities of wheat as long as they have no home market for it.
I would like to discuss for a moment the benefits to the farmer of the 5 per cent reduction of duties upon binders and mowers. They would save about $7.50 on the two articles. Everybody knows that the farmer buys a mower and a binder only about every ten years; an ordinary binder will last the farmer about that length of time. We admit that he will save $7.50 in that time, but that is a trifle compared with what he would have saved under reciprocity. I would like to show the hon. member for South Oxford and the people of this country what the farmer would gain if he had free wheat. Take the small farmer who sells about 1,000 bushels of wheat in a year. It is only fair to assume that he would gain about 5 cents a bushel on his wheat if he had free access to the American market. Five cents a bushel on 1,000 bushels means $50, which in ten years amounts to a gain of $500 to that farmer on only 1,000 bushels of wheat. That does not take into consideration the benefit he would receive from his oats, barley and flax. If hon. gentlemen want to be fair they will readily See what a benefit the farmers would have by getting free access to 'die American markets for their wheat.
I would like to refer to an assertion made by the hon. member for North Wellington (Mr. W. A. Clarke) during the course of his remarks, as follows:
I feel sure that we as representatives of the eastern portion of the Dominion of Canada can go to our people without any sins to answer for, and tell them that the hon. Minister of Finance has made-if they feel that it is a benefit- greater reductions in the duty on farm implements than the reciprocity agreement would have given them had it been put into effect in 1911.
In all fairness to the hon. member for North Wellington, he surely cannot be sincere when he makes am assertion of that kind. I have here a list of fifteen or sixteen of the implements used by the average fanner in the West, with a statement as to the amount he would have saved had reciprocity been put into effect in 1911. Here are a few of them:

Retail cost.	| Customs | Duty Duty. | Valua- | Collected, tion. | 1 1	Duty under Reciprocity.Breaking plough	
Harrow	
Binder (8 foot)	
Buggy	$28 00 28 00 125 00 110 00	20% 1 $16 00 | $3 20 20% 1 17 00 | 3 40 m% 1 110 00 | 19 25 35% | 60 00 | 21 00	$2 40 2 55 16 50 18 00
So that hon. gentlemen will readily see the advantage the farmers would have received under reciprocity, notwithstanding the fact that the hon. member for North Wellington tries to make the
10 p.m. people of this country believe that they will receive greater benefits under the present reduction on binders and mowers than they would have received under the reciprocal trade arrangement proposed in 1911.
The hon. gentleman argues that if we have free wheat our wheat would all go south of the line. He simply makes the assertion, but submits no proof whatever that this would be the case. Our friends on the other side claim that if we had free wheat our railroads would have nothing to do. The western farmer has made a study of this question, and he does not believe any such thing. The western farmer believes that if he gets free wheat, his wheat will still follow the same channel; where we would get the great benefit would be from competition. Every man who wants to be fair knows that in Canada today we have practically no competition in the handling of our grain. Gordon & Ironsides and Pat. Burns have practically controlled the cattle trade of western Canada, and the condition is practically the same with our grain. If reciprocity had gone into effect, we would have opened up the market to the south of us, and the small American buyer and miller would have been allowed to come in and bid on our wheat. The result would have been that the farmers would have got a larger price for their corn, the railways would have reduced freight rates, the men who handle grain would have done so for less money, and the farmer would have been materially benefited.
They say that the Canadian miller can not compete against the American miller; but so far in this debate not a man has offered any proof of that. I for one, as a representative, do not believe in such an argument. I believe the Canadian millers could compete against any millers in the United States or in Great Britain to-day.
Perhaps there is one reason why they could not. There are very few. men in Canada who make so many trips to Europe or all over this country as our Canadian millers. While they are doing that they are not attending to their own business. Perhaps they would be in a better position to compete if they contributed less money to campaign expenses and put their money and energy into their own business. I am satisfied that the millers can compete with those of the United States or Great Britain if they are made to stand on tiieir own feet. The only way to test that is to give us free wheat, and then we_ can see whether they can compete against the Americans. When the western Canada farmers come to this Government and ask for anything, they do not come here as a selfish body of men, as they were represented by the last speaker. They meet the organised farmers of Ontario and discuss their questions with these men from all standpoints before they come to this House with any request. When they asked for free wheat and free machinery, they had taken up this question with the farmers of Ontario, and had obtained the advice and consent of these men before coming here; so that when the hon. gentlemen complain that the farmers of western Canada think only of the West, they are greatly mistaken.
Three or four weeks ago there was quite a discussion on the purchase of stone from the American side. The Minister of Public Works was criticised for buying stone on the American side, and justified himself by saying that in this way he saved for the Dominion $28,000. I would ask the minister how he is going to justify that policy with the western farmer? If he was justified in buying this stone on the American side and saving the Dominion $28,000, how can he justify himself to the western farmer when he denies to him the market to the south, from which he would benefit probably $10,000,000 every year? I cannot understand the force of the argument of hon. gentlemen opposite. They tell us that gentlemen on this side of the House

are divided, that some are free traders, some are protectionists, and some are moderate protectionists. Where do the hon. gentlemen opposite stand to-day compared with the position of hon. members on this side? The provincial Government in Manitoba has asked free wheat and free flour. What position are the 'Conservative members from Manitoba going to be in in the coming elections? Here they are arguing against free wheat but the members in Manitoba are praying for free wheat. The Manitoba Conservative members while in Manitoba are free traders, but while here they are protectionists. Hon. gentlemen from Manitoba sitting on the opposite side, when they were in opposition, were for free trade. I remember reading speeches of hon. gentlemen advocating further reduction on agricultural machinery. We had the members before the House some time ago asking for free trade in agricultural machinery. It would have been more benefit to the farmers than a reduction in tariff would be and hon. gentlemen voted against it, so I fail to see that they were sincere when they were in opposition any more than they are now. Now they talk about protecting the farmer. The trouble with the farmer to-day is that he has too much protection; he is protected from selling his grain in the market to the south or in an open market, and he loses five, six or eight cents a bushel. Then when he comes to buy machinery to cultivate his land with he is forced to pay about fifteen per cent more than he should have to pay. That is the protection the farmer gets. The hon. member for Brantford says that the policy of the Liberal party is, wherever a manufacturer sticks up his 'head to knock it. If that is the policy of the Liberal party I would like to know what is the policy of the Conservative party in connection with the farmer. Every request the farmer makes he is knocked, he is turned down. He has not been granted one thing that he has asked for, and it appears to me that as soon as the farmers began to do well the present Government refused them a market, and raised the cost of their machinery and thus prevented them from making money. If that is not knocking the farmer I do not know what, would be. A great deal has been said about the success of the Liberal party during their fifteen years of administration and whenever you charge the present Government with being responsible for hard times they laugh and sneer.
I would like to go back eight or ten years to the time when the flood of immigration 
into western Canada commenced. Any man with .sense will admit that the flood of immigration into western Canada produced the good times and caused our manufacturers to grow. Every man placed on the land must have 'machinery to work the land and the more machinery purchased by the West the better for the eastern manufacturer.
Hon. gentlemen take great credit for the construction of the Hudson Bay railway and I am sure I am willing to give them all the credit that is coming to them. I trust it will be a great success. It is a very hard road to construct. Most of -the work has to be done by station work. What I request of this Government is to take over the Canadian Northern road from The Pas to Dauphin, build it up to a standard road, and operate it as a Government road. If the Government investigate this matter they will come to the conclusion that The Pas is not the proper starting point for a road, and I am satisfied if they look into the question they will take over the Canadian Northern railway, about three hundred miles in length and establish the terminal point in Dauphin. It is much easier for other roads to get to' the Government road at Dauphin than at The Pas. I ask the Government to consider this with all earnestness and sincerity and I am satisfied if they do they will adopt that policy.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to occupy the time cf the House to any great length, but as a representative of a rural constituency,
I feel it my duty to place my views before Parliament upon the questions that are being discussed in Parliament at the present time. I regret that the tariff question cannot !be considered on its merits, removed altogether from politics. The tariff to some extent has always been made a political football in Canada and I presume that it always will be. It has formed the platform of both political parties for a great many years, and is likely to continue to be the platform on which we shall go to the people in times to come.
I want to congratulate the Minister of Finance upon the splendid Budget speech he delivered this session. He has, I believe, the confidence of the people of Canada, and has behind him in this House the united support of the Conservative representatives, who are proud of him as one of their leaders and as the Finance Minister of Canada. The people of Canada-Conservatives, Independents, and Independent Liberals-look to him with confidence and

believe that he will administer the high duties of his office with satisfaction to this Parliament and to the people of Canada as a whole. He has announced this year a surplus of $36,000,000 over and above expenditure. That is a record of which he may justly feel proud. It is a larger surplus than any Liberal minister has been able to announce to this House in the past. When the Liberal party came into power in 1896 the net debt of Canada was $258,497,000. When they left office in 1911 they had increased the public debt to $342,042,000. That is, they had increased the national debt during their term of office by $83,545,000. Notwithstanding the legacies left by hon. gentlemen opposite in the shape of unpaid expenditures and contracts which had to be carried out, the present Government under the able management of the Minister of Finance have decreased the public debt of Canada by $6,000,000 in the past two years. That is a record of which the Finance Minister may justly feel proud.
When hon. gentlemen opposite were asking the support of the electors of this country in 1896, they stood upon a tariff platform which at that time they called free trade. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, I think, said the goal of his ambition was 'free trade as they have it in England.' When the right hon. gentleman and his party came to office in 1896 you would naturally suppose that they would have carried their pre-election promises, for I am one of those who believe -and I think others will agree with me- that the election promises of public men are sacred, and that every man who seeks the votes of the electors should carry out the promises he makes to the electorate. Although Sir Wilfrid Laurier and his party had promised free trade as they have it in England, they did not carry out that promise when they assumed office. For the fifteen years they were in office they adopted as their platform the policy of the Conservative party. It was practically the old National Policy. In 1894 the Hon. George E. Foster, who was then Minister of Finance, made great reductions in the tariff. I recall that he reduced the tariff on agricultural implements from 35 per cent to 20 per cent, and there were reductions all along the line both upon manufactured goods and upon the necessaries of life. When the Liberal party assumed office they made very few changes. We are reminded occasionally about the British preference; but, giving them credit
for whatever they may have done in the way of tariff reductions, when figured out, all their reductions amount to less than one per cent on the whole; some claim two per cent; but, whether one per cent or two per cent, their tariff reductions on the whole were very little during all the time they held office. Notwithstanding the fact that hon. gentlemen opposite claimed to be free traders and revenue tariff men, they stood upon the platform of the Hon. Mr. Fielding, which, without any question, was a protectionist platform. It is a very fortunate thing that they did not adopt any other platform, for if they had carried out their pre-election promises it would have resulted in ruin and disaster to this country. It is true that just a year or two before they went out of office they reduced the tariff on agricultural implements by two and a half per cent. I was a member of the House at the time, and I remember the applause that greeted Hon. Mr. Fielding when he made the announcement of that reduction. He was applauded by his followers and the Liberal press throughout the country, but when this Government proposed to reduce the duty on agricultural implements by five per cent, hon. gentlemen opposite told us that the farmers were being gold-bricked. If they are being gold-bricked now by a reduction of five per cent they must have been doubly gold-bricked when the reduction was only two and a half per cent. At the time the Liberals reduced the tariff on agricultural implements, they increased the valuation, so that the duty was really higher than before the reduction. At that time the present leader of the Opposition was a great personal friend of Sir Lyman Melvin-Jones. They were very close and intimate, and I think the home of Sir Lyman Melvin-Jones in Toronto was the home of Sir Wilfrid Laurier whenever he visited that city. In order to please his friend, the right hon. gentleman made him a senator. But not only did he do that; While he tried to make it appear that he had given a reduction in the duty on agricultural implements, he had really assisted his friend by increasing the valuation. About the same time, he made Mr. Frost, of Smith's Falls, another agricultural implement manufacturer, a senator. So we see the right hon. gentleman had very close friends in the agricultural implement business at that time.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Do not you go into that business ?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I doubt if a reduction in duties means very much in the way of de-

creased prices to the consumer. I am a firm believer in adequate protection for manufacturers in order to encourage them to locate in Canada, and to build up great manufacturing institutions in this country so that competition will regulate prices. When you lower the duty to such an extent that you close the factories and shut out Canadian competition, you increase prices to consumers in this country. We have instances where a reduction of duty has not done very much good. Some years ago the Government of the day reduced the duty on coal oil, but no one will say that it lowered the price. On the contrary, it put that industry into the hands of the American combine and the people received no benefit. The price of coal oil was raised by that reduction of duty. Take binder twine, another item from which the duty was removed. The farmer is paying more for binder twine to-day than he ever paid before. If protection had been kept on binder twine and Canadian factories encouraged, the competition among those factories would have given the consumer of binder twine the benefit of a lower price than he is paying to-day. The same argument applies to everything in the way of manufactured articles. It is useless, of course, to try to make the free trader believe that this is the case; but the honest opinion of the protectionist is that competition regulates prices and that the public pays less for the goods than if they were manufactured outside the country and imported.
Hon. gentlemen opposite say:	If you
protect these industries., they will form trusts and combines. In my own county, the Hon. Mackenzie King, addressing the electors, told .them about the trusts and combines. What trust or combine was ever incorporated under a Conservative Government? They are all the products of hon. gentlemen opposite, if there are any combines in' Canada. Although my hon. friends opposite talk of trusts and combines when they are out of office, they never did anything during their term of office to interfere with them.


Mr. DOUGLAS:: Do you think there are any trusts and combines in Canada?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I do not think there are. Hon. gentlemen opposite say there are, but 1 doubt it.
We have a strange conglomeration of ideas on the tariff among hon. gentlemen opposite. Our good-natured, smiling, and very able friend, the hon. member for

Red Deer (Mr. Clark), is, I believe, an honest free trader at heart, but he is a little unfortunate in his record. He was a member of this House for a good many years supporting the late Government. He stood upon the platform of Mr. Fielding's tariff and during all the years I have been in the House with the hon. gentleman, I cannot at this moment recall his ever attacking that platform or saying that the people of this country were being robbed by the protective tariff. He is, however, a free trader in opposition, like a good many other hon. gentlemen opposite. Not only did the hon. gentleman support Mr. Fielding's tariff, but he sat in this House and supported what I suppose might be termed the most iniquitous form of protection that could be inaugurated, namely, bounties.


Michael Clark: 
Francis Ramsey Lalor: 
Michael Clark: My hon. friend must again allow me to correct him. For some reason or other the bounties went out; they disappeared.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I am glad to know the hon. gentleman takes so much credit to himself, because I never knew him to vote against the late Government during all the time

they were in office and all the time he was a member of this House.
Mr. CLARK-I was not going to vote against their removing the bounties against which I protested.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: The bounties naturally ran out. The arrangements were made for certain lengths of time, and the bounties expired according to those arrangements.


Michael Clark: Disappear is the same as
expire.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: The Liberal Government paid out $16,000,000 in bounties to the manufacturers. I have another case where the hon. member for Red Deer was an avowed protectionist. There is no question that he is a good Britisher; that he loves the old flag and the old land; but he was opposed to granting $35,000,000 for three dreadnoughts to be owned by Canada and to be put into the British service. He voted against that proposition; but he was in favour of a Canadian navy, which has been designated a tin-pot navy, and which would cost perhaps $300,000,000 or $400,000,000. He showed his free trade principles then by taking the stand that those ships should be built in Canada, even though they cost 25 to 35 per cent more than if built in the motherland. In that case the hon. member was not a very good free trader, although now I give him the credit of being almost in absolute control of the Liberal party, because he is gradually educating and bringing over his hon. friends one by one to his way of thinking. Perhaps it is because they are in Opposition. The hon. gentleman has a deskmate, a good friend of mine and a very able man, who comes from the neighbouring constituency of Welland (Mr. German). It would be pretty hard for the hon. member for Welland to follow the free trade principles of other hon. gentlemen opposite. He would not follow reciprocity; he left his party upon that occasion, manfully and courageously, and he did a great service to Canada by so doing. He helped in the election throughout tne country, because every one knew that he was a strong Liberal but that he could not stand for reciprocity. If there is any town in Canada that has grown and prospered, it is the town of Welland. Only a few years ago it had a population of about 2,000, and to-day its population is 10,000. Why has that town grown so rapidly? It is because the Government of Canada said 179
to the manufacturers of the United States: If you want to supply the people of Canada with manufactured goods, you must come here and manufacture them in this country. You must employ Canadian capital and Canadian labour in this country, and thus build up our towns and cities. The result was that they came over to Canada and built up the manufacturing town of Welland. The time is not very far distant when the old Welland canal from Port Colbome to St. Catherines will be one great hive of industries, established by American manufacturers who have come to Canada to manufacture goods in this country in order to avoid the duty. Surely that is a better policy to pursue than one that would permit them to manufacture in the United States, employing American people in their factories, and shipping their goods to Canada. If I mistake not, that is the policy of hon. gentlemen opposite, that is where the parties divide, and I am glad to see that division. I shall be glad if the electors of this country have a chance to decide between the free trade policy of hon. gentlemen opposite, and the policy of moderate protection which the Conservatives have advocated and stood for from the days of Sir John Macdonald down to the present. I shall have no fear as to the result. We know what happened the Liberal party in 1878. Prom 1874 to 1878 they tried to carry on the affairs of this country under what they called a revenue tariff, and the electors waited for their opportunity, which came in 1878, to declare very decidedly that the Liberals should govern the country no longer. We know that from 1874 to 1878 there was general depression throughout the country, that men were out of employment, that factories were closed, and that the working people were receiving low wages. And we know also, that when Sir John Macdonald came into power in 1878 and adopted the National Policy, general prosperity followed. I remember that, at that time, Sir Richard Cartwright told the artisans of this country that they must work harder and eat less, and when you compare the Liberal policy of free trade with the Conservative policy of fair protection, that is just what it amounts to at the present day.
In 1896, when Sir Wilfrid Laurier was preaching free trade, and promising free trade to the people of this country, he also had friends among the manufacturers. Mr. Bertram was a candidate of his in Toronto,



and just on the eve of the election Mr. Bertram thought he was going to be defeated, and he wired to Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who replied that the manufacturers were not going to be hurt. The right hon. gentleman was carrying on then, as he and his party are carrying on now, a policy of trying to deceive the farmers of this country by making them believe they will do something for them, which they have not the slightest intention of doing. The ex-Minister of Railways (Mr. Graham) spoke in Hamilton last Thursday, and he did not preach then free trade or lower tariff before the manufacturers, but, according to the Hamilton Times, says of his address:
Referring to the tariff Hon. Geo. P. Graham contrasted the Liberal policy of a stable tariff under which Canada had known fifteen years of its most abundant prosperity, with the tariff tinkering of the Tories.
In his speech the hon. gentleman (Mr. Graham) practically gives the assurance to the manufacturers that they will not be disturbed, but at the same time he says there must he free trade in food-stuffs. Not very long ago a delegation of the manufacturers of Ontario who support the Liberal party came here to see some of the leaders of that party, after their famous resolution about free agricultural implements. I do not, of course, know what occurred at the meeting; but I should judge from what ihese gentlemen say on the train when I meet them that they are quite sure that nothing will be done by the Liberals to hurt them. It would seem as if the platform of hon. gentlemen opposite is a platform to get in on, but a platform which they do not intend to carry out should they unfortunately be returned to power.
Although some people seem to think that I am an extreme protectionist, I am not so by any means. I believe in fair and moderate protection.


William Stewart Loggie: What is fair and moderate.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I think the present tariff
is a pretty fair and a pretty moderate tariff. The hon. gentleman (Mr. Loggie) himself stood upon that tariff and supported it for fifteen years, during which time he never spoke a word against it.


James McCrie Douglas: It is pretty high on
woollens.


William Stewart Loggie: The duty on woollens
does not compare with the duty on canned vegetables.
TMr. Lalor. ]


Francis Ramsey Lalor: And they say there is a
pretty high duty on lobsters. I do not believe in extreme protection, but I believe in, a moderate protection, and I believe we have a moderate protection now in Canada.


John Howard Sinclair: Does the hon. member
believe in adequate protection?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: Yes, I thoroughly believe
in adequate protection?


John Howard Sinclair: Then, will he explain
why the Government does not give us adequate protection?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I should think the Government is giving us pretty adequate protection.


John Howard Sinclair: Will the hon. member
explain why he and his friends voted for a resolution asking for adequate protection when we had practically the same tariff as we have to-day?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I think perhaps there may have been some changes made, tout if/the protection was adequate at that time the resolution fitted into the conditions beautifully; it was only a confirmation of the platform the hon. gentleman for so long supported.


Mr. STEVENS:: And the Liberal party
opposed our amendment, so that they thought the tariff was inadequate.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: A fine spectacle these gentlemen opposite present to the people of Canada to-day. They would lead people to believe that there is no difference of opinion among them, and they are complaining about the platform which they stood for and supported during all the years they were in power. For fifteen years not one of them gave a chirp; they were perfectly satisfied and contented with the Fielding tariff, which they contended was the most beautifully thought-out tariff that ever was put in force. But now, when the Conservatives are in power, these gentlemen think the Fielding tariff is no good, that everything is wrong about it. It makes all the difference in the world where these gentlemen are sitting. In their opinion, they are Heaven-born politicians and statesmen, who were never designed to sit in opposition. When they are in power, they say the country is prosperous and that everything is fine, but the moment they lose patronage and are out of office they think the country is going to the dogs. Just imagine these gentlemen going before

the electors of Canada and talking free trade; these gentlemen who talked free trade before 1896, but who never practised it when they got to power. I do not wish to speak too strongly on the question, but I should think when an appeal is made to the people the Liberals will be the laughingstock of the country. What faith can the people of Canada have in their assertion when they know how, when in office, they failed to carry out their promises they made before they attained power.
One of the policies these gentlemen opposite are now advocating is free food. They felt that they were not getting the vote of the people in the cities and towns; they saw that the workingmen who wanted good wages and continued employment were putting their confidence in the Conservative party, and now, in an attempt to get their votes, they are .talking free food for the workingman and telling him about the high cost of living. What is high in the cost of living to-day in Canada? Sugar is cheaper than ever, tea is as cheap, coffee is as cheap, wearing apparel, I believe is as cheap, and, as a matter of fact, there	is nothing of
any importance that is dearer to-day, except	the products	of	the farm.
Is there any other class of people in this country who deserve protection and good prices better than the farmers? When the farmers are prosperous everybody is prosperous. They are the backbone of the country; they are the people who produce the wealth of the country; and I am only sorry that the farmers are not getting bigger prices for everything they raise. These gentlemen of the Opposition think that by taking the stand on free food they are going to catch the votes of the people of the cities and towns.


Mr. BRADBURY:: And fool the farmers.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: to give increased protection to the farmer i of this country. What class of people in Canada are more deserving than the farmers? They deserve all they get and a great deal more. There is no class of people who work harder for their money than do the farmers of this country. When the city man is still in bed and sleeping, the farmer is out working, and when the city man is enjoying his evening at home, the farmer is often out working until late at night. There is no class of people who work harder than they do. Our farmers are prosperous we are told, and they are; they are getting along all right. But they make their money .slowly, and they need everything that any government, whether Liberal or Conservative, can give them.
Now, we have been doing something for the farmers. I remember the night of my election, when we defeated reciprocity, there was great rejoicing in the county of Haldi-mand, and I suppose that rejoicing extended throughout the whole of Canada. The farmers gathered for two nights in my town and we had a continuous celebration. I told the farmers at that time what I hoped the Government would do for them. I said: Now that we have a Conservative Government in power, the farmers who have been neglected for so many years by the late Government will receive something from the Conservative Government that has never been given them by the Liberals. I told them I hoped that one of the first things would be to assist them in building good roads. And we tried to give that to them.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: You did not try yery hard.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: In Haldimand the county council have spent about $100,000 in the last three years on good roads, and if hon. gentlemen opposite and their friends had allowed that Bill to become law, every farmer there would have one-third of the money in his pocket because of the help the Government would have given him in the building of their roads. It is most important that the farmer should have good roads.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Why did the hon. gentleman's friends defeat the Bill?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: That is rather amusing. I think my hon. friend is joking.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: No, I am not joking, I am in earnest. Why did your friends destroy the Bill?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: The hon. gentleman imagines that his friends are in power. That Bill was introduced in this House, a fair Bill. But hon. gentlemen opposite opposed it and the Grit majority in the Senate killed it, and no one knows it better than the hon. member opposite. I think I can see far enough ahead to see my opponent trying to explain to the farmers why they did it. We have done a little more than that for the farmers. We voted $10,000,000 spread oveT a number of years for agricultural education in this country, which I think, will be a good thing for the farmers. Another thing I told the farmers in Haldimand, was that now that we had a good Government in power we would give them rural mail delivery.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: They had that
before.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: We were going to give
the farmers pleasant and happy circumstances at home. We were going to deliver their letters and their daily papers to them so that they could read them ever night before they went to bed, and I am pleased to know that the Government have carried out that intention. Hon. gentlemen opposite have said:	Oh, we inaugurated rural
mail delivery. The hon. member for Rou-ville is a pretty good fellow; I must say that when he was Postmaster General he was very obliging and very kind, but we must speak of rural mail as the hon. gentleman inaugurated it. It was a fine system; hon. gentlemen opposite certainly ought to be proud of it. The mail carrier was permitted to deliver mail to the farmers along the old stage routes and every other farmer in the county had to walk from five to ten miles to the post office to get his mail. The system was unpopular because it was unfair and the first thing this Government did when it came into power was to remedy that condition so that every farmer in the province of Ontario at least has his mail delivered at his door. That is one of the greatest things that has been done for the farmers of this country. The hon. member for East Lambton (Mr. Armstrong), who advocated this boon for the farmers when in opposition, deserves a great deal of credit for the study and attention he gave to that subject. We are doing something for the farmers, and I hope the Government will

continue to do a good deal more for them; they deserve whatever they get.
I am not going to say very much about the question of free wheat, because I do not know so much about the conditions in the West; but I do think that the milling industry, which is a great industry in this country, should be encouraged. I should like to see the wheat of the farmers of Canada manufactured in Canada in Canadian mills. This would help the farmers because they could use the offal for the feeding of their stock and get it perhaps at a lower price than they pay for it to-day. Hon. gentlemen opposite talk a great deal about free wheat, but gentlemen from the AA^est, not members of this House, who have conversed with me in the matter, have expressed the opinion that free wheat would not be as great boon for the West as our friends would make it appear to be. I was talking to a gentleman a few days ago who raised twelve thousand bushels of wheat last year. So far as he was concerned, he did not know that free wheat would be a great benefit to him. He did tell me, however, of one thing that would be an advantage to him-and I quite agree with him on that point-the securing of lower freight rates from the West. Transportation is the important question in the West to-day, but 'hon. gentlemen opposite by their transportation policy and by the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific railway have done away with the possibility of cheaper transportation in this country for many years to come. If members from the West, having in mind the building of the Transcontinental railway, voted as they should vote, they would vote against the Liberal party on any question. I shall not speak of the commission appointed to investigate the construction of the railway, whose report proved beyond all manner of doubt that over $40,000,000 was absolutely wasted through gross mismanagement in the construction of the road. Further, I submit that the construction of that part of the road between Levis and Moncton was a sheer waste of money. In that part of the country it parallels the Intercolonial, a government owned road, and through the building of this line $75,000,000 have .been thrown away. Aside, however, from this waste of money, the thing was a had bargain for Canada; hon. gentlemen entered upon a policy of building a road that will cost so much money chat transportation can never be cheapened in this country-and that is the most unfortunate feature of the whole matter.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: If we ground
twice as many barrels of flour as we do today, where would we sell it?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: In the British market, I
presume.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: How?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: The same as we would sell what we are selling now.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: The British miller wants to buy wheat.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: Wheat and flour both. We would not expect to manufacture all the flour, but we could manufacture a considerable portion of it. I claim that the Grand Trunk Pacific railway was a bad bargain for this country; it has killed cheap transportation for all time to come. The farmers of the West will for generations contribute five cents a bushel towards the bad bargain and the mismanagement of hon. gentlemen opposite in connection with the Transcontinental railway; that is one of the greatest taxes the farmer of the West has o pay.
I have already said that I do not believe there is anything too good for the farmers either of western or of eastern Canada. I would be prepared to support the building of Canadian freight steamers to carry our wheat and our farm products to the British market. This would seem to be the only way of remedying the transportation bungle that was made by hon. gentlemen opposite and the only way of cheapening ocean transportation. I hope the Government will inaugurate a system of cheap ocean transportation in the interests of the farmers as a whole, and particularly in the interests of the farmers of the West.
An hon. gentleman speaking from the other side of the House the other day-I think it was the hon. member for South Cape Breton (Mr. Carroll)-read from a paper, a copy of which I have before me, figures by which he endeavoured to show that flour was selling at Halifax at $6.50 a barrel and in London at $4.18 a barrel. If the hon. gentleman had read from another portion of the very paper from which he was reading he would have seen that his figures are wrong, and that there is not such a large difference in the prices. AVhile I am not a miller, I know something about what it costs to make a barrel of flour. It takes two and one-third bushels of wheat to make 100 pounds of flcur. On a basis of 90 cents a bushel at Fort William, it would cost $2.10 a hundredweight for flour, 10 cents for the bag, and 20

cents for manufacturing, a total of $2.40. Deducting 36 cents for offal and adding 20 cents for freight, we have a total of $2.24, so that a barrel containing 200 pounds of flour would cost, delivered at Montreal, $4.48. The figures given by the hon. gentleman were, therefore, wrong, but he was doing only what hon. gentlemen on the other side are so fond of doing-knocking some industry. All that an industry has to do is pop up its head and the hon. gentleman will knock it as hard as he possibly can. When he was making that assertion he was knocking the milling industry.
I	am interested in an industry which has received some attention on the part of
of hon. gentlemen opposite. I
II	p.m. refer to the canning industry,
of which I think all Canadians have just reason to feel proud. The Dominion canners have, I think, about 60 canning factories in Canada and the independent canning factories have about 50. I want to say this about the Canadian canning industry: Whether the goods are produced by the Dominion or by the independent canners, Canadian canned goods are a credit to Canada. The aim of the industry has been continually to improve the quality of the goods; they have done that, and to-day the canned goods of Canada compare favourably with the canned goods of any other country in the world. Ten years ago, when the Dominion Canners was organized, the canning business in Canada was in a bad condition. The factories were not in good shape and the machinery was not adequate or up-to-date, but to-day the canning factories in Canada, whether they belong to the company of which I happen to be a member or whether they belong to the independent canners, are a credit to the country. You can travel through the United States from end to end but you will not find canning factories that compare with those in Canada to-day. The goods that are done up are pure, free from adulteration and, more than -that, they are the cheapest food that any labouring man can put on his table. The canning business is knocked by hon. gentlemen opposite because they do not know what they are talking about. In my county my opponent for two general elections followed me around with canned goods and canned goods labels and every time he spoke he made votes for m-e because the people knew that my statements about the canning business were absolutely correct. I repeat that they are the cheapest goods a labouring man or anybody can put upon

his table, and the purest and most wholesome. You can to-day buy a three-pound tin of tomatoes for ten cents. You would wonder how the tin could be made for the money. I have seen advertisements for twelve tins for a dollar but that is too cheap, ten -cents is the regular price for th-e-se goods. The manufacturer puts them up, puts -a beautiful label on the tin, boxes two dozen to a case, -and pays freight to the wholesale merchant. The wholesaler, in turn, sells them to the retailer and the retailer sells at a profit to the consumer, and yet they are bought by the consumer three cans for a quarter; but hon. gentlemen opposite are -still pitching in to the canning business and calling it a combine and a merger-.


James McCrie Douglas: What about the prices last year?


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I am speaking of this year. Last year they were high. There was a failure of the crop in Canada and we even had to import them to supply the demand and pay -the duty and w-e sold them at a loss to fill our orders in Canada because we only packed 40 per -cent of our requirements. Hon. gentlemen opposite, if they were fair, would know that that is the case, but they continue constantly to attack that industry. These attacks are most unwarranted and unfair. The canning business is not managed altogether by Conservaties. On the board of directors of which I am a member, we have Liberals as well as Conservatives and they must feel very sorry indeed to he-ar attacks made on a business that is carried on honestly in the interest of the public. We pay millions of dollars to the farmers and -employ thousands of men and women in the factories and still that business is attacked session after session although there are n-o facts to warrant the attacks made upon it. If it is an industry hon. gentlemen attack that industry. They are so disappointed over the defeat of reciprocity -that they attack everybody for it and especially the manufacturers; if they would only look a little farther they might rope in the farmers and blame them a little. It looks now as if they wanted io get even with -the farmer by giving free food so that -the farmer would suffer -along with the manufacturer. We know that there is a business depression in Canada. Everybody knows that. All you have to do is to be interested in any business, to hold stock in any concern in Canada and you will know that there is -a depression. Canada is not the only country with a business de-

pression. I am interested in manufacturing in the United States as well as in Canada and depression exists over there to a greater extent than here. I know the conditions 'because I am interested on both sides of the line. The depression is great here, but it is greater there. The New York Central road has laid off 25,000 men lately. On the short road from Buffalo to Niagara Falls and Lockport they have actually in the past month taken thirty trains off that short run. That applies to the whole country. The depression that exists there exists here, and I claim that it is not wise, it is not a proper policy, for members of Parliament in a Canadian House of Commons to decry and knock their country. I claim more than that, that the men who are in this House from western Canada, from Alberta and Saskatchewan, have done their provinces more harm in this House this session than all the good they can ever do. Who would ever think of taking up a farm in the West and settling there after reading one of the speeches of hon. gentlemen opposite. They are doing everything they can to stop immigration into that country. They are doing everything they can in this House to stop prosperity and immigration in the very provinces from which they come; and I say to hon. gentlemen opposite that if they would take some of the wealth that they have made out of western lands, which they and their friends got cheaply probably from the Government that was in power, and invest that capital, which they have taken out of the settlers of that country, in the establishing of manufacturing institutions in their province and their own towns, they would do a great deal more for their conutry than they are now doing. I say, in conclusion, that we should not knock our own country; we should try and boost it. I say, do not knock, but boost, and if we will all do that we may bring about the prosperity that should prevail in this great Dominion always; and if we can grow in the future as we have done in the past everybody, including the merchant, the manufacturer, the artisan and the farmer will be prosperous and successful.


James McCrie Douglas: Mr. Speaker, it is always a delight to listen to the beautiful unpartisan method in which the hon. member for Haldimand (Mr. Lalor) presents his case when he speaks before this House. He is enjoyable to that
extent, but I really think that he believes
a great many of his own statements. He referred to what he called the unfulfilled pledges of Sir Wilfrid Laurier prior to 1896, when Sir Wilfrid Laurier was appealing for the suffrages of the people of Canada on what he called then a policy of free trade as it is in England. I might remind the hon. member, although it is a tu quoque argument, that his own leader, prior to 1911, went to the provinces of western Canada promising them that if he were returned to power he would give to them the control of their natural resources. As yet we have heard nothing of that, although this Government has been in power something over two years. This was one of the main planks of the platform of the Conservative party in western Canada. It was used by every speaker in behalf of their campaign. The present Prime Minister also promised to give assistance to a chilled meat industry if he were returned to power. He has been in power since 1911, and we have heard nothing further about that part of his promise.
We have been treated by the hon. member for Haldimand to a statement as to the wonderful prosperity that attended Canada under the National Policy in force from 1878 until 1896, when the late Government came into power. If he had studied statistics he would have discovered that for a number of years prior to 1896 the trade of this country was practically at a standstill, and that it did not increase in any respect until the revision of the tariff in 1897. If he had lived in western Canada, as I have, he would know that that statement applies more forcibly to the West than to the East. He also made the statement that food and clothing were cheaper than they have been for quite a number of years. I am afraid the hon. member has not kept in close touch with the clothing trade in recent years, or he would not have made that statement. Clothing is dearer to-day than it has ever been in the history of Canada. He also mentioned the undesirability of the imports of butter which has been coming into Canada in recent years. To my mind, that is not a very undesirable state of affairs. If a country, essentially agricultural, is importing butter, it must be that the people of Canada, who are agricultural people primarily, do not find butter-making a profitable line of business. If the hon. member's remedy of a high tariff wall against the importation of butter

were carried out, where would the consumer be? That is one of the great troubles of this Government. They appear to absolutely forget the consumer in every piece of legislation which they bring forward. The great bulk of our population is made up of consumers. This Government takes little thought for his protection. We are told of the tremendous disasters which will befall the manufacturer if the protection is taken off his industry, but the consumer can starve to death for all gentlemen opposite care. The consumer apparently does not enter into their consideration at all. We were told by a gentleman who ought to have known better that he would support in this House a tariff on butter, and that such a tariff would be a benefit to this country.
I regret that in the Budget speech of the Minister of Finance the same lack of consideration for the consumer presented _ itself. There was nothing in his speech from beginning to end to give the consumer any hope of redress.


John Hampden Burnham: How would you benefit the consumer?


James McCrie Douglas: Certainly not by the imposition of a tax.


John Hampden Burnham: Go ahead and tell us.


James McCrie Douglas: Cannot the hon. member figure it out?


John Hampden Burnham: I can, but wrhat about you?


James McCrie Douglas: Before the hon. member for Haldimand goes out, I want to say a word about the canning industry. He made the statement that there were sixty factories in the Dominion Canners' Association and fifty independent factories. He also said that the Dominion Canners' Association waB not a combine. I will leave the members of the House to judge whether it is or not. He also gives great credit to the Dominion Canners' Association for the very low price oi canned vegetables this year. I admit that vegetables, and tomatoes especially, aTe cheaper this year than they have been for five or perhaps six or seven years. He might also have said that last year in place of canned tomatoes selling .at three tins for twenty-five cents they were selling at twenty cents a tin, or two for thirty-five *cents. I do not think he would consider tomatoes at that price the cheapest food the workingman can put on his table. As
[Mr. Douglas. 3
regards the question of a combine, he very conveniently omitted the contract he had with the wholesaler as to how he should handle the products of the Dominion Canneries. That was the most beautiful contract I ever had the pleasure of looking at. By it, the wholesaler pledged himself to handle nothing but the goods of the Dominion Canners' Association. At the end of the selling season he was allowed a rebate of ten cents a dozen on his vegetables, and 121 cents a dozen on his fruits. If he bought outside of the sixty factories of the Dominion Canners' Association he was liable to lose his whole commission. That strikes me as a combine, and I will leave the members of the House to judge whether it is or not.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: Might I ask the hon. gentleman if he thinks that was too much profit to give to the wholesaler?


James McCrie Douglas: I do not think it was too much profit for the wholesaler. The profit in the canning industry is not made by the wholesaler or by the retailer, but by the manufacturer. The poor farmer gets very little for his tomatoes, about twenty-five to twenty-seven cents a bushel. That does not strike me as being a very high price.


Francis Ramsey Lalor: I think the hon, member wants to be fair. Let me tell him that ten years ago we paid twenty cents a bushel for tomatoes, and now we are paying thirty cents. Nearly everything we buy is nearly fifty per cent dearer than ton years ago.


James McCrie Douglas: I am out three cents.
The point I wish to make is that the price the farmer gets for his raw product has absolutely no influence on the price at which the manufacturer sells to the wholesaler. The hon. member made the statement that the crop last year was a short one, and for that reason tomatoes were worth $1.35 to $1.50 a dozen. On account of a short crop the manufacturers could not fill all their contracts, he said. That is quite true, but although he was unable to fill his contracts, the manufacturer took every possible advantage he could in the way of enhanced prices.
I shall not take up very much more time of the House, but I wish to discuss the effect of the Underwood tariff in connection with the entry of free wheat into the United States. All sorts of opinions have been advanced by different members. The hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Suther-

land) scoffed at the idea that the western farmer should desire a market for his wheat other than along lines east and west. He seemed to think that we could force grain to be hauled a tremendous distance through barren country, and yet be profitable to the farmer growing the grain. The next moment we heard another hon. gentleman say that the great problem in western Canada was not markets, but transportation. How on earth the transportation problem is going to be solved by forcing producers in western Canada to send their grain two or three thousand miles to the eastern seaboard, is beyond my comprehension.
In the investigation into the rates recently held before the Railway Commission, it was found that wheat was being hauled from the prairies of western Canada to the head of the lakes at a lower price than to any other part of the continent of America. Therefore we cannot hope for redress from the Railway Commission as long as conditions of that kind prevail. If we had the market to the south of us, we would have, in the first place, the advantage of competition, which to my mind is the most important one. We would also have the advantage of the short hauls as between the country points and the market at either Winnipeg or Minneapolis, because I have faith enough in the people of Canada, even in the millers of Canada, that when they see that they are really up against such a proposition, they will not allow their American neighbours to monopolize ' the whole trade of western Canada. That argument was used during the reciprocity campaign regarding our cattle and hogs. After the Underwoo'd tariff came into effect in October of last year, it was an absolute boon to the province of Alberta from which I come, inasmuch as we had begun to produce more hogs than we could consume, the first year in our existence when we were able to do so. I have not the figures here to substantiate that statement, but I have an article copied from a Calgary paper, dated March 8, in which the statement is made that in sixty days we shipped from the city of Calgary hogs to the value of $470,000. That is from one city alone in the province of Alberta and these hogs were sold to the city of Seattle, a market of which we never dredmed. By the removal of that duty, which was done by the good grace of our neighbours to the south of us, the farmers benefited to the extent that those hogs, brought at Seattle from- $7.75 to $8.25 per cwt. and the farmers of
Alberta were able to market that tremendous number of hogs within that very short time. I have a paper here from the city of CalgaTy dated April 18, which says that in one day over $60,000 worth of hogs were shipped out of that city for the Seattle market. Calgary has become to-day one of the greatest shipping points in Canada for live animals, and is rivalling Toronto and Winnipeg in that respect.
We are also going into mixed farming, following the advice of the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce, and last year we produced more poultry than we were able to consume. For the first time in the history of Alberta our poultry and eggs were more than sufficient to meet the requirements of that province. If we do not get free access to the American market for our wheat products, we will go more Extensively into mixed farming. We have no home market in Alberta, and where can we sell this produce? We can grow all the hogs required for the Dominion of Canada, but where are we to sell them? We cannot afford to pay the freight from Calgary to Toronto. We have packing industries, and can pack a certain number of hogs; but, unless we get unrestricted markets not only for our wheat but for all our other products, what is to be the result? Ask the eastern manufacturer what is the result of the defeat of reciprocity. If he is honest, he will tell you that it is more stagnant in eastern Canada than it has been for twenty years. When I was in Montreal the other day I had a conversation with a number of wholesale men there, one of whom said to me, ' We have not had such poor business for twenty years as we have to-day.' He did not know that I was in politics. I said,
' Can it by any possibility be true that this stagnation has resulted from the change of Government?' He said, ' I never thought of it that way, but that seems to be the case; the only place where we can sell goods is in the city of Ottawa.' I said, ' How do you account for that?' He said, ' Because Parliament is in session, and so many delegates come to Ottawa who buy goods. That is the only reason I can give for it.' The hon. member who preceded me (Mr. Lalor) is a manufacturer, and a good one. He has one of the best knitting mills not only in Canada but, of its line, in the world; and for the goods he produces I believe he is capable of producing them against any manufacturer not only in Canada and the United States, but in Germany; yet ask that hon. gentleman how business is just now, and he will tell

you that his travellers are not making expenses, that his resident salesmen on the Pacific coast are just marking time. Nevertheless he is one of the gentlemen who did his best to bring about this state of affairs.


John Hampden Burnham: Would you advise
foreign competition as a remedy?


James McCrie Douglas: I do not just see the connection.


John Hampden Burnham: Neither do I.


James McCrie Douglas: An allusion was made by the hon. member for Haldimand to an article which appeared in the Montreal Standard in regard to the price of flour at Canadian points and English points. I was one of the gentlemen who received a copy of that paper, and I presume every member received one. I noticed a mistake in the statement, but I thought it was a typographical error. I took the pains to write to the editor of the Standard to find out if his correspondent was correctly informed or not. I received a letter signed by the man who made the statement, and, addressing himself to the editor of the Standard, he says:
Your letter of the 8th instant has been handed to me, with copy of letter addressed to you from Mr. Douglas, M.P., in which that gentleman states the alleged discrimination against Canadian consumer has been very much exaggerated. I beg to state that the undernoted figures prove that 1 underestimated same. Such figures disclose that the difference amounts to $1.70, which proved the figures which I quoted to be a fair average.
I do not know who this gentleman is?


Mr. ROGERS:: What is his name?


James McCrie Douglas: His name is W. Lutton. Taking as his authority the North West Miller he figures out the price at Montreal at $5.70 a barrel, the price in Liverpool at $3.99 per barrel, and the price in London at $3.99 per barrel, for September, October and November of last year. We have heard a great deal during this debate as to the relative benefits of protection and free trade. Hon. gentlemen opposite have evidently taken it for granted that because the Liberal party have advocated the abolition of duties on a number of articles that they are absolute free traders. For my own part, personally, I am always inclined to let them have that opinion, but I do not think they are doing justice to the Liberal party when they make such statements. I do not think the lowering or the abolition of a duty on any specific article means that the party which advocates suoh a policy is absolutely

going in for free trade. If that were true, then the Conservative party is just as much a free trade party as is the Liberal party, because I notice that in the recent revision of the tariff they have taken the duty off a good many articles, although the unfortunate part of it is that the articles on which the duty has been removed are all used by manufacturers, and not by the consuming classes.	[DOT]
It has been claimed by hon. gentlemen opposite during this debate, that the binder twine industry in Canada was ruined by the Liberal party removing the twine duty in 1897. I have some figures here to show that that statement is absolutely incorrect. The hon. member for the Yukon (Mr. Thompson) quoted from a speech made last year by the hon. member for Wentworth (Mr. G. 0. Wilson), the statement that fourteen out of fifteen Canadian twine factories had gone out of business when the duty on binder twine was removed. A gentleman who is thoroughly acquainted with the binder twine industry in this country, informs me that in the days of high tariff on this commodity more factories' were closed by the twine trust in Canada than since the Liberal Government reduced and finally put twine on the free list. He points out that the factories closed by the trust when there was a duty on binder twine were: Brown, of Quebec; Banner-man, of Lachute; the Port Hope mills, the Dovercourt mills in Toronto, the St. John mill in New Brunswick, and one of the' Brantford mills. These mills, as I say, were all closed under the high protective tariff on binder twine. In fact, the industry had got to such a state that the Ontario Government started manufacturing twine in the 'Central Prison, and the Dominion Government followed suit by manufacturing twine in the Kingston Penitentiary, in an endeavour to break the combine of the Canadian Cordage Company. There was one binder twine factory in Brantford which did not go under, and the owners of this factory continued to prosper under the high protective tariff, and they paid dividends amounting to 60 per cent in one year, 90 per cent in another year, and 110 per cent the next year. The result was that a number of people, induced by the enormous profits made by this factory,' resolved to go into the business. You will always find that where an industry appears to be making undue profits, a great many people will rush into it, and so it happened with regard to the manufacture of binder twine

in this instance. A binder twine factory was established in Brandon, and others were established in different parts of the Dominion. However, they were not managed properly, and they all went to the wall, not because of free twine by any means, but because of bad management. Industries of any description, which are not managed on good business principles, are bound to fail, and the statement that these factories went under because the duty on binder twine was removed, is therefore not borne out by the facts.


Alfred Thompson: What is the reply of the hon. gentleman to the claim now made by the grain growers of the West, that the binder twine industry is in the hands of an American trust, and that the price of twine is higher now than it was before the duty was removed?


James McCrie Douglas: I think that probably
the statement is absolutely true, that the binder twine industry is in the hands of an American trust to-day, but that is because they corailed the whole raw product. How any tariff can remedy that state of affairs is beyond my comprehension. If it were a manufactured article that was controlled by a trust, I could understand how the removal of the duty would affect it, but when, as in this case, it is a raw product that is controlled, I fail to see how any tariff is going to remedy the evil.


Alfred Thompson: What is your remedy?


James McCrie Douglas: There is no remedy so far as I can see.


Mr. PARDEE:: What is your remedy?


James McCrie Douglas: There is-no duty on
binder twine and what more can be done. It might be possible to get at the combine in some other way, but I do not see how tariff-tinkering is going to assist it. If we had a tariff on binder twine I believe the conditions would be just that much worse to the extent of the tariff.
Now, Mr. Speaker, referring to the Budget speech delivered by the Minister of Finance, "I have to say that I regret very much that the hon. gentleman has placed a duty on steel rods. To my mind that is going to be a very serious thing, because I very much fear that the result of the duty on steel rods is going to be to increase to the consumer the price of nails, and all products of steel rods. I was speaking a few days ago to the manager of the nail factory in the city of Calgary, and I asked him:
' What is going to be the effect of this duty on steel rods on your industry'; and he said,
* it is going to put us out of business.' I replied that I feared that it would. He then told me: 'We heard a mention of that very _ thing last year, and I took it upon myself to write to the Minister of Finance, to the Prime Minister, and to the member for Calgary, protesting to the utmost of my power against any such duty; the answer I got from all these gentlemen was that they would not consider it for a moment; that they felt that the effect would be to put the small nail makers out of business, and that they would not do that.' He fold me that the hon. member for Calgary was most emphatic in his statement that under no circumstances would he permit of a duty being imposed on steel rods, as he knew the effect it would have on the industry in Calgary. For that reason I am very sorry that the Minister of Finance was overborne by the arguments advanced by the steel manufacturers, but I hope he has it in his power to protect these small manufacturers in some way should the occasion arise. With the high transportation rates which we have to pay on heavy hardware, such as nails and other commodities which are made out of steel rods, it would be a serious handicap to the people of the country who use nails every day, if the price were now increased.
I do not know, -Sir, that I can add anything further to the debate. The question has been discussed in all its phases, and I have only to regret now that the Minister of Finance in presenting his Budget this year has absolutely ignored the wants of the great masses of the people, the consumers, the farmers, the artisans, and that he has pandered to the wants of the manufacturers. Then, as to the question of putting the East and the West against each other, and as to the charge made by some hon. gentlemen from Ontario that the farmer of the West is merely a wheat miner,
I have to say that these statments are not warranted by the facts. I hope they will grant the wishes of the organized farmers for relief from the restrictions placed upon them to-day in their market.
On motion of Mr. Pardee, the debate was adjourned.
On motion of Mr. Rogers, the House adjourned at 11.47 p.m.

Thursday, April 23, 1914.