1916-04-18

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PRINTED BY J. db L. TACHE,

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House of Commons Debates

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Speaker: Hon. Albert Sevigny.
Tuesday, April 18, 1916.

Sir ROBERT BORDEN moved:: That the names of Messrs. Devlin and Ross be substituted for those of Messrs. Molloy and Tobin on the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts.


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Motion agreed to.


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Bill No. 92, for the relief of Robert Charles Vondrau.-Mr. Scott.
Bill No. 93, for the relief of Percy Lynn Woods.-Mr. Boys.


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On the Orders of the Day:
Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: Mr. Speaker, may I interpose just for one moment on a question of privilege. I would like to correct a report which I find in the Winnipeg Telegram of the 13th inst. referring to me, and which, under the circumstances, is a gross and mischievous misrepresentation. The Ottawa correspondent of the Winnipeg Telegram, whom I do not know at all, writes to his paper on the 13th of April as follows:
Ottawa, Ont., April 13.-Long- after midnight Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Hon. Rodolphe Lemieux, Hon. Jacques Bureau, and Ernest Lapointe! M.P., who have been chosen by the Liberals to introduce a bilingual resolution in Parliament were in conference in the Liberal leader's office. Previous to this conference Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Senator David, and Senator Choquette had met and discussed the question. Senator Choquette, following his speech in the Senate on Ontario volunteers, went with Senator
David to the Liberal leader, and, it is believed, Sir Wilfrid Laurier conveyed their views to his supporters in the Commons.
This correspondent refers to the close relationship of Senator Choquette with Sir Wilfrid Laur-ier. I refer to this, under the circumstances, because the atmosphere being rather charged with electricity, there is an insinuation-net an insinuation, but a positive statement for which there is no foundation of fact whatever. The relations between Senator Choquette and myself are not close; they, are the reverse of close; they are very strained politically, as was admitted by Senator Choquette himself on that very day. I have never seen Senator Choquette during this session except once, and not to discuss the bilingual question. The only thing that was discussed between us was a railway question of which we may hear further during the present session. As to my relations with Senator Choquette,
I call the attention of the House to the explanation which he himself gave in the Senate the day after he made his antirecruiting speech. Everybody knows that my views and the views of Senator 1 Choquette upon this question are the very antipodes. I need not say what has been my attitude on the subject of the war, and of Canada's participation in the war, during this session and during all previous sessions. Senator Choquette made a statement on the subject because he had seen in the newspapers that my name had been connected with his. On the 13th of April Senator Choquette, on the floor of the Senate spoke as follows:
I take on myself the whole responsibility of my words in this House and outside, and I protest most strongly against the report connecting my words with the name of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the great leader of the Liberal party, in order by insinuation to represent him as being responsible for what I said.' I advocated Liberal principles for thirty years under Sir Wilfrid Laurier in the other House, but we all know -I grieve to say it but must do so in order that the responsibility for my actions and words may be properly fixed-that over ten years ago I had some difference with Sir Wilfrid Laurier about what he should do. I have the greatest



respect for Sir Wilfrid, and I hope he has friendship for me, but we differed ten years ago when I had to take part against the Premier of Quebec at the time. Again, not more than five years ago I opposed Sir Wilfrid on his Naval Bill [DOT] I took the responsibility of my stand on that occasion, and I know the Tories were very glad to use my speech and my views against Sir Wilfrid Laurier at that time, to serve their purpose.
This is the total refutation of the imputation that is conveyed by the correspondent of the Winnipeg Telegram, and I hope he will take the opportunity of correcting that impression.



WAR CONTRACTS.


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On the Orders of the Day:	"
Sir SAM HUGHES (Minister of Militia and Defence):: Mr. Speaker, with the indulgence of the House, I desire to make a personal explanation. On the 9th of March I left Ottawa for England. [DOT] A week or so prior to my leaving, I spoke to my right hon. friend the Prime Minister (Sir Robert Borden)' and some of my colleagues, explaining to them the necessity of my going.
I asked the Prime Minister if he would see the leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) and ascertain if there were any questions likely to arise in connection with my department which would require my attendance here. It was agreed that I should see the 'leader of the Opposition, and I did so. I saw also the hon. member for Pictou (Mr. E. M. Macdonald), the hon. junior member for Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean), and others on that side, and asked them if there were any questions affecting my department that would require my attendance here. The leader of the Opposition frankly stated that he did not know of any; but also, with the statesmanship which characterizes him, he declined to assume responsibility for all his followers. But I think I am justified in saying that he said he did not know of anything-


Wilfrid Laurier: Personally.


Samuel Hughes: -personally, he did not know of anything that would justify him in saying that I should require to remain here longer. None of the other prominent members of the Opposition could conceive, of anything that might arise. It was known that I was going away. Needless to say, I did not "go duck-hunting with a brass band;" I did not placard the

fact that I was crossing the ocean; a statement was given out that I was going South, which was perfectly true.
A day or so before I went away, the hon. member for Carleton (Mr. Carvell) spoke.
I think I intimated to that gentleman also that I was going away. Those hon. members who will recall the night of his speech will recollect how his eye wandered to the clock, praying "for night ot Blucher." They will recollect that he repeated himself; and, if Hansard correctly reports him, he repeated himself over and over and over again. I thought-I was unkind enough to think-that he was killing time, for it was known that I was leaving the next day at noon, and that was the only chance I should have to get at him. I asked him that night to continue and finish his speech, and indicated that I would be only too delighted to take up the few minutes that were necessary in reply-it would not take very long-before I left. But he pleaded weariness, and the sympathy of Mr. Speaker and the House was accorded him, and he got an opportunity to finish his speech next day. I do not know that much harm was done, however.
I shall not refer to my visit to England, and the splendid work the boys are doing, both in England and at the front, although so many of them are going down, I am sorry to say.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear


Samuel Hughes: But when I received the message that startling statements had been made in the House involving the honour of the Shell Committee, and, indirectly and to that extent, my own honour, I returned on the first and fastest steamer.
I rather enjoyed the trip. I was glad and I am glad at the Chance to dear the atmosphere.
In this connection, I wish to thank the hon. member for East Toronto (Hon. A. E. Kemp) for his kindness in acting so splendidly as Minister of Militia during my absence. I found everything in a very satisfactory condition in the department when I arrived. I have also to state that during my attendance at the sessions of this Royal Commission-and I intend looking after it fairly well-I shall do myself the honour, as has always been my custom when temporarily absent, to ask the Prime Minister to look after tanything that may be necessary in connection with the Militia Department.
However, on my return, I have no hesitation in saying, I was surprised at the

[DOT] character of the statements made by the hon. member for Richmond (Mr. Kyte). I had expected something really important. It is no part of a member's duty, nor is it right, to impugn the motives of another man, and I do not do so. But I had a perfect right to inquire for my own satisfaction what was the moving spirit behind the hon. gentleman's speech. Was it to ascertain the truth concerning this matter? If so, all he had to do was to communicate with Colonel David Carnegie or General Bertram of the Shell Committee, and he would have his questions answered in five minutes- answered truthfully, and answered to anybody's satisfaction. Was it to obtain notoriety? If so, he has had it, but it will be short-lived. Was it to injure the Tories? -those horrible Tories! If so, I have every reason to believe that he will fail in his object. Was it to assist the cause of human liberty? I want to point out to that hon. member that only truth and right directing a powerful attack can win for that cause. Or is it merely petty party parochial politics? I leave the public to come to their own conclusion on that subject. I cannot conceive of his object in trying to take advantage-of the high-strung nervousness of the Canadian public,' whose gallant sons are fighting and dying for the great cause. However, he is responsible to his own conscience and to his constituents.
Now, what are the conditions surrounding the shell contracts? At first no one could be induced to touch them. The horde of self-seekers, who afterwards came to the front, would not for love or money come out and help on the cause at the beginning. Bankers interfered who subsequently kept pestering General Bertram and the Shell Committee in order to bolster up little side-shows here and there all through the country who wanted contracts for shells. Prominent business men who had capital invested jn factories and the machinery all ready could not be induced for love or money to go into the manufacture of shells and similar commodities at the beginning of the war. They were all poverty-stricken, nervous, and afraid to step in and help the Empire, though they would not take any risk in doing so. There was want of confidence on the part of capital; there was uncertainty as to the duration of the war; -there was lack of proper equipment; there was a necessity for procuring the raw material; there was an absence of skilled labour; there were haTd times; there were nervous people who suffered from lack of 188*
confidence; and there was a great need to remove all these depressing influences that were abroad throughout the country. But there were men who were not afraid. A few stepped into the breach; the manufacture of shells was begun; the money commenced to circulate; and it was found that Canadians could rise to the situation and play their part as well as the inhabitants of any other country in the upbuilding of the Empire and the development and protection of human liberty.
The next step was when confidence was 'regained. Every one wanted to get"into the game. People talked in millions instead of thousands, and there were agents and promoters everywhere. That matter, however, has been touched upon by me in this House already during the present session, and I will not repeat what I said before.
As I understand the statements of the hon. member for Richmond (Mr. Kyte) and those of the hon. member for Carleton (Mr. Carvell)-I trust that if I refer more to the hon. member for Richmond than to the hon. member for Carleton, the latter will not feel slighted-they are that a contract was made for time fuses with people who had no intention of producing fuses and who will never produce them; that $1,500,000 was paid to promoters who divided that sum amongst themselves; and that Great Britain will lose that money. The fact is- the details will follow later on- that the two companies with whom the contracts were made are now employing between them nearly 8,000 men, and that they have invested in plant, machinery, and materials fully $6,000,000. While they have undoubtedly met with great difficulties in the production of fuses, they have, with the exception of one other company, done better in that work than any other company on the continent of North America. So much so is that the case that the British Government, through Morgan and Company of New York, have recently given one of those firms a new contract for 4,000,000 additional time 'fuses and the other an order for 1,000,000 time fuses. Every dollar of the money advanced was protected by the guarantee of the strongest trust company on the continent of North America, namely, the Guaranty Trust Company of North America, and incidentally, I may say, by the fortunes of the" men behind those companies. When I state that the American Tobacco Company, the members of which are worth upwards of $500,000,000 on their own personal accounts, were behind one concern.

and that other gentlemen with personal fortunes aggregating very large sums away up in the millions and tens of millions were behind the other, you will understand, Sir, that it is no wonder that the Guaranty Trust Company of North America was only too ready to go as security for those companies. The money so advanced went for the purpose for which it was intended, namely, for the purchase of plant and material. That is the general situation. The details will be elaborated later. From the experience which has been gained, I think perhaps it would have been better to undertake the manufacture of fuses in Canada, as I understand that similar undertakings have since been started in England and also in France. As a further instance of the bona fides of those two firms, it may be noted that the above advance of money was only 15 per cent of the contract price, whereas the usual cash advance through Morgan and Company is 25 per cent.
I turn now to the Hansard report of the speech of the hon. member for Richmond, which will be found on page 2360 of the Unrevised Hansard, under date of March 28. The hon. member states:
The reason why Mr. Thomas did not have the opportunity of consulting with my right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition was-
And so forth. I think it is rather a pity that my hon. friend did not consult with the leader of the Opposition, because, if he had done so, if my information is correct, he would have found that the right hon. the leader of the Opposition did have a conference with Mr. Thomas.


Wilfrid Laurier: I had no conference with Mr. Thomas. He called on me socially; that was all.


Samuel Hughes: I am not retailing
any confidential information imparted to me by Mr. Thomas. I have no hesitation in telling the House and this country and the British Empire that Mr. Thomas did not state that it was a private conference. He called on the right hon. the leader of the Opposition by request-so he informed him -of the Minister of Munitions of England, and had a conference. Whether it was long or short, public or private, good, bad or indifferent, I care not. .
On page 2362 of the Unrevised Hansard the hon. member for Richmond says:
With the exception of the Dominion Iron and Steel Company, there was no factory or plant in Canada manufacturing t.n.t.

I regret exceedingly to have to correct the hon. member ^ again. The Dominion Iron and Steel Company has never yet manufactured any t.n.t. This is another sin of the Shell Committee. When I was in England in 1914 I was asked by the War Office if t.n.t. could be manufactured in Canada. On my return to this country I sent for General Bertram, the then chairman of the Shell Committee. We talked the matter oyer, and the result was that the Dominion Iron and Steel Company received through the agency of the Shell Committee an advance of $90,000 to enable them to start the manufacture, not of t.n.t., but of toluol, a component part of t.n.t. Thus, through the instrumentality of the Shell Committee, the manufacture of toluol, which is subsequently manufactured into tri-nitro-toluene, was begun in the Dominion of Canada, and the credit for that is due to the Shell Committee and those who are associated with it. I merely make this remark as a passing correction. I have not yet found in the speech of the hon. member any statement that is correct, and I will just correct a few of hie misstatements en passant.	. ,
The toluol manufactured by the Dominion Iron and Steel Company is taken to a place near Montreal and manufactured into t.n.t. The Toronto Chemical Company at the Sault, through the instrumentality of the Shell Committee and those associated with it, manufacture toluol, which is manufactured into t.n.t. The Curtis and Harvey Company and the Canadian Explosives Company are also manufacturing t.n.t.
With regard to a gentleman of whom some of you may have heard, Colonel J. Wesley Allison, I may say that this officer was formerly associated with Vanderbilt and Dr. Webb in the New York Central railway. I understand that he was purchasing agent or something of that kind. He was respected and is respected by the manufacturing concerns of the United States and of the Dominion of Canada. At the outbreak of the war manufacturers and contractors in the United States were uncertain whether under the law they could 1 deliver their commodities to a foreign country in war time. It was uncertain whether the then Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan, would not endeavour to prevent the exportation of these commodities. I challenge an instance where a contractor in the United States at that period undertook to deliver, outside of the

borders of the United States, any commodity in the war line, contracted for. Not one of them would do it. Then we were up against this proposition: That Britain, and Canada, and every other country contracting in the United States had to assume the responsibility of getting the goods out of the country. I was requested by the British Government to. look after this end of the transaction, I enlisted the sympathy and assistance of Colonel J. Wesley Allison, and so well was it done- I may point out that in the early stages these articles were brought over by ferry, but that procedure became almost unbearable and could not be kept up; .then whole trains were shipped right through in bond, and-I want this clearly understood, because I am told there has been some uncertainty about it-by arrangement with the Minister of Customs these war munitions were permitted to come in free of duty and were passed on to the Old Land. Later, through the instrumentality of this same officer, it was discovered that there was no need whatever of bringing these goods in a roundabout way from the manufacturing centres in the United States through Canada, so they were shipped direct from the port of New York and from other ports near the places of manufacture. So carefully was this managed that the Colonial Secretary, Mr. Harcourt, after these things had been going from New York for a year, still thought they were going by the old route through Canada. Let me point out further that when the Shell Committee had made inquiries in Canada from one end to the other, when I myself, assisting them, had asked at least fifty different concerns to undertake the manufacture of fuses in .Canada-because a shell without a fuse is useless-it was found that not one firm in Canada, with all due regard to Mr. Russell, could be induced by the Shell Committee to manufacture fuses in this country. I know that articles have been padded up and written in the newspapers in this connection. I repeat that not one factory in Canada-not Mr. Russell, not Mr. Lloyd Harris-could be induced to manufacture fuses in the Dominion of Canada. I did not give much time to this sort qf thing; I had other fish to fry. But I did devote an odd moment to it now and then in Ottawa at the Chateau Laurier, which does my right hon. friend the honour of commemorating him by its name. When 1 urged and begged some of these Canadian manufacturers to make
fuses I had been met with the statement that they could not possibly make them. I turned to Allison, who was there, and I asked him if he could get capital to come in from the United States. He did not know anything about it; that afternoon he came to me and asked me about the details. I said: " I do not know a confounded thing about it; go and see Bertram." He saw Bertram and came back to me that night and mentioned the men who are in these two companies that are making these fuses to-day, and making them successfully. He spoke of a gentleman named Rufus Paterson, whom I had never met, seen, or heard of, but who was spoken of as one of the most capable mechanical engineers in the world. He is,poke of Dr. Harris, well known to gentlemen on both sides of the House as a very capable man. He is a very wealthy man, living in. the city of New York. He epoke of others-I forget the names; at all events they were men in these two companies. He said that they were very wealthy men, and that he would see what could be done to have the fuses made in Canada. But there were no buildings in which to manufacture them; new buildings would have to be built absolutely from the foundation up. I do not know the details; I never inquired into it from that hour on. Finally, however, when it came to letting the contracts for fuses, they could not get the buildings in Canada, and as the British Government were in a great hurry for the fuses it was decided, I understand, on the part of Gen. Bertram and the Shell Committee, to have them made in the United States in the meantime. I know nothing about Colonel Allison's connection with these companies. I may say frankly here that I think Colonel Allison, if he did get anything, or does get anything, out of these concerns, is as much entitled to it, because he has delivered the goods, as gentlemen who sell sausages, boots, leather, breeches, and other commodities of that kind up and down the Dominion of Canada.
Later, when it came to purchasing revolvers, pistols, rifle ammunition and other war material, and when I found that the price asked for rifle ammunition for the British Government at that time was $42.50 I again enlisted the services, or the sympathy and assistance, of Colonel Allison. In the intervening days I got the ammunition reduced to $37.50; I have the offer yet. We met these gentlemen through the instrumentality of Colonel Allison. I am not permitted to go into further details con-

rainbow-chasing affairs which are to be found in every street, in every city in the Dominibn, or on the North American continent, or in the world. First, they would be asked five cents a rifle, then they would be asked ten cents, then there would be another advance, and the agents of the German interests who were holding those rifles were simply taking all the money they could get out of the various people who were anxious to get them; but they had no intention, so far as I could ascertain, of delivering up those rifles. Without going into the whole story, the rifles were never obtained and they are there yet. So that, when my hon. friend says that this was agreed to he does not say that they got them.
Then he speaks of another deal concerning 140,000 rifles, known as the Allison Southern rifle deal. It will be found that this was even more visionary than the first one. I objected to these rifle deals; I reported directly against them; and, if it is true that Allison was in them-and I do not know whether he was or not- I reported directly against -his best interests and accordingly took away the amount that it is stated Allison was to get. If Allison, as it is stated, was to get $1.25 o-ut of each rifle, I robbed him of $1.25 each on 600,000 rifles in one case and on 140,000 rifles in an-othdr.
Then, the hon. gentleman says that there were negotiations pending with the Providence Chemical Company, of St. Louis, for the sale of 5,000,000 pounds of picric acid. It might as well be understood first as last that whenever any man, I care not whether he was black or white, French or British, or of any other race-o-r German Canadian- appealed to- the Department of Militia and Defence, representing a firm that was straightforward and competent to do the work, I -had no hesitation, nor had the Prime Minister-I think I am justified in using his name in that regard-in (backing that concern to bring trade to Canada from any part of the Empire or the world. Therefore, not only did we do that, but when I found that exorbitant prices were being charged the British Government or the Canadian Government, I used my best endeavours to have these prices reduced to what was fair and -reasonable. At the time I am speaking of, the prices being paid for picric acid, as I was informed, were exorbitant, and an effort was made in England by members of the British Government to have those prices reduced by bringing in other competitors. The re-
[Sir Sam Hughes.!
suit was, not that this gentleman sold anything, but that he forced the parties who had been negotiating with the British Government to reduce their prices down to lower and proper figures. That is what I had in my mind when I stated that through the instrumentality of this gentleman millions upon millions had been saved to the British Government; because it is well known in this House that I have been asserting from the beginning of this war, that	if the war is
going to be won, it is going to be won by dollars and cents and munitions. Flesh and blood cannot run up against steel and shrapnel shell and high explosives with any hope of winning the war. Therefore I have maintained from the start, I maintained it long years ago

and I in consequence incurred odium and the enmity of certain gentlemen in Canada-that this war was coming on, and that it was our duty to get ready when commodities were cheap. I realized that Germany had every warehouse, within her borders filled from cellar to garret with rifles and munitions of war, and that is borne out by the facts, for they have not yet caught up to those supplies which they had made before the beginning of th6 war. I pointed out that they had these munitions made cheaply, -and that 'the nations that fought them would have to produce their supplies in a hurry, with unskilled labour, and under very adverse conditions, and that the prices which would be paid by the British, the French, and the colonies, would of necessity be abnormal, being those of war-time. I declared then that every dollar that could be husbanded should be husbanded in order that the final result of victory for liberty might be assured. I had therefore no hesitation in endorsing our saddlery men, our shirt manufacturers, our boot manufacturers, our clothing manufacturers, our producers of every kind in Canada, who had commodities to sell and who could provide these commodities for the British Government at fair prices.
The hon. member for Richmond in the course of his speech was asked some questions :
Sir Robert Borden: Is the hon. gentleman reading from an agreement or from a brief?
Mr. Kyte: I am reading from a statement I have prepared.
Sir Robert Borden: Would he be good enough to send over any of the agreements he may have read as he finishes with them?
Mr. Kyte: I will send over everything that the right hon. gentleman is entitled to have from

me. The Munitions Board is not very ready to give us information; I do not think we should hesitate to stand upon our rights in regard to this matter.
Sir Robert Borden: I was not asking the hon. gentleman to depart from any rights. I was merely asking, as a matter of courtesy, if he would have any objection to sending over the agreement he has read.
Now, they say that an equivocation is worse than a falsehood.
Mr. Kyte: We have sent over one document already.
If the inference from that is not that he was reading from an agreement, I do not understand the use of the English language. Further on he speaks of a contract with the Electrolytic Metals Company, of which I never have heard that I am aware of; and then he goes on to say:
I have here a summary of the amount that was actually divided between Yoakum, Lignanti, and Allison.
' Then he went on to read a list of commissions that, I understand, turned the head of the House of Commons, the figures were so magnificently large. All rainbow! I am assured by my counsel, who has been in New York awaiting my arrival, that he has examined these, and that not one dollar of this stuff has ever been divided or ever will be divided.
After referring to a contract with one of the ammunition companies, in regard to which I know nothing, the hon. gentleman speaks'of the Edwards Valve Manufacturing Company, a matter that will come before the commission, and then he goes on:
Out of a contract negotiated between the Canadian Vickers and Allison for 500,000 rifles, known as the Allison Southern rifle deal -for $8,500,000, Yoakum and Allison receive $625,-
000.
I am informed that it is unlikely that one dollar was ever received by them, or that one dollar will ever be received by them. He says:
Then, out of a contract negotiated between the Canadian Vickers and J. W. Allison to sell 140,000 rifles, and known as the Allison Southern Rifle deal, Allison and Yoakum receive $1.25 per rifle, or $175,000, less one-eighth paid to Lignanti.
Not one dollar has ever been received or ever will be received. And yet a gentleman, representing a free constituency in the Dominion of Canada, knowing that he had no data whereon to make these -statements, stands up here and makes to this House and this country these abominable misstatements.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Order. I am afraid the hon. gentleman is exceeding the rules of debate.


Samuel Hughes: I accept the ruling. I retract the word " abominable." The hon. gentleman goes on to refer to a contract for 2,500 tons of picric acid, which, he figures, paid a commission of $262,500. Not one dollar was ever contracted for, not one dollar was ever received for this contract. This House and this country are told that these men pocketed these huge sums, and there is not a particle of truth in the statement.
Then, the Finance Minister (Sir Thomas White) speaks. They even wakened him up with the sound of these big figures-and he does not deal in small sums. They roused him from his slumbers, and he asked a question:
Sir Thomas White: Would my hon. friend state the contracts from which these commissions are to be derived?
And the answer of the hon. member for Richmond followed, and will be found at page 2378 of Hansard:
Mr. Kyte: I have read them.	,
-Sir Thomas White: Are they contracts of the Shell Committee?
Mr. Kyte: Not all of them.
Sir Thomas White: My hon. friend will realize the difficulty of following such a complicated statement as this.
I should think so.
Sir Thomas White:	Does my hon. friend
suggest that the commissions to which he has been referring are to be derived under contracts with the Shell Committee?
Mr. Kyte: Not all- of them; I think there are three with the Shell Committee.
The hon. gentleman (Mr. Kyte), as reported at page 2380, says:
The hon. member for Carieton found fault not only as to non-deliveries, but as to the prices being exorbitant and altogether unjustifiable.
Let me point out that there is only one firm on tlhe continent of North America that has been able to compete with these two firms that began under such adverse conditions. I have read the great list of other firms that have not yet delivered one solitary fuse. And as to the prices, so far as the No. 80 British fuse is concerned, the hon. gentleman cannot find a firm in the United States or Canada to take a contract and guarantee deliveries, in lots of a million, at the price accepted by these concerns. The American fuse is 75 cents to $1 cheaper than the No. 80 British fuse-these are time fuses I am speaking of. In regard

to the graze fuse, the No. 100 detonating fuse, I have nothing to say; I never heard of it definitely until after the contract was made. When the original order came from the British (Government, an agreement had been made, as already referred to in this House, for these fuses. They had no detailed, (specific plans for the No. 100 fuse. They knew that the price in Great Britain was nearly $4-something like $3.60 or $3.72. I do not know anything of the details, hut am merely giving an explanation to the House as I have it; and it was found that this detonator or No. 100 fuse could be made somewhat more cheaply, and it is being made somewhat more cheaply to-day.
When in England I read an extract from a German paper relating to present conditions. The Germans claim that since the outbreak of the war they have added a population of 55,000,000 to their domain. They claim that they have annexed Belgium almost entirely, the northern portion of France, nearly all of Russian Poland, nearly all of Galicia, and all of Servia; that Bulgaria is with them and also Montenegro, Roumania, the Adriatic provinces, and Albania, and that they have formed an alliance with Turkey. I had the honour years ago in this House of Commons of pointing out that that was the ambition of Germany, namely, to rule from the North sea and the Baltic to the Adriatic, the Aegean, and the Euxine. They have seized and they control to-day all the vast resources, agricultural, mineral, and manufacturing, of those countries that I have named. They control the rich industries and mines of Belgium and of France, at Lille, Armentieres, and all those great industrial centres which our boys can see every day from the trenches. In Russian Poland they have possession of vast mines and manufacturing establishments. In Galicia they control very rich oil fields and the other industries there. In Servia they have abundance of copper from the mines there. Bulgaria, with her vast resources, is with them, and I see from recent statements in the press that Roumania has come to an agreement to furnish Germany with millions of tons of farm produce. Every day, they claim, the grandest railway train in the world runs from Berlin to Constantinople, and the vast resources of the Turkish Empire, in men, materials, and produce, are at their disposal. Every morning shows that the German submarines are not idle, and the commerce of the Allies is dis-

appearing from the face of the waters. Such is the situation, according to the Germans. Yet, after an absence of four or five weeks, I find, on my return to Canada, that two hundred of the ablest men in this country, members of the House of Commons, instead of being out helping on the cause, are sitting here listening to piffle of that description.


Wilfrid Laurier: Mr. Speaker,
I have just one word to say in regard to the facts and materials which have been presented to the House by my hon. friend the Minister of Militia. When my hon. friend left for England the motion which I had made asking for an investigation into all the operations of the Shell Committee was still pending before the House. The Government had from the start taken the attitude that this investigation shouid not be granted and that they would not, for reasons with which the House is familiar;, favour such an investigation; in fact, that they would oppose it. But, when my hon. friend from Richmond (Mr. Kyte), in the course of the debate, after my hon. friend had left for England, brought to the attention of the House contracts made by the Shell Committee with two American concerns, which the hon. member for Richmond characterized as mushroom companies, for the manufacture of some 5,000,000 fuses at a price of $4.50 each, and stated that the approval of this contract had attached to it the signature of my hon. friend the Minister. of Militia, the Government thought that they would, at all events in so far as that operation was concerned, change their attitude and grant a commission of investigation. .The Prime Minister informed ns two days afterwards that he had advised His Royal Highness the Governor General that a commission should be appointed, and that he had communicated with the Minister of Militia asking him to return at once. The situation in the eyes of the Government, therefore, was very grave, inasmuch as it necessitated the return of the Minister of Militia. When the hon. gentleman came here to-day, as the commission had been granted, as therefore his conduct in this matter was to be investigated in the terms laid down by the Order in Council, we expected that my hon. friend would explain his connection with it; that he would inform the House how it had happened, what were his intentions, what were his motives, and what he had in mind when he made those contracts. My hon. friend has

to-day discussed almost everything connected with the motion which was pending when he left, and which has been disposed of since, but he has said very little about his connection with those contracts for time fuses. He has not chosen to explain the circumstances under which the contracts were given. In fact, if I have understood him correctly, he has rather hinted that the contracts had been made without his participation. If that inference is correct, he has not explained to us how his signature and his approval is attached to them. The only reference which he made to the contracts was to explain why he had given them to two foreign firms, the information being that Canadian manufacturers had been urged again and again to enter upon the manufacture of fuses and shells and that they would not do so. He insisted that he was in a manner forced to go to the United States because the Canadian firms had been deaf to his repeated appeals in that regard. That is a' matter for investigation. But, Sir, my hon. friend has chosen to go into other contracts-steel, boots, shoes, Colts revolvers, and so on.
I have to express my regret that he did not think it advisable to refer also to a contract which has been brought forward prominently in the press with regard to the disposal of small ammunition It has been alleged in the press that his department has sold fuses and cartridges, manufactured by the Government for the benefit of the country, to a private firm. This matter is in the air to-day, it is demanding attention, and I am surprised that my hon. friend did not refer to it, since 'he chose to go into other matters than this one.


Samuel Hughes: I shall be more than delighted, at any time, at any place, in this House or out of the House, if my hon. friend wants any data on that subject, to give him everything he wants.


Wilfrid Laurier: If that was the intention of my hon. friend, he has lost a fine opportunity of carrying it out. The information is desired not only by myself. The press has talked about it and has given the views of the community on the subject-not only the Liberal press, hut the Conservative press as we'll.


Samuel Hughes: I must say that I never heard of it.


Wilfrid Laurier: It may be;
I assume that mv hon. friend has not heard
it. At al'l events, if that is the case, he will have an opportunity of giving an explanation. At this moment I do not want to deal with the matter in any way; it is not fair for me, or for the hon. gentleman, or for the House, that the matter should be discussed to-day.
I regret that my hon. friend has gone into matters which will come before the commission. But one statement particularly struck me in the references made by my hon. friend, and with regard to it I think the House is entitled to some information. My hon. friend told us that it is not his intention to act as Minister of Militia pending this investigation, and that he is turning his department over to the Prime Minister. I should like to ask my right hon. friend the Prime Minister to inform us what is the exact condition of things- whether or not my hon. friend the Minister of Militia is still in the Government, and, if he is in the Government, why he is not administering his own department?


Right Hon.   S@: The Minister of Militia is still a member of the Government. He has asked me to undertake the administration of his department while he is occupied with the investigation which has been granted, at the instance of hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House. Has my right hon. friend concluded his remarks?


Wilfrid Laurier: I have.


Robert Laird Borden: I desire to say that, with regard to the matters to which the right hon. gentleman has alluded, and which are now under investigation, the Minister of Militia and Defence has assured me that he not only desires, but intends that the investigation shall be full and complete to the end, and that he is prepared from now henceforth to place his time at the disposal of that commission in order that the most searching investigation may be made. I sent a telegram on Friday last to Sir William Ralph Meredith, which I communicated to the Hon. Mr. Justice Duff-I had heard that the commission had not been organized-desiring them to undertake the organization of the commission and to proceed with the inquiry at the earliest possible moment. I received a telegram in reply from Sir William Ralph Meredith, on Saturday I think it was, informing me that the commission would meet to-morrow and would then organize and continue the investigation

with every possible expedition until it is completed.
I do not know that there is anything further in the observations of my right hon. friend that demand comment at the moment, except this: The Minister of Militia and Defence had had no previous opportunity of making reply in respect of certain matters with which certain hon. gentlemen on the other side sought to oonnect him. Many allegations were introduced with regard to enormous profits supposed to have been made by Mr. Allison, which were not connected, so far as I am aware, with the Shell Committee, or with the Minister of Militia and Defence, or with the Government in any shape, form, or manner whatsoever. The allegations of the hon. member for Richmond were entirely new to me in respect of nearly all these matters, but they were introduced in such a way as to endeavour to connect the Minister of Militia and Defence with the supposed enormous profits. Therefore, notwithstanding the criticism of my right hon. friend, I think it was a perfectly proper thing for the Minister of Militia to make .the observations which he did make in reference to the supposed contracts in order to dissipate the idea that he had any connection with them, or that any such contracts were, as a matter of fact, ever made, or any such profits ever realized. It seemed to be the object of hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House, at a most critical time in the history of this country and of the Empire, to swell up an enormous sum of supposed profits, and by veiled insinuation to connect the Minister of Militia and Defence with them. I am free to say that there never was a Royal Commission recommeded and granted, for inquiry into the conduct of a minister of the Crown, that was based on such slender and slight foundation of charge or assertion as the Order in Council and the commission issued in pursuance of it in this case. In recommending that course to Hie Royal Highness the Governor General, I went beyond the pledge that I had given to the House. I went beyond that pledge because I realized the impression which hon. gentlemen on the other side of the House were endeavouring to create by suggestion and insinuation, and .because I was determined that these insinuations should be probed to the bottom. Let me assure my right hon. friend and gentlemen on the other side of the House that they will be probed to the 
bottom by this commission, and that no effort on the part of this Government will be wanting to that end. In making that assertion to this House I am expressing the determination and conviction of every one of my colleagues, and especially of the Minister of Militia and Defence himself. To-morrow this matter will proceed before the tribunal which has been selected, and while that investigation is being carried out the Minister of Militia and Defence will give his whole time and his whole energies to the investigation of the facts and the determination of the truth. I am prepared, at his request, although it is a very great burden in addition to responsibilities already sufficiently onerous, to undertake to give my attention to the affairs of hie department in OTder that the efforts of this country in doing its part in the'great conflict which the Empire is carrying on may not be stayed and that our great common cause may not suffer from lack of attention or effort in that department. That is the whole situation, which we expose frankly and without any hesitation to the members of this House and to the people of this country.


Mr. E. M. MACDONALD:: (Pictou): At the request of my hon. friend the junior member for Halifax (Mr. A. K. Maclean), who was forced to leave the House and who was mentioned by the Minister of Militia in connection with a conversation the minister had with him previous to his going to England, I desire to state that the Minister of Militia had spoken to the hon. member for Halifax and asked him whether he thought the Opposition would agree to allow him to get his Estimates through quickly in order tp enable him to leave for England. Be replied to the hon. Minister of Militia that he could not tell him, and suggested that he should see the leader of the Opposition. He affirms that he made no undertaking with regard to any matter as a result of that conversation. I desire *to say with regard to myself, for the hon. Minister of Militia mentioned my name, that the minister spoke to me with regard to his going to England.
He discussed with me certain matters ' which I need riot mention here, and he asked me whether I would see the right, hon. leader of the Opposition in regard to the question whether any matters would come up affecting him. I told him I would not see the right hon. leader of the Opposition; that,, if he desired to hold,any comt

munieation with those upon this side of the House in regard to any matter of that kind, he would have to see the leader of the Opposition himself, and I was aware that he did so.
I understood the Minister of Militia to say, in response to my leader, with reference to the question of small arms ammunition, that he was prepared to deal with that question. I would ask him to take occasion to deal with that question at an early day, as there has been some slight difficulty in getting information in regard to the matter in his absence.	.


Samuel Hughes: I will remove every difficulty, and the hon. gentleman's most ardent wishes shall be gratified. So far as concerns the tittle-tattle of discussion between the hon. junior member for Halifax (Mr. Maclean) and myself, that is nothing. I had already seen the leader of the Opposition when I saw the junior member for Halifax; but that does not matter. The gentlemen were very courteous; I am not finding the slightest fault. The leader of the Opposition said that, so far as he was concerned, he knew of nothing coming up, and he was very nice. The hon. member for Pictou (Mr. Macdonald) was also very nice; I was delighted with him for once in my lifetime.



D'EATH OF PRIVATE D. CURRY.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. KYTE:: I desire to call the attention of the Acting Minister of Militia to some complaint with respect to the illness and death of Private Dugall Curry, at St. Joseph's hospital, Glace Bay, during the past week. It is alleged that Private Currie did not receive the medical treatment he was entitled to from the medical officer in charge of his regiment, and it is alleged that, owing to that neglect and the consequent delay in receiving medical treatment, his illness was increased and possibly his death resulted. I should be glad if the acting minister would make inquiry.


Mr. KEMP:: I will draw the attention of the Prime Minister to the matter and he will likely give an answer to the hon. gentleman to-morrow.



RECRUITS FOR THE ROYAL NAVY.

[Stage Direction]
On the motion of Sir Thomas White (Minister of Finance) for Committee of Supply:
Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I wish to direct the attention of the Minister of the Naval Service to an article in to-day's issue of the Montreal Daily Mail. This House will recall that, at an early period of the session, I ventured to press upon the attention of the House the fact that it is very desirable that in this great war Canada should play some part upon the sea as well as upon the land. I felt that, coming from a portion of the Dominion where our men were accustomed to following vocations on the sea, it would be more easy to obtain men who would volunteer for naval service than to obtain volunteers for service on the land. I see in the Daily Mail a despatch from Ottawa to the effect that the English Government have asked the Canadian Government to take steps to recruit men for service in the navy, and that a deputation, headed by Lord Alfred Guinness, is on its way out from England to interview the Government with regard to this question. It was urged by -hon. gentlemen opposite, when I mentioned the matter, that such a thing as recruiting men in Canada to serve in the navy would be entirely unnecessary, that they were not required, that England did not need in her navy any one from this country. Will the Minister of the Naval Service tell us if this despatch is correct, and if it is the intention of this Govern. ment to proceed to call for recruits to serve in the British Navy?	,


Hon. J. D. HAZEN (Minister of the Naval Service):: Mr. Speaker, -some time
ago, when I spoke to the motion for papers referred to by my hon friend, I referred to the fact that the British Government had asked us if we could obtain the enlistment of about 200 men capable of taking charge of motor boats. They asked us to have it made known that they would enlist a certain number for that purpose, and to receive applications; and they said they would send out a commission from the Admiralty to make selections from the number offering. We have done that. We have advised the Admiralty of the fact and we are informed that the Hon. Rupert Guinness and another gentleman are now on their way here to consult us in regard to that matter. I may say further that they have intimated that they are willing, if we can get volunteers for the purpose, to take into the British navy a certain number of men who would enlist at the British rate of pay and subject to British conditions. That infor-

mation was furnished to us only within the past few days, and we are now taking steps to make that fact known so that any of our seamen who are anxious to enlist in the British navy will be able to make application to, us, and when the Hon. Rupert Guinness arrives here the matter will be submitted to him. I suppose that the newspaper item to which my hon. friend refers is something along that line, but I have not yet seen it.


Hon. WILLIAM PUGSLEY:: As my hon. fri'end from Pietou will not have another opportunity to speak, I shall read the despatch which appears in the Montreal Daily Mail. It is a despatch from Ottawa as follows :
Canada to recruit for British Navy.
Ottawa, April 17.-The British Admiralty wants recruits in Canada for the navy and a recruiting party headed by * Hon. Rupert Guinness is on its way across the Atlantic. The party will be in Ottawa in the course of a few days. Only seafaring men are required as recruits and the rates of pay, pensions and separation allowances will be those in force in the Royal Navy.
It is expected that the Canadian Patriotic Fund will take care that the emolument to the dependents of the Canadian sailors will be made up to the standard of the militia.
The limit of age is 40 and the period of engagement will be the duration of the war. Persons resident in the maritime provinces who wish to join should as a preliminary step send their names and addresses to the Superintendent H.M.C. dockyard, Halifax; those resident in British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan to the Superintendent H.M.C. dockyard. Esquimau, and those in the remaiing provinces to the Secretary Department of Naval Service, Ottawa.
Beyond the regular naval service the recruiting party wants recruits for the auxiliary patrol service of the Admiralty. This is a motor boat service which has turned out to be one of the most valuable of the navy.
That information would seem to be somewhat more definite and autheni'c than the remarks of the 'Minister of Marine and Fisheries would lead one to suppose. It would rather seem as though some one in Ottawa, probably connected with the department, had more information as to the mission upon which these gentlemen are coming from England than my hon. friend the Minister of the Naval Service himself.


John Douglas Hazen: It is exactly the information which I have given the House.


William Pugsley: No. While the Minister of the Naval Service puts the idea of recruiting sailors for the Admiralty as secondary to the question of getting men to man motor boats, this article puts the

question of recruiting for the navy ahead as being the supreme matter in regard to which this commission is coming from England and the question of manning motor boats is one of ah entirely secondary character.
* While upon my feet, I wieh to express my regret at the half-hearted way in which the Minister of Naval Service speaks of the idea of recruiting Canadians for service in the British navy. He says that any persons desirous of entering the Admiralty service will be requested to send in their names, and will be given an opportunity of serving. I think that from the beginning of the war this Government has been remiss in its duty in not encouraging our young men to offer their services to the British Admiralty. Of course, we on this side of the House have always been in favour of starting a Canadian navy, which would be of assistance both to Canada and to the Empire. Failing that, I think, as many other hon. gentlemen on this side of the House think, that this Government ought to have taken hold of the question in a whole-hearted and enthusiastic manner. We have thousands, scores of thousands, of young men in Canada, living on the shores of the Great Lakes, who are accustomed to navigation; thousands of young men upon, the coasts of both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans; thousands of young men engaged in the . fisheries, who would be delighted to have an opportunity of entering the service of the Admiralty. But, from the very beginning of the war until now, they have received no encouragement, and to-day the remarks of my hon. friend the Minister of Marine and Fisheries are made in a halfhearted way. He says that if the British Government want our young men, and they want to go, they will be allowed to go; that permission will be given to them to serve the Empire in this splendid service. I do not think that that is the right spirit in which this question should be approached. This Government should have entered into an arrangement with the British Government to enable our young men to receive in the naval service pay commensurate with that which our young men serving in the army are receiving, and should have encouraged them to enter the Admiralty service. It should always be borne in mind that our young men, engaged in the naval service of the Empire would be engaged in the service of Canada, for Canada is almost in the centre of the Empire, and what benefits the Empire

benefits Canada. Every effort has been put forth, with enthusiasm and with zeal, to encourage our young men to serve in the army; but no similar effort has been made to encourage them to serve in the navy, and that is a branch of the service in which, as I have said, many thousands of our young men would feel it an honour to serve.
I am glad that hon. gentlemen opposite are coming to reason. Perhaps the minister will allow me to say, without offence, that I trust they will wake up to the necessities of the situation. We know how hampered this Government has been.. I know what has hampered it, and every member of this House, and the people of this country, know what has hampered it in regard to doing anything to assist in the naval service of the Empire. They know that this Government pledged itself before the elections of 1911 to abstain, as far as possible, from having anything to do with the naval service of the Empire. I trust that the gentlemen who are coming from England will be able to do something to wake the Government from its lethargy, so far as this important branch of the service is concerned, and that something really beneficial will result from the efforts of the committee who are proposing to visit Canada.



CANADA'S TRADE AND COMMERCE.

[Stage Direction]
On the motion for Committee of Supply:
Sir GEORGE FOSTER (Minister of Trade and Commerce):: I am going to ask the House this afternoon, before taking up my Estimates, to listen to a short statement which I think may be of some interest in connection with the trade and commerce of the country. I am not making any apology for asking the House to listen to me for a few moments on this matter, as I think it is one of very great importance, and one to which, probably, neither side of the House has devoted that amount of time, energy, and attention which 224 representatives of Canada, comprising business men, men of capacity, men of influence, men of ripe and extended views, men of great experience in commercial and business matters, might have found it profitable to devote.
I do not believe that any of us in this House, or that any one in the country quite appreciates the tremendous transition which is to take place in this country some time soon when war ceases ,and peace commences, a transition rendered necessary because



REVISED

[Stage Direction]
of the diversion that has taken place along certain lines since the war began. At the risk of repeating something of the sentiments, if not the words which I have already expressed in this House, I am going to call the attention of the House to a few prominent features of the situation.
What has happened in this country since August, 1914 ? The happenings have been gradual and, therefore, they have not impressed themselves upon our minds with the same force as if, instead of being gradual, they had come suddenly. But they are none the less important and none the less grave because they have been gradual.
TJp to the present time, 300,000 5 p.m. adults have been drawn from the fields of industry, from the factory, the business house, the farm, the mine, and the fisheries. These have been abstracted from productive work in these lines, and if this war continues for a year, or a year and a half more, 500,000 adults will have been been abstracted from productive work in this country. Now, if the Minister" of the Interior had come to this House two years ago and stated that he could promise that within a year there would be an immigration into this country of men like ourselves, representing an addition of 250,000 adults to the working forces of Canada, he would have made a statement such as had never been made in Canada, or in any other country in the world. And if he had followed that up with the statement that in the succeeding year there would be an immigration of men like ourselves, knowing our institutions, understanding our laws, familiar with our social, intellectual, and moral habits, adding in the course of two years 500,000 working adults to the productive power of this country, that would have been a statement surpassing in interest and gravity the one to which I have just alluded. But does it make any difference whether the statement shall be made in that form or shall be in the inverse form, that in two years during which this war shall have been carried on 500,000 adults shall have been abstracted from the productive forces of this country? That is the first point to consider and it is one which I would like the country to consider very carefully.
More than that, during those same two years som-filling else has been taking place. There has Deen a diversion from productive, beneficent labour into lines of labour and work which are not beneficent and productive, but which are malefficient and hurtful. Tens upon tens of thousands of

[Stage Direction]
men have been diverted from normal and beneficent, productive work in this country and have been set to the work of making munitions of war for the purposes of the destruction of life and property. In this destruction of life and property, the only redeeming thing which can be said about it is that they are defending the life and liberties of the Empire and fighting for the cause of human freedom and liberty. But from the economic point of view, my argument stands that this diversion has taken place. Something more has taken place in that time. Not only has there been this diversion and abstraction of productive labour, but there has been no compensating inflowing current of immigration. To a young country like our own, a country situated as Canada is, that is one great source of growth and advancing strength and prosperity. Outside of the natural increase, and coming from suitable sources, the strength and prosperity of the country are enhanced by an inflowing population, adults and others, which mingles itself with, and becomes co-operative in the production and development of the country. For these two years of, war a very small amount of that current has flowed in and Canada is bereft of the invigorating and progressive force and enterprise which are derived from such sources. But, in addition, capital and equipment and capital for the purposes of equipment have been diverted to and employed in the work of making munitions of war and therefore is not employed in normal productive industries. This is a factor which has also to be reckoned with. In addition, financial conditions will have been so changed that when peace comes we shall be met with a different situation as regards enterprise and industry from that which existed before the war. Money will be harder to get, interest will be higher, the cost of Government and of administration will be enhanced and all these are factors in the obtaining of capital and in the working out of enterprises for which capital is necessary.
Now, you 6ay that this labour, or a great deal with it, will return. Let us consider some factors in regard to this. Of these 500,000 adults who will have gone from our country some, unfortunately, will never return. That will foe human energy entirely lost to this country. Another considerable portion of those who return will be totally, or partially, disabled and will therefore be, in one way, a 
burden which we will all love to bear, but yet an economic burden upon the country; or they will be reduced in point of worth and efficiency in the productive work of the country. The men who come back after two years of the life in the trenches, with all the strain, the nervous and physical shock, the endurances and privation of war, will be different from the men they were before they went to the war. Wil'l these men quickly settle down to normal operations? Will they be as effective as they were before? Any way there will be a period, more or less lengthened, during which there will be a process of adaptation and of change from the old- though it is only two years old-to the new and something like the normal conditions that preceded it.
Now, this is just a rough statement of the facts upon one side of the case. Are we thinking about this situation which faces us when the war stops? The moment the war stops the doors of every munition factory will be closed and the help that was gathered, and which worked therein, will have to find some other employment. When the munition factories stop, the thousand and one subsidiary operations which spread themselves through the length and breadth of the country, connected by more or less subtle threads with the dominant work of forming munitions of war, will also come to a standstill, and these two working together will bring about a period during which reversion to normal, adaptation to circumstances as they then exist, will eat up time, will confuse and disturb energy and will have its effect upon the economic condition and development of the country. These are the things that face us. , Whilst we are glad to see the munition works doing their part in supplying the Empire with that which is necessary, whilst we are glad to have the money which comes as a sequence to the employment, yet all this is not beneficent and productive work and when it stops-yes, before it stops-well before it stops-the people of this country should be putting on their thinking caps, sizing up the situation and getting ready for the inevitable and important change that is to come. The first duty of this House and of the people of the country is simply to face that situation, to get right down before it, face it, think it out and be prepared with plans and organization as to what shall be done when the time arrives. That is the first duty of us all. In the next place,
I

will you allow me, Mr. Speaker, to call your attention to another phase of the question, and that is: what are the practical things that can be done and to what extent are we doing these practical things?
And now I make an acknowledgment to the House: that is, that I feel the duty and necessity of saying a few words about my own department, the Department of Trade ahd Commerce. I have not projected that department nor myself before this House nor before the country; I have been very modest with reference to the work that was going on. I have come to the conclusion that I have been a little too modest and that maybe my department has not taken that place in the minds of hon. gentlemen to which it is rightly entitled. I do not speak in this way from any personal vanity, or any personal regret; but I would like the people of this country and ihe members of this House to know something of what we really have been doing; and I speak in order that my department may not only have their sympathy but also their active help and co-operation. So, I know, Mr. Speaker, you will pardon the allusion that I am about to make to my own department.
One of the things that I think we ought to do, and may well do, is to take stock of the situation in Canada as it will probably tie when peace comee. What is it in the Dominion of Canada that we shall consume, that we shall find necessary for our daily wants? To what extent can that be produced in Canada, and to what extent must we depend upon outside countries for these supplies? First-and I am not going to labour the point, for I wish to finish my remarks by six o'clock-I think that the thing we ought to do is to sit down and take stock of the resources and of the wants of the country. And with this idea-that, knowing what we require, and knowing how much is produced by ourselves at the present time, and for how much of it we have to depend upon foreign countries, we may, in a business way, set ourselves as Canadiaip to the solution of the problem of our wants. And I think the most accurate statistics that it is possible to have on that subject should be within the departments in Ottawa, and more especially within my own department, and should be there for the use of the House and of the business men of the country-information, comprehensive, accurate and fresh, as the foundation for the active work of dealing with this problem.
The next thing I think it is necessary
189}
for us to do, and which my department is trying to do, and I think is pretty effectively doing, is to find out in what fields outside of Canada goods that are made in Canada, and the products raised in Canada, may find sale and consumption. There .are business enterprises and aggregations of capital which may better busy themselves with the home market of Canada, and with that only. There are other aggregations of enterprise and capital which may better busy themselves entirely in providing for the foreign markets. And there are other aggregations of capital and enterprise that may most economically combine both, and, making a base of the home market, extend their trade to the supply of foreign countries and thus diminish the incidence of overhead and general expenses upon their total trade. So, my department, while I have had charge of it-and as it commenced before, and I hope will continue-is particularly occupied with that problem.
Through what media? In the first place, we have the medium of the Trade Commissioners whom we now have in every important district of the United Kingdom, in the overseas dominions, and in such foreign countries as it has seemed best, up to the present time, to enter. These trade commissioners are, I believe I can say without exaggeration, doing their business on the whole excellently well, and some of them deserve all the praise that can possibly be given them for the energy, the capacity, and the success with which they are carrying on their work. These trade commissioners are diligently engaged, from the first of January to the thirty-first of December in every year, gathering information in the districts to which they are accredited and the areas to which their work applies. They are gathering that information judiciously, and not simply sending in anything which would make a paragraph or a report. They send in weekly and monthly reports, and these reports are carefully edited and published in our bulletin, and in that form sent out weekly to now some 6,000 or 8,000 of selected business men in the different parts of Canada. It has been a source of great gratification to me to receive the kind words and hearty endorsation of business men in every part of Canada, testifying to the interest with which these bulletins are regarded as welcome, helpful and profitable visitors to their offices and their homes. But the trade commissioners are assisted, and the scope of the whole system is widened by the privilege which we have,
[Stage Direction]
the right we have at the present time as Canadians, to call upon the commercial intelligence branches of the British consular service in every part of the world. These officials are not only instructed from the Foreign Office, but from the communications I have had, they are willingly and cheerfully throwing themselves into the work, and providing ua with such information as they think will be of use, such information as is asked of them by Canadian merchants and by my own department. So, special reports asked for by my department are obtained from all these countries upon special subjects, from the intelligence department of the British consular service. That gives us a much wider scope than if we had simply our own trade commissioners. Then, there are special and travelling commissioners. As the House will probably remember, I appointed a special commissioner to the West India Islands, who spent nearly a year and a half in those islands, went through them thoroughly, possessed himself of the information which was there to be obtained and which was particularly adapted for the purposes and the needs of Canada, and has lately published a report. I do not know whether all members of this House of Commons have seen it or not, but if any member would like to see it I would be glad to put it in his possession. It is a book upon the West Indies, and it embodies the result of his travels, his observations, and his advice with reference to trade.
William Pugsley: What is the name of the commissioner?


George Eulas Foster: Mr. Watson
Griffin. Within the last few months I have also had prepared a resume of the distinctive energies of Canada in production, both natural and industrial, a sort of vade mecum for our outside commissioners, people in foreign countries, British consuls and others into whose hands we put it, destined to answer this question: Is there anything that you want to know about Canada? If there is, here is a book in which you will find something in reference to it. If you want more information, you will know where to apply for it, and get it in detail.


Mr. LEMIEUX:: Can we get that book?


George Eulas Foster: That book has
just been put through the press, and members of Parliament will have a copy of it placed in their hands. It is not for general distribution in Canada; it is for the pur-

pose of helping and aiding our correspondents and business men in foreign countries who want to know for instance, where asbestos is found, and obtaining similar information in reference to any of the natural or the industrial products of Canada.	,
During the last year one of our best trade commissioners has spent five or six months in Russia, going through the country from west to east, from Petrograd to Vladivo-stock, and he has made his observations and gleaned his information from every part of that country. He has embodied that information in reports which have been published in the Bulletin, and those reports have been collected in a small volume. Today Mr. Just is in Petrograd as our chief trade commissioner in Russia, and within a few weeks another trade commissioner from Canada will take up his headquarters at Omsk, in the farther east; and those two gentlemen, with efficient .sub-workers at several points, will cover the Russian area in the endeavour to get information with reference to Russian trade and send it to us for distribution.
I have adopted a system of training subcommissioners. Young men who have gone through the universities, or through the colleges or the schools, who are well educated, and have shown excellence in certain lines of economic and business pursuits, have been taken into the department and have been trained in the departmental work so as to get the home view, as it were, of these matters-trained with reference to tariffs and customs regulations. They have then been given travelling commissions through different parts of Canada, under instructions to make for themselves a thorough examination into different lines of industries and businesses and report to the minister thereon. They have visited the exhibitions, the factories and the producing centres in order to get that information. After having passed through a drill of a year and a half or two years in that way, they are going to foreigk or outside fields. One of them, a graduate of McGill, wil'l be the commissioner at Omsk; another will take up a position in another district; and a third, a university graduate from Toronto and .a clever young man, is now studying the Italian language in connection with his drill in 'Canada, and I design him to undertake in Italy the work of getting that same information and of acting as our trade commissioner there.

This year, in response to an appeal from British Columbia, whose lumber interests were somewhat disorganized and confused, I asked the British Columbia people to pick out for me the man who they thought would be best suited for the work of travelling over the world in the interest primarily of Canadian lumber, with reference particularly to the western coast. They gave me their man, a university graduate, a vejy clever young man who had had training in forestry work in British Columbia. He is now making a tour of the world, commencing with the United Kingdom, and visiting France, Belgium-such part of it as is left-Russia, South Africa, India, China, Australia, New Zealand, and the South American continent. He is on the latter part of his travels, and his reports, full of information and of suggestions, have been, published in the Weekly Bulletin; and, when they have been finished, they will be collated in a pamphlet or volume by themselves. Not only has he been looking into the matter of lumber conditions and possibilities, but he has also had an eye to general trade conditions, and his reports have embraced that side of the question as well as the lumber side. In Great Britain I appointed a general trade commissioner, with a special knowledge of fruit questions, who works in collaboration with the agricultural department, and who is engaged in gathering information and sending us reports in reference thereto.
At the present time I am contemplating the sending of a special trade commission to the United Kingdom, to France and to Italy. These will be different from our trade commissioners. I am trying to select four or five business men of Canada- men of capacity, of practical experience, to a certain extent of expert knowledge in the different lines of industry to which they are or have been attached-who will form an honorary commission. Their expenses will be paid, a secretary will be provided for them, experts in different large lines of industry will accompany them; and their duty will be to'go to those three countries and look specially for new openings which are possible owing to the changed conditions brought about by the war, openings which would have been impossible two years ago, but which now, temporarily in certain cases, and permanently, I believe, in many cases, will be open to the industries and products of the Dominion of Canada. These men will make a thorough inquiry,
they will have the best opportunity for doing so, and they will prepare an exhaustive report on those fresh points of view which have come into exstenee within the last few months, owing to the problems and the conditions imposed by the war. That, I think, will be very important for this country, and the result will be very beneficial to the future expansion of our trade.
Then I have been for the last two years looking thoroughly into another branch of work in connection with the Department of Trade and Commerce, which, I think, is no less important, and which in the future will be of very great interest and benefit to us. I think the time has come in Canada when we should establish a bureau of commercial information, which shall stand in Canada as the clearing house for commercial and business information with reference to foreign countries and to our own country as well. I have looked into these commercial museums and bureaus of information in different countries. Perhaps the one I have in mind will be formed on a plan different somewhat from those that exist in Japan and in other countries, particularly in the United States, where the conditions are much on a parity with ours. I think I can better express my aim by reading the ideal placed before us in the establishment of a bureau of industrial information, and which when complete will:
1.	Answer all enquiries for information respecting commerce and industry, home and foreign-a. clearing house for commercial intelligence.
2.	Exhibit samples of home manufactures in actual and photographic form, and statistics thereof.
3.	Exhibit samples of goods in vogue for consumption in foreign countries of such kinds as might be made in Canada, and statistics related thereto.
4.	xExhibit samples of imported goods of such kinds as mighjt be made in Canada, with statistical information relating thereto.
5.	Exhibit samples of natural resources,
serving as material for manufactures, in Canada and in the Empire, with statistics relating thereto.	'
6.	Exhibit the .processes of manufactures and industries in Canada.
7.	Exhibit, in diagram, the resources, production, and trade of Canada; our lines of transport, internal and external.
8.	'Co-ordinate the scientific and engineering forces and factors of Canada along the line of research and technical re-

quiremeirts intimately connected with production and distribution.
One of the revelations of the war has been that there lie within the British Empire raw materials the command of which, when the war broke out, would have had a profound effect upon the progress and prosecution of the war. The Empire woke up to find that in many most important particulars its own raw materials were within the hand and clutch of the enemy, and were being and had been exploited by them, forming an important base of supply and a means for offensive action in the way of the manufacture of munitions, and thus tending to aid the enemy and injure the Empire. One thing that will come out of this war, I think, is that the various parts of the Empire will be drawn so closely together in economic interest and their minds will be so devoted to the development of the great estate within the bounds of the Empire itself that the best energy and enterprise and capital of the Empire will be mobilized for the exploitation of its own boundless resources of raw material, and these will be kept primarily for the use of the Empire, whatevei may be left over for other countries afterwards. So a part of the work of this bureau of industrial information will be the collection and description and representation of the raw resources of Canada and of every other part of the Empire.
Such a bureau as I mention would exhibit also the processes of manufacture and industry in Canada itself. To-day the stranger who visits our shores must travel from British Columbia to Sydney before he can get a visualized idea of what we make and how we make those things which we do produce. It is possible, with no very great expense, to have in this central museum, distinctly visualized to the visitor, whether he be from a foreign country, or from our own country, the processes of manufacture and industry in this country. Pictorial representation is in these times taking on the efficacy of a fine art. It is a wonderful co-operator and helper in getting together in small space what otherwise could not be seen without extended travel, much time, and great expense. This bureau will not be simply for people outside the country. Our own people in Canada have, in some cases, almost as little idea of what we do produce in this country as people from outside, and it would be a wonderful eye-opener and stimu-

lant to our people if they could pass in review occasionally something of the kind that I have tried to describe.
Then, there will be exhibited also in that establishment, in diagram, the resources and productions and trade development of Canada, and onr lines of transport, both internal and external. An attempt will be made to co-ordinate the scientific and engineering factors of Canada along the lines of research and technical requirements intimately connected with production and with distribution. I think this is of prime importance to us in Canada. There is today in our universities, in>
our colleges, in 'scientific societies, and in individual laboratories, excellent resources and ability for chemical research, for all that kind of research which transfers from the laboratory to the factory what is absolutely necessary for the factory at this time, and what will be more necessary for the factory when the period of unexampled competition comes within three or four or five years from now. Science, knowledge, and information are as essential to a well-ordered and successful business as they are to the profession of the doctor or the engineer or any scientific man. Germany's great point of vantage was that her technical and scientific instruction had advanced to such a pitch and had disseminated itself so widely that it worked itself into the very grain of Germany's production and made them the powerful competitors that they were. Britain, Canada. Australia and other countries must not merely take a leaf out of Germany's book; they must sit down before that question and solve it by bringing the aid of scientific research, of engineering capacity, of technical power and expertness into the region of the farm and the factory and the business establishment, and incorporating and. bringing together those essentials which ought never afterwards to be disjoined. Such a commercial bureau of information as I have attempted roughly and briefly to describe can, without any very great expense, be brought into existence in Canada, and prove of great help and of great instructive and stimulating power to the business and industrial life of Canada in the future.
Then, I think something else should be done, and should be done soon. It may be that 'I have been criticised' for not thinking that it should have been done sooner, for I have had many statements and suggestions made to me on that score. Men have written to me and men have said to me: What is your department doing all

this time? Should you not get people together, and should you not .have them thinking, making plans, mobilizing for the work of the future? Now, I looked upon that in a somewhat different light from some other people. My view was that there was a time at which such an attempt would have been premature. But things have developed by the very force of necessity. The work of Canada had first to be devoted to the furnishing of munitions iand war supplies. That took all the energy, and, for the time being, all the thought, all the enterprise, and all the capital, that could be got. The demand was less in normal lines, and consequently less enterprise could successfully be devoted to ordinary production. The time has now pretty well arrived when we can see far enough through the mists to enable us to make up our minds fairly well as to what future conditions will1 be, and hope has so far come into the dominant position as to lead us to think that we are getting somewhere near the end of this war. So I believe that now, outside of all these aids and all this work which we have been carrying on, outside of what the manufacturers' associations have been doing, outside of what boards of trade have been doing, and what individual business men in this country have been doing, the time has come when wrn ought to sit down together in council, and when the business men of this country ought to exchange ideas, formulate plans, and take measures to mobilize and systematize the industry, the business capital, and the business enterprise, which are to attack the problems of the future. So what I propose to do is this, within a reasonable time to call together a convention of the business men of Canada, from the Pacific to the Atlantic- men in every kind of business, the captains of industry, the experts in industry, the scientific men in industry, the engineering men in industry, the transport men, the banking and financial men representatives of all kinds of enterprises and industries; to have them sit down together in conference here in the city of Ottawa for three or four days in a heart-to-heart talk about these matters, and to come not unprepared to give definite views with reference to different phases of the great industrial and economic questions which are looming up before us, and which must be solved by us. At that convention I propose to have the report of this commission of which I spoke a while ago; and I propose to have here also the permanent Canadian trade commissioners in other countries, who are gathering information for this very purpose, and who will be on hand to give tha;, information to the people who are assembled.
That, in brief, outlines a line of action which, I think, may well be undertaken, and which my department is undertaking. For all of that I must ask this House for money. For all of that it is requisite that we shall have added ability. But added ability and money for purposes of that kind constitute a demand with which no reasonable man in this country will find fault. There is nothing outside of the problem of its defence, with which it is more necessary that this country should busy itself than the problem of production and distribution of products. That is the problem of trade and commerce, which must be founded on production, with which it is twin sister, and most intimately connected. I have been taunted sometimes with being too economical in my department. I believe in economy; I hate extravagance.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: I hate the idea of taking money from the people's pockets, putting it into the people's treasury, and then spending it for that which is nought and worse than nought.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: But I do believe that there is nothing which this House or this country, if reasonably asked, would deny to the departments and to the ministers who wish to engage in the kind of work where money goes to ite proper objective, and is actually needed.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: And where that proper objective is likely to result in benefit to the public interests.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: How my hon. friend rolls his sturdy form in front of me as I make that declaration, as if to say: "That is hard for you chaps on that side of the House." How was it for my hon. friend? The tu quoque argument is not worth a snap of your finger; but large men like my hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) sometimes use it and sometimes laugh it, and sometimes give it representation as my hon. friend has just done, as much as to say: "We on this side have never let money go aside the proper objective."


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: They know very well that they 'have. They know very-
, Mr. PUGSLEY: Just make a comparison.


George Eulas Foster: All the same, just as I state it I believe it. I have stated it before and I will state it again; and I do not think I come with an empty plea, or a plea that will be refused-


Mr. GRAHAM:: An empty treasury,
though.


George Eulas Foster: -by the House or by the country, when I ask that the coffers of the Trade and Commerce Department be a little more generously filled up than they have been. I leave you my administration in the past from 1911 up to the present time. The books are there, my reports are there, my work is there.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: And -all of you are quite welcome to go and examine every bit of it. I have not done all I have tried to do; I have not done all I wanted to do; but I have tried to manage my department in a fair, reasonable, and economical way.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


George Eulas Foster: But there comes a time when economy must be given a little different translation. That time has come now in my department, and I am going to ask my colleagues, and afterwards this House, to be a little more generous to my department for the next few years which are to come.


William Pugsley: Will they be in the sup-piemen taries?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, they will be in the supplementaries; that is where these things come. I have wearied the House probably longer than I should have done-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No, no; go on.


George Eulas Foster: -But I felt it my duty to lay these things before the House and to enlist the sympathy of men on both sides of the House in this matter; and if I can have the extreme pleasure of having hon. gentlemen on both sides of this House, after this brief sketch of what I propose to do, give me the benefit of their criticisms, I shall feel greatly indebted to them,

If something that I have in view now can be better done, let me have it. On this side the House, or on the other side, let us at least take up this question, a mighty and tremendous one, and one which I have very inadequately brought to the attention of the House. Let us take it up, put aside our party prejudices and our party shibbo-, leths for a moment, and come right down . to a good hearty committee-of-the-whole conference upon what is best to be done, and bow it can be done, under present conditions, in reference to the development and the distribution of our country's products.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I agree with almost every word my hon. friend has uttered this afternoon, but I would like him to supplement his remarks by declaring that the business commission which he is going to appoint and send abroad will be of a non-partisan character.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Pugsley: That is dissented from.


George Eulas Foster: I know that if I gave my hon. friend warning ahead it would be a shock to him, but he will see what the commission is to be when I announce the names.	,


William Pugsley: I have listened with a great deal of pleasure to my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce. He has certainly giyen us a very valuable and informative address. When he stated that he intended to enlist the sympathy of his colleagues as well as the sympathy of the other member's of this House I thought I would like to have a well-secured dictaphone under the council table when my hon. friend was pressing his colleagues support him, and especially when he was impressing upon them the necessity of economy in the other departments of the Government, in order that he might have a little more money to carry out the important projects which he has in view. There is the difficulty with the hon. Minister of Trade and Commecre; he never brings to bear upon his colleagues his great ability and what ought to be his surpassing influence. If he does we fail to see any results. My hon. friend has come to this House on more than one occasion and talked eloquently and forcibly of the necessity of economy. You, Sir, have heard him say in stentorian tones that he abhorred extravagance and believed in econ-

omy. How often has he told his colleagues that he abhorred extravagance and believed in economy? The Estimates brought down to this Parliament in these war times amount to the enormous sum of $189,000,000. Think of it, Sir, an estimated expenditure of $189,000,000 in a country with a population of about 8,000,000. Can we believe for a single moment that the Minister of Trade and Commerce can sit dumb while his colleagues are putting forward demands upon the treasury of this country for millions and millions of dollars? If my hon. friend had sought to use his influence-and he could use it if he tried-he ought to have been able to produce a different result, and it would not have been necessary for him to take a slap back at his colleagues twice during this session when he talked about economy and insisted upon the necessity of a .more rigid supervision over the expenditure of public moneys. In that veiled manner my hon. friend has made two strong attacks upon his colleagues in the Government.
At six o'clock the House took recess.
The House resumed at eight o'clock.


William Pugsley: I regret to notice that the questions which have been so ably presented by my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce do not seem to attract that attention on the part of hon. gentlemen opposite that one would expect. Therefore I would hardly hope, in view of the slim attendance of hon. gentlemen opposite, that the things which he has presented will command their very deep or earnest consideration. I had hoped that some one or more hon. gentlemen opposite would have taken advantage of the occasion to rise in" their places and express their views in regard to the proposed economies which have been so ably presented to the House by the Minister of Trade aim Commerce. I regret to have to observe that in my opinion he would find very little support from that side of the House. These young gentlemen -these young spendthrifts-who are sitting on the treasury benches beside my respected friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce do not seem to have the same regard for the sacredness of the treasury, or the necessity of saving public moneys, as has the Minister of Trade and Commerce.
The matters which have been presented are very important; but in this connection I cannot help observing that we have had
two extraordinary and rather contradictory speeches from the treasury benches this afternoon. My hon. friend the Minister of Militia and Defence (Sir Sam Hughes), in which I think I am quite right in describing as the extraordinary statement he made to the House, deplored the fact that Germany had been so siyjcessful in this war that she had added 55,000,000 of population to her dominions, that she had acquired a number of countries, such as Serbia, Poland and Galicia, and that now she had a splendidly equipped railway running from Berlin to Constantinople. The hon. gentleman appealed to the members of this House, in tones which seemed to show how deeply he was affected, and he deplored the fact that in this dreadful state of affairs two hundred members of this House were wasting time on such piffle as the question of the waste of some $80,000,000 in connection with the purchase of shells and the taking of large commissions in connection with the letting of the most improvident contracts which were given in the United States for fuses. He seemed to feel that the end of the war was by no means in sight, but that the question was so serious, that the representatives of the people should not be discussing questions which ordinarily would engage their attention, but that they ought to be overlooking the faults of the Shell Committee, the Minister of Militia, and the members of the Government, sacrificing their own views as to whether it is right and proper, and giving their whole assistance to the Government in carrying on the war.	v
My hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce, on the other hand, takes \a roseate view of the situation. He has a vision that enables him to see the end of the war. The hon. gentleman is so pleased with the prospect that he even contemplates calling together the business meii, manufacturers, and other classes of people of Canada in the very near future. He is going to have a great banquet in the city of Ottawa, I presume, in connection with the convention he proposes to hold. Well, it is a roseate view that my hon. friend seems to have, and I can picture the delightful time that they will have at that convention and banquet. It would be worth going 3,000 miles even to hear the eloquent speech which my hon. friend will deliver on that occasion.


Mr. REID:: Hear, hear.	,


William Pugsley: It certainly would.
I


An hon. MEMBER:: Hear, hear.


William Pugsley: While it is pleasant, in one aspect of the case, to find that the minister has such a roseate view of the future, there is one thing that is a little deplorable, and that is that the minister seems to have been touched with the microbe which has been afflicting the other ministers, and he feels now that we on this side of the House should join with hon. members on the other side of the House and encourage him to bring down Supplementary Estimates giving him all the money that he desires to carry out his roseate ideas. I am beginning to despair somewhat of even the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Has it not seemed pitiable that the minister should be seeking in all quarters of the world to advance the trade of Canada, that he should be educating young men from the universities, that he should be educating one especially, to advance the interests of Canadian trade and commerce in Italy, sending others to the West Indies, sending these gentlemen to all parts of the world to seek to secure trade for Canada, while right down here to the south of us, Sir, is a great country with a hundred million people affording to the people of Canada every opportunity for trade, every opportunity for the advancement and promotion of commercial intercourse that any people would desire, a country whose trade, so far as Canada is concerned, even durng the period that this Government have been in power, and when they have sought by every means at their command to hamper and prevent trade with that people, has yet advanced by leaps and bounds. In the year ended March 31, 1915, the trade of Canada with the people of the great republic to the south of us surpassed by about $170,000,000 the trade of Canada with all the rest of the world put together. What a marvellous showing that affords of how trade can be developed if you seek trade with people with whom you will naturally have commercial intercourse. Let me give the House the figures for the year ended March 31, 1915:
Total imports of Canada	$ 629,444,894
Total exports	 490.sus.877
Total foreign trade	 $1,120,253,771
The total trade of Canada with the United States during that year was $644,026,253, and the total trade of Canada with the rest of the world was only $476,277,518; so that we had about 170,000,000 more trade with the United States than with all the other countries of the world combined, Great Britain included. Yet, notwithstanding

these facts, the minister has not told us
to-night that he has done anything to encourage trade between Canada and the republic to the south of us. He has not told us what action this Government has taken with respect to that trade. If he had told us, it would have been a story of trying to-hamper trade instead of encouraging it. You know as I do, Mr. Speaker, that the great hope of this country depends upon the development of our fertile, wonderful Northwest. There in the three Prairie Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta you have a country which would make not one European empire but which is large enough and wealthy enough in resources to make three European empires. And yet, knowing, as these gentlemen do, knowing as in his heart the Minister of Trade and Commerce must know, that the best means of developing that country, the best means of getting immigrants into that country, the best means of enabling to grow up there a large and conltented population, is to give to the producers of the West free access to the markets of the great American republic, this Government has persistently refused to place upon the statute-books a law which would open the markets of the great country to the south of us to the farmers and cattle-growers of our western lands, a step which would be the means of advancing to a far greater extent the commercial development of this country than all the commissions and all the emissaries that my hon. friend could send to all the countries of the world. And yet they claim that they are in favour of increasing our trade.


Mr. BLAIN:: Does the hon. member think that the Canadian people made a mistake in 1911 when they voted against reciprocity with the United States?


William Pugsley: In my judgment they
did make a mistake. But the results have not been so disastrous to the people of Canada as they would have been had it not been for the fact that the Democratic party in the United States were victorious in the last election and to a large extent opened their markets to our people. As a result of this we are able to send our lumber into the United States free of duty, the duty on oats has been reduced from fifteen cents to six cents a bushel, the duty on cattle has been vastly reduced.


Mr. TURRIFF:: It has been taken off;
and the same with hogs.


William Pugsley: The duty has been taken off, and so has the duty upon hogs, as my hon. friend reminds me. The result has been that our exports to that country have been enormously increased and we have not felt the disastrous effects which would otherwise have come to the people of Canada as the result of their refusal to accept the agreement which had been made with the United States. Not only does this Government refuse to place upon the Statute Book a law which would admit United States' wheat and wheat products free of duty, and would thereby open to the people of Canada a free market for our wheat, but in the new tariff which last year they placed upon all products indiscriminately they imposed a heavy tax upon American products, and during the present session they went further, and, in respect of a most important part of the food supply, of which only some 200,000 bushels was imported into Canada-I refer to apples- they imposed a tariff against imports from the United States which is nine hundred per cent greater than the duty the United States imposes on the same article going from Canada into the American republic. In every respect these gentlemen have sought to hamper the trade which is natural to the Canadian people, the trade which could be most easily developed. They have been seeking in all quarters of the world, sending their emissaries across the Atlantic and across the Pacific to cultivate a trade difficult to obtain, while hampering and hindering that which is at our very doors. They forget that the inexorable law of supply and demand must make an enormous demand in the United States for Canadian products, a trade which has grown in the face of difficulties which have existed in the past. They forget that we have close to the Canadian border great cities such as Portland, Boston, Baltimore, Washington, Philadelphia, New York, Cleveland, Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Minneapolis, and St. Paul-and so I might go all the way to the Pacific ocean-where there are millions of people consumers of products who would be glad to obtain the products of Canada both of the East and of the West.
Well, my hon. friend has told about what he proposes to do, and has given us a very interesting story. It shows great effort, on paper. It shows that many stenographers have been employed in the arduous work he has had to do with; it shows great thought, and, so far as can be said of a scheme on paper, I do not know but that it
reflects great credit on the Minister of Trade and Commerce. And he has told us that he is in favour of encouraging industrial and technical education in this country. He has not said that in so many words, but he has told us how much good the chemist may do to advance production in Canada. Has he never heard of the report of the Commission on Technical and Industrial Education, a report made by most experienced men and strongly in favour of the very thing the hon. gentleman advocated this afternoon?-a report which was submitted to the Government shortly after this Administration came into power, but which they have not acted upon up to this moment, but have pigeonholed it, declining to bring it into operation. How long have they been in power? Judging by results, one would say they had been in power only a few days; but judging by the Auditor General's Report one can see that they have been in office for years, for they have left a record in the public expenditure which only a number of years would enable any. Government, however, extravagant to make. They have been in office for some four years, and not one single step they have taken to encourage in Canada industrial and technical education. The Minister of Trade and Commerce comes before Parliament this afternoon and suggests that it would be well to encourage the study of chemistry in Canada-as if he had never heard of the report of the Commission on Industrial and Technical Education. Would not you think that, instead of talking, instead of writing reports, it would be desirable to do something of a practical nature and to bring into operation some of these things which my hon. friend professed to be so anxious to see inaugurated in Canada?
But there is something else that he has forgotten. He did not give us one word about the important Economic and Industrial Commission of which his colleague, Senator Lougheed, is chairman, and which has been working for a number of months in an endeavour to solve the very problems which the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce, in his very eloquent speech of this afternoon, presented. That commission is housed in a mansion on Vittoria street, formerly the home of Mr. Manuel, one of Ottawa's millionaires. In this magnificent house they have been housed for a considerable period, and there, I am told, they have numberless clerks, and have already spent many thousands of dollars working on the very problem which the Minister of Trade and Commerce presented to us this

afternoon as entirely new. I think he had better consult with his colleague the President of the Council, the Hon. Mr. Lougheed, and not entirely ignore the work that this commission is doing. Heaven knows it is costing the country enough, but it is only one of the eighty odd commissions which this Government has appointed since it came into power. Surely my hon. friend, with his long experience and his great ability, ought to be able to work out such problems himself; or, if he cannot do that, he ought to be able to work them out with the assistance of his colleagues. But he is going to have a commission also to work at the same thing, and then, when he gets it organized, he is going to have this conference and a right good time right here in the city of Ottawa, and he is not going to wait until the war is over, because he now sees the end of the war in sight. My hon. friend has asked us to meet with him here in friendly intercourse almost as a joint committee of this House to talk these things over and endeavour to arrive at a decision as to what' will be best for Canada, but when the hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux) asked. him if he would treat the matter from a non-party standpoint there arose a buzz of protest from behind the hon. gentleman which prevented him from giving an assent to the proposition of my hon. friend from Rouville. Whether the war is on-or whether the war is not on, this Government is partisan first, last, and all the time, and we need not expect very much from it.
My hon. friend says that conditions are going to be very different after the war is over, and that we must get to work now and have these commissioners and have this conference, and, I suppose, have this banquet and talk this thing over. My own idea is that we should win the war first.
I would far sooner see the time of this House taken up in trying to expose wrongdoing and trying to prevent graft and the waste of millions upon millions of the money of the people of Canada and of the British Empire than in discussing theoretical questions which will not become practical until the war is over. My hon. friend has great fear, however, that the industries of Canada will be affected to a large extent by reason of 250,000 of our young men being taken from Canada to fight the battles of the Empire. My hon. friend aleo deplores the fact that while industries have been created, yet they are not being used for a good purpose, and *

*
says that ordinary industries are to promote the peace and happiness of mankind, while the industries which have been started in connection with the manufacture of munitions of war are really for the injury and the detriment of mankind. Was my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Com- t merce here when the Minister of Finance made his Budget speech, in which he spoke in glowing terms of the great increase which had taken place in the trade of Canada since the war began, of the wonderful development which had taken place, of the thousands of men who were being employed? The Minister of Finance fairly gloated over the present situation and said that to-day Canada was prosperous. One would almost think he would like the war to go on forever, because then Canada would have a flowing revenue and men would be employed and the taxes could be paid, because people would have the money coming in from munitions to enable them to pay the taxes. I rather agree with my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I think it is deplorable that this condition of affairs should exist, and we ought not to boast of what has been the result of it from a financial standpoint so far as this country is concerned, and we ought not to take pleasure or pride in it as the Minister of Finance and many other gentlemen on the opposite side did. Of course, it ought always to be remembered and pleaded in excuse and palliation for the Minister of Finance, that before the war broke out our industries from the Atlantic to the Pacific weTe paralysed, that men were out of employment; that the wheels of industry had stopped, that the factories had closed and the chimneys were smokeless, and that the war did start up new industries and did give employment to many people. I am not, however, one of those who despair of things righting themselves very quickly when the war is over, whether it should be over in the near future or at a somewhat later date. While it is true that many thousands of our young men will come back maimed and disfigured and incapable of taking their places in the industrial life of Canada; while it is true that many thousands more have already laid down their lives upon the battlefields of Europe and that many thousands more will, I fear, lay down their lives before this war is over; yet it should never be forgotten that the training which those thousands of young men have obtained and will obtain makes them better, physically

and morally, and when they come 'back they aTe likely to be better citizens than they were before they went away. There is no training which is better physically and morally for a young man than the training of a soldier, and I believe that when they do come back they will soon take their appropriate places in the industrial life of Canada, and that it will not take long to settle the problem which will face us in the future. I do not despair of our country rapidly going ahead again and soon Teaching the wonderful stride which it attained in the years when the party led by my right hon. friend who is now leader of the Opposition was in power. When he came into office there was great depression; but, by the adoption of energetic and progressive policy, the wonderful resources of our western country were made known to the people of the United States and of Europe, and it was not long before immigrants from the Old Land and from the new began to flock to Canada, not by thousands, not by tens of thousands, but by hundreds of thousands. We have in our western country the same rich lands that we have ever had. We not only have the millions of acres which have been settled upon, but in that country there are 'from seventy-five to a hundred million acres of land still unsettled, still belonging to the Crown, among the most fertile and most splendid land that can be found in any part of the world. And all that has to be done is for a Government progressive enough to take steps for the settlement of these lands, to make their wonderful advantages known to the people of the outside world; and when peace comes, immigrants will ag'ain come into ou country by the hundreds of thousands, as they came in the years gone by. That will bring prosperity, that will bring peace, that will *bring hope and inspiration, to the people of Canada. I, Sir, have no fears for what the future may bring forth, and I desire to repeat that, instead of indulging in those theoretical ideas which the Minister of Trade &nd Commerce seems to have in his bonnet, and for which he is asking the opportunity to spend money while the war is on, we should wait until the war is won, and then the people of Canada will soon adapt themselves to the situation, and you will see an era of prosperity again spreading over this country My hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce is going to have a great commercial bureau, situated in Ottawa. While I am not quite sure that that would not be
desirable at some distant time, I think that the matter of our voting unanimously, as the minister has suggested, a considerable sum of money at this late day in the session in order to carry out these ideas might very well be postponed until different conditions prevail throughout the country.
I had thought, Mr. Speaker, that my hon. friend would have had something more practical to present to us to-day than that which he has suggested. He knows that since this war began the necessity for a Canadian mercantile marine has increased week by week and month by month. He knows well-because he comes from a province where even the most ignorant are aware of this-that in the not distant past Canada was one of the great ship-building and ship-owning countries of the world. He knows that in the city of St. John, from which I come, it is not so many years since we could see at least 1,200 men working in the shipyards of Courtenay bay. He knows that shipbuilding was carried on up the St. John river, on the Kennebecasis river, on the north shore of the province, on the magnificent Miramichi river, where ships of the world, almost, could lie at anchor. He knows that the people there have the instinct for shipbuilding. He knows that if there is anything which the Empire requires to-day for its success in this war it is more vessels to carry the products of the overseas dominions to the markets of England and the Allies. He knows that, as a result of the destructive submarine warfare, the merchant marine of Great Britair has been declining to an alarming extent, and that upwards of 2,000,000 tons of mercantile shipping belonging to the Empire have been sunk. He knows that many people in this country outside of Parliament have been urging upon the Government the necessity of doing something for the promotion of shipbuilding. Yet, Sir, with this knowledge, my hon. friend comes to Parliament and talks about his emissaries, about his commissioners whom he is sending to all parts of the world to encourage trade and commerce, about the bureau which he is going to establish on behalf of Canadian industries, ahout the convention which he is going to have before long in Ottawa. He talks about all these things, but upon the great question in which the people of Canada and the people of the Empire are so vitally interested, my hon friend remains silent. When I ventured to bring this question to his attention a few days ago he told me that when he should come again with his Estimates he would ask our advice with

regard to ship-building. When my hon. friend intends to ask our advice, I do not know, but let me tell my hon. friend that unless this Government take hold of this important question at once and do something in a practical way for the encouragement of ship-building in Canada, they will be committing a crime against the people of this country and against the people of the Empire which no administration of the department, no matter how good that administration in other respects may be, can condone or expiate before the people. In the presence of the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, who would properly have this important subject in hand, I say that to-day Canadian ship-building is hampered as it should not be by the duties which this Government imposes upon engines, boilers and other machinery which enters into the building of ships. If he would remove the duties upon these articles and give reasonable assistance and encouragement to shipbuilding, it would not be many months before shipyards would be established in Canada, before many keels would be laid and many vessels turned out which would be an ornament to Canada and of material assistance to the Empire. I am not alone, Sir, in* this demand for the encouragement of ship-building. Hon. gentlemen opposite act as if they were under the impression that no man in Canada thought that shipbuilding should be encouraged or undertaken in this Dominion except my unworthy self. They act as if the words which I speak are not worth listening to, and they pay no heed to what I say. Let me tell them that they will hear before long the voice of the people of Canada demanding that they should take action. There is no reason why they should not take action. I have it upon the most reliable authority that if they would give proper encouragement, steel shipbuilding would be undertaken in the province of Nova Scotia. I know that there are people interested in shipbuilding, who, if reasonable encouragement were given, and the duties on machinery taken off, would engage immediately in the building of wooden vessels furnished with auxiliary power, which would be of enormous assistance in transporting food products from Canada tc. the markets of the old world. Sir, this Government have done nothing, in spite of the fact that the Minister of Trade and Commerce has seen the freight rates upon our wheat, upon our cattle, upou our 
lumber and upon everything which Canada has to send to the markets of the old *-.*olid going up month after month since the war began, until to-day the carriage of these products costs the producers and consumers together a thousand per cent more than it did before the war broke out. Is there not something in that state of affairs that will appeal to hon. gentlemen opposite and make them take hold of this practical question instead of devoting their attention to theoretical questions which are of no practical importance?
I apologize to you, Sir, and to the House for taking up so much time with reference to these matters, particularly at this late date in the session. As a member of this House I felt that the remarks of my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce were deserving of some attention. I was not able to agree with him that the course which he outlined was one that ought to be pursued for the advancement of trade in Canada, and for the industrial development of our country. I regret to have to differ from him at this time, he made such a kindly appeal to us to work with him. I would love to work with my hon. friend. If he would only come down to us with some broad progressive policy based upon true lines of Canadian development I should be glad to work with him, but so long as he continues not to be influenced by those grand and beneficent considerations which are had in regard by men who would like to see our foreign trade developed; so long as he simply looks to the keeping of a home market; so long as he does not look abroad, particularly to that country with which we would naturally trade and with which, if proper encouragement were given, our trade, amounting to hundreds of millions, as it does to-day, would still further advance by leaps and bounds; so long as he follows these lines I regret that I am not able to agree with my hon. friend or to act with him.


Mr. H. H. STEVENS (Vancouver):: I
would not delay the House at this late date in the session by continuing this discussion had it not been, first, for the fact that the Minister of Trade and Commerce has delivered in the House this afternoon one of the most masterly presentations of the trade pro^ipm0 facing Canada and the Empire that has been delivered in Canada since the outbreak of the war.
The Minister of Trade and Commerce, as on other occasions since the outbreak of. the war, presented his proposals not only

in a non-partisan way, but in a manner which showed that he has given the problem the deepest consideration from a national and economic standpoint. In terms entirely free from partisanship he invited the co-operation of the House, and particularly of the leading members of the Opposition, whose experience has made their advice valuable, to co-operate with him and with the Government and the House generally, in an attempt to solve these enormous problems. My hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) a few moments ago took to task hon. gentlemen on this side of the House because we did not rise in support of the Minister of Trade and Commerce. But, Sir, the hon. member himself was actually wiggling in his seat for three or four minutes before my hon. friend concluded his remarks, and was on his feet before the hon. minister had actually taken his seat. I hasten to take this opportunity of expressing not only my approval, but my gratitude to the minister for introducing the subject in the manner he has. In my estimation there is no greater problem facing the Dominion of Canada to-day than the problem of what we are going to do to reorganize the nation's industrial and commercial life after the conclusion of this war. My hon. friend from St. John says that when these young men come back from the front, with the training and discipline which results naturally from a military life, they will again fall back into their places in the industrial life of Canada. This is the first time I have heard, in recent times, from the lips of an hon. gentleman claiming the experience, and at the same time having to a large extent the respect, shall I say, of the people of Canada, for his ability at least, such a sentiment as that. The hon. gentleman knows, if he knows anything at all, that when there is a disruption of trade caused by a great war lasting for a period of years, men do not fall back into their places again. If he wants a few examples I shall give him some that occurred during the few months prior to the opening of the session. Between September and January, there returned to my city a large number of men wounded and incapacitated for further military sendee. Three particular cases which came to my notice impressed on my mind the gravity of this problem, which the hon. member laughs at and brushes to one side as a simple proposition. ' The first was a young bank clerk who returned from the
front- to Vancouver. He came to my office and asked what would be done for him. I asked him what he did before the war. He said he was a clerk in such and such a bank. I said: There should be very little difficulty in your going back to youT old position. He said that he did not want to go back to the bank, that he was out of the bank now and never wanted to go banking or clerking again; he wanted an outside job. Would my hon. friend thrust that man back into his former position? My hon. friend knows that the mere fact of this man having served the Empire would arouse sympathy for him if any such attempt were made. Then a young man came to my office and I asked him the same question. He said he was a farmer. I said: That is splendid, because I know where there is a demand for young men on farms. He said: Not much, I have had all the farming I want, I want a city job.


William Pugsley: He must have been after a Government job.


Henry Herbert Stevens: He was after a Government job; and I may tell my 'hon. friend that I recommended him and about 30 others for Government jobs. And further to gratify my hon. friend in his little gibe, I have adopted the policy in Vancouver that no one but a returned soldier gets a Government job, and, if my hon. friend does not agree with that policy, he may as well say so. So far as patronage is concerned, if that is what the hon. gentleman wants to introduce at this time, I would not give a snap of my fingers if all the patronage in my riding were undertaken tomorrow by a commission. Patronage has no attraction for me; it is the curse of public life:	But that is the situation and
the facts, that these men come back to Canada with their former ideas disrupted and changed; they have been taken out of the ruts they were in before and they are going to demand a different outlook in life. The return of 250,000 or 300,000 of these men will have a very serious effect upon the affairs of the country, and so I say that, in my estimation, the greatest problem facing Canada to-day is the problem of re-adjustment at the conclusion of the waT. The hon. member for St. John says: Oh, let us wait, there is lots of time to deal with this, let us first win the war. Oh, he says: I would sooner sit in this House and expose graft than indulge in the consideration of such profound economic

problems as those proposed by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. Certainly he would rather do that, scandal mongering, the digging out of alleged and supposed graft, has more attraction to my hon. friend than the consideration of these great problems. It mates my blood boil-I may be young, while my hon. friend may be ancient in his seat-but it makes my blood boil to sit here and waste the time of this House week after week, and month after month, what at? A lot of pettifogging, alleged scandal. Ninety peT cent of the charges made by hon. gentlemen opposite are absolutely foundationless. I have not the slightest objection to any hon. gentleman in this House, be he a member of the Opposition or a supporter of the Government, rising in his seat during these strenuous times and calling the attention of the House to well-established irregularities. But the wasting of the time of the House seems to me to be a serious evil, and many hon. gentlemen opposite deplore it as much as I do, because they have told me so with their own lips. You do not hear them talking on these petty graft scandals. I say they deplore the attitude assumed by some hon. gentlemen opposite in this matter, at a time when the House should be paying attention to these great problems. My hon. frienu called the supporters of the 'Government a group of young spendthrifts. I had under my hand the other night, a list of the figures of the hon. gentleman's department prior to the accession to office of the present 'Government, and I think that any comparison of the records of the two Governments in this respect must result favourably to the present Government. Take, for instance, the Public Works Department, of whose spendthrift policy we have heard so much from my hon. friend. He has moved that certain Estimates be cut in two, willy nilly, whether they are needed or not. As a matter of fact, the Minister of Public Works saved on his appropriation last year upwards of $12,000,000. Instead of making false criticisms, it would come very much better from the lips of the hon. member for St. John and others if they would hand out a little commendation once in a while when the Government does perform a good act. Take, for instance, the fitting up of this building. Within three days of the fire we were in here, comfortable; and we have been comfortable ever since. What has it cost? The whole fitting up of this building was done out of the savings of last year's appropriation on the mainten-
ance of Government buildings. The sum of $39,000 was all that was spent in the fitting up of this building, and the work was done in a remarkably short time.
Then the Minister of Trade and Commerce gave a detailed statement showing the activities of his department which, through the whole regime of my right hon. friend who leads the Opposition, was a dead letter, an absolutely useless department, a sinecure. My hon. friendrthe Minister of Trade and Commerce has given us a splendid resume of what his department has accomplished, and is accomplishing. My hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) said a moment ago: Here we have right south of the line the greatest market in the world, and, instead of bothering ourselves with the foreign markets in Europe, why do we not develop that market. Does my hon. friend consider that the market of Russia to which the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce is giving particular attention now, is a market to be ignored? There is a country with 170,000,000 people, comparatively undeveloped; a country that will demand in the next few years more railroad steel, more construction steel than any other country in the world; a country which requires certain natural products that we have in abundance, such as silver, copper and lead, and from which we can import many valuable articles which we can not and do not produce at home. It is a country which may be reached by both out seaboards with equal facility, through Archangel and the Baltic ports on the Atlantic side, and through Vladivostock on the Pacific side; a country which is open to our trade, waiting for development, and having a population of 170,000,000. My hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce sends one of the ablest trade commissioners the department ever had to investigate the trade of that country; he makes excellent reports, and all he receives by way of support from hon. gentlemen opposite, if the hon. member for St. John speaks for them, is sneers and ridicule. I am surprised at the attitude of hon. gentlemen opposite. I did expect that the remarks of the Minister of Trade and Commerce would have some support from them.
My hon. friend from St. John actually blames the Government for the high freight rates on the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. This Government-he did not say so in so many words, but the insinuation was there, and that is about all we get nowadays, in-

sinuations; innuendoes, and allegations of one kind or another-this -Government sat idly by while -the freight r-ates on the various ocean routes were going up by leaps and bounds. Everybody knows perfectly well that it is because of the withdrawal of tonnage from the usual trade routes for the transport services 9 p.m. of the war, and because of the fiendish submarine policy of Germany, that freight rates have gone up. There were one or two sane remarks made by the hon. member from St. John, and' those were in connection with shipbuilding. I do not agree with him that a great deal could be done to stimulate shipbuilding in Canada. But in connection with steel shipbuilding, we must bear in mind that so far as steel plates and ship-angles are concerned at the present time, it is a very difficult thing to get them at anything like reasonable prices owing to the large demand in other parts, and owing also to the amount of steel that is being used for munitions, and for other purposes connected with the war. But a great deal could be done immediately to -stimulate the building of wooden vessels with cheap auxiliary power. On the Pacific co-ast, we have peculiar facilities for this class of industry. We have the timber; we have the trade waiting for ships to carry it, and if we had the tonnage we could to-day be shipping millions of feet of lumber to the markets of the world.


William Pugsley: Hear, hear.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I certainly agree with
my hon. friend that this is an opportune moment for dealing with the question of shipbuilding.


William Pugsley: The hon. gentleman
could not help agreeing with me.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I have been in favour of it for a great many months; in fact, for a number of years. I give my hon. friend credit for the few remarks which he made on that subject at -the end of his long and rather rambling speech, as giving something of value.
iMr. PUGSLEY: It was only rambling in comparison with my hon. friend's excellence.
-Mr. STEVENS:	Then my hon. friend
charged the Government with having placed on the statute-book duties which made it difficult to carry on the shipbuilding industry. Nearly all the material used in ship-190
building comes in free with the exception of boilers and engines. As my hon. friend knows perfectly well, boilers and engines can be made with the greatest success in Canada.


William Pugsley: Does my hon. friend agree with me, as all shipbuilders agree, that the very best engine that is used for auxiliary power is what is called the Deisel engine, and does he not know that that is not made in Canada?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Some of them are made in Canada; they are making internal combustion engines in Vancouver.


William Pugsley: Not the Deisel engine?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, the Deisel engine, or the ordinary internal combustion engine. I have not the slightest doubt that they can be made in Canada. However, that is a point which we could discuss in an intelligent and friendly way, and not in the hypercritical way adopted by my hon. friend. It is a question of encouraging shipbuilding and possibly of removing the duty on that class of engine, and I would like to see the Government look into that question and see whether it would be reasonable or possible to do something along that line.
Just a word or two upon the proposals of my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce. He proposes to hold a convention. My hon. friend from St. John says that the minister is going to hold a huge banquet, and that certain people are going to enjoy a feast, and so on, which was an entirely unfair and improper way of referring to the suggestion of the Minister of Trade and Commerce. The minister proposes to hold a convention of the leading industrial men of Canada, experts in the various industries, and nothing could be more desirable than to get together those men who are experts in their various lines. Then, some of the problems with which we are faced to-day could be intelligently discussed, and a policy looking to the best interests of the country as a whole could be mapped out. The Minister of Trade and Commerce has already sent throughout the various countries of the world commissioners to gather information and data so that our merchants, our captains of industry, our manufacturers, could have an intelligent idea of the needs of other countries. I know from my own slight experience that one of the difficulties that has faced the manufacturer in Canada has been a lack of clear, definite and accurate



information as to the requirements, wants, wishes and whims of the people of foreign countries. We cannot go on doing as some of the old English manufacturers did, and thrust our type of manufactures upon other countries. We have to study the markets, and give the people of other countries the line of goods, or the type of article, that they want, not the type that we want to give them. Therein lies the success of many of the manufacturers south of the line. They try to manufacture an article which is attractive to the people to whom they hope to sell, and that is where we have been lacking in Canada up to the present time. The Minister of Trade and Commerce proposes to rectify that chronic error in our industrial life, and to give the manufacturers of Canada an intelligent idea of what is required by the various foreign countries. In this regard I think he has done and is doing excellent work, and, instead of receiving the criticism and sneers which have fallen from the lips of my hon. friend from St. John in such unctuous terms, he should have received commendation and assistance. I noticed that when my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce was speaking, the hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux) seemed to respond, and I am under the impression that before this discussion ends, he will rise up to a little higher plane than his colleague from St. John, and will offer, on behalf of the Opposition, some real assistance and advice. It is not often that a minister of the Crown, Tory or Grit, comes to this house and says: I do not know it all, and 1 would be very glad to have your suggestions and constructive assistance. That is what the Minister of Trade and Commerce says, and, in view of his long experience, such a statement coming from him should have some effect upon hon. gentlemen opposite. I hope, Sir, that the results of the proposals will be that for once this session we can drop these picayune peccadillo politics and partisan views and indulge for a little while in a real discussion on commercial lines.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Mr. Speaker, I hope to not detain the House more than I should with the few remarks that I intend to offer. I am glad that in the speech delivered by my hon. friend from Vancouver (Mr. Stevens) he should have found at least one good feature in the observations of my hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) a moment ago. As long as my hon. friend from St. John criticised the

Government mildly he was doing something very wrong, in the judgment of the hon. member for Vancouver; but when my hon. friend from St. John tackled the question of shipbuilding, then my hon. friend from Vancouver found that fox his own province, for his own port, perhaps there was something more than rambling remarks in the speech of the hon. member for St. John-that there was in it something constructive which had been -carefully evaded by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir iGeorge Foster).
Be that as it may, I wish to say at once that I have listened with great pleasure to the speech delivered this afternoon by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I do not know if anything practical will result from the remarks he has made; I hope something practical will emerge from the discussion. The hon. gentleman will allow me to say what Lord Lytton said once of a great parliamentarian who, like the Minister of Trade and Commerce, was able to sway a public audience. After having listened to this great orator, Lord Lytton, in his poem, " Saint Stephens," described his eloquence as follows:
Then did I know what spells of infinite choice To rouse or lull has the sweet human voice.
My hon. friend has the sweet human voice, and he has the 'peculiar faculty of winning the plaudits of those who are his fortunate listeners. But, Sir, this is not poetry, this is a trade. I expect, in spite of all, that -something -constructive will emerge from the statement h-e has -m-ade to-day. As he well said, this war will not last. I hope it will soon be ended and that it will end victoriously for the Allies. When this w-ar is ended, new conditions will arise in this country and the world. 'The most important thing for us who are not in the fray, not in the trenches, is to do our duty, not only to our country, but to the Allies, by organizing the conditions which economically should help the Allies and ourselves.
Nothing can better help our country or our Allies at this juncture than the practical development of our trade. It is true that all our industrial plants are actually employed, it is -true that there are war orders distributed from the Atlantic to the Pacific, but as was stated the other day in the House, this has brought about a fictitious prosperity in the country and my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce was right this afternoon when he, warned us that this prosperity, being fictitious,

could not last. II we do not at the present moment, or in a few months, collect our thoughts, the aftermath may be disastrous. Our industries will be dislocated and in the period of reconstruction which is going to follow the declaration of peace, the country will not be prepared to face the realities which will confront it. The duty, therefore, of the 'Minister of Trade and Commerce, and of the department over which he presides, is at the present juncture to organize for the future, economically speaking, and to assist in capturing for Canada her legitimate share of the world's markets. My hon. friend threw out the suggestion that we should have a round table conference and give to the questions arising out of that conference our best thoughts. For my part, I can assure the hon. gentleman that he will get my best support in studying the organization of this country in view of the reconstruction period that is to follow the war.
I was, however, rather surprised that in the course of his eloquent and able speech my hon. friend evaded an issue which, it seems to me, should have been foremost in his thoughts. I refer to the preferential trade policy betwen the Motherland and the dominions. I do not propose to say that I am committing myself to that policy, because I understand that there will be in a short time a conference between the Allies and the dominions, but I would have, expected from the hon. gentleman, who has always been a convinced-shall I say a consistent-adherent of the idea and the principle of closer co-operation between the Mother Country and the 'dominions, that he would have given us the benefit of his views upon that subject. I remember that some years ago my hon. friend delivered in England, perhaps in Scotland, a series of addresses in favour of that policy. I remember that during the last campaign, and since the last campaign on many occasions, the hon. gentleman has been the protagonist of' the policy of preferential trade between the Mother Country and the dominions. Let me here express my sincere regret as a Canadian that in the Paris Conference Canada is not to be officially represented by a Canadian. I am in good faith in making this statement. I am not ready to say that I would favour a preferential trade policy as between the dominions and the Mother Country, but I am ready to listen to any reasonable argument upon the question, and 190J
[DOT]to accept any solution which is favourable to the interests of my country and the Motherland. But, Mr. Speaker, T should have expected that the Canadian Covern-' ment would have been represented in that conference, and that my hon. friend himself, would have been our delegate. No abler, no more eloquent Canadian could have represented the interests of Canada than the present Minister of Trade and Commerce. Look at what has been done by Australia. The Prime Minister of Australia left his country, crossed the Pacific ocean, went to the United States-


George Eulas Foster: ;He did not touch the United States.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He went to Honolulu.


George Eulas Foster: And from there to Vancouver.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He went to Honolulu, thus touching United States territory, and there he gave ap interview which I read.
I followed him very closely from the day he left Australia. He came to Ottawa, and had several conferences with the members of the Cabinet. From here he went to England. Many of the English papers, and perhaps many in the British Government, did not relish the idea of Mr. Hughes asserting his rights as an Australian to represent directly his country at the Paris Conference. But I admire the pluck of the man. He stood to his guns, and to-day he is the accredited representative of his country at the Paris Conference. True he goes to Paris as an Imperial Privy Councillor, but will not he represent the interests of his country at the Paris Conference more than the interests of Great Britain? Yes. And our country, so proud-our country, the largest and the oldest of the overseas dominions-our country which took such a prominent share in the establishment of the Colonial 'Conferences, will not .be represented. My hon. friend (Sir George Foster), or the Prime Minister (Sir Robert Borden), or at least our representative in London, Sir George Perley, should have directly represented Canada at that conference. But be that as it may, J was surprised that in his remarks bearing on the development of the trade of this country my hon. friend should have avoided speaking of the question which is engaging the attention of his electors in Toronto, of a large number of the people of the province of Ontario, and a large section of the Canadian community generally, namely, the

question of a preferential policy between the Mother Country and the overseas dominions. I am in receipt of a resolution adopted by a meeting of representative farmers, manufacturers and business men, held in Galt, Ontario, on the 11th of April, 1916. I shall not ask the House to afford me time to read the entire resolution but let me read the conclusion, the prayer which is contained in the resolution. My hon. friend will see that it raises an issue which cannot be ignored:	i
Therefore be it resolved that this meeting of farmers, manufacturers and business men, representing the counties of Waterloo, Brant and Perth, place itself on record as of the opinion that, next to such an organization of her resources in men, money and material, as will best conduce to a speedy and successful termination of the war, Canada's paramount duty is so to organize'public opinion at home, and to assist in organizing public opinion abroad, that there may be consummated with as little delay
as possible:
1. A series of preferential tariffs between all parts of the British Empire that will give the greatest practical encouragement to mter-impCTisil^trading,	reciprocal tari(tS| between all
nations that are allied against the Central Powers in the present struggle, by means of which the trade of the countries concerned will he conserved as far as practicable for their mutual enjoyment.
3 An agreement among all the Allies to give favourable tariff treatment to neutral countries.
etc., etc. Sir, I am surprised that my hon. friend should have ignored that question. This was the occasion for him to refer to it. I hope that 'before this session passes we shall hear from him on this subject. I have always thought that this proposal of a reciprocal tariff between the Mother Country and the dominions was not feasible, and that, perhaps, it would in some way injure the Mother Country and injure the dominions with other nations of the world. But I am open to conviction. This war has changed radically views and opinions that were entertained before it began-


George Eulas Foster: And conditions,


Rodolphe Lemieux: -and conditions, certainly. I say that I am open to conviction on the subject. But I should have expected that a master, like my hon. friend, would have given to the House the benefit of his views on that question. But probably we shall hear from him later on.
The question of transportation has, reached, as the hon. gentleman will admit, an acute stage in our country, due, of course, to the loss of so many ships since the beginning of the war, and also to the requi-

sitioning of so many of our ships by the Admiralty. I commend to my hon. friend an article which was published a few days ago in the By-Water Magazine, written by the well-known authority, Mr. Wolvin, on the enormous amount of money which has been paid by Canada to the United States for lake and ocean transportation. He refers especially to the shipment of our grain, and says:
To move this grain from United States ports to foreign purchasers undoubtedly required 500 steamers, each of which in stevedoring charges, supplies purchased, and repairs made, would average a cash outlay in port of $1,200, or a total of about $600,000.
So we find that we have calmly turned over in cash to our neighbours to the south:
Lake vessels.. ..
Railroads	
Port charges..	. .
Ocean vessel port
. . $4,125,828 00 '	. .	6,143,061 81
	 519,147 06
disbursements 600,000 00


Mr. EDWARDS:: At what date?


Rodolphe Lemieux: languages and of what may be properly termed the economies of foreign trade.
Just a word about modern languages. My hon. friend the member for Vancouver spoke of the possibilities of better trade conditions with Russia, that great country which is now an ally of Great Britain and France. May I tell my hon. friend-and this is a plea for bi-lingualism-that if an Anglo-Canadian not conversant with the Russian languages or dialects-because there are many Russiae in the Greater Russia-is to represent us in order to establish better trade relations over there, he will meet with difficulties, because the only foreign language spoken freely in all the large centres of Russia is the French language. I say this en passant, so that/ my friends in the House may understand how important it is for us, 'Canadians to be conversant with more than one language.
In connection with the very able report of the Ontario commission, which came to the conclusion that in order to provide employment for the unemployed and to meet the conditions arising after this war we should develop our trade with foreign countries, I may say that in Great Britain also, this question has of late been very prominent. Not later than in the month of January last a motion was made in the British House of Commons by Mr. Hewiris, and the very question which was presented to the House this afternoon by the Minister of Trade and Commerce, was also discussed in the British House. Mir. Hewins moved:
That with a view to increasing the power of the Allies in the prosecution of the war, His Majesty's Government should enter into immediate consultation with the Governments of the Dominions in order with their aid to bring the whole economic strength of the Empire into co-operation with our Allies in a policy directed against the enemy.
I would commend this debate to those of my	fellow-members who	take aspecial	interest in	the	trade	question,because	in these	speeches,	especially
in those delivered by Mr. Hewins, Mr. Chaplin, Mr. Fell and Runciman, you will find most interesting data and facts.
For the moment I wish, Mr. Speaker, to' say a few words about the trade possibilities between Canada and France, one of the great Allies. My reasons for com fining	my remarks	to	FranoojCanadian
trade are obvious. First of all, as I have stated, France is the great ally of Britain. A hurricane of glory has swept over France. She has fought the enemy since the beginning of the war in a way which, by her

heroism and by her undaunted courage, has elicited universal admiration. Besides, we should bear in mind that one-third of the population of this Dominion is of French descent. We have had two treaties with France, one which was negotiated some years ago by the late lamented Sir Charles Tupper, and another which was negotiated only a few years ago by Mr. Fielding when he was Minister of Finance. We have an oceanic service with that country .which, I believe, could be improved. I hope that when the war is over and when new steamers are built my hon. friend will exact from the Allan Company a better and more modern service between Montreal, Quebec, Halifax and St. John. and1 Havre. Sir, France is anxious to trade with us; she is willing to buy from us. If you look at the latest figures published by the Department of Trade and Commerce, you will realize how wonderfully our trade with that country has increased.
In 1896, the total trade, imports and exports, between France and Canada, amounted to $3,364,313; and for 1915, the total imports and exports were $22,847,315. This is a wonderful advance, and shows how France is anxious to trade with us. I know that people will say that these conditions arise from the war, that France is buying from Canada war munitions. But, Sir, I am informed on the highest authority that we can maintain our trade at at least that figure between Canada and France after the war is over, because Fran''- ;-grateful to Canada, grateful not only for the noble part Canada has taken in the war, for the blood which has been freely given by her sons on the plains of Flanders yesterday and to-day, but grateful also for the gifts that have been made from every city, from every town, from every hamlet of Canada, to the suffering peasantry of France. Yes, France is and will be grateful. It so happens that the Republic is represented to-day in Canada by one of the ablest consuls-general this country has ever had in the diplomatic service. I refer to Mr. Bonin of Montreal who was conseiller d'ambassade, and who is a far-seeing statesman. He is an arduous worker who knows exactly the economic conditions of both France and Canada, and he has been doing his beet to foster those conditions since the war began. Consider the importance of that Franco-Canadian trade. 20. years ago it was about $3,500,000 a year, total imports and exports, and last year it was nearly $25,000,000. It is the imperative duty of Canada to maintain that trade,

and to do whatever is possible to promote it in the future.
What was our trade with Germany? In 1896 that trade, total imports and exports, was $7,212,000; and in 1914, the year before the war, it was $19,119,000. I do not know that many people in Canada, that many people in the Empire, will be willing to develop trade relations with Germany after the war, and if we can transfer our orders from Germany to France, we will only be doing a patriotic duty. I was rather painfully surprised last year, when the first war loan of France was launched, that this loan was not better appreciated by our banking institutions in Canada. There is an old saying in Europe that was applied to France before the war, and I suppose will be applied to her after the war:	France is the creditor
of all nations, and is the debtor of none. My hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce, who is versed in finance and who knows the credit of all European countries, is aware that this ie true. Every country in Europe was more or less a vassal to Prance, from a financial point of view, and if there is anything to be regretted it is that France was far too free and to generous in her foreign investments. Yes, I was surprised that when France offered some of her coupons on her national loan to the banking institutions in Canada, the response was not * very generous. Perhaps there were reasons for that. The Government and the banking institutions had probably in mind that we would have our own domestic loans, and that we had to provide in some way for the needs of the British exchequer. At all events, I express this regret, and I wish to state most explicitly that there is no nation in the world, with the exception perhaps of Great Britain, which stands higher than France in regard to national credit. You may ask me, and the Minister of Trade and Commerce may ask me, what Canada could buy from France. I would simply mention a few articles that Canada ' could buy from France instead of buying them from Germany as we have been doing in the past, such as wines, drugs, chemicals, scientific instruments, and above all, Particle de luxe, what is commonly called Particle de Paris, which has been insidiously replaced in many markets of the world by the shoddy goods of Germany with the false labelling "article de Paris." 'Our importers and their agents should see to it that the commercial world is not humbugged, as it has
been in the past, with the shoddy goods of Germany falsely labelled "article de Paris." But what is now imjwrtant for Canada is to know what she can sell to France. The list which I am about to read I take from a French review dealing especially with this question of our better trade relations with France. Although it has been often said that there is no sentiment in business there is already in France a very pronounced movement in favour of the expansion of commercial relations with the Allies, and particularly with Canada.
The desire, as much as the necessity, after the war, to substitute for the Austro-German trade direct commercial relations with the Allies, either by the creation of preferential tariffs, by the signature of com* mercial treaties, or by the direct action of commercial leagues having for their special object the severance of all trade relations with Germany, will contribute in a great measure to the aforesaid expansion, which, as regards Canada, will be here the more pronounced that we can furnish and manufacture an immense quantity of the items which were formerly bought in Germany.
In the review which I hold in my hand, it is shown that during the year before the war broke out France got from Germany manufactured goods and raw products, to the value of $250,000,000. Now, Sir, France will require from Canada, and is ready to receive from Canada these raw products and manufactured articles : Wood pulp, horses, live stock, frozen meat and fish, cheese, flour, hay, leather, saddlery, shoes, asbestos, steel, building material and rolling stock for railways and all sorts of tools and implements which, during the war, have been exported from Canada to France will certainly continue to be exported, and to the aforesaid articles must be added the goods which France used to buy from Germany and which she now knows she can ihave in Canada. Ae I have stated, the exports from Germany into France amounted to $250,000,000 per year before the war, and there is no reason why a large proportion of that trade should not henceforth be given to Canada. In addition to the above products and articles, the following items may now readily find a market in France: Agricultural implements, steam excavators, dredges, road ploughs and horses, concrete laying machines, steam rollers, etc; railway material and rolling stock, spare parts for locomotives, straight and bent axletrees, steel in bars, locomotive tires, cars and vans; locomotive fire grates,

bolts with or without nuts, manganese bronze tubes, coupling chains and hooks, nails, brads and staples, copper tubes, copper wire, bars, and plates, cast iron locomotive cylinders, cast iron and cast steel pieces, steel and copper grate plates, cross-head leaders, brass plates and wire, moulded brass pieces, springs, flat spiral and screw, buffers, smoke tubing with covered welding, weldless tubing, stretched tubing, copper tubing, railway ties in any quantity, I am informed; wood and steel flat cars and freight cars for standard and narrow gauge tracks; construction handcars, steel in bars and blocks, profiled steel, beams, corner plates, air compressing, machines, electric and compressed air drills, electric apparatus, hardware and plumbing sundries; wood and iron working machines, chucks, planers, drilling and countersinking machines, tackles, cranes, pulleys, etc.; wood and pulp, iron, steel, copper, nickel, asbestos, coal and phosphates; horses and live stock; wool and woollen garments, underclothing and hosiery; leather, shoes, saddlery, harness, belts; butter, eggs, cheese, canned fish and meat, frozen fish and meat, ham, pork, lobsters, crab fish, salmon, codfish, sugar, maple syrup, molasses, condensed milk, flour, hay; furs, green and dressed skins; paper, naphtha, soap, tobacco, artificial manures, twine and cord, trunks, carriages; raw and manufactured rubber, grain, alcohol, photographic implements, furniture, fishing nets, hemp and flax thread, brushes, pins, cotton goods, etc., etc.
The above list was handed to me by the Secretary of the French Chamber of Commerce in Montreal, and the Consul General of France 'in Canada wishes to call the attention of every manufacturer and of every lindustnial firm in Canada to these articles, because he is anxious that Canada should get the preference in French trade.
A few months ago the French Government delegated to Canada and the United States a mission composed of several members of the House of Representatives. The mission was headed by M. Maurice Damour, who has occupied a very high position in the financial world of France. For some years M. Damour was, if I mistake not, Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Commerce in the House of Representatives in Paris. I was present when he addressed the Board' of Trade in Montreal and later on a meeting of merchants and manufacturers

on the 23rd December last. On that occasion, he said that as France had been taken unawares by war, she did not intend to be taken unawares by peace, and for that reason she was sending trade commissioners abroad in order to seek other markets in place of those she had sought before, and in order to trade with people other than those with whom she had traded before. He called our attention to the fact that the northern part of France having *been invaded, all her industries in that part, and the best at that, had been practically annihilated. He said that, for instance, the textile and metal industries were crippled, and that France required the raw material from Canada in order to enter upon her period of reconstruction. He said they would require agricultural implements for moto-culture to replace farm hands. So many yeomen have given itheir lives on the battlefield that moto-culture will replace the use of farm hands in a large degree in agricultural France. He said that for years the French manufacturers had bought, for instance, their asbestos from Berlin, whilst Berlin was importing asbestos directly from Canada. He said: "We must not make that mistake in the futurp." After that meeting, a cablegram was addressed to the Premier of France, M. Aristide Briand, which read as follows:
The economic associations and the representatives of the industrial and commercial forces of Canada assembled to receive the mission of Maurice Damour, deputy, acclaim his hearty statements. They address to the eminent head of the French Government their sentiments of gratitude and their faithful devotion to great and beautiful France, and to affirm their will of maintaining to-morrow on the economic field the fraternal union which binds them to-day to France in the struggle for the certain triumph of the cause of right and civilization the Canadians decide to repay soon to the Old Country, whose fervent souvenir they will cherish, the visit made by the Damour Mission which has opened with success the most brilliant future to the economic relations between Canada and our dear and glorious France.
Benson,
President of the Board of Trade.
Mr. Speaker, a delegation met my hon. friend on the 15th of January. There were representatives of the Board of Trade, the 'Corn Exchange, of the banking institutions and of the transportation companies. The object of that interview with my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce was to promote trade between Canada and France and with that object in viey they asked him to send repre-

sentatives to France to attend the Exposition de Lyon. My hon. friend properly said that, as only a section of Canada was represented in that delegation, he could not at the present time see his way clear to granting the request. I agree with him. There is something more urgent than the Exposition de Lyon. I understand that a commission composed of business men will visit France, and possibly the other allied countries, in order to systematically promote better trade relations.
But I wish to draw his attention to a matter which I regard as of greater importance. There is at present in France, a movement on foot towards the reconstruction of cities and towns that have been destroyed during the war. I hold in my hand the programme of a large and important committee which has been formed in France in order to organize a Reconstruction Exposition. This Reconstruction Exposition is under the high patronage of the president of the French Republic, and the ministries of commerce, industry, postal and telegraph service, agriculture, interior, public instruction and arts, the general council of the Seine and the Municipal Council of Paris. It is to be held in Paris during the months of May, June and July, 1916. What is the object of the Exposition? I wish I could address myself to the industrial communities of Canada and to our manufacturers, in order to impress them with the importance of .that Exposition. It -will advertise to the. world what are at the present moment the needs of France for the reconstruction of its devastated cities, towns and villages.
The Americans have not been slow in responding to the call which has been made to them by the committee to which I have just alluded. American manufacturers have formed a national committee, and they are preparing to send out delegations to all those engaged in industrial . activities in order to capture as far as possible the trade which that reconstruction will necessarily create. The exposition will open on May 16 in the Terrace of the Tuil-eries Gardens and in the halls of the Jeu de Paume, which the ministry has been good enough to place at the disposal of the exhibitors. The programme is to be divided into four groups. In the first group will be found the essential organs of a modem town, the plan for arrangement and extension, and plans for reconstruction, everything concerning the aesthetics and hygiene
of a city, the precautions to be taken with a view to the absolute respect of local styles, the variety of which lends such charm to French towns, the preservation of historic monuments and of any particularly beautiful natural site, etc. The second group will contain buildings in general, public edifices, dwelling houses and rural and industrial construction. In the third group will appear modern methods of and materials for construction, with examples of what has been achieved. Lastly, the fourth group will be specially devoted to legislation governing the arrangement, the construction, the improvement, and the beautifying of cities. The American manufacturers know that their chance is there, and quick as they are to realize their opportunities, they have (launched an appeal to the business men. I wish that that appeal had also been made by my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce to the Canadian manufacturers. I claim that our Canadian manufacturers, Tories as they are generally-


George Perry Graham: Oh, not all.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Not all-are keen, progressive, capable, and quite able to hold their own against the American manufacturers. I hope that my hon. friend will yet make a special appeal to them, so that they may get their share in the immense reconstruction business which France expects within the next few years. Let me quote just a few paragraphs from the appeal made by the American manufacturers:
We regard this as the greatest opportunity American manufacturers ever had to establish themselves in the commtrcs of Europe. The habitations of 35 millions of people are more or less damaged or destroyed and everything must be replaced. The highways are destroyed, the streets of cities are destroyed, all the public service., systems, such as water, sewerage, gas light, electric light have been destroyed, factories, dwellings, farms, everything. The labourers need every kind of tools and implements by the millions, used in building and refurnishing these institutions. Furthermore, the neutral countries have been in the habit of buying from countries now engaged in wair, and their markets are entirely bare. These countries find themselves not independent, and each one is seeking to make it so.
Hence they all want to get vast quantities of up to date machinery to manufacture the things they formerly have gotten from the countries now at war. It will require the full capacity of all the American factories for many years to meet these needs, provided they exhibit samples here that are satisfactory to the buyer. I may add that the American goods are more popular in Europe than any other, but it is practically impossible to get them.

Now is the opportunity foT the Canadian manufacturers.
Practically everything, except things to eat or to wear, are desired in this exposition.
To illustrate the demand and the readiness with which goods offered are taken, let me say that we are already asked to make prices and submit samples for the restoration of one city, which will cost 150,000,000 francs, another 250,000,000 francs, another, 600,000,000 francs
The exhibits will be admitted free from all duties, and arrangements will he made with the French consul at the point of shipment to so stamp the goods on their departure.
Again I urgently call the special attention of the Minister of Trade and Commerce to that circular, and ask him to have it distributed amongst the manufacturers and business men of Canada. Tbeir opportunity is excellent, having regard to our special standing in France.
Mr. Speaker, I will not take up the time of the House further, except to say this: There is some confusion m certain minds as to the business ability Of the French people. People are apt to believe that the French people are only able to make savings. Sir, the French are a wealthy people because they make savings, but they become wealthy because they are industrious. It is by hard work that they make their savings profitable. It is said that the French export trade does not bulk large in the bluebooks. Let me answer in the words of one of the ablest French statesmen, an ex-Minister of Foreign Affairs, who visited Canada a few years ago, and who has been one of the most remarkable writers before and during the present war, who was one of the fathers of the Entente Cordiale-I refer to Mr. Gabriel Hanotaux. Speaking of the trade of France with the world, he said it could be crystallized in one simple expression, "small tonnage and large profits." We do not export coal from France, says Mr. Hanotaux, but we export diamonds- small tonnage, large profits. We do not export cotton, he says, but an artist in Paris will buy a small canvas, put a frame around it, and with a few strokes of his brush he will sign his name-Cormon, or some other -selling it afterwards for 500,000 or perhaps 1,000,000 francs-small tonnage, large profits. That is the commerce of France, coupled with her genius, expressed in words.
But, Sir, to conclude it all, and regretting that I have taken so much time, let me say that I expect my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce, who has such command of the English language, but whom I suspect to be French at heart-I would say that even to his electors in Toronto-


An hon. MEMBER:: He speaks French well.


Rodolphe Lemieux: He speaks it well; he is a university graduate. Yes; I expect that he will do his best to promote trade between Canada and France. He may well be proud of what has been achieved, not only since the war but before the war, for our trade with France has increased wonderfully within the past five years. The time has come to capture more of that trade, to keep it in the channels which it has entered, and so to maintain between / Canada and the old motherland of one-third of the Canadian people, now the faithful ally of Great Britain, the happiest relations that can exist.


Mr. S. F. GLASS (Middlesex East):: I have a question to ask the hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux), but did not put it while he was speaking, as I did not wish to interrupt him. He quoted from a circular sent to the members of this House portions of a certain resolution, but he omitted the preamble and certain clauses. I presume that the fact that he presents these resolutions to the House, and places a portion on Hansard, may be taken as indicating that to some extent they met his approval. But I would like to read a clause in the preamble and also a portion of the resolution which the hon. member omitted. Possibly there may not have been reason for omitting these, but I think they would form a valuable contribution with the rest, as showing the opinions of these representative farmers, manufacturers and business men who met in Galt:
And whereas it would seem to he feasible for the Allies, by means of customs tariffs and otherwise, to reserve their great consuming markets for their mutual enjoyment, and to the exclusion of the enemy, thus serving the double purpose of hastening their own economic recovery, while retarding that of the Central Powers.
The hon. gentleman said he would not delay the House by reading the whole resolution, but he read the third clause and passed over the fourth as "etc, etc." The fourth clause says:
An agreement among all the Allies to subject the products of the Central Empires to such surtaxes and other disabilities as will effectually restrict their competition in the markets of the Allies.
I wanted to ask my hon. friend why these parts of the preamble and of the resolution were omitted by him in reading this circular.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I might very well have read the fourth clause. I read from this circular just to show the necessity of Canada taking part in the economic conference at Paris. I regretted the absence of a Canadian delegate at that conference.
There was, however, no thought on my part of avoiding this issue, and I did not say that I committed myeelf to the preferential trade policy. I am, however, willing to listen to such an idea as my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce has presented, and to any arguments in favour of it. I stated that theories that were roseate and that had captured men's 'hearts and heads before the war would crumble to pieces after the war. I even expect some of my Tory friends to be free traders after the war. Therefore I am open to conviction, but I sincerely regret that Canada shall not be represented at that Paris conference and shall not give expression to her views.


John Gillanders Turriff: Mr.'
Speaker, unfortunately for myself I was not in the House this afternoon when my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce made his speech. I can, however, quite agree with the remark made by my hon. friend from Vancouver (Mr. Stevens), that it was a most eloquent and able speech. My hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce has the faculty of making good speeches and of giving expression to good ideas. Unfortunately, however, his colleagues do not always seem to agree with him, or at least they do not back him up to any considerable extent. Not long ago we listened to one of the most eloquent speeches ever heard in this House delivered toy my hon. friend, I think, on the Budget, when he spoke of the advisability of cutting out political patronage and of having a public committee appointed to deal with all requests for the expenditure of public money before the items were placed in the Estimates. That was a very fine idea, but it does not seem to have been impressed very strongly upon his colleagues, because the Estimates have been coming down in department after department, perhaps not quite as large as in the last year or two, but extremely large, and one minister after another has -been asking for millions of dollars which they claim they do not expect to expend during the current year.
My only reason for saying a word on this occasion is this, that I understand that my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce is proposing \to expend a considerable sum of money in looking over the whole face of the earth in an endeavour to find new outlets for trade between Canada and other countries with which we are not trading at the present time. I quite agree with the general proposition that it is very desirable and necessary for 'Canada to secure additional trade if at all possible; but the point that I particularly wish to impress upon my hon. friend is that in every case where he will send commissioners to secure additional trade with Canada, that trade is secured at a great cost. In every case, particularly if you secure a trade arrangement with any foreign country at a distance, in addition to the expense of securing that trade, you have to subsidize steamship lines to carry it, so that the taxpayer of Canada has to put his hand into his pocket and out of any profits that are mkde from the trade he has to pay for securing ships to carry the freight backwards and forwairds between Canada and whatever country the trade arrangement has been made with. " Let us take the case of the trade arrangement that my hon. friend made with the West Indies. It is very good in its way, but it has not amounted to much, and it has meant a heavy expense. If we trade with our own sister colonies, Australia or New Zealand, we have to grant large steamship subsidies. If my hon. friend secures additional trade arrangements with other countries, there will be large expenditures in subsidies in order to make that trade possible. What I want to point out in particular is that right at our own door for the asking more trade can be done in one week than can be done in a year with any other country with which my hon. friend can form a trade arrangement after paying sweetly to get it. Right at our own door is a population of between ninety and a hundred million people who are wanting to trade with us, who are already trading with us to a large extent,' who are doing more trade with us than Canada is doing with the whole world. Canada, with a population of about 7,500,000, buys approximately twice as much from the. United States as the ninety or a hundred million people buy from us and we have to pay the difference by trade with otheT countries. Those people want to buy from us. My hon. friend could enable them to do so by a turn of the hand, and .it -would be of great advantage to the people of Canada. In many parts of Canada the people have

almost unanimously been asking for freer trade with the United States, and we could have it without hurting any portion of this country. Yet my hon. friend and his colleagues absolutely refuse to extend the trade of Canada where it can be carried on fox nothing and still give splendid results and be profitable. The people of the United States are probably the richest people in the world at the present time. During the past two years that this war has been waging they have made thousands of millions of dollars on account of the war, and they want to buy our goods, whereas practically every other country to which my hon. friend can go in order to make a trade arrangement has become more or less impoverished by the war. I do not for a moment mean to say that if my hon. friend made a trade arrangement with any of the nations that are now engaged in this war, it would not pay for the goods it bought. No doubt it would do so; otherwise it would not buy the goods. But what I want to point out is that we have right at our own door a hundred million people wanting to buy our goods.
Mr. EDWARDS; Wanting to buy what?


John Gillanders Turriff: All the natural products that can be produced on any piece of land in any part of the Dominion of Canada from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
Mr. COCKSHUTT; What are they to do with them?


George Perry Graham: Look at the trade returns.


John Gillanders Turriff: - We need not care what they will do with them. Surely my hon. friend does not need to worry about what they will do with the implements he manufactures if they buy them and pay cash for them. It does not matter to him whether they plough the ground with them or whether they leave them out on the ground to rot. If they buy the goods and pay cash for them, what more does my hon, friend want? Here we have a hundred million people wanting to buy our goods, offering to buy them, wanting to better our trade relations, to get our goods in and pay for them, and what more can any one ask for is something that I cannot understand. So far as we in the West are concerned, we produce practically only the natural products of the soil. The prairies are not a manufacturing section of Canada. I believe that for centuries we shall not be a manufacturing country out there, for the simple reason that the cosi of living is higher in that part of the

country than it is in Eastern Canada, and that we have not the raw materials. The advantage of shipping in the raw material and paying freight on it as against' bunging in the manufactured goods is not sufficient to overcome the extra cost of manufacturing. In most things, at all events, we shall not be manufacturers in the West; we shall be producers of natural products- wheat, oats, barley, flax, cattle, horses, sheep, hogs and everything that is produced on the farms. We shall sell these things and buy our manufactured products from the manufacturers in Eastern Canada if we can get them anything like as cheaply as we can get them elsewhere.


Richard Blain: What about* Winnipeg as a manufacturing city?


John Gillanders Turriff: Winnipeg does some
assembling and manufacturing.


Richard Blain: It ranks third among the
manufacturing cities of Canada.


John Gillanders Turriff: I know perfectly well
what the trade returns are, but Winnipeg is not a manufacturing city in the sense that Montreal and, Toronto are. There are certain things that we manufacture in the West; Winnipeg will be a large assembling point. But even if we do some manufacturing, our main business will be agriculture and its associated industries. We shall sell those products wherever we can sell them to the best advantage and we shall buy the manufactured products that we use to the extent' of hundreds of millions of dollars, thus making the western country the best market for the Canadian ymanu-faeturer. What does the Canadian manufacturer want? To my mind, if he took the proper view of the matter, he would want to put the western farmer in a position to get the best price for what he grows and produces. What does the western farmer do with his money? He does not bury it. He sends it into the towns and villages near where he lives; from there it goes to the wholesalers in Winnipeg and from there it goes East to pay for manufactured goods. Why not give the Canadian farmer in the West the best advantage that you can give him so that he will be a better customer for the Eastern manufacturer than he can possibly be so long as you circumscribe his market? The Canadian farmer is not asking for protection. He is not asking that duty be. imposed on any one thing that he grows. No farmers1 organization in the Prairie Province will ask that duties be placed on

anything that the farmer produces. What they want is to have the duties all taken off the goods they are producing. Give them the free market, and that is all you need worry about. They will sell where they can sell to the best advantage; if they can sell better across the line they will do so, and thus be able to expend more money in goods manufactured in Eastern Canada anid be a bigger asset to Canada as a whole and to the Canadian manufacturer in particular. To give them this market would he a general advantage to Canada. It was said four years ago during the reciprocity campaign that we would pay too much for the American market for our farmers' produce. Well, there is an opportunity now to get that American market without paying anything for it. Supposing my hon. friends across the floor of the House were right four years ago-I do not think they were, but never mind that now. At the present time they can get the American market for wheat and all wheat products and potatoes by simply putting them on the free list. The western farmers, and to a large extent the eastern farmers, want to see that done, because it would . mean an increase in the trade of Canada each year to the extent of tens of millions of dollars. iMy hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce could bring that about at once if he and his colleagues wanted to do so. They would not have to spend a dollar; they would not have to give any steamship subsidies. Why will they not do it? My hon. friend is anxious to send men all over the face of the earth to try -to make little trade arrangements that would not amount in a year to what the extra trade with the United States "would amount to in a week. Why this course has not been followed is something that is very difficult to. understand. Four years ago our friends across the floor of the House maintained that the putting of cattle on the free list would mean the ruination of Canada. But a little over two and a half years ago the United States put cattle and hogs on the free list, with the result that practically every hoof that has been exported by Canada has gone to the United States. Why? Simply because we can get more money for our cattle there than we can get by sending them to Liverpool. Have my hon. friends across the floor of the House observed any lack of loyalty on the part of the prairie provinces since they commenced to sell their cattle and hogs in the United States? Do they think that it has had a bad effect
oh Canada in any way? If they do, why do they not put a stop to it? They know very well that that state of affairs has been in the interests of Canada, and they know, too, that it would he very much in the interests of Canada if that trade were increased. My bon. friend the minister is in the frame of mind to try to increase Canada's trade. My recommendation to him is that instead of spending all this money in sending men all over the world to try to secure some doubtful trade-all good enough in its way-he should begin 'by getting the trade that is right at his door, and which can be secured for nothing. Surely that is common sense; surely that is reasonable. It is what the people are asking for; it would not hurt any one, and it would be a very great advantage along the lines that my hon. friend is working on. It very often happens that what we can get for nothing, or with very little effort, is not appreciated. My hon. friend thinks that if he can make a trade with some nation
10,000	mites away at a cost of a quarter of a million or half a million dollars by way of subsidies to>
steamships to carry the goods back and forth he has achieved something of great value to the country and of great credit to the Government. It is true that this trade would be of advantage to the people of Canada. I do not want to curtail my hon. friend, or interfere with him in any way so far as getting the trade of the outside world is concerned, but what I appeal to my hon. friend to do is, first, to get the trade that is right at his door, and that he can get without paying anything for it. Why does my hon. friend refuse? I cannot think of any other reason than that it is done at the instigation and on the advice of the manufacturers of Canada. I may be wrong in that, but I can think of no other reasonable reason why my hon. friend should refuse to give us the American market where it is possible to get it. I have no doubt that in addition to wheat, wheat products and: potatoes, my hon. friend could have a large number of other natural products added to the list, and in doing this he need not touch manufactured articles at all, or interfere with the Canadian manufacturer in any shape or form. .
In regard to the building of ships, I wish to impress on the minister that, according to reports in the Old Country papers, both the Government and private interests are urging that special efforts be made to in crease the building of ships in the Old Coun-

try. Great complaint is being made because in one particular town where ships are built, there were 157,000 hours of work performed and over 15,000 hours lost by the workingmen. The article to which I particularly refer went on to point out what a tremendous loss that was to the nation, and where they were going to land if this war kept on. It is an unfortunate thing to have to say that during the last week practically five ships a day were sent to the bottom by German torpedoes and mines, 33 for the week. That is going pretty strong. I doubt if the British shipbuilders, in addition to keeping up and increasing the strength of the navy, are going to be able to keep up the tonnage of freight boats if the Germans can continue to sink them at that- rate. These, of course, were not all British ships, but the destruction of neutral or Allied ships interferes just as much with the carrying of goods from Canada to Great Britain as if they were all British ships that were sunk. I see that they are building large ships in the United States. The other day a ship whose keel has not yet been laid was sold at auction on the Pacific coast. It is to be a ship of 7,500 tons. The report did-not say whether that was registered tonnage or carrying capacity. The ship was sold for $600,000, yet it will not be built until the coming summer. We in Canada ought to be able to build ships as well as they can in the United States and it would appear to me to be good policy on the part of the Government to take this matter up in earnest. I am sure that if the Minister of Trade and Commerce will do that he will do that he will find out that we on this side of the House, while we may criticise-and I am sure that a considerable amount of criticism is good for any Government-our criticism will not interfere with the Opposition assisting the Government to any extent that may be possible in securing a method or system by which we can go on and build some ships in Canada. My own feeling is that we should take off every vestige of duty on everything that goes into the construction of a ship, and then we would offer a permanent inducement to the shipbuilders of Canada to go ;into the business, a very great inducement over and above what they have now. If something along this line is done, we may be able to help make up the wastage. I was glad to hear that the Minister of Trade and Commerce was in hopes that the war would end at an early day, that the end was in sight. Listening to his colleague the Min-

ister of Militia, one would come to the opposite conclusion, because the Minister of Militia explained to the House what Germany had accomplished; and whatever we may do in the near future, it is unfortunate that we have to say so, but the fact remains that we have not yet started to drive the Germans back. They are'gaining ground to-day in France; we have not driven them back. The Russians are driving the Turks back, but the German army has not, so far, been driven back. I do not think that means that we will not win in the end, but we have a long, hard task ahead of the Empire and of the Allies, and if we delay too long in starting to provide ships to keep up commerce between Canada and Great Britain, if vessels are to be destroyed at the rate of five per day, it may turn out that next fall, when we have our wheat and other farm products and other products that the British Empire needs, to send across, theTe will net be ships enough to carry our produce across r+ any price. I think that something ought to be done along the lines of securing trade that is offering to us near at home. I trust the minister will consider this matter, and I know that if he sets his mind to it, with the experience he has had and the ability he has, he will accomplish something; and I am also quite sure that we on this side of the House will be willing and ready to tender any assistance that it is possible for us to give.


John Wesley Edwards: The hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) calls to my mind a couplet which runs:
The lightning- hug is brilliant, but it has'nt any mind-
It wanders through creation with its headlights on behind.


John Gillanders Turriff: That is very clever.


John Wesley Edwards: I do not want to say, or to be understood as saying that the hon. member for Assiniboia-is like the lightning bug in not having any mind. He has a mind, of a kind. But I think I might be excused for saying that the last line of that couplet does apply to the hon. gentleman very aptly-that his headlights are on behind. If the hon. gentleman from Assiniboia has forgotten some of his past history, there are members of this House who have not forgotten, and there are some of us who still remember that this same gentleman who gets up now and.talks about making everything free as the air we breathe, taking the duty off agricultural implements,

is the same man who, in 1907, not only voted against reducing the duty on agricultural implements, but got up in his place in the House and spoke against any reduction in the duty on agricultural implements, putting himself on record as one of those expressing the unquestioned view of the western farmer, that the western farmer in 1907 did not want the entire duty taken off agricultural implements. Now he says he is expressing the view of the western farmer. What changes have taken place in the western part of this country? Has the western farmer changed his mind in regard to the duty on agricultural implements? Or is the changed attitude of my hon. friend due to the fact that he is now sitting to your left instead of to your right? On that occasion the hon. member for Souris (Mr. Schaffner) moved for a reduction in the Fielding tariff, and the hon. Minister of Finance of the Laurier Government, the Hon. Mr. Fielding, rose and argued very strongly that it would be a very wrong thing to expect men to accept the motion of the hon. member for Souris, and reduce the duty on agricultural implements; and, like a good, stalwart, loyal supporter, the hon. member rose and said that he thought this was certainly right. He said: "Do not reduce the duty; the farmers in the West do not want the duty reduced.'' Now, when this same gentleman gets up and preaches along the lines he has taken since the change of Government, we have a right to take his statements cum grano salis-with a good liberal supply of salt at that.
The hon. gentleman says that there are 100,000,000 people across the line who are anxious to buy our products, who are craving our Canadian products. He says that they removed the duty on cattle. If they topk the duty off Canadian cattle they had a purpose in view. I would suppose that theif purpose was that they wanted the cattle to come into the United States, and, if I am correct in my reasoning in that respect, I would suppose that the reason they do not take tlie duty off wheat is that they do not want the wheat to come in to the United States to- the extent that they wanted the cattle to come in. But is the United States the natural market for Canadian farm products? I know that that assertion has been made repeatedly by hon. gentlemen opposite, but, in my judgment, the United States is not the natural market for Canadian farm products. I say that the Minister of Trade and Commerce is
justified ini sending out his trade commissioners seeking to enlarge our markets and to encourage trade with countries across the seas. I say that the West Indies, for instance, are a natural market for many of Canada's farm products, because these farm products are not indigenous to the West Indies. The natural markets for our products are those countries where these products do not naturally grow, not countries like the United States, where they have a surplus of these products. In what condition do we find the United States, so far as farm products are concerned? It is not starving for Canadian farm products; it is our, greatest competitor in the markets of the world in these products. What country, of all the countries in the world, today produces the greatest amount of wheat for export? Am I not absolutely right when I say that the greatest wh^abproduoifig and wheat-exporting country in the world is the United States? Large as our export was of last year's crop, it was small, indeed, compared with the exportable surplus of wheat in the United States. In the production of wheat the United States ranks first among the countries of the world. As an exporter of wheai the United States ranks first among the countries of the world. In the production of com the United States ranks first among the countries of the world. It produces, I venture to say, as much corn as the rest of the countries of the world put together. In the production of oats, and in the exportable surplus of oats, the United States is far and away ahead of Canada. I venture the assertion that the United States to-day exports a larger quantity of meats than any other country in the world. Yet the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) tells us that the United States is the natural market for Canadian wheat when the United States exports more wheat than any other country.


John Gillanders Turriff: And oats.
Mr. EDWARDS; He tells us that the United States is the natural market for our oats, though it is a large exporter of oats. He says that the United States is the natural market for Canadian meats, though the United States exports more meats than any other country in the world to-day. The hon. gentleman will not attempt to deny my statement in that respect.


John Gillanders Turriff: Is my hon. friend asking a question? ,


John Wesley Edwards: I am making a statement. I said that the hon. gentleman would not deny my statement that the United States is the largest exporter of meats in the world. Does he wish to deny that?


John Gillanders Turriff: If the United States is
the largest exporter of oats, it is a very large importer of Canadian oats, on which it pays a duty, and of cattle also, though they get the cattle free.


John Wesley Edwards: The hon. gentleman
does not deny my statement.


John Gillanders Turriff: No, it is true.


John Wesley Edwards: Very good, then we
agree on that?	*


John Gillanders Turriff: Yes.


John Wesley Edwards: I did not think he would deny it. I repeat that the hon. gentlemen said that the United States was the natural market for Canadian meats.


John Gillanders Turriff: Yes.


John Wesley Edwards: I say that that statement is illogical in view of the fact that the United States is the largest meat exporting country in the world.


John Gillanders Turriff: They buy our cattle.


George Perry Graham: They also buy our raw
material.	4


John Wesley Edwards: If the hon. member
for South Renfrew will take the trouble to look at the figures for the last two years he will find that, immediately after the duty was taken off cattle, there was a rush of cattle from Canada to the United States, but he will also find that that rush did not continue and that there was a considerable falling off.


John Gillanders Turriff: Where are they going?


John Wesley Edwards: I maintain that it is
illogical to say that a country such as the United States, which is unquestionably one of the greatest, if not the greatest agricultural country in the world, a country which has an exportable surplus of farm products, is the natural market for our farm products. Instead of being the natural market for Canada, it is our chief competitor in the markets of the world.


Mr. COCKSHUTT:: It is the unnatural
market.


John Wesley Edwards: As my hon. friend says it is not only not the natural market for Canada, it is an unnatural market. The natural markets for the products of this

country are, I repeat, those countries which do not produce the same kind of articles, and the best kind of trade that we can develop is with the countries which will take articles from us which they do not produce, and which will sell to us articles which we do not naturally produce. That is the proper basis of trade.
But hon. gentlemen opposite, with their famous reciprocity agreement which they wished to place upon this country, proposed to throw Canada open to the surplus production of all the agricultural countries of the world. That is what they proposed to do, and had the people of Canada not voted them out of power, had the people of Canada endorsed that policy, what would it have meant. It would have meant that the farmer of Canada would have been certain of one thing: that he would always receive for his product the lowest price paid in any country in the world, because, if the price of any farm product in Canada became high enough to be an inducement to the farmers of the Argentine or of the United States, or of any other country to send their products here, their products would be sent here. The price of our farm products would have been reduced to the .lowest possible level and kept there if the reciprocity pact had been carried into effect. In 1911, after giving the matter very careful consideration, the people of the Dominion said that they did not want anything of the kind; and while hon. gentlemen opposite, like the hon. member for Assiniboia, may try to make himself, and others, believe that the people of Canada want reciprocity, I venture to say that neither he, brave as he is in regard to trade matters, nor any other member who sits beside him, will venture to test the opinion of this House by a resolution on that matter, much lees to test
11 p.m. the opinion of the country, and make it an issue. They know that the people have decided on that, and the hon. member for Assiniboia knows, as other hon. gentlemen opposite know in their hearts, in 1911 the people of Canada decided wisely.


John Gillanders Turriff: No, I do not.


John Wesley Edwards: He knows that they
decided in their best interests. There is no doubt about that; the hon. member knows it perfectly well.
The hon. member for Assiniboia referred very briefly to the question of this great war. He quoted the optimism of my hon.

friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce and he characterized my hon. friend the Minister of Militia and Defence as being somewhat pessimistic. He added to-day his own opinion to the effect that the Germans were getting the better of this war. I do not agree with him for one moment. I do not believe he could find, if he were in a position to canvass the opinion of the people of Germany, that even they would agree with him. They do not think they are getting the better of the war. In a great war there are three factors which must be taken into consideration-men, money and munitions. If the war is short you may exclude the question of money and assume that both parties to the war will have 'enough, but if the war continues for any length of time, money will be a factor and money is one of the most important things in this war. At the beginning Germany had it over France, Russia and England in so far as men and munitions were concerned. That is the reason why she was able to make the wonderful advance she did make on the eastern front as well as on the western front, but during the last six cr eight months the situation has entirely changed. While it is true that the line is practically where it was some months ago-


John Gillanders Turriff: That is all I said.


John Wesley Edwards: But the hon. gentleman left an impression that I want to dissipate if I can. While it is true that the line is practically where it was a few months ago, it is also true that the Germans have not been able to carry on their offensive and advance on the western front, because in the meantime, or within the last few months, England and France have been enabled, not only to bring up men, but to bring up munitions, and in men and munitions, they are on an equality with Germany and are holding her there. The same thing is true of the eastern front as regards the contest between Russia and Germany. If you look at the whole situation, notwithstanding that Germany holds most of the Belgian territory which she has taken, notwithstanding that she temporarily holds her position in France and has overrun Serbia, the position of Germany and Austria in this war has become gloomier. While that is the condition on land, that is not the only phase of the question. The greatest blow which ha3 been struck at Germany in this war has been struck by the British Navy in tying up the German Navy 'behind the
forts of Kiel, in scattering German commerce and in driving it from the seas.
The hon. gentleman spoke of the British vessels which had been sunk by German torpedoes, and he intimates that possibly- if this continues, we may not have enough vessels to take our wheat-where, did he say?-not to the United States, but to take our wheat across to England. No matter what the price might be, we must have enough vessels, he says, to take our wheat across to England. If that is true ''or us, it will be true for the United States too. They would not have any chance to lake their wheat across. Will the hon. member for Assiniboia get up and say that in a case like that, if we had not access to the British market, our natural market for wheat would be in the United States, where they would have millions and millions of bushels tied up that they could not get out to the markets of the world? Will he argue that? If he will not argue that, how can he logically maintain his position? But, while my hon. friend speaks about the possibility of boats being sunk, why is it that our Canadian wheat and the wheat of the western farmers is getting across the ocean to the markets of the world? It is because Britain has freedom upon the sea; it is because the British Navy rules the sea, and I cannot sit down without reminding the hon. member for Assiniboia that he was one of the men who stood up in this House and did his part to prevent the Dominion of Canada from making that navy stronger than it is to-day, and assisting it to protect our products on the way from Canada to the markets of the world.


George Perry Graham: Mr. Speaker, this debate seems to have got away from everybody, or everybody seems to have got away from it. My hon. friend who has just sat down (Mr. Edwards) has discussed the Navy. I do not think he has missed any question that has been up in the House during the last year. I intend to make a few remarks on the proposal of my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster) in reference to the development of the trade of Canada and the machinery he proposes to use. I was once asked, while discussing the departments of the Canadian Government with the then Prime Minister, what department I considered the most important. I did not mention the Finance Department, I did not mention the Department of Agriculture, although these are very important, but I said to him that I thought the



department that gave the greatest scope to a man with a heap of eDercry was the Trade and Commerce Department in a young country which is really just beginning its development. However, I will refrain from making any comments until the Supplementary Estimates come down, as I understand my hon. friend has almost induced his colleagues to let him have a vote in the Supplementaries for this purpose. I must say that notwithstanding all the theories that have been spun to-night, and I do not say it disrespectfully in connection with what has been said or thought by any of you as to trade within the scope and the lines of a preferential tariff, when the department or the members of any convention, get down to the real question, they will discover that the representatives of Canada, and rightly so, will insist upon the position that they will not give up any of their rights to manage their own affairs as they see fit even though that view may not harmonize with somebody else's idea. Generally speaking, the theory is good, that when you come to take up some measure which is new, you will not allow the people of any other country, even a country in the British Empire, to control the conditions under which you manage your affairs, but these conditions will be controlled by Canada as they have been in the past. However, this is a large subject, and I am afraid I might make a speech if I continued along that line. I will keep my remarks until the supplementary estimates are up.


Mr. F. N. McCREA (Sherbrooke):: Mr. Speaker, there is a matter that I think my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir Gfeorge Foster) might deal with, and perhaps he could do so much more easily than he could deal with the question of navies and shipbuilding tonight. Canada produces a small quantity of hemlock tan bark, but, she produces more than can be used here. There has been an embargo placed upon the export of that commodity under an Order in Council which was passed about a year ago but which was only put into effect about a month ago. Whilst there is not a very great quantity produced, there is more than there is sale for in Canada.
In the part of the country	I
come from, there has been business for more than fifty years in the shipping of bark to the United States. But this embargo was put into force about a month ago and the export of the stuff is held up.

And there is no sale for it in Canada. I think that the Order in Council must have been put in force without consideration, because I cannot see any good purpose that is going to be served by prohibiting the export of tan bark. It cannot be shipped to Europe in the form of baTk. At one time, in the province of Quebec, there were quite a few extracting works which reduced the bark to a liquid form so that it could be shipped anywhere without great expense for freight. But these works have disappeared, as also have many of the tanneries that formerly used bark. Consequently there is only a small quantity used in Canada. Unless the embargo is removed the stuff will waste, foT it is not an article that will keep for any great length of time. I think that probably this matter is under the charge of the Minister of Customs, but I should fancy that the Minister of Trade and Commerce, who is interested in doing everything necessary and possible for facilitating the handling of the Canadian products, would also be interested. I trust the hon. minister (Sir George Foster) will give it his attention and will try, if possible to remove this embargo. Of course, if there is any good reason why it should not be removed, we will have to put up with it. If the Government can have it removed, it will be of benefit to us, and will hurt nobody.


George Eulas Foster: Have any representations been made to the Customs Department or to my department on the subject?


Francis N. McCrea: Yes, to the Customs.


George Eulas Foster: I have not heard of it. I will make a note of the matter.


Francis N. McCrea: I have a letter from Mr. McDougald, who says that the embargo has been put on and could not be removed. I do not think he has considered the matter very carefully.



SUPPLY.

[Stage Direction]
The House in Committee of Supply, Mr. Rhodes in the Chair.
Trade and Commerce-Trade commissioners and commercial agents, including expenses in connection with negotiations of treaty or in extension of commercial relations; miscellaneous advertising and printing, or other expenditure connected with the extension of Canadian trade, $150,000.
George Perry Graham: I presume that when the supplementary estimates are under con-

sideration there will be ample opportunity to discuss this question?


George Eulas Foster: The same discussion can take place.
Mr. GRAHAlM: I do not see any reason why 'this should not pass.


Mr. THOMPSON:: Have we any trade or commercial agents in South America?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, >ve have a representative in Buenos Aires. The former and actual commissioner of trade there was Mr. Poussette who was one of our experienced trade commissioners and who was changed from South Africa to that point about four years ago. But Mr. Pousette went overseas and the work of the department iij Buenos Aires is being done by Mr. Webb, who also is a very efficient man. That reminds me that today I had a letter from a very prominent Canadian who has'just made a tour of the Argentine. I had given him letters to Mr. Webb, and he had called upon him. He was very cordial in his praises of the services Mr. Webb performed for him and gave a very flattering idea of the worth of his services to Canada. When .the war is over, Mr. Poussette will take his place again. In addition, we have the services of the British consuls in all South America. Two years ago Mr. Poussette made a tour of the states of South America, and consulted personally the consular agents. We have found his report of great value.


Frederick Pemberton Thompson: I followed with great interest the discussion which has taken place. I feel very strongly that Canada, in the very near future, will have a golden opportunity to reach out and get her share of the world's trade. Our interprovincial trade, of course, has been a great factor in our economic development; but we have built our transcontinental railways, subsidized our steamships, dredged our harbours, lighted our coasts, all with the ultimate idea of making our country one of the great trade routes of the world. And 1 think that just now, with war in progress and the sympathies of our Allies with us, we cannot do better than project our ideas regarding trade in the future w'th neutral countries and with our Allies. I have always thought that, we have never got our full share of the South American trade. Germany has had a very large percentage of it; Great Britain has had a large percentage of it; France has had a very
191J
considerable percentage; but Canada, I feel, has never had as great a share of South American trade as we should have had. In the countries that lie adjacent to the Equator, I believe, there is great opportunity for exchange of products with Canada. Brazil, for instance, offers a large field for the exploitation of our extra-territorial commerce. They grow many things which we want, and we grow many things which they want, pulpwood, for instance. It is generally considered that we have enormous resources in our forests for the making of pulp, aand I believe that Brazil imports a large quantity. The woods indigenous to the soil of Brazil, we are told, are not suitable for the making of pulp. That is one item, which, I think, .the Minister of Trade and, Commerce should investigate. I understand that there is an opening there in a larger way than in the past for the sale of our fish. Many of our manufactured products might find a market in Brazil. I am glad to know that we have a trade agent in the Argentine. Though that country and ourselves compete in many things, still there are articles which we can exchange with mutual profit. I hope the Minister of Trade and Commerce will be seized-as I am sure he will be-of the importance of cultivating as far as possible the exchange of products between Canada and the republics of South America. There is a great opportunity right now, and I believe that our neighbours in the United States are exploiting those markets in South America to-day, and I hope that we shall get our full share from now on as we have not had that full share in the past.
Progress reported.
On motion of Sir George Foster, the House adjourned at 11.35 p.m.
Wednesday, April 19, 1916.
The ' House met at Three o'clock, the Speaker in the Chair.



QUESTIONS.

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

Edward Mortimer Macdonald: .
1.	How many persons are employed In the Pay and Record Office, in London, England, in addition to the commissioned officers?
2.	What is the average cost per month of the operation of said office?


Sir ROBERT BORDEN:: 1.	N.C.O.'s and men, 915; of this number about half are men who have been invalided, siek or wounded, from the front. Civilian clerks: male, 99 over military age, or unfit for military service; and 2G4 females.
2.	For month of January, $96,200.


Mr. DEVLIN:: 1.	Is there a Canadian Pay and Records Office in England? If so, how many officers are employed in it, and how many men?
2.	What was the total number of officers and men of the Canadian force in England and France up to the end of March, 1916?
3.	Is there a Pay and Records Office in connection with British War Office?
4.	If so, how many officers and men are employed in it?
5.	What is the total number of the force of the British Army?
6.	Are the officers in the Canadian Pay and Records Office in England paid according to rank, or do they get special pay?
7.	Do they get anything extra for allowance?


Sir ROBERT BORDEN:: 1.	Tes. Officers, 50; N.C.O.'s and men, 915; of this number about half are men who have been invalided sick or wounded from the front. Civilian clerks: male, 99 over military age, or unfit for military service, *and 264 females.
2.	134,838.
3.	Yes, by latest available information in Army List there are 38 pay and record offices in the United Kingdom. The duties, however, performed by the British pay and record offices differ in several important respects to the Canadian pay and Tecord office. The latter, in addition to the same duties carried out in British pay and record offices, also has charge of all officers' accounts and records, and includes a large audit staff which audits all expenditure before accounts are forwarded to Canada. Both these duties are performed by separate
' offices and staffs in the case of the British army. The work of the Canadian office is still further increased by having to furnish complete informatio'n to the Militia Department in connection with all casualties, in addition to supplying information to the War Office and to relatives of Canadian officers and men in England whereas in the case of the British offices, they only have to deal with the War Office and units, etc., in the United Kingdom, and have nothing to do with records or accounts of officers of the army.
4.	No information, but from inquiries made in England last October, it was ascertained that the staff required to deal with
	*
the pay and records of the British Expeditionary Force was higher, in proportion to the total strength of the army, than the staff of the Canadian pay and record office was to total strength of Canadian Expeditionary Forces overseas.
5.	No information.
6.	Officers are paid according to appointment for which special rates of pay and allowances are prescribed by Order in Council.
7.	All allowances are included in special rates, except allowance in lieu of rations at 50 cents a day, the same as other officers receive.


PUGWASH SPUR LINE.
Mr. MACDONALD:: 1.	What has been the total cost of the spur line of railway built from the main line of the Intercolonial railway into the brickyard at Pugwash, N.S.?
2.	What has been the total amount of freight arrived from this spur ^line?


Mr. REID:: 1.	The Pugwash spur was built to the brick and tile plant, on the west side of Pugwash harbour, at the request of the Nova Scotia Clay Works, Ltd., they guaranteeing to ship not less than 6,000,000 bricks per year for a term of 15 years, to pay an extra or shunting charge of 20c. per [DOT] thousand bricks, and to bring in at least 60 cars of coal each year for a period of 15 years, upon which they agreed to pay 20c. per ton as an extra or shunting charge. The cost of this spur line was $79,432.97.
2.	Total Intercolonial earnings on freight delivered from this spur, $1,026.79.


THE VALE RAILWAY.
Mr. MACDONALD:: 1.	What amount has been expended on the Vale railway since it was taken over by the Government?
2.	What has been the receipts from the operation of said road since the date of operation? >
3.	What has teen th^ cost of operation?


Mr. REID:: 1.	Since the Government made a* tentative agreement for leasing the Vale railway, it has expended $6,925.52 in. operation and maintenance.
2.	$5,245.98.
3.	The cost of operation of this section is included in the answer to No. 1.


MAIN STREET SUBWAY, MONCTON.
Mr. COPP:: 1.	What was the total cost of the Main street subway, Moncton, N.B. ?
2.	How much was paid for right of way and

for damages in connection w'th said subway constructions?
3.	To whom were such payments made?
4.	Have any such claims been made to the
R.	iilway Department that have not been paid? If so, by whom and for what amounts?
5.	"What has been the cost of the different concrete sidewalks laid on and in connection with the Moncton station yard during the past three years?
6.	What was the cost of the concrete sidewalks along Main street, Moncton, N.B., leading to and through said subway?
7.	If the concrete and other bridge work in connection with said subway was let by contract, what was the contract price, and what, if any, amount has bsen paid contractors over and above the contract price of same?
8.	Is the Government aware there are said to be other dangerous level street crossings in the city of Monoton? If so, how many, and is it the intention of the Department of Railways to eliminate same in the near future?
9.	Were the grades on streets approaching the subway changed from the original plans regarding same? If so, in what particular?..
10.	Have damages b en paid?. If so, how much for the properties east of Archibald street, in front of which the s.reet has been lowered from one to ten feet, caused by the construction of said subway?
11.	What was the total cost of concrete work in connection with said subway?


Mr. REID:: 1.	$132,673.21.
2.	Nil.
3.	See answer to Number 2.	[DOT]
4.	Claims for abuttal damages have been presented as follows: George V. Steeves, $1,000; Edward O, Steeves, $5,800; M. Francois Hogan and Margaret" E. Hogan, $6,000; James D. LeBlane, $12,000; Henry
S.	Armstrong, amount not named; W. McK. Weldon, amount not named. [DOT]

6.	$3,444.38.
7.	The contracts for the concrete and other bridge work in connection with subway are at schedule prices for the different items of work.
8.	When financial conditions improve it is the intention of the department to complete the elimination of level crossings in the city of Moncton, in accordance with the arrangement made between the management and the city.
9.	The rates of grades not changed.
10.	No.
11.	$30,411.18.


ENLISTMENTS IN CANADIAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES.
Mr. EDWARDS:: 1.	How many officers, N.C.O's and men have enlisted in Canada for overseas service during January, February and March of 1916?
2.	How many enlisted from each province during the first three months of 1916?
3.	How many enlisting from each province were, respectively, British subjects born outside of Canada, French Canadians, German Canadians, and English Canadians (that is, Canadians of English, Scotch, Irish or Welsh descent)?
How many of these enlisting from each province during the first three months of 1916 were, respectively, Methodists, Presbyterians, Roman Catholics, Anglicans and other denominations?


Robert Laird Borden: 1 and 2. Enlistments of N.C.O's and men for overseas service with the Canadian Expeditionary Force for January, February and March, 1916:
No.	M litary Dist.	Jan.	Feb.	Mar.	Total.1.	Ontario	4,071	2,561	2,622	9,2542.	Ontario	7,669	7,785	6,981	22,4353.	Ontario	3,035	3,409	3,595	10,0394.	Quebec	1.537	1,414	2,284	5,2355.	Quebec	423	495	542	1,4606.	Maritime Provinces	1,915	1,757	3,639	7,31110.	Manitoba and Saskatchewan.	5,375	4,831	8,736	18,94211.	British Columbia and Yukon.	3,384	1,821	1,547	6,75213.	Alberta	1,803	2,585	2,759	7,147Totals	29,212	26,658	32,705	88,575
3 and 4. This information is not yet available.


NEW BRUNSWICK AND PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND RAILWAY.
Mr. COPP:: 1.	How much has been paid on account of the purchase price of the New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island railway?
2.	How much of said purchase price remains unpaid? -
3.	How much interest has been paid on the purchase price of said railway, and to what date is said interest paid?


Mr. REID:: 1.	Amount paid on account of the purchase price of the New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island railway, $180,000.
2.	Amount of purchase price unpaid, $90,000.
3.	Interest paid on purchase price, $10,186.30; interest paid to August 1, 1915.


PELAGIC SEALING COMMISSION.
Mr. BARNARD:: 1.	What was the total cost of the commission to inquire into the question of compensation to sealers, for damages caused by reason of the, compulsory cessation of Pelagic Sealing in the North Pacific Ocean?
2.	How much, if any, of the said cost has been charged against the funds received from the United States, under the Sealing Treaty between the United States, Japan, Russia and Canada.


Mr. HAZEN:: 1.	$35,546.93.
2.	None.


ASSISTANCE TO FAIR ASSOCIATIONS.
Mr. PAQUET:: 1.	Did the Federal Government ever grant any subsidy for the construction and repair required for exhibitions in rural counties?
2.	What are the circumstances under which the Federal Government grants subsidies to exhibitions?


Mr. HAZEN:: 1.	No.
2.	The conditions governing federal aid to fair associations may be briefly stated as follows:
Fair associations whose shows are open in all classes to the whole of Canada, and which have paid out in the utility classes of live stock and poultry at their last preceding show the sum of $5,000 or over, will be given a grant equal to 50 per cent of the actual amount paid out, the maximum grant to any show not to exceed the sum of $5,000.
Fair boards, when making application to the Live Stock Branch for this grant, must forward a certified and properly subscribed statement of the auditor's report of all prize money paid out at the last show in the classes previously referred to; as also a copy of the proposed prize list for the succeeding year. For the purposes of this grant, the prize list must be approved by the Live Stock Commissioner. All pure bred live stock exhibited at shows which receive the benefit of this grant must be registered, in the name of the exhibitor, in the Canadian National Live Stock Records. In all questions of policy or matters of dispute the decision of the Live Stock Commissioner shall be final.


UNOPPOSED MOTIONS FOR PAPERS.
[Stage Direction]
Mr. Sinclair.-For a return showing a list of the decoders and censors employed at Halifax since the war broke out, together with the names, dates of employment, total amount paid, by whom recommended, and former employment of each.
Mr. Sinclair.-For a return showing a list of all medicals and chaplains appointed by the Department of Militia and Defence in the military division of Nova Scotia, since August 4, 1914 j together with the name, post office address, date' of appointment, rank, present position, whether in Canada, England, or at the front, rate of pay and total amount paid each, since the beginning of the war. Also the names of any who have withdrawn from the service, with the date of such withdrawal.
Mr. Boyer.-For a copy of all letters, petitions, correspondence and telegrams exchanged between the Government, its district engineer, and all other persons, concerning either the construction or repairing or purchase of the wharves at the following places: lie Perrot Sud, the Church in the village of lie Perrot, the village of Vaudreuil, Pointe Cavagnole, Hudson, Rigaud, Graham, Pointe Fortune, and
fMr. Hazsn.]
lie Perrot nord. Also a copy of all specifications and reports already brought down at my request in relation to the documents prior to and since 1904, and a statement of the amounts that have been paid for such construction or repairs, and to whom they were paid.
Mr. Boyer.-For a copy of all letters, petitions, correspondence and telegrams exchanged between the Government, its resident engineer, and all other persons, concerning the dredging work done at the following places: Ste. Anne de Bellevue, Pointe Fortune, Ottawa river channel between lie au Foin and lie Si Paquin, Graham channel, Rigaud channel, Hudson heights channel, Hudson, Como, Pointe Cavagnole, channel at Vaudreuil village, Dorion Bay channel. He Perrot Church, lie Perrot Sud wharf, arid lie Perrot Nord wharf. Also a statement of the amounts paid to different persons, companies, etc., for such work, the dates, etc., and a copy of the estimates already brought down at my request, the whole since 1904.
Mr. Devlin.-For a return showing who, if any, is director of recruiting and organizations in England for the Canadian service; his name, and his duties; how many are employed upon his staff; and what are the total expenses of his staff.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Right Hon.   S@: I desire to ask the indulgence of the House for a few moments while I draw attention to the approach of an anniversary which will always be memorable in the history of Canada. In a few moments I shall have the honour to propose a motion to the House which I have asked Sir Wilfrid Laurier to second.
The Canadian forces now at the front hold to-day .a position of honour in the line which the Allies are maintaining in France [DOT] and Belgium. We in Canada, far removed from the scene of war, surrounded by the conditions of peace to which we have always been accustomed, can hardly appreciate or realize the situation which confronts the people of France and of Belgium, and indeed the people of Great Britain. There lies the long-extended battleline, there the manhood of these two nations defend their country; and there, as I have said, the Canadian forces in the British lines hold a position of honour, which they will maintain in a ipanner worthy of the beet traditions of this *country.
Let me recall for a very few moments what has transpired since the commencement of the war so far as the action of this country is concerned. You will remember that the first Canadian force which crossed the Atlantic was the Princess Patricia Regiment, which went to the front in France

or in Belgium about the end of December, and which distinguished itself on many a battlefield by achievements that will always be remembered by the people of Canada. Last July I had the honour of seeing what was left of that regiment. The ranks had been depleted

in fact, had been decimated; but the spirit of the men and of the officers was as dauntless as it was on the day on which they sailed from Quebec.
At the commencement of October the first Canadian division crossed the seas, and about the middle of February they went to the front. I suppose that nearly every hon. gentleman in this House had the privilege of seeing that force while it was assembled at Valcartier. In actual warfare they were nearly all untried; so far as military knowledge and experience were concerned, they were new men, men without previous military experience for the most part. They went to the front in February. Perhaps they did not realize that there was to come to them in the very early future a test such as might have daunted the bravest and most experienced veterans. The story has been well told of that great event. It can never he completely told, as hundreds of instances of individual heroism can never be recorded, because the men who know of these incidents and who took part in them lie under the sod in France or in Belgium. To-day let it be enough to remember that, although their trenches were obliterated by artillery fire, although they were assailed by awful methods of warfare hitherto unknown and unused amongst civilized nations, although one of their flanks was exposed, and they were attacked by overwhelming numbers, they never retired except under direct orders, and from first to last they did not lose one Canadian gun. There is therefore little wonder that, when on the afternoon of Sunday, the 25th of April, 1915, two British brigades came forward to pass through their lines and to make a counter attack, these Englishmen, hundreds of whom were going forward to certain death, paused for a moment to cheer their Canadian comrades, and to say " All hail " to Canada. Well did these Canadians merit the tribute universally accorded that but for them the onrush of the Germans might not have been stayed, and that the events of the past year might have been very different from those which we have known. Canada's heart will always be thrilled when the memory of those days is recalled. The same valour, the same determination and the same tenacity characterized the Canadians at Festubert and Givenchy. Our hearts are saddened day by day with the long lists of casualties which come to us; but the spirit of the Canadian people is as firm and as undaunted and the response of the men of Canada is as ready as in the days of August and September of 1914.
Up to the present time we have enlisted in Canada about 310,000 men; and in the period between the first day of January and the 15th day of April more than 100,000 Canadians came forward to do their part in this great struggle. That recital of itself is enough to convince us that the spirit of Canada is as firm and its determination as unshaken as it ever has been since the commencement of this war.
The military organization of this country was unfitted to undertake so great a task as that which has been accomplished; and I am and always have been ready to concede that but for the whole-hearted support of the Canadian people, and but for the splendid spirit which has animated them, men and wdmen alike, since the commencement of the war, it would not have been possible for this Government or for any Government to do what has been achieved.
The anniversary draws nigh; the war still continues. Perhaps a year ago we may have imagined that events would have shaped themselves otherwise and that the situation would be different to-day from that which now confronts us; but, although the task during the past year has made itself manifest as much greater than we centemplated at the beginning of the war, still we are ready with the same response, and in no part of the Empire is there a firmer spirit than in Canada, nowhere a firmer resolve to do our duty to the end. The determination of the people of this country is as inflexible and as unshaken as ever.
We are approaching the anniversary of the day on which the first great test came to the Canadian troops at the front. How shall we honour those who survive? How shall we honour the men, whether in the British islands or in this country, who have rallied to the colours and who are keen and eager in their desire to go to the front and do their part? As for the men who have survived this test, can we better honour the memory of their achievements than by flying upon all the public buildings of Canada and upon all the buildings which are available for that purpose from the Atlantic to the Pacific the flag of our

country for which they have fought, and will still fight?
What of those who fell ? Do I hear someone say that for them we should fly the flag at half-mast, and not at the head ?' Not such is my conception, Mr. Speaker, and I believe that we shall best honour their memory also by flying at the head that flag for which they made the supreme sacrifice and which symbolizes the ideals of. justice .and liberty which Canada, in common with the whole Empire, maintains in this war. The memory of those who have fallen will always be a tender and revered but yet a proud memory in the hearts of Canadians, and for them, as well as for those who survive, I conceive this to be a fitting tribute by the people of Canada. So, I have the honour to propose the following resolution, seconded by Sir Wilfred CLaurier:
Resolved that this House desires to place on record its admiration and pride in the valour and heroism displayed by the Canadian Expeditionary Force at the front and its profound appreciation of their service to Canada and to the Empire.
That the spirit which animates the Canadian people in this conflict has found its highest expression in the achievements of Canadians upon the battlefields of France and Belgium; and as the anniversary draws near of the first great test to which the Canadian troops were subjected and in which they so splendidly distinguished themselves, it is fitting that there should be a suitable commemoration throughout the Dominion of the service thus rendered to the Empire, to the allied nations and to the world.
That this House commends the proposal that on the 22nd, 23rd and 24th of this month flags should be flown at t}ie head on all public buildings throughout this Dominion and that the Canadian people be invited to commemorate thus the momentous events of a year ago in token of Canada's determination to do her part until the efforts of our Empire and the allied nations shall have been crowned by an honourable and lasting peace.


Right Hon.   S@: W7hen our young volunteers crossed the ocean, to take their part and the part of Canada in the war, which was then and is still going on, and when we realize that alongside the French soldiers and the soldiers of Great Britain they would have to face the best-equipped troops in the world, troops which in the last half-century have ever been victorious, there was in many Canadian, hearts apprehension at the thought that they were to encounter such dangers. It is a well-known fact in the history of nations that young , soldiers, whatever be the stock from which they have sprung, have always undergone a severe

ordeal at the first shock of battle. It would have been folly to have expected that our young soldiers would show the steadiness of veterans. But history has already recorded that, where we expected these young men to act like young and raw recruits, they really acted in a manner which was not excelled by the veterans of the British or of the French army. One with a Canadian heart could not but be thrilled at the news that came to us that these young soldiers on a certain day had beyond all doubt saved the honour of French and British arms, and not only that, hut had saved the day for the cause of civilization. It has been established that on the occasion to which my right hon. friend has just referred, in the three days of the battle, when the lines had been lost to the French troops, after they had for the first time come in contact with the poisonous gases, it was the Canadian troops who came to the rescue, re-established the lines, and snatched victory from the very jaws of defeat.
The proposition of my right hon. friend that the Canadian people should Temember that day' is one that must commend itself to us all. What should be the form of that commemoration? In what manner should we Canadians express our testimony to the valour of our soldiers on that occasion? The proposal which has just been made by the Government, I think, must commend itself to every one. There are many ways in which this occasion might be commemorated, but the best way, I think, is that proposed by my right hon. friend: to unfurl upon the first anniversary of the battle the banner under which they fought on the soil of France for the cause of civilization. Let the banner rise, let it float at the top of every mast and at the top of every steeple throughout the length and the breadth of the land, there to be looked upon with pride by every Canadian, and with the knowledge that it is supremely the banner of freedom, of justice, and of power.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to. '

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day :
Robert Laird Borden: The hon. member for Richmand (Mr. Kyte), inquired yesterday if Colonel Day is still in charge of the 185th Battalion at Broughton, N.S., where the regiment is at present training. The Adjutant General states that from re-

cords at Militia Headquarters, Lieutenant-Colonel F. P. Day is still in charge of the 185th Battalion, C.E.F.


DEATH OF PRIVATE D. CURRY.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Robert Laird Borden: The hon. member for Richmond (Mr. Kyte) inquired yesterday as to the death of Private Dougall Curry at St. Joseph's hospital, Glace Bay, during the past week, and as to the medical treatment which was afforded him. A telegram was sent to obtain the information, but no reply has yet been received.


CENSORED DOMESTIC LETTERS.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. KAYT:: I wish to bring the attention of the Postmaster General to the manner -in which his censors are dealing with the mail.


Wilfrid Laurier: Hear, hear.


William Frederic Kay: I have here a letter from the Canadian Bank of Commerce, posted at the town of Bedford, and( addressed to me at Phillipsburg, eight miles away. This letter has been censored. I called up the manager of the Canadian Bank of Commerce at Bed-rford on Monday, and he told me that on the 10th of April a letter addressed from the Union Bank, Quebec, to the Canadian Bank of Commerce at Bedford, had been censored. He further said that a letter posted on April 12 from his bank, that is, the Canadian Bank of Commerce, at Bedford, to the Canadian Bank of Commerce, Ste. Catherine street, City Hall branch, Montreal, had also been censored. I think the people of this country and the members of this House are entitled to know who is doing this censoring, and why it is that our domestic letters are being opened in this manner. Possibly the Prime Minis* ter would be good enough to bring this matter to the attention of the Postmaster General.


Robert Laird Borden: I shall be very glad to direct the attention of the Postmaster General to the matter. Some complaints have come to me of departures from absolutely plain instructions which I know were given three or four days ago with regard to correspondence, not within this country, but from the United States. I cannot conceive how such mistakes should have happened, in view of instructions that I know have been given. It is my purpose this
afternoon, in the absence of the Postmaster General, to send for Dr. Coulter to direct his attention to. these matters, and to endeavour to bring it to pass that mistakes of this kind shall not occur in the future,
I concur with my hon. friend in the view that they are entirely inexcusable.


CASUALTY LISTS.
[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. BUCHANAN:: A lew days ago I
brought to the attention of the Acting Min-ieter of Militia the system adopted in re* porting casualty lists. It has been represented to me that it is impossible to identify men under the system followed since then. When the next of kin is given, the address may be in England, Ireland, or Scotland, 'and it is impossible for newspapers in Canadian cities to identify men who have enlisted from those cities. Of course the newspapers desire to identify local men. I have a letter from a newspaper editor in Calgary saying it is impossible to identify men in that way. It has been suggested that the department should resume the old system of giving the names of the battalions, with the understanding that the newspapers would not publish the battalions, but could use this information for purposes of identification.


Albert Edward Kemp: I was Acting Minister of Militia when my hon. friend brought this up a few days ago; and I thought the arrangement then made was satisfactory. However, I will assist the Prime Minister in bringing the matter to the attention of the proper authorities of the Militia Department with a view to improving it still further, if it can be done, while at the same time carrying out the intention of the order that was first issued.


BOUNTIES ON ZINC.
[Stage Direction]
On motion of Sir Thomas White (Minister of Finance), the House went into committee, Mr. Rhodes in the chair, to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to authorize the payment out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund of a bounty of two cents per pound on zinc or spelter, containing not more than two per cent of impurities, produced in Canada from zinc ores mined in Canada; provided the standard price of zinc or spelter in London, England, at the time of production is less than £36.19.3 sterling per ton of two thousand two hundred and forty (2,240)pounds, when the bounty payable shall be an amount equal to the difference between such standard price per ton and £36.19.3 per ton. Further provided, that in no
[Stage Direction]
event shall bounty be payable when the price received for zinc or spelter by the producer is eight cents or more per pound, and that no bounty shall be payable on zinc or spelter to the producer during the continuation of the war, and in no event on zinc or spelter produced after July 31, 1917.
Further resolved, that the total amount payable under the provisions of any Act founded on these resolutions shall not exceed the sum of
3400.000.
iSir THOMAS WHITE:	It	may be
helpful to the committee if I give a brief explanation. Provision ie made for the payment of a bounty not exceeding two cents a pound on zinc or spelter produced in Canada from zinc ores mined in Canada. The legislation will not apply when the price received for zinc by the producer is eight cents or more per pound. It will not apply during the period of the war, or after July 31, 1917. That is to say, the legislation is confined to the period between the termination of the war and July 31, 1917. This legislation is in pursuance of a promise which was given by the Government in August of last year to producers of zinc in Canada with the object of providing for the refining of pure zinc in the Dominion. An extraordinary condition prevailed at that time, and, as a matter of fact, still prevails. After the outbreak of the war an unusual demand arose for zinc. To give the committee an idea of the character of that demand, I may say that in 1914 the export of zinc in pigs, bars, plates, and sheets from the United States amounted to only 4,000.000 pounds, whereas, in 1915, the exports had risen to
256.000.	000 pounds; that is to say, the demand for zinc from the United States, where the zinc of this continent has been refined, was increased sixty-fold in a period of one year. The price rose from about 8 cents a pound, which was, I think, the price prevailing before the war broke out, to 40 cents a pound in 1915. It was brought to our attention last summer by the Shell Committee that the Canadian manufacturers of brass cartridge cases were unable to obtain pure zinc for their purposes. At that time no- zinc was being refined in Canada, with the exception of that being produced by a small experimental electro-lithic plant at Trail. The output of that plant was about one thousand pounds, or half a ton a day. As the result of the shortage in zinc, and of the inability of our manufacturers to obtain the necessary supplies for the manufacture of brass cartridge cases, there was a great delay in their output, and the matter became quite serious.

We took it up with the view of seeing whether any action on our part would prove an incentive to the zinc producers of Canada, the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company at Trail, and the Weedon Mining Company of Quebec, and others, to establish plants to provide zinc in Canada at reasonable prices for the purposes of the Shell Committee. After several1 conferences the Government determined upon this legislation, and, accordingly, a promise was given to the zinc producers in Canada. As the result of that promise, the Shell Committee was enabled to make a contract with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company of Trail for 8,000 tons at t'he price of 15 cents per pound, with an option upon
8,000	additional tons at a price of 12J cents per pound.
In consideration of the undertaking which the Government gave to introduce this legislation providing for a bounty, the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company undertook to put in the necessary plant to produce zinc at the rate of 25 tons per day, beginning not later than five months from the date of the acceptance of their offer by the Shell Committee. In a word, therefore, the result of the promise which was given by the Government to introduce this bounty legislation, is ' that the Shell Committee, and the manufacturers of brass, cartridge cases in Canada, have been enabled to obtain domestically a supply of pure zinc at 15 cents per pound at a time when pure zinc was selling in the United States at 40 cents per pound. I think that the price of pure zinc in the United States to-day is about 30 cents per pound. I do not think that any further explanation is necessary, as the resolution is fairly plain in its terms.
Mr. DEVLIN:: In view of the promise of the bounty, have many manufacturers given the assurance that they will manufacture this smelting zinc?


Sir THOMAS WHITE:: There were two companies I have mentioned, the Consolidated Alining and Smelting Company at Trail, and the Weedon Mining Company in the province ,of Quebec. I am not aware at present of any others, but we made the announcement broadcast through the press, and sent a copy to all those engaged in the zinc mining industry in Canada.


George Perry Graham: There will not be much paid under this legislation at present?


William Thomas White: I am glad my hon. friend has raised that point. I overlooked

mentioning the reason why it was considered necessary that this bounty should be given. It was this: the producers of zinc were unwilling to establish an expensive, plant in view of the possibility of the war coming to an end soon. They were quite content with the price which could be obtained during the war, but what they feared was that if the war should come to an end in the early future, the price of zinc would at once drop and an expensive plant would become unprofitable. They were content to establish their plant should the war last as long as the 1st of July, 1917; so that the contingencies which they had in mind have been provided for in the resolution before the Committee./
Mr, DEVLIN: Did they ask for any advance on their contract?


William Thomas White: At the outset-I am speaking now from recollection, but I am certain that I recall accurately-there was a proposal that the Government should make an advance for the purpose of defraying a part of the cost of the plant. That was not regarded favourably, and the bounty resolution took its place as being more satisfactory.


Mr. SINCLAIR:: Is it understood that the output of the mines, or the product of this industry, will be confined to Canada or to the use of the Allies during the war?


William Thomas White: The legislation is general in character, but the Shell Committee was, as I stated, able to make a contract for 8,000 tons at 15 cents per pound at a time when the price in the United States was 40 cents per pound, with an option upon a further 8,000 tons at a price of 12i cents per pound. I was assured by the Shell Committee at the time that the arrangement which they had made was perfectly satisfactory to them, and, so far as I have been able to learn, there is now no danger of the manufacturers of' brass cartridge cases being short of pure zinc.


Wilfrid Laurier: We had legislation of this nature some years ago. Has it expired?


William Thomas White: My right lion, friend is probably thinking of lead.


Wilfrid Laurier: Did that legislation not apply to zinc also?


William Thomas White: My right hon. friend may be right, as his memory is usually good, but I do not recall that it
applied to zinc. There is legislation relating to lead very similar in character to this; that is to say, it provides for a bounty on a sliding scale.


George Perry Graham: As I understand it, this merely guarantees to the producer a certain price to a certain date; that is, that the zinc will not go below a certain price. If it remains at a price of over 8 cents per pound, the producer will get no bounty, but should the war cease before 1917, and the price recede to 6 or 7 cents per pound, he would get a bounty.


William Thomas White: Yes.


John Gillanders Turriff: I would ask if this is the beginning of a movement on the part of the Government of Canada to deal with the question of handling Canadian ores in Canada, or is it merely a small matter dealing with the production of zinc and guaranteeing a certain price to the zinc manufacturers. It seems to me that this war has shown us that we are very much behind the times in Canada in our general methods of dealing with our mineral products. There is no question that Canada is one of the richest countries in the world in respect to minerals, and there is no doubt also that during the years that we have been mining and shipping our ores abroad, chiefly to the United States, to be handled, we have lost millions and tens of millions, and, I suppose, hundreds of millions of dollars.
Consider what has occurred in the Cobalt country since the camp was discovered some twelve or thirteen years ago. There was charged, on the average Cobalt ore, over $200 per ton to the men who took out the ore and shipped it. There were no proper facilities for dealing with the ore in Canada. The mine owners had to pay the freight on the ore to New York and he had to take practically what was given to him. All the Cobalt ore carried a large percentage of nickel and cobalt, both of them extremely valuable metals, and in most cases the owner of the ore not only did not get anything for the nickel or the cobalt, hut if there was more cobalt than nickel, or more nickel than cobalt, he was paid nothing for either, but he was fined so much a ton because the refiners claimed that it cost more to smelt or refine the silver product on account of the presence of these other metals. In many cases the loss of nickel and cobalt amounted to a great many dollars per ton. There is absolutely no shadow of a question that the two big smelt-

ing concerns in the United States saved all these by-product's and got an extra profit out of them over and above the large amount that they charged the owner of the ore for taking out the silver. In most cases the ore would run from 1.500 to 6,000 ounces of silver to the ton, but the owner only got 93 or 94 per cent of the silver, and he did not get anything at all for the by-products in the ore, which in many cases amounted to $5 or $10 per ton.
I would like to take this opportunity to point out that something should be done to improve this situation. It is a matter worthy of consideration as to whether the Government should not give some assistance to put the necessary plants up in Canada where all Canadian ores could be treated without having to send them abroad. The same thing applies to nickel, only very very much more so. I 4 p.m. was taken to task in this House because I make' the statement some weeks ago that our nickel ore produced by the Canada Copper Company, a subsidiary of the American Nickel Company, was sent in the form of matte to New Jersey and there refined by the International Nickel Company, which is largely a German concern, and that a great deal of our nickel was going to our enemies during this period of war. I pointed out that we had no possible control and that we could not control the nickel once the ore, or matte, went outside the boundaries of Canada. The hon. the Solicitor General (Mr. Meighen) took me to task for the statements I had made, sayng that they were all wrong and that I was wrong in particular as to the amount of money that the International Nickel Company was making. My hon. friend the Minister of Finance (Sir Thomas White), a few days after that, confirmed to a large extent my words, because he showed that the International Nickel Company was making twice as much as the Solicitor General had stated. I want to draw the attention of the House to something that was said in the British House of Commons on this subject' at that time. I have here a sessional paper containing speeches delivered in the British House of Commons dated January 18, 1916. I want to read one or two-short extracts from a speech made by Mr. Hewins, who is a very prominent member of the British House, and who was a member of a commission appointed to look into this matter some time ago. Here is what he says in part about the way in which our ores are handled:
Let me take one important question which plays a very important part in the whole scheme of German finance-I mean the control of our raw material and especially of the shipment of the ore produced in the British Empire. X do not wish to go into any lengthy details about this important scheme, but whether you take the zinc concentrates in Australia, nickel in Canada, or the whole series of metals, I am really giving way no secret when I say they are virtually controlled by German syndicates and have been for years. One of the most effective branches from that point of view of German activity for many years past, in support of the European system which I have described, has been to provide for the security of her manufactures by securing this control, and everybody knows at the present time that, if you once smash the power of these German syndicates, you inflict a most severe blow, not only upon the economic power of Germany, but in particular on those financial methods which they have applied and still apply to support ' their policy.
I believe the Government are fully acquainted with the development of this important question in the Empire. If I am not mistaken, as long ago as last December twelve months, the Australian Commonwealth approached the Government on the subj >ct. I am speaking entirely from memory, but it certainly was something like that. In Canada measures have been taken in regard to this particular case, and I do suggest that one of the first things the Government might do is not to act alone but to act in consultation and collaboration with the Dominion Government to see that these resources of the British Empire, of which in many cases we have almost a monopoly, are no longer exploited in the interests of our enemies, and we should tell the Germans quite frankly that this state of things is going to cease once and for all. I agree no nation can say, or would dream of saying, that we will for all time make a monopoly of the raw materials which we produce in our Empire. We cannot say that but I think we are entitled to say that the resources of the British Empire shall be held, controlled, manipulated and used by Britishers first and foremost. Very few things would excite more interest and enthusiasm in the Empire than a definite resolve on the part of the Government that at once and forthwith steps shall be taken to secure that result.
If that does not confirm every word, and more than every word, that I spoke in regard to our nickel going to the United States, its going to Germany, and its being controlled by Germans, then I do not know where you could get more confirmation. I thought that when we were on this subject it would be a good time to bring this matter to the attention of the Government. I am doing it partly for the. purpose of proving that what I said a month ago was practically correct, but more particularly, that a better state of affairs might be brought about in Canada, so that in the event of another such war as 'this breaking out we should not be in the position we are in to-day. Minerals are of the utmost importance in manufacturing war material of different kinds, and

if, when this war broke out, we had prevented our Canadian nickel going to Germany, prevented them from using it in making battleships, big guns, small guns, and rifles, we should have been in a position aflmost to cripple Germany. But we were not in that position until a month or so ago, when after I brought this matter up in -the House the Government stopped, to a certain extent, the export of nickel to the United States. But the Government should go further. This war will be over, I hope, in the near future; it will be over before very long, anyway, and we could take this step now as a war measure. Now is the time, wh&n we have an' absolute monopoly of nickel, to see that .it shall be refined in Canada, and if all' our nickel was refined in this country we should be able to control its export in time of war. Assistance of this kind could be given, by the Government at a very small cost, and I trust the Minister of Finance will take the matter up with his colleagues, and see if the Government cannot make a beginning along the lines I have suggested.


Mr. R. F. GREEN (Kootenay):: I desira to say just a word or two an connection with the proposal for giving a bounty on zinc produced in the Dominion of Canada. Some twelve years ago, I think it was, the Government then in po-wer, under the leadership of Sir Wilfrid Laurier,were wise enough to introduce a measure granting a bounty on lead produced within the Dominion. The giving of that bounty has had a very beneficial effect on the lead industry of our country. It has given the producer the assurance of stability so far as the market is concerned, and it has not cost the Government a great deal. If my memory serves me right, the amount that was originally set aside for bounty purposes was $5,000,000, and the period within which it could be earned was five years. At the end of the five years during which the lead producer was probably experiencing the worst time since the bounty was first given, something like half the $5,000,000 Was still unearned. The period was extended for another five years, and at the end of that time there was -still left just a little short of $1,000,000. The present Government extended the period still further, until the balance of the bounty should have been earned. I repeat, the bounty has been of great benefit to the lead industry in this country. The -Government's promise to give -a bounty upon zinc has also had a beneficial effect, enabling zinc producers to establish works for the production of zinc in Canada. I trust the -Government will see its way clear at the expiration of this period, if not before, to devise some scheme to enable us to establish zinc production works in 'Canada large enough to refine all the zinc produced within the country. When those works are established we shall, if they are of the proper kind, be able to compete in the markets of the world. We are producing to-day a certain amount of refined zinc in 'Canada, and will -continue to produce it just as long as the prices remain high, -say over eight cents a pound. I am sorry to say, however, the present method of producing zinc in -Canada is not so economical as the method in which it is produced in the United States. It has been produced in the past in the United States, Belgium and Germany, by what is generally known as the Belgian process.
Our zinc has been produced by the elec-trolytiq process, -which will always be more expensive than the Belgian process. The Belgian process is the cheapest known process in the world to-day. As I understand it, the zinc is driven off in fumes; those fumes are gathered in long flues of one description or another, and the old bag process enters very largely into it, the flues being choked with ordinary bagging, in which the zinc is collected as the fumes cool. That is a very economical way, and will always be cheaper than the electrolytic process. I hope the Government will find some way of assisting the refining of zinc in this country, so that eventually all the zinc we produce will be refined in Canada, and I trust with the hon. member for Assiniboia that the same policy will be followed with regard to nickel, copper and other metals. The hon. gentleman mentioned that producer^ at Cobalt lost when a certain percentage of different ores were present in their first raw product. I am afraid that will always enter into the question. Most of the lead, silver, zinc and other ores produced in my part of the country were at one time treated at the large smelters in the United States, where they were treated on the same basis as the United States ores, and the situation, so far as zinc ores are concerned, is very similar to that outlined by the hon. member for Assiniboia. I might say that our lead ores contain a certain percentage of zinc, iron, silver-lead, and other metals, and any of these lead ores containing over 10 per cent of zinc are penalized to the extent of 50 cents a unit per ton, and as

the hon. member for Assiniboia pointed out with regard ,to nickel, not only are they penalized for the zinc contained in the ore, but they get nothing for the zinc contents and are paid only for the silver-lead contents. The same practice is followed with regard to American ores, mined in American mines and smelted in American smelters. Therefore, any assistance that this Government would give would not do away with that particular handicap, because that is a condition that must be overcome. If there is a certain percentage of material that is foreign to the one that is being treated or to the bulk of the material of which the ore consists, that must necessarily be removed in some way before the ore can be treated, and therefore there must of necessity be a penalty after that maximum percentage has been reached. Another reason why I think the Government should encourage the reduction of ores within this Dominion is because in my opinion, we should take care of all our natural re-cources that we can possibly handle; that we should polish them up and put them in the highest possible state of perfection so that we can market the finished product, thus getting the greatest value out of them. In that way not only would we obtain a higher price, but the -money spent in refining and finishing -the ore would be spent in the Dominion amongst our own people and would be the means of establishing large industries in this country, and after the refining process was completed, we could sell the finished product in the markets of the world. I hope that the Government will take steps to ensure that every pound of crude metal produced in Canada is refined in the Dominion and placed on the markets of the world as the finished product.
-Mr. NESBITT: Apparently, by the resolution, the hon. gentleman is proposing to give a bounty only when the price is below a certain fixed figure, which means that below that figure the smelting company or corporation that proposes to undertake smelting can not make the business pay. My hon. friend (Mr. Green) has told us about using up the raw' material in this country. Everyone in the mining business wants to use the raw material in this country if he can get a market for the finished product. Our natural resources have been in existence since the glacial period, and what the people want before they put their money into these industries is a market for the product. The Govern-[M-. Grean.]
rnent, as I understand it, canno-t afford to build up a market for zinc or spelter; the smelting companies have to find their own markets all over the world. I would like to ask the minister why, if we have zinc ores in the West, it is necessary to give a bounty so as to enable those who mine zinc ores to make a profit. My hon. friend (Mr. Green) and my hon. friend from Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) talk about the enormous quantities of raw material in this country. Why is it necessary to give ^ bounty if there is such a profit on these things, because we all know that this year spelter has reached an enormous figure? We all know that spelter has risen in price from six cents to twenty-eight cents a pound. I want to -see if I am right in my proposition that the reason the minister proposes this resolution is that the corporation or whoever is going to go into the manufacture of spelter cannot make a profit under a certain price, and that to guard against the spelter going below that price he is going to give them a bounty of two cents a pound so that they will be in a position to mine at a profit.


William Thomas White: I am sorry my hon. friend was not in the House when I made what I regarded as a very full explanation. I shall, however, be glad to go over the same ground again.


Mr. NESBITT:: Briefly, please.


William Thomas White: Last summer,
when we gave the promise respecting this legislation, the only zinc being refined in Canada was by a small experimental plant at Trail which turned out about a thousand pounds or half a ton a day. They employed the electrolytic process. The war created such a demand for this zinc that the exports of zinc products from the United States increased sixty fold and the price rose as high as forty cents a pound. It was brought to our attention by the Shell Committee that the Canadian manufacturers of brass cartridge cases could not obtain pure zinc for their work, and there was great delay in consequence in their output. We called a conference of zinc producers, two companies being represented, as well as the Shell Committee and representatives of the Mines Department at Ottawa, and the whole situation was considered pretty carefully. The producers were unwilling, owing to uncertainty as to the duration of the war, to make a large investment. They were apprehensive that, if

the war should come to a sudden end, the price of zinc would drop to 5 or 6 cents a pound, and that they would lose their investment in their plant. It was to guard, them against that contingency that we promised this legislation. My hon. friend will see from the resolution that the operation of the measure is confined to the period between the conclusion of the waT and July 31, 1917. They felt that if the war lasted as long as that they would make sufficient profit in the meantime to justify them in the establishment of their refineries. As a1 result of the action taken by the Government, /the Shell Committee was enabled, on behalf of the Imperial Government, to enter into a contract with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company at Trail for 8,000 tons' of zinc, at 15 cents a pound, to be produced at the rate of 25 tons per day. This was a reduction of 25 cents on the then prevailing price, with an option of a further 8,000 tons at ]2j cents a pound. The object, therefore, was to ensure the zinc producer of the continuation of price for such period as would justify him in establishing his plant.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Then they satisfied you that they could not produce spelter at 6 cents a pound?


William Thomas White: There is a very limited market in Canada for zinc and spelterj and with the expense of the electrolytic process it was quite clear that there was no chance whatever of their making a large investment for the purpose of going generally into zinc production unassisted by bounty legislation. In answer to my hon. friend from Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff), I may say that this legislation is of a temporary character. It arose out of a situation in which there was a real shortage of zinc in Canada. The larger question to which my hon. friend from Assiniboia and my hon. friend from Kootenay have referred is one of the most important in Canada; that is to say, the treatment in Canada of Canadian ores. It is by no means as simple a proposition as appears upon the surface, because many considerations enter into the question which are not pb-vious at first sight. One of them is touched upon by the hon. member for North Oxford. The question of tariffs also plays a certain part. It is perfectly plain, however, that since the outbreak of the war there has been a growing feeling in favour of the refining in Canada of Canadian ores, especially those products
which, may be needed in time of war. I think that not only Canada but the Empire has come to realize as never before that situations may arise in which the nation that produces within its own borders the materials necessary in war times has a decided advantage in war. It is a question that will engage more and more the attention of the public and of legislators as time goes on. We are in the midst of war; our expenditures are very heavy, and they will increase, as I have stated on more than one occasion in this House. But the whole question of our mineral production and of the finishing in Canada of our mineral products is one that will engage my most earnest attention and the attention of the Government within the next year or two. It is clear that Canada has immense mineral resources, capable of almost unlimited development; and, so far as I am concerned, I shall certainly not be wanting, and I believe the Government will not be wanting, in giving consideration to a policy which will lead to the development of those resources.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The community that I represent are very strongly opposed to bounties-whether wisely or unwisely I would not like to say at the moment. If my hon. friend means by "the encouragement of production from raw material in Canada" that the Government are going into the bounty business again, I think he will find very keen opposition from the farming community of the country.
Resolution reported and concurred in.
Sir THOMAS WHITE thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 94, to provide for the payment of bounties on zinc produced from zinc ores mined in Canada.


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

[Stage Direction]
The House in Committee of Supply, Mr. Rhodes in the Chair.
Prince Edward Island railway, $613,100.
William Pugsley: The hon. member for
Kings, P.E'.I. '(Mi. Hughes) was obliged to leave by the train. He asked me to request the minister to allow this matter to stand.


John Dowsley Reid: We usually have an understanding that one item should be allowed to stand, and that on that item the hon.

gentleman can discuss the Prince Edward Island railway, or canals, or anything relating to the department.


William Pugsley: One item will be allowed to stand?


John Dowsley Reid: Yes.


William Pugsley: Before we go on with the discussion of this item, perhaps the Acting Minister (Mr. Reid), would be good enough to let me know as to the correspondence concerning the operation of the Transcontinental railway by the Grand Trunk Pacific. The hon. gentleman said that he would look into the matter and bring down the correspondence.


John Dowsley Reid: Certain of the correspondence was brought down.


William Pugsley: That only relates ,to the ..change of grades, but the Acting Minister will remember that in pfevious sessions I .called attention, as I did this session, to the fact that when the late Government was in power the president of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company had offered to take over the Transcontinental by sections as completed, to put on rolling stock to the satisfaction of the Government, and operate the road to the satisfaction of the Government; the accounts were to be audited by Government officials, and, if there should be a profit upon the operation, that profit would go to the Government, and if a loss the Government would bear the loss, but it should be added to the cost of the railway upon which the company would pay interest. It is upon that subject I wish to know if there has been any correspondence. The Minister of Railways as. sured the-House that he would take up that . subject and see if the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company was still prepared to en-[DOT] ter into such an arrangement.


John Dowsley Reid: The arrangement for the taking over,of the uncompleted sections, if I understand aright, was made with a view . of taking , over the different sections before the road was completed.


William Pugsley: Yes, under the statute there is provision for it.


John Dowsley Reid: Before it was completed. But before that was done, they came to a , decision to appoint Sir William Whyte as an arbitrator, and on his arbitration they took over the portion between Winnipeg and Superior Junction. That was done under - the award of Sir William Whyte. Of course,
[Mr., J. ,D. Reid.J
that is passed and gone, and the road wes completed, so far as the Government was concerned, and the Grand Trunk Pacific was asked to take over the whole road as a completed road. That was in March of 1915.
Mr. PUGSLEY. Was that by letter?


John Dowsley Reid: Yes, the correspondence was brought down. I have here, in addition, the final letters in which the Grand Trunk Pacific were asked and refused to take over the road. Perhaps I had better read these last two ' letters. The letter from the minister is as follows:
25th March, 1915.
Dear Mr. Chamberlain:
. As intimated to you in previous correspondence the eastern division of the National Transcontinental railway is completed within the meaning of section 20 of the agreement between His Majesty the King and the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, dated 29th day of July 1903, scheduled to the National Transcontinental Railway Act, chapter 71, of 3 Edward VII, and the said division is ready for operation.
I find a reference in your correspondence to certain additional works still under construction by the Transcontinental Railway Commission, which additional works it was contemplated by the commission and by your company would ultimately be used in connection with the road as now completed. The Government, however, having been advised that the eastern division, for purposes of operation, has been reported by the chief engineer of the Transcontinental Railway Commission as completed and ready to be leased, is of the opinion that it is in the public interest that such lease be now entered into. You will readily understand that were any o.her interpretation as to date of completion to be placed upon the agreement with your company it would mean the postponement for a very considerable length of time of the taking over of this extensive line of railway by the Grand Trunk Pacific, with results that might be incompatible with the public interest. Such a postponement would be to a date very hard, if not impossible to determine, as in one sense a railway can never be said to be complete. The responsibility for such a postponement X must decline on behalf of the Government to take.
The Government has under section 15 of this agreement ascertained the cost of construction, in the manner therein provided, and in so doing have included only such expenditure as has gone into work on the eastern division as now completed and ready to be leased.
I therefore request that the lease referred to in sections 6 and 20 of the above mentioned agreement be entered into. The Government has had prepared a form of lease embodying the provisions required to be included in the same by statute and by agreements between your company and the Government. The rental reserved is based on the cost of construction ascertained as aforesaid. This lease I now hand you on behalf of the Government. You will observe attached to the form of lease is a Schedule B, which schedule should contain a description of the rolling stock marked and assigned by the company to the eastern division of the National Transcontinental railway. I trust that such

rolling stock as the statute directs has been provided and assigned accordingly, and as particulars of the same are now not in our possession, I would request that the schedule be duly filled in by you.
On behalf of the Government I beg to request that this lease be executed by your company and assuming that the schedule as so filled in will represent rolling stock fulfilling the conditions of the agreement, and provided and assigned as therein set out, I undertake that this lease will be promptly executed on behalf of the Government.
It has been and is my desire that there be nothing contained in the lease as drafted and now presented not strictly provided for by statutory requirements, and nothing omitted directed by statute to be included. This desire I believe is lived up to in the form of lease enclosed. Should, however, in your opinion the form contain any feature to which reasonable objection can be taken, or omit any necessary provision, I am prepared on behalf of the Government to confer with your company and to endeavour by every proper means to come to a common basis, and I will make every effort tc do so consistent with the requirements imposed on us by statute.
That you may have before you the method by which the cost of construction, and consequently the annual rental, is arrived at, I am enclosing you a copy of the report of our auditors thereon and of the schedules thereto annexed.
Yours very truly,
(Sgd.) F. Cochrane.
E. J. Chamberlin, Esq.,
General Manager,
Grand Trunk Pacific Railway,
Montreal, Que.
The reply to that was dated April 27, about a month later, and is:
Grand Trunk Pacific Railway,
Montreal, Canada, April 27, 1915.
Dear Sir,-I duly received your letter of 25th ultimo enclosing certain documents, including a form of lease of the eastern division of the National Transcontinental railway, which you requested should be executed by this company.
After giving your communication and enclosures careful consideration, I beg to state I cannot see my way to ask our directors for authority to execute the lease. Among the reasons which have influenced me in reaching the decision indicated are:
(1)	The great increase in the cost of construction of the eastern division beyond that in contemplation by the parties at the time the agreement of July 29, 1903 was entered into.
That the cost as now computed and upon which the company is asked to pay interest by way of rental is greatly in excess of that estimated in 1903, appears to be admitted. How this largely increased cost has been occasioned has been the subject of investigation by a commission appointed by your Government on the 29th day of January, 1912. The report of that commission was submitted to Parliament last year. I do not think I need do more than call attention to it and to the official record of the debate which followed its submission. I might however, add that to my mind this large excess of cost over the estimate might have been to some extent avoided had 192
our view of the meaning and intention of clause 7 of the agreement of July 29th, 19031, been accepted. That clause, as you are aware, provided that the construction of the eastern division should be subject to the joint supervision, inspection and acceptance of the chief engineer appointed by the Government and the chief engineer of the company. In order that full and practical effect might be given to this provision, the company suggested at the outset that all contracts should contain a clause declaring that the expression " chief engineer" meant the chief engineer of the Government and the chief engineer of the company acting together, and provide that payments to contractors should only be made upon the joint certificate of both engineers. Our suggestion, was however, not adopted. Mr. Gordon Grant, chief engineer of the Transcontinental Commission would seem to appreciate the purpose of clause 7 by asking as he did in his letter of 2nd February last that Mr. H. A Woods, our engineer, should sign jointly with him a formal acceptance of the line.
The cost was further added to by the imposition of a duty upon steel rails shortly after the agreement of July 1903 was entered into.
(2)	The non-completion, up to the present of the eastern division in accordance with the provisions of the agreements of July 29th, 1903 and February 18th, 1904.
The company takes the view that the eastern division is not yet completed in accordance with the agreements. The claim of the Government to the contrary rests upon Mr. Grant's statement to that effect, which, however, is not acquiesced in by Mr. Woods. Mr. Grant admits that large sums must yet be expended before the line will be completed. I refer to his letter of March 24th last to Mr. A. Bell of the Department of Railways and Canals, with which he submitted statements showing estimated expenditures for work still uncompleted amounting to several million dollars. The letter addressed to you by Messers Bell and King on the 24th ultimo also shows quite clearly that they do not regard the line as completed. In that communication they say:
" The estimated cost of the line when all the works now under way are completed, which completion is contemplated on the 31st December, 1916, will be $179,586,877.35 as set out in statement "A" hereto annexed... .The above amount may, of course, be very largely increased by reason of court decisions. "
The following paragraph ' appears in their letter to you of the 23rd ultimo:
" We beg to call your attention to a letter received from the Solicitor General, a copy of which is hereto attached, from which it appears that the ' cost of construction ' of the eastern division as completed on the 31st December, 1914, within the meaning df section 20 of the agreement scheduled to the Act of 1903 should not include expenditures made on and in respect of certain works which were still under construction. The result will be that the * cost of construction as a basis upon which to ascertain the rental to be paid by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company at this date will be very considerably less than the actual cost upon completion of the said additional works now under way."
If, as appears from the foregoing, it is intended that the company shall eventually pay interest upon the cost of the works still under construction, those works must necessarily be regarded as part of the eastern division, other-


William Pugsley: Then we may take it
for granted that there is no correspondence showing any inquiry on the part of the Government as to whether or not the pro' posal made by Mr. Hays to the late Government, to which I called the attention of the House, had been met. There is no correspondence dealing with an interim lease, pending the completion of the whole line?


John Dowsley Reid: I understand that, unless
anything of that kind was burned, there is no correspondence.


George Perry Graham: I would point out that
the first reason given by the Grand Trunk Pacific is based on the brief placed in their hands by this Government in the form of the Lynch-Staunton report, which is what I told the Government would happen. They paid $100,000 for a report which provided the Grand Trunk Pacific with a brief and with an additional reason why they should not take over the line. They cite the report and the speeches of members of the Government, and of those supporting it, in favour of their contention that the line cost more than it should have cost, and, consequently, they would not take it over. That is one reason. The second is one to which we have referred several times, that is, that the road is not yet completed. There is no question that the road is not yet completed under the meaning of the statute or of the agreement. Sir William White said that the shops were part of the eastern division of the Transcontinental, but the shops at Quebec are not yet completed. There is a vote for the completion of the works of the eastern division of the Transcontinental this very session, so that there is no possible escape from that contention of the Grand Trunk Pacific.
The other contention, that the road has not been constructed under the joint supervision of the company and the Railway Commission, is not well founded. I submit that the records will show that if there was a sinner, in the matter of joint supervision, it was the Grand Trunk Pacific, and not the Railway Commission or the Government. One of the chief difficulties we had was-I think I have stated it before-

that in the time of the late Mr. Hays the Grand Trunk Pacific declined at first to make inspections and to approve or disapprove of certain portions of the road as the contractors completed their work. For example, a large contractor would have a certain portion of the line to build, and he would employ many sub-contradtors. When the sub-contractor completed his work, and the chief contractor submitted it for approval, it was altogether unreasonable to allow a matter of that kind to stand. It had to be decided, because the men had tc get their pay, the sub-contractors had to be paid, and the chief contractor had to get his pay from the Government. The company took a great deal of urging before Mr. Hays consented to have those differences of opinion decided every thirty days, and to have the approval or disapproval of the engineers. It is not true that the work was not carried on under joint supervision, and I make the statement that, outside of some things that were referred to arbitration under the Act, the Grand Trunk Pacific approved of every foot of work done and of every dollar expended up to the time that the late Government went out of power. Consequently, there is no foundation for that objection. I may explain to the committee what the method was. Under the agreement, the road was to oe constructed under the joint supervision of the chief engineer of the Grand Trunk Pacific to meet the chief engineer of the Board of Railway Commissioners. At one time I think it took me longer to get them together and then not the chief engineer, but the assistant chief engineer, Mr. Wood, was sent.
I do not know whether the company is hanging anything on the difference between the chief engineer and the assistant, but the company sent the assistant. Thete men met together and when they con'd net arrive at a decision it was referred to a board of arbitration composed of these twe and a third who was, as a matter of fact, Sir Collingwood Schreiber, who is in the Government service. The difficulties I pointed out a few moments ago were, first, the delay of the company in meeting the commission, and, next, of the Government in approving or disapproving of the work of construction. After a good deal of discussion, some of which was more or less heated, as will be remembered toy those who were then members of the Government, the Grand Trunk Pacific agreed that these difficulties, if difficulties there were, should toe settled every thirty days in order that the work of con-mi
struction could go on. Where the work was approved payment could be made and where there was a question it could either be referred to the arbitrators or put on one side for further consideration,. Their contention in that respect is not well founded, because in every case of importance, except those that were before the board of arbitration, and some of those had been decided, the chief engineer or the assistant chief engineer of the Grand Trunk Pacific, had approved of every bit of work done.
I submit again that the Grand Trunk Pacific were not in a position, under their agreement, to take over the road as it was offered to them, and I will tell the committee why. It was to lie taken over under an agreement which, as in the form of a statute, was ratified by the Parliament of Canada. It was also ratified toy the board of directors and by the shareholders of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company. If the road was not completed, as I think the Grand. Trunk Pacific had a right to say it was not under the statute, then they could not, through their president, enter into a lease without the consent of the directors and, I believe, the approval of the shareholders, because it then became a new agreement. The minister will see that Mr. Chamberlin says in his letter that he could not recommend the directors to enter into a lease because he had to report that the road was not completed. If that road had been completed under the statute, without any question, he would have reported that to the directors and they would have given him instructions to lease the road under these conditions. I think the Government have made a grave mistake1, first, in making changes in the line-the seriousness of which I will not discuss, as they have been discussed before-and in making any changes at all which gave the president of the company an excuse for not taking over the line. If my hon. friend looks ,at the correspondence he will discover that when the changes were being made in the curves and grades, the president of the company wrote to the Government stating that if the changes were made he would not take over the line. The Government made a mistake at that time in accepting the advice of the engineers, or those who were responsible for that advice, and in persisting in making these changes, because that was the first intimation that the Government had that the company would not take over the line.
Next, there was no semblance of a com-

pleted line at Quebec under the agreement. There was a certain agreement, and under that agreement is was expressly provided tl at the work must have the joint approval of both the company and the commissioners. The changes at Quebec have not yet been agreed to toy the Grand Trunk Pacific. I have had all the correspondence up to a certain time, perhaps preceding the correspondence read to-day. In that correspondence there were references made to certain talks, but it' always came back to the point where the Grand Trunk Pacific officials backed away from approval, and the correspondence is rather against approval than in favour of it. That being the case, of course it was clear that the Grand Trunk Pacific were preparing, in so far as they were concerned, not to take over the line. I think the Government made a serious mistake in not proceeding according to the agreement, completing the rokd and getting the approval of the Grand Trunk Pacific, because the company had intimated that if the plans were deviated irom they would Hot take over the line.
I do not know that I shall say anything more. I think it was a great mistake. The country has suffered by reason of there being no operation of the Grand Trunk Pacific east of Cochrane as' there should have been. West of ICochrane there is a fair tri-weekly passenger service from Toronto. Those two travel on the line say that the service is excellent. Commercial men who travel on the line to the West have told me that they get an excellent service over the Grand Trunk Pacific from Toronto all through the West. The roadbed is a marvel to railway men who travel over it, the trains are well run and the accommodation is excellent. But* east of Cochrane there is practically no service. The point I raise is that if the line had been completed according to the agreement, the Grand Trunk Pacific could not have evaded taking it over. Then you may say that they could not afford to run it. There was a clause in the agreement which provided against just -such a contingency as that.
It was provided that for seven 5 p.m. years after the completion of the line the Grand Trunk Pacific was not to pay the Government any interest, which contemplated a small business for a certain number of years. Having to pay no interest, the Grand Trunk Pacific would have been in such a position that they could have run trains merely at the cost of operation. Then the public 
would have been in this situation all the way from Moncton to Cochrane, a section which is practically neglected now, that they could have compelled the Grand Trunk Pacific to give a fair service. The company are not so compelled, and they take refuge behind the plea that there is no traffic. That view would not have held with the Board of Bailway Commissioners, because in Canada, where roads have been publicly aided, even if the traffic is light, they must accommodate the public. A company cannot stop running trains, even on one of our old lines, if the reasonable accommodation of the public is interfered with. The Board of Eailway Commissioners have compelled companies, which did not want to run trains, to give a service because the public was suffering by the stoppage of these trains. I think again that the Government have made a great mistake in having left a loophole for the Grand Trunk Pacific by enabling them to say that they had not completed this line according to the agreement, because if they had they would have been in a position to have compelled the company to take over the road, and the people would have been having the benefit to a much greater extent, particularly east of Cochrane, of the vast investment of money that has gone into this great enterprise. The object of the construction of the line is being defeated. East of Cochrane there is only a local service. Quebec is on a side street and not on the main line at all. East of Cochrane it is merely a local service, and, instead of being a part of the great continental railway that it was intended to be, it is being used merely as a local road, with occasional trains, and no Service worthy of the name is being given. That refers also to the Maritime Provinces, and I might express the opinion that it is useless to spend the millions which are being spent in Halifax, St. John, and. at other points for this great ocean to ocean service if it is not going to 'be conducted as a through line.
Vihy develop Canadian ports at Halifax, St. John, Quebec and Montreal, if we are not going to do our best to bring the traffic of the West to them!' What happens and what must happen in winter? The Government is running the line from Toronto in connection with the Grand Trunk, and it runs over the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario. Any freight which comes down, and as to which the Grand Trunk has any say, will not be taken over the Transcontinental

from Cochrane east. It will be brought from Winnipeg to Fort William down to Cochrane, then to North Bay, and then, if it has to go east, the Grand Trunk will take care of it at North Bay, and turning east at Scotia Junction, send it on to Portland or Boston, and not to a Canadian port. That will not be serving the object for which this vast amount of money was expended. I had not the honour of being in the House when this measure was put through, but I have read the debates, and everybody knows that a great deal hinged on the development of the ocean ports. While the road was being constructed my hon. friend will remember that time and again we discussed methods of making the Grand Trunk Pacific, when it took over the line take the traffic to Halifax and St. John. But now, when the Government, and not the Grand Trunk Pacific, has got the road, it does the very thing we tried to prevent the Grand Trunk Pacific from doing. It is handing over a large portion of the traffic destined for east of Cochrane to Scotia, and it then finds its way to American ports, as the Grand Trunk has no interest in taking it to Halifax or St. John, or even to Quebec. Whatever the Government intends to do, ought to be announced to the public at once. There is great dissatisfaction in the eastern part of Canada over the way this line is being managed. Whenever I discuss this matter the minister says he thinks I am after the manager. The manager and I are as good friends as the minister and the manager, but he thinks I am all wrong, and I am just as absolutely sure that he is all wrong, and we leave it at that. I am not after the manager at all. We must never look at this road from the point of view that it was intended solely for present needs, or to accommodate merely a part of the people of Canada. This road was constructed by all the people of Canada, and we have no right, particularly when the Government is managing it, to direct the traffic at a point half way along the line, and give those on the eastern end of the road no benefit whatever. Quebec is greatly disappointed and so will Halifax and St. John be if the present method of carrying on the road is persisted in. ilt is said that along the road east of Cochrane there is nothing to induce operation, but we must remember this, and the members from Ontario will bear it in mind, that when the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario road was first spoken of, a great
many people laughed at the idea of building a road into a country of rocks, where there never would Ibe any traffic; but the construction of that line has resulted in the opening up and development of the richest deposit of silver ore in the world, as well as cobalt and other minerals. We do not know w'hat may be found along the line of the 'Transcontinental east of 'Cochrane, but we do know, on the authority of the Prime Minister of Ontario, that there is along the line of the Transcontinental , land of as good a quality as can be found any where in the world, and the only way to let the people know what we have in this hinterland of Ontario and Quebec is to take them along the Transcontinental. What is the good of building the road there and then practically shutting it up? Let the people travel along the line east of Cochrane and get acquainted with the newer parts of Ontario and Quebec, and then we shall see these new parts opened up and developed, and, it may be, the discovery of some hitherto unknown valuable mineral productions. It is the duty of the Government, even more than of the company, to see that this is done, and I again urge the Government, how that they have taken over the road, to see that the line east of Cochrane is not made merely a local line, but that a service is at once established so that a man can board the Intercolonial at Halifax for Moncton, and there be attached to a train that will land him in Prince Rupert, if he desires to go by the Grand Trunk Pacific. That is what the line was intended for, but so long as we keep the eastern portion of the road closed, everybody east of Cochrane is deprived of the benefit for which he pays his taxes, just the asme as people in any other part of the country.


John Dowsley Reid: As regards the non-completion of the line, and that being a reason why the Grand Trunk have not taken it over, the hon. gentleman understands that that objection might be raised at any time for all time to come..


William Pugsley: Not at all.


John Dowsley Reid: They could always say that the road was not completed. I think myself that they did not want to take over the road last spring on any terms, and the best evidence of that is that the Grand Trunk Pacific came to us a year ago and asked for assistance for the western portion of the line. The hon. member says that if the road had been completed so that the com-

pany could have taken it over under the lease, the Railway Commission could have compelled them to operate the road. Now we know from experience, and they know, that to operate the road from Winnipeg to Moncton will mean a serious loss every year for a number of years to come. That being so, how could we force them to operate the eastern portion, supposing they had taken over the road, when they had just received a large amount of money to assist the western end of the line. At all events the Minister of Railways and Canals was satisfied, and the correspondence bears him out, that the company would not take over the road at that time. But, be that as it may, it is perhaps not worth while discussing just now. What I wanted more particularly to deal with was the hon. gentleman's remarks regarding the operation of the road. Everybody agrees that the road between Cochrane and Winnipeg has been operated satisfactorily, not only to the people along the line, but to the general public as well. With reference to that portion of the road between Cochrane and Moncton, I think I stated the other evening that conditions there were not the same as west of Cochrane. I admit that it is not a satisfactory service east of Cochrane, and the Government never intended the service to be left in that condition. When the road was taken over, without an engine, car, or equipment of any other kind, we had to take some 75 engines off the Intercolonial and many cars as well. It has been a very difficult matter to get the equipment that is necessary to operate the road from end to end in a way that would be satisfactory to the public. I think I also stated that the Department of Railways and Canals had been trying to arrange a through train service from Halifax and St. John-I am not forgetting St. John, as the hon. member states-to Winnipeg-


George Perry Graham: You did the other night.


William Pugsley: Even for small favours we are thankful.


John Dowsley Reid: I also stated that the service between Halifax and St. John and Winnipeg would be arranged at the earliest possible date.


William Pugsley: What date is that, may
I ask?


John Dowsley Reid: I am just coming to that if the hon. member will be patient. I discussed the matter with the general manager of the road and he told me we would have

a through train service between Halifax and Winnipeg, and, of course, that means through to Prince Rupert.


William Pugsley: You did not ask him about the through service from St. John.


John Dowsley Reid: Halifax and St. John. I overlooked St. John again,


William Pugsley: You pverlook St. John pretty frequently.


John Dowsley Reid: I must not do that. The people of St. John are very fine people; they treated me well when I was there, and I would not like them to think for a minute that I have forgotten them.


William Pugsley: I think you told them on one occasion, if I remember aright, that if they thought Mr. Pugsley had not made large enough provision for harbour improvements to come to you as Minister of Customs and. you would give them millions and millions more.


John Dowsley Reid: The hon. member will remember that since that statement was made, we have been trying to economise.


William Pugsley: Things have tightened up pretty considerably.


John Dowsley Reid: We expect to be running a
through train service from Halifax and St. John to Winnipeg on or about the 1st day of June.


William Pugsley: Of this year?


John Dowsley Reid: Yes, that is what I meant. We expect to run a through passenger service, with pullman cars attached.


William Pugsley: Will that be a daily or a tri-weekly service?


John Dowsley Reid: I have not gone into that, but it is altogether likely that we shall run a tri-weekly service. We will, at least, run a service that will be satisfactory. We have ordered cars and we are trying to get more power as soon as possible, and I think that what we have done so far and the arrangements we have made for a through service ought to be satisfactory to the House and to the country. So far as the freight for Quebec and St. John and Halifax is concerned, the hon. member knows that we have been carrying quite a large quantity of freight through to' Quebec and to St. John and to Halifax over the Transcontinental via Quebec, where we have a ferry that takes the cars over, and until the bridge is completed, of course, we must use-

3W3


George Perry Graham: Does not my hon. friend remember that the other day, when he was making a statement about the Intercolonial, he said that freight coming from the West was handed to the Intercolonial at Quebec, and that that was the reason of the congestion? Is it not a fact that the reason why the Intercolonial receipts are so swollen and there is so much congestion is that the freight that comes over the Transcontinental to Quebec is handed to the Intercolonial and does not continue its journey over the Transcontinental?


John Dowsley Reid: My hon. friend, of course, understands the Railway Department better than I do, as he has had considerable experience in it. The Intercolonial railway has a first class equipment, one that could handle any quantity of freight or passengers between Quebec and Halifax and St. John over the entire system. Then the Transcontinental system was handed over and attached to the Railway Department. There was at once taken away from the Intercolonial 75 engines and a large number of cars to run on the Transcontinental. We had not a single engine or any car at all that we could put on that road between Quebec and Moncton. We could not rob the Intercolonial of any more engines or cars.


George Perry Graham: Could you not run them right through?


John Dowsley Reid: No, because they were required between Winnipeg and Quebec. We had not nearly enough power to get the freight to Quebec; but by getting that freight to Quebec and overworking the Intercolonial equipment, we were able to handle that freight through. That may have been one reason for swelling the Intercolonial earnings; but the hon. member knows that, having taken every engine that we could get to work west, we could not take over any more to put on the Transcontinental. We did use a part of the Transcontinental from Levis down, using the Intercolonial engines, and if we had had cars and sufficient power to use both lines, we would have used them and we would have received earnings from them. I think that is a fair answer to give' to my hon. friend. There is no great advantage in swelling the earnings of the Intercolonial. We want to use both lines to the advantage of the public and of the Government railway system as a whole. If we get the equipment that is already ordered, there should
not be any delay of any freight between Quebec and the lower provinces when we have both lines running, and both lines will be used to ensure that the freight is carried through. The whole trouble has been that there has not been enough equipment. If we can get the passenger service and the equipment ready for the 1st of June, I think the public will be satisfied.


William Pugsley: Reading the correspondence and listening to the statement of the minister as to what is on file-and I presume he has brought here everything which is of importance-I think it is very clear that the Grand Trunk Pacific are absolutely in the right in reference to the completion of the contract, in claiming that the time has not yet arrived when they c'an be callled upon to enter into a permanent lease for the operation of the road. It might be just as well to read some of the important portions of the correspondence so that they may appear upon Hansard. In this connection I wish to charge upon this Government that, in my opinion, for the purpose of in some way discrediting the late Government, of in some way making it appear, as the Solicitor General stated to the House when the matter was under discussion at the last session, that the Government had not been careful in making such an agreement with regard to the Grand Trunk Pacific which that company could be forced to live up to, and being desirous of being able to say, as they have been repeatedly saying to the people in this country that, owing to some weakness in the contract, this Government had not the power to compel the Grand Trunk Pacific to enter into a lease, and that that company had defaulted in their agreement, this Government, influenced by that desire, have deliberately asked the Grand Trunk Pacific to do what they knew that company were under no obligation to do. They have not approached the matter in a way in which a government ought to approach any important question such as this. They have not said to the company: we will perform our part of the contract and then we will expect you to perform yours. But, before this road was completed, before the contract had been finished on the part of the Government, the Minister of Railways asked the company to enter into a lease which it was not under any obligation to enter into, and which, as the president said, he could not properly ask his directors to authorize.


John Dowsley Reid: I may remind the- horn, member that all that is in Hansard of last year?


William Pugsley: And it will do no harm to put it on Hansard again.


John Dowsley Reid: No objection.


William Pugsley: As one member of the House, and representing that portion of the Dominion which feels that it is being wronged day after day by the action of this Government with respect to the Transcontinental, I feel it my duty to. put the matter again before the public and to press it upon their attention in the hope that this wrong may yet be righted. All parts of Canada are interested in having the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company undertake the operation of the line from the Atlantic to the Pacific. It is not a matter only for St. John, Halifax and all other important towns in the Maritime Provinces, but the city of Quebec, and a large portion of the province of Quebec and a .large part of Ontario, and indeed the whole Dominion, is vitally interested in having one operation of this system, and not ,a divided operation with the Government in control of the eastern and the company in control of the western portion.
Take the statement of the auditors, Messrs. Bell and- King, who, apparently, were appointed by the Minister of Railways to deal with this question of the cost of the road. In the letter which is contained in the return, and which is dated 23rd March, 1915, they say:
We beg to call your attention to a letter received from the Solicitor General, a copy of which is hereto attached, from which it appears that the " cost of construction " of the eastern division as completed on the 31st December, 1914, within the meaning of section 20 of the agreement scheduled to the Act of 1903, should not include expenditures made on and in respect of certain works which were still under construction. The result would be that the " cost of construction " as a basis upon which to ascertain the rental to be paid by the Grand Trunk Pacific Company at this date will be very considerably less than the actual cost upon completion of the said additional works now under way.
Here was a contract for the completion and equipment of this line from Winnipeg to Moncton. In March, 1915, the Solicitor General seeks to advise the company that the road may be operated, and therefore it must be deemed to be completed, even though most important works regarded both by the Railway Commission and by the company as necessary to the completion of the line are still under construction, in-

volving an additional cost of several millions. So, you have a clear admission that the road was still uncompleted and the work was still going on. But the question apparently was whether the rental was to be paid on the basis of the cost at that date or upon the cost with the additional works under construction. Of course they held that if a lease was to be entered into at that time it should be on the basis of the cost up to that date, leaving the cost of the works uncompleted to be arranged for later. There is a letter from the Solicitor General dated filth March, 1915, in which he admits, from the statement of the chief engineer, that the Leonard shops were not completed, nor the branch line to those shops, nor the Quebec joint terminals. How could a road be said to be completed until its joint terminals in one of the great ports of the country which it was designed to reach have been completed, I fail to understand. Yet this gentleman who occupies the important position of Solicitor General is trying to make the auditors and the chief engineer believe that the road may be completed under section 20 of the agreement, even though these important terminals which were to form an essential part of the Transcontinental line have not been completed and will cost several millions yet to complete. Nothing could he more absurd. There could be no greater evidence that the Government were simply humbugging, so far as the Grand Trunk Pacific was concerned, and seeking some excuse to proclaim to the country that they had made default to their contract, when it was this Government that had made default, not only in altering the grades but in not completing the line under the contract.
Then we find Mr. Gordon Grant admits that these very important parts of the work have not yet been completed. He admits that in a letter dated March 10, 1915. We have a letter from the Solicitor General on the 6th of March, in which he refers to the statement of Mr. Woods and says'that it is to be noted that Mr. Woods appears to base his refusal-that is his refusal to sign

upon the claim that the road at present cannot he said to he completed within the meaning of section 20 of the agreement scheduled to the National Transcontinental Railway Act 1903. Mr. Woods, X presume, had in mind certain portions-
-not of certain work outside the agreement or outside the Transcontinental line, but
-certain portions of the works-

That means certain portions of the Transcontinental line.
-which at present, or rather on 31st December, 1914, the date up to which audit is being made, may be said to be under construction. I have always understood, both from yourself and from the commission, that although there are such portions that are still under construction the same are not essential, for the immediate operation of the entire line.
We may say with respect to any railway that you can operate it even without station houses. You can operate a railway without a telephone or telegraph line, if you aTe careful, if you do not run more than ten miles an hour and keep a good lookout. You can operate a railway without water tanks, if you carry portable tanks with the trains to supply the engines with water. You may operate your line with one locomotive and one train, if you are willing to run trains one way one day and hack the next. But if your contract requires station-houses every ten miles, terminals at the ports where they ought to be provided -if you are to have all the equipment which belongs to a first-class railway, then, though you might operate your railway, it cannot be said to be completed until the terms of the contract have been carried out. That is what Mr. Woods, the Chief Engineer of the Grand Trunk Pacific, stated and that is what the Solicitor General admitted-that portions of the work were still under construction. And portions of it are under construction to-day; the minister is asking in these very estimates for $1,500,000 to pay for the construction of the Transcontinental line. Yet notwithstading, these gentlemen have-may I be permitted to say-the assurance to tell the members of this Parliament and the people of this country that the Grand Trunk Pacific have made default in their contract and therefore the Government has been obliged to take oveT the operation of the Transcontinental line.
I never heard of any pretense put forward by a Government which had less foundation to rest upon than the pretense which the Government has been putting forward against the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company. That company has never made default'. After reading the correspondence from end to end, I say that they have never made default so far as the carrying out of their agreement is concerned; that the fault is on the part of the Government; and that the Government is treating both the Grand Trunk Pacific Company and the people of this country in a
most unfair manner when it seeks to throw the blame upon the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company and to make it responsible for the fact that the Government has undertaken the operation of the line. The Solicitor General-oh, what term can I get that would adequately express what' he does? Although he admits that the work of construction is still under way, he asks the Government engineer if he will be good enough to state that, in his opinion, the eastern division was, on the 31st September, 1914, completed so far as was essential to the efficient operation of the entire line at that time. Even although the specification had not been complied with, even although the work of construction was still under way, yet, in order that these gentlemen might get a little kudos for themselves, and throw some discredit upon the late Government and upon the company which the late Government, through this Parliament, created, and make the people believe that the company was in default, the Solicitor General asked the chief engineer to be good enough to state that' the road was completed, when he had before him positive evidence that the road was not completed, but that the work of construction was still under way.
Then we come to Mr. Chamberlin. We will see the ground on which he bases the refusal of the company to enter upon the lease. He says, in a letter of February 15, 1915:
Dear Mr. Cochrane,-I beg to acknowledge your communication of the 3rd instant, in regard to the provisions of the agreement of 29th July, 1903, relative to the providing of equipment for the eastern division. In reply I would call your attention to clause 20 of the agreement, which, as you will see, provides that when completed the said eastern division shall be leased to and operated by the company for a period of 50 years.
Clause 22 also indicated quite clearly that the equipment of the value of $20,000,000 to be provided, of which $5,000,000 worth is to be supplied for the operation of the eastern division, is to be the first equipment " for the completed road." I do not understand that the Government claims that the eastern division is as yet completed in accordance with the agreement, and your other letter to me of the 3rd instant bears me out in this. That being so, you will, I think, agree that it would be improvident and unwise on the part of the company to proceed to acquire under the present unfavourable conditions, equipment involving the expenditure of so large a sum, and which, pending the completion of the line, and to a very great extent, at least, not only remain idle, but materially decrease in value.
Now, is that not a reasonable letter? Is that not just such a letter as any prudent official, having charge of the interests of

the railway company, would write to the Government'. He says:
I do not understand that the Government claims that the eastern division is as yet completed in accordance with the agreement and your other letter to me of the 3rd instant hears me out in this.
This letter of the 3rd I shall read later on. Mr. Chamberlin here positively states that Mr. Cochrane had written to him on the 3rd of February, 1915, a letter in which he admitted that the road was not completed in accordance with the terms of the contract. I find here another letter from Mr. Grant to the Solicitor General, under date of February 15. In it he says, among other things:
I enclose herewith Mr. Woods' letter to me, of the 11th instant, refusing to sign the acceptance and refusing to acknowledge the line as completed.
Surely nothing could be clearer than the ground upon which the company ie putting its refusal, namely, that it is the Goyern-ment that is in default, that it is the Government that has not completed the line but always intimating that, when the Government carries out its part of the agreement, the Grand Trunk Pacific Company will be prepared to carry out its part in *good faith, and to enter'upon the agreement. But, Sir, can you blame a company, can you blame the president of a company, whose duty it is to guard the interests of his shareholders, when he refuses, before the road is completed and before it could be operated in such a way as to earn to the fullest capacity which a completed line would be able to earn, to enter into a lease under which, within a certain period after the lease was signed, the rental must necessarily be paid, and which would involve large obligations upon the company? It was his duty to stand out until the contract was completed upon the part of the Government. He would have been negligent in his duty towards the shareholders, he would have been guilty of a gross breach of duty towards the shareholders whom he represented, if he had departed from the original agreement and bound the shareholders prior to the time when the agreement provided that they should be bound. *On the 11th of February, 1915, Mr. Woods, the chief engineer, writes to Mr. Gordon Grant a letter in which he says:
This is the first intimation I have ever received that even the Government considered ..the line fully completed.


John Dowsley Reid: The word "fully" is in there.


William Pugsley: Surely. How can you have a line completed if it is not fully completed? If it is not fully completed, it is only partially completed, is it not? If it is not fully completed, it is partially completed, and yet my hon. friend says: Oh, no, the line is not fully completed, yet it is completed. I think it would require a Philadelphia lawyer, ten Philadelphia lawyers, to explain what the minister means by the distinction between a line being completed and being fully completed. I am unable to discover any difference. This line is either completed or it is not completed. If it is completed, then it is fully completed. If it is not fully completed, it is only partially completed. I can see now what is the trouble with these gentlemen. They have been of the impression that the line might be completed even although it was only partially completed, and, this line being partially completed, they thought they had a right to call upon the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company to enter into the lease. Well, I am sorry for the minister if he has been led away by this definition, which must have been given to him by the Solicitor General.
Here is the letter of the Hon. Mr. Cochrane, dated the 3rd of February, 1915. This is a most interesting letter as showing what perhaps he meant by partial completion as distinguished from completion:
3rd February, 1915.
Dear Mr. Chamberlain,-With further reference to my letter of 23rd January in which I enclose a statement of the cost of construction of the eastern division of the National Transcontinental railway, I beg to point out that it is not intended that the item therein inserted as necessary to cover the completion of certain works shall be included at the present time in the amount on which interest should now be calculated.
What may be incomplete is not at the present time an essential portion of the National Transcontinental railway, and it is only upon the cost of the work as completed that it is proposed to calculate the Interest.
What work? The work of building the Transcontinental railway, and that part of the work of building the Transcontinental railway which is not yet completed is, he says, in his judgment, not essential to the operation of the line. As I have said, the same remark might be made with regard to the station houses, the houses of the section men, the water tanks, the telegraph and telephone lines and other things which enter into the equipment of a first-class line of railway. The statement is made by the Minister of Railways and (Canals (Mr. APRIL 19, 1916
Cochrane) that the works which are not yet completed form part of the work of construction of the Transcontinental railway. They were included in the specifications, and form a part of the railway, and he admits that they are not yet completed. My hon. friend from South Renfrew (Mr. Graham) calls my attention to the fact that on a reference to the workshops at Trans-cona and at Quebec he found that both formed an essential part of the Transcontinental railway.
I would like to know what is really underneath this business. It certainly strikes me as a most singular thing that when the Minister of Railways merely acknowledged receipt of the letter sent by the president of the railway company, as long ago as April 15th, setting forth the grounds, which in 'his mind are sufficient, for not entering upon the lease, showing that the road has not 'been completed, that the specifications have not been lived up to, and calling attention to the excessive cost of the road, based, of course, on the report of the two commissioners who were appointed by the Government. We have no evidence of any negotiations; no evidence of any attempt to meet the views of the Grand Trunk Pacific Company in any Way; no evidence of a desire to leave the question to arbitration. Without anything further being said on the subject, this Government makes arrangements to operate the Transcontinental railway itself. That is what the correspondence shows, and it looks to me as if Mr. Gutelius, the general manager, who has the ambition to extend Government operation all the way to Winnipeg, and who may look toward Government operation all the way to the Pacific coast, was the influence behind the Minister of Railways. Or it may be that the Minister of Railways himself is wedded to Government operation, and would like to get rid of the Grand Trunk Pacific and assume charge of this road from east to west. Whatever the reason was, it strikes me as a most extraordinary thing that, without making any reply to that letter, and without attempting any negotiations with reference to it, the Government assumes the operation of this road.
In the remarks which I have made I have felt it my duty to find fault with the Government for the way in which they have treated the Grand Trunk Pacific in regard to these important letters. Let me ask the Minister of Railways if it is not possible to impress upon the Government the desirability of making arrangements to enable
the Grand Trunk Pacific to enter upon the operation of this line If there are any questions still to be settled, let them be taken up and settled. If It will take six months or a year to finish the line so that the Grand Trunk Pacific may enter upon operation, let arrangements be made as I think they could easily be made, to go on and complete the line. Let it be arranged that the seven year period will begin to run from the time the road is completed, so that no injustice will be done to the Grand Trunk Pacific in that regard. Let some arrangement be made under which the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company will undertake and carry on the operation of this Transcontinental line all the way from Winnipeg to the Pacific ocean. That is the only way in which we can have a proper service. We do not want divided operation in Canada; divided operation is contrary to the spirit and to the letter of the agreement which was entered into when the contract for the Transcontinental railway was executed. We know that there were many people in this country who thought that the Transcontinental line should have its eastern terminus at North Bay. There were many people who thought it would not be of any great advantage to extend the line east of North Bay, that being the point at which the Grand Trunk' Railway system would join the Transcontinental railway. But those of us who are interested in the development of Canadian ports, both in summer and in winter, and in having the traffic of Canada carried through Canadian channels, took the ground-and to that view my right hon. friend who then was leader of the Government (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) was strongly wedded-that it should be an essential feature in connection with the new Transcontinental line that, as far as possible, all Canadian traffic should be carried through Canadian channels and pass through Canadian ports to and from the markets of the old world.
In the contract it is provided that all tiaffio which is not otherwise -routed shall be carried through Canadian channels. I do not believe that the people of Canada would ever have thought of engaging in this great enterprise if that had not been an essential feature of the scheme. What is this Government doing now? It is proposing, I believe; it is hoping, I believe, that the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company will not enter upon the operation oif the eastern division. If that hope is

realized, the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, closely allied as it is with the Grand Trunk Railway Company, will have every possible interest to carry its traffic, not through Canadian ports, but through American ports, and the grand patriotic idea which was at the bottom of this vast undertaking will he wholly defeated. Hon. gentlemen ought not to forget that the Grand Trunk Rsilway Company have a line running all the way from North Bay in the province of Ontario, 'through Ontario into Quebec to the city of Montreal, and from Montreal east to the port of Portland in the state of Maine. They have large terminals there, they have made great developments at that port, and it would be very convenient for them, and, from many aspects, very desirable for them to carry Canadian traffic to the port of Portland in the state of Maine. That is why, as I have said, the late Government determined that they would have the line constructed, not simply from Winnipeg to North Bay, but from North Bay to Moncton, passing through the city of Quebec, and that there should he imposed upon the Grand Trunk operating the eastern division as part of and in connection with the Transcontinental system, so that they would be interested in carrying their traffic through [DOT] Canadian channels .and Canadian ports.
Now, to come back to this Government, I hope they will realise the importance of this question, that they will take it up and endeavour to solve it as speedily as possible. It will be infinitely better for the country, even at some sacrifice, even if they have to make an effort to meet the views of the Grand Trunk Pacific, that the Government and the country should come together and that at the very earliest possible day the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company should operate this whole line from the ports of St. John and Halifax through Quebec and all the way to the Pacific ocean. My hon. friend knows very well that there are advantages in many other respects in having only the one system of management, only the one transportation company to deal with, and only one operation between the two oceans. What would the Canadian Pacific have been, in so far as the development of Canadian trade is concerned, if they had stopped at Winnipeg and some other company had operated the line between Winnipeg and the ports of the Atlantic ocean? It would not have been, even to the very slightest degree, the wonderful 
factor in Canadian development which that transcontinental railway has been in the past. I believe that the same remark will apply to the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company. Get them to engage at once in the operation of the line; make an arrangement with them, a reasonable arangement, such as I know it will be possible to make, for this operation; let them become interested in the development of traffic along the line; and you will have a growth and a prosperity infinitely greater than you will have if you continue this operation by the Government, an operation which for a number of years must necessarily be temporary, because no one can say but what, if this road is completed under the terms of the contract, the Grand Trunk Pacific will then be in a position to take over the road or enter into a lease, and the Government will be ousted from the operation of the line. Therefore my hon. friend must see that the operation by the Government must be of a temporary character, and neither the Government nor its general manager will be interested in developing traffic along the line, in encouraging the establishment of industries and in giving a good service as the company will be interested, because whatever traffic and development there may be in the immediate future will inure in the end to the benefit of the company, which, when the Toad has been completed, will demand that a lease be made and will enter upon the operation of the line.


John Dowsley Reid: I do not like to interrupt the hon. gentleman, but as it is six o'clock, and as there is an arrangement that we shall adjourn until Tuesday next, I would ask the hon. gentleman if he would leave the balance of his remarks until Tuesday, and; I would also ask the leader of the Opposition if he would concur in one item passing now and allowing the other items to remain until 'Tuesday.


William Pugsley: If the minister will say to this committee that the Government will take up with the Grand Trunk Pacific Company the question of settling the basis on which the company shall operate the road I will have no more to say; I will not take any more of the time of the House on this question. But if the hon. gentleman will not do that I will not promise just how long a time I am going to take up, because it is of great importance. My hon. friend knows very well how important it is to the people of eastern Canada and the Mara time Provinces.


John Dowsley Reid: I always enjoy the remarks of my hon. friend, and I would do anything to encourage him.
Progress reported.
On motion of Mr. Reid, the House adjourned at 6 p.m.	.
Tuesday, April 25, 1916.