1917-06-13

CENSUS OF MALE POPULATION OF CANADA BETWEEN THE AGES OF 20 AND 45.

Sir EDWARD KEMP:: I desire to lay on the Table 50 copies of a Census of the male population of Canada between the ages of 20 and 45.


Sir WILFRID LAURIER:: Might I suggest that several copies of this be printed?


Sir ROBERT BORDEN:: There is no objection to that, but I .would point out that 50 copies have already been laid on the Table.


Wilfrid Laurier: There have been a good many requests by mail for copies of this census.


Robert Laird Borden: The Minister of Militia informs me that a large number of copies in the form of those already laid on the Table will be supplied.



FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF CONFEDERATION.

Sir GEORGE FOSTER moved:: That the report of the Special Committee appointed to consider and report upon the arrangements which should be made for the celebration of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the foundation of this Dominion, presented on the 31st day of May last, be adopted, and that Rule 74 be suspended in relation thereto, and that the same be printed forthwith.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to. *

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally -are indicated by asterisks.)	'

Mr. MARTIN:: 1.	Is the Government aware as to whether or not the Labour Club of Montreal submitted to the City Council of Montreal a resolution in favour of the manufacture and sale of oleomargarine in Canada?
2.	If so, has the attention of the Government been called to the matter by the City Council of Montreal?
3.	Is it the intention of the Government to take action in this matter?


Mr. BURRELL:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Yes.
3.	Any announcement on this subject will be made in due course.


DR. J. A. MCDONALD, JR.
Mr. KYTE :: 1.	Has Dr. J. A. McDonald, Jr., of St. Peters, N.S., been in the employ of the Militia Department at any time since September 1, 1914?
2.	If so, did he hold a commission, and what rank and rate of pay did he have?,
3.	How long has he been in the service of the Department of Militia as medical officer, and what is the total amount that he is receiving for his services?
4.	If not -employed by the Militia Department at the present time, when did his services terminate?


Sir EDWARD KEMP:: 1.	No.
2,	3 and 4. Answered by No. 1.


DR. B. A. LEBLANC.
Mr. KYTE:: 1.	Has Dr. B. A. Leblanc, Arfchat, N.S., been in the employ of the Militia Department at any time since September 1, 1914?
2.	If so, did he hold any commission, and what was his rank and rate of pay?
3. How long has he been in the service of the Department of Militia as medical officer, and what is the total amount that he is receiving for his services?
4.	If not employed by the Militia Department at the present time, when did his services terminate?


Sir EDWARD KEMP:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Lieutenant, rate of pay, $3 pay of rank, 75c. field pay, $1.50 subsistence allowance.
3.	Appointed 28th February, 1917. $304.50, March 14th to May 10th, 1917. Granted leave of absence without pay from May 11th to June 1st, 1917.
4.	Answered by No. 3.


WILLIAM C. NICKERSON.
Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: 1.	Has William C. Nickerson, of Clark's Harbour, N.S., been employed by the Government of Canada in any capacity during the years 1915, 1916 and 1917?
2.	Has said William C. Nickerson been employed as special recruiting officer for the Canadian Navy or for the Dominion Overseas Forces ?
3.	If so, how long was he employed in such work, and how much was he paid for the same?
4.	Is he now in the employ of the Government?
5.	If so, in what capacity and at what salary?


Mr. HAZEN:: 1, 2 and 3. During the -winter of 1916-17 William 0. Nickerson was a member of the local committee at Clark's Harbour, acting under the Nova Scotia Provincial Naval Recruiting Committee. The members of these committees gave their services gratuitously, and a detailed record of the actual time they were engaged in recruiting work has not been kept.
4.	No.
5.	Answered by No. 4.


G AUDIO SE FAGUY.
Mr. LACHANCE:: 1.	Was Gaudiose Faguy suspended or dismissed from the Customs Office t in Quebec? If so, when?
2.	What were his duties?
3.	If dismissed, what was the reason of his dismissal?


Mr. REID:: 1.	The services of L. G. Faguy were dispensed with from March 1, 1917.
2.	Clerical service in Warehouse Ledger Keeper's office.
3.	Services dispensed with in view of his unsatisfactory services.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS.

Mr. OLIVER:: 1.	Between what points on the Canadian Northern Railway Line west of Edmonton are the rails to be taken up to be placed on the Grand Trunk Pacific Line?
2.	Between what points on the Grand Trunk Pacific Line west of Edmonton are the rails of the Grand Trunk Pacific to be replaced by rails of the Canadian Northern Railway ?


Mr. EDWARDS:: 1.	What was the total expenditure connected with agriculture by the Federal Government in each of the fiscal years from 1904-05 to 1916-17, inclusive?
2.	How much money was set apart by the Agricultural Aid Act of' 1912 to assist the Provincial Departments of Agriculture to improve and extend their work?
3.	How much of above amount was given to each province^ and what was acomplished in each province as a result of such assistance?
4.	How much money was set apart by the Federal Government under the Agricultural Instructions Act of 1913, and under the provisions of the said Act what amounts wfere respectively allotted each year to the several provinces?
5.	What is the general purpose of said Act, and to what extent has that purpose beenf made effective in each province?


Mr. EDWARDS:: How much money was given by the Federal Government in iron, steel and other bounties,

(a) previous to 1896 ; (b) from 1896 to October, 1911; and (c) from October, 1911, to March 31, 1917?


Mr. BOULAY:: 1.	How many immigrants into Canada, English or otherwise, have obtained employment in the Civil Service, inside and outside, since the 1st of July, 1914, to date?
2.	How many of them are exempt from, military service?


Mr. LACHANCE:: 1.	Who are the employees who have received increases in salary or bonus in the Customs Office at Quebec on the 1st of April, 1917, or since that date?
2.	What is the date of the appointment of each of them, the amount of their several salaries, and the date and amount of increase or bonus received by them since?


Mr. LACHANCE:: 1.	How many battalions of infantry left Canada with the First Contingent?
2.	What is the number, and what are the designations of the different units of artillery which left with the First Contingent?
3.	What is the number and the designation of the different medical corps which left Canada with the First Contingent?
4.	What is the number and the designation of all the other units which left with the First Contingent?
5.	What are the names, rank and duties of the supernumerary officers who left with the First Contingent?



FORM FOR PRESENTING PETITIONS.

Mr. SPEAKER:: The hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux) yesterday expressed a desire that I should make a statement with respect to the precise form in which petitions should he drawn, his request having particular reference to a number of documents purporting to be petitions which have recently been handed in.
While it does not seem to me essential that petitioners should use exact or uniform words, it would appear that the practice has invariably been to require substantial adherence to a form- which has long been recognized.
Bourinot, 4th Edition, at page 234, lays down the rule and provides the precedent which should be followed, the first requisite being that every petition should commence wiijh the superscription "To the Honourable The House of Commons in Parliament Assembled." Thus properly addressed and the subject-matter of the petition being in order, it would,still be irregular to receive such a document without a prayer. The practice in the British House of Commons would appear to be substantially the same. May, 11th Edition, at page 525, says: "Without a prayer, a document will not be taken as a petition; and a paper, assuming
ir

the style of a declaration, an address of thanks, or a remonstrance only, without a .proper form of prayer, will not be received."
I have examined a number of the'documents referred to by the hon. member. They are not addressed to the House either in form or in substance. The reference, if to anybody, would appear to be to the Council of the City of Montreal. They contain no prayer. It would appear, therefore, that these documents are not in form and cannot be received.


Wilfrid Laurier: The word
" prayer " has two meanings, hut I suppose in this case it means a request.


George Eulas Foster: Not the religious meaning.



THE MILITARY SERVICE ACT, 1917.


[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Robert Laird Borden: I should like to say to my right hon. friend that I propose to go pn with the Military Service Bill to-morrow unless he has some objection, which, of course, I should be glad to consider.


Wilfrid Laurier: To-morrow
will be too early for our side of the House. I was going to speak to my right hon. friend to-day about fixing a date for the second reading.


Robert Laird Borden: If my right hon. friend objects, we will not take up the Bill to-morrow, but I hope when he discusses the matter with me, the second reading will be fixed at the earliest practicable date.


Wilfrid Laurier: Hear, hear.



OVERSEAS EXPEDITIONARY FORCES.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. MACDONALD:: Will the Prime Minister be good enough to furnish the House with a statement showing the number of enlisted men who are now in France, the number in Great Britain, and the number in Canada. I mean those who are effective.


Robert Laird Borden: I am not quite sure whether it would be proper to do that, having regard to certain military considerations. I will consult the Adjutant General of the Staff and I shall give any information that may be permitted.
146t



SECOND READINGS.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 42, to amend the Chinese Immigration Act, Mr. Roche.
Bill No. 68, to amend the Civil Service Act, Sir Thomas White.

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Sir Robert Borden, the House resumed in Committee of Supply, Mr. Rainville in the Chair.
Mail subsidies and steamship subventions.- Steam service between Canadian Atlantic ports and Australia and New Zealand, $140,000.
[u"I suppose we might as well go on with Estimates tomorrow. I shall go on with my Estimates \u201e 'd some other ministers will be ready, the Minister of Agriculture probably."]
George Eulas Foster: This is in the
hands of the same company as before, the New Zealand Shipping Company.


Mr. CARROLL:: Are these contracts being carried out at present?


George Eulas Foster: Soime of them are not being carried out to the full. The difficulty of getting vessels is very great and requisitions are frequent. Therefore, sometimes a month is intermitted. We simply pay at the rate provided for each voyage which is completed under the conditions fixed.


Wilfrid Laurier: From what
port do they sail, and to what ports in Australia and New Zealand?


George Eulas Foster: From Montreal and St. John once monthly, and they have the right to touch at three or four ports in Australia before going on to New Zealand.
Ocean and mail service between Canada and Great Britain, $1,000,000.


Mr. A. K. MACLEAN:: Is there any
change in this service?


George Eulas Foster: This service is carried on as last year by the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services. They cannot give what was contracted for when we entered into the arrangement foT the renewed and strengthened service. Such vessels as are approved of, and as can be kept on the Toute under the changes constantly going on orbing to requisition are used. The vessels which have carried on the service during last year and which are relied upon at present chiefly are the Missinabie, the Pretorian, the Grampian, the Metagami, the Scandinavian, the Scotian and the Corsican. These vessels ran in speed from 14 to 15 knots. The service is conducted on a different plane from that originally designed. It is known only at the last moment that such and such a ship will sail, and the

Post Office has to pick it up, generally getting sufficient notice to enable it to forward the mails. Last year the service was performed entirely by boats of the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services, that is, by the old Allan and Canadian Pacific boats. This year, owing to the confused conditions and to the fact that two other lines have come back into the Canadian trade with good boats-the White Star Line and the Cun-ard-we pay so much a trip and take the best vessels of these three lines that offer. The White Star Company have two, the Megantic and the Canada which are very good vessels. The Cunard Company have one or two good vessels and the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services the other vessels. We pay exactly the same rate as we paid last year but on the trip or half trip basis.


Mr. LEMIEUX:: Have you, on the whole, the same quantity of tonnage as before?


George Eulas Foster: Not the same amount of tonnage as before the war but a good amount. This year we expect to get two mails each week.


Wilfrid Laurier: The ports are the same?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


William F. Carroll: Has the delivery of the mail been fairly good?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.
Steam service between Canada and Cuba, $25,000.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: Was that service performed last year?


George Eulas Foster: No, nor was it performed the year before but it has been allowed to stand because if it becomes possible to continue it, it is a good service for the Maritime Provinces.
Steam service or services between Canada and Newfoundland, $70,000.


George Eulas Foster: This is the same service as last year and at the same rate.


Wilfrid Laurier: The same company?	.


George Eulas Foster: The same company.	[DOT]


Mr. McKENZIE:: That is a broad statement-between Newfoundland and Canada? Where is that service?


George Eulas Foster: The contract for service is from Sydney to Port aux Basques, hut the same company sails additional boats from Louisburg to St. John direct. They did so last year and they intend

to do so this year. We have contracted for a daily service between Sydney and Port aux Basques connecting with the railway to St. John.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: This company do not appear to be able to perform the service between North Sydney and Port aux Basques. We excuse them because of the difficulty they have had in getting ships but I suggested to the minister that before they start a new service from Louisburg to St. Johns the department should insist upon them performing the first service. There is a railway line between Port afix Basques and ,St. Johns and if there is a good line maintained between Port aux Basques and the end of the Intercolonial railway at North Sydney there will be a good service. Before they start a new service, which is rather an unnecessary one, from Louisburg to St. John, because I do not know what particular trade they are going to get, they should improve the present service. Last year and the year before, it was not unusual to see 100, 75, or 50 cars standing on the wharf, waiting for transportation and the excuse was that they had no boats. I call this to the attention of the minister and I would suggest that he should insist upon the company doing as much as possible to supply a fairly good service between Port aux Basques and North Sydney before they try to get boats for what would appear to be an unnecessary service.


George Eulas Foster: That is entirely within the option of the company. We have no orders to give in that respect. Our contract for service is between Port aux Basques and Sydney. The vessels are not diverted from that route to the service between Placentia and Louisburg. The company have other vessels for that service. I mentioned it to show that the same company, which was performing the service between Sydney and Port aux Basques, were making occasional trips between Louisburg and Placentia. Originally the boats were excellent ones but were both taken off the route, a year and a half or two years ago. One was taken by the Allies for work in northern Russia and I think the other was sold to the same power with the consent of the Government as they se'emed to be needed by Russia. The vessels which were on a year ago and which are on now had a bigger cargo carrying capacity than the original boats. Freights are going and they go every day. Mails are being carried and they are being carried every day. The quality, appearance and passen-

ger accommodation of these boats are not quite so good as those of the boats that were previously on. For this diminution in character a reasonable deduction is made from the amount of the subsidy.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I am not suggesting that the minister should make any deductions because I believe it is very difficult for the company to get boats and the service is a very good one and is affording great facilities for trade between Newfoundland and Canada via North Sydney. The minister says the service is from Sydney. It is not from Sydney and if it is so on the books of the minister's department it is a mistake. The service is from North Sydney.


George Eulas Foster: It is from Greater Sydney.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Yes, the commercial
metropolis of Eastern Canada.


George Eulas Foster: Quite so.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: We must aim to get other facilities in connection with this trade as well as supplying the boats, or encouraging the company to supply boats. There are several other things in connection with the trade that the ministers who perhaps should look after them, are neglecting. The building of a wharf possibly belongs to the department of Public Works and taking it over and looking after it is possibly the duty of the Department of Marine and Fisheries, but to afford facilities for trade, it would seem to come under the direction of the Department of Trade and Commerce. If these other ministers should try to get clear of their responsibilities, in this matter we must look to the Minister of Trade and Commerce. At North Sydney, where connection is made by steamboat between Canada and Newfoundland and where the Intercolonial ends, tRe wharf is absolutely inadequate for the business which has to be handled there.
The buildings on this wharf come right to the edge on one side, so that there is berthing accommodation for only one steamer. A steamer lies there every day so that there is no room for fishing vessels to transfer their cargoes to the railway cars at this wharf, and they are obliged to go to a private wharf and have the fish trucked to a railway car. Then complaint is made that the railway arrangements are such that only one car can be handled at a time. We have a magnificent harbour, and it would be very easy to extend the wharf so as to
give sufficient berthing accommodation for all vessels. I brought this matter to the attention of the acting Minister of Railways last year, but nothing has been done. I know it is useless to bring it to the attention of the Minister of Marine and Fisheries as he simply collects wharfage on wharves that have been completed. I therefore urge the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster), whose duty it is to see that facilities are provided for our people to carry on trade and commerce, to urge his colleagues to provide sufficient money to make proper acommodation for the carrying on of business by our people.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I noticed the otheT day a newspaper statement that a large increase had been made in the subsidy for this steam service to Newfoundland.


George Eulas Foster: The information is not correct.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What was the subsidy paid that company five years ago compared with that paid to-day?


George Eulas Foster: The subsidy is as stated here. The vote is $70,000. Five years ago, that is 1912, we paid $31,874. In 1915 it was $48,000, and this year about the same.


Rodolphe Lemieux: So that the statement
is correct?	[DOT]


George Eulas Foster: In speaking of an increase, I thought it meant a modern increase, not one of ancient years. One very important difference is that formerly this company was paid in addition $30,000 as a postal subsidy. That is not now paid, and it is now a daily service.


William F. Carroll: Is this service to Louis-burg something new, or the occasional trips to that port during the winter months?


George Eulas Foster: I think thie is
winter's months trips.
Steam service between Canada and the West Indies or South America, or both, $34.0,666,66.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Has the minister any
figures to give us as to the treaty with the West Indies? Has there been an increase in our trade as a result of the treaty?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, I think I may say there has been a very satisfactory increase. In 1912, the value of cargoes of Canadian origin going over this line was $2,325,000. In 1914, it was $2,618,000. In
1915,	it was $3,507,000, and last year, in
1916,	it was $4,698,000. Thus, comparing

1912 and 1916, the value of Canadian cargoes has a little more than doubled. Of course, you have to take into account that prices have risen in that time, but still it shows a very gratifying increase. Then there is Some little carriage of goods of United States origin.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Is there a large increase in imports?


George Eulas Foster: The chief increase is in exports. But last year, and partly the yeaT before, there was a very large increase in imports owing to the very large amount of sugar brought in for the refineries.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What are the chief imports?


George Eulas Foster: The chief articles imported are the tropical products, sugar, coffee, eocoanut, Trinidad asphalt, oranges and bananas.


Rodolphe Lemieux: And our exports?


George Eulas Foster: Our exports run over the whole gamut of our natural products, such as fish, canned salmon, canned goods, flour, oats, vegetables, groceries, cheese, pease, live-stock, sulphate of ammonia, tea, fertilizer, lumber, laths, cordage, and a great many other articles.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Has my hon. friend any figures in regard to potatoes?


George Eulas Foster: I have not them here. I can get a statement in regard to them.


Mr. SINCLAIR:: I understand the minister to say that the value of the goods imported during the last three or four years has doubled.


George Eulas Foster: The exports have about doubled.


John Howard Sinclair: I suppose we rftay also assume that the freight collected by the steamers has doubled. I think, as a matter of fact, it has more than doubled. It would appear to an outsider, if my surmise is true, that the subsidy in this case might be reduced, because if they were able, in 1912, to carry on a successful business and pay dividends on half the trade they should he able now, as they are getting more than twice as much money, to carry on business with a less subsidy. My idea is that these subsidies 'are given for the purpose of building up a trade. [DOT] Once the trade is built up, so that it becomes self-sustaining, we should not continue paying the same amount of

subsidy. We should have a system by which the subsidy would be reduced and applied somewhere else.


George Eulas Foster: I have had a long experience in connection with the running of the service between Canadian ports and the West Indies. When I was in the ministry many, many years ago, we began this service, and I think I can safely say that no West Indian service which has ever been run between Canada 'and the West Indies has been a paying proposition. My hon. friend knows, probably better than I, the extreme difficulties of a West Indian service to be found in the character of their ports, only one or two of them allowing Vessels to get up to dock. They have a system of lighterage everywhere, and long distances between the ports, and an itinerary which takes about six weeks to make, and, in addition to all these things, we have a not over-abundant passenger list, which is, of course, the paying part in such a service. I think I can say, without any doubt, that the line which is now carrying on the service is the best that we ever had, and the service is entirely satisfactory from the point of view of what is attainable and what is advisable between our country and the West Indies. Some parties advocate a faster service, a 15, 17 or 18 knot service, mainly for passengers. Others advocate cargo boats alone. These boats in use now are a cross between the cargo boat and the passenger boat. They have excellent passenger accommodation and good cargo accommodation, and1 the two combine very well on these steamers, I think that very general satisfaction has been given by the work which is done with them. In reference to the reduction of the subsidy, we keep as close a tab as possible upon the rates, and no rates are 'raised without the authority of the department, and an investigation is always made before any advance is allowed. The expenses of steamships, as my hon. friend knows, have very greatly increased, and last year and the year before-particularly last year-the expenses were very heavily increased. There has been a very great increase in the price of coal, and on these long voyages a tremendous amount of coal is used. The size of the coal bill for these vessels is astonishing. I have tried to keep in touch with the Halifax and St. John Boards of Trade in reference to the control and regulation of the rates which have been paid, and we have always arrived, I think, at a satisfactory conclusion, after discussion, in regard to freight rates. When one thinks

of what would happen if these vessels were taken off, it makes one prize the service more. We have a pretty severe struggle to keep those vessels on the route, and within the last three or four weeks they came very close to being requisitioned, owing to the necessities of the Mother Country, but we have been able to keep them on. If they were thkem off at tfhis Ipartdcular juncture, it would practically cut off connections between Canada and the West Indies.


John Howard Sinclair: I am quite aware that
the business is abnormal just now, and that it is very difficult to find vessels to do any kind of work. I am glad to know that the minister is keeping track of the rates, and endeavouring to control them in some way, but if the minister has the information at hand, it would be interesting to the' committee to hear about the rates on some special articles, as they existed in 1912 and as they exist to-day, so that we may have some idea of the increase that has taken place.


George Eulas Foster: I have not the figures with me, but, will be very glad to secure them. My hon. friend will see, all things considered, that there has not been the increase that he might fear on the staple articles. The rates on flour and staple goods have been kept down very well. The Tates on sugar, molasses, and one or two other articles, have been increased, but they have been able to bear the increase.


John Howard Sinclair: Perhaps you can furnish us with that information. I know the rates on the tramp steamers from the West Indies on molasses and sugar have increased very much, and I should like to know how they compare with the rates on the steamers to which we are paying subsidies.


George Eulas Foster: That is a difficult question to answer, because the tramp steamer takes whatever she can get. If somebody wants a cargo, moved, and the tramp steamer is able to move it, if it is a case of necessity, almost any rate will be given. We can compare the rates on our steamers with the rates on the steamers from New York. In no case do our rates exceed-and in most cases they are lower- than the rates from New York.


Mr. MARCIL:: During the last year or
two I have heard earnest appeals from Canadians who visit the West Indies at various times and who take an interest in trade matters, who feel that the time is now
opportune to bring about reciprocity between Canada and the West Indies, as a result of the war. Has anything been done of an official character? Is the minister in a position to know if any feeling has been manifested in regard to this matter among our fellow citizens in Canada?


George Eulas Foster: That isf a kind of rapproachement.


Charles Marcil: That is the suggestion I
have read under the signature of very able correspondents in the Montreal press. Mr. Macaulay, of Montreal, thought it would be an opportune time, and I wanted to inquire if any move had been made in that regard, or if the matter is still the subject of academic discussion.


George Eulas Foster: Mr. Macaulay has written some very excellent articles, and is a very firm believer in a closer connection than a commercial connection with the West Indian islands. I have my own thoughts about that, but I have not put them before the public, because I think it is a great deal better that the West Indian islands should come to us rather than that Canada should take the position of seeking to influence sentiment in the West Indies. This much I know, that there is a growing friendly sentiment between the two countries induced by intercommunication, and a very excellent influence in that direction has been the extension of the banking facilities of Canada to the West Indian islands, and the increase of. trade and personal communication. The extension of the banks to the West Indies has been a cogent argument and a plain proof of how much export trade depends upon banking facilities which emanate from Canada as an exporting country. The lesson that has been learned from what is going on in the West Indies is a very excellent one for our exporters. I have my own opinion that in the extension of trade which is to come after this, one of the potent influences for that extension will be the influence of inter-related banking facilities. There are, of course, questions that have to be taken into consideration when any union between the West Indies and Canada is considered. Those will not be insuperable, maybe, when the proper time comes for discussing such matters.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I am glad that my hon. friend from Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil) has brought this question to the notice of the committee. For several years past I have read very able articles by Mr. Macaulay, of

the Sun Life Assurance.Company, who has long been the chief exponent of the idea of union between the West Indies and Canada. No doubt the West Indies, since the construction of the Panama canal, have become of great strategic value to the British Empire. The United States have lately acquired one of the Danish islands, which shows that they have an eye open to the business that will necessarily accrue in the future as a result of the construction of the Panama canal. There have been 4 p.m. objections raised to the scheme of bringing the West India islands into our Confederation. Some years ago, in my official capacity, I attended a conference in London, that question was discussed in my presence by two of the then members of the Campbell-Bannerman Government. One of them said en passant: "The United States Government have their colour problem; do you think that the Dominion of Canada would absorb the West Indies with the colour question looming up so seriously in the neighbouring republic?" My object in rising when I heard my hon. friend (Mr. Marcil) inquiring about the proposed union of the West Indies with Canada, was to speak of that other union scheme which I think is much more feasible and much more practical and urgent. I refer to the union of Newfoundland with Canada. I am travelling perhaps far afield from the item under discussion, but my remarks will not be lengthy. I understand that for the last four or five years the objection in Newfoundland against the idea of union with Canada has lost some of its force. We all know that the late Archbishop Howley had succeeded in influencing public opinion very largely in favour of the idea of an ultimate union between Newfoundland and Canada. Since then-and I wish to draw the attention of the minister particularly to this point-I understand that overtures have been made to Canada, and that there has been a voluminous correspondence on the subject between the present Prime Minister of Newfoundland and 'the Prime Minister of Canada. The facts were made public not long ago in the Montreal papers as a result of litigation between the owner of a certain paper and one of its former editors. There it was " alleged that negotiations had recently taken place between the Government of Canada and the Government of Newfoundland, and that the question of union between the ancient colony and the Dominion had been seriously entertained. What truth is there in those allegations or' rumours, and has a scheme of union between Newfoundland 
and Canada been contemplated by the Government?


George Eulas Foster: I think my hon. friend has, in his excursion, travelled so far away from the item under discussion that he has rather confused my tabula. I am now intent entirely on commercial ocean services, and my attention is given so completely to that, that I beg my hon. friend not to switch me off this afternoon. One remark that T made with reference to the West Indian matter to my hon. friend from Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil), I will repeat to my hon. friend, and follow it up with the simple saying that so far as Canada is concerned, with reference to Newfoundland, our latch-string is always on the outside and a light is always burning in the window.


John Howard Sinclair: Some time ago I brought to the attention of the House the fact that salt was extremely scarce for carrying on the fisheries in the Maritime Provinces. The fishermen have responded to the appeal for greater production. We have a prolific fishery and active fishermen, but it is impossible to carry on the business successfully without an ample supply of salt, and owing to the scarcity of tonnage the shortage of salt is becoming alarming. I understand that the department has taken up this question, and I should like to know whether the minister has succeeded in getting tonnage for carrying salt to Halifax and other ports in the Maritime Provinces.


George Eulas Foster: My department has been dealing with this question for about four or five months, and the result is simply this. Great difficulty is met by the fishermen themselves in getting charters for salt, but that is their matter; if they can find a tramp or some other vessel it is for them to make their own arrangements. The fishermen had recourse to the department, and conceived the idea of transports of His Majesty bringing salt in ballast from overseas to Dominion ports. The assent of the Admiralty was cheerfully given, but of course these transports are primarily for war purposes, and if salt is to be taken it must be within each reach of the route of the vessel. If that is the case, the transport will always take the salt if it can be loaded without undue delay. This has been done in the case of Newfoundland ports and others. The salt, I suppose, comes mainly from the Mediterranean, and it is vessels whose route is contiguous to Mediterranean ports that can advantageously bring this salt across. A

reasonable freight is charged, in reference to which some dickering has taken place by the fishermen; that is a matter for adjustment. At present any who require salt brought across in. these transports had better get into communication, through their agents, with the Admiralty in London, because it is impossible to fix transport sailings on this side and conduct the operations with any degree of certainty dr despatch.


John Howard Sinclair: Have the rates been
fixed by the Admiralty?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


John Howard Sinclair: What are the rates?


George Eulas Foster: I have not got
the rates. I know there has been some comment on the fact that Newfoundland has been receiving cargoes of salt while other -places could not get salt. The explanation was that the Newfoundland people paid the price, thereby avoiding delay.


John Howard Sinclair: I saw a letter from a
Halifax firm stating that some people-I do not know whether it was the Admiralty or private shipowners-were asking 40 shillings a ton for carrying the salt. That is considered an extortionate rate, and I was anxious to know whether the minister had a rate which he could make public, so that dealers might have some idea of what they would have to pay.


George Eulas Foster: I suppose the
rate would vary somewhat with the port from which the cargo was taken.


Mr. J. J. HUGHES:: The minister said that some dickering had taken place between the fishermen and some other'parties. Who were the other parties?


George Eulas Foster: The Admiralty.


James Joseph Hughes: There must be some mistake, because the fishermen themselves do not import salt.


George Eulas Foster: I meant the large companies who are importing the salt.
*Steam service between Canada and South Africa, $146,000.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Has there been any increase in the trade between the two countries during the past year?


George Eulas Foster: 
John Howard Sinclair: Have regular trips been made?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, I do not
think more than one or two trips have- been missed. The line has suffered, if you call it suffering, just as the Royal Mail Steamship Line has suffered, through having a large percentage of their vessels diverted to war purposes.
Steam service between Halifax, St. John's, Newfoundland, and- Liverpool, $20,000.


Mr. MACKENZIE:: Is this service now
being carried on?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, with the
occasional omission of a trip.


Peter H. McKenzie: Is the contract from year to year or for a number of years?


George Eulas Foster: From year to
year.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I think that by a slight diversion in the route this service could be made of much greater usefulness than it is at present. I would not ask that the .steamers call at Sydney, but they might call at Louisburg. Many passengers from Liverpool or St. Johns, Newfoundland, would land at Louisburg, or would take passage at Louisburg going the other way.


William F. Carroll: I would urge the attention of the minister to what has been said 'by my 'hon. friend (Mr. McKenzie). A considerable volume of trade could be developed if these steamers were to call at other ports, which, besides those in their present route, Louisburg has been mentioned, is an excellent harbour and open the year .around. It has splendid facilities for bunker coal, which can be got cheaper there than at any other place in the Maritime Provinces. In the island of Cape Breton we have been developing in recent years quite a commercial centre, with our

large coal fields and our great industrial concerns, such as steel works. I think the Department of Trade and Commerce, in making future steamship subsidy contracts, should bear this in mind. It has always been a matter of surprise to me that these boats did not call -at Louis'burg, if nowhere else. I do not know whether this is a Canadian Pacific Railway line or not.


George Eulas Foster: A Furness-Withy line.


William F. Carroll: I suppose that nothing can be done for the present season, but the mutter could be considered in future contracts. The change proposed will develop a trade between Newfoundland and Cape Breton, and also between the motherland and Cape Breton, which we have not at present.


George Eulas Foster: Of course, any detour which would lengthen the time of the voyage detracts by that much from the transport effectiveness of the service. This is the first time, so far as I recollect, that this matter has been brought to my attention. Nothing can be done this season, but When the service is being arranged for again the point will be borne in mind.


William F. Carroll: There would be very little detour to Louisburg.


George Eulas Foster: But longer to Sydney.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: It is -for that reason I have suggested Louisburg. Another advantage is in the coaling. At present they coal on this side at Halifax, taking coal the product of the mines in Cape Breton, which has been hauled to Halifax. There are coaling facilities at Louisburg which are so good that many ships bunker there at all seasons of the year. We have thousands of people from Great Britain, miners, who come from Scotland or England, and who go home in large numbers every year, and return again. Nothing seems to deter them from making this voyage. The fact that it is going to cost them a large sum of money does not seem to matter. They go from Sydney to New York and take the boat there. It would be * great advantage to these people, and would be the logical thing so far as the Government is concerned if they could be furnished with transportation [DOT]from their own door to the Old Country.
Winter steam service between St. John, Dublin and Belfast, $7,500.


John Howard Sinclair: How many trips do
they make?


George Eulas Foster: In 1916 they made six trips only. The usual run of trips has been from four to nine.


John Howard Sinclair: They are freight vessels?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, and carried last year upwards of over a million dollars of cargo.
Winter steam service between St. John, Halifax and London, $15,000.


William F. Carroll: Are the sailings of these boats so arranged that they do not all leave about the same time?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


Mr. PUGSLEY:: Does the minister keep any control over freight rates which are charged?.


George Eulas Foster: The department has control over the rates of every subsidized steamship line.


William Pugsley: Does it exercise that
control?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


William Pugsley: What are the rates on ordinary merchandise and lumber?


George Eulas Foster: I cannot tell my hon. friend, but I will get him the information.


William Pugsley: The reason I speak of it is that freight rates on the Atlantic route are said to have risen to enormous proportions. I would think that as the rates are so high, and as the steamships are paying extremely handsome profits, it would be much better to take a portion of these subsidies and endeavour to encourage,the coastal service between the Maritime Provinces and ports of the United States, particularly those which are capable of furnishing anthracite coal to the consumers of the Maritime Provinces. Apart altogether from the question of building ships, I suggest to my hon. friend the possibility of securing a freight steamship service, or even a service by sailing vessels, between ports in the Maritime Provinces and those of the United States which are close to the coal supply. It seems to me a most extraordinary, a most deplorable, thing that the cost of anthracite coal in St. John has reached the enormous price of $15 per ton. People are looking almost with despair to what will take place during the coming winter. It is almost impossible to get coal. Dealers decline to enter into contracts because of the impossibility of securing

transportation by water. It would almost seem to me that if the Government can not build ships for the export service, it would be worth while considering whether they might not take away a portion of the subsidies paid to some of the Atlantic steamship lines which are making enormous profits in order to encourage the establishment of a coastal steamship service for the purpose of relieving the coal situation. It is a matter of very great importance and I invite the attention of the minister to it. These are times when departures must be made from the rules which govern under normal conditions. In normal times there was an abundance of vessel accommodation available. To-day there are scarcely any available for the coastal service.


George Eulas Foster: Yes, that is very true but the other remark my hon. friend made is equally true that there is a deplorable scarcity of transport tonnage. I do not know at the present time where a single vessel can be got for a subsidy to run on these coasts. We have tried from below New York to Maine and New Brunswick. We have endeavoured to get hold of vessels and it has been impossible to do so. At the present time it is absolutely impossible because no vessels are allowed to go out. They are required on the southern waters. The colliery owners of Sydney are not taking coal to the St. Lawrence district simply because their own vessels are requisitioned and a>re being used for the war and they find it absolutely impossible to substitute other vessels for those which are requisitioned. Coal is being banked there at this time because .of the impossibility of getting tonnage to carry it. That is the result of the war and the circumstances will not, in .so far as I can see, be mitigated during this season. I think transport iwill be more and more difficult to get during this season. At the end of this season, and during next season, there will be a very considerable contribution of new tonnage which will gradually come in. But little of that will come in until the latter part of this season. The year 1918 will, I think, see a pretty large addition. The addition, is so far as freight carriage is concerned, will be measured by the overplus of the new compared with the destruction of the old.


William Pugsley: The difficulty is that the new vessels which are being built are being built largely for the Imperial Government under contract with the Imperial Munitions Board. They will be used upon the Atlantic but that will not help out the local situation. My hon. friend admits that the situation is very grave indeed. Why would it not be a good thing for the Government to engage in the building of a hundred small wooden vessels in the Maritime Provinces and in Quebec and put them on the trade routes? Let the Government control these boats and keep down the transportation rates by means of them. These small vessels, of 250 or 400 or 500 tons, could be built very quickly in the Maritime Provinces. I have scores of letters from people who say that shipyards are available, timber could be got, and men put to work. But it is said the Imperial Government does not believe in these smaller vessels, and have limited the size to 2,500 tons. All the better, let the Imperial Government go on through the Imperial Munitions Board building the larger vessels, but let the Dominion Government engage in the building of smaller vessels which apparently there will be no danger of the Imperial Government commandeering. Then they will be available for encouraging local trade. The situation, as the minister has said, is grave. I say its gravity cannot be magnified; it is very grave indeed. I believe that unless some relief is given coal will actually run to $20 a ton. See what a burden it is upon the people, upon the families of the soldiers who have gone to the front to fight the battles of the Empire. How serious will be the burden upon them and upon all classes of the community! The Government can give relief if it wants to and if it will take hold of the question in a reasonable and proper manner, as it ought to have begun to do two years ago. The Government ought to have anticipated the very condition that exists to-day. The war may run on for two or three years longer; that is the opinion of men in England and in the United States who ought to know; and are we simply to lie down and to do nothing except to deplore the situation and express the opinion that it will grow worse as the months and years go by? Surely, instead of talking about it, something practical ought to be done. If the Government took hold of the situation in a practical way, so far as the coal transportation in Canada is concerned, I believe that very satisfactory ' results could be obtained within a year. It is very late, I admit, but it is not tdo late.
In view of the conditions to which our people must look forward in the near future,
I say it will be nothing less than a crime if this Government does not take measures in the emergency which has arisen in respect

to transportation between ports in Canada, and between p.orts in the United States and in Canada.


Mr. KNOWLES:: There is a principle involved in what my hon. friend from St. John (Mr. Pugsley) has said that is more important and wider even than the geographical country of which he is speaking. I think it is an important principle which he enunciated, that these unfortunate conditions should, so far as possible, be foreseen and anticipated. It is only thus that you will provide against them in the most economic way. If the Government simply, in an easy-going way, drag along and say, We can get along this week and this month, and all through the summer without coal in the Maritime Provinces and on the prairies, it may have quite an easy existence in the interim, but the condition of affairs when the crisis really comes upon the different parts of the country will be a great deal more grave even than if it were anticipated and provided for as far as possible. We know that the Government has many pressing matters calling for its attention *which are affairs of the moment, but it is just as important that they should sit down in an intelligent way and look into the future and endeavour to solve the problems of the future by preparedness, as to think about the things that are urgent for the moment. The whole story of good legislation is the anticipation of the future and providing against its troubles. The trouble we have to-day owing to the shortage of men for overseas service might have been anticipated and prepared for, and we might have avoided the crisis that stares our nation in the face at the moment, if the Government had looked intelligently into the future and had foreseen, as they could have foreseen, what now is clear to every person. They might have foreseen it long ago.
I remember that three years ago this Government had as part of its duty the providing of seed for the western farmers. They had all winter to provide the seed, but nothing at all was done. They waited until spring came, and then they had to pay, not quite double, but nearly double what they would have had to pay if the seed had been purchased when the price was more reasonable. I think the Government then went out and bought seed at $1.50 a bushel which the homesteaders had to pay. They paid that for the very same wheat that they could have purchased some months before for less than $1 a bushel.

We have a condition of affairs in the western provinces which is more grave and vital than the condition to which my hon. friend has referred. On the prairies we have a class of people who have no other source of fuel than coal. We have been accustomed to get enormous quantities of Pennsylvania coal, and we have also received coal from the western collieries, particularly those at Lethbridge and Drumheller. As I said, the Pennsylvania coal is to be cut,off this year, and we will not have it next year at all. The best judges of the coal situation tell us that practically no Pennsylvania coal will be brought into the prairie provinces next year, and we all know that we cannot have coal in the winter from the western coal mines unless coal is mined during the spring and summer. The Government seem to be handling this question in the same easy-going manner. We have asked time and time again what has been done and what is being done in the way of anticipating what will be a crisis in this nation when there is a failure of coal supplies from the United States and the western mines to provide fuel to keep our people warm on the prairies. The matter has not yet become one of life and death, but the fact that the crisis is somewhat removed in time does not detract one iota from its certainty. So surely as time is marching on, so surely will that real, physical condition of affairs come upon us, and that grave crisis present itself when the summer is past and the months for consuming coal are really with us. We have been at the Minister of Labour for weeks and weeks to know what he is doing. We do not know whether the minister realizes the gravity of the situation or not. We very much doubt if, for a moment, he realizes its gravity in such a way as a statesman should, and I think that the hon. member for St. John (Mr. Pugsley) is doing absolutely the right thing in impressing upon the Government that it is their duty to anticipate problems and crises of this kind. The only economic way, the only statesmanlike way, of providing against these problems and crises, is to look at them in ample time and make some provision in the way-of preparedness before the crisis is really upon us. I say this with a great deal of seriousness. The condition of affairs in our western country is one that no man can contemplate without the utmost seriousness. We have had the Pennsylvania supply cut off; and in our own western coal districts, between the Minister of Labour and the operators and the Coal Miners'

Union, -there is nothing but chaos; they are doing everything but producing coal. . The minister is digging up excuses by the top, but no coal is being dug. Under these circumstances, the Government is not discharging its great duty to the people, that is to do something to prevent this very grave and vital crisis from facing us. I have known winters in the West when the Northwest Mounted Police have been scouring the prairies-we do not like to mention these things in this House-going to this shack and that shack, this district and that district, and finding men- who had suffered death because they h"d not fuel to keep themselves warm.
I speak for the homesteaders, the women and the little children on those prairies. The Minister of Labour should not merely say: " For the present there is no crisis, no one is cold; we will cross the bridge when we come to it," but I think he should, as the hon. member from St. John advocated, anticipate the future, and say that these precious days and-months shall not slip by, but that something shall be done under the circumstances, so that this impending crisis may be -averted. I speak of this -as a national affair. You cannot encourage people to continue living on those prairies in the West if you do nothing to avert a crisis such as is threatened. We want the people to stay there, develop the country and produce wealth on the unimproved prairie land. Therefore, the Government must discharge its duties and make living possible in that country. I urge the minister and the Government to anticipate these matters and address themselves to it, and no-t remain idle day after day, and say they do not know of the conditions. Apparently they have done nothing, and I think that they should, after thoughtful consideration, come to this Chamber and say they are going to do something. They cannot do much by commission. We have had commissions until we -are tired of them. A -commission was -appointed a year and a half ago to deal with the resources of Canada. They were going to knit everything together in a beautiful web, everything would work economically, and each industry would minister to the resources of the other industries. They held a few meetings, and we heard no more of them for some months. I am not hopeful of commissions. I s-ay nothing about the appointment o-f Mr. M*agrath. The hour has not come to discuss his fitness; my mind is open; I have not decided one way or -the other on that, but we cannot conclude that the responsibility is shelved, -and the Government's duty fulfilled simply because Mr. Magrath has been appointed. The House and the country should be informed as to wh-at is -being done to avert the grave condition of affairs which is threatened, and the matter is not far removed from the subject under discussion. The minister might tell us whether the appointment of Mr. Magrath is all that he purposes doing, or whether he is still going to devise something which will have practical results in saving us from the grave conditions which threaten us through shortage of fuel in the West.


Mr. CROTHERS:: I have no desire to
withhold anything from the committee which I think, in the public interest, should be divulged. My hon. friend from Moose-jaw probably appreciates the difficulty that we had to overcome in the southeasterly part of British Columbia, and the southwesterly part of Alberta. This is -not the only difficulty that has existed out there. There were serious strikes in 1903, 1906, and 1907, and a more serious one in 1909, extending over five months. Another, still more -serious, occurred in 1911, extending over eight months. * I have no desire to find any fault with my predecessor. I have no doubt he did everything he could to avert these labour disturbances in that district. We have been exceptionally successful since the autumn of 1911, till a few months ago, and had no difficulties in that district. We first made an agreement in October 1911 for some three years and four months, which continued until March, 1915, when another agreement was entered into, to continue for two years from that date. That agreement worked satisfactorily till July last. At that time the workers declared that they would not adhere to the provisions of the agreement any longer, although it would not expire till the 31st March of this year. They then demanded a war bonus of ten per cent increase over and above the provisions of the agreement of 1915. The operators, in substance, conceded that demand. It was not a flat increase of ten per cent all round, but it ran from 7J to 12 per cent, or from five to twelve and a half per cent, and the miners, under that arrangement and a sub sequent one, continued to work. The last agreement, as the former one, provided that thirty days before its expiration, the two bodies should get together, -and endeavour to negotiate an agreement, so that there would be no cessation of work when that

agreement expired. They came together in March and negotiated for seven weeks, and finally reached an agreement satisfactory to the representatives of the men and the operators, but, under the constitution of the United Mine Workers of America, no such agreement could be effective until a vote of the men themselves was taken. That vote was taken about May 5, and the men rejected the agreement that their representatives had negotiated, and quit work. We have been making every effort to secure a resumption of work in those mines. I have not gone into the details of what was done. I do not think it would be in the public interest to do so now. We are just as anxious about it as the hon. gentleman from Moosejaw is, and we are giving it very close attention. I have no doubt that whatever means may be necessary to accomplish the object, those mines will resume operation irf .a very short time. The Government prefer the owners should operate these mines under an amicable arrangement with the miners. If that cannot be done, other means will be adopted to operate the mines. I do not think it is necessary for me to give details of what is being done at the present time, but I will assure the committee that work will be resumed just as soon as possible, and I expect it will be within a very short time.


William Erskine Knowles: I expect to go to my riding in the very near future. Inasmuch as I should be informed of what has happened here, the first thing the people will ask me will be: "Did not the Minister of Labour, a number of weeks ago, say that, if the operators and tne miners did not co-operate, the Government would see that the mines were operated?" or words to that effect. I will have to answer that the minister did use words to that effect a few weeks ago. They will askWhat would the natural meaning of the words of the minister be, as understood by an impartial listener; would it not mean that matters would be remedied in much less time than has really elapsed?" We worry about the matter of time, because it is tremendously important to us, as the minister will appreciate. I accepts his statement now. There is not much trouble to-day but the time will come when it will be, not only a matter of comfort but of saving human life, and they will say: "Did not the minister give you to understand that, if the mine owners and others did not co-operate, he would do something, and was not the impression that the minister gave that that promise or statement would be carried into effect without the lapse of time which has

already occurred without considering the delay which may take place in the future."


Thomas Wilson Crothers: I will take my hon.
friend further into my confidence and give him the information which I had at that time. The president of the Mine Workers of America, which is an international labour *organization, having its headquarters at Indianapolis, sent me a message stating that he had sent to the president-of the organization in district 18 a telegram the substance of which is as follows: I have instructed the men to return to work immediately on conditions obtaining on the 31st of March last, and as soon as we get through with the convention I am attending here in Minneapolis, I will either go myself or send representatives to the district to endeavour to reach an agreement satisfactory to both parties. When I stated in the House that I expected the men to return to work within forty-eight hours, I had that telegram in my possession, and I believed the local officers would at once carry out the instructions given by the president of the organization. Within a few days the representatives of the men sent me a message giving me a copy of one which they said they had sent to the president of the organization telling him that they were going to manage the matter for themselves and that he should not interfere. That was rather a peculiar stand for the men to take. Mr. White, however, the president of the International organization, took the matter up with the local officers at each mine throughout the whole district, which is a very large one, and he endeavoured through them to have the men return to [DOT]work at once. That endeavour appears to have failed also. I received a message yesterday stating that I would have some definite information to-day, but I have not received anything yet. We are keeping *close watch on the matter, and I can only *assure my hon. friend that we are not losing sight of the importance of having coal for the farmers, for transportation purposes, and for the purpose of keeping smelters at work in order that manufacturers of muni-itions in the different factories throughout the country may continue operations. I believe that very soon work will be resumed in those mines.


George Eulas Foster: Both the Minister of Labour and the hon. member for Moosejaw are good friends of mine, and I am glad to see them occasionally, but they have come into my house and turned me out. I have let them have a period for

cavorting around and honours, I think, are now about equal, so that I suggest that we go back to the work before the committee.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Items Nos. 154 and 158
*appear to refer to competing lines which go over the same route, except that one service goes to Liverpool and the other to London. In these times of stress and strain and scarcity of money, surely one line of steamers *could do the whole work.


William Pugsley: The hon. member is confounding St. John with St. Johns.


George Eulas Foster: That is only the difference of a letter.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I may be making a
mistake, tout the service is all on the same track.


George Eulas Foster: 
Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Some economy should
find its way into this department, and if the work performed by two lines of steamers can be done by one, that should he 'brought to the attention of the minister.


George Eulas Foster: That is true, but both lines are busy.
Steam service between St. John, Halifax: and London, $25,000.


George Eulas Foster: Although the
vessels run between the same ports, they Tun on different timee, ana the two lines are doing simply what one line with double the accommodation would do.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Has there -been any change in the subsidy for the service between Canada and Newfoundland?


George Eulas Foster: No.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I understood that
some exception was taken by the department to the service rendered toy the steamships Kyle and Meagle which took the place of the steamships Bruce and Linnwood. As the boats now on the line are 5 p.m. rendering service that is not so luxurious but that seems to be satisfactory in war time, that service deserves every possible encouragement. If the minister had accepted my recommendation in regard to the 'service between Pictou and the Magdalen Islands, he would have had much better conditions there than exist now. In view of the transportation situation by sea, I hope there will toe no disposition on the part of the department to make
any conditions which will interfere with the existing service between Canada and Newfoundland, which appears to toe quite satisfactory. There is strong competition between Canada and the United States for the trade of Newfoundland. The Red Cross steamers have 'been running from Boston to St. John's, Newfoundland, and securing a great deal of traffic. The other route via North Sydney is the only method toy which Canada can trade with Newfoundland since the withdrawal of the steamers from Montreal, so that route should receive every possible consideration and encouragement. I heard incidentally there was 'some question about the subsidy of last year.


George Eulas Foster: There was a
question about the subsidy because the steamship company worked without a contract and would not come for a contract. They furnished me with no Tates, and I did not purpose to pay a subsidy until the steamship came under contract and performed a satisfactory service. In subsidized steamship services where the vessels are not so well equipped and of smaller tonnage than those which are in the contract, a reasonable adjustment is made for that deterioration. A slight adjustment was made in this case, and the matter for the last year has been settled and a contract entered into for the ensuing year.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: What is the difference


George Eulas Foster: About $5,000.
Steamship service between Canada and Australia or New Zealand or both, on Pacific ocean, $180,509.


Mr. NESBITT:: Is there any service now between St. John's and New Zealand?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Is there a service now between Canada and Australia on the Atlantic ocean?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, but the service is interrupted through vessels being requisitioned, although I do not think there have been more than one or two lapses during the year.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: We ship monthly to Australia and New Zealand, and all last winter we had to ship from New York.
. Sir GEORGE FOSTER: The vessels were overcrowded and were not able to take all the freight offering.

Steam service between Canada, China and Japan, $253,333.34.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Is this the Canadian Pacific Railway service?


George Eulas Foster: Yes. The Empress of Asia and the Empress of Russia are the two newest boats. There is also the Empress of Japan and the Monteagle.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Is the trade satisfactory between Japan and Canada?


George Eulas Foster: It is about the same as usual.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Have you exported more wheat to Japan?


George Eulas Foster: Not very much.
. Mr. LEMIEUX: How do you account for that?


George Eulas Foster: Japan is very prosperous now and rice crops abundant.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I thought our export of wheat to Japan would have increased since the exhibition at Osaka fifteen years ago.
. I remember at the time I visited Japan, bakeries were established at the different centres in order to get the people accustomed to bread. I was told that the best quality of rice was nearly all exported. Has no effort been made by the minister to increase our wheat exports to Japan?


George Eulas Foster: I cannot say that any great advance has been made in the substitution of wheat and flour for the food of the generality of the people, of Japan, though amongst certain classes there flour is being used more and more every day. They use a softer wheat than we do, and our exports have not increased very much.	.


Rodolphe Lemieux: When I was in Japan I was told that the reason why soft wheat was used was because the freight rates between Canada and Japan, were too high. The freight rates from Seattle and Oregon ports were lower than from Vancouver and Victoria.


George Eulas Foster: All the cargo
vessels running now between the United States and Japan are Japanese boats. They can be operated very cheaply, and vessel owners in the United States have been unable to compete with them.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Has there Deen any exportation of wheat to any great degree from Pacific ports?


George Eulas Foster: No. The Panama canal from which a great deal was expected, and still is expected, has not developed the through trade that was expected, owing to some difficulties in the canal itself, but more particularly owing to the war.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: There have been statements that wheat passing through the Panama canal would be in danger of fermentation. British Columbia looked forward hopefully to the development of trade on the opening of the canal. Some time ago I saw a very large elevator there which had been built for the handling of wheat, but had been very little used. Has the department considered the possibility of fermentation of wheat passing through the tropics?


George Eulas Foster: The department, of course, has no experience with wheat passing through the canal, but we do not expect any difficulty such as my hon. friend suggests. Wheat from Argentina moves through equatorial areas and reaches Britain in good shape. My own opinion is that there would be no difficulty in this respect, but the question will not be settled, I suppose, until the cargoes go through.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I am glad to hear that the minister is of that opinion; it is my own view. There should be no danger of fermentation, as wheat from the Argentine and other countries passes through the same zone and arrives in Britain in good condition.


George Eulas Foster: There is always this to be taken into account: Wheat raised in different countries, and even in different parts of the same country, varies greatly in the degree of moisture it contains. That has been exemplified in our own Northwest. About three years ago, taking up the question of the future transportation of wheat with a view to the lines which that transportation would permanently follow, I established in Winnipeg a laboratory in charge of Dr. Birchard, where experiments have been, and still are, carried on, to ascertain the moisture contents* at different seasons, of the wheat grown in different parts of the Northwest and the keeping qualities of the wheat under transit conditions. Records of these experiments are carefully kept, and so we are building up a basis for general conclusions in Tegard to *such matters as the use of the Panama canal for the transport of our wheat. As

the temperature conditions will be about the same-certainly no worse-for the Panama canal transit for our wheat and the present transit for Argentine wheat, I venture the opinion that there will be no difficulty on that account.
Steam service between Victoria and San Francisco, $3,000.
'Mr. MACDONALD: What service is this?
'Sir GEORGE FOSTER:	This is one of
the perpetual commemorations of confederation with British Columbia. We have to keep a service between San Francisco and British Columbia. Formerly that service was run at a cost of $25,000." This is not a service ypu would subsidize if you were choosing to subsidize services, and so it has been cut down to $3,000, which is the smallest amount that, with proper dignity, can preserve the memory of a great event.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Is it an American
line?


George Eulas Foster: R. P. Rithet & Co. This is a service we cannot get rid of except with the consent of British Columbia. I made a proposition to them to use the money for the British 'Columbia coast trade, but they thought it should not be changed.
Steam service from the opening- to the closing of navigation in 1917, between Gaspg Basin and Dalhousie or Campbellton.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I notice that the good
service we had in the old-days on that coast has disappeared. Last year the hon-. minister presented to that coast a steamer called the Elaine. She was a very poor boat; I think if I should call her a tub no fault could be found with the description. Moreover, instead of plying at the dates which would be reasonably expected, she only started the service on the 6th of August.
The service is required during the whole year and more especially in the spring and fall. I simply call the attention of the vigilant minister to the very poor service performed by the unfortunate Elaine, and I would expect that he would stir up the owners of the vessel to at least give the people on the coast a chance of getting their provisions and sending their produce to market.


George Eulas Foster: The reason the vessel went on at such a late period was that the old vessel disappeared qnd we came very close to having no vessel at all. In the end we got this one but she did not get on the route until late. Of course, she 147
was not paid for work she did not do. That route is one of the disappointments of our coast traffic. It is one of the finest scenic routes probably that we have in Canada in its way, running along the coast of the Baie de Chaleur for its whole distance. This used to be the only method of transit and it was well patronized. Then the railway came in and it is there now. The railway itself is not the most modern bit of machinery you could devise.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The first section but not the last.


George Eulas Foster: I have never been over it myself, I have never risked my life which is somewhat precious, but I have heard some tall stories in the past of private cars which tried to get over, the route. We are keeping up that route and I do not like to tell the committee how small is the amount of freight which is carried.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The season was short.


George Eulas Foster: The minister
is torn between conflicting emotions; one is his disinclination to abandon that route on account of its1 scenic beauties and the other is his sense of duty to the country with reference to paying out money for subsidizing that route. However, the old vessel is going on this year in gopd time and I hope she will do better than she did last year.


Rodolphe Lemieux: The minister is quite right in saying that this is one of the most beautiful sections in Canada. When the old Admiral was plying between Dalhousie and Gaspe we had, during the summer months, quite a number of American and Canadian tourists visiting the coast. Later on the people of the coast formed a syndicate, got the contract from the Government and built a boat that suited the business of the coast. The name of that boat was the Lady Eileen, but unfortunately the boat was lost in a storm somewhere near Newport Islands. Another boat was obtained but it was an old boat which had been in service around the Islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. It was a very poor substitute. So it has gone from good to bad and from bad to worse. I understand the difficulties of the minister. As he explained, during the war we cannot expect to get boats, they are not to be had, butlhope that after the war the hon. gentlemanwillseethat the service is restored to its former conditions. As regards the railway, no doubt



the construction of that road has affected the trade which formerly gave the service the bulk of its profits. But a boat is needed all the same. The first section of the railway from Paspebiac to New Carlisle was built under the hon. gentleman's regime and I agree with him when he says that there are tall stories about that bit of the railway. As regards the section from New Carlisle to Gaspe, it is in excellent condition but of course, in order to reach Gaspe, you must pass over the bad section of the road. During the last two years the company has made an effort to give the public a tairly good service. If the hon. gentleman will risk his private car next summer-


George Eulas Foster: It was not my car.


Rodolphe Lemieux: -he will certainly find no difficulty in reaching Gaspe where the people will be glad to meet him provided he does not talk politics.
Steam service between Halifax, Canso and Guysboro, $5,000.


John Howard Sinclair: Has that service been performed?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, a weekly service by the Halifax-Canso Steamship Company.
Steam service between Halifax and Newfoundland via Cape Breton ports, $10,000.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Who performs that service?


George Eulas Foster: J. A. Farquhar and Company.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Are there two boats now? There used to be the Seal and the Sable.


George Eulas Foster: Just the Seal is on the route.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: At what ports in Cape Breton does she call?


George Eulas Foster: Halifax, Sydney, North Sydney, Marble Mountain, Baddeck, Ingonish, Neil's Harbour, White Point and St. Paul's Island, and at Channel, Codroy, Sandy Point, Bay of Islands and Bonne Bay, Newfoundland; thence on the return voyage to Halifax, calling at Bay of Islands, Sandy Point, Codroy, Channel, St. Paul's Island, White Point, Neil's Harbour, Ingonish, North Sydney and Sydney.


John Howard Sinclair: These local services on the coast of Nova Scotia that connect with the railway might be improved by making them more frequent. The service between

Guysborough, Canso and Halifax carries large quantities of fish to be shipped by the Intercolonial to Montreal and western points. In this way it has become a good feeder to the Intercolonial railway.
The same is true of the Canso service, running between Guysborough and Queensport to Mulgrave, and also from Canso to Mul-grave. I pointed out to the Minister of Marine and Fishries the other day that that service, which 'has been carried on for a number -of years, has been a very profitable source of traffic to the Intercolonial. When the service was started in 1896 the amount received toy the Intercolonial for traffic at Mulgrave was $6,460. Twenty years afterwards, in 1916, the .amount received by the Intercolonial there was $90435.04. This will show the minister that this has been a splendid investment for the Government. They have been paying out some $10,000 and receiving traffic amounting to $90,000. This kind of traffic could be very much developed if facilities were afforded. The Intercolonial railway has had no enterprise during any part of its history in dealing with this question of collecting freight along the coast. The steamship lines that have been established for that purpose have been founded by private capital and assistance has been given to them toy other departments of the Government, but the Intercolonial itself has not taken the matter up and has shown a lack of enterprise in collecting traffic in that way.
The trouble with the service between Canso and Guysborough and Canso and Halifax is that the boat can call at only a few points in a distance of over one hundred miles. Much local traffic could be collected there if facilities were afforded. I refer to this in order that the minister may take it up with the Minister of Railways, and possibly work out some policy that will give the fishing interests of the Maritime Provinces an opportunity of reaching the Intercolonial and thus of developing their business.


George Eulas Foster: I quite understand that.


John Howard Sinclair: Will you do anything?


George Eulas Foster: After the war.
Steam service between Halifax and Spry Bay and ports in Cape Breton, $4,000.


Mr. KYTE:: This is the service carried on by the owners of the steamer Margaret. For many years that service was subsidized between Halifax and Spry bay, the subsidy being $2,500. This $1,500 additional, I sup-

pose, is to subsidize the service between Spry 'bay and Cape Breton.


George Eulas Foster: It runs as far as L'Ardoise. The ports of call are Halifax, Jeddore, Owl's Head, Tangier, Pope's Harbour, Ship Harbour, Sheet Harbour, Sober Island, Spry Bay, St. Peter's, Arichat, WeBt Arichat, Poulamond and L'Ardoise.


John Howard Sinclair: Port Felix is not included?


George Eulas Foster: No, I do not see it.


John Howard Sinclair: The boat passes about one hundred miles of coast there without making a call. I understood she did call at one port in Guysborough, Port Felix. I trust it has not been overlooked.


George Eulas Foster: I will inquire about that.
Steam service between Halifax, South Cape Breton and Bras d'Or Lake ports, $6,000.


William F. Carroll: What are the ports of call?


George Eulas Foster: This boat makes two round trips from Halifax to Gabarous, Louisburg, Main-a-dieu, Port Morien, Glace Bay, Sydney, North Sydney, and one trip from Halifax to G-abarous, Louisburg, Main-a-dieu, Port Morien, Glace Bay, Sydney, North Sydney, Baddeck, Grand Narrows, Iona and St. Peter's.


William F. Carroll: Who is the contractor?


George Eulas Foster: The Halifax and Glace Bay Steamship Company.


William F. Carroll: Was the service performed last year to Glace Bay?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


William F. Carroll: I was given to understand by a citizen of Glace Bay that she did not call at Glace Bay last year.


George Eulas Foster: Glace Bay is mentioned in her round. I will inquire about that.
Steam service between Halifax and West coast Cape Breton, calling at way ports $4,000.


Mt. A. W. CHISHOLM:: Where does that boat call?


George Eulas Foster: Halifax, Port
Mulgrave, Port Hastings, Port Hood, Mia-bou, Grand Etang, Cheticamp, and Eastern Harbour calling once every two weeks at Havre- au Bouche and Margaree, and calling at Inverness whenever there is -a reason-
147}
able quantity of freight or number of passengers to be landed or embarked, weather permitting.


Alexander William Chisholm: Margaree is one of the most important points on the Whole route, and why the boat should be permitted to pass Margaree and call at the other points is something I cannot understand. If the minister looks over the returns he will find there is more freight taken at Margaree than any other point, excepting, probably, Cheticamp. Its port serves a large and prosperous section of country, with a population of 8,000 souls. It is a glaring injustice and insult to the people of this section that the option of calling at the port only once in two weeks should he given to the boat authorities. Are the men who constitute thus company of more importance in the eyes of the Government than 8,000 free citizens? Does the Government prefer meeting the wishes of the steamship company than the urgent needs of the people of Margaree and surrounding country? I wrote the minister with regard to this matter. Margaree is also an important fishing station, and I should like to call the attention of the Government to the pressing need of regular boat service in view of the fact that we depend on this for all our supplies and for shipping our fish and farm produce. I also wish to impress on the minister the great need of making Margaree Island a place of call. This is an important fishing station with stormy rough coast. I would not ask them to call except When there is a necessity, but there should be some way for them to know when there was a necessity- when there was something to ship or when people desired to go aboard of the boat.


George Eulas Foster: I will look into the matter and give my hon. friend the information he desires.
Steam service between Halifax and Sherbrooke, $2,000.


John Howard Sinclair: What are the ports of call in that service?


George Eulas Foster: Halifax, Port Dufferin, Moser River, Ecum Secum, Marie Joseph, Liscom'be, Sonora and Sherbrooke


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: What is the name of the boat?


George Eulas Foster: The "Dufferin."


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: And the contractor?


George Eulas Foster: J. W. Murdock is the contractor.


Steam service from the opening to the closing of navigation in 1917 between the mainland and Magdalen Islands, $18,000.


James Joseph Hughes: The minister is
aware that this is a very poor and unsatisfactory service. The directors and managers of the steamer employed in this service openly discriminate, in their own favour, against other people doing business. The fact of the matter is that while the "Lady Sybil" was on this service, the "Amelia" was also employed at the work she is doing to-day, namely, carrying goods for her owners, the difference being that she is now being paid a subsidy by the Government. I had occasion to call the attention of the department to a glaring instance of discrimination, which took place last fall, of which I have personal knowledge. Some parties in the Magdalen islands in the fishing business

and I suppose rivals to some extent in business with the owners of this ship-bought some boat plank from the firm with which I am associated. When we were shipping this plank, the captain told us he had no room and could not take it. The owner's boat builder happened to be present, and he offered to buy the plank. Under the circumstances we were delighted to sell it, and immediately space was found for it on the steamer, and because, in doing my duty, as a member of Parliament, I drew the attention of the department to this fact and to other facts of which I was aware, these people refused to pay for the plank, and the consequence will be a lawsuit.


George Eulas Foster: You should not have complained till you got your money?


James Joseph Hughes: But, as a public man,
I had a duty to discharge.


George Eulas Foster: Duty is imperative.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What is the name of the owner of the vessel?


James Joseph Hughes: William Leslie & Co. are large owners, and Robert Leslie & Co. are part owners. Dr. Starrat is the manager representing the firm of Robert Leslie & Co. I know that parties in the Magdalen islands cannot import goods unless they have the good will of these people. They are penalized, and they have no certainty that their goods will be carried. It is an intolerable state of affairs.


Rodolphe Lemieux: What is the name of the . boat?


James Joseph Hughes: The "Amelia." Last /ear a lumber-laden steamer was wrecked in the gulf of St. Lawrence. This, boat went to the rescue, but it was after tugs powerful enough to take the disabled steamer to Halifax had arrived; the "Amelia" was doing very little work, and her services could have been dispensed with. I am informed that the manager, Dr. Starrat,. was remonstrated with for having the steamer off the route for such a length of time, and he stated that he did not care whether he received the subsidy or not, because he expected his share of the salvage would be larger than the subsidy the Government would pay. The service was interrupted for a considerable time in that way, without any necessity whatever. I called the attention of the department to this last year, and I thought possibly some reduction would be made in the subsidy, on account of the very inefficient service, and on account, particularly, of the discriminatiori against the ordinary business man, but no penalty was enforced, and they were not obliged to make any refund. Conditions this year are worse. The company appear now to realise that they can do just what they like, and yet this large subsidy is being paid. This condition of affairs is intolerable. When the contract with the Lady Sybil expired, Mr. William McLure, the owner of the ship, was willing to enteT into a new contract with the -department for a number of years, but the department refused to renew the contract for more than one year. If that be the case, it was poor business judgment on the part of the department because ships were becoming scarcer every year and it would be an advantage for the department to enter into a contract for some years. Mr. McLure, knowing that he could not get a contract for more than one year, received and accepted a good offer for his ship, and the result is the inefficient service we have today. Surely the department is not powerless; surely this company will not be allowed to do just as they please; surely the department will not pay them $18,000 a year of the public money for practically carrying their own goods and discriminating against those of nearly everyone else. It. would be almost a good thing to abolish this service, because the public are receiving no good whatever, and the company feel their position so strong that any one who calls attention to this matter is likely to be penalized. Surely the minister can do something to mitigate this crying injustice.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Last year I informed the minister that the Amelia was quite inadequate to the service and was a dangerous boat to travel on. The same boat is still on the service, and I have received from my former electors in the Magdalen islands many protests against the service. There is no space in the boat available for passengers and the boat is very filthy. The Lady Sybil was built especially for the service; she was run for a year or two by the Leslie company, and then that company thought it more advantageous to put that boat elsewhere and to put on the Amelia. Finally the Lady Sybil was sold to Mr. McLure, and she gave a most excellent service to the Magdalen islands. It would be a pity if the inhabitants of those islands, who are isolated for such a long period of the year, should suffer through the action of the department. The minister should look into the matter again and see that those people receive a better service.
At six o'clock, the committee took recess.
After Recess.
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


George Eulas Foster: If I could have lived up to the difficult task set for me this afternoon by the hon. member for Mooee-jaw, and known five years ago what was going to happen to-day, I might have made different dispositions', but that was a pretty difficult thing to do. We are in our present ooniditipn mainly for the reason that the really good boat we had, and which had been on the service for five or six years, left us. I tried to get the loan of a boat from the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, but it was impossible for him to accommodate me, and in the end the Amelia was the only boat available and I had to take her. I do not think we could have done without this service to the Magdalen Islands. The boat made 52 round trips last year and in addition to the mail carried 1,714 passengers as compared with 633 in 1915, and 6,600 tons of freight as compared with 8,400 in 1915. She was paid therefor $14,000, there being a reduction on account of services not performed. The same condition of affairs prevails this year; there is no other boat available.
With reference to what the hon. member for Prince Edward Island said, this is the first I have heard of the difficulties which occurred last year, and I shall certainly look into the matter. A steamboat owner who
is paid to perform a public service certainly should not discriminate in favour of his own business or between two persons whose freight he carries, and I should be loath to think that that had been done. But ae the hon. member has brought the matter to my attention I will make inquiries, and if the information is different from what he says I will inform him and the committee.


Rodolphe Lemieux: Would the minister instruct his inspector to see that the boat is kept in a sanitary condition? From the complaints I received last fall from a clergyman on the Islands it certainly looks as if the inspector had failed in his duties. How many times a year does the inspector look over these subsidized boats?


George Eulas Foster: He visits them all once during the season; that is the utmost he can do.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I know it is difficult to get a suitable boat for this service, but I wish the minister would make a special point of seeing that this boat is kept in a clean and sanitary condition.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Had the minister
followed my advice about this service two or three years ago we would not be in the position we are in to-day. The minister will recall that I urged the desirability of giving such a^subsidy as would secure the services of the Lady Sybil. The eastern portion of Prince Edward Island and the Magdalen Islands may be an isolated place, but they are inhabited by the very best Canadian citizens, and it is very important that a good service should be given them, ilf the Lady Sybil had been engaged all this trouble would have been avoided. There is no question about the unfitness of the Amelia for carrying passengers and performing the service generally in a proper way. I have not personal knowledge of the conditions mentioned by my hon. friend from Prince Edward Island, but I have heard rumours of complaints along the line indicated, and I think the minister should look into the matter.
Steam service between Pelee Island and the mainland, $8,000.


George Eulas Foster: This was a new boat last year.


Mr. GRAHAM:: What is the port of call on the mainland.


George Eulas Foster: The boat runs
between Kingsville, Leamington and Pelee

Island. It is the only means of communication they have.
Steam service between Petit de Grat and Intercolonial railway terminus at Mulgrave, $7,000.


George Eulas Foster: William G.
Leslie is the contractor, and the name of the boat is the Magdalen.


George William Kyte: Has any complaint reached the minister regarding the inefficiency of the service last year and the length of time the boat was laid off for repairs?


George Eulas Foster: I do not know just how long she was laid off, but it is an all-year service and the boat is allowed one month for repairs, either January ot February, I think. She must have some chance to repair.
Steam service on the Petitcodiac river between Moncton and way ports, and a port or ports on the west coast of Cumberland county, $2,500.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: How long has that
service been subsidized?


George Eulas Foster: According to the record before me, the subsidy began in 1907.


William F. Carroll: I have on several previous occasions brought to the attention of the minister a matter of importance to the county I have the honour to represent, South Cape Breton, the establishment of a steamer service on the Moira river. Year after year, petitions and other communications have been eent to the minister regarding a service on that river. On each occasion when I have brought the matter to the minister's attention he has told me that it is not the policy of the Government to subsidize steamers on inland waters. But when the Estimates come down I find such subsidies included.


George Eulas Foster: 
William F. Carroll: If it is not the policy
of the Government to do that sort of thing, these subsidies should not be allowed to survive. Moreover, at this particular stage in the history of the country I do not press the matter as I certainly did .press it in 1911, 1912, and 1913. But I am going to press it-


George Eulas Foster: After the war is
over.


William F. Carroll: Yes, after the war is
over.	[DOT]

Steam service between Pictou and Montague, calling at Murray Harbour and -Georgetown, $6,000.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Would the minister give the figures showing the trade on that route?


George Eulas Foster: According to my record the service 'began in 1907. The passengers carried in 1907 numbered 1,320 and in 1916, 1,455. The freight in 1907 was 2,464 tons, and in 1916, it was 5,468 tone. Livestock and mail make up the rest of the traffic.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: In view of the proposed car-ferry communication between Prince Edward Island and the mainland, what is proposed as to the existing route between. Pictou and Charlottetown, Pointe du Chene and Sumimereide?


George Eulas Foster: The Prince
Edward service is to be carried on by the Intercolonial railway. I have not exact information on that subject. I understand from the report of the Minister of Railways (Mr. Cochrane) and from his statements in the House, that everything is now fitted for running and that the improvements contemplated will be made before the season of navigation is over, so that this new route will be in use through the winter season. As to the concentration of the service at that point, and as to what is taking place on the old route, I am not able to give my hon. friend the information. There will be some dislocation and it may be some hardship to localities, until the trade accommodates itself to the new route. But, on the whole, the balance of advantage ought to be with the new and improved ferry route.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Do I understand the minister to say that during the present summer it is expected that the Department of Railways will manage communication with Prince Edward Island by the ferry between Cape Tormentine and Cape Traverse?


George Eulas Foster: That is what I understood.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: And the route from Summerside to Pointe du Chene, and Pictou to Charlottetown, will be done away with? Is that the hon. gentleman's impression?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, but I may be wrong.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I hope the hon. gentleman is wrong. Some department of the

Government own boats which are still fitted for service on the present route. And, as the Prince Edward Island railway is not of standard gauge, to concentrate traffic at one point by means of a car ferry seems an outrageous proposition.


George Eulas Foster: These boats may be running; I am not sure. All I know is that the railway is looking after the service.


James Joseph Hughes: The Minister of
Trade and Commerce is much more familiar with the geography of that portion of the country than is the Minister of Railways.


George Eulas Foster: Yes, I know the geography.


James Joseph Hughes: I can tell the hon. minister that it is the opinion of people in close touch with the business that goes on between Prince Edward Island and the mainland, men whose opinions are worth something, that the oar ferry, run under present conditions, that is with a narrow guage railway on Prince Edward Island, will never take care of all the traffic. Besides that, a large portion of the Island traffic is with eastern Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. To carry produce from the eastern end of Prince Edward Island by car ferry to the eastern portion of Nova Scotia is much the same in principle, though not quite in degree, as to go fr.om Ottawa to Liverpool by way of Vancouver and Montreal. If the minister can use his influence with the Minister of Railways to allow the boats to run at least this summer between Pdctou and Charlottetown and Pointe du Chene and Summer-side, until the car ferry is tested, I think that would be only reasonable.


George Eulas Foster: I shall be glad
to see my colleague on that subject.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: The Minister of Railways is a very difficult man to get anything out of. It is very difficult to find out what he is doing. He is not like the Minister of Trade and Commerce who, I am bound to say, is genial and willing to give information.


George Eulas Foster: Don't draw comparisons, please.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I hope the hon. gentleman will not be offended seeing that the comparison is favourable to him. I am going to appeal to him as an old Maritime Province man


George Eulas Foster: That is where
you hit me on a tender point.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: -to have some consideration for the situation. I do not think there is much good in our talking to the Minister of Railways. Whatever virtue there may be in the car ferry, it is only in being able to send a loaded car direct to its destination either from Prince Edward Island to the mainland or vice versa. Pending these conditions, however far in the future they may be, to divert the present boats from the route which they now cover, and concentrate all the traffic at an out-of-the-way point, compelling all the travel and all the business to seek that one Tpute, is an unwise and unnecessary thing, and ought not to be permitted. I bespeak from the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster) that he will see the Minister of Railways and urge him to permit trade and travel to continue their present course until new conditions are provided. The people of Prince Edward Island who, at one time were supposed to take some interest in the car ferry, have come to the conclusion that it will mean such a serious dislocation of their business conditions that the result will not justify the expenditure. Such a change, under the conditions which I have described, would create the greatest possible dissatisfaction in the Maritime Provinces. I am not speaking any too strongly upon this subject in pressing the matter upon the minister I bespeak his attention to the matter involving as it does the internal trade of the three Maritime Provinces. No service that the minister is providing for in his Estimates in our part of the country can compare in importance with the service to which I am referring. If the interprovincial connection between the three provinces be dislocated it will create nothing but the greatest dissatisfaction and it should not be thought of for one moment. I trust the minister will use his powerful influence to see that conditions remain as they are and that the boats which are now employed are kept in their regular positions until we can see what the future will bring forth.
Schooner service between Pictou, New Glasgow, Antigonish county ports and Mulgrave, $1,000.


Alexander William Chisholm: What is the size of that schooner?


George William Kyte: What class of vessel is subsidized by this item?


George Eulas Foster: She is a schooner with auxiliary power which was put on that serivce for the accommodation of the people

of that coast as the harbours are so shallow that a large vessel cannot get in. She gives not a very extensive but a very good service.


Alexander William Chisholm: Could I get a copy of that?


George Eulas Foster: Yes.


George William Kyte: What quantity of freight and what number of passengers did she carry last year?


George Eulas Foster: She made 26
trips, carried 253 tons of freight and received her subsidy.
Steam service from the opening- to the closing of navigation in 1917, between Pictou, Mulgrave and Cheticamp, $7,500.


Alexander William Chisholm: Has the department control over freight rates charged by these boats?


George Eulas Foster: Yes, all rates have to be submitted and no changes are made unless they are approved by the department. For a series of years the rates charged by these coast services were kept at about par. They received their subsidies and the rates were the same each year. There may have been some few changes but very few indeed. But, during the past two years there has been an almost universal pressure for some increase in the rates because coal and other costs have increased and it has been a choice between advancing the subsidies and giving a reasonable advance in the rates. The department has taken up each case, and, as well as it could, has come to its decision as to what is a reasonable advance. In some cases applications have been granted, in other cases they have not been and in still other cases the demands have been scaled down. Under present circumstances costs are higher and they have a fair claim for some increase. If there is to be an increase, we do our part by paying the subsidy and asking those who carry on the trade to take their portion of the added cost if there be any through the added rate. It is not an easy thing to do but we have to do it.


Alexander William Chisholm: I quite appreciate that. Is there any schedule in the department that one could get to show w]hat freight rates these concerns are charging?
A man in my own county, who gets considerable freight over this boat, might like to know what is regarded by the department as a reasonable charge. Could the department furnish anything in that line?


George Eulas Foster: There is a
schedule for each one of the services and we have in the department the rates that are charged every year by every one of these subsidized boats.


Alexander William Chisholm: I am in possession of a letter from an importer of hay and he tells me that the boat plying between Mulgrave and a northern port of Inverness county, Margaree, charge $3 a ton for pressed hay. That is certainly an exorbitant charge because I know that boats plying on other coasts in Cape Breton charge 65 per cent less than that.


George Eulas Foster: For a similar-distance?


Alexander William Chisholm: Yes. There have been complaints against the exorbitant charges that are being made by this boat. I do hot know whether these charges are regarded by the department as being fair or not and therefore I would like to get that schedule. It seem-s to me most unjust and unfair to burden our people with exorbitant charges in view of the very fat subsidy enjoyed by this boat. $7,500 a season the two subsidies receive by the boats which ply between Pictou and Inverness and Mulgrave and Inverness. There is another matter which I referred to last year and that is the lightering costs from steamboats at Margaree Harbour. This harbour has been scandalously neglected for the last five years. Formerly steamboats could get in and out but it is only under favourable conditions that fishing boats can get in and out now. It is only by boat that goods can be landed down there. Importers of goods are at least entitled to -some consideration in the matter of lightering goods. The Government could very well insist on the steamship company landing the goods at Margaree at their own expense. I would respectfully ask the hon. minister to look up the files in his department and he will see there that I got this arrangement made in 1911. Why was this discontinued? The importer to whom I have referred had to pay 85 cents a ton for getting that hay off the boat to the wharf. Some arrangements should be made by which the people would not be called upon to pay this extra charge in addition to the. extraordinary increase in the freight rates, particularly in view of the large subsidy received. I again bring this matter to the attention of the minister. I have brought it to his attention twice already, but it seems the desire of the steamship company is paramount in the thoughts of the Government. This company have absolutely no justification in asking the minister to permit them to increase their freight.

The country are paying them a subsidy larger than was ever thought of in the past.


George Eulas Foster: I have made a note of it.


Alexander William Chisholm: I have never heard anybody say that there were any good results from my former efforts.


George Eulas Foster: We will see what happens this time.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I did not catch the
name of the steamer performing that service.


George Eulas Foster: It is the Kinburn, owned toy Roderick McDougall.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Would it not be as well to have her go through direct from Pictou to Mulgrave? I am told that it now parallels the Intercolonial and any person going from Pictou to Mulgrave gets there more quickly toy railroad.


George Eulas Foster: There are quite
a number of routes on which the vessel parallels the railway. The trouble is that when the vessel is put on the people all want the railway and when the railway is there they want tooth the railway and the vessel.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: It is quite possible that the boat was running before the Intercolonial from Mulgrave to New Glasgow was built, and they wanted it kept on.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: The natural route
would toe direct from Pictou to Cheticamp.


Alexander William Chisholm: Since this discussion has come up, I may say that this boat has no right to go to Pictou at all if the minister had continued the service we enjoyed toefore he took charge, viz., the service of two 'boats, one from Pictou to the Inverness coast, and a second from Mulgrave to the ports of the coast. It was originally the custom to carry the trade from Port Mulgrave to the Inverness ports, making two regular trips a week. There was another boat from Pictou touching Port Hood, MaTgaree, Mahen, Grand Etang and Cheticamp, tout for some reason the subsidy was taken from the Pictou-Margaree-Cheticamp route and added to the subsidy given to the boat from Mulgrave to Port Hood, Mahen, Margaree, Grand Etang and Cheticamp and Pleasant Bay. The result is that we do not get as good service from Mulgrave on the Intercolonial to ports in Inverness as we did before, owing to the delay caused toy the boat going to Pictou.
It is impossible for one to properly give the two services. I repeat that this boat has no right to go to Pictou at all, but attend to the Mulgrave-Inverness ports. Another if smaller boat should be on the Pictou route as was there before my hon. friend took charge. The steamboat is the only service we have. We have no railway service and surely we should toe expecting improvement in this service Tather than retrogression, as. is now taking place.


George Eulas Foster: It is hard to be the arbiter between two such conflicting interests.


John Howard Sinclair: Would the minister mention the ports of call?


George Eulas Foster: 
George William Kyte: The first half dozen names are those at which the schooner calls, and the reason given by the minister for subsidizing the schooner is that the water is very shallow in these harbours. This would look like duplication.


George Eulas Foster: The schooner
calls at a number of ports that are not visited by the steamer.


Rodolphe Lemieux: As I have to leave the House in a few moments I would ask permission to make a few remarks to the committee upon Franco-Camadian trade relations. I tam aware that Canada and France have a steamer service which w.as subsidized by Canada to the extent of $200,000. Will the minister tell the committee the names of the steamers which are performing the service at the present time, and if, generally speaking, they have given satisfaction to the public? I wish to call attention to the fact that the Department of
/

Trade and Commerce, over which my hon. friend presides, should stimulate the manufacturers of Canada to endeavour to get their share of trade in the vast demand that will be made on the various manufacturers of America in the near future, in the reconstruction period into which France is now entering. I have in my hand documents which show that about 729 communes-that is, small villages and towns-have been invaded 'by the Germans. About 200 of them have been relieved since the great drives have been inaugurated by the Allied armies, and, according to the opinion expressed by a member of the French Chamber of Commerce, it is expected that, in a short time, the other communes will also be relieved, and the people of France will then realize that over 50,000 habitations have 'been actually destroyed. Apart from the sympathy which this country has in connection with the terrible disaster which the passage of the Huns in those regions caused, there is a practical view to take of the situation, when all sympathies 'have been given. France will have to reconstruct those hamlets, towns and communes, and she will have to draw on the foreign countries for the raw material. Last year I read to the House a circular which the Chamber of Commerce of Boston and the Board of Trade of New York bad jointly published broadcast in the United States, inviting all the manufacturers to look after the enormous trade which this reconstruction period in France would involve. I told my hon. friend at the time that attention should be paid to that practical side of the question, and I should like to know if anything has been done by his department in that connection. As we have a direct service between Canada and France, it seems to me that it could not be better utilized than by asking each of the manufacturers to encourage that service by the shipping of their goods to France, for the reconstruction of these communes. The trade between Canada and France, I am happy to say, has greatly increased of late years. I find that in 1912 the trade was $14,000,000 in round figures. In 1913, $18,000,000; in 1914, there was an increase of $200,000, making a total of $18,200,000. In 1915 that trade had increased to $22,847,000, and in 1916 to $41,799,951, and I have seen figures which show that up to February, 1917, our trade reached the high water mark of something like $63,000,000, or $65,000,000 for the eleven months of the current fiscal year. This means that France is an excellent client of Canada, and that we should not maintain 
that trade for war purposes only, but that we should try to capture that market for the years of reconstruction, which will come very shortly. Bight or ten years ago a committee of very distinguished Frenchmen was formed. One of the most prominent members of that committee was Monsieur Gabriel Hanotaux, former Minister of Foreign Affairs in France. He and Monsieur Ribot, the President of the Council in France, were the fathers of the alliance between Russia and France. This committee, viewing with alarm the strides made by the Germans on the various foreign markets, and the attention paid by the German traders to North and South American trade, formed an association called Franee-Amerique. It comprised all the prominent friends of the United States, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, and some other of the southern republics. They have their head office in Paris. They publish a monthly magazine called France-Ameri-que, and this review of very high order is devoted chiefly to the promotion of good fellowship between the Allied nations, and also to the development of better trade relations with these nations. This committee sent a delegation to Canada a few years ago, which visited Montreal and Quebec, after having visited the United States. On its return to Paris the committee published a little book which I hold in my hand, about the possibilities of trade between France and Canada. The contents of that book are most interesting. I ask my hon. friend to communicate with this committee in Paris, through the Commissioner for Canada in France, Monsieur Philippe Roy, and through the French Consul General in Montreal, Monsieur Bonin, who has worked so conscientiously and so unsparingly since he has been in Montreal for the enlargement of trade relations between France and Canada. Through the Comite France-AmeHque the minister will find the natural channel his department requires abroad for making known in France the resources of Canada, and at the same time he will get, through the review published by that comite, an advertisement of the greatest advantage.
On two occasions I have spoken of the project launched a year ago by a committee of French and Canadian business men for the equipment of exhibition trains, one touring the principal cities of France with the staple products of Canada, and the other touring our country from ocean to ocean with the staple products of France.

A voluminous correspondence has been exchanged between Senator Beaubien and the minister on this subject, and the minister encouraged the movement as far as it lay in his power to do so. I have the correspondence before me. I have here the answer the minister made to Senator Beaubien, and although the project for the time being fell through because of the dire necessities of war, I hope that at the earliest opportunity, this project will receive the attention of the minister. The manufacturers of Toronto and Montreal have manifested a deep interest in it. Our four railway systems, the Intercolonial, thanks to the good-will of the Minister of Railways and Canals, the Grand Trunk, the 9 p.m. Canadian Pacific and the Canadian Northern have agreed to give the trains free access over their systems. I have here the letters which have been sent to Senator Beaubien on the subject, and the following firms are willing to favour the scheme: The Desbarats Printing Company, Limited, Montreal; The Phoenix Bridge and Iron Works, Ltd., Montreal. This company understand that in the reconstruction period in France our structural steel will be sorely required by the communes which have been so heavily devastated. Then there is the Roland Paper Company, Limited, Montreal. France is already a large consumer of Canadian pulp, and we must encourage that trade as much as possible. I know a firm, the Chicoutimi Pulp and Paper -Company, which had some large contracts with the publishers of Le Petit Parisien, a paper which has a circulation of about a million a day. That journal is supplied with its paper by a Canadian firm. This is one instance; I could name others:	The Canada Linseed
Oil Mills Co., Montreal, Laurentide Company, Limited, Montreal, J. & T. Bell, Limited, Montreal, The Steel Company of Canada, Limited, Montreal, S. H. Ewing and Sons, coffees, -spices, corks, wholesale teas and general commission -merchants, Montreal, The William Rutherford and Sons Co., Ltd-., Montreal, Cluett, Peabody and Company, Inc., Montreal, Charles E. Frost & 'Company, Pharmaceutical Chemists, Montreal, The Montreal Cottons, Ltd., Valleyfield, B. J. Coghlin Company, Ltd., railway supplies, etc., Montreal.
The various boards of trade in Canada and in France have also given their support to that project. I quite agree with the minister that at present we -must abandon the idea of having an exhibition on wheels, but I hope the project will not be shelved
in the files of the department. We must, by all means, maintain the trade between France and -Canada at the figure, namely, $60,000,000, which it has reached. It would be -regrettable, indeed, if, with a treaty between France and Canada -and with a steamer service between Havre and Montreal -we should revert to the days when we hardly did any business with that magnificent country, the pride of the world. This war has awakened the sympathies and also the commercial activities of our people, -and in the years we shall have in France one of out foremost commercial Allies.


George Eulas Foster: I have listened with interest to the statement of my hon. friend. We have no subsidized -service running now between Canada and France, . nor have we had one since the first yeaT of the war. Conditions make it impossible for boats to be put on that service. There was a -statutory provision under which we paid a subsidy to the boats of the Allan line before the war commenced.
The statement that my hon. friend has made with reference to the closer acquaintanceship between France and England is very apt, and we look for results frp-m it. We do not look upon it as an acquaintanceship generated for war purposes only, and to continue only during the war. We believe that as they become better acquainted with us and with our resources, and as we become better acquainted with them and with the particular wants to which we may cater, the foundation for an expansion of trade will -be laid on a better basis than ever before. But after all, a department, ever so wide awake a department as that of Trade and Commerce, cannot go beyond a certain point. The merchants themselves, the producers and the business men, must take advantage of their opportunities and pu-sh the interchange and exchange of articles between the two countries. A very instructive letter appeared in the Bulletin a week ago from our commissioner in Paris, which I would advise my hon. friend to read if he has not already done so, as I think it struck the nail right on the head. In a word it amounted to this: there is plenty of trade in France for the future if Canadian business men will look after it, but it will not take to itself wings and fly 0-ver here; it needs the nurture and care and enterprise and activity of the men who are interested on this side of the world. The United States has awakened to great activity in thought, and in planning to cater to the wants of the reconstruction period, but in so far as France is concerned, the
COMMON^
letter goes on to say that the people of the United States have not made much more progress- than we have, and for the same reason-they have not banded themselves together to look after the possibilities of the future.	.
The $50,000,000 to $60,000,000 trade that my hon. friend has spoken of is of course only a war trade, and we shall only be laying up disappointment for ourselves if we expect that figure to be kept up after the war. It will sag, but afterwards it will rise again if we look after the .opportunities which I am sure are open to us. France will need the natural resources that we can supply, and as her Ally we shall be given a sentimental advantage in France. At the present time negotiations are proceeding for the supply of a large amount of lumber from Canada for reconstruction purposes after the war. Correspondence is taking place with my own department, and I hope it will come to much, but it will not do so unless producers on this side take advantage of their opportunities. It is true that the producers of Canada for the last three years, arid at no time more than now, have had their hands and hearts full in doing what was necessary to be done for the war, and it has been difficult-I acknowledge the difficulty-to switch them from the absolutely necessary work of the war and turn their thoughts and activities to planning for conditions after the war, but they are thinking more about it than ever before. No one knows, however, when the war will end, and no one knows what conditions will be when the war does end, and it is practically impossible for them to lay definite plans until the conditions that will prevail are more definitely known than at the present time. It is a case largely of watching and waiting, not simply waiting, but planning in- thought, if not in actual outlay and equipment, for the seeming possibilities of trade after the war.
The project of an exhibition on wheels is a lively and up-to-date project; it is a good project, but at the present time it is absolutely impossible of achievement because of transport conditions in France, and transport conditions here would not favour it. The project has to go into the category of those things that are not out of sight , simply because they are not being carried out. Here, again, we shall have to watch and wait for the proper opportunity.


Rodolphe Lemieux: In connection with the reconstruction period in France, it was suggested to the minister, I think, that a 
number of ready-built houses, such as in my younger days we used to see in Ottawa, should be exhibited in Paris. Has anything been done along that line?


George Eulas Foster: The matter was brought to my attention, -and I took it up with the department and had the woodworkers plan certain houses. After these plans were made it was thought better- and -under my advice it was done-to .send the plans to Paris to have them thoroughly looked into -and vised, as it were, by governmental authority, acting either directly or through a committee. That was done, and we received modified plans from them for two or three different styles of what we would call shacks, to be used temporarily until more permanent buildings could be erected. In every case their plan called for a more elaborate and more costly building than we had planned. Our buildings would -cost from $75 to $100, but with the improvements, coverings and the like of that, suggested toy the French authorities, they would cost considerably more. However, a number of houses were constructed and I got transport for them free of charge to Paris, where they were on exhibition in the Champs Elyse'es. I myself saw them when I was over there last summer. They had the name of Canada on them, and served to show not only our plan of construction for temporary buildings of this kind, but our materials as well, and they were seen by a great many people. [DOT] But the war has gone on much longer than anybody thought it would, and although we know now what they want and though the plans are in the hands of the woodworkers of Canada, not much is being done at present. They, too, I suppose, are awaiting the proper time. What works directly against -them is the absolute impossibility of getting transport for goods. [DOT]


Mr. CURRIE:: I think that the question of our trade with France is one of the most important subjects to be discussed in this House. The ideas that prevail in Canada as to what will be required in France after the war is over are- largely erroneous. For instance, it is expected by many that immediately after -the war we are going to be called upon to send large shipments- of lumber and ready-made houses to France. Having lived in the war zone, I have some idea of what the requirements there are likely to be; also, I am conversant with the building trade. The building material used in France is almost entirely brick. When a farmer wants brick to build a house he

simply goes into his fields, builds a kiln, and makes his brick. The lumber used for the roof consists of limbs from the trees in the fields, usually elm. The timbers for the building are the same. The flooring and roof is tile, which the farmer makes out of clay, as he does his brick. Consequently, the wood products that we shall need to send to France will be doorsr window sash and some flooring. For doors and window sash we are likely to find a ready sale. We should get patterns from France in order that we may be in a position to supply what they will require. Then there is hardware.


Rodolphe Lemieux: And structural steel-


John Allister Currie: Yes, I wish to deal with all these matters. I had these things under observation when I was there, and I think that after the war there will be a large market for builders' hardware such as locks, hinges, aiid other things, usually of a cheap kind. In France, most of these articles that have been destroyed by the Germans were made by the local blacksmiths, and we ought to be able to supply the French people With a cheaper line of articles	suitable	for	their
building purposes. As to structural material, it is to 'be assumed that after the war France will have recovered her iron and steel works, and will be able to supply for her own use large quantities of rails and of structural material. But many bridges of the old regime, stone bridges, will be replaced with 'bridges of steel, and a great deal of structural material will he used in France in that way after the war. Figures show that already a large trade has sprung up between Canada and France, and it is not altogether a war trade. Many articles of iron and steel manufactured in Canada are shipped to France, as well as certain textiles and articles of wood. The concern that has taken charge of this trade in France is the Hudson's Bay Company. That company has something like forty or fifty ships carrying goods from the United States and Canada to France. So far that company has given a preference to Canadian goods. But the United States is lending large sums of money to France, and I notice that these loans are made on condition that the purchases to be made with the money shall be confined to the United States. I have not observed that the Canadian Government is lending money and in this way promoting the purchase of goods here for France. France had already borrowed large sums in the United States, but without any string on the money, with the
result that she was able to place large orders in Canada. I know this because I know of one concern which had an order of half a million dollars from France, not of a war character, but, as I may say, of a semi-war character. But we have reached the highest point in that trade. There does not seem to be any arrangement made for the exchange, the money, to continue the purchase of these goods in Canada from now on, and those who have been manufacturing goods for France and have been looking forward to a continuance of the trade will find this business falling off within the next two or three months. The purchasing, I understand, is taken out of the hands of the parties who had it and is given to the Imperial Munitions Board, which has now virtually come under the rule of Washington, and the purchases for France must be confined to American goods. Therefore, I do not think that Canada need look for more than eight or ten millions of dollars' worth of business with France next year unless something is done. This is to 'be regretted.
I would strongly urge upon the Government the necessity of looking thoroughly into this French trade question. It is not altogether a matter of shells and munitions. It is a valuable trade and can be continued after the war if the necessary credits and exchange are provided. Therefore, those in Canada who are manufacturing for France-and I know a number of them-need not, I think, look forward to more business after the next two or three months when their present contracts expire, because they are faced with the fact that purchases made for France from now on must be made in the United States, because the money is being provided by the United States. I wonder whether the Minister of Trade and Commerce has taken this matter into consideration. If not, I would urge him to .look into it to see if *some arrangement cannot be made so that the French Government may participate in the credit here with the British Government, so that this trade, which is important, may continue not only now but after the war.
'Mr. LOGGIE:	The minister referred to
the fact that the subsidy is not used by the Allan Bine. I am sure he will recall the fact that boats of the Allan Line that loaded at Montreal did not load their full cargo for Havre but after discharging at Havre, went on to London and did not stop long at Havre because of the congestion and the difficulty of unloading cargo. Has any effort been made to procure the service in

a different way? For instance, if a monthly steamer were to start from Halifax and go via New York, or Portland, or both, having in view a full cargo for Havre, would not that meet an existing demand? I am informed that several steamers loaded partly with Canadian military stores, and also carrying commercial go.ods to some extent, went from Portland. But these sailings were known to very few of the *mercantile people. I can understand the reason for that, as these vessels were carrying military stores. But I think that in the interests of the commercial world it would be worth while for the department to find out if it would not be practicable to have two or three sailings start from Halifax calling at Portland and New York, and then to Havre with a full cargo. I am quite sure that there was not the slightest difficulty in procuring full cargoes because I know that goods were held up in New York for months last year and practically all the goods that were forwarded from the Maritime Provinces to France went by New York.
Mr.. CURRIE: Does the hon. gentleman not know that there was a ship sailing for France each day nearly all last summer?


Rodolphe Lemieux: Were they of the French line?


John Allister Currie: I do not know what the name of the company was that was operating the ships, but they sent out a ship every day from Montreal last summer.


Mr. LOGGIE:: I know that there are ships in the employ of the Government sailing from Montreal to Havre, but these ships' will not carry commercial goods.


John Allister Currie: They did.


William Stewart Loggie: Then I am wrongly advised. I would like to know to whom to apply, as I am interested in applications for tonnage. *


John Allister Currie: Why not apply to the parties who have these boats in charge? Nearly all of these ships are chartered by the Hudson's Bay Company, and if the hon. gentleman would apply for tonnage I am satisfied that they would let him have it.


William Stewart Loggie: I will be very glad to do so, and I shall certainly use the information which my hon. friend has given me.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: If it is correct.


William Stewart Loggie: Yes, if it is correct. I fancy that we will find that it has a little flaw in it when we come down to the busi-
ness end of it. But we look to the minister to keep up communication between Canada and France. The minister suggested that it was not possible after war was declared. I know his difficulties. I know there was a ship on the sea bound for Havre at the time war was declared, and that the cargo was discharged at London and held a long time there before it was sent across the channel. The sailings to France were discontinued. If the minister will have his ships fully loaded when they set out for Havre it will help to solve the trouble. The difficulty with the Allan line boats is that they have not been loaded for Havre but for London, and they have taken some cargo for Havre/ They do not want to lose time by calling at Havre. If the steamers had been fully loaded there would not have been that difficulty. I hope the minister will find some boats that will enable us to have a sailing once or twice a month during the summer with a full cargo for Havre. They have the right to call at one port after they leave Halifax, to call at New York and then to sail for France. I am not sure whether they have a right to call at Portland. If the minister will look into it I will be very much obliged.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: The statement made by the hon. member for North Simcoe (Mr. Currie) to the effect that under existing conditions the whole control of purchases for war needs in France is to be vested in our American friends is a statement of very great import. I see no reason why there should not be a conference between our Government and the French and British Governments in regard to this whole question of purchases of this character. We see French and English commissions coming to the United States, we see conferences in regard to financial matters and arrangements being made for providing food supplies of all kinds. You find a British minister stating in the Imperial House of Commons that they are relying on the United States for their food supply. Why should they not be relying on this country for their food supply in regard to production, and why should not France, as far as our industries may permit, have arrangements made so that Canada might take some part in the rebuilding of France just the same as under existing circumstances we are told the United States are to do? I hope the minister will be able to give us some assurance that a condition of that kind is not being permitted to exist and, if it does exist, steps should be taken to remedy it immediately.


William Stewart Loggie: Has the minister anything to suggest as a way out of the difficulty which we meet in sending goods to France while the war is going on? I am sure that when the war is over the matter will be adjusted but in the meantime something might be done by the Government.


George Eulas Foster: I think care ought to be taken before statements are made or criticisms are offered that the sources of information are correct. At this time there is a multiplicity of statements made as to what is going to be done iand what is being done. There is a multitude of projects sent in from various sources to the two Houses of Congress in the shape of bills but no man on earth knows what the shape of the matter will be when it gets out of Congress. I do not bestow very much time or attention upon Bills that are merely introduced into committees of the two Houses of Congress, and which are waiting for discussion and ultimate action. It is a peculiar thing that in all that has been going on since the second day of April, and in all the preparation that has been made in order to put powers into the hands of the administration of the United States, up to the present moment only three important Bills have really become law. One is the Loan Bill, another the Bill for selective conscription and the third is the one which has been passed just a day or so ago and which is known as the Espionage Bill. The name, however, does not give very much of an indication of what the Bill is. The essence of the Bill is to confer a power upon the administrative authorities to control exports from the United States, and in that way to put into their hands a power of blockade which is the most effective which can be established with reference to the Central Powers in Europe.


George Perry Graham: The powers with regard to censorship which were originally in the Bill were stricken out?


George Eulas Foster: The proposition which was made was changed in the first Bill and then the section of the first Bill which was passed was tooi wide to suit Congress and the extreme espionage provisions of the Bill were stricken out. But there are considerable powers of supervision, or of espionage as it is called, still remaining in the Bill. My hon. friend from Pictou (Mr. Macdonald) says that he has noticed that in the British House of Parliament statements are made that Britain looks to the United States for their food supply.
Statements are also made by the leader in that House that Great Britain and the Allies look to Canada as well as to the United States for their supplies. I should not like the impression to go out, and I am sure that my hon. friend would not, that the British people were saying in their Parliament that they looked to the United States foT their supplies and left Canada out.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I was speaking about understandings, following my hon. friend from Simcoe.


George Eulas Foster: There is this to he remembered: when we want to do anything here in war time we have a more speedy way of doing it. Under the War Measures Act, almost any power can be taken and can be exercised by the Government for war purposes and under war pressure. An Order in Council gives the power,'and you go on and exercise it. In the United States there is no such thing as an Order in Council or a War Measures Act. When a .state of war was declared in the United States, the President and the secretaries of the different departments had no more power in these respects and could get no more power than any outsider, and they cannot get that power until it is conferred in every separate instance and in every separate line by Acts of Congress. It is these Acts of Congress for which the Administration is waiting and has been waiting, in order to organize, the several departments of work. Take the matter of food regulation and food supplies. That bill is still before Congress. It is being debated, it has not yet been passed. It has been before Congress for ten or fourteen days. It is expected that it will be passed in a few days. When it is in so far as powers are given, then, the Administration will be able to use those powers. The French mission and the British mission visited Washington and conferences were had with the United States Administration. Lines of effort and co-operation were discussed and principles were laid down and in course of time agreed to, and they will be adhered to; but up to the present time, in most particulars, the Administration has not received the powers that are necessary to enable them to act. Cooperation between Canada and the United States, thorough co-operation between the Alliee and their commissions, and the United States, is what is being aimed at and is what I believe will be carried out.
With reference to the purchase of sup-

plies for the Allies, Canada's resources, I am quite sure, will be called upon for everything that she can possibly supply. I do not know that there is a staple food product that Canada can make or produce this year, after she has served her own people, and has a surplus, that will not be exigency required by the Allies, and every ounce of exportable wheat and flour made therefrom is required and will be asked for by the Allied powers through their buying commission. So that we are not being left out in the cold in any possible iway. Neither do I know, I have no authority for saying -if I were asked I would say exactly the opposite-that all the money which is loaned to Great Britain or to France or to the other Allies must be expended in the United States of America. There is this fact to be considered, that Britain's advance contracts made in the United States were tremendously large, -and I believe that almost every cent of the loans so far made to Great Britain has gone to pay for advances that were already made in that country. To that extent, if the purchases were in the United States and the debt was owed for them in the United States, those moneys would go, of course, to clear off that indebtedness. But I have yet to learn that there is any absolute string that is placed upon the expenditure of the money. Naturally most of it will be expended in the United States of America by the Allies v ho desire to obtain supplies.
With reference to transit from this country to France, there are not, as I have said, any subsidized services-there have not been since the war. Havre became, almost immediately after the outbreak of war, a port so congested that it was almost impossible for a merchant vessel to get any service there, and even up to the present time it is a great British seaport, and supplies and munitions and equipments fqr war flood and congest it. The Hudson Bay Company has been, and still is, the agent of France, to a large extent, in buying in this country, but the Hudson Bay Company with its ships, either owned or chartered- and there are a good many of them -has . been buying for the French Government, and it is the articles that the French Government needs that have the first place, if I am not wrongly informed, almost the. total claim upon these vessels.
I have had man after man and company after company ask my good offices to get commercial freight on the Hudson Bay Company's vessels, but I have not succeeded in doing so because the claims of the 
French Government were paramount and they had to be. In one case I did get a consignment put upon one of those boats, but it was because the French Government saw that that particular consignment was almost absolutely necessary for French agriculturists, and so they made some room on one of the vessels in order that that shipment might go forward.
Two countries like Canada and the United States, with their basic products almost the same, taking food into consideration, must act in conjunction with each other; a border line of three thousand miles, with producers and farmers on each side, has to be looked at in these matters. The consumers in the United States have just as large stomachs and just as big appetites as consumers in Canada, and it is certain that, in all the regulation of prices that may take place, the vast mass of consumers in the United States will be considered as being a very vital factor. On the other hand, production is just as necessary for the United States at this hour as it is for Canada, and if anything it is a little more necessary. Production must be looked at in the fixing of prices as well as consumption, and you must strike a happy medium which give price enough to attract productive enterprise and yet prices not unreasonable, under all the circumstances, for the consumer.
I't is absolute folly for any one of us to imagine that we can appoint a food controller, and that he can go into the market in Montreal, Toronto, or anywhere else and fix prices at his arbitrary discretion, without having regard to supply and demand and the conditions that are world-wide today. If we try to bolster ourselves up with such a remedy we shall be trusting to a quack remedy, and shall only meet with disappointment. In this world there are forces which no mayor of a city, and no man seated on a nail keg and talking to his fellows of the enormous prices that are demanded, is going to have very much influence on. The results are 'being motived by world causes, and these are* as the deep currents of the sea. Storage and speculation-are but scum and froth upon the surface, not to be allowed if they can be kept off, to be sedulously looked into, restrained and restricted; but to-day we are called upon to pay high prices because of the 'basic conditions of the times in which we live, supervening upon three years of the most disastrous and widely destructive war that history has ever recorded.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: The minister has scarcely answered the question put to him

in respect of possible sales of goods 'by-Canada to France. If I understood the question aright, it was whether in the event of Canada selling goods to France the Government had in contemplation any means of financing international transactions. The member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux) emphasized the desirability of trade between France and Canada, but the weakness of his argument was that he suggested no way by which France could pay Canada for goods purchased. The truth is that if tomorrow Canada sold to France $200,000,000 of structural steel there is no way by which France could pay for it, except by Canada, or some one on 'her behalf, making a loan to France, and paying for the commercial transaction with the proceeds of the loan. The United States is selling to France and England tremendous supplies of goods, but everybody knows that this is only possible because the United States is willing to lend, and is lending, to these countries the money with which to pay for these goods. While it is very desirable that we take advantage of the possible trade open to us in France, for instance, during the reconstruction days which are soon to come, still the wishing of it does not bring the trade. The person suggesting the proposition should propose some way of financing the transaction. It is a matter, I think, to which the Government should give some consideration. It is very desirable that we should have a share of the European trade which will be coming to this side of the Atlantic after the cessation of the war. Our factories will then have ceased their work upon, munitions and war contracts, and it would be very disastrous if our largest industries were closed down- for the want of orders. If we can bring to this country contracts from the European countries amounting to some hundreds of millions of dollars in order to keep our factories open and our labour market busy, that certainly is desirable, and I think, if possible, the Government should assist our industries to make these sales abroad. I do not know at the moment just how it could be done, because Canada perhaps could hardly afford to borrow money at the present time for such purposes, but she might do so temporarily, and she might dispose, in the United States or elsewhere, of these securities which France, or other (purchasing countries, would gladly give to the Cana. dian Government. In that way, Canadian exporters might be paid for orders which came to this side of the water from the 148
European countries. If the minister is desirous of developing this class of trade with European countries after the war, it seems to me that he must consider the question of assisting our manufacturers in arranging the financial transactions which are incident to such commercial exchange of goods. If this cannot be done, there is not much use keeping the elaborate machine going in the Department of Trade and Commerce. It may be educative, but it can bring no trade to the country. My impression is that I have seen in the press, on several occasions, the statement that the minister has had many interviews with Canadians relative to the export of their products to the Aliied countries now and after the cessation of war. I would like to inquire from him if that matter was ever placed before the manufacturers by the minister, or did they place it before him for consideration?


George Eulas Foster: I do not know that I can answer all my hon. friend's questions. When this war is over, and the exhausting processes of the war have had their effects, I do not know what will happen with regard to the purchase of new and necessary material for the reconstruction of the damaged and ravaged countries that have passed through the war. We know the course of events at the present time. The Allies, in so far as their resources and credit went, financed themselves as long as they could. They then very largely had recourse to Great Britain, and Great Britain financed them, and is helping to finance them to-day, and, on the whole, has financed them to a most tremendous extent, as my hon. friend knows. Now, the great nation which has lately gone into the war, with her resources undiminished by the ravages of war, has all the advantages which have come from business resulting from the war, and is looked to, to give credit, and she is giving credit. No one likes to say that France or Great Britain or Italy is exhausted. Those countries are not exhausted, but they have gone through a tremendous process of exhaustion during the three years of the war, and financially they are in a very tense state of strain. What will happen after the United States has given its loans to the aid of the Allies to the extent that it can, and after the war has been finished and after the reconstruction takes place and new material has to 'be secured, is a problem most difficult of solution. One thing of two and, maybe, two things will take place.



first that, instead of reconstruction going ahead at a bounding pace after the war ceases, it may have, by sheer necessity, to go ahead at a very moderate rate, and people will probably have to live for many years in less comfort and with fewer appliances and equipments than they had before; secondly, that the actual necessities in some way or another must be had, and the Government and financial institutions will have to come to the rescue in so far as these necessaries must *be bought. Take Canada at the present time, and to turn to the *question of my hon. friend (Mr. A. K. Maclean): is there any way by which Canada can finance the producing interests of the country, manufacturers, for instance, in order to enable them to finance Allied countries which are not able to meet the payments at present? My hon. friend has to take into account that money markets are pretty well closed to Canada at the present time. She cannot make loans in Great Britain; on the contrary she has advanced many millions of dollars to finance orders that Great Britain has placed in this country, but there is a limit to Canada's capability for doing that for what is sold to Great Britain or to France, because Canada has to take up and to take that burden almost entirely upon heT own shoulders from this time on, however long or short the war may be. That makes it difficult for the Government to arrange financial strength in order to protect large sales to be made to Allied countries and payments to be made to manufacturers without their having to wait a long time for them. The banks do their share in that respect, and they must be relied upon with their combinations to bear a large share of the burden. It depends on how far the banks can go along that line.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: It would be well to have some experts study the matter so as to anticipate the future.


George Eulas Foster: My hon. friend can rest assured that these matters have been and are being studied. It is easy to study them; it is much more difficult to find a solution.


John Allister Currie: The vital point that I
raised has not .been answered; that is to say, that orders that are placed now upon this money that is being borrowed by France in the United States, must be .placed in the United States. I know for a fact that many orders in this country for France and Great Britain are being held up on that account. Of all the business that we have done with

Great Britain and France in respect to the war-and according to our returns we have turned out millions of dollars worth of munitions-fully two-thirds of the money went to the United States for the raw material. Fully two-thirds of the steel and copper that has been sold to the Allies by Canada, has come from the United States, and Canada's money has paid for that. Therefore, when the United States trade papers all announce distinctly that every dollar of this loan that the Allies are getting from the United States, must be spent in the United States, that is an unfriendly act, and this 'Government should take steps to ascertain whether it is true, because we are just as much entitled to some business from that money as is the United States. It should be a free loan.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: It is the money of the United States.


John Allister Currie: The United States lends
that money on the understanding that it must be spent in the United States and not in Canada, nor in the Argentine Republic.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: It was borrowed on that condition.


John Allister Currie: 
Daniel Duncan McKenzie: We have had a very great deal of theory and cloud navigation for the last hour or so, and perhaps we had better come down to earth again.


George Eulas Foster: Perhaps we had better come hack to the Estimates.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I do not want the line to be drawn the moment I have something to say. The minister was the worst sinner of all. He went careering all over the country, .and I must ask him to permit me to do a little careering. The hon. member for Simcoe has brought out a point which ' is rather against the minister. In his judgment the minister is a man full of capacity and ability, but he will not do anything. Now, there is some excuse for a man not doing anything who has no ability, but no excuse at all for a man at the head of a department who has, as the hon. member say3, both ability and capacity. I was very glad to read the Order in Council that the minister laid on the Table yesterday; that was a practical step. The Order in Council says that Mr. Magrath is to be fuel controller. That has a very restricted meaning. By fuel we usually understand fire wood, or what is used for domestic purposes, but the Order in Council is much more comprehensive in its scope. It deals with power of every kind that is produced from steam or coal, as well as with domestic fuel. I notice that some months ago the minister called before him the coal managers of the different parts of Canada, particularly of the Maritime Provinces, and he has the advantage of the knowledge he gained in that way. I come from a very large coal centre and know something about coal mining, and about what a mine may ordinarily be supposed to produce. A manager may say that such an amount is the full capacity of his mine, (but if you can show him where he is going to make money he will produce more. If the minister would give the coal companies of Canada, and of Nova Scotia particularly, a fixed price for every pound of coal they produce up to their utmost capacity the mines of Nova



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Scotia would be producing four million instead of three million tons a year, and so on throughout the country. The Government would be taking no risk, because every pound of coal they bought they could readily dispose of. But the great thing is to hold out to the coal companies an inducement to produce an article for which there is the greatest possible demand, and for which there will be the greatest possible necessity. Bather than find fault with the minister for this appointment, I think the task he has imposed on Mr. Magrath is too much for any one man; he has more than he can accomplish. The fuel controller should not ask the coal managers, how much coal have you in your bank? How much did you produce yesterday, and how much will you produce tomorrow? He should be empowered by the minister to say to them, "Produce as much as you like. We will give you a fixed price for every pound you produce." The minister should adopt a policy similar to that followed by the Government at the inception of the munitions industry, when the manufacturers were told to produce as much as they liked, and would be given a fixed price for a certain number of years which would cover the cost of their plant and allow a very substantial profit besides. The minister need not be afraid that he will have coal on his hands because he will be taking gold out of the ground. I again want to impress upon him the necessity of holding out inducements to the large coal companies to produce to their utmost capacity. In the Order in Council it is stated that only 200,000 tons of coal could be got in Nova Scotia to meet the demands of Montreal and other places. That is mere folly. It is ridiculous to mention such a figure as 200,000 tons in connection with the tremendous coal mines in the Island of Cape Breton and Pictou, particularly in the Island of Cape Breton. I can assure the minister that if he will hold out such an inducement of this kind, the coal companies will have no difficulty in providing all the coal he wants.
William Stewart Loggie: Referring to item 183, at what points does the steamer call?


George Eulas Foster: At Chatham, lower Newcastle, Loggieville, Oak Point, [DOT]Church Point, Escuminae, Neguac, and Mills Point Wharf on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and at Chatham, Lower Newcastle, Loggieville, Oak Point, Baie-du-Tin, Church Point and Neguac on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

Steam service .between Riviere du Loup, Tadoussac and other north shore ports, $6,000.
Winter steam service between Riviere du Loup, Tadoussac and other St. Lawrence ports, $8,0-00.
Winter steam service between St. Catherines Bay and Tadoussac, $3,500.


Mt. GAUVREAU:: It has always been
hard for me to understand why the Minister of Trade and Commerce was so quick to listen to politicians when he entered into that last contract for winter and summer navigation between Riviere du Loup, Tadoussac, and North shore. Perhaps he is not aware that the Trans-St. Laurent Navigation Company, of Fraserville, was really the pioneer of winter navigation, on the lower St. Lawrence. If he comes to Riviere du Loup, where he will be well received, he will find that a little boat called the Mahone has done a really great service on the St. Lawrence, especially in its winter trips made to Seven islands for the relief of the people there. I thought at the time that, in view of what this company had done, it would be better treated by the department and by the minister. But, unfortunately, .politics carried weight, even in so serious a matter as this. In 1912, Mr. Berube was elected to the local legislature for Temiscouata, and he happens to be a Conservative. Being unfriendly to the management of the company, he started at once to oppose it. Then there was the hon. member for Chicoutimi and Saguenay (Mr. Girard) a Conservative member on the North shore. With these two warring against it, it is no wonder that the poor company was killed. The contract with that company was cancelled and a contract was made with the Quebec and Levis Ferry Boat Company. At the time I warned the Minister of Marine and Fisheries (Mr. Hazen) that the boat they proposed to use, which had been built principally for the ferry crossing between Quebec and Levis, could never stand the strain of the trip between Riviere du Loup and Tadoussac and the North shore. I never thought that this would be so quickly proven. But in the winter of 1915, the boat went op a rock on Red Island at the mouth of the Saguenay Tiver. She was a total loss, and if there were no lives lost it is due to the fact that this little boat, the Mahone, went to the rescue and rendered good service. The contractors then sent out the Queen, and two months afterwards she was sunk in St. Catherines Bay, on the north shore. This is what happened to the company that stepped into the place of the Trans-St. Laurent Navigation Company, of Fraser-

ville. I think the minister realizes that if there is a place below Quebec where we need steamer communication it is between Tadoussac and Riviere du Loup. I believe the amount appropriated is sufficient for ordinary circumstances-these three services represent a total of $17,500. But since these two boats disappeared we have been without means of crossing. Tenders were called for, and I believe that the Trans-St. Laurent Navigation Company sent in tenders. But, if I am well informed, their tender was higher than the amount placed in the Estimates. This, no doubt, accounted for the refusal of the minister to give the contract. At present we have no service at all. I hope that the minister will try to arrange that, even if a larger sum is necessary, the tender of the Trans-St. Laurent Navigation Company shall foe accepted and their boat may foe placed on the line.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: How long did they have the contract?


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: For many years, up to 1914 I think. Perhaps the minister may say that the boat is too small, or that she has been condemned. That may be true so far as the winter traffic is concerned. But he will see by the report of the commissioner who was sent down there that the boat could have been allowed to make trips in the winter, carrying freight only and no passengers. If I am well informed there is a man who wishes to place a gasoline launch on this route between Riviere du Loup and Tadoussac. I do not know what kind of a boat it is, nor what is its capacity, but I am told that this man, Mr. Lajoie, of Chicoutimi, is recommended by the hon. member for Chicoutimi and Saguenay. Well, even a small boat would be better than none, and I hope that the minister will find a way to give us a service between Riviere du Loup and Tadoussac, first in the summer, and then in the winter time.


George Eulas Foster: I am not thoroughly clear in my own mind with regard to the steps that have been taken in this matter, but my impression is that the vessel that was there was condemned and consequently we were unable to employ her. We require a certificated vessel. Then came the difficulty of getting another vessel.


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: The boat was not condemned as a freighter, but it was condemned under the pretext that it was not safe for passengers. You can employ a boat as a freighter without allowing passengers to go on board.


George Eulas Foster: Yes, but we subsidize for both freight and passengers, and as it was impossible for them to carry passengers because of the condemnation, we did not feel that we could subsidize the boat. There has always been the difficulty of the exceedingly small amount of freight to be carried. Take, for instance, the route between Rivifere du Loup, Tadoussac and St. Lawrence ports, for which there was $8,000 subsidy. The number of trips made in 1916 was 29, and the amount of freight carried was 42 tons. That was about one and a half tons per trip. It is a very small amount, of tons per trip. It is very small amount of pay for it. You could buy that tonnage over and over again for $8,000, and if the boat could not carry passengers it seemed too much to pay. We asked for tenders, but the tenders were still higher, and in some cases it became impossible to get a boat. I will look into it and read the remarks that my hon. friend has made.


James Joseph Hughes: The minister says that he could not subsidize a boat condemned as far as the passenger service is. concerned. I am informed that the steamer Amelia, plying between the mainland and the Magdalen islands, was condemned last fall as a passenger steamer.
Sir -GEORGE FOSTER: No, she has a certificate and always has had. She would not be allowed to run without a certificate.


James Joseph Hughes: Would the minister go back to item No. 191:
Steam service between Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton and Newfoundland, $16,500.
How often will the trips be made, and at what ports in Prince Edward Island will the boats call?


George Eulas Foster: I think it is the same as last year:
Regular sailings every fortnight between Summerside, P.E.I., and St. Johns, Nfld., calling each way at Charlottetown, P.E.I., at Sydney, N.S., and, if so required by the minister, calling on outward voyages only at Souris, P.E.I., and North Sydney, N.S.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: What is the name of the boat?


George Eulas Foster: The Sable Island.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I have had complaints from my town about that boat because when going to Sydney she passes our port and does not call. If she had to go farther to call there might be some excuse for it, but in going in and coming out she has to pass North Sydney and if she brings freight

for North Sydney she leaves it at Sydney and it has to be reshipped to North Sydney. Some arrangement should be made by which this boat would regularly call at North Sydney.
Progress reported.
On the motion of Sir George Foster for the adjournment of the House:


George Perry Graham: What business will be taken up to-morrow?


George Eulas Foster: I do not know what arrangement has been made by the Prime Minister and the leader of the Opposition as to the Military Service Bill.


George Perry Graham: I think it is not coming up until next week.


George Eulas Foster: Not to-morrow?


George Perry Graham: Not to-morrow.


George Eulas Foster: 

CONDUCT OF THE WAR.


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Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM: I wish to notify the Government that at an appropriate time I will move the following or a similar resolution:
That in the opinion of this House it is desirable that steps should be taken forthwith by the Government to provide that accumulated wealth should contribute immediately and effectively to the cost of the war, and that all agricultural, industrial, transportation and natural resources of Canada should be organized forthwith so as to ensure the greatest possible assistance to the Empire in the war and to reduce the cost of living to the Canad dian people.
George Eulas Foster: Will that opportune time probably be to-morrow?


George Perry Graham: No.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.35 p.m. Wednesday.
Thursday, June 14, 1917.