1916-04-28

OMISSION FROM HANSARD.


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Mr. SCHAFFNER presented the second report of the Select Standing Committee appointed to supervise the Official Report of the Debates, as follows:
House of Commons,
Friday, 28th April, 1916.
The Select Standing Committee appointed to supervise the official report of the Debates beg leave to present the following as their second report:
Tour committee have had under consideration the question of the accuracy of the report of a passage in the speech delivered by the Honourable the Minister of Militia and Defence on the 2nd March ultimo, which read as printed:
" There was no quarrel between that gentleman and myself as to who should dictate the patronage. The trouble was that I found something not exactly square and I did not care whether he was Grit or Tory, his head came off."
Tour committee, upon inquiring into the matter, have found that the reporter, in the haste of transcription, accidentally omitted certain words, and that the accurate report, according to the reporter's notes, should read:
"There was no quarrel between me and the other gentleman as to who should dictate the patronage. The trouble was I found the fellow grafting, and when I found something not exactly square, I did not care whether he was Grit or Tory, his head came off."
All of which is respectfully submitted.
(Sgd.) F. D. Schaffner,
,	Chairman.

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On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. PUGSLEY:: When may we expect
the report of the Commission issued to Sir Charles Davidson to inquire into the purchase of various materials and supplies, , submarines, etc.? It is stated in the newspapers that Sir Charles Davidson has handed a portion of the report to. among others, a clergyman, who was requested to look over it and give his opinion with regard to the purchase of submarines. It the report is ready to be handed out to private individuals, it surely ought to be submitted to this House. I have been told-I do not know how accurate my information is-that Sir Charles Davidson is ready to submit his report, and has offered to submit an interim report to the Government, but there has apparently been no expression of a wish on the part of the Government to have that report. That may or may not be true, but the min-

ister will be able to tell me when we may expect an interim report at least, giving the proceedings to date.


Sir GEORGE FOSTER:: The report is
pretty nearly concluded, and we may expect it to be finished almost any day. I do not suppose my hon. friend would take exception to the course pursued by the commissioner in trying to elicit a^l possible information in reference to a subject in which my hon. friend is interested, the purchase of submarines. In some respects a clergyman ought to be able to give information about such an engine of destruction, but whatever was shown to the clergyman was shown with an idea and a desire to elicit information from the witness in reference to some remarks or strictures that he had passed, based upon newspaper reports, and it was to complete, and to complete on a good basis, the evidence of the witness, that that portion of the report was handed to him. There was nothing improper in that.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: Was my hon. friend consulted by the commissioner? He seems to know a great deal.


George Eulas Foster: I take my information from the newspapers, and from some remarks I have heard about the House.


William Pugsley: My point was that if
the report is in such a condition that an interim report can be shown to private individuals, it certainly ought to be submitted to this House, because Parliament is the body which is first entitled to receive the report'of the commission and the evidence which has been taken by that commission.


George Eulas Foster: My hon. friend could argue that on the interim report. It was a page of tlhe evidence which was shown to this witness, in order that he might be enabled to sustain or to withdraw or restrict the statement he had made with reference to the transaction, a statement which, I understand, he made on newspaper reports.



SASKATCHEWAN RIVER WATER SUPPLY.

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On the Orders of the Day:
['I think we had better go into Committee, so that I may finish my statement. I seem to have got one day behind this week.']
Mr. KNOWLES:: Will the Minister of Public Works tell us how the matter stands with regard to the gathering of data in
connection with the supply of water to certain towns from the Saskatchewan river? There was, I think, a commission which undertook to gather data as to the cost, etc., of bringing water from the elbow of the Saskatchewan to different towns, including Regina and Moosejaw. The minister made come public utterance on the matter some time ago.
Mr. ROGER'S: I have not in mind at present the exact standing of the matter,. It has not been up for consideration for some little time, but I will be glad to look it up and give the hon. gentleman any information we have in the department.



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On Committee of Supply being called:
George Eulas Foster: Before the House goes into Committee of Supply I propose to make a short statement with reference *to an item which is to be submitted in Committe of Supply-the vote for the administration of affairs under the Canada Grain Act. I do not intend to take up much of the time of the House in doing so, but I have found, in my experience, that when we get into Estimates the committee drifts off into some particular line of controversy, and the Estimates for a most important service may pass through the committee and be finally disposed of while no connected idea of what that service is ie 'brought out by the questioning or is presented to the committee. So that, just for a few moments, I beg the indulgence of the House while I refer to this grain system of ours, which, in a way, is a most wonderful and important development.
When I took charge of the department in 1911, we had the Manitoba Grain Act and part 2 of the Inspection Act, under which the grain business of the West, in so far as it came under the supervision of the Government, was carried out. Besides that legislation, there had been examinations and reports of commissions with reference to a revision or consolidation or reenactment of the Grain Acts so as to bring them more into conformity with the necessities of the situation and with the growth of production in the West. Very valuable information had been gained before that in this way, as I have said, and in 1912 Parliament entered upon the work of perfecting that legislation, and the Canada Grain Act, much as it stands now, was the Tesult of its labours. On the whole,

I think that Parliament was successful, by the co-operation of both sides of the House in a very friendly and frank way, in attaining a * legislation which has stood the test of the four of five years which have passed, and has stood it well. Some more or less important amendments were made to the Act two years ago, and with these amendments the Act stands as it was passed in 1912. Under that Act, from 1911 to the present, a very large development has taken place.
The fundamental feature of that Act, as contrasted with the Act which preceded it, was in placing the administration of the grain system in the hands of a commission, with headquarters at Fort William, instead of, as under the old method, trying to administer the Act from the department here in Ottawa. Three gentlemen were selected who, I think, have justified their choice, and who, from 1911 to the present, have been continuously and busily engaged in the administration of that Act.


Mr. SPEAKER:: I observe that there is no objection on the part of any hon. gentleman to the statement which the hon. minister is making, but I must draw the attention of the House to the fact that there is no motion before it.


George Eulas Foster: I think we had better go into Committee, so that I may finish my statement. I seem to have got one day behind this week.



SUPPLY.

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The House then went into Committee of Supply.
["If on a rising market, neither he nor any one else knows whether the market will rise for another hour. If he does know it, he is, able to go on the market and buy against his belief and make money on the rise. However, I do^not say that it wo.uld be the part of any farmer to go and buy against it. He got the full value of the grain that he had in store the day that it was appropriated, and he got more than that: he got the added value to every bushel that he had behind, and I do not think there were many farmers in western Canada of those who had grain in store who did not have several bushels behind for every one that they had in store. He got the profit that accrued by reason of the increment of value added to what he had left, and he got a fair price for every bushel that he sold. So that, taking it all in all, the farming community of Canada, by virtue of the course taken, were the gainers not by thousands, but by hundreds of thousands-yes, by millions. They would have been gainers also had we taken the other course. The speculators were not by our method losers. On the other hand, they were not the gainers that they would have been if we had taken the course suggested toy hon. gentlemen opposite. They were not the gainers at the expense of our principals, the Allied Commission in Europe. That is what I conceive to be good Government business; that is the course a good Government should pursue. Where it can eliminate the middleman it should do so; where it can act for the benefit of its principals, it should, as any other agent do so faithfully and firmly. That is what we did in this case; we did it to the advantage of the producers and to the advantage of our principals, and they are the parties whose interests we were bound to have in mind.\nAt six o'clock, the House resumed and then took recess.\nThe House resumed at eight o'clock."]
George Eulas Foster: I was going'on to mention the fundamental changes that were made in the legislation passed in 1912, and I was speaking of the formation of the board as one of the chief of those changes. Besides the administration of the Grain Act in the way of licensing, certification, weighing, and inspection generally, power was given to- the board to construct elevators, and under that power action has been taken which will be detailed a little later. So that the Grain Board with its newly constituted powers had something more to do than simply to administer the clauses of the Grain Act referring more particularly to the carriage and inspection of grain.
Under votes of Parliament that have been granted, they have carried out those extraordinary /duties in the construction of a large addition to our storage and

elevator system. Looking at it, as it is now, it seems to me that Canada is one of the best equipped countries in the w'orld, having regard to its population and its general resources. Outside of the United States of America, this is really the foremost country in the world in point of elevator equipment, not only as to capacity for storage, but as to the distribution and situation of the elevators, extending as they do from one coast to the other and being strategically, as it were, placed at the chief points for the reception and shipping of grain. Starting at Halifax, you have a storage capacity, small in extent, of 500,000 bushels; coming to St. John, you have a storage capacity of about
2,000,000 bushels; coming up then to Quebec you have a storage capacity of a little over 1,000,000 bushels; and at Montreal you have a storage capacity of 5,000,000 bushels. Then, you enter upon the large storage - districts of our country, extending through the whole of Ontario, with the great heart and centre at Fort William, then stretching over the Northwest, until finally, at the harbour of Vancouver, the last finished of the series built by the Government is now just about ready for operation. It may surprise the House somewhat-it would one who has not looked into these matters- to know that the total storage capacity for grain in the Dominion of Canada is 172,000,000 bushels, which is a very large proportion of the total grain production of Canada that is liable to come under storage and transit conditions.
Passing from that, which is the general view, we have all kinds of elevators amongst those that I have mentioned. We have the private elevator; we have the hospital elevator for taking care of the sick grain of the country and nursing it back to health and substance again; we have the mill elevator for the convenience of the mills scattered through the country; we have the public elevator and the terminal or transfer elevators at the several ports. The Government elevators form a very considerable part of this whole system. Last year there were inspected of the grain of the country, at Winnipeg, 183,000 cars, amounting to
305,000,000 bushels-, or a little over twice as much as was inspected at Winnipeg in the preceding year. That measures the activity of the grain industry and of the grain transit business through a centre like Winnipeg, which is the great debouching point for grain that is raised in the West, and which will remain so to a large extent, with the exception of what may be taken off

through western exits either towards the far East or via the Panama canal to European markets.
The Government elevator system commenced with the building of the terminal elevator at Fort William. I may say just in passing that the Government-controlled-and-owned elevators have a total capacity of 22,500,000 'bushels, and that those that have been built and are operated under the Grain Board have a capacity of 14,000,000 bushels at the present time. As I have just stated, a big terminal elevator, with, a capacity of 3,250,000 bushels, was^ built at Fort William, and has been in operation now for about three years. In the succeeding year the policy was adopted of having a number of internal storage elevators constructed, and the points that were chosen were Saskatoon, Moosejaw, and Calgary, with transfer port elevators, one at Vancouver and the other at Hudson bay, to be ready for work when that route, if it becomes a grain route to Europe, is opened up. The Government elevators are the most up-to-date of any elevators in the world. They are built on the most approved plans, they are all operated by electricity, they are all equipped with the latest and most effective drying machines, cleaning machines, and apparatus and choppers for the dockage, so as to chop or grind this refuse in a way which will destroy its fecundity land therefor diminish the weed troubles which might arise as it is being used throughout the country as fodder for stock. These Government storage elevators perform the office of furnishing to the people, where they would not otherwise have them in any degree, or to a very limited degree, opportunities for the treatment of grain that becomes damaged, for the cleaning of grain, for the drying of grain, and for the putting into condition the dockage and refuse which is fed to stock.
There is also this added benefit which has arisen from the Government elevators in the interior. Up. to the time of the establishment of these elevators, the farmer at Red Deer, for instance, if he sold his grain, had to wait until that grain found its way to Winnipeg, was inspected there, and the certificate of its grade and weight came back to him at Red Deer. That might consume anywhere from 14 days to a month. In the meantime, he had no document upon which he could go to his bank and get advances on his grain. The fact that at Moosejaw, Saskatoon, and 'Calgary, which are now inspection points, this grain may
be inspected and weighed and almost immediately thereafter the man may get his certificate and may take it to his financial man or bank and get advances upon it, is a very great benefit to the farmer.
In the matter of cleaning, it is surprising to find the quantity of dirt which is carried and paid for, if you sum up the total transit of grain from the place of its production to the ultimate point of its disembarkation. Whatever good arises from the cleansing of grain, in the way of making *it a more saleable product, or in the way of preventing the cost of the carriage of useless material, which accrues to the farmers in the various districts and the producing centres, comes from the facilities which are given by these storage elevators.
These storage elevators, and the terminal elevator, involve an outlay of capital of $5,500,000; or it will be about that when the finishing touches are put upon the Vancouver elevator which, as I have said, is now about ready for work. That expenditure of $5,500,000 has resulted in providing a storage capacity of 14,000,000 bushels, with the incidental advantages of which I have spoken, It is gratifying to know that, as the people come to find what service may be rendered by these Government elevators, they are taking advantage of them. Last year and this year, I think I may say, the revenues which have been derived from the elevators have exceeded by a fairly good amount the expenditures which were necessary in order to have them carried on. The total revenues from the Government elevators last year were a little over $800,000; so that you see the whole matter forms quite an important business in itself.
In order to carry on the operations of that system, the department has, under the Board of Grain Commissioners, about 496 employees at work during the busy season. In 1912, the first year of the operation in the West under the new Grain Act, the number of permanent employees was 79; last year, 1915-16, there were 98; so that there has not been a very large increase in the number of permanent employees when we take into account the fact that whereas in 1912 there was only one elevator, in 1915-16, four elevators were being operated, which of course required a larger force. The increase in the number of employees is of the temporary class, who are employed chiefly during the busy period of the grain season. Under the Grain Commissioners and the Chief Inspector there are detachments of deputy inspectors, samplers, and trackmen, extending all through the sys-

tern; and, if one (fould visualize at any one time in the busy season the work of those men and the tremendous current of grain which passes under their supervision, and every bushel of which has to be inspected, certificated, and weighed, one would get a very pleasing idea of the busyness of the grain industry of the great West and of the country as a whole. These few remarks are all that I intend to make with reference to the general system.
I come now to another point, that is, to explain very briefly what has been asked from the beginning of the session, the commandeering of grain in November last.
I have laid on the table of the House, and the members have it in their possession, a statement which covers all the essential facts; and those who have studied that statement will have the most of the information that I am able to give them this afternoon. The main circumstance which led up to the commandeering of the grain was the very large, and, to a certain extent, abnormal crop of wheat and of oats which was raised in Canada last . year. The Government has been, in the different departments and as a whole, constantly on the alert for every opportunuity to direct the attention both of the British Government and of the allied Governments to the opportunities Which they might have in Canada of providing for themselves those necessaries both as to food and other equipment which they needed for the work and sustenance of the war. This year not only had Canada a very large crop of grain, particularly wheat and oats, but the production of the world was very large. Our neighbours to the south had their bumper crop-a larger crop than had ever before been reaped in the United States. Australia, which the year before had had a failure in her wheat crop, and had been obliged, as also had New Zealand, to im- _ port grain from far-distant countries, Canada included, last year had a bumper crop of wheat, a very large amount of which was available for export. Therefore the Government, in pursuance of its policy of being alive to the necessities of the case and the opportunities that might occur, was especially anxious to call the attention of Great Britain, which had more knowledge of Canada, and of the allied governments of France and Italy, which had not so much knowledge of this country's capabilities, to the possibility of their supplying their wants from Canada and to the advisability of their throwing as much of that
trade as they possibly could into the hands of Canada, which was supporting the war. Not that we wished to be paid m any way for what we were doing in . reference to the war; but, naturally enough, if supplies were to be bought, we urged that due regard should be given to allied countries which were especially well situated to supply certain lines of demand. Negotiations running over two or three months were constantly in hand, and at last on the 23rd of November an order was received, practically from the Allies' commission, but through the British Government, asking the Canadian Government to procure for them a large quantity of wheat. The cablegram was received from the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the Eight Hon. Bonar Law. It is well to remember the date, because nothing could be done towards filling the order until it came to hand. Whatever negotiations were under way, whatever prospects were held out, not a step could be taken to procure a single bushel of grain until the definite order to procure the grain was received.


Wilfrid Laurier: That order
has not yet been laid upon the Table.


George Eulas Foster: In the memorandum which I laid upon the Table, I mentioned the fact and, I think, the date, and I said to my right hon. friend that the cablegram which covered the order traversed to a certain extent the previous negotiations and covered a wider range than the order, and that it was not thought wise to lay it upon the table of the House, but that if my right hon. friend wished to see it I would -be very glad to let him peruse it. That is the way in which that matter stands at the present time.


Mr. OLIVER:: Would the minister have , any objection to giving us now his summary of the purport of the cablegram which constituted the order, eliminating those parts which have nothing to do with it?


George Eulas Foster: The purport of the order, in so far as it affects Canada and the purchase of wheat by Canada, can be summed up in a very few words. It was an order to purchase a very large quantity of wheat.


Frank Oliver: A given quantity?


George Eulas Foster: 'The given quantities which were to be bought at that time were preceded by negotiations which looked towards other quantities, and this first

purchase was as a commencement and, in one way, as a reserve to be drawn upon as it was needed; so that the meaning and significance of the order, looking to preceding negotiations, was that we were authorized immediately to commence purchasing. There was the desire not only to have the grain purchased, but to geit it just as quickly as possible. The urgency of the order together with the date at which it came, the 23rd of -November, made it necessary for the iGiovernment to act quickly. The 23rd of November brings you pretty close to the very active season of shipping, pending the -close of navigation on the lakes. The Government had to decide how the purchase should be made.
Right here let -me say frankly and decidedly that the British Government did not dictate to the Canadian Government any method to be employed in procuring that grain,-I suppose they never thought of such a thing. All we were asked to do was to purchase the grain. There are three ways in which the grain might have been purchased. Judging from remarks I have heard in the House it seems to have been thought by some, -and it may be thought still, that the better way would have been to have gone to the West and buy direct from the individual farmers the grain that was required. I think a little consideration will make it clear that that would not have been a wise method to pursue. In the first place, it was not possible. We could not have sent to the farmers of the West a number of buyers and by any possibility have got the grain to Fort Willia-m before the closing of lake navigation; and that, if there were no other consideration, precluded the adoption of that method of purchase. Another method of purchase was to select brokers and have them buy on the grain exchanges the amount required, some 12,000,000 bushels more or less. The first objection to -that is that you pay a large commission. The Government was in the place of the purchaser and to a large extent trustee for the purchaser, and, consequently, it was its duty to buy the grain at the very best possible price.


Frank Oliver: Did the order convey any statement as to price?


George Eulas Foster: Nothing. Then, as to the use of brokers; if the business had been done through only one broker difficulty would have arisen, and if more-than one broker had been employed competition would have arisen. The moment a government begins to purchase grain on the exchanges, no matter how secretly, there is telepathic connection which makes the information common in a very short time, and then the knowledge that the Government is purchasing and that brokers' are competing for gram for the Government causes an increase in the price and may lead to a very large increase. A year before this operation, European governments commenced buying grain in Canada and the United States. They bought openly. As a result the market went wild and the prices rose rapidly, away beyond any actual value. Those prices, of course, could not be maintained, but they were very uneconomical and expensive to the countries that were buying. 'Taking these things into consideration, and after having taken the best advice they could get and- studying the question for what time was allowed them- for there was not much time left-the Government came to the conclusion that the fairest way all round was to take possession of the grain by commandeering it. As a result of their decision, on the 27th of the month they sent an order to the Government elevators at Fort William and the public elevators- in eastern Canada and the Government-controlled elevators, to retain all wheat in store at that hour, of the grades of No. 1, No. 2, and No. 3, and reserve it for the use of the Government. That was done, and as a result 10,300,348 bushels of these grades was commandeered at the head of the lakes and 3,321,458 bushels in the eastern elevators, a total of 13,621,806 bushels. The price which was current on the day when the commandeering order passed was the price paid for that grain, $1.04} for No. 1 Manitoba, and proportionate prices for No. 2 and No. 3. The market before that had been on the upgrade, not violently, but -still upwards. That being the case, I think we are justified in concluding that every man whose grain was taken stood to lose nothing on the mon-ey he had invested in the grain. If he were not a speculator, if he were not holding for a profit, if he were disposed to be just the seller for the day, -he received a fair and equitable price for his grain. He had an honest price, whether he got a speculative price or not. There is this- consideration also, that -the grain which was bought was held mainly by middlemen. Had the Government gone on the market and bought grain from day to day at ascending prices, the man who bought the

grain at lower prices would, have been the one to profit by the increased price brought about by the purchase. But, in commandeering, that state of affairs cannot obtain; you commandeer and you have the grain on the instant and at the current price of the day. After the buying of a large quantity of grain by the Government, even by the commandeering process, the idea gets abroad that possibly more will be bought. In any case, a very large quuantity has been taken out of the market and out of the hands of the holders, and these people must go back to the primary source, to the farmer, to replenish the store. Then, whatever increase in price takes place in commandeering, or shortly after, while the re-purchase is going on, redounds to the benefit of the producer, or primary holder, that is, to the farmer himself. I grant that difficulties have to be met, and would have had to be met under any form of purchase; but, taking all things into consideration, I believe that the method followed was the best for the Allies. They got the grain at the current rate of that day, at one equable and honest price, and had to pay nothing by way of increased valuation which would have taken place if the grain had been bought on the instalment plan from da]^ to day on rising prices. So that the Government performed its duty as trustee of the allied nations by getting the grain for them without paying a commission price, at the current rate of the day, and without the risk of any increasing prices which might be due to the buying of grain by the Allies in the market.
An additional reason why haste was a factor in the arrangement when that grain was commandeered was that as much as possible of the grain, should, in the interests of the allied nations, be got out before the freezing up of the lakes and at the cheapest possible rate of carriage. That also was a factor in determining the Government to commandeer the grain. When the grain was commandeered, difficulties arose: we knew that they would arise; but it was possible to mitigate those difficulties. The first difficulty was this: if 10,000,000 bushels of grain taken by the Government, which was in store at the head of the lakes awaiting an x opportunity to utilize the short period of lake transit which was left to it before the closing of navigation, had/remained in the hands of the Government, any person who had wished after that date to take advantage of lake transit 
would have had to commence by a repurchase, which on the most rapid arrangement would have made him late by days ' and perhaps by weeks in getting to Fort William and making ready for transit by the lakes. Some method, therefore, had to be arranged by which there should not be a stoppage of the outflow of the grain by the lakes for the limited period of lake traffic that remained. That difficulty was got over in a way that is usual at Fort William and at such places. The grain commissioners loaned that grain to those who had vessels in readiness and who wished to get their grain out to the United States lake ports or to the eastern lake ports of Ontario, keeping the bill of lading, a perfect security, under the condition that the grain was to be replaced within ten days. Some 7,500,000 4 p.m. bushels were thus loaned, and from the morning of the day after the commandeering when that system was adopted, to the night of Tuesday,
10,000,000 bushels took water at Fort William-a record output in the history of the lake ports. No barrier, therefore, was opposed to the quick and ready transit of grain by the only water route which was available for a short period of time. Every bushel of this grain was restored and got into transport condition at the head of the lakes within ten' days from the time that the loan was made. Thus was that difficulty overcome.
The next difficulty that arose was this: Nearly all the eastern millers of Ontario had grain in the eastern elevators or at Fort William-almost entirely in the eastern elevators-which they expected to get quickly by the lake route in order to keep their mills going. The mills do not hold much in reserve. Indeed, many of them hold scarcely anything in reserve; they hold 'it in the elevator and take it out from day to day or from week to week as they require it. When this grain in the eastern elevators was commandeered the supply of the mills was entirely cut off. In order to keep the mills supplied with grain and to provide against the closing of the mills, many of which were engaged on contracts for flour for the allied Governments, we adopted this arrangement; we unconditionally released all grain that was commandeered in the eastern elevators, upon the deposit with the Government of a guarantee by the millers that the grain had been' bona fide contracted for and that it was to be ground

up in their mills and used for no other purpose. We released about 1,900,000 bushels of grain from the commandeer; that grain went into the hands of the millers, and the millers' operations went on just the same as if there had 'been no commandeer. This provided for that difficulty. It reduced the total quantity of commandeered grain by that amount.; but you could not go into these elevators and commandeer a portion of the grain; you had to commandeer the whole, and the total commandeer was a little more than was necessary for the supply of the allied nations for the months of December and January.


William Erskine Knowles: How much would have actually supplied the requirements of the Allies for the two months that my hon. friend mentions?


George Eulas Foster: I could not tell my hon. friend how much. Purchases are still being made on account of the Allies.


Wilfrid Laurier: By the Government?


George Eulas Foster: No,, not by the Government.


William Erskine Knowles: The minister referred to two specific months, and said that a certain amount was too much.


George Eulas Foster: I did, because certain quanti ties were to be delivered each month.


Mr. MARCIL:: Did this commandeered grain leave the country by Canadian ports?


George Eulas Foster: I will come to that in the course of my narrative.


Mr. W. M. MARTIN:: 
George Eulas Foster: I think the answer to that is very easy. Before a single ship could be sent or ordered to be sent to an Atlantic port, there had to be a certainty that the grain would be there for it when
it came, and it was impossible to buy grain and send it down to the seaboard in driblets. It was absolutely necessary that there should be a certainty of an ample supply of grain in order that the Allies might intelligently arrange for its transportation. It is true that 7,500,000 bushels were loaned out of the Fort William elevators, and loaned for a period the utmost limit of which was 10 days; but that was not subversive in the least .of the system which the Allies would put. into operation for-carrying their grain. Even if, on the day of the commandeer, and when a cablegram went that so much grain 'had been secured, the Allied Governments had been able to send ships out, the ships could not have reached Atlantic ports before the return of the grain that had been loaned and its gradual movement to the Atlantic seaboard. The difficulty that arose was along this line: Bona fide contractors, with the Old Country purchasers for grain, found that by this commandeer the grain which they had contracted for with those purchasers, and for the transport of which cargo space had been taken-and the cargo space itself was coming across the ocean and must be met here-could not be procured, and that, if the commandeer remained upon that grain, and there was no condition under which they could fulfil their contract except by going back to the West, purchasing a new supply, and bringing it down to the seaboard, much of it necessarily having to come by rail, it would have been quite impossible, in many cases, for them to have carried out their contracts on time, and the vessels would have had to wait in port to be loaded, with heavy demurrage. The arrangement made to overcome that difficulty was this: To the man who had a bona fide contract with British purchasers and who showed the evidence of that contract, we released the quantity of grain required to fill that contract, and he gave us his undertaking and deposited his guarantee that he would return that grain, in store, at a certain time. Under that arrangement no difficulty of any moment arose with reference to the bona fide contract men who were exporters of Canadian grain to the British market. Some trouble and some confusion was no doubt caused; but at the same time I must say, in justice to both grain holders and grain buyers, in Winnipeg, in Montreal, in Toronto, all along the line, that, although they would have preferred that the commandeer had not taken place, they took it in good spirit.

They fell in with our plans and did not object very strongly. There was, on the whole, a hearty co-operation with the Government in the carrying out of the arrangements that made it possible for them to keep their contracts.


William Erskine Knowles: 'The minister said the grain was loaned to people having contracts. What was the limit of the time for which it was loaned ?


George Eulas Foster: That grain was to be returned at different dates, and those dates were, as nearly as possible, arranged in connection with our knowledge of the possibility of vessels coming to receive it, and being able to get here at certain dates.


William Erskine Knowles: Did all of that gram have to be returned before tbe close of navigation?


George Eulas Foster: No. Very little of the export grain could be returned before navigation closed. That grain would have to be returned after navigation closed, and returned in store at Fort William, which was done. So that those three arrangements which I have tried to explain, carried out in connection with the commandeer, caused the least possible confusion and derangement of the grain trade, and, on the whole, I think it has worked out exceedingly well.
I know that some criticisms will come. One criticism will be founded upon a question which will be .asked:	Has all of this
grain gone out yet? I answer to that: No. Then the further question will be asked: Why were you in such a hurry to get the grain on the 27th day of November if it has not all been carried out up to this date? This much I shall say, that there has been always more grain ready for loading than could be carried by the ships provided by the Allies to transport it from our ports; and the balance of the grain will probably not leave our ports before the middle of May, when the last of it will be taken out from the port of Montreal. Just about the time of the commandeering of the grain, the difficulty of obtaining tonnage for the Allied powers for the operations of the war and other operations subsidiary to them became acute; and, although Italy, one of the allied powers, was in great need of that grain, in dire need of it-because Italy, before the war had been declared, had carried on a very brisk trade with Germany and had sold a large propor-

tion of her wheat to Germany, so that when the war was declared between Italy and Germany-Italy came into the war-


Charles Marcil: Italy and Austria. Italy
is not at war with Germany.


George Eulas Foster: Anybody can sleep on that who wishes. It does not appear to me that they are very friendly with each other.


Wilfrid Laurier: They could
buy and sell though.


George Eulas Foster: In a technical
point of view, no war has been declared. That is true. But, in the other point of view, Italy is doing her level best to destroy the cause of the Teutonic Allies, and doing it with a bravery and a consistency that has not been excelled by any nation which has been engaged in the war. So that, intervening, was this extreme scarcity of tonnage; and, although there has been necessity for the quickest possible transit of that grain, it has been impossible for them to provide the vessels necessary more speedily than they have done. Three-fourths of that grain has already left tbe Atlantic seaports, and probably a little more than one-fourth remains yet to be taken out. Now, I think that is all the statement I have to make with reference to the commandeering.


Wilfrid Laurier: For whose benefit was the wheat bought?


George Eulas Foster: As I think my statement shows, the wheat went into the hands, of the Allied Commission in London. That is a commission on which representatives from Italy and Russia and France and Great Britain sit. There may be some others on it, but these are the principal representatives, and they are under the presidency, or chairmanship, of a British official. That Allied Commission purchases supplies of every kind necessary for the war, or for the sustenance of the people en-' gaged in the war. They have their methods of finance arranged in conjunction with Great Britain, and they sit there as a commission, receive bids, make contracts, and make purchases., and they d* this in common session. The moment that the grain commandeered was in out possession it was handed over, at exactly the cost and charges that were incurred, to this Allied Commission, and from that time it has been under their charge as to its disposal. They asked the Department of Trade and Com-

meroe to undertake the supervision of that grain from the point where we procured it to the seaboard, and to see that it met the ships at the different ports. My department undertook that supervision and has been carrying it out.


Charles Marcil: Are these Canadian ports?


George Eulas Foster: They are not all Canadian ports. Wherever the Allied Commission, which is providing the vessels, could get a vessel to go most conveniently and most economically, they asked us to send the wheat, and this wheat has been provided and loaded at ports from Baltimore in the South to Halifax and St. John in the North.	'


Wilfrid Laurier: The commission has purchased also in the United States.


George Eulas Foster: 
Wilfrid Laurier: Has this commission purchased any wheat in Canada besides what the Government purchased for it?


George Eulas Foster: I think I may
say that before that time, and since that time, the countries represented on, that commission have purchased in Canada, and purchased very largely.


Wilfrid Laurier: I see by the correspondence brought down that France purchased direct in Canada without the intervention of this commission. I know- it is public knowledge-that the Allied Governments have been purchasing largely in Canada. What I want to know is whether that commission has purchased in Canada from private parties in addition to what was purchased through the Government.


George Eulas Foster: Yes, the commission has purchased, and is purchasing.


Charles Marcil: Is this the only occasion oh which the Government was called upon to commandeer?


George Eulas Foster: My hon. friend must not put it' in that way; he must not say that the Government was called upon to commandeer. The Government was no$ called upon to commandeer; it was called upon to purchase. Commandeering was resorted to a year ago, or a little more, 202
when a quantity of oats was secured in that way for the French and British Governments, I think.


Wilfrid Laurier: The action
taken by the Government in the month of November last, at the end of the season,, was absolutely exceptional, and no such action should (be taken by a government except under exceptional circumstances. A government should not interfere so as to dislocate trade in any way, or to raise an obstacle to the ordinary channels of trade unless there is an absolute necessity for doing so. iSo far as my information goes, and I think it is perfectly accurate-it is within the knowledge of everybody-no government anywhere ever commandeered any commodity except for the purpose of immediately supplying the people for consumption. There may, perhaps, foe circumstances where a different course has been pursued, but, as a rule, no commandeering of any commodities ever took place in any country unless there was a possibility of famine in the particular commodity, and the government saw that the people were suffering. In this instance, the Government received information, as my hon. friend says, on the 23rd of November last that the Allied Nations were wanting wheat. In the statement which he places before the House my hon. friend proceeds- as follows:
Early in the autumn of 1915 when it became evident that Canada, in common with the United States and Australia, would have large surpluses of wheat for export, representations were made to the British Government with a view of interesting it and the Allied Governments in the purchase from Canada of a generous portion of the large quantities they would undoubtedly require.
That was certainly a very commendable action on the part of the Government-to try to enlist at once the good-will of the Allied Nations and to see that they supplied themselves in Canada with a commodity of which we had a large surplus. Then my hon. friend goes on to say:
These representations were successful and on November 23, instructions were cabled to the Canadian Government by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to purchase a large quantity, delivery to begin in December and continue for the following months.
It would have been sufficient to draw the attention of the Allies to the fact that we had a very large crop in Canada, and then to leave the ordinary channels of trade to supply the necessities of the Mother Country and the Allied nations. The Government, however, thought they would go into the business themselves; they became pur-



chasers of wheat for the benefit of the Allied nations, and the result of their efforts was to secure . the magnificent quantity of 13,000,000 bushels. That was all they could do or all that they attempted to do. When there was a surplus available for sale of at least 100,000,000 bushels of wheat in the month of November, my hon. friend, by the method he adopted, secured 13,000,000 bushels. Was there any necessity for that action? What purpose was served, or what benefit accrued to anybody from it? What reason was there for dislocating trade, as it was dislocated at the moment-so much so that two days afterwards my hon. friend was obliged to see that that man got his quantity and that other man got his quantity, that the shippers got their quantity, and the millers their quantity-what was the reason for such action if the object could have been accomplished just as effectively by the ordinary methods of trade, winch would have been far better than the the extraordinary methods followed by the Government. My hon. friend has attempted to justify himself, and I do not think that he has made out a case at all for resorting to this extraordinary process. He said that the wheat was bought without any commission, but every purchaser is prepared to pay commission where the ordinary methods of trade are followed, and there is no reason at all why the ordinary methods of business, which are legitimate, should not have been followed. There is no reason why. The only excuse for it is that it was a case of necessity. My hon. friend is aware that at the time this extraordinary, this despotic, action was taken by the Government, there were serious complaints coming from all over Canada from men in the business that the Government were interfering with their legitimate operations, and up to this day I have not heard a single good reason why this extraordinary action of the Government was taken. I submit that there was no excuse for the Government to interfere, and that these operations should have been left to the trade. At the very moment when my hon. friend was taking this extraordinary action, the French Government, as appears from the correspondence which my hon. friend has brought down, was a purchaser of grain in Canada, and my non. friend seized part of the grain which belonged to the French Government, and which had been purchased on their behalf by the Hudson Bay Company. Was there any reason 
why my hon. friend should not have employed either the Hudson Bay Company or other operators rather than by arbitrary action to take hold of the grain that was on the lakes and in the hands of the operators at that time? Whilst in times of war we are not disposed to be critical, at the same time I submit very sincerely that there was no justification whatever for such action.
There is another thing: I do not see why the whole of the correspondence has not been brought down. My hon. friend knows the rule of this House, that if a public document is quoted it must be laid on the Table. My hon. friend said that there were some parte of the correspondence that were confidential. Anything that is confidential I do not ask for, but what is not confidential should have been brought down for the information of thp House. That is the rule that has always been followed. The whole of the correspondence has not been brought down. I see by the return that an Order in Council was passed on the 4th December last. This order in council was afterwards cancelled and was replaced by another one which is in these terms:	,
The minister further reports that the action which he has taken for the above purpose is set forth in the telegrams, copies of which are hereto appended, and that the instructions given in the messages signed by the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, the Minister of Railways and Canals and the' Solicitor General were sent after consultation witji him and at his request in pursuance of the proposed appropriation and control of the wheat aforesaid.
The last paragraph of this Order in Council, which was passed on the 8th December, is in these words:
The minister recommends that the Order in Council P.C. 2873, respecting the appropriating of wheat, passed on the 4th day of December, 1915, be repealed.
That is to say, they first passed an Order in Council on the 4th December, and four days afterwards, on the 8th December, this Order was repealed and replaced by the one to which I have alluded. The first Order in Council was not brought down. I suppose it is not very material, but still the order of the House was to bring down all the correspondence, and in this the order of the House has not been carried out. Then, here is something that appears to be very strange. There is another Order in Council pas'sed on the 8th January, in which it is stated that the Minister of Trade and Commerce and the Minister of Finance recom-/

mend that " in order to in part effectuate the provisions of the Order in Council of the 4th December, 1915, ratifying the appropriating " of wheat and so on, a certain disposition be taken. But the Order in Council of the 4th December had been already repealed. On the 8th January, in order to effectuate the Order in Council of December 4, an Order in Council is passed, notwithstanding the fact that the Order in Council of December 4 had been repealed. I just make these comments, because it seems to me that the whole thing is very irregular. Whilst I am not disposed to insist upon the irregularity of the proceeding, still it is a thing which ought not to be repeated. The last statement made by my hon. friend showed that there was absolutely no necessity for the proceeding. He acted suddenly, saying there was great necessity for having it done immediately. The purchase was made on the 27th November, before the close of navigation, but the wheat had not all been delivered to the allied nations that purchased it.


George Eulas Foster: That is so.


Wilfrid Laurier: Then where was the necessity?


George Eulas Foster: I anticipated that criticism, and I have answered it.


Wilfrid Laurier: What is the
answer?


George Eulas Foster: When my right hon. friend finishes, his remarks I will answer him.


Wilfrid Laurier: Now he gives us the excuse that it was impossible to secure tonnage to expedite the shipments. Everybody knows that, but if my hon. friend had not the tonnage to expedite shipment there was no necessity for any such hurry to commandeer the wheat. If there was to be any benefit to anybody on account of the condition of the wheat market, certainly the vendors, the producers, were entitled to it.


George Eulas Foster: I have no fault to find with the remarks of my right hon. friend in the way of criticism at this moment, not in the least. If 'he had been leading a government at that time, and the circumstances had developed exactly as they did, and it had come to the point where action, was necessary, be might not have had acted in the same way that this Government did, but his Minister of Trade and Commerce might have adopted a dif-
202i
ferent method of procuring action along the lines which he has. indicated would have been best, and might not have taken the method which we took. It is simply a question of the judgment of the purchasing authority-the Government in this case- as to the conditions at the time of the purchase and the necessities of the case. Upon the conditions as they were, and the necessities of tiie case, this Government came to the conclusion that they must get that gTain and get it at once, because it was necessary to have it.
I will take up in order what has been stated by my right hon. friend by way of objection. First, he said that commandeering should never !be resorted to as a general rule, and has never been resorted to, except in the ease of some great necessity in the country itself, such as lack of food, where privation, if not starvation, must ensue unless the Government commandeers, takes hold of, and feeds out gradually and by Tation, as it were, what is necessary to prevent such privation or starvation from taking place. But there are other circumstances in which, upon the very same principle, commandeering might take place. I have mentioned the condition of Italy m reference to the shortage of wheat. The shortage of wheat in Italy at that time was absolutely acute. The information was before the Government that Italy needed a certain quantity of wheat, as much or more than tihe wheat which was* commandeered, and that they needed it absolutely at that time. There was no bargain that the Government here was to prepare or supply the tonnage which should carry the wheat. The necessity was there. Italy and the other allied Governments were to look after the wheat being carried, and at the time that order was given the expectation here was-ana no other expectation could have been formed under the circumstances.- that that quantity of wheat was absolutely necessary, would be called for, and would be taken out of the country within a very short time. Now, what I have stated,
I think, is absolutely plain and fair. What I stated was that acute scarcity of tonnage supervened, which made it impossible for the Italian Government, with the aid of the British Government and the Allied Governments, to get sufficient ships to carry that wheat out at once, and Italy's needs had to be and were to a certain extent met by going to another market and getting what she wanted from another source.


William Melville Martin: When was the wheat shipped to Italy and how much was shipped ?


George Eulas Foster: Wheat has been shipped ever since and is being shipped now.


William Melville Martin: Was any wheat shipped to Italy say, within six weeks after the commandeering took place?


George Eulas Foster: I do not think there was.


William Melville Martin: DV the commandeering of the wheat we did not assist any dire need in Italy, because Italy would have been in need yet so far as the action of this Government is concerned.


George Eulas Foster: My hon. friend may think that is a criticism, but I hardly agree with him. If we had known everything, if we had known that this intervention of scarcity of tonnage' would take place and that the Italian Government would not be able to get the tonnage to send for the wheat when we expected them to send for it and to get it, and if we had acted upon that knowledge, then we could have .taken our time and have procured the wheat from time to time and in driblets.


William Melville Martin: I do not wish to interrupt the minister, but it seems to me that if the commandeering of the supply of wheat was such an absolutely urgent matter at that time, it would have been an easy matter foT the Government to ascertain whether there were available vessels in which to take that wheat out.


George Eulas Foster: It was not the duty of this Government to find the vessels. When an order comes for wheat and when there is urgency for that order, you fulfil it under the circumstances and conditions as they are at the time. If something intervenes so that the shipping cannot be found, and the wheat cannot be sent forward, that comes afterwards; it is not within the knowledge of the purchasing party at the time the purchase is made.


William Erskine Knowles: May I ask a question?


George Eulas Foster: Will you allow me to go on until I answer the objections of my Tight hon. friend ? I will take his question after I get through. He must always give way to his leader.
My right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition says every purchaser is 
prepared to pay a commission. He argued that the consideration that this wheat got in that way would not have to cost more to the Allied Governments was not a tenable one, because every one who purchased knew that a commission was to be paid. Weil, I would not like to say that in cases of war necessity- and this was war necessity-it is good doctrine that, even if you <jan get wheat at a lower price by paying no .commission, it is still well to adhere to the course of trade and pay a commission. My right hon. friend is on dangerous ground when he presses an argument of that kind.
My right hon. friend says that the Order in Council of the 4th of December was not brought down. There is no objection to its being brought down. After the Order in Council was passed, it was found to be defective in certain respects, and instead of passing an ordeT just to amend that Order in Council, and leave them both with efficacy, the Government thought that the best w(ay, as is often done, was to embody the first Order in Council in the second, with the amended portions, and pass the one Order in Council covering the whole thing. I will give my right hon. friend the first Order in Council at any time if he thinks it is necessary to have it.
Then, he made a statement with reference to the Order in Council of January 8 being based on the Order in Council of December 4, which was cancelled. Perhaps that may be technically a ground for criticism, but the Order in Council of December 4 was virtually in and formed the substance of the amended Order in Council which was passed on December 8, The Order in Council of January 8, was, I think, largely for the purpose of financing the whole arrangement. If my right hon. friend would like to know what the arrangement was, I may say that a credit was opened with the Bank of Montreal, which advanced the money necessary to pky for this wheat as the payments fell due, that the Government stood behind that loan as a guarantor of it, and that the whole of that amount has already and long since been paid off.
Now, if my hon. friend from Moosejaw (Mr. Knowles) has a question? Maybe my hon. friend wants to make a speech instead of to ask a question.


William Erskine Knowles: I will surprise my hon. friend by not making a speech. I would like to know who initiated the whole business? Did the proposition start from this

Government or on a request from the Old Country?


George Eulas Foster: I have already
answered that half a dozen times, I think. I said as plainly as a man could say that the British Government never indicated to this Government how it should procure that wheat-whether it should buy it under commission, buy it by an agent or broker, go to the farmers and buy it direct, or how it should buy the wheat. Our order was simply to procure the wheat for them, and this Government takes the whole responsibility of the method it took to procure the wheat.


William Erskine Knowles: I did not ask the minister- with regard to details of that kind. The minister was proceeding to say that it was none of the business of this Government how the wheat could get to Italy. I thought it was an opportune time to ask him who first opened negotiations looking towards this Government being the instrument of getting the wheat across. Did this Government take the first step towards facilitating the supplying of wheat, or did the request come from the Old Country because of the dire need of Italy, and so on?


George Eulas Foster: I think my hon. friend must have that information. The whole action was based upon the statement that with the supply that we had the Government was anxious to direct all possible purchases of wheat to this country; and from the time the crop began to be garnered until the order came we were in constant communication with reference to supplying not only wheat but other supplies and necessaries to the Allied Governments; and you may say if you like that the suggestion came from this Government to the Allied Governments asking them sympathetically to consider all possible purchases of supplies from Canada, and that after negotiations had gone on for a certain time in respect to this and many other things, this order came for the purchase of wheat.


Mr. BURNHAM:: Has fault been found with the minister for not having commandeered more wheat when he was at it?


George Eulas Foster: I do not know. Fault may have been found in a great many ways. That has not come particularly to my mind, although I do recollect now, when my hon. friend mentions it, that some persons were strongly in favour of our commandeering the whole western crop.


John Hampden Burnham: I thought my right
hon. friend was in favour of it.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend has favoured the House with a speech in two parts, one dealing with the question of elevator accommodation and the actions of the Grain Commission for the Government's handling of the grain trade generally, and the second part dealing with the details of the commandeering, of wheat last fall, which is probably one of the most controversial matters that could be brought up in the House of Commons. The whole question of the Government's handling of the grain trade of Canada is necessarily important in the last degree, and, being important, is necesarily controversial. If I take the opportunity of criticising the policy of the Government and its administration in regard to its handling of the grain trade generally, I hope it will not be said that I am doing so particularly from partisan motives.


George Eulas Foster: Not at all.


Frank Oliver: It is desirable that there should be a clear understanding as to whether the policy pursued by the Government is the best policy or not the best policy, and, as some of us hold differing views, it is our duty to place those views before the country.
The minister epoke of the amount of elevator accommodation in Canada and expressed the opinion that very satisfactory conditions exist in this country in regard to the transportation and handling of grain. He said we were probably the best-situated country in the world in this respect, at any rate next to the United States. He said that we have a splendid system of handling grain, one of our advantages being that grain is handled under the Grain Commission and in part through elevators which are the property of the Government and are under the control of the commission. This, of course, brings up the question whether the Government has used the best judgment in the interests of the country in its location of the elevators, in the expenditure of money upon these elevators, and generally the results of their policy to the producers of the grain. I apologize for introducing a matter so controvei'sial, but it is necessary that we should know where we are at in this matter. I am compelled, therefore, to recall to attention the fact that before the present Government took office, in the contest which resulted in their taking office, it


George Eulas Foster: Who spread it?


Frank Oliver: Newspapers supporting my hon. friend.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: Not one of them. Has the hon. gentleman a quotation?


Frank Oliver: It is a fact; there is no argument by which-


Arthur Meighen: It is not a fact.


Frank Oliver: Yes, it is.


Arthur Meighen: Oh, no.


Frank Oliver: My hon. friend had better not butt in; he has not been doing himself much good by that lately. A plain fact is a plain fact. I am not holding the Government directly responsible. I am not saying that the Government put it in the Canada Gazette, but I am saying that newspapers supporting this Government did spread that idea broadcast, and I cannot think that they did it without having some indication from the Government that warranted them in doing it. To such an extent was that idea spread-my hon. friend will not deny this-that the British Board of Trade cabled to Canada to deny that the British Government had anything to do with the commandeering of that wheat.


John Hampden Burnham: Does the hon. gentleman know for a fact that that was cabled?


Frank Oliver: Certainly: it became necessary for the protection of the good name of the Government of Great Britain for the Board having authority in the matter to cable to this side of the water to deny that they were responsible for that action. It may seem a light thing to my hon. friend to interfere with the business that relates to agriculture when it seems such a tremendous thing to interfere with the business of shipping, or nickel, or any of these other matters. But I want to say-and this is why I am speaking so strongly- that inasmuch as the agricultural industry is the principal wealth producing industry in this Dominion of Canada, it not only is entitled to every advantage that this Government can give it in the way of administration, but it is entitled not to be interfered with in any detrimental way unless the gravest reasons can be brought forward for that interference, no such reasons having been brought forward in this particular case.
It was most unfortunate that this seizure of wheat at Fort William should have been made within the last few days preceding the close of navigation. The minister has said that it was because the close of navigation was so near at hand that it became necessary to seize the wheat. Well, if it was necessary to seize the wheat because the end of the season of navigation was near, it was necessary that the seizure should have remained on that wheat and that the seized wheat should have gone forward while navigation was open. But, inasmuch as the wheat seized was, in

large proportion, afterwards released, his argument that it was necessary to seize because the close of navigation was approaching falls absolutely to the ground. He said that during the few days following the seizure a larger amount of grain took water at Fort William than during any similar period in the history of the country. That is probably true; but it is also true that there was either one or two days when grain did not take water. There were only 8 or 10 days in which grain could take water, and the seizure of the grain held up that grain for that time. Much more grain would have taken water had the seizure not taken place. The minister rested his case practically on the near approach of the close of navigation. That was the chief reason why it was necessary to seize instead of buying-in order to get the summer outlet for the grain. But dong after navigation closed, as the Minister of Railways told us the other night, the Government itself, over its own railroad, gave a rate on grain to Montreal absolutely identical with the summer rate. Thus the minister is left without a shadow of a ground of reason for seizing the grain at the time he did. The grain could have been bought at any time, and could have been brought forward at any time during the whole winter at exactly the same rate as it was being shipped out at Fort William on the day it was seized. There was therefore no reason why that grain should not have been bought in the ordinary coUrse of trade, so far as facilities for bringing it forward or the cost of transportation was concerned. In the ordinary way it would have reached its ultimate destination. As a matter of fact it has not yet -reached its destination, although the course of trade was interfered with.
When in- Winnipeg recently I asked a gentleman connected with the Grain Exchange what estimate was placed on the losses of dealers owing to the disarrangement of the market. He said the amount was variously estimated, but that the minimum was $200,000 of direct loss to the men engaged in the grain trade in Winnipeg and the western country owing' to the action of the minister. I ask the minister if he thinks it was right to disarrange 'the trade of our country to an extent sufficient to' cause a loss of $200,000 to men who my hon. friend says were speculators. Well, they were speculators; there is no doubt about that. So is every man who buys a stock of groceries and puts it into his store and sells it out again. The grain

trade of Canada and of the world is carried on by speculators. They are just as necessary a part of the grain business of our country as the elevators or the railroads or as my hon. friend's grain commissioners. There must be men to buy and sell grain or grain will not be bought and sold, and when the minister lightly suggests that because it was grain dealers who lost the $200,000 it is a matter of no concern to the people of the country, I can only say I cannot agree with him. The grain trade is in the hands of the grain dealers in large measure; just as the Grain Commission controls the direction of the trade in a certain way, just as the railroads carry the grain and the elevators handle it, so the grain dealers are the men through whose hands it passes.


Mr. WRIGHT:: I understood the hon.
member to say that the grain commandeered was owned by the farmers who had shipped it to Fort William in cars. The hon. member now says that the bulk of the grain was owned by grain dealers and not by the farmers.


Frank Oliver: I do not wish to be understood as having said that the grain commandeered belonged to the farmers. I was speaking of the general situation. That is a matter with which I shall deal later. The grain crop goes through the hands of the grain dealers. If the grain dealers dropped $200,000 by reason of the interference of the Government, they will see that they are insured against any further contingency of that kind by taking it' out of the farmer in any future business transactions. As a matter of fact, the hon. member for Q'Appelle (Mr. Thomson) pointed out this session that since the grain was commandeered there has been a greater spread between the track and street prices than before, simply because the dealer was insuring himself against any further interference by the Government in the transactions of the grain trade.


John Hampden Burnham: Then the speculator did not lose. That proposition has gone by the board.	'


Frank Oliver: The speculator says he did lose. Part of the grain that was in the elevators at Fort William and that was seized belonged to the farmers, part of it to the millers, and part of it to dealers.


William Wright: In about what proportions ?


Frank Oliver: I understand that about 3,000,000 bushels belonged to the farmer*. That was grain that had been shipped to Fort William in car lots by the farmers who produced it. It is a remarkable fact that it was 3,000,000 bushels that was held by the Government. Nearly 2,000,000 bushels was returned to the millers and seven and a half million bushels was returned to the dealers, but 3,000,000 bushels was held by the Government-the 3,000,000 bushels that belonged to the farmers.


William Wright: Surely.


Frank Oliver: Surely. And on the 3,000,000 bushels that belonged to the farmers the farmers lost the benefit of the advance in price to which they were entitled, and which they would have received if the Government had not seized their wheat. The Government loaned back to the dealers and back to the millers, 'but they did not loan back to the farmers.


Mr. BL  RNHAM@: Was that all the wheat they had?
(Mr. OLIVER: No.


John Hampden Burnham: Then, why did they not sell the other wheat?


Frank Oliver: The reason why they did not sell all their wheat was that the Government did not facilitate the transfer of that wheat to the Atlantic seaboard. They have the wheat on their hands yet, but not that particular 3,000,000 bushels. It is a remarkable fact that the amount of wheat which the Government held synchronized with the amount of wheat which the farmers had in the elevators, and while the handling of the grain of the miller and the grain " dealer was facilitated, the farmer simply lost without recourse, and he has no recourse yet. I think it is only right to point out that, in this case, as in other cases I have mentioned, the Government has absolutely disregarded, not only the interests, but the elementary rights of the greatest of our wealth-producing industries. It has set up from time to time that it has done these things in the interests of the prosecution of the war, but, in this case, if I may so, it has been caught with the goods. It commandeered wheat on the plea of urgency, and it has that wheat yet, and those on whose behalf it commandeered the wheat have not taken it away and have not furnished the transportation to take it away. Could there be anything with less excuse and less reason than the action which this

Government took; could there be less ground for blaming the war conditions or the needs of the Allies?


William Wright: Might I be allowed to
make a comment or two upon some of the statements made by the hon. member for Edmonton? (Mr. Oliver). As a matter of fact we have absolutely no proof, beyond his assertion, as to the amount of grain which was held by the farmers. From the little knowledge I have of how' grain is handled in the western country, I say that there is a comparatively small amount of grain held by the farmers in the elevators at Fort William. Occasionally we meet a farmer of a speculative turn of mind who has become wealthy by growing grain in a large way, a man perhaps owning 50,000 acres, and he will handle his grain as an ordinary grain dealer. A few men of his kind may have had gram in the elevators at. Fort William, but the average farmer working a section, or a half-section or a quarter-section does not, as i rule, have very much gram m the elevators at Fort William, or anywhere else, except at home where he may have a little stored waiting for the price to rise to the point at which he can safely sell it. He will use the elevator in his home town to some considerable extent, but 1 have not known many cases where farmer would ship his grain to Fort William and hold it there. If the men engaged in the grain business have suffered as seriously as my hon. friend from Edmonton would suggest, the grain probably belonged to a man in the grain business and not to the farmer in the West. If a large quantity was held by the farmer, it would certainly mean no loss to the grain dealer, because he would have nothing to do with it; he would have advanced no money upon it* and would therefore have no claim upon that grain.
My hon. friend protested against the Government commandeering that grain and not taking it away immediately to the Atlantic coast. I ask, what difference would it make whether it was in the elevators at Fort William or down at the Atlantic coast, when it could not be shipped out of the country? What possible difference could it make to the grain dealer?


Frank Oliver: What earthly purpose was served 'by commandeering the grain if it was not possible to get it forward?


William Wright: We will suppose that a gentleman in the Old Country wired an

order to a grain dealer at Fort William to buy him so much grain. The grain dealer secures that grain, and he sends it as far as Fort William and has it stored on the order of the man who has purchased it. He ha3 done his duty; he has complied with the terms of the order. It is then up to the man in the Old Country who has ordered that grain to get it away, to provide the accommodation across the Atlantic so as to allow the grain to go forward. If this Government, at the request of the people of the Old Country, secured so many million bushels of grain, I think they complied with the requirements of the case; they secured the grain. It may be a question, as the hon. gentleman indicates, whether they took the wisest course, or not. That is a question for debate.


Frank Oliver: Hear,'hear.


William Wright: But I think they performed, their duty when they secured the grain, and1 we have -the positive assurance of the minister that it has gone forward as fast as it -could be removed from the Atlantic coast. What more could have -been done? I ask any reasonable man in this House, or in this country, Whether the Government has not done all it could do?
I do no,t think that the farmer in the West has suffered loss to the extent of a five-cent . piece, and I do not think the dealers have lost very much by the action of t'he Government. They might have lost if the Government had been in a position to take away the grain at once. They might have suffered some annoyance from delay in replacing the grain taken away. But when it was found that the grain could not be removed immediately they were allowed to take some of the grain and to replace it at Fort William at a later date- when it would suit the Government to have it removed to the Atlantic seaboard. Consequently, they -suffered no loss. In fact, I do not see how anybody suffered loss. I think the farmers of the West, as a class, got a better price- for their grain, following the action of the Government, than they would have got had the Government not taken that action, because the very fact that the Government stepped in and was storing grain had the effect of putting up the price. The price went up, and remained up for some considerable time as the result of the Government's action, and then it dropped back to the normal, and it has been lower ever since.


Frank Oliver: I understood my hon. friend to say that the action of the Government in commandeering the grain raised the price throughout the West?


William Wright: Yes.


Frank Oliver: Then had the Government not better commandeer a little more and raise the price again?


William Wright: If the hon. gentleman suggests that I have no objection at all.


George Eulas Foster: Does my hon. friend make that suggestion?


Frank Oliver: If the Government can raise the price substantially on 100,000,000 bushels of grain by commandeering 10,000,000 bushels we all agree that they should do so.


William Wright: The fact of the matter is that the price of grain went up, but when the grain could not be got out of the country the price began to fall. Compared with the price at Liverpool, I say that owing to the action of the Government the price was higher in the West than it was 'before, and than it is to-day.


Frank Oliver: Will the hon. gentleman not ^ urge the Government to heave it up again, to commandeer another 10,000,000 bushels ?


William Wright: I leave that to the hon. gentleman, who seems to have the wellbeing of the farmers of the West at heart. Why does he not take action?


Frank Oliver: Because I do not think that the action of the Government had the effect which .my hon. friend says it had.


William Wright: The hon. gentleman is quite entitled to his opinion, and I think I am entitled to mine, ^nd I think I know as much about the grain business as the hon. gentleman. I do not think that very much fault can be found with the Government for taking that action. I admit that it is a question open to debate, and every man is entitled to his opinion. In my opinion it was the wisest course to take in order to be sure of obtaining that much grain, because, if it had been left to be purchased in small quantities, as the hon. gentleman thinks it ought to have been, they might not have secured the grain as easily as they did. I do not see what good would have been accomplished by taking any other course and I do not see any point in the objection that
the hon. gentleman has raised. I think he is actuated more by a desire to find fault with the Government than by any other motive.


Frank Oliver: May I ask my hon. friend this? He considers that the action of the Government in commandeering the wheat raised the price and thereby conferred a benefit on the country-the farmer.


William Wright: I did not say on the country; I said on the farmer.


Frank Oliver: On the farmer; but the reason given by the minister is that buying the grain in the ordinary course of business at that time would have raised the price.


Arthur Meighen: I cannot say that I am surprised that the action taken by the Government in this case has met with the opposition of certain hon. members on the other side of the House. My experience of recent months has been that the more commendable the action the more violent and direct is the opposition. My imagination would fail me were I to try to conceive of any course this Government could fake that would not Joe described by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) as an attack upon the farmers of the West. If we commenced a system of distributing public money to each farmer individually, we would be met with a complaint by the hon. member that we were robbing the farmers of western Canada.


Frank Oliver: No harm in my hon. friend trying it.


Arthur Meighen: But my hon. friend's argumentative attacks are often transparent fallacies. My right hon. friend the leader of the Opposition (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) takes the ground that the course adopted by the Government was an extraordinary one .and could only be justified by extraordinary causes. I do not know that I can take any exception to that' pronouncement. The leader of the Opposition, while by the accident of fate, he has passed through the world as a Liberal, is to those of us who know him best, anu I think to the country as a whole, well understood to be about the most pronounced Conservative, in the right mfeaniog of the term, that there is in Canada. If this Government does strike out upon new and strong lines in any matter, the first and the last to oppose is the leader of the Opposition. When we seek to ground our course on the plea of emergency, he is the loudest in disap-

proval, and sets to work to show, not always with success, that no such emergency exists. In the case of the appropriating of the wheat, the Government were faced with the necessity, as it appeared to them from the documents in hand, of procuring a large amount of wheat in a short time with the probaible necessity, through their agency or otherwise of procuring a larger quantity in a short time in the future. This appeared to us in definite form on the 23rd November. The courses open to us have been mapped out, and I do not need to relate them at length. But the Government could not go into the market, through an agent, and procure the wheat within the v time limited unless with results which we deemed would be inconsistent with our duties as agent and trustee. The Government, under the circumstances, selected men acquainted with the business whose advice would be valuable. The advice of these men was obtained, and not only under the circumstances were we able to obtain it as to the course to be pursued in respect to the actual purchasing of the grain, but as to the difficulties that would be met with in the purchasing of it by other means and as to the best method of solving those difficulties. The preponderance of view was that the proper course, consistently with our duty as the agent of the allied commission, and to the producers in Canada was to take the grain by appropriation. The views obtained wrere obtained in a confidential way as should be done in these cases. Two of the men whose views were so given have seen fit to state in part what they said to the Government and not to state the rest of it, but even with that I do not feel compelled to go farther and put the whole position assumed by these men, and assumed by the others who were called in, in reference to the matter, upon record. It may become necessary later on.


William Erskine Knowles: Is it true that one of
the largest and most reputable commission houses in Canada stated that they could get the grain without any extraordinary means?


Arthur Meighen: It is quite true that
there was scarcely a commission house in Canada that was not ready to buy the grain at the usual rate of a cent a bushel. It would be a very strange commission house that would not be anxious to do that, but I am justified in saying this, in answer to my hon. friend from Moosejaw,

that there was not one who did not readily agree that for the Government to go into the market and get the grain that was required would result in the inflation of the market


Frank Oliver: Hear, hear.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. member for
Edmonton says " hear, hear ". I know what he has in the back of his head-that had we gone about it by the means of sending of agents into the market the farmer would have received the benefit. No one denies that the farmer would have got the benefit just as he has it now. But there is one result which would have accrued, which has not by our method accrued, and that is that immense profits which would have gone to the middleman, who is usually the object of jealousy and attack on the part of the hon. member for Edmonton and other members of the Opposition, would have been extracted from the pockets of the Allies for whom' we were acting. The hon. gentleman does not say " hear, hear " to that, but he knows it.


Frank Oliver: Grain is handled for a
certain commission, a percentage of half a cent a bushel, and I suppose the buyers would have bought it on that commission.


Arthur Meighen: No doubt they could
have bought it, and they would have been very glad to have done it. It will be observable to hon. members in this House that after villifying the middlemen, and all who look like middlemen, if it is necessary for the purpose of opposing the Government of the day, the hon. gentleman can quite readily assume the role of the champion of middlemen and agents. He says, and the leader of the Opposition backs him up in this assertion, that every purchaser is ready to pay a commission, and consequently the Government should be ready to let the commission man come in and get his commission on every purchase.


William Melville Martin: Would it not
have been possible, without employing any commission men at all, to have done exactly the same thing that you did in the purchase of seed grain-employ the men in your own department to purchase that grain, they getting their salaries and no commission?


Arthur Meighen: That undoubtedly
would not have been possible. The only way to have got it otherwise would have been to have employed some one to get it

on the market and pay the usual commission.


Mr. TURRIFF:: You had Wesley Allison.


Arthur Meighen: I have no doubt that
had these hon. gentlemen been in power ' that is just the course they would have pursued. I am going to the heart of this question; I am going to discuss it seriously, as it deserves.


William Erskine Knowles: And it needs discussion.


Arthur Meighen: It needs discussion and it will get discussion. Hon. gentlemen say that we could have pursued the course of putting an agent, or agents, into the market and commissioning them at so much per bushel to buy the grain. It is argued that the amount procurable was not l^rge proportionately to the amount traded in at that time on the grain exchanges. In one sense that is true, but not in any sense that means anything in relation to this discussion. It is true that grain is traded in by the millions of bushels on the Grain Exchange. The same grain is traded in perhaps ten, perhaps fifty, perhaps a hundred times, and consequently the whole volume of trading is very great. The thirteen or fifteen million bushels, as in this case that we have in mind, might, before it ultimately reached a purchaser for export, have been traded in ten or a hundred times. But the purchase for actual export and use of thirteen or fifteen million bushels is a very large transaction, even in relation to the trading of the Grain Exchange. It may represent five, ten, or twenty times that amount of trading in volume as the grain in the usual way of trade proceeds. Now, I think I have made that clear.
There was not one of those who were called to give their opinion on the case, and who should have been qualified to give that opinion, who did not agree that it would have been utterly impossible to conceal the principal behind the agent, and to avoid, in part at all events, the result which accrued the year before-an inflation of the market to the benefit of the dealer and speculator in grain, and to the disadvantage of the consuming public and the Allied Commission. It was felt at the time that there would be some dislocation in regard to contracts already entered into, and means were canvassed by which that could be reduced to the minimum. The advice of those men was taken upon that and was followed, and I think they and the country are to be congratulated upon the thoroughness of
this work and the success which attended the reducing of that dislocation to a minimum. That, of course, appertained to the dealer alone, a man who is entitled to be treated fairly by Governments as by all, and that was the principal objection-'may I go further and say the only objection-urged against the course taken by the Government by those called in. No obejction against the course taken was offered by any one called in to advise the 'Government, and no objection, except for political reasons, could be urged to-day by any one except as it affected the middlemen, the dealers, and the speculators.


Frank Oliver: Who were the parties
whom the hon. member consulted?


Arthur Meighen: Two of them the hon. gentleman knows; the others were eastern men. Personally I have no objection to giving the names; but, as the matter concerns the Department of Trade and Commerce, and as they wore called by the minister, I will leave him to decide whether or not he will give their names.


Frank Oliver: In all cases they were
dealers or speculators.


Arthur Meighen: Oh, no. The hon.
gentleman seems to know who they were, but he wants to ask in order, if possible, that the names may be published.


Frank Oliver: We know perfectly well
that Mr. Crowe of the Winnipeg Grain Exchange and Mr. Crerar of the Grain Growers' Grain Association were consulted by the hon. gentleman, and they are dealers and middlemen.


Arthur Meighen: Yes, and the objections were solely from that viewpoint; nor was it suggested by any one, nor would it be suggested to-day, except for purely political reasons, that from the point of view of the producer, the farmer, any possible objection could be taken.


Frank Oliver: Did the hon. member or
any of his friends consult the western farmers on the subject.


Arthur Meighen: I- do not think that the association for which the hon. gentleman often stands up will stand beside him when he says that Mr. Crerar, of the Grain Growers' Grain Association, in no sense represents the western farmer. I am led to believe that he, in his position as representative of the Grain Growers' Grain Association, and his institution exist for the benefit of the western farmers.


Frank Oliver: And Mr. Crerar advised
against' this seizure.
Mr. ME1GHEN: Mr. Crerar did not advise against the seizure from the point of view of the farmer. So far as his advice and criticism went, they were based solely on the interference that would be caused to the trade in the hands of the middleman and the speculator. If 1 were to tell the hon. gentleman all that was said from the point of view of the farmer, I am sure it would be no comfort to his argument this afternoon. From the point of view of the farmer every consideration advanced was in favour of the commandeering.


Frank Oliver: It is only fair, when the hon. member brings authorities to bear upon the subject, that he should state what those authorities said.


Arthur Meighen: I will be just as fair, and fairer, I think, than some of the speakers who have preceded me in this debate. The opinions of the gentlemen I do not intend to state, nor to give their names, further than they have given them themselves. The minister may do so if he desires.
Now we come to the actual results of the commandeering. To purchase in the open market, as to purchase by the method taken, would, as can be easily understood by any one acquainted with the trade, clearly bring about an increase in price; but as to which method would have the greater effect it was difficult to measure. Both methods would very likely bring about a rapid increase in price. To have adopted a method of purchasing in the open market within the time desired would immediately -all were agreed on this and all agree today-have resulted in something of the nature of an inflation in price. I ask hon. gentlemen opposite and also hon. members on this side: Would this Government, commissioned as a Government to act as- the trustee of the Allied Commission, have been justified in taking a course which would have added to the value not only of all the grain in the West, but of the grain sought to 'be purchased in store and brought about a largely inflated price for the benefit of those who held it in store and for the loss of those for whom the Government were acting?


Frank Oliver: Tt did not seem to bother the Government very much in the case of shells and fuses.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman is anxious now to get on to the subject of shells and fuses. Some of his friends are just as anxious to get off the shells and fuses. Now we are discussing the question of wheat, and I intend to keep to it.


William Erskine Knowles: I think honestly the
hon. gentleman is sorry that he ever touched the wheat last fall.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman
may decide what his opinions are; I presume he will give me the prerogative of deciding mine. I am discussing the effects of the course taken. The effects of the course we did not take would have been clear; it would have added at once very largely to the value of the grain in store to the benefit of the grain speculators. It is really refreshing to hear the hon. member say that some speculators told him that the loss to those men was $200,000, and that he thinks that we committed a great wrong. It seems to me that it is only about three weeks since the hon. member argued here that they were a band of ring-sters, a combine to extract money from the western farmers by depressing the price of wheat. Now he weeps tears be-, cause he finds the course we pursued took $200,000 from' their profits for the benefit of the Allied Commission. For myself, I do not think it did. They failed to make the money they otherwise would have made; there is no doubt about that, and they may regard that as a loss. They would have made the money if we had taken the course of -buying in the open market all the grain they held in store for speculation; and that may be how they measure their loss. If we had put commission merchants into the field to buy, every cent of rise in the price per bushel would have meant $130,000 out of the pockets of the Allied Commission and would not have meant a dollar in the pockets of the farmers of Canada beyond what by the rise actually took place. The course we pursued had the effect of raising the value of the wheat back of the elevators in Fort William in the hands of the farmers and unsold; it had-the effect of raising the level of markets all the way westward. The other course would have had that effect also; but this course did not have the effect of raising the value of the grain in the hands of the speculators and taking it out of the pockets of the Allied Commission, whereas the course my

hon. friend recommends would have done that.


Frank Oliver: What we were recommending was that they should leave trade to follow its own course when there was no urgency.


Arthur Meighen: The course the hon. gentleman recommends would have put money into the pockets of the speculators of whom he is the champion this afternoon, and would have taken it out of the treasuries of the Allies, But the money that went to the owners of grain, by reason of the rise in value of the grain after the commandeering, went into the pockets of the farmers, and they have got it.


Frank Oliver: Could the hon. gentleman raise the price again?


Arthur Meighen: When new cases arise . we will consider the circumstances and will be governed Iby the same considerations that governed us before, and I may tell the hon. gentleman that he has said nothing in this debate that will be considered worthy to enter into the discussion of that matter.


Frank Oliver: Seeing that the Allies have not got much of the wheat yet, it seems likely they will not deal with the Government again.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman is complaining now on the part of the Allies. They got their grain at $1.04}, whereas his method, according to his own argument, would have given them the grain at $1.30, or something like that.


Frank Oliver: They have not got it at all.


Arthur Meighen: They have got it so far as our delivery is concerned.


Frank Oliver: But they cannot eat your delivery.
. Mr. MEIGHEN: Had not the hon. gentleman better go across and help them? We have fulfilled our contract. Now, if the hon. gentleman has anything pertinent to the argument to interject I have no objection to be interrupted, but surely he does not think that he deceives me by complaining of the conduct of the Allies and attributing that to this Government. We took it for granted-and we have no reason yet to think we were misled-that the Allied Commission desiring the grain within a very limited time and would be able to take deliveries and get them over. No
doubt the Allied Commission believed they could^ do so; there is no question they had reason to believe they could. But the exigencies of war are beyond the exact measurement of even the Allied Commission, though possibly not beyond the exact measurement of the hon. member for Edmonton. The exigencies of war they were not able to take with accuracy into consideration and adjust their conduct exactly to them. Events arose, doubtless, which they had not in contemplation, and they were not able to get the grain across- which was their part of the work-within the time they had anticipated. But our end of the bargain was fulfilled, we lived up to our end of it by getting the grain for them and getting it at a fair price, the market price. That was the fulfilment of our duty to the Allies for whom we were acting.


William Erskine Knowles: How much did the Allies ask should be secured for them?
Mr .MEIGHEN: Hon. gentlemen have asked that ad infinitum, and they have been told it, so far as we can tell it, by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. The ordeT that was given us was filled. There [DOT]were other messages and negotiations preceding the order which affected the necessities of the order as actually given, and which made it our plain duty to have that order filled within a very limited time, and, to that end, to get the grain by the expropriation method. Any other method would have inflicted upon those fox whom we were acting a severe toss from which the farmers themselves would have gained no benefit beyond what they have gained by the method adopted.


William Erskine Knowles: I desire to correct the statement of the hon. minister. I did not ask the Minister of Trade and Commerce before what the quantity was. I did ask as to the time. Of course, if the minister does not care to tell the amount, that is all right.


Arthur Meighen: The question was asked and answered, and I thought it was the hon. member from Moosejaw who asked it.


William Erskine Knowles: I was not here when the question was answered, and perhaps the hon. gentleman will tell me what the answer was.


Arthur Meighen: The amount is represented by the amount delivered.


William Erskine Knowles: But how much did they ask the Government to secure?


Arthur Meighen: The figures are on
record-some 13,000,000 bushels were actually commandeered.


William Erskine Knowles: Did the Allies ask for
13,000,000 bushels or what more did they ask for?


Arthur Meighen: The amount they got
represented what they asked for.


William Erskine Knowles: The hon. gentleman
does not need to answer if he does not wish to do so.


Arthur Meighen: Has the hon. gentleman understood that it was 13,000,000 bushels?


William Erskine Knowles: Did they ask for 13,000,000 bushels?


Arthur Meighen: I do not recall the exact wording of it, but it was put within such limits that the amount we actually procured for them in this way fulfilled the order. The hon. gentleman knows that it is not possible to place on record the communications that passed in regard to that matter between tbi3 Government and the Allies; if not he has not any adequate sense of his responsibilities ae a member of Parliament. These communications, as one can well understand, contain statements of fact and apprehensions which should not be made public, and no man with a proper sense of durty would ask that they should be made public.


William Erskine Knowles: Surely you can make
that much public.


Arthur Meighen: That much has been
made public.


William Erskine Knowles: When?


Arthur Meighen: In the House-now.
How often does the hon. gentleman want an answer? The order was given in such terms that the grain procured at the time amounted to a fulfilment of the order as to the grain required and as to the time. I do not see that any more is pertinent to the case. It is argued that there was a dislocation of trade, and a peculiar twist of reasoning was gone through by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) that all the grain except that received from the farmers we gave back-that the farmers had three million bushels and the dealers and millers had seven and a half million bushels, and that we gave back the grain to the others, and we kept that of the farmers and have it yet. The grain we gave back 
was returned within ten days, or rather it was not given back at all but merely loaned in order that there might be no stoppage in the fulfilment of orders and the outflow of grain at Fort William. It was all done under contract, duly secured, for the return of the grain in the same channel, and it was returned-and that is all there is to this assertion about delay. And not only that, but by the centralization and control exercised at Fort William by the adoption of that method, greater speed was made than ever was known before in the history of that port. The hon. gentleman has complained of a delay of a day or two. There was no delay; there was no cause for delay. I know that the order was given on Saturday night and the following morning, on request from Fort William, I myself instructed them, on behalf of the Government, that there should be no delay whatever in the loading of any vessel or in the pouring out of the grain through the funnel at Fort William.


Charles Marcil: Was this the only order received from that commission?


Arthur Meighen: No, other orders have
been received at various times, perhaps not from this special commission.


Charles Marcil: How were they dealt
with?


Arthur Meighen: I do not recall whether it was in pursuance of a foreign order or not, but we did on a former occasion commandeer another class of grain. Other orders have been filled by purchase, but in those cases there, was time enough to make purchases without unduly affecting the market and without loss to those for whom we were acting.
I was dealing with the question of delay. By means of the organization and centralization of control in the department, so far from there being any delay in the pouring through of the grain, there was expedition, there was facilitation, there was a saving of time. Within a period of four or five days after the commandeering of the grain, there was a larger issuance of grain from Fort William than ever before in the history of the port. Let me give, as it were, a picture of the method followed. Fort William is like a great funnel through which the western grain pours. After the commandeering, the grain continued to pour through that funnel as before but expedited by the fact that the Grain Commission controlled the vessels into which the grain went, and were able to see to it that each

vessel was loaded fully at one elevator, instead of passing from elevator to elevator. The grain continued to pour through that funnel with greater expedition than it had come through before. But while it was doing so such grain as was necessary to fill orders went to the fulfillment of those orders, and the remainder of the grain as it entered the funnel was appropriated to the purposes of the Government order. That is a picture of what actually took place. There was virtually no dislocation in that regard. There was great fear of dislocation. There was, indeed, very great apprehension, particularly on the part of grain dealers in Winnipeg, that it would not be possible to' meet these difficulties in any adequate way, and that these dealers stood to suffer great losis. But when they were apprised of the actual method adopted to adjust the situation and to meet all their legitimate demands, they were one and all loud in their approval of it. I wish to endorse what the Minister of Trade and Commerce says in regard to these men. It was our desire to keep down their losses, to keep down even their apprehension, to the lowest possible point. It was their desire, I believe, to meet us in every way that they could, even if they felt that it would be at a loss to themselves. They did meet us in a proper spirit; they assisted the Government by every means in their power in the carrying out of the appropriation in such manner as to .result in the least possible disoomiforture and inconvenience. I believe also that the farmers of the West, except, possibly, a few who may be of the same mind as hon. gentlemen opposite, or too much under their influence, have approved the course adopted.


William Melville Martin: I would like to ask the minister if he has any information as to how much of the grain in the elevators belonged to the farmers?


Arthur Meighen: I cannot give the exact figures, but I am glad the hon. gentleman mentioned that. Very careful inquiries were made before the appropriation took place as to .about what percentage would be unsold in the 'hands1 of the farmers. The figure that was generally adopted -indeed, I think it was the only percentage that was suggested-was twenty-five per cent. I think the Estimates given were all about the same; it has worked out something like that. There have been complaints that grain that really had not been appropriated at all was paid
203	.
for by grain' companies at the commandeered price, on the representation that, the grain was included in the appropriated grain. It may be-indeed I think it is a fact-that grain that was never really appropriated and that still remained the property of the farmer was represented- perhaps* innocently in some cases-by grain dealers as being appropriated and was settled for by the grain dealer with the farmer at the appropriated price. We have had complaints along that line. In fact, the Grain Commission, whose duty it has been to follow up such cases wherever complaint was made, have compelled grain merchants in many cases actually to pay to the farmer the additional price because they had settled on the representation that the grain had been appropriated, although it had not been appropriated at all. The final outcome of At all is this: about 3,000,000 odd bushels of farmers' grain and about 10,000,000 odd bushels of speculators' grain were appropriated at Fort William. All of it was paid for at the market price. Previous to the date of appropriation the market had been a slightly rising one. Whether it would have continued to rise an hour longer, no human 'being could say. It might have fallen the very next day; we cannot tell-it might have risen. At all events, previous to the appropriation the price had been rising, and $1.04} was paid for No. 1 Northern wheat. One would almost think, to hear hon. gentlemen opposite argue, that to appropriate grain was to commit some awful injustice; that to buy grain or anything else at the market price was doing the owner or proprietor of the grain very serious injury. There is ho doubt the fact that unless circumstances otherwise demand it is the right of an individual to choose his own time of selling, but to say that serious injury or any injury is done is to exaggerate the facts. I have heard it argued by hon. gentlemen opposite-I think by the hon. member for Edmonton-why do you not expropriate the manufacturer's product? You expropriate the product of the farmer; why not expropriate that of the manufacturer? Well, there are some manufacturers in this House and I put to them the question whether one of them would not be very glad if the Government came along and expropriated all his product at the market price? Would there be a happier day for him in the whole history of his manufacturing career?


Frank Oliver: Not if on a rising market.


Arthur Meighen: If on a rising market, neither he nor any one else knows whether the market will rise for another hour. If he does know it, he is, able to go on the market and buy against his belief and make money on the rise. However, I do^not say that it wo.uld be the part of any farmer to go and buy against it. He got the full value of the grain that he had in store the day that it was appropriated, and he got more than that: he got the added value to every bushel that he had behind, and I do not think there were many farmers in western Canada of those who had grain in store who did not have several bushels behind for every one that they had in store. He got the profit that accrued by reason of the increment of value added to what he had left, and he got a fair price for every bushel that he sold. So that, taking it all in all, the farming community of Canada, by virtue of the course taken, were the gainers not by thousands, but by hundreds of thousands-yes, by millions. They would have been gainers also had we taken the other course. The speculators were not by our method losers. On the other hand, they were not the gainers that they would have been if we had taken the course suggested toy hon. gentlemen opposite. They were not the gainers at the expense of our principals, the Allied Commission in Europe. That is what I conceive to be good Government business; that is the course a good Government should pursue. Where it can eliminate the middleman it should do so; where it can act for the benefit of its principals, it should, as any other agent do so faithfully and firmly. That is what we did in this case; we did it to the advantage of the producers and to the advantage of our principals, and they are the parties whose interests we were bound to have in mind.
At six o'clock, the House resumed and then took recess.
The House resumed at eight o'clock.



[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 76, for the relief of Christopher Sinclair.-Mr. Douglas.
Bill No. 79, for the relief of Hope Fother-gill Baily.-Mr. Thoburn.
Bill No. 92. for the relief of Robert Charles Vondrau.-Mr. Scott.

Bill No. 93, for the relief of Percy Lynn Woods.-Mr. Boys.
Bill No. 88, to incorporate The Manitoba and Saskatchewan Bible Society.-Mr. Schaffner.
Bill No. 82, to incorporate The Eire Insurance Company of Canada.-Mr. Nesbitt.

[Stage Direction]
The House in Cbmmittee of Supply.
John Gillanders Turriff: Ever
since the House assembled in January last we have been waiting with a good deal of curiosity to know what reasons would be given by my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce for the unusual course that was taken by the Government in commandeering the wheat required for the Allied countries. We certainly expected that there would be some good reason behind the action that would justify the Government in dislocating the trade of the country to the extent which it did, but when my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce, and his colleague the Solicitor General, the two ministers who were interested in carrying the transaction through, gave their explanation before the Committee to-day we found that they had really no excuse to give other than that in their judgment the course which they took was the best in the circumstances. My hon. friend the Solicitor General, complained that there was nothing that the Government could do that would satisfy the Oppositicm. I am prepared to agree with the hon. gentleman that we cannot expect much from this Government that we on this side of the House would be able to agree with. One reason that was given by the Won. the Solicitor Genera], and one which he seemed to think would cover up everything else, was that, by commandeering 13,000,000 bushels of wheat last November, the Government raised the price of wheat to the farmer in the West. Let us look into this for a few moments to see what justification, if any, there is for that statement on the part of the Solicitor General. At the time that the wheat was commandeered, there were at least 200,000,000 bushels of wheat in the '* West to be sold.
My hon. friend suggests that the action of the Government in taking 13,000,000, out of 200,000,000 bushels, had the effect of raising the price of wheat and making every bushel that the farmer had worth more than it was before. You might as well say that if a dozen farmers brought in 200 bushels of potatoes to sell on the Ottawa

market, and one householder in Ottawa bought thirteen bushels, that would put the price of potatoes up all over Canada, because the percentage would be the same. That is only one of the absurdities of the argument of hon. gentlemen opposite. You must remember that the price of wheat went up all over the United States at the same time. As a matter of fact, our Canadian market simply followed the trend of the market of the United States. For many days prior to the 27th November, when the minister commandeered this wheat, the price had been advancing, and surely no man in his senses would say that, because my hon. friend took 13,000,000 'bushels off the market .by commandeering it, or in any other way, he had put up the price on the
200.000.	000 bushels in Canada and on the
700.000.	000 or 800,000,000 bushels in the United States. The 13,000,000 would be about one per cent of the wheat that was affected. And our hon. friends offer that to the farmers of the West as an excuse for the action the Government took in commandeering this wheat, and try to get out of an awkward corner by attempting to make the farmer believe that the action they took has given him a better price. It is not possible to tell absolutely what my hon, friend had in his mind when he did this. I would be inclined to believe that the minister did w.hat he thought was the viery best under the circumstances. I am inclined to believe, also, that his colleague, the Solicitor General, thought he was going to pull off a good political stunt. At that time there was a good deal of agitation for free wheat, provided I may be allowed by the Minister of Trade and Commerce to mention free wheat again in this House this session. There was considerable agitation at that time for free wheat, and the Solicitor General took this view of the matter: Now, here is an opportunity to commander 13,000,000 bushels of wheat. Usually just 'as navigation is closing for the season there is a drop in the price of wheat. Of course, my hon. friend had to take soma chancels, because for a considerable time the price of wheat had been going up; but as soon as navigation closes the price usually drops down. The Solicitor General, I imagine, expected to find himself in the position that the Government had commandeered a certain amount of wheat, a large percentage of which was owned by the farmers in the West, and as these particular farmers would have received an enhanced price for their wheat,
203*
it would have shown the acuteness of the Government and that the Government were working in the farmers' interests. Unfortunately for the calculations of my hon. friend, if that was his view, the very opposite took place. The commandeering of this wheat, instead of enabling my hon. friend to make political capital, has 'acted as a boomerang. The price of wheat kept going up, and the farmers who had wheat stored at that time, and who had to take the price that was offered with no option in the matter, are the men who have suffered and are complaining bitterly about the way they have been treated.
The minister said to-day that it was perfectly right that the farmer, generally speaking, should be allowed to decide his own time and to use his own judgment as to when he would sell his wheat and what price he would take for it. No one is complaining that the price received for that wheat was not a fair price. It is a pretty fair price-$1,041 at Fort William for No. 1 Northern. But surely the farmer had the right to say whether he would sell that wheat at that price or not. If my hon. friend had offered to buy that wheat from the farmers, very many of them would have sold probably at that price. But there were hundreds of farmers who had wheat down there, and who did not want to sell at that time. These were men who had got their threshing done, had sold a car or two of wheat to settle up the .accounts connected with the threshing, the store accounts, and the account for growing the crop. They expected that the price of wheat would go up, and they had shipped their wheat down to Fort William intending to hold it for the spring market. You must remember that a farmer cannot hold wheat in his home elevator. No country elevator, whose business is to handle wheat, not to store wheat for a long time, will allow itself to be filled up by holding the wheat there. A farmer puts wheat in the elevator on the understanding that the elevator has the right to ship that wheat down to the head of the lakes and put it in storage there. It does not make any difference to the farmer; it does not cost him any more to store it at Fort William than it does at the home point. He is quite agreeable to that, and if he wants to hold the wheat until the following spring, or to take advantage of any advance in price during the winter, he puts his wheat in storage at Fort William or Port Arthur. If he desires to sell all he has to do is to sign his certificate, hand it over to the

buyer, and get his cheque for the amount. I want to assure the Solicitor General and the minister that there was a great deal of that wheat /held by the farmers. It was acknowledged .to-day in the House that there was something like 25 per cent owned by farmers. My information is, and I got it from a prominent member of the Grain Exchange who was in a good position to know-and if I am astray in my figures, the minister, who probably knows exactly, can set me right-that there were over
5,000,000 bushels of this wheat belonging to farmers stored there and not sold on that day. Those farmers have lost quite a sum of money. A number of farmers in my constituency have brought the matter to my, attention. One of them whom I ran across down here a month or so ago told me that he had three cars of wheat at Fort William, the wheat was commandeered, and at the time he was speaking to me the loss was about $750. Another farmer in the vicinity of Frobisher had 10,000 bushels of wheat in store at Fort William that he was holding for spring, and at the time he wrote to me about it he could have sold for $1.25 a bushel, whereas the price he got from my hon. friend was $1,041, so that he was out $2,500 on the transaction. There are scores and hundreds of farmers throughout the prairie country who have suffered just in the way that the two I have instanced have suffered. I imagine that none of those farmers would object to having his wheat commandeered if it had been a necessity in connection with the war, a necessity for Great Britain or for Canada, or even for any of the Allies of Great Britain; but the position they take, and naturally so, is that this was done without any justification; that the minister could have procured his 13,000,000 bushels of wheat without causing a ripple on the wheat market and without dislocating or disrupting the trade or causing any inconvenience for anybody connected with the trade.
One of the ministers stated this afternoon that the Government had taken advice on this matter. We do not know all to whom they applied for advice, but we know that Mr. Crowe, one of the most prominent grain buyers in Winnipeg, and Mr. Crerar, President of the Grain Growers' Grain Association in Winnipeg, advised against the course which the Government took; at least, they said so in interviews which were published in the newspapers and which I have never seen contradicted. Mr. Rich-

ardson, of Kingston, probably the largest grain dealer in Canada, stated that his advice was absolutely against it, and that grain could have been purchased without interfering in any way with the trade, without hurting anybody, and without raising the price. Mr. Richardson instanced one occasion on which there was only 4,000,000 bushels of Kansas red spring wheat on the market, of which his firm had purchased
2,500,000	bushels without raising the price a fraction of a cent. At the very time that my hon. friend commandeered this wheat, wheat was pouring into Fort William at the rate of two or three million bushels a day; so that the question was only one of a week's receipts, and, by giving a broker an order to buy it quietly, the wheat could have been purchased without causing any disturbance whatever.
The Minister of Trade and Commerce stated that you could not buy from the farmers. I do not think tljat is correct. On the very day that my hon. friend commandeered that wheat, there were millions and tens of millions of bushels of wheat throughout the West, every elevator where the grain had been threshed being practically filled to its capacity at the end of November. As I pointed out the other day, my hon. friend could have bought that wheat, because the market price for wheat in the elevators of the West was practically ten cents a bushel less than the market price for wheat on the track ready to be taken to Fort William, for which the price of $1.04 was paid. It would have been a boon to the country to have taken that wheat out of the elevators in the West, and it could have been taken out by the National Transcontinental and been landed at Portland or at St. John, provided that the Government had given the same rate over the whole route as over the part from Armstrong to Quebec, and in that way they would have procured the wheat at a lower price for their customers, the Allied Governments. Yet my hon. friend or his colleague this afternoon laid great stress on the duty of the Government to buy this wheat at the best possible price, I think, for the Kingdom of Italy. In that case, why did they buy November wheat on the 27th of November? Why did they not buy December options? At that time December wheat was six or seven cents a bushel less than November wheat; and, as the minister apparently knew that they did not need the wheat then, he could just as well have bought the wheat to be

delivered a little later, and secured it at about seven cents a bushel cheaper, if he was working so hard in the interest of Italy, which was to get the bulk of the wheat. To prove that my hon. friend did not need the wheat then, I may say that no sooner had he commandeered the wheat than there was such a rumpus raised by the dealers and the millers that he immediately, out of the 13,000,000 bushels, turned back 7,500,000 bushels to be replaced later on. Therefore he could just as well have bought December wheat and paid that much less for the people for whom he was purchasing.
Another statement made this afternoon was that there was the utmost need of haste to meet the dire necessities of Italy, who, previous to going into this war, had sold herself short of wheat, and therefore had to get a great deal more, and that as a consequence the Government could not wait an hour, but must immediately commandeer the wheat. That sounds very well, but it does not bear analysis. At the ordinary rate of consumption of wheat by people who use wheat flour, the people of Italy from November 27 to the present time would have consumed about 120,000,000 bushels of wheat. That is taken on the basis of seven bushels per head of the population, which would be a fair average for a country of English-speaking people. Italy, however, may not use so much wheat; she may use more of other kinds of grain or of fruit. Let us suppose that she uses only two-thirds as much wheat as Englishspeaking nations, that would still leave about 80,000,000 bushels that she has consumed from November 27 to the present time. If there had been the necessity for haste which one would judge there was from the way in which this Government undertook to procure the wheat, Italy would many months ago have had at the various ports sufficient tonnage to take 15,000,000 bushels of wheat across the ocean. Therefore the argument that tremendous haste was necessary does not hold good for a minute. As my hon. friend from Edmonton pointed out this afternoon, this wheat was no sooner secured than the Government undertook to satisfy the millers and the dealers. The large millers were given all the wheat they needed, and the dealers were given wheat to fulfil their contracts, but no farmer was given the option of taking his wheat back and making other disposition of it. The farmers were left
out of the deal. There were, however, a good many small millers who suffered very much from this high-handed manner of dealing with the wheat.
Take the case of the small miller in the East who had made contracts for 10,000 or 20,000 bushels of wheat. That wheat is in the elevator at Fort William awaiting shipment. The commandeering takes place. These mills have no contract for the delivery of flour to any of the allied countries, therefore they do not come under the rule which would allow them to borrow their wheat back from the Government. But these mills have contracts with buyers, bakers and flour dealers all over the country. When they bought wheat they sold flour to a similar amount-that is the practice with the miller. So, in this case, the miller had bought his wheat and, on the basis of the price he paid, had sold his flour. The Government steps in and takes his wheat, and he has to go on a rising market and buy at an advance of five or ten cents a bushel, and yet he must sell his flour at the price at which he contracted to sell it. In this way many small mills through the country have lost large sums. The men who got out all right are the big millers and the big dealers- which is what usually happens in the transactions made by hon. gentlemen opposite; the smaller dealers, and the farmers particularly, get no consideration whatever, nor have they power to help themselves in such a case as this. Did I understand the Minister of Trade and Commerce to say that when the allied Governments ordered' wheat they ordered oats also?


George Eulas Foster: No.


John Gillanders Turriff: Probably I got that confused with the statement he made that oats had been commandeered once before. There is one point I would like cleared up. Would the minister say just what part of this 13,000,000 bushels of wheat was shipped out of Fort William before the close of navigation?


George Eulas Foster: I have not the exact figures before me, -but I think it must have been about 7,000,000 bushels.


John Gillanders Turriff: Then, do I understand that the rest of the wheat is still at Fort William?


George Eulas Foster: That would not necessarily follow.


John Gillanders Turriff: Was there a special rate on it by rail? Perhaps the minister would

say whether there was a rate on it of six cents a bushel from Fort William to Quebec.


George Eulas Foster: I do not think there was any rate of that kind.


John Gillanders Turriff: I found it a little difficult to harmonize' the statement that approximately three-quarters of the wheat commandeered had already been shipped to the allied countries with the other statement that only about one-half had been shipped out of Fort William before the close of navigation-unless, of course, it was sent down at the high Canadian Pacific rate by land during the winter months. At all events the 'Government has apparently had enough of commandeering wheat, and the allied countries have apparently had enough of ordering wheat through the Government; both are apparently satisfied to leave each other alone for the future. The minister stated this afternoon that these foreign countries were still buying wheat in Canada; but, as I understand, they have not ordered any more wheat through the Government. I think that in that they show wisdom. Evidently the whole transaction did not prove very attractive to them, even though the Government was not charging any commission -of which a strong point was made this afternoon. Apparently these allied governments are satisfied that when they want wheat it is better to go to an ordinary dealer and buy it in the ordinary way. I am very glad these governments have come to that conclusion, because, in spite of the argument of the Solicitor General (Mr. Meighen) and the hon. member for Muskoka (Mr. Wright), I am satisfied that the commandeering of the wheat did not raise the price of wheat by a fraction of a cent, and so did not benefit the farmers. On the other hand, the farmers who had not sold their wheat, but had it in storage, lost, probably, half a million dollars on the wheat they had.
~ An hon. MEMBER: Carried.


John Gillanders Turriff: It will be carried, but there is no hurry. We know perfectly well that the Minister' of Trade and Commerce brought this matter up to-day to kill time, and that is all-right. The minister is not crying " carried," because he does not want it carried just now, and so his friends had better wait with patience. It will be carried in good time and probably whenever the minister wants it.


William Wright: The hon. gentleman says that the Minister of Trade and Commerce introduced this to kill time. The hon. member himself is aiding and abetting the minister in that? *


John Gillanders Turriff: I plead guilty to the charge. I do not object to help the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I would rather help him than any other man in the Government, or than any man behind him. But, as hon. members opposite are anxious to get through with this, and as probably the purpose has been jerved now that we have spent some time over it. I will not speak at much greater length, but will give some hon. member opposite an opportunity to do what neither of the ministers, apparently, was able to	do'-give a
reasonable reason for the action of the Government in commandeering this wheat.
If any hon. gentleman opposite can suggest some reason that will satisfy the men wiic owned the wheat, they will be accomplishing something worth while. According to :ny non. friends opposite-according to the minister, at all events-the commandeering of one per cent of the wheat that was on the market put the price up to from 25 to 30 cents a bushel within a month afterwards. The hon. member for Edmonton, I think, this afternoon suggested that if that was the case, why should not the Government commandeer another quantity of wheat and put the price up? The price has gone down about 15 cents a bushel during the last two or three months. Very soon the farmers of the West will begin to haul out the wheat that they have not yet marketed. If this commandeering of wheat raises the price, my hon. friends would have a good opportunity between now and the time this wheat is hauled to do something more for the farmer. But I imagine that the Government will not attempt it again; they have had enough in this one effort, which was acted as a boomerang.
During this afternoon something was said -I want to bring this to the attention of the Minister-about an investigation being made by the Grain Commission into cases where dealers had settled with farmers on the basis that their wheat, stored at Fort William and Port Arthur, had been commandeered, whereas it really had not been commandeered at all. If settlement were made on this basis a month after the commandeering, there would be an approximate difference in the price of 25 cents a bushel, and the dishonest dealer would have an opportunity of robbing the farmer to that ex-

tent. It seems to me that that is a pretty serious matter. A great many farmers may, without knowing anything about it, have been treated	this	way	by questionabledealers, and I think it would be well worthy of the attention of the Board of Grain Commissioners to find out the amount of wheat commandeered was owned by the farmers	in the elevators	at	thehead of the1 lakes. 'I know that my horn, friend would	not	want	to see	any	onecheated in that way, and if this course were adopted the Government could be sure that no farmer in the West was getting unfair treatment. I hope that in future, when this Government is	called	upon	to
secure wheat for any of the Allied Governments, they will, instead of commandeering it, put some one upon whom they can depend on the market to buy wheat in the usual manner, and avoid disrupting trade in the manner that it was disrupted in the month of November last, to the advantage of no one and to the great disadvantage of the farmers in the West.


William Melville Martin: I wish
to make a few remarks on some of the questions raised by the Minister of Trade and Commerce this afternoon, not so much with regard to the commandeering of the wheat as with regard to the policy that has been pursued by this Government since 1911 oin the question of terminal -elevators. The minister apparently takes a great deal of credit to himself and to the Government for the establishment of the Grain Commission and the general policy 9 p.m. that has been followed since the establishment of that commission with regard to terminal elevators in Canada. The minister is no doubt aware that the Grain Act which he introduced dn the beginning of the year 1912 was exactly the- same Grain Act, with one or two exceptions, the chief of which I shall mention in a moment, as that which had been introduced into the Canadian Senate during the reciprocity session of 1911, but which never got as far as the House of Commons. However, the grain men and representatives of farmers' organizations in the various provinces of the West appeared before the Banking and Commerce Committee of the -Senate and a general agreement was arrived at as to what the Grain Act should be. In 1912, after the present Government assumed office,- the minister introduced a Bill, which so far as the Grain Commission and the principle of Government control is concerned, was exactly the
same act as that which had been practically passed by the Canadian Senate under Liberal administration in the year 1911. Whatever success, therefore, has come from the Grain Act as at present existing and the system of Government control may largely be attributed to the fact that under Liberal administration there were men who knew something about the situation and were able to cope with it. I must say that I believe that the system of Government control in connection with the grain situation in Canada has proved fairly successful. In the sessions of 1909, 1910, and 1911 the question of Government control and Government ownership and operation of terminal elevators was discussed in this House. On two different occasions members of the then Opposition from western Canada moved resolutions in the House of Commons in favour of Government ownership and operation of terminal elevators. The last resolution, moved in tile w-nter of 1911, was to the effect that the Government should acquire by lease, expropriation or otherwise-these were the very words used in 'the resolution-the terminal elevators of Canada. The question before the House of Commons on that occasion was not the establishment of one Government elevator, but the acquiring by lease, expropriation or otherwise of elevators throughout the country. That was the policy of the men who now occupy the treasury benches. In the sessions of 1909, 1910 and 1911 the policy advocated by members of the present Opposition, then supporters of the Government, was the policy of Government control that was carried out in their Grain Act of 1911 and adopted by this Government when it came into power.	I remember hearing the
present Prime Minister in the city of Regina in the month of July, 1911, during the recess in the reciprocity session of this Parliament.	In the western newspapers
he was reported as expressing himself in exactly the' same way as he expressed himself on the platform in the city of Regina. He said on that occasion that if the Conservative party were returned to power, if he were leading the Government of this country, the Government would take over the terminal elevators throughout Canada. How has this Government fulfilled that pledge? I am not saying that I was in favour of that policy. I was always in favour and am now in favour of a system of Government control of terminal elevators. But the members of the present
3J20

Government, then in opposition, promised the people, on public platforms as well as on the floor of Parliament, that they would take over, own and operate the terminal elevators of this country. I believe the people of this country expect that an) political party that is elected to administer the affairs of Canada is bound to carry out in some degree at least the pledges that its supporters make to the people while they are carrying on an election campaign, particularly those planke of their platform that they vote for in the House of Commons. I venture to say that the present Minister of Trade and Commerce voted for Government ownership and operation of terminal elevators in the House of Commons on more than one occasion. If he did not it was because he was not present, because every other member of his party did and the members of western Canada particularly from Manitoba, were one and all in favour of Government ownership and operation of terminal elevators. In so far as the carrying out of that policy is concerned all the Government did was to establish one terminal elevator at Fort William. It is true that they established an elevator at Vancouver and interior elevators in Saskatchewan and Alberta, but, so far as any effect on the grain trade or on the general grain situation is concerned, all this Government has done is to establish one Government terminal elevator at Fort William. They might just as well have allowed a private company to build that elevator for all the effect it has had on the grain trade. That was done as a sop to the people of western Canada, in order to show that the Government were going to fulfil their pledges. Take the interior elevators established in Alberta and Saskatchewan-at Saskatoon, Moosejaw, and Calgary. I never heard any demands from the people of western Canada for the establishment of those elevators. Certain it is that the Grain Growers' organization of Saskatchewan or the United Farmers of Alberta never asked for the establishment of any interior storage elevators. Experience has proved during the last two years that except when there was an exceedingly big crop, and when the railways took the position they did this year by placing an embargo on the shipment of grain east of certain points, the interior elevators are of little use, because the people will not use them. In the Calgary elevator, in January, there was something over 200,000 bushels.

In Moosejaw a very small percentage of the space was filled at that time and the same situation existed in Saskatoon, although to a lesser degree, because there was a little more grain in that elevator in January and February than in the other two. But the people will not use these elevators unless they are forced to do so. They were forced to do so this winter on account of the exceedingly large crop, and on account of the fact that the railways could not haul out the grain because they would not accept shipments for eastern points. But I venture the opinion that in an ordinary year the interior elevators, would be of very little, if any, use. Take the terminal elevator at the city of Vancouver. I wonder if the minister imagines that that elevator is of any use at the - present time. I have not information as to how much grain there is in it at present, but only a very small percentage of the space was filled in January and February of this year, according to the information I have. I am informed by men who know traffic conditions of the Pacific that there will have to be an entirely new class of boat constructed for Pacific traffic through the Panama canal before you can handle any grain through the Vancouver elevator. I am informed that no boats of the type that carry grain on the Atlantic now exist on the Pacific. If that is the case I do not believe, and I do not believe that the minister believes, that the Vancouver elevator will be of any practical use for the next ten or fifteen years. I s>ay it was built simply on the system that goes in this country, the system of party patronage, which the minister so eloquently condemned in this House a short time ago, and I agree with everything he said on that occasion. The only reason for the construction of the Pacific coast elevator was the demand of the Conservative party in Vancouver. That is the opinion generally expressed throughout the West. We have had an absolute about-face on the part of the Government on this question since the days when they were in opposition.. All the western 'Conservative members, especially those from Manitoba, have simply turned their coats on this question ~of terminal elevators. They were, one and all, in favour of the Government operation of terminal elevators, just as we used to hear the Solicitor General championing the rights of the western farmer with respect to a lower tariff in this county-yet at every oppor-

tunity since this Government came into power the tariff has been increased, and the Solicitor General has on each occasion been one of the first to champion the increase. Instead of being the champion of the western farmer now, he has lost sympathy with the western people in general, because not only the western farmer but the western resident in general is interested in these matters. The Solicitor General and other Conservative members of Parliament from western Canada in this House, since they came into power and got near the treasury benches, have simply turned their coats on this question which so largely affects the people of the West.
The commandeering of wheat has been so ably discussed by the hon. member for Edmonton (Mr. Oliver) and the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) that I hesitate to take up the time of the House, and particularly of the Government, by dealing with it at further length. I agree with what was stated by the hon. member for Assiniboia about the present situation in Parliament. I have been trying to find out what we have been here for since the Easter holidays.


George Eulas Foster: Hear, hear.


William Melville Martin: I am glad that the Minister of Trade and Commerce agrees. If he would get his, colleagues together and get them to agree to some kind of railway legislation, so that we could have it before us and know what we were doing,' we might be out of here in two or three days. As it is we may be here for two or three weeks. There was no reason for our coming back here after the Easter holidays. The Minister of Trade and Commerce or any other member on that side of the House may attempt, if he likes, to blame the Opposition for the present condition of affairs. I say that the Government of this country is responsible for what goes on in this House. We are waiting to-day for a line of Government policy in regard to the railway situation, a very serious situation, but we have heard nothing of such a policy. Is it possible that the Government cannot agree on this question and place something before the House which we may consider and then get back to our homes, where we ought to be.
In regard to the commandeering of wheat, if the Minister of Trade and Commerce, as he has stated to-day, was convinced that there was an urgent need- apd no doubt there was an urgent needfor this grain among some of the allied nations, particularly Italy. If the people of Italy were in dire need at that time, they must be either starving or starved to-day, if they are still waiting for the Canadian grain. It appears to me that before the wheat was commandeered in this country, two conditions should have existed. One, I think, existed according to the Minister of Trade and Commerce, that was the condition' of dire need. The other circumstance that should have existed was transportation facilities for the carriage of the grain. Otherwise there was no reason for adopting such a high-handed method to get a sufficient quantity of grain to satisfy the Allies. Why did not the Minister of Trade and Commerce or the Government find out if these means of transportation existed ? The hon. Solicitor General (Mr. Meighen) says it was the business of the British Government and the allied powers to see that the boats were there; that it was none of our business; that all we had to do was to grab so much wheat and say: Now it is there, come and get it. I say that before the Government took such highhanded action and went aside from the ordinary channels of business, they should have satisfied themselves first of the condition of dire need, and secondly, that the means of transportation were available to take the grain for the Allies' Commission. The second condition certainly did not exist and yet the Government commandeered some 13,000,000 bushels of wheat. That, to my mind, is the case in a nutshell. And what is the condition of affairs to-day? According to what has been stated by the minister to-night, some 7,000,000 bushels of the commandeered grain has actually gone across the Atlantic. The other 6,000,000 or
7,000,000 bushels is still in some elevators in Canada. The minister says it does not follow that because it has not all gone out of the country it is still at Fort William. It may be that the men who>
borrowed the grain have not yet seen fit to fulfil their obligations and return it to the Government, as the minister said, in ten days. I have not heard the minister say that that is the case; I am only suggesting that possibly they have not returned the grain which they borrowed from the Government. In so far as	this question relates
to the price of wheat, nobody in this House, nobody in this country, believes for one minute that the commandeering or purchasing of 13,000,000 bushels of grain in a market of 300,000,000 bushels

had any effect whatever on the price. I suppose that if the price had gone down, the Government would have said to the farmers in the West: Your wheat was needed and you have got an increased price anyway. But the commandeering had no effect on the market. The price did go up, hut not half as much as it did a year ago. The Government says it increased the price of wheat. No person imagines that the purchase of a very small quantity of the total Wheat crop of western Canada would have a cent's worth effect on the price of the whole production. The Solicitor General says that before they decided to commandeer the wheat they consulted a good many grain men, but the hon. member for Assiniboia has pointed out that three of those men, who apparently were consulted, have stated that they advised against it. I presume that they advised that the grain might be procured by the ordinary methods of business, by having somebody purchase it. The Minister of Trade and Commerce said that there were three ways by which the grain might have been procured. First, it might have been purchased directly from the farmer; secondly, it might have been procured through a	broker, and,	thirdly, it	mightbe	commandeered. I think	then
is another method by which it might have been secured, namely, by making use of the Grain Commission, which is a very efficient body, or through some person associated with the Grain Commission. If I am not seriously mistaken the Grain Commission with its .staff of officers could have procured thait grain without the payment of one cent to a middleman. That would of course have satisfied the hon. member for Portage la Prairie (Mr. Meighen). When I listened to the discussion this afternoon, it seemed to me that there was a great difference between the method adopted by the Government, and the reasons given for its adoption, and the method adopted in the purchase of seed grain for the farmers in the West during the season of 1915. To-day, the Government says it was very anxious to save commission to the middleman. It is all anxiety on behalf of the .prospective purchaser. i It was not the Minister of Trade and Commerce who purchased the seed grain; if he had had to do with it I am confident that it would have been handled in a much more efficient and economical manner than it was. I contend that it was done in a most wasteful manner. In 
1915 it was the vendor of the seed grain that the Government was anxious about, the man from whom the Government would select 200 or 300 bushels out of perhaps
3,000	bushels. That was the man about whom the Government was anxious, the vendor of the grain, and not the prospective purchaser, who, in the spring of 1915, had to pay $1.50 for his seed grain. In the session of 1915, after I had investigated the grain market prices during the months of January, February, and March, 1915, and of November and December, 1914-1 got the prices from Fort William, and the average price paid by the Government in each one of those months for the seed of the western farmer-and I proved that the average price paid by the Government in each of those months was higher than the ordinary price at Fort William, after making allowance for transportation charges, by from ten cents to twenty^six cents per bushel. It was not the prospective purchaser then whom the Government was anxious about, but, as I have said, the vendor. I am very glad that the Minister of Trade and Commerce did not employ the same officials, or the same class of men, to purchase the grain commandeered for the allied countries as were employed in purchasing the seed grain for the western farmers in 1915.


Mr. W. A. BUCHANAN (Medicine Hat):: I want to deal with a matter concerning the province of Alberta, particularly the southern part of that province. Tt is in regard to the location of the internal storage elevator at the city of Calgary. I happened to deal with this matter when 1 spoke on the Budget, but the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce was not in the House at the time, and I would like to repeat some of the observations I made then. My contention is that the location of the elevator at Calgary was absolutely unwarranted. The explanation offered by the minister, in reply to a question I asked earlier in the session, was that the Calgary elevator was not intended to be, and is not, favourably situated for shipping grain east to Fort William. There is no question that it is not favourably situated for shipping grain east to Fort William. I maintain that the expenditure of money on an elevator in the province of Alberta could have been made to serve both western and eastern shipments of grain if the elevator had been located further south, on the Crow's Nest branch of the Canadian Pacific rail-

way, and I will try to offer to the minister what I think are substantial grounds for that argument. Calgary, as the minister knows, is practically on the ' border of the wheat-raising area of the province of Alberta. From Calgary north, the farming is practically of a [DOT] mixed character. From Calgary west it is ranching, and from Calgary east there is a considerable amount of grain grown. In the southern part of Alberta there is a great proportion of the wheat-raising section of the province. Any farmer east of Calgary shipping to the head of the lakes, and desiring to use an internal storage elevator would, if shipping by the main line, use the elevator at Moosejaw. If a farmer shipped along the Goose Lake branch of the Canadian Northern railway, he would use the elevator at Saskatoon, but in the extreme southern part of the province, shipping east, he would also have to go to Moosejaw and use the elevator there if he so desired, because it means a back haul to ship to Calgary.
I understand that the minister maintains that the elevator at Calgary was intended solely for shipments westward, that is by the Pacific. If that was the reason, an elevator could have been located at the city of Lethbridge, which would have served the shipments east to Fort William, and, at the same time, have served shipments west by the Pacific. But the Government insisted on having that elevator for the province of Alberta located at Calgary where it could not.possibly serve for some time shipments to the Pacific coast. That elevator was constructed and placed in operation before the Panama route was opened, before it was even declared feasible for grain shipments. It was placed there solely for the purpose of handling shipments by the Pacific when there was no guarantee that shipments could be made by that particular route. I think that the Government can be charged with making a fatal error in the location of that elevator in the province of Alberta. I am going to use the name of my own city not for selfish reasons, but because I believe that the location of that elevator at Lethbridge would have served shipments east and shipments west. The city of Lethbridge is practically the centre' of the wheat growing area in the extreme southern part of the province of Alberta, and in that extreme southern part I think it can be safely said that 80 per cent of the wheat raised in Alberta is produced. All the railroads run into Lethbridge. The farmers could have shipped their grain there and used the internal elevator at Lethbridge, and it would not have meant a back haul, whereas, to use the elevator at Calgary, under ordinary conditions, means a back haul for the farmers of a great proportion of the wheatgrowing section of the province of Alberta. I asked how much grain the Calgary elevator had handled from the date of the opening till December 31, 1915, and the answer was that the total amount, including all grains, was 185,455 bushels. Then I asked how much the elevator had handled from 1st January to the 14th January in this year, and the answer was that the total amount handled was 248,367 bushels. This elevator has a capacity, according to the minister, of 2,500,000 bushels. That was all the grain that was sent to the elevator up to the 14th January. I admit that since that time there has been a considerably larger amount of grain going into the Calgary elevator. This was not because the location of the elevator warranted the grain going there, but -'because the rates were reduced at the elevator-practically removed-the Canadian Pacific also made a reduction in rates in order to get the grain into the elevator, and an embargo was placed upon grain going out of Alberta to eastern points. All of these things forced the grain into the Calgary elevator. But that was an unnatural condition, due to the action of the railways and to that of the Grain Commission in reducing rates-. My charge against the Government is that this elevator was located at a most undesirable place with reference to the wheat-raising area of Alberta, when it was placed at -Calgary. It should have been placed in the extreme southern part of the province, and it might then have served 80 per cent of the grain-raising parts of the province for shipments east and west. The elevator was placed at Calgary, I believe, against the best judgment of the Grain Commission. I believe it was placed there for purely political reasons, and on account of the patronage system whioh my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce -has condemned, and which I condemn-. I believe that if the constituency which I represent had been represented by a supporter of the Government the elevator would have been placed in that constituency. An argument can be presented in favour of the location of an elevator in that constituency, but there can be no argument in favour of the location of such an elevator at Calgary, except on the theory that it isi intended to serve the western

route. But the western route is not in existence at the present time. I would like the minister to state to-night how much grain has been shipped by the western route during the last twelve months. The shipments are going east and will go east until the conditions warrant them going west, or until it is established that the Panama route can be used, or until we have a market in the far East. I think the minister has learned of the opinion of the farmers in Alberta. I asked a question later on this session as to whether he had received any representation from farmers in Alberta about another elevator in that province. The minister stated that he had received a great many petitions signed by farmers asking that an elevator be placed at the city of Lethbridge in the southern part of Alberta. He knows that the opinion of the farmers is that an elevator should be placed there. I doubt very much whether the Government ever had representations of any kind from any organization of farmers, or from any individual farmers, in favour of locating the elevator at Calgary. I think I have given good reasons why the elevator should have been placed in the southern part of the province, and in support of my argument that it was a mistake to locate the elevator at Calgary. If the minister has any other reasons for the decision of the Government to place the elevator at Calgary, I would like to hear them during the course of this discussion.


George Eulas Foster: If my hon.
friends from,the West who are interested particularly in the question are through, I do not want to do them the discourtesy, nor myself the disadvantage, of not replying to some of the points that were raised by each. Two of the most ingenious things I have heard put forward to-night were put forward by the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff). He evolved an absolutely new idea-I do not know whether he has patented it or not-as to why we were talking about the commandeering of grain and about western grain conditions in the House to-night, and the brilliant conclusion at which he arrived was that the Minister of Trade and Commerce was anxious to kill time-so he brought this up. I do not think I have to do more than to mention that to show the extreme ingenuity of my hon. friend and to indicate on what very slight grounds he can build such a substantial structure as he has set up. Then again, he was still more ingenious, if possible, in

another way. In spite of the arguments that he had brought forward, he felt still that his case was weak and so he made it as strong as possible by his final argument along that line. He said that we would do nothing for the farmers, we would not give them back their wheat, and then he thought it a brilliant idea to couple the Ontario millers with the western farmers' wheat. We would not do anything for these small millers he said, but we would fill up the elevators of the big millers in Ontario. I may tell my hon. friend that if he will come to my office to-morrow morning I will be very pleased to show him a list of the mills in Ontario, under exactly the conditions that he has spoken of this afternoon, which required very small amounts of grain to keep them going. The large portion of the grain that was released to the millers of Ontario was released to the men who wanted 10,000, 20,000 or 40,000 bushels to keep their mills going to bread their districts and carry out the obligations they had entered into to deliver flour to their clientele from week to week and month to month. That disposes, I think, pretty well of the two famous arguments of my hon. friend which he evolved like an Egyptian wizard out of nothingness, so to speak. But then he had another idea. If a man receives a definite, positive order, to buy wheat to a certain extent, to be delivered at a certain time, that time being as early in December or even .in November as possible, then, instead of buying it on that order, he should go into the option business and buy options for the succeeding months. In that way he might get the wheat a little cheaper and do something for his clients. But the unfortunate part of the argument is that the client did not want a December or a January option bought. The client wanted wheat bought at a certain time and in certaih quantities. My hon. friend knows that if you buy a December option, the possibilities are that you will not get your wheat until the very last day of December. You run that risk anyway, and a man takes advantage of his option with the idea that he may make something by carrying it to the very last day. Suppose we had bought December options and that at the end of December we had 10,000,000 or 12,000,000 bushels, how would we have brought that out and where would it have been at the present time? I do not think that my hon. friend's suggestion was a very good one.

The hon. member for Moosejaw (Mr. Knowles) made 'certain remarks. If my hon. friend had been here wheal I made my remarks immediately after we went into Supply, he would quite well have understood that I did not claim for myself as minister of the department, nor for the Government, all the credit or even a very large part of the credit, for the enactments which now form the Canada Grain Act. If my hon. friend will read Hansard when it comes out to-morrow, he will find that I expressly mentioned the preceding legislation and what had been done, and stated that the legislation of 1912 was a re-construction or reaffirmation, with certain added features, of the legislation which had already been on the statute book or prepared for enactment. 1 was not trying to take the credit for that Act in its entirety or even in great part to the present Government; I did not pursue the argument along that line. What I did say was that some new features were introduced that were important, and I then went on to point them out.
My hon. friend from Regina (Mr. W. M. Martin) stated that the Vancouver elevator was placed there absolutely .as a matter of party patronage. I probably know as much about the Vancouver elevator as my hon. friend does, and, if I had listened particularly to the voice of party patronage, mighty strongly impressed upon me, the elevator would probably not have been at Vancouver to-day, but at some other place. There was, from beginning to end, no thought of party patronage in the placing of that elevator. Rightly or wrongly, we started out with the idea that when the Panama canal was constructed there would be a very available route open all the year round for the passage of the increased production of wheat and other grain in the Northwest toy Vancouver, through that canal, and so on to>
Europe. And so I believe it will come. I have faith in that route, or I would not have helped to have an elevator placed either at Calgary or at Vancouver. I believe that will be a great grain route in the future. It has this advantage, that where one side of Canada is blocked, so fax as ocean traffic conditions are concerned, for a large part of the year, there you have an outlet to the Pacific ocean for whatever may develop in the far East and for the Panama canal trade, and that outlet is open every day in ther yeair. The Vancouver elevator was placed where
it is as the complement of that policy which we had designed and which we were carrying out. That policy may have been a wrong policy or may not, but the Vancouver elevator went as a sequence of that policy, and as an attachment, as it were, to the Calgary elevator.
A suggestion was made that maybe the trouble with reference to the grain arose because it had not been returned either by the parties who had borrowed it or by the parties to whom it had been released or who were exporting wheat to the Old Country. I think I stated this afternoon that every bushel of that grain had been returned, and it was returned absolutely on time as stipulated, in some cases earlier than the time stipulated, so that there was nothing that took place in those two transactions that was not according to the conditions that were imposed and honourably carried out. Furthermore, there is not a bushel of that grain now in western elevators; all of it is in the East waiting for the vessels that are to take it out.
My toon, friend from Medicine Hat (Mr. Buchanan) had something to say with reference to the location of the elevator as between Calgary and Lethbridge. In so far as he gave the facts with regard to petitions and to grain production, he stated them exactly as they are. Lethbridge is a large grain centre. A wonderful transformation has taken place in southern Alberta; that country, which a few years ago, it was supposed, was not worth five cents for 'grain, and would all have to go to grazing and cattle and stock raising, suddenly developed into a great grain-producing district that astonished even the people of Lethbridge and of that part of Alberta, and for the last few years at least has produced large quantities of grain. My hon. Ifriend is exactly right when he says that the southern part of Alberta would find Lethbridge very much in its line for shipments east; but it also finds Moosejaw in its line for shipments east, the elevator at Moosejaw being available for that purpose. For shipments east it has little, if any, use for the Calgary elevator. But that elevator was meant for shipments west, not for shipments east, and was built partly as a feeder to the transfer elevator which was afterwards to be erected at Vancouver.
At least two of my hon. friends have broken out into the strongest arguments against internal storage elevators generally. My hon. friend from Edmonton (Mr. Oliver)

.said that instead of spending the money for one or any or all of these internal storage elevators, the money should have been expended to put up elevators at St. John, Halifax and Quebec, and he developed his argument that if we only had had elevators there last year, great good would have been accomplished. I think I made it as plain as could be when I spoke here a day <jr two ago, and I think I made it plain again to-day; but, if not, I will make it plain now, that if you had had all the storage capacity of the three elevators at Moose-jaw, Saskatoon and Calgary, down either in Quebec or St. John or Halifax, or distributed between them, you would not have got one bushel more of western wheat on to the markets and into consumption in Europe than you have this year without those storage elevators there. I do not want to be misunderstood, in that. I believe that a port like Montreal should have pretty large storage facilities, and a port like Quebec should also have good storage facilities, because they are both transfer positions; but there is an advantage to have at those two points, in readiness for the spring opening of transport out by the Atlantic, large storage facilities, so that whatever can be carried down of the surplus of wheat during the winter season by the railways will find a resting place there and be ready for the spring opening. The conditions, however, this year were such with regard to transport by the ocean that no amount of storage at those ports would have helped the Atlantic situation to any extent. Do not let us be too hard on those storage elevators in the West. They were not built tor one year or two years; they were built for permanent use. Things are in their growing condition in the West. Closer farming conditions, greater additions to the wheat-producing area, will be constantly going on in the West, and I believe that these storage elevators perform a good office at the present time and will more and more come to commend themselves and prove beneficial to the wheatgrowing interests in their districts, but even up to the present time they have not done so badly. I ask the attention of my hon. friend to the Calgary elevator. He has stated-and it is to some extent true-that extraordinary conditions this year have drawn more wheat into Calgary than might come under different conditions. The Calgary elevator, up to a late date, had received 1,729,916 bushels, and shipped 352,720 bushels-a movement of a [Sir George Foster.}
little over two million bushels. The Saskatoon elevator has received 6,841,874 bushels of grain, and has shipped out.
4,274,000	bushels!-over eleven million bushels have passed in and out of that elevator this year, and the work is still going on. As to Mooisejaw, unfortunately I have not the exact figures, but I think it has had a movement of close upon eight millions of bushels of grain, this season up to the present time. True, this is an abnormal year. But it is well t.o have some provision for abnormal years. This year has been abnormal in the greatness of production, but we had an abnormal year once when bad weather and other unfavourable conditions caused a deterioration of a vast amount of grain. In james like either of these, these elevators will save millions of dollars to the grain-producing interests of the West. So, even if they have to depend for full action upon abnormal conditions yet, year in and year out, they will satisfy,
I am sure, a certain, want in that country, and will prove very useful in their day- and I hope their day will be a long one. Other remarks were made by my hon. friend, but I am sure that both of us are pretty well agreed that iwe have talked long enough and killed enough time on this ' particular phase of the discussion.


William Ashbury Buchanan: I understood the minister to state that if the Alberta elevator had been located at Lethbridge it would have served shipments east only, meaning that it * would not have served shipments west. And he said that the elevator at Calgary is of no service for shipments east, meaning that it was intended only for shipments west. But I contend that if the elevator had been located at Lethbridge it would have served shipments west even better than at Calgary, and at the same time would have served shipments east, which the Calgary elevator cannot do. Lethbridge is on the Crowsnest branch of the Canadian Pacific. The company has constructed a branch from the Crowsnest line through the Windermere vialley to Golden, on the Canadian Pacific, reducing both the grade and the mileage, and giving a through route by the Crowsnest Pass and the Windermere valley to Vancouver and other Pacific ports. With such a location Lethbridge would have been a better place for the elevator as a means of serving western shipments than Calgary, and it would have 'been in a position to serve shipments east also. Another thing

to be remembered is that the Canadian Pacific is building practically another through' line from Winnipeg and Lethbridge to the coast, known as the Lethbridge-Weyburn line, opening a large country in the southern part of Alberta. All the grain could go west if desired, and if shipment east was desired it could go as well by that route as by the main line. Besides that, Lethbridge is in the heart of the wheat growing section of Aloerta. When you go north to Ualgary you are in an area where mixed farming almost wholly prevails, and from which hardly any shipments of grain are made. South of Calgary it is almost purely wheat raising country. I think the minister is wrong in stating that the Alberta elevator if located at Lethbridge would have served the east almost wholly. It would serve the west as well as Calgary, but would have served both, and not the west only.


Frank Oliver: The day before yesterday I was in the beginning of asking the minister for information in regard to the grain situation: first, in relation to the 11,000,000 bushels transported over the Transcontinental, and then, generally, the situation of the grain in the country-how much of the total crop was sold in the country and where it was located, and how, much had gone across the ocean? I think the minister said that the question might well have been discussed at that time, but that he would be ready on another occasion when the item was under discussion to give the information. If he has the -information, I shall be glad if he will give it to me.


George Eulas Foster: As to the 11,000,000 bushels hauled over the Transcontinental, I am not able to give my hon. friend the information as to where that lies or how it was distributed. But I have not forgotten that I said I would try to get that information, and I will get it if the Minister of Railways/ who also promised the information, does not get it. At any rate, we will have the information here on Monday. As to the other, speaking generally, if my memory serves me well a bulletin was issued last week by the statistical branch of my department which gave about the location, within a very short time, of the grain in the country. I cannot remember exactly the quantities, but I think that at the head of the lakes


Frank Oliver: I remember, there were
50.000.	000 bushels of all grains at the head of the lakes on the 14th of April.


George Eulas Foster: I have information here that is rather interesting bearing somewhat on the subject referred to. The Dominion elevator at Port Arthur received this season 19,600,000 bushels, and made shipments" of 16,619,000, up to April 14, 1916. That is, it handled, in and out, about
36.000.	000 bushels of grain. The terminals at Fort William had receipts of 228,000,000 bushels of grain, and handled out 190,000,000 bushels of grain.


Frank Oliver: Grain or wheat?


George Eulas Foster: That is all grains. Wheat was shipped from Fort William to United States lake ports, 77,800,000 bushels to Buffalo and 20,700,000 to the other United States ports on the lake, making altogether
98.500.000.	To the Canadian lake ports 4)1,-
800,000	bushels were shipped, and to Montreal 823,271, a total of 42,600,000 bushels. That is to say, during the last season 70 per cent of the grain went out via Buffalo and nearby United States ports, according to that calculation. I find that 63 per cent of the 183,365 cars that were inspected, embracing a -little over 300,000,000 bushels, graded No. 1 northern and better, and 80
per cent graded No. 3 northern
10 p.m. and better. That was an extraordinary showing for the crop of wheat in the West this year. This year, with its quality as well as its quantity, the grain of Canada, particularly that of the Northwest, has made a name throughout Europe, especially among the allied nations, that will be very beneficial in future transactions. The British, French and Italian Governments have all been pleased with the quality of the grain that they have got. As I mentioned in the committee once before, it is vastly superior to the quality of the wheat from the United States. I do not mean to say that they have not a quantity of very superior wheat, but the quality of their wheat this year does not in excellence grade up to ours.


Frank Oliver: The fact is-without desiring to give the hon. minister information in regard to his own business-that the United States- does not export its best wheat, while Canada does.
Sir GEORGE- FOSTER: It exports some of its best wheat


Frank Oliver: That is why they want free trade.


George Eulas Foster: 1 am afraid I have not the particular information that my hon. friend asks for, but I will be sure to get it.


Frank Oliver: What is. the estimated total production of wheat in .the three Prairie Provinces last year?


George Eulas Foster: Up to the end of October 15, 1915, the total production for Canada was estimated at 336,258,000 bushels, of which the Northwest Provinces pro; duced 304,2010,000 bushels'. Of oats, the total for Canada was 480,000,000, in round figures; the Northwest Provinces produced 305,000,000. Of barley, the total for Canada was 50,800,000; the North-west produced 33,000,000. Of flax, the total for Canada was 12,604,700, of which the Northwest Provinces produced 12,537,000.


Frank Oliver: Of this total production of
304.000.	000, only 139,000,000 bushels are accounted for as having passed east of Fort William?


George Eulas Foster: My impression
just now is that the estimates that passed through my office the other day gave about
80.000.	000 as still in the farmers' hands.


Frank Oliver: Of courses, there is a good deal in the interior elevators.


George Eulas Foster: Yes'.


Frank Oliver: Then my figure is correct, is it not; 97,000,000 to United States points and 42,000,000 to Canadian points makes
139.000.	000 in all?


George Eulas Foster: That is about
what it was.


Frank Oliver: That would leave a little over half the crop, more than 150,000,000 bushels still west of the lakes?


George Eulas Foster: The estimate
might be a little large now; it is coming out pretty rapidly.


Frank Oliver: Is there any estimate of the amount required for local seed and feed?


George Eulas Foster: I have not the
estimate here, and I would not like to make the calculation. I will send my hon. friend the information.


Frank Oliver: I find, according to my
account here, that over 160,000,000 bushels were still west of the lakes on the 14th of

April. Deducting 20,000,000 for seed and bread, that leaves 140,000,000 still for export. Of the 142,000,000 that went forward east, 97,000,000 went to United States ports. Of the 42,000,000 that went forward to eastern ports, how much crossed the ocean during the period from October 15 to April 14?


George Eulas Foster: I will have a
statement made out and see that my hon. friend gets it. I am not able to give it tonight.


Frank Oliver: What I want to know is how much wheat passing through Canadian ports has crossed the ocean since the first of October, 1915, in order that one may judge approximately what the prospects are for getting tonnage to carry the balance of our export surplus, which we desire to dispose of before our next crop becomes available.


John Gillanders Turriff: As against the $725,000 expended in connection with the running of the whole grain business, what were the receipts from inspections and general revenue under the Grain Act?


George Eulas Foster: The revenue
that is derived, as my hon. friend knows, comes from the car inspection fee of 50 cents for each car; the weighing fee of 30 cents for each car; the in-registration fee, when the car goes into the elevator of 4 cents; and the cancellation fee of 4 cents. Those added together amount to 88 cents. That is what might be called the actual fees in connection with the administration of the Act. The other revenue is really earnings, that is for service given, such as might 1 be given by a private elevator owner. At the terminal elevator at Port Arthur, for instance, there are the following items:	storage, $159,518; cleaning,
$4,994; drying, $8,299; bulkheads, a small amount; sale of screenings, $24,000. Then there are some other smaller items. You must add to or subtract from that revenue the overage or shortage at the end of the year. In our own elevatoF we had an overage in flax to the value of $26,816. I made particular inquiry as to how we came to have that overage, and the commission informed me that that overage in flax is due to the very fine methods employed in screening it and getting out from what is in other elevators waste, real value. At the Saskatoon elevator some of the items of revenue were: storage, $46,575; cleaning, $20,604; drying, a small amount; screenings, $1,000; grinding screenings, $2,686; packing

for the seed grain, $12,268. The total revenue from that particular elevator was $91,453.


John Gillanders Turriff: If my hon. friend would give me the total revenues.


George Eulas Foster: I have not them made up. That, however, gives the sources of the earnings.


William Ashbury Buchanan: Has the minister any record of shipments of wheat by the western ports last year?


George Eulas Foster: I do not think
there were any large shipments of grain via Vancouver. Some grain did go west for Japan and South America, and there may have been some other for the far East, but it was a small quantity .A considerable shipment was put through for New Zealand. A portion of the grain purchased for New Zealand was shipped via Vancouver and went through, having been sacked at our elevator at Moosejaw. As my hon. friend knows, not only was traffic through the Panama canal' disorganized by the war, but the Panama canal itself has been closed for months on account of land slides.


William Ashbury Buchanan: Does the minister
know whether it will be possible to ship grain via the Panama canal without sacking at Vancouver?


George Eulas Foster: Of course you
can never be positive about anything until you have made the experiment, but if grain can be shipped from the Argentine to London, passing through the tropical belt without harm, I do not see why the short passage through the Panama canal should injure grain in good condition. That is the impression of some of the best grain men.


Frank Oliver: Could the minister give
me the annual consumption and production of wheat in Canada east of the Lakes?


George Eulas Foster: I have not the
figures here, but I can send my hon. friend the whole statement in print. I would refer my hon. friend to the monthly bulletin of statistics published by the department.


Frank Oliver: I do not think that the
figures I have asked for are contained in the very interesting statistics published in the bulletin.


George Eulas Foster: I suppose we can never get at the exact consumption of grain in the East or West. You have to make an estimate, and generally it is estimated that
about six bushels to the head is a generous consumption.


Frank Oliver: The situation as to general transportation seems to me to be very serious. About 42,000,000 bushels of grain has come to eastern Canadian ports. A large proportion of that will necessarily be for local consumption. If one-quarter of it was for local consumption, that would leave us with 30,000,000 bushels seeking ocean transport, and the information the minister has given to the House is to the effect that it has not been able to secure ocean transport. If that is the result of the transport business for six months, what is going to happen to us when we have to get rid of
140,000,000 bushels in the succeeding six months?


George Eulas Foster: Of course, a
great deal of the wheat that went via Fort William to Buffalo and the other lake ports, ' that is 95,000,000 bushels, has, I suppose, found its way by this time to ocean ports, and a large proportion of it probably has gone over.


John Hampden Burnham: Would the minister
express hfj opinion of what the future of agriculture with regard to the cultivation of wheat is likely to be, in view of the fact, expressed in print, as coming from those best able to judge, that last year 20 per cent more wheat was Taised in the world than was needed for consumption?


George Eulas Foster: The hon. member has put a very large question to me, but there is one method of solution; let us try, a!1 of us, to do the best we can to raise as many more mouths as possible to take care of the extra consumption.


William Ashbury Buchanan: The minister has been giving us lots of information to-night, and I would like some more before we arise. Is it the intention of the Government to establish more than one storage elevator in the province of Alberta? That is all I ask; 1 will not ask where it is to be placed.


George Eulas Foster: I will tell my hon. friend this: I have had a great number of petitions, and a good deal of correspondence, and I have .taken the position that the elevators that we have already built-at Saskatoon and Mbosejaw-in connection with the east, and the Hudson bay transfer elevator on the northern route, when it is opened, together with the terminal elevator at the head of the lakes, complete what was in our minds at the time when the policy was laid down.



Then the Calgary elevator, with the transfer elevator at Vancouver, completes that end of the policy. It was not part of that policy that we should erect interior storage elevators in the West wherever they might be useful. I know that that is quite an easy road for the man who wants storage to travel on. He says: Here is a district which has much more production than storage capacity; you have a storage elevator at Moosejaw; why do you not put a storage elevator down here. We are trying to keep on the track of linking up all the storage elevators with the transfer elevators at the ports, and along that line the policy at the present time has been carried out as far as we had anticipated. Even supposing that it was not war time, it would scarcely seem possible for us to anticipate a further expenditure of money for storage facilities, leaving that to corporate and private capital to take up. The Transcontinental railway with the Intercolonial railway having a great service, has to supply certain storage facilities, and more storage facilities are necessary in connection with that road than exist at the present time, so that there will be an extension of Government building-to what extent I do not yet know-in connection with railway transportation. But I suppose that when we cease to hope we cease to live, or to put it the other way, hope on as long a6 you live.
Progress reported.
On motion of Sir George Foster, the House adjourned at 10.07 p.m.
Monday, May 1, 1916.