1917-07-18

QUESTIONS.

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

Mr. KAY:: 1.	Has the Government come to any decision as to the number of secretaries, assistants: or office employees which will be required in the office of the Food Controller?
2.	Have any appointments been made?
3.	If so. what are the names of the persons appointed?
4.	What salary is paid to each?


Mr. HUGH CLARK:: 1.	No.
2.	Yes.
3.	S. E. Toidd, B.S.A., W. A. Willison, and F. W. French.
4.	S. E. Todd, $4,500 per annum; W. A. Willison, $4,500 per annum; F. W. French, $250 per month, and living expenses, not to exceed $100 per month.


MATHESON POST OFFICE.
*Mr. McKENZIE:: 1.	Was the post office removed from the residence of John Matheson, blacksmith, of Matheson, C.B., to that of Murdock McLeod?
2.	If so, for what reason was the change made?
3.	How long has said John Matheson been Postmaster?
4.	What was the distance between the office held by John Matheson and the nearest offices on either side?
5.	What is the distance between the same office now at Murdock McLeod's and the offices on either side of it?
6.	What is the distance between John Matheson's house, where the office was formerly, and Murdock McLeod's house, where the office is now?
7.	Was there any petition or any other request or demand of a public nature asking for the changing of the above office?


Mr. DOHERTY:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Inconvenient location of the post office.
3.	From 1876 to 1st June, 1917.
4.	Less tlhan a mile from Little Narrows and about three and a half miles from Why-coeomagh portage.
5.	Nearly two miles from Little Narrows and about two and a half miles from Whycoeomagh portage.
6.	About a mile.
7.	Letters were received by the department from people representing the inconvenient site of the post office and that the change should be made in the interest of the proper distribution of the mails.
[*Sir Robert Borden.]


POINT TUPPER MAIL SERVICE.
Mr. KYTE :: '
1.	Who has the present contract for carrying the mails between the post office and the I.C.R. train at Point Tupper, N.S.?
2.	When was the present contract entered into, and what is the amount paid annually to the contractor for such service?
3.	Who was the previous contractor, and what
was the amount which he received for such service ?	[DOT]
4.	Were tenders called for the service previous
to awarding present contract?	[DOT]


Mr. DOHERTY:: 1.	Roderick Dumpily.
2.	1st July, 1917, $150.
3.	Joseph McDonald, $50.
4.	Yes. The young man who was performing this contract made arrangements with a man named Henessey to perform the contract during his absence, ias he had to leave the locality, inasmuch as he was going to attend college at Antigonisih. After commencing .attendance at college the man whom he had employed to perform tihe service was taken ill, and the young man stated was unlikely to recover, .and as no person else could be obtained to carry on the service, he iasked that he be relieved from it so ias not to interfere with his college course. The contractor was therefore liberated, public tendeis invited and the contract awarded to the lowest tenderer. The department was more willing to release him inasmuch as it was felt that he had taken the contract at a price below what it could be performed for.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN.

Mr. KYTE:: 1.	What is the number of officers who have been in England nine months or more and who have not been to France?
2.	How many went to England with the 1st contingent who have not yet been in active service in France or elsewhere?
3.	What is the number of (a) officers, (b) non-commissioned officers and men who have been discharged to Canada and who have not been in active service in France or elsewhere?
4.	What is the number of officers who are holding- permanent appointments in England who have not been in active service in France or elsewhere?
5.	How many officers went to England with the 1st contingent who were not attached to any unit, and who subsequently returned to Canada without being in active service in France?
6.	What pay and allowances were paid to these officers, and what is the estimated cost of subsistence and transportation to the time they resigned in Canada or received other appointments?
7.	Has separation allowance been paid to persons who were not entitled to receive the same?

8.	If so, to what amount, and have such payments been cancelled?



UNOPPOSED MOTIONS FOR PAPERS.

Mr. BOULAY:: For a return giving a list of the different Commissions created since the beginning of the war, concerning the soldiers, their pensions, hospitals, etc., showing the names of the various Commissioners who have comprised said Commissions.


Mr. McKENZIE:: For a copy of all correspondence between the Post Office Department, or any officer thereof, and any person whatsoever in reference to the removal of the post office from the residence of John Matheson, blacksmith, Matheson, C.B., to the residence of Murdock McLeod of the same place, and the dismissal of the tormer Postmaster, John Matheson.



MOBILIZATION SCHEME.

[Stage Direction]
On the notice of motion:
Mr. MURPHY:: For a copy of the mobilization scheme for the Canadian Forces compiled (or published) in the year 1913.


Sir EDWARD KEMP:: I would like the member for Russell (Mr. Murphy) to be good enough to let this motion drop. In this country, as in other countries, it has not ibeen deemed advisable to make tnobiliz-ation schemas public.


Charles Murphy: Dropped.
Motion dropped.



' DAYLIGHT SAVING.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. BOIVIN:: The Daylight Saving Bill has been awaiting its second reading since June 15. I have just received a personal letter from a prominent employee of the Grand Trunk Railway company, part of which reads:
May I also ask if the Government will do anything with the Daylight Saving Bill? If it is brought in for Canada and not for the United States, it will, of course, quite considerably affect train schedules. I would like to be informed thereon as far in advance as possible, as we are quite seriously interested.
May I ask the Minister of Trade and Commerce if it is the intention of the Government to put this Bill through during the present session? If so, in view of the fact that the summer season is quite far advanced, will the proclamation bringing the Act into operation be issued this year, or will it he held over until next season?


Sir GEORGE FOSTER:: That is a matter for the House to decide. I intend to introduce the Bill at the first convenient opportunity and to make a full explanation of it. Undoubtedly a large part of the season has passed during which a daylight saving measure would be useful. In the United States a similar measure has passed through the Senate and will come into operation next year. It may be advisable for us to take up the discussion of the Bill with a view of keeping in line with the course followed by the United States.



CIVIL SERVICE INSURANCE.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Hon. RODOLPHE LEMIEUX:: Since the Military Service Bill came before the House I have received several letters from young men who are liable to be called upon for military service, inquiring whether the Government intends to amend the Insurance Act with a' view to fixing a maximum amount of premium, covering war risk, payable on their policies. The insurance companies, as my hon. friend knows, charge a higher premium for war risks. There is a feeling among these young men that when they are called they will be unable to keep up their insurance policies because of the extra premium. I would ask the Prime Minister-I do not see the Minister of Finance in his seat-to consider this- matter. When the Bill is before the House for third reading, I intend to bring the matter up again.	.


Sir ROBERT BORDEN:: I shall direct the attention of the Minister of Finance to what my hon. friend has said. I am not sure that the matter has not already been under his consideration.



FORBIDDEN CIRCULATION IN CANADA.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Hon. FRANK OLIVER:: I have here a book called "The Fiddlers" by Arthur Mee. It was sent to me through the mails; I believe that copies have been received by a number of other members of Parliament. As I heard some question about this matter I looked up the Canada Gazette of Saturday, July 14, and on page 104 found the following:
Censorship Notice.
Consolidated Orders Respecting Censorship.
Department of the Secretary of State of Canada,
Ottawa, 11th July, 1917.
Notice is hereby given that, in pursuance of the Consolidated Orders respecting Censor-


ship, dated the 17th day of January, 1917, passed under the provisions of section 6, of the War Measures Act, 1914, a hook entitled "The Fiddlers," by Arthur Mee, published by Morgan & Scott, Limited, 12 Paternoster Buildings, England, has been declared by the Secretary of State of Canada, to contain objectionable matter as defined by the Consolidated Orders respecting Censorship, and that the possession within Canada of any issue or copy of the said "The Fiddlers," whether heretofore or hereafter published, has been prohibited by a "Warrant of the Secretary of State of Canada, dated the 12th July, 1917, and that, as provided by paragraph 3 (1) of Order 111 of the said Consolidated Orders respecting Censorship, any person guilty of an offence against the said Orders shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding five thousand dollars or imprisonment for any term not exceeding five years, or to both such fine and such imprisonment.
Thomas Mulvey, Under-Secretary of State.


Mr. PUGSLEY:: And you have a copy there?


Frank Oliver: I have the book and I have read it in part. It is a powerful arraignment of the liquor traffic in the United Kingdom. I have read the order in council of Wednesday, the 17th of January, 1917, consolidating orders respecting censorship, and I desire to ask the Government under what paragraph of these consolidated orders this notice has been issued, and in respect of what portion of the matter contained in this book?


Robert Laird Borden: I am afraid that I am in the same unfortunate position under the law as my hon. friend, because a copy of the book has also been sent to me. Possibly I may have shifted the responsibility, as I handed over my copy to one of the officers of the department to peruse until I should have an opportunity of doing so myself. The prohibition of the book did not come to my notice until a copy of it was sent to' me, inviting me to peruse it and see whether there was any good reason why it should be prohibited.
I shall make inquiries as to the matter about which my hon. friend asks for information, and let him know the result at a later date.


Frank Oliver: May I ask that the Secretary of State be instructed to suspend proceedings against members of this House until the Prime Minister has reached a conclusion in the matter?


Robert Laird Borden: I am very much interested in that request myself.



EXTENSION OF THE TERM OF PARLIAMENT.


[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Right Hon.   S@: With reference to the resolution for an extension of the parliamentary term, which was under debate yesterday and was voted on last night, hon. gentlemen will have observed that I did not make any motion that the resolution should be sent with a message to the Senate for the purpose of securing concurrent action there. My failure to take that course was due to the reason which I set forth when moving the resolution. I then declared that I did not think it should be acted upon unless there was unanimity or practical unanimity in the House with regard to it. The result of the vote upon the resolution showed something very far short of either unanimity or practical unanimity, for the vote stood 82 in support of the resolution and 62 against. Under the circumstances, therefore, and having regard to the course which I laid down in moving the resolution, I desire to announce what must already be apparent to hon. gentlemen in this House, that the Government do not purpose taking any further action upon the resolution, as it was carried by a majority of only 20.



FARM LABOUR IN WESTERN CANADA.


[Stage Direction]
Mr. J. G. TURRIFF (Assiniboia) asked for leave to move the adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, the farm labour question in western 'Canada.
" And leave having been granted,
Mr. TURRIFF:: I shall detain the House for only a few moments. The securing of farm help is of very great importance to the people of the West. We are now in the middle of July, and usually harvesting begins within two or three weeks of this date. In order to bring the matter quickly before the House, I shall read an article that appears in the Manitoba Free Press of July Ilth, 1917, under the heading, The Farmers' Forum:
Farm Labour Problem.
Every few days letters arrive for this column, commenting on the extreme shortage of labour for harvest and threshing and suggesting methods by which the shortage may be met. The same suggestions appear in varying forms in all the letters received.

These suggestions, stated broadly, are:
First:	"Conscript the slackers in cities ana
towns, place them in the army and return to the farms sufficient numbers of farmers and farm labourers to take care of the crop. In other words conscript man power and send it to do the task for which it is best fitted."
Second:	"Conscript alien enemy labour and
compel them to do the farm work at something like reasonable wages; a few suggest that as they would be fed on the farms they should be paid army wages only, others, however, ask merely for a reasonable rate of wages, and some security that these men when hired will live up to their contract."
The object of this editorial is not to discuss either of these proposals, but rather to discuss the methods which are being adopted to secure help, more especially with reference to Manitoba; also the outlook for help for all three provinces.
First, as to what has been done. Louis Kon, the head of the immigration department for Manitoba, who has this matter in charge, as soon as the spring rush was over began to lay plans for harvest. With a view to ascertaining the requirements of the farmers, he circularized the secretary of every municipality in Manitoba, suggesting that the council appoint one or more reliable men in each municipality, who would act as agents for the free distribution of labour, who would ascertain the needs of the municipality and transmit them to the immigration office, and who could be applied to to look after the menr when they are ready to go out and see that they reach their proper destinations. . The* ready and general response to this suggestion is an excellent indication of the feeling in the country that help will be short and that there will be difficulty in securing it. It may be assumed that there will be on record in the immigration office, in the course of the next three weeks, a ' very complete list of the requirements of the province.
A careful review has been made of the source of possible supply, and frankly the outlook is not encouraging.
The sources, roughly, are:	Homesteaders
within the province, a limited supply of agricultural college student labour from the United States and possibly a percentage of regular farm labour from those States with crops which mature at an earlier date than our own.
A certain percentage of the labour employed in large establishments in the cities and towns, which volunteered last spring, and when not called upon for spring work, was asked to hold itself in reserve for the greater needs of harvest.
A possible percentage from the province of Quebec, the large alien population in the west available only at very high wages.
With regard to homesteaders, many of whom are aliens, it must be remembered that while a large number of them were available last spring, there will not be so many this harvest for the simple reason that last spring these men doubled up, and one man put in the crop of four or five while they went to help with the seeding elsewhere. In harvest it will take from four to five men to take off what one man seeded, and it is just as important that their crops be saved in good order as any other.
Student labour from the United States will be highly efficient, but it is not yet sure that
it will be available in any large numbers as it may be needed at home. If any large number can be secured these young men will work in groups, moving from point to point as they are needed, and will, no doubt, be of great value, as they will work with trained brains as well as trained hands.
Regular farm labour from the United States is a very uncertain quantity at present. It will not be available from the States immediately to the south, the Dakotas and Minnesota, as their crop is almost as late as our own. There is a possibility, however, some may be secured from the winter wheat states. The provincial immigration office is in communication with Assistant Secretary Vrooman, of the Department of Agriculture, Washington, seeing what it may be possible to do along this line.
With regard to help from industrial concerns and large city establishments, many or these are already working with a very short staff, so that the number from this source cannot be large. It may be found necessary to close all the industrial concerns for a few weeks, with the exception of the munition works and industries manufacturing foods either for home consumption or shipment overseas, and send every available man and every ablebodied woman employed in these industries to the country.
Help from Quebec is highly problematic, unless it is conscripted for the purpose. Already signs are not wanting that Quebec is preparing to refuse work in western harvest fields in retaliation for western members of Parliament voting for the Conscription Bill. The alien labour at home is equally problematic until it is definitely known whether or not these men are to be conscripted, if the Bill goes through. Nothing short of compulsion will make many of them work at all, or any of them work for less than the very highest wages which necessity may drive-farmers to pay. At least this is the information furnished by very many farmers and farmers' organizations.
From interviews in the papers, on the return of Sir George Foster from Washington, it appeared as if he had made arrangements with regard to help from the United States, but upon inquiry it is learned that nothing but generalities were discussed and no plans laid by the federal minister.
Inquiry also reveals the fact that nothing is being done or planned along this line by the head of the National Service Commission. It would have been reasonable to expect that the information gathered from the National Service cards would have been available for the purpose of ascertaining the various classes of labour available, but up to date so far as the public have any knowledge this has not been tabulated. The indications are that so far as farm labour is concerned each province is to be allowed to shift for itself.
This is not as it should be. The shortage of labour is so very great that the only way of meeting the difficulty is to have available supplies mobilized and moved from point to point as needed. This can only be effectively accomplished by federal authorities. They too are the only people in a position to deal with the matter of transportation. Labour should be carried at the very lowest rate from point to point and with the minimum of red tape about securing this transportation. Last spring low rates could only be secured for

groups ot five or over, from points outside of Winnipeg, whereas they should be equally available for one man if that one man is all that is needed at a given point. Moreover, transportation should be useable on any train, passenger or freight.
The foregoing gives some idea of the gravity of the labour situation. It is not a matter of securing help for the farmers in order that they may make a profit out of their crop; it is something vastly more important. It is the need of securing help for the farmers to save the crop, in order that our men, fighting in the trenches, may be properly supplied with food that we may have sufficient for our own tables and also that we supply as far as possible the needs of Britain for bread. Everything from Britain indicates that rationing is steadily becoming tighter.
The crop of every homesteader, who may have in no more than 20 or 30 acres, has suddenly become of national and indeed of Empire-wide importance. The west, in times of peace, claimed boastfully that she was the bread basket of the Empire. Now is the time to make good that boasting.
I also received the following telegram:
Winnipeg, July 11, 19T7-
J. G. Turriff, M.P.,
Ottawa, Ont.
Please see Manitoba Free Press of Wednesday morning page 10, Farmers' Forum article on farm labour problem. Suggest you take this matter up in House and get statement from Government as to intentions and plans for securing men and providing transportation. Situation is regarded as quite serious here and to be in time action should be taken immediately.
This telegram is signed by G. A. MacDonald, who, I understand, is in charge of that class of work in the province of Manitoba.
The article I have read deals with the matter so fully that I do not think it is necessary for me to add anything further than to say that this is a very very serious question. If we have wet weather during the next few weeks the crop in many parts of the provinces will be fairly heavy, and a good deal of labour will be needed, and there is very little extra labour there at the present time. I bring the matter to the attention of the House in order that the Government may be seized of it, and may relieve the minds of the people of the West by showing what steps have been taken, or what steps are being taken.


Robert Laird Borden: I am very glad indeed that my hon. friend (Mr. Turiff) has brought this matter to the attention of the House, as it is appropriate that the steps which have been taken by the Government with regard thereto should be known. The subject has been more immediately under the attention of my colleague the Minister of the Interior who will give, on certain ^aspects of the question, more detailed information than I can offer at the moment.

I may, however, say that negotiations have been going on for some time between the Government of Canada, through our Department of the Interior, and the Government of the United States, through one of its departments, for co-operation in the supply of labour, so that what is not required in one country may at a particular time of need in another country be used as far as is reasonably possible in the last-named country. As a result of negotiations between the officers of the Department of the Interior and officers of the United States Government a memorandum to carry out this purpose was drawn up, which was submitted to the Government of Canada and approved immediately. It has also been approved by the Government of the United States, and it will come into operation at once. My hon. friend the Minister of the Interior will explain it more fully.
So far as other steps are concerned, there was a meeting called last week, at my instance, which was attended by representatives of the Canadian Pacific railway, the Grand 'Trunk railway, the Grand Trunk Pacific railway and the Canadian Northern railway. I also asked ithe attendance of a representative of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, a representative of the Canadian Bankers' Association, and representatives of the Imperial Munitions Board. The meeting was held on Saturday last.
The object of asking representatives of the Bankers' Association., the Manufacturers' Association and the Imperial Munitions Board, was to ascertain whether or not some means could he contrived by which, during the brief period of the harvest, when labour is so urgently necessary, some men might be spared from the activities of those carrying on. industries and banking, and it was thought also that the Imperial Munitions Board could oo-operate to some extent. The meeting was also attended by Mr. Peterson, secretary of the National Service Board. While the article to which my hon. friend has called the attention of the House is very instructive and useful, I think the writer was under a misapprehension, in one respect. The returns, received 'by the National Service Board have been tabulated and Mr. Peterson informs us that there are 250,000 people, or thereabouts, in Canada, who, in returning their cards, stated that they would be willing to go to some other part of the country upon the condition that their remuneration should not be less than they were then receiving and that their transportation expenses should be paid. Of course, I do not mean

to suggest that anything like 250,000 people would be available for this purpose, but it would seem to indicate that the information obtained by the National Service Board in that regard might be of use. There was a very hopeful feeling as to the provision of necessary labour expressed at this meeting and especially by the representatives of the railway companies who have had such questions before them year [DOT]after year, and who say that the grave apprehensions entertained from time to time have not- been realized. They 'believe that sufficient labour will be provided this year.
The meeting was also attended by several of the ministers whose departments appertain especially to this matter. When we had completed the conference of an hour, the representatives of the railways, of the associations to which I have alluded and of the Imperial Munitions Board and the National Service Board, spent some further time in devising the best means of co-operation. They have embodied their conclusions in a memorandum setting forth the lines along which they purpose to act, and included in the course which they intend to take is an effort by the secretary of the National Service Board to get in touch with the persons who have indicated their willingness to transfer their labour to other parts of the country, especially such as are not engaged in industries that are vitally essential to the carrying on of the war. It is not intended to apply to those whose skill in a particular industry or service would be of more advantage than in any other occupation. That, briefly stated, is the situation as I understand it at present. We are keeping .in touch with the railway companies and the boards and associations represented at the meeting. It was in pursuance of a suggestion made at this meeting that I placed the situation before the people of Canada generally, and asked for their good will and co-operation in order that the harvest now ripening may be gathered and that there may be no loss to the country by any failure so to. gather it.


Mr. BUCHANAN:: I am quite sure that the remarks of the right hon. Prime Minister (Sir Robert Borden) will be encouraging to the farmers of the West, who have been in doubt as to the supply of farm labour. I am not going to speak of the West as a whole, but I wish to make a few remarks about the obstacles which face the farmers of the southern part of Alberta. As the House knows, there was a coal strike in the spring and many miners were available for
farm work. Now that the mines have resumed operations, and will, we hope, be busily engaged for the rest of the year, there is no possibility of any labour from that source being available for farm work. We have been accustomed to get some labour from the United States, and this w.as particularly so last year. Our harvest is coming on almost at the moment that the United States is calling men up under the selective draft, and there is no doubt that the supplies from that source will be depleted. In the southern part of Alberta the acreage under crop is 10 per cent greater than it was last year, and consequently the demand for help will be heavy. Some effort should be made to organize farm labour for the harvest, and to this end the co-operation of, the .provincial governments should be secured. If it is possible to transfer men from one section of Canada to the other in order to carry on farm work that system should be adopted. In some parts of the country the harvest will be earlier than in others, and the men might be shifted from one place to another. If such a system were adopted it would be of considerable assistance. In the past the men have gone to one district, remained there until the work was concluded and then they have drifted away, but frequently not to the places where there was a demand for their labour. By the proper organization of the men that situation would be relieved. I appreciate what the Government is doing to meet the situation. The chief trouble at present is that farmers are afraid that they will not have any labour, and if they could get an assurance that there is the possibility that labour will be provided as it is needed it would help to relieve their apprehension on this score.


Mr. W. J. ROCHE (Minister of the Interior) :: My right hon. friend the Prime Minister (Sir Robert Borden) has already pretty well covered the arrangements which have been undertaken by the Government in order to secure the necessary farm help. But possibly I might elaborate a little the arrangement that has been made between the United States and Canada. When my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Sir George Foster) was in Washington he took the matter up informally with representatives of the United States Government. We sent down the Deputy Minister of the Interior and the Inspector of Immigration agencies in the United States to consult with the authorities at Washington. They had an interview with representatives

?508

of the labour, agriculture and immigration departments of the United States and a tentative arrangements was made to be submitted to the respective governments for their approval. Pending its consummation, an official was to be appointed by both Governments to carry out the operations under the arrangement.Thearrangement is, in short:-
1.	That the Canadian Department of the Interior will place no obstacles in the way of the entry of the United States across the Canada-New England boundary of agricultural and lumbering labourers, not needed at the particular time in the lumber and agricultural industries of Canada, to take part in the harvesting of the potato and other crops in New England and elsewhere, and in the cutting and rafting of timber in the New England woods, as hereinafter mentioned, or in the way of the entry into the United States across the boundary between Canada and the States of Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana, of farm labourers to participate in the harvesting of wheat in the States mentioned; hut, on the contrary, the said Department will, through its immigration officials and in all other ways open to it, encourage the coming of such surplus agricultural and lumbering help into the portions of the United States specified, and in pursuance of that policy will endeavour to have conveyed to Western Canada, sufficiently in advance of the opening of the harvest season there, such harvest helpers as may hereafter be reported to them by the United States Department of Labour to be needed in the States of Minnesota, North and South Dakota and Montana and other States, so that such helpers may promply cross the line and assist the forces mobilized by the United States Government in the harvest fields of the said States.
2.	That the United States Departments of Labour and Agriculture will not only permit but encourage such surplus agricultural labourers among those now mobilized for harvesting purposes in the middle West, as rapidly as the need for them in the harvest fields of the United States decreases or disappears, to cross the boundary into the provinces of Manitoba, Alberta and Saskatchewan and there assist in the harvesting of the wheat crop, and that appropriate instructions will be given all immigration and other officials of the United States looking to the end that the surplus supply of farm labour in the middle western portion of the United States may be made available to western Canada in the manner and for the purpose stated.
3.	That Canada and the United States will mutually enforce, through their Immigration Services or otherwise, such precautionary measures as may be needed to insure that all persons whose departure from the respective countries is permitted will be required to return to the country of origin immediately that the temporary purpose involved in their admission to the other country has been accomplished.
4.	That as soon as this tentative agreement is approved by the appropriate officials of the respective Governments an officer or officers will be selected by each Government to devise and execute the details of a plan of operation.
This has been approved by the Canadian Government, and we have information that it has been approved by the American Gov-
emment, and. the officials herein mentioned will be appointed to carry out the arrangement. I quite agree that there is a great shortage of farm labour in the West. At the same time, we have had the same cry for many years past on behalf of the Provincial Governments and of the farmers, and I can say without exaggeration that usually they d.o not err on the -side of -asking for less than they reailly require. On the contrary, I think that their needs, have been supplied by considerably less numbers than the estimates of the respective Provincial Governments. For instance, this spring an arrangement was made between the Provincial Governments -and the Dominion that certain immigration officials were to be -sent to the United States by the provincial -authorities to act in co-operation with Dominion officers in securing farm help to put in the crops. The Provincial Governments estimated a much larger number than they required. By reaispn of a very active publicity campaign in the United States, we were able to secure several thousand additional helpers from the United States, sufficient to supply the demands. Owing, ho-wever, to the United States sin-ce then coming into the war, we could not, of course, in justice to that country, inaugurate a -similar campaign for harvesters, and therefore the arrangement I have just read has been made on the h-asis of co-operation -between the respective Governments to help fill the requirements p-f the farmers and others in the respective countries. Last year it. w-as estimated that we would require from 35,000 to 40,000 harvesters in the -three provinces of the West. There were sent in toy the transportation companies from the East, in round numbers, 27,000 men. About 4,000 of those came from the United States. Som-ewfaere in th-e neighborhood of 3,000 entered through th-e western ports and nearly 2,000 through the eastern ports. The transportation companies allowed a special rate of $10 to Winnipeg and the men were distributed to the various portions of the three provinces at a rate of half a cent a mile. There was a return rate of, I think, $18. I have asked the transportation eo-mpanie-s to grant an even lower rate if possible for the ensuing season, and, while they have not committed themselves, they ar-e considering it, and I hope that a cheap rate may be secured.
The article read contains some very practical suggestions, of which some have already been acted upon, while others I think will be rather impracticable. For instance, the suggestion is made that we should conscript the alien enemies and the

slackers and compel them to work at a fixed maximum wage. An effort was made to do this in connection with spring work in Manitoba, and I understand that there was a proposition from the Grain Growers to the Provincial Government to fix a maximum wage, so that each farmer could secure help at a reasonable wage. The Provincial Government, however, could not see their way clear to accede to that request. You may take a horse to water but you cannot compel him to drink; and while you can conscript men to fight in defence of their country, while they will fight because they are fighting in defence of their own lives in the trenches, it is another thing to compel men to go into the harvest field and work there. I am afraid that if we compelled men-to work in that way the farmer who employed such men would obtain very little result from their labour. The Prime Minister has already said that a conference was held here a few days ago between the various bodies he mentioned. We are going to leave no stone unturned in order to secure the necessary help. All of these bodies have promised to use their influence in their respective spheres to release as many men, under their jurisdiction as they possibly can, in order to provide the necessary amount of help. The Deputy Minister of Agriculture for Saskatchewan visited Ottawa and had an interview with me last week, and we have promised co-operation, so far as possible, with his Government. The Provincial Government are willing to distribute any help that goes into that province. They are also carrying on a propaganda locally to secure men. Last year there were ticketed out from towns and cities in Saskatchewan, 3,700 men for farm work. In Alberta there were ticketed out from cities and towns 3,200, and from Winnipeg about 5,000, so that the local supply was quite large. However, we do realize that there were a number of soldiers in Canada last year. There were some 16,000 in Camp Hughes and some 3,000 at Sarcee Camp, who were released, nominally to help on the farms. I do not say that all went to. farm work, in fact I "know that many did not. But owing to the fact that there are comparatively few troops in Canada to-day, we cannot draw on this source as we did last year. Every possible thing that can be done will be aone by this department in the interest of the farmers, in co-operation with the Pro-223i
vincial Governments and those other bodies that have been mentioned.


Frank Oliver: Do the plans of the Government in this connection include the acceptance of the suggestion of the hon. member for Parry Sound (Mr. Arthurs) that 12,900 men now on service in England but unfit for service in France should he returned to Canada for the purpose of engaging in their ordinary vocations?


William James Roche: That would come under the jurisdiction of the Militia Department. I do not know that the views expressed by the Minister of Militia (Sir Edward Kemp) quite harmonized with those of the hon. member for Parry Sound (Mr. Arthurs), as many of those men have already gone to France, and many others have been given employment on construction and fortifying work.


Mr. MARCIL:: Has the minister considered the idea of asking that the conscription Act be suspended in order to get men to carry on the work in. the harvest fields?


William James Roche: No, we have not considered that: the conscription Act takes first place.


Mr. ROBB:: The shortage of labour anticipated in western Canada is now on in eastern Canada. In support of his argument for labour to reap the crops of western Canada, the hon.. member for Assini-boia (Mr. Turriff) quoted an article in the Winnipeg Free Press. One feature of that article struck me, that was the statement that the people of Quebec were refusing to work in the western wheat fields as retaliation for the" imposition of military service. That is only in. line with a lot of other misrepresentation of the province of Quebec that have been spoiling paper and ink for the last few weeks throughout this country. All throughout eastern Canada to-day, while the haying is on, as every hon. gentleman from Ontario and Quebec knows, labour is almost unobtainable. Farmers are now offering $3 to $5 a day for help and are unable to obtain it, and you will find women working in the hayfields of eastern Canada. My hon. friend from Assiniboia (Mr. Turriff) has said that western Canada is the bread basket of the Empire, and perhaps this is true. But I hope that our friends in the West will not forget that eastern Canada provides the cheese and the butter to put on that bread. And providing cheese and butteT does not mean work for three or four weeks in the .springtime, and three or four weeks during

the gathering of harvest; it means hard and slavish work every day of the year, and many farmers of eastern Canada have lessened their herds because they were unable to obtain labour to take eare of them. While it is important to have labour to put in and gather the crops, it is equally important to have labour to move that crop to market. Last year, in western Canada, they raised a pretty fair crop of grain that would have been useful for the feeding of cattle in eastern Canada, but, owing to the shortage of labour to operate the railways, to get out coal or supply fuel for the engines, that *crop was allowed to remain during the winter, and they were unable to move it until the grass was growing in eastern Canada, *and it was not required. The result of the shortage of labour wasi that throughout eastern Canada the canners of this country were buying cattle at reduced prices, because the farmers had no feed for their cattle. I say it is equally as important that the Government should provide labour for the coal mines, and labour to operate the railways of this country to move the crops as it is that they shall provide labour to gather the crops. We heard a good deal of complaint about Canada not being able to produce potatoes for the requirements of her people last year, but many people know that there were thousands of bushels of potatoes left on the railway sidings in Montreal, because there was no labour to move them until the frost came along and spoiled them. Those are the conditions we are faced with, and I think the Government should take these matters into account when considering the labour question. While the labour conditions may be acute in the western country, it is more so in eastern Canada. Industries are nearly closing down or they are running shorthanded because there is no labour, and it is a libel upon the province of Quebec to say that labourers refused to work on account of the conscription measure. Labourers in Quebec are ready to work wherever they can get a day's pay, and there are more men wanting to help than there is labour offering.


Mr. LEVI THOMSON:: I desire to call the attention of the Government to a matter which came to my notice last fall. The Minister of the Interior speaks about labour sent out from Camp Hughes. That labour was very useful in our part of the country, but it had a very disturbing influence in another way. A great many of us who were running threshing outfits

were dependent on some of those recruits for helping to run the threshing outfit, and in the middle of the threshing season they were taken off, and the work was not completed. The result was the work dragged along, and practically no fall ploughing was done at all, and we have much less wheat in crop this year than in other years. I know it from experience. I have had men taken away from me, and I know how it works.


Mr. NESBITT:: I may say that every year in Ontario we suffer a great deal in the fall of the year from the advertisements for labour for the West. They take our men away from us in the fall of the year, when we require them very badly, and I was going to suggest to my hon. friend that, in his organization, he should look after the taking of labour from one place to the other more by organization than by wild advertisements as to high prices and that sort of thing, because that has a tendency to make men restless and make them leave their work. If a man has two or three .men employed, or perhaps only one man, we know they simply leave when they like. Very frequently you dare not say anything to them. They get up and leave you, and that is caused a great deal by advertisements which appear in the fall of the year for labour in the West. My hon. friend who preceded me spoke of the necessity for labour for various industries and for transportation. He is absolutely right, and labour in our section of Ontario is just as scarce as it is anywhere else. I quite appreciate that it is necessary to move the harvest in the West, but it is also necessary to move our crops in the East.


George Eulas Foster: You antedate the work out there.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: So far as harvest is concerned, we do, but then follows the preparation for fall wheat, which is just as important, for the next year, and then follows the root crop harvest, which is equally important, if not more so, in a way, in Ontario, and then you have the corn harvest. Our great harvest, after all, nowadays, is the corn harvest in the fall. of the year. Our fall wheat and corn harvest immediately follows our grain harvest. We require more men in corn harvest than we do in grain harvest.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Shall the hon. member have leave to withdraw his motion?
Motion withdrawn!.


Mr. SUTHERLAND:: 1 desire to say a word-


Edgar Nelson Rhodes: I put the question to the House whether leave should he given to withdraw the motion and no protest having been made, the motion was declared withdrawn. It is too late for the hon. member to speak on that motion now.



PRIVILEGE.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
William Pugsley: I desire to bring before the House a matter of privilege, which I mentioned some days ago, but allowed to stand, so that it would not block the Military Service Bill. That Bill is now taking a rest, and it will be quite in order to draw attention to the matter. -	[DOT]


George Eulas Foster: What is the subject?


William Pugsley: It is the reference to a statement made by my right hon. friend the Prime Minister, on June 6, when he announced the appointment of a commission to investigate the judgment of Mr. Justice Gait-


George Eulas Foster: The Prime Minister is not in the House and is engaged on very important business, and I do not suppose the hon. member from St. John would wish to take it up m his absence.


William Pugsley: I will allow the matter to stand, and when I take it up, I desire the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, and the Minister of Labour to be present.


George Eulas Foster: We will endeavour to have them here, if the hon. member promises to be short.


William Pugsley: And my hon. friend the Minister of Trade and Commerce is interested, because he proved himself a letter writer.


George Eulas Foster: I am always here.



PAIRS ON YESTERDAY'S VOTE.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. THOMPSON:: I wish to call attention to an error in yesterday's Hansard. I am represented as having voted on the motion for the adoption of the resolution, moved by the Prime Minister for the extension of the term of Parliament, and also as being paired with the hon. gentleman from Charlotte (Mr. Hartt). I did vote for the motion, and the statement that I was paired is not correct.



INTERCOLONIAL RAILWAY-INCREASE OF FREIGHT RATES ON COAL.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
William Pugsley: About the time that the fuel commissioner was sent to the Maritime Provinces to investigate the high cost of fuel, the Intercolonial railway authorities added an extra freight rate of 50 cents a ton upon coal, thus considerably increasing the burden of the people. May I ask the Minister of Railways and Canals if that rate still continues, and if so, whether the order bringing it into force will be rescinded?


Mr. COCHRANE:: It is true that the rate was increased. The reason was that we had to increase the wages of our employees within the last two months to the extent of over $2,000,000. We also had to meet an increased cost of coal of over $1,000,000. Upon representations, however, made by the fuel controller and other persons, we have agreed to allow the old rate to stand until the 1st of August, after which an increased rate- between 30 and 40 cents a ton less than the first increase-will be put into effect.



RAILWAY ACT AMENDMENT.

[Stage Direction]
The House in Committee on Bill No. 13, to consolidate and amend the Railway Act. -Hon. Frank Cochrane (resumed from Monday, July 16.)
Mr. Rainville in the Chair.
On section 302-Regularity in train time.
Herménégilde Boulay: Mr. Chairman, allow me to
call your attention to subsection 2 of section 302 which is of very great importance to the travelling public, in the province of Quebec. Monday last, when we were in committee on the Bill, I stated that it would be proper to amend this subsection, so as to make it more satisfactory to the travelling public in my province. The proposed amendment would affect exclusively the province of Quebec and I fail to see that it could cause any inconvenience in the other parts of Canada. I hope the suggestion will be considered to be in the best interest of the public. I do not expect that any member from the province of Quebec will oppose the amendment; I rather believe that it will meet the views of all. '
The amendment that I suggest affects only the province of Quebec. Members from that province know the inconvenience that has been' suffered in the past by the travelling public in that section of the country by

reason of the fact 'that a great many of the conductors, brakemen, baggage masters, station agents and ticket agents cannot understand the language of persons boarding and leaving trains. This amendment would effect a great improvement over present conditions. Several times I have acted as interpreter on behalf of persons who were travelling, because railway employees were nnable to understand them. Every company moving trains in the province of Quebec should require its employees to understand both languages. They wouild have no difficulty in selecting from amongst their own employees persons who could speak both languages. Subsection 2 of this section reads:
Every railway company shall print in both the English and French languages the time tables that are to be used along its lines within the limits of the province of Quebec.
I move that this subsection be amended by adding thereto the following words:
And all employees coming in contact with the travelling public shall understand both official languages of the country.


Mr. J. E. ARMSTRONG:: 
Edward Walter Nesbitt: In clause 302, with which we are dealing, there is a provision that the time tables and instructions shall be printed in both languages. What more do we want?


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: The hon. member for Rimouski (Mr. Boulay) has moved an amendment to clause 302 to the effect that both languages shall be spoken by the crews on the railroads running through the province of Quebec.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Is there any serious
trouble under the present system? We have had it for a long while.


Mr. PAQUET (translation):: Mr. Chairman, I approve entirely of the amendment moved by my hon. friend from Rimouski (Mr. Boulay). I have myself witnessed of late unfortunate occurrences due to the fact that the railway employees could not understand what the passengers meant. Now the hon. member for Lambton (Mr. Armstrong) has just made a statement; but I think we could request the hon Minister of Railways and Canals to do his best to have that amendment inserted in the Act, for the greater 'convenience of the travelling public in the province of Quebec.


Herménégilde Boulay: 
Charles Marcil: To appreciate this question properly, our friends from Ontario should think for a moment of the condition passengers w.ould be in if a Frenchman who could not understand English was in charge of a train running through Ontario. That would not be in the interests of the passengers or of the country. In the province of Quebec, although a large number of our people speak the English language, unfortunately a great many do not, especially those' from the rural parts of the province, and the district of Quebec in particular. The result is that a conductor in charge of a train may have a car full of people with whom he is unable to communicate. Having regard to the fact
that railroad companies operating in the province of Quebec .already print their time tables, hills of lading, posters, and so on _ in both languages to facilitate the transaction of business, I see no reason why the train crews should not 'be required to speak both French and English. It is very awkward for people who are stranded at a railway station and are unable to make themselves understood.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Do not nearly all the
railway men understaand French?


Charles Marcil: 'The ticket sellers, of
course, are .able to speak both languages, and the conductors as well; that is elementary. I do not want to be harsh; a certain length of time should be allowed the railway companies in which to make this change. My experience is that a large number of the old conductors who have been employed on the roads in the province of Quebec for (the last thirty or forty years can speak both languages, but men are being brought in more and more from western Canada who are unable to speak French, .and that is a great inconvenience to the travelling public and the public generally.
If the matter were property placed before the Canadian labour unions and if they understood it, I certainly think thej would not object to the encouragement of the learning of both languages, especially in the province of Quebec, because it is evident that it is to a man's own interest if he wants to do any business that he should be able to speak both languages. I think it should be encouraged on the railways, because after all the railways deal with the public. The Minister of Railways might give the companies fair warning that m a year or a year and a half the ticket seller and the conductor at least-those who come in direct contact with the public- should understand the two languages.


Mr. PROULX:: I am strongly in favour
of the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Rimouski (Mr. Boulay).
Mr. J. E. ARMSTRONG; I do not want it understood that I am opposed to the crews being able to speak the French language. I should think it would he a very great advantage if they could do so. I merely called the attention of the committee to the position in which the railroads are placed at the present time, especially on the main lines in and out of important cities in Quebec. To pass this amendment would be to say that nobody but French Canadians should be employed



S514 COMMONS

[Stage Direction]
on railroads in the province of Quebec. The result would, be that the railway unions, [DOT] the large majority of whose membership are English-speaking, would be sure to retaliate and prevent French Canadians from being employed outside the province of Quebec.
Mr. MARCH,: There are a large number of English-speaking Canadians in the province of Quebec who can speak both languages. It is a great mistake to imagine that only the French Canadians speak both languages.	'
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: I am quite well aware of that fact. What I called the attention of the committee to is the fact that the representatives of the railway unions are strongly opposed to an amendment of this nature being placed in the Bill.


Mr. WRIGHT:: When the matter was up before I suggested that it might very well be left in the hands of the Railway Commission, and if they had not the power to deal with it, such power might be conferred upon them. We can very well see it might be a great hardship to put a clause of this kind in as an ironclad rule. Take, for instance, a train leaving Halifax for Vancouver; because it ran through a portion of Quebec for an hour or two, would it be right to compel the crew to be able to speak the French language? Might it not be a very great hardship indeed, and interfere with the running arrangements of such trains? On the local trains running between cities in Quebec it would be no great hardship to a railway if it had to have men who could speak both French and English, and I can understand that such an order might very well be made. At the same time I think it should be left in the hands of the Railway Commission.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I wish to thank my hon. friend from Muskoka (Mr. Wright) for the very sensible remarks he has made, and I think it would be well if my hon. friend from Rimouski were to accept his suggestion. If a provision were placed in the Act whereby the Railway Commission might regulate this matter, we would come to a satisfactory conclusion, because the province of Quebec is represented on the commission and I am sure the interests of the province would be well looked after.
I may assure the committee this question is not brought forward with the idea of raising a vexed question. There is a real grievance in some cases. I quite agree with my hon. friend that we cannot expect a bilingual crew on a train leaving Halifax 
or St. John for Vancouver, yet one must recollect that on a long-haul train partial changes of crews are made. A conductor might take the train from Halifax to Montreal, and be relieved there, so it would simply be a matter of arrangement. It might be arranged that when a train reaches the boundary line between New Brunswick and Quebec a conductor speaking both languages would be put in charge. Certain grievances on this subject have been made public. Two cases were given a little more publicity than the others. One concerned some young boys coming home from college, and the other was a case of gross misconduct on the part of a conductor on the Canadian Northern Railway. In the first instance, some students were going from Rigaud to Montreal. They were threatened with arrest by the conductor of the train because they could not understand him, and he insisted that they should understand him. The doors of the car were locked, and had it not been for the intervention of a gentleman whose name was mentioned, those boys would have been arrested when they reached Montreal, because, according to the conductor, they had refused to pay their fares. The case which happened on the Canadian Northern was on a new line in a new district. The conductor was ignorant of the language of the passengers, and on the occasion referred to he handled very roughly one of the passengers who did not understand him. When the remonstrance was made to the company in Toronto they took the matter up and the answer was very satisfactory. Apologies were made, and the company promised that such conduct would not be renewed. These are only two instances which occur to my mind at the present time as tending to show there certainly are grievances.
But as the hon. member for Muskoka (Mr. Wright) stated, the local conditions could be looked after if the power was given to .the Railway Board to deal with such conditions. I would be agreeable to accepting that suggestion, and I would suggest to my hon. friend from Rimouski that he amend his motion accordingly. It is well that this grievance be met before the committee, because certainly there has been some wild talk of late about it on the various trains.


Mr. GREEN:: I am not in favour of the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Rimouski (Mr. Boulay), nor am I in favour of the suggestion made by the hon. member for Muskoka (Mr. Wright). This is a matter that should be left as it is. I

see no reason for making it the law that the people in charge of the trains should speak both languages. I quite agree that it would be an advantage, and that it is just and right that where necessary the train officials should speak both languages. But surely that is a matter that should be left to the railway company who are handling the business of the road. If it is necessary to their business to have men speaking two languages, whether they be French and English or other language that may be necessary in some particular portions of Canada, surely we can leave it to the railway companies to see that the public is being served. I do not think it would be right for this House to put upon the statute books a law making it necessary for the Tailway companies in all cases, either in Quebec or any other province, to have men in their service who could speak both languages.


Charles Marcil: I approve of the suggestion made by the hon. member for Muskoka (Mr. Wright), and supported by the hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux). I think the Railway Board would have no hesitation in declaring that local trains should be in charge of a conductor, and that the tickets should be sold by a ticket seller, who could understand the passengers. I am prepared to leave it to the board to say how trains running beyond the limits of the province of Quebec should be manned.	-


Francis Cochrane: There is a certain
degree of unfairness in insisting upon this. Many trains leaving Montreal get out of the province of Quebec long before the time comes for changing the conductors and other officials. There are three or four trains a day going out of Montreal on the Canadian Pacific and Grand Trunk, and there will be on the Canadian Northern, in regard to which the conditions are as I have described them. It is not as it is with the Intercolonial. For the Intercolonial, I would accept the proposal Tight off as far as running in the province of Quebec is concerned, because we run several hundred miles through that province. But, it is a different proposition in regard to the trains running out of Montreal. Unless there is a wide latitude given to the Railway Commission, I would not want to agree to the amendment. On Intercolonial trains running through the province of Quebec, it is all right, but on trains running between Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa it would be very objectionable.


Charles Marcil: I understand the minister to agree that with reference to local trains in the province of Quebec the amendment might apply but that the question with reference to trains running outside of the province should be dealt with by the Railway Commission.


Francis Cochrane: I did not say that.


Charles Marcil: I did not quite understand the hon. gentleman.


Francis Cochrane: I said that with regard to trains in the province of Quebec there was no objection to it, but that with regard to tr-ains running out of Montreal to Toronto, Ottawa and the Coast it is unfair to ask it. These tr-ains are only in the province for three or four (hours, at the most, after leaving Montreal.


Herménégilde Boulay: The hon. member for
Kootenay (Mr. Green) said -a few moments ago that we had better leave it to- the company. It has been left to the companies for the past forty or fifty years and no improvement has been made yet. We start from Ottawa and at the car door we meet a man who speaks only one language. When we start from Montreal to -co-me to Ottawa, although it is in o-ur own province of Quebec, we. meet the same man, we are confronted with the same situation-^and if wTe speak only French how can we be understood? These companies that are running trains from Ottawa to Montreal have been running them for a great -many years. Of course they do not lose passengers; they have the -same number of passengers all the time; it does not cause any harm to their traffic, but it causes harm and annoyance to the passengers. Those of us who travel in the province of Quebec have witnessed the annoyance caused to the passengers and this has been going on for the la-st forty or fifty-five years. We do not ask this change for the province of Ontario or New Brunswick; we are asking it foT o-ur own province. If the companies running trains from Montreal to Ottawa cannot of themselves -see that it is nothing but juist to give u-s men who understand both languages, it is up to- the -Government to force them to do it. I do not say th-a-t tho-se operating trains from Montreal to Toronto or Hamilton or Vancouver should be able to speak both languages, b-ut those who are running trains from Montreal to Ottawa or from Ottawa to M-aniwaki in the province of Quebec should be able to -understand the passengers who bo-aTd their trains. I appreciate the remarks of my hon. friend the

Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Cochrane) as to the Intercolonial, and I thank him for what he has done. At the present time we do not lack these advantages on the Intercolonial; we have men on the trains of that line who are able to understand both languages. If the Intercolonial, starting at Montreal, and running through the province of Quebec, has been able to get men who can understand both languages, it is just as easy foT the Canadian Pacific, the Grand Trunk and the Canadian Northern to get the same class of men. I heard the hon. member for Frontenac (Mr. Edwards) the other day saying: Let us know what other grievances you have in the province of Quebec and we will be ready to remove them at once. This is one of the grievances we have. Imagine the difficulties on board a train of a poor lady or a man who does not speak any English. They are confronted with a conductor, or a station agent, or ticket seller, who doe's not understand what they say, and if they do not get what they want they are displeased.
Quite often disagreements and even serious quarrels arise because these two people cannot understand each other. Members of the House, I think, will realize that I am right in my contention, and I do not think that members from other provinces should interfere in a matter of this kind, which relates only to the province of Quebec.


Charles Marcil: The section and the amendment might both stand in order that a provision may be drafted which will satisfy every one.


Francis Cochrane: If the amendment referred to, local trains wholly within the province of Quebec, I should accept it, but it does not seem desirable to apply such a provision to interprovineial or international trains.


Charles Marcil: Probably the Board of
Railway Commissioners would order that on local trains in Quebec the conductors at least should understand both languages.


Francis Cochrane: That is not the proposition.


Rodolphe Lemieux: It is quite possible that we could agree on an amendment which would not interfere with international trains. So far as local trains are concerned, I think we can agree.


Francis Cochrane: So far as local trains are concerned, I would agree to it right away.
Section stands.

On section 303-Posting information about late trains.


Herménégilde Boulay: This section provides that the station master must write up the time when a train that is late will arrive at his station. I think that that information should be posted up at every station in relation to all trains, whether they are late or not.


Francis Cochrane: The time the train is due is always put there.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The time the train is due to arrive is marked on the hoard, and if the train is late they mark on the board the time it will arrive.


Herménégilde Boulay: Not at all the stations.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: In the country stations they are not very particular about marking the time on the board, but there are very few people at those stations, and they get the information from the stationmaster.


Mr. CARVELL:: Has the hon. gentleman ever found any grievance over this? It is the first time I have heard the question raised. On all the roads I have had anything to do with they have the time placed on the board in different columns. The first column is headed " due to arrive," or " due to leave," and then another column is headed " will arrive at." When trains are on time they will simply say " on time." Every passenger is entitled to a time table, and he knows when the train is due to arrive and due to leave. It is only necessary to mark the board when the train is not on time. It seems to me the section goes far enough. The section provides that if the train is not going to leave when it is scheduled to leave notice should be given.


Herménégilde Boulay: It is all right for the hon. gentleman from Carleton and those who travel much, but I am speaking for the common classes. At the very large stations the time of .arrival is placed on the board, but that is not done at the small stations. At the present time a stationmaster is not obliged to mark the time the train is due, and therefore it will not be reported until the train is late. But the poor traveller who comes ten or twenty miles has no time table in his pocket. Many times when we ask the stationmaster for a time table he has none. I asked for a time table here at Ottawa to get the time of the trains running from here to Montreal and I could not get one.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I think it is provided in the law that there must be a printed time-

table at every station. My Lon. friend is thinking about the Intercolonial. It is only a sort of half railway anyhow. When the hon. gentleman gets on a railway where they run trains properly, he would not find any difficulty, and this law does not affect the Intercolonial. I think the section is all right as it stands.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On 'Section 310-Trains or oars moving reversely.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: The words of the
first part of the section have been transposed and the words "which is not adequately protected by gates or otherwise have been inserted. In committee we struck out the words in the second line of the old Act, "moving forward in the ordinary manner," and also in tfye fifth line or of the tender if that is in front." This matter was fully discussed by the representatives of the Brotherhood, and it was decided that in the general interest this should be struck out.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: It does not change the
meaning at all, but the committee thought it would be much clearer if the section read as it appears in the Bill. Under this section it makes no difference whether it is the tender or freight car that is foremost on the train, the part of the car which is foremost shall have a man stationed on it.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 311-Obstruction of highway traffic.
Charles Marcil: Is there anything stipulating the time a train may be held up when crossing a road?


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Five minutes.


Charles Marcil: It does not apply to the
Intercolonial. I know at Matapedia the trains are held up for some time.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: They are held up all
over.


Francis Cochrane: The Intercolonial is
not the only road where the trains are held up.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On Section 312-Traffic, tolls and tariffs: Accommodation for traffic.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: There are changes
of more or less importance, largely at the suggestion of Mr. Hardwell, the traffic expert of the Railway Commission, after discussion with the board. While in committee an important change was made in the wording. The following words: are added as paragraph (e) of subsection 1:
Furnish such other service incidental to transportation as is customary or usual in connection with the business of a railway company.	'
This was thought in the public interest, and referred to the milling in transit matter which was brought before the committee at the instance of several prominent men from different cities in Canada.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: When that came up it was to be handed over to the traffic manager of the board. I have not had an opportunity of comparing the two. Were any changes made in the section as it left the committee?


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: This is placed in the reprinted Bill as paragraph (e). The clause formerly read:
Furnish such other service as may he customary or usual in connection with the business of a railway company.
It was amended to read:
Furnish such other service incidental to transportation as is customary or usual in connection with the business of a railway company.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That is right; I was
present when that amendment was made.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 314-Equality as to tolls and facilities.
Charles Marcil: Is it under this clause
that the Board of Railway Commissioners are authorized to permit branch railways to charge very high rates in the winter season?


Francis Cochrane: They cannot put on a tariff without submitting it to the board.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Branch line railways, especially some in the province of Quebec, that can now make almost any freight charge they like, will, after this Bill becomes law, be brought under the jurisdiction of the Railway Commission, because of their being connected with the Transcontinental lines.


Charles Marcil: I refer to the railway line in Bonaventure and Gaspe counties. The rates on this line are certainly higher than they are on the main line of the Intercolonial Railway.


Francis Cochrane: Has it a Dominion
charter?
r.ui6


Charles Marcil: Yes.


Francis Cochrane: Then it must submit its rates to the board.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: This section provides only that there shall be equality of rates and tolls upon each road. For instance, the railroad that my hon. friend speaks about must charge all persons the same rate or toll. Another section provides that all rates shall be subject to the control of the Railway Commission.
Mr. MARCH,: What I wanted to know was under what principle the Board of Railway Commissioners authorized these small lines to charge rates almost double those charged on the main line. The minister must appreciate the disadvantage to the people which results from the imposition of such high freights.


Francis Cochrane: You have the right to go to the commission and demand that the rates shall be made right.


Charles Marcil: Under this clause?


Francis Cochrane: No.


Charles Marcil: Has the section so providing been adopted?


Francis Cochrane: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 323-Tariffs; general provisions.
Charles Marcil: May I again ask why there is such a difference between the summer and the winter rate on some of these branch lines? Can an extra rate be imposed by a company of its own authority, or must any proposed increase be authorized by the Board?


Francis Cochrane: All tariffs of all roads have to be authorized by the commission.


Charles Marcil: Why should freights be higher at one season of the year than they are at another?


Francis Cochrane: It costs more to run a short line than it does to run a long,one.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 331-Special freight tariffs.
Francis Cochrane: I move that subsection 3 of this section be amended by adding thereto the following words: '
Provided that where objection to any such tariff is filed with the Board, the burden ofi proof justifying the proposed advances shall be upon the company filing said tariff.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to. Section as amended agreed to.

On section 332-Competitive tariffs.
Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I have often wondered by what process of reasoning the Board will allow a company to give a rate to or from a competitive point very much lower than the rate charged for a greater distance to a non-competitive point.


Francis Cochrane: It is because of the water tariff.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No, there are hundreds of places in Canada which are called competitive points; that is, they are touched by two railways. The Railway Board allows the companies to charge 50 cents a hundred, we will say, from these competitive points. Now, I cannot see why the companies should not be compelled to carry the same quantity of freight, no matter whether in carload or broken lots, for the same rate from a noncompetitive point, but instead of that the companies are allowed to charge a very much higher rate for carrying the freight a considerably less distance. I know enough about railways to know the arguments they put forward in justification of this. They say that it is necessary to give a lower rate at a competitive point in order to get the business. They lose money, they say, at some of these competitive points, and must be allowed to make up for it at some other place, and so ,they strike at the poor fellow who does not happen to be at a competitive point. I know the arguments that the railways advance, and the facts as they exist. Does not the minister feel that some change ought to he made? I know I am raising a big question, but I know the minister is able to handle it.


Francis Cochrane: I do not know so much about competitive points as about rail and water points.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: The same principle is involved.


Francis Cochrane: For instance, you can get the same rate from Montreal to the Soo as from Montreal to Sudbury, although the Soo is 180 miles further. The reason for that is that shippers can send their goods by rail or water. I suppose it is about the same with competitive points on the railways. One road establishes a rate, and another company can come along with a cheaper rate.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I do not think the minister catches my point. We all know that water transportation is cheaper than rail transportation. There is no doubt whatever that during the navigation season

freight can be delivered front*-Montreal to the Soo much cheaper by water than by rail, and if the railways are to do business at all they must be allowed to file a tariff to meet the water rate. But that is not the point I am making. The Kailway Board will allow the companies to quote a lower rate from Montreal or Ottawa to Vankleek Hill, for instance, than the rate charged to a non-competitive point which is at a considerable less distance. I have often wondered why that was allowed. I know that the business with which I was connected in my own province some years ago, a foundry and machine shop, was practically driven out of business through our competitors in the lower part of the province being able to send their products to Edmuudston very much cheaper than we could send ours to points a hundred miles nearer. We were not -at a competitive point, and had to pay a local freight rate to get cur goods in, and another local freight rate to get them out. Our competitors could get their freight to the distributing point at Edmundston very much cheaper than we could, alhough it had to be hauled twice as far. That has been going on ever since I was a boy, and I presume that unless somebody like the hon. member for Rimouski (Mr. Boulay) raises a big row about it-and I think if he took this matter up he might achieve some results-the same condition will continue. It does not seem to me to be right; I think there should be some levelling up of the rates. I cannot see why a man who lives at a non-competitive point should be compelled to pay from twenty to thirty per cent more in freight rates than his competitor who lives a few miles further on at a competitive point.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: It is no doubt true, as my hon. friend says, that a proportionately higher rate is charged at a non-competitive point than at a competitive point, but I have sometimes seen a proportionately less rate at a non-competitive point than at a competitive point.


Francis Cochrane: I never saw that.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: 1 have had the experience.


William Wright: I think my hon. friend should file that case, and mark it a? Exhibit "A."


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On -section 346-Members of Parliament -and Board, eitc., free.
Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Why was that change
made? Why should a member (A Parliament furnish his card? If he 'happened to leave it at home he might be put off the train unless he paid his fare.


Francis Cochrane: How would the conductor know him?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: The conductors -should
surely know -a member of Parliament. However, I think I can see the .object of making the -change. There is one point I want to bring up, not that I advocate it, but I think there -should be some discussion upon it. In the rural sections of Canada it very often -becomes necessary to travel on trains pther than the ordinary -passenger trains.
I have frequently found that I would like to travel on accommodation trains, or even on freight trains. The railway company with which I have to deal h-as been very nice about it. I would simply -send a wire or a telephone message tp the superintendent and the privilege was invariably granted. I have to comply with that formula, or the conductor would be -infringing his regulations, and it would only get him in wrong if 1 bad not the authority. I w-ould like to know -if the question has ever been raised -as to whether our certificates entitle us to ride upon freight trains as well -as on passenger trains. The law -say-s " free transportation on -any of the trains of the company." That is very -broad.
Mr. M-cCRANEY:	I have had occasion
to travel on freight trains in western Canada, and I -always offered them my pass as the certificate of my right to do -so. It has never -been questioned. The conductors in our -p-art of the -country take lit for granted that we are -authorized to ride on freight trains.
I would like to ask the minister if there has been -any trouble over the showing of the certificate of -a member of Parliament. I think if -a member of Parliament is known to a conductor there is np reason why his -pass -should be shown. If he happened to le-ave it -at home, why should he not be carried without it, if he is kno-wn to the -conductor?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: As a matter of fact if
they know him they do not look at his pass.
Mr. -M-cORANEY:	I know they do not.
What I want to know is why -should this he in the Act? A member of Parliament gets on -a train -and, -although he is known to the conductor, the Act says he1 shall not be carried unless he produces his certificate or pass.


Francis Cochrane: -I do not think it is
very unfair to ask a passenger to produce



P520 COMMONS

[Stage Direction]
his ticket or fciis pass. I think the railway companies are only asking what is thedT right, and it would be going rather far to ask them to forego it.
Mr. MeCRANEY: Of course, the pass is not taken up.
Mr. COOEKRANE:: But it is a voucher for the transportation. The conductor takes the number of it. How many of us know the numbers of our passes? I certainly do not know mine.


Mr. GRAHAM:: You have a bagful of
them.
Mr. MeCRANEY: It is all very well for ministers who travel in private cars, and who do not need passes. I know I have frequently left my pass at home, and I do not want to be under any obligation to the conductor to produce it. I am satisfied no member of Parliament would be so unreasonable as to refuse to show his pass if it were required.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: One reason for this change in this Bill is that conductors complained that occasionally they were put in an embarrassing position when passengers claiming to be members produced no cards of identification. In addition, to that, the rules laid down by the railways are very strict.
Mr. MeCRANEY: If I got on a train and did not have my pass, and the conductor did not know me, I would pay my fare, take a voucher from the conductor, and ask for a refund, under the section- as it stood before. I would not be entitled to a refund under the section as it stands now. If a member of Parliament is not known to the conductor, and' has not his certificate, it is only proper -that the fare should be paid, and the member entitled to a refund.


Mr. CRUISE:: Has the conductor the
right to lift your pass?


George Perry Graham: If he 'suspects it is presented by any person but the rightful holder.


Robert Cruise: The conductors o.n the
Canadian Northern lift your transportation.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: On the Canadian Northern they are the quintessence -and boiled down essence of a nuisance.


Robert Cruise: I was coming down to
Winnipeg not long ago, and the conductor lifted my pass and forgot to give it to me in the morning. I had to come through to Ottawa without it. I happened to be with the hon. member for Edmonton, who vouch-[Mr. Cochrane.}
ed for me to the conductor on the Grand Trunk Pacific, and I came through in that way. I do not think every time we get off a train we should have to go to the conductor or the porter to get our certificates back.


George Perry Graham: I think they lift the passes in order to avoid arousing the passengers when a new conductor comes on.


Robert Cruise: Why would it not -be sufficient to simply take the number?


George Perry Graham: They make an Arrangement between themselves by which conductor No. 1 hands the transportation on to conductor No-. 2, so that the new conductor does not disturb the passengers.


Francis Cochrane: They do it for your
comfort. It is the 'fault absolutely of the new conductor if you do not get back your pass. The object of taking the pass is to make it unnecessary to arouse the passenger from his sleep.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: There is only one road
in Canada that insists on taking up your card when you go to bed at night.


Francis Cochrane: There is not a road
that does not do it.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: There is only one road
that does it-the Canadian Northern. Every other conductor takes the number of your pass and hands it -back. That is the way they do on the Canadian Pacific and the Grand Trunk everywhere in Canada. The Canadian Northern only have coloured men on their cars and they insist on taking up your card, It is absurd. They could take your number just as well as they do on the trains of other companies. The Canadian Northern ought to correct their instructions because they are a nuisance. They are liable to leave you in the lurch in the morning and not give you back your card because the porter is off duty and some other fellow is in his place. While this includes the Clerk of the House of Commons, it does not include the assistant clerk. I see no reason why it should not.


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Rainville):: It
does not include the Clerk.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: No, it does not; I read that wrongly.


Joseph Hormisdas Rainville: They should be included.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I should think that the
Clerk of the House of Commons and his assistants might be included.


Francis Cochrane: It has. never been done;
I do not object to doing it.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I do not see why they
should not be included, Mr. Minister. Will you make a note of that?


Francis Cochrane: All right.


Mr. McCRANEY:: Will the minister hold up this clause? I do not want to be unreasonable with the officials on the trains or to say that because a man says, he is a member of Parliament he should be allowed to travel free. My hon. friend from Dauphin (Mr. Cruise) claims that the porter on the train holds the transportation of a member of Parliament, and if the member gets on another train without his card, under this section he has no. redress. I think that ought to be changed.


Mr. SINCLAIR:: I have no sympathy
with the position of my hon. friend from Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney). I think a member ought to carry his pass in his pocket, and if he is too careless to keep it in his pocket he should pay. If he does not get it back it will not do very much harm. It would be a very good thing if he did pay something to. the railways now and then. I do not see any reason why this section should not be adopted.


Charles Marcil: I remember that the late Mr. Bergeron, then member for Beauhar-nois, raised this question before the opening of the doors because it was a question of privilege and he wanted it discussed before tne galleries were occupied. He made the suggestion that there should be one card issued to the members for the whole of Canada so that members would not have to carry about twenty-five or thirty different passes, and the suggestion was accepted by the late Mr.. Blair, then Minister of Railways. I think it is only reasonable that a member should carry his one rass; in the old days a member had to carry a whole pack of cards.


Robert Cruise: I would like to know
whether the railway conductor has a right to lift transportation or not.


Francis Cochrane: I do not think he has a right to do it. He only does it for your comfort. If the conductor changes in the night it saves you from being awakened.


Robert Cruise: There is something wrong about the situation. They have a habit of lifting my transportation and not giving it back. On the train from Dau'phin to Winnipeg there is only a porter, and there is no change of porters during the trip.


Francis Cochrane: Is there a conductor too?


Robert Cruise: There is no pullman conductor but there is the regular train conductor. They have known me perfectly well for twenty years, and still they insist-
Mr. GRAHAM- That is the reason.


Robert Cruise: -still they insist on lifting my transportation. I have no objection if they have a right to do so.


Levi Thomson: I do not think any of these porters or conductors claim to have that right. I took the question up with one of them on one occasion and he said: We have no right to do it, but if we take your certificate we will not have to call you up. I do not see any reason for taking up the certificate merely because some other conductor is coming on; the fact that you produce your certificate to one conductor should be sufficient. Sometimes the pullman car conductor claims that he is obliged to satisfy the conductor of the train that my certificate is all right and that therefore it is necessary for him to take it. Of course they admit that it is my property, not his, and he has no right to hold it. I see no reason why they should hold that certificate, because any official who is placed in the train should be such a thoroughly reliable man that the conductor could depend on him; otherwise the company have no business having him there. When he satisfies himself that you have a certificate, that should satisfy the company. He is the servant and agent of the company, and if it is necessary we should have a further measure to make this obligatory on the railways. The officials have no right to disturb you after you have once produced your certificate.


William Wright: I want to refer again to the point as to whether members of Parlia- 1 ment have the right to travel on freight trains. I was absolutely refused the right to travel on a freight train and the conductor informed me he had special instructions from the company to permit no member of Parliament to ride on his train. I discussed the matter with the late member for Lincoln, Mr. Lancaster, who was considered a railway authority. He said that in his judgment I would never succeed in any action I might take against the railway company for damages. He thpught that the interpretation that would be put upon the clause by any court would be that the right of a member of Parliament to travel would apply only to passenger trains.


George Perry Graham: The advice was right.


William Wright: I did not think it was at that time. If that is the law I am satisfied, but I think it ought to be made perfectly clear what our rights are in that regard. I happened to be passing backward and forward to and from my home, and arriving at a junction I had to stay there, within 16 miles of my home, for eight or nine hours. A freight train passes at such an hour that I could make close connections, which would save me all of that time every time I go to my home. I should like to know my rights in that regard.


George Perry Graham: My hon. friend has no rights on a freight train.


Francis Cochrane: It says "on any of the trains of the company."


George Perry Graham: He has the rights under this pass that any man has who buys a ticket, except that perhaps he could not claim damages. No other citizen can be carried on a freight train, and consequently I say that my hon. friend has no right, on his pass, on the freight train. The presence of a passenger in a caboose on one of the modern heavy freight trains might divert the attention of the erew from their duties, and it must be remembered that if the right were granted to members of Parliament to travel on freight trains, citizens who purchase tickets might demand the same right, and what answer could we make to them?


Herménégilde Boulay: I do not entirely agree with my hon. friend from South Renfrew (Mr. Graham), because this section of the law applies to all trains. It is sometimes very convenient and in the interests both of the member of Parliament and of the public that he should be able to reach some small place in his constituency that can only be reached at a convenient time by travelling on a freight train. I see no objection to a member of Parliament riding in a caboose, if he wishes to take the risk of boarding and alighting from it, and so on. I should like to know what rights the railways have in the matter of charging for excess baggage. We have all a considl erable weight of baggage sometimes.


George Perry Graham: Particularly going home.


Herménégilde Boulay: You do not mean that we are robbers?


George Perry Graham: No, I was just suggesting that we nave the baggage one way or the other.


Herménégilde Boulay: I understand from the reading of the Act that we are allowed to 
carry all our baggage, but should it exceed the amount allowed to the general public the railways charge excess on it. Then, too, if we leave our baggage in a station for more than twenty-four hours, we are charged storage.


George Perry Graham: I cannot see why there should be any charm about the baggage of a member of Parliament any more than about that of the ordinary man paying a fare. Why should I ask a railway to carry for me a piece of extra baggage when my neighbour, who has paid for his ticket, has to pay for his extra baggage? If we get for nothing the same privileges that the ordinary man pays for I think we are going as far as we ought to ask. As to the contention that the law contemplates that railways shall carry members of Parliament on freight trains, I think that my hon. friend in any court would find that the meaning of " any train " in this clause is any train that carries passengers.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I share entirely the views expressed by the hon. member for Guys-borough (Mr. Sinclair) about this privilege enjoyed by the members. It is a very liberal law, indeed, which allows members of Parliament to travel free on all railways in Canada. I have some sympathy with the case brought up by the hon. member for Daupbin (Mr. Cruise). I understand from the Minister of Railways that this is a matter for regulation, and that the companies are not entitled to the privilege of lifting the certificate of a member. As to baggage, the allowance in Canada, in fact on this continent, is very much more liberal than it is in Europe, where you have to pay for any baggage in excess of a handbag.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: In Europe they take the rest in the car with them.


Rodolphe Lemieux: They allow only a certain amount in the car. The treatment of the Canadian public by the railways in this respect is exceedingly liberal.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I did not intend to precipitate a discussion of this kind to-day. It is all very well for members in the millionaire class, like the hon. member for Rouville (Mr. Lemieux) and the hon. member for Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) to talk about these matters as they do; they do not care whether they have a right to travel on railways free or not. But consider the ordinary poor solicitor-farmer member, the common people-it means something to us.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I hope my hon. friend will repeat that at the bank.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: As to the right of a member of Parliament to travel on freight trains, or on any except regular passenger trains,
I wish to say a word.
I have no fault to find with anything. I have never been refused transportation, and have received every courtesy from the railways. Sometimes they do not ask me to sign the release, but I always insist on signing it. I have taken the view of the hon. gentleman from Renfrew (Mr. Graham), that I have not the legal right to travel on a freight train, but I thought I would like to raise the discussion. The Railway Department may know something about the view the railway companies take of this question.


Francis Cochrane: I do not think the hon. member is entitled to ride on freight trains, and I do not think he should be allowed to do it.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess.
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.
On section 302-regularity in train time.


Francis Cochrane: I move that the following be added to this section:
All railway employees on local passenger trains running in the province of Quebec, having to deal with the travelling public, shall be conversant with the English and French languages from and after January 1, 1919.
Amendment agreed to; section as amended agreed to.
On section 346-members of Parliament and board, etc., free:


Levi Thomson: If the minister
does not adopt the suggestion of the member for Saskatoon (Mr. McCraney), this section ought to stand. If a member loses his pass or it is taken away from him, I do not think that he should have to pay for his transportation.


Francis Cochrane: I think we get enough privileges without asking fo'r any more.


Levi Thomson: That Is not a
privilege. If in ordinary cases a man pays when he should not pay, he may recover from the railway company. If a member mislays his certificate or leaves it behind him-, the railway company is nothing out, even if it does- make a refund. In any case, I do not see why they should not be compelled to make refund in such cases.


Francis Cochrane: I do not think so.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 348-dangerous goods:
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Sections 348
and 349 refer to the carrying of dangerous commodities. They have been amended to provide that when carrying dynamite, etc., railway companies must conform with the regulations made by the board. The board has issued exhaustive regulations in this matter.


Rodolphe Lemieux: I was shocked some
months ago when travelling from Montreal to Ste. Agathe to find that dangerous- explosives were being carried on the train.
I hope that the Railway Commissioners have adopted very stringent regulations respecting the carrying of such dangerous commodities.
Section -agreed to.	.
On section 350-carriage of mails, troops, equipment, etc.:
Mr. J, E. ARMSTRONG: The commission struck out after the word "Canada," on the sixth line, the words- "the Commander of the Forces" and inserted the words "the Minister of Militia or the Deputy Minister of Militia."


George Perry Graham: We have two Ministers
of Militia now. Does that apply to -both?


Mr. ROGERS:: This Act only applies to Canada.	-


Mr. REID:: There is only one Minister
of Militia. The other is the Overseas Minister of Militia.


George Perry Graham: That is a rather fine
distinction to draw in a statute. The Overseas Minister of Militia has all the powers of a minister.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 358-traffic by water:
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: This section
deals with a matter in which I have taken a deep personal interest-water-borne traffic. I hope that at no distant date we shall be able to place the boat-s on our inland waters under the control of the Railway Commission.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think the Toronto Board of Trade wanted section 358 amended.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Possibly the hon. gentleman refers to the amendment which I attempted to have the committee accept. It has been struck out.


George Perry Graham: The Boards of Trade were against it.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: A number of them were.


George Perry Graham: Toronto was.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: It was an organized attack, I believe.
' Section agreed to.
On section 373-Lines and wires on highways and public places.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Here an important change is made. It had been held by the Privy Council that "company" in former section 247 was confined to railway company, and that power companies, etc., which were given powers in their special Acts to construct upon highways, could, where there was no restriction in the special Act, do so without any consent or leave and without being put upon any terms or conditions. Old section 248, subsections 2, 3 and 4, put certain limited restrictions on construction of telephone lines, distinguishing between highways in cities, towns, and villages, and highways in other places; and between long-distance or trunk lines, and other lines. The committee struck out after the phrase "line or lines" in the fourth line the clause "for the conveyance of light, heat, power or electricity." Then in paragraph (d) we have the new words "nor without giving at least ten days' previous notice to the owner thereof or to the municipality, nor in any case where forbidden by the board, cut down or mutilate any shade, fruit or ornamental trees, but the board may when it deems proper dispense with such notice and may in any case make any order or direction it deems fit respecting such trees."


George Perry Graham: Cutting down of shade trees by the telephone and telegraph companies is very troublesome to the municipalities. You may have as beautiful a shade tree as you like planted by yourself on the street in front of your house, and then along come the telephone men and cut off perhaps the finest limbs on the tree. It is very difficult to get any satisfaction, and the damage is apparently so small that people usually put up with this practice. In our town many very beautiful elm and maple trees have been practically ruined by the telephone and telegraph repair gangs. These gangs are in many cases composed of men who do not live in the municipality, but are here to-day and gone tomorrow; they spoil your shade tree and

away they go, and there seems to be no recourse.	.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Why was that line struck out in section 373? Was it not this section the Toronto people were here about?


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Section 374 is the one the Toronto people are most interested in.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Why were the words in subsection 1, "for the conveyance of light, heat, power or electricity" struck out?


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: These words
were struck out in three different lines of this section. The matter is dealt with in particular, if I remember rightly, in the following section. The telephone and telegraph people were present at the committee and took a very great interest in section 373. Mr. McCarthy of Toronto was also present, and after listening to his argument in favour of the amendment, which was very necessary, he said, the committee struck out the words my hon. friend. refers to.
On section 374-company:


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: There is a very important change in this section. These two clauses are read together, as was stated by the hon. member for East Lambton (Mr. J. E. Armstrong). The first clause of the section gives a definition of a company. It says:
(1)	In this section,-
(a)	"company" means any person or company having legislative authority from the Parliament of Canada to acquire, construct, operate or maintain works, machinery, plant, lines, poles, tunnels, conduits, or other means for receiving, generating, storing, transmitting, distributing or supplying electricity or other power or energy, but does not include a railway company, or a telegraph company or telephone company.
That is it simply refers to electric light and power companies. It separates telephone and telegraph companies from the others, and cuts it down to dealing expressly with electric light and power companies.
I have no hesitation in saying it is the grossest piece of class or local legislation I have ever heard proposed, much less enacted in law, since I came to this Parliament thirteen or fourteen years ago. The Railway Committee in Parliament has for a great many years been trying to carry out the general provision, which says that nothing shall be done in any municipality without the consent of the municipality, and if the parties interested cannot agree they appeal to the Railway Board, and the decision of the Railway Board is final.

That is the only fair and decent way I can imagine of settling these matters. Some difference arose between the city of Toronto and the Toronto Electric Railway Company. There is the Toronto Electric Light, Heat and Power Company, which is closely bound up with the Toronto Electric Railway Company and also with the Toronto and Niagara Power Company, which, I may say, is the father of them all. The explanation given to the committee was that the Ontario Hydro-Electric Commission had spend about five million dollars in the city of Toronto developing the light, heat and power situation, or the city of Toronto, acting under the Hydro Electric Commission, had expended that amount of money. In any event that much money had been spent, and because- they had dealt entirely with the Hydro Electric Commission, they ought to be placed in a position different from any other company or any other corporation or municipality in Canada.


Francis Cochrane: No, that is not right,


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Yes, it is right.


Francis Cochrane: The policy is that the municipality should control its own streets.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: But that is not the policy in any other place in Canada, and I challenge the minister to put his finger on a solitary statute where any municipality has the right to control its own streets unless it is subject to an appeal to the Railway Board. I know they will tell you this case stands out by itself, but that does not alter the fact that this company got powers from this Parliament, and started operation in good faith. They spent millions and millions of dollars, and now, because the Hydro-Electric Commission, or the people of Toronto acting under the Hydro-Electric Commission spent about five million dollars, they ought to have the right to say the Toronto Electric Light, Company cannot extend their plant or works unless the municipality gives them permission. The municipality told us in so many words they would not give that permission, because they did not want them as competitors, and the sub-committee of this House introduced clause 5 into this Bill simply to give the municipality of Toronto the absolute right to prevent this company from doing business. I protested against it then, and I protest now. I do not suppose my protest will have much weight, but I could not allow class legislation of that character to go through without objection. You may say the city of Toronto ought to have the right
224*
to control their own streets. If my hon. friend will take that attitude with every corporation and every municipality in Canada we will discuss it. If he will say there is no appeal of a municipality to the Railway Board, it is debatable, but to say there is an appeal except in the case of Toronto, to prevent a company which has been doing business there for eighteen years from continuing business, I say is class legislation and should not be allowed. The real cause of the trouble is in the definition given in subsection 1, and the amendment in subsection 5. This is so cunningly worded that unless one had been 'before the sub-committee and had listened to the arguments of the lawyers on both sides one could not tell what it meant. You could not take that section before any court in Canada to-day and get an intelligent interpretation of it unless you had some outside evidence to buttress it up and show what it means. Let me read it:-
(5) The provisions of the last preceding subsection shall apply to and restrict the powers of any company heretofore incorporated by Special Act or other authority of the Parliament of Canada notwithstanding that such provisions may be inconsistent with the provisions of such Special Act or other authority, and notwithstanding the provisions of section three of this Act; and it is hereby declared that the powers of any such company have been so restricted since the date of the enactment of chapter thirty-seven of the Revised Statutes of Canada 1906, that is to say, the thirty-first day of January, 1907.
The only way they could work this out was to make this clause retroactive by ten years. I do not believe such a proposition was ever even mooted, let alone attempted to be enacted in law in this Parliament, and I can only say that so far as I am concerned I shall vote against this subsection.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Mr. McCarthy and others who appeared with him when this clause was originally before us protested against the introduction of the amendment, They stated that they had sold bonds in England of the Toronto Niagara Power Company for $15,000,000, and we are practically confiscating these bonds.


Francis Cochrane: No.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: We are taking away their rights to supply power in Toronto where they are established and that is practically the same thing. I, like my hon. friend (Mr. Garve'll), voted against it at the time and I certainly will vote against it now. I voted against it then with a full understanding of what we were doing. We , are practically confiscating the rights of

the Toronto Niagara Power Company and we are largely redwing the value of the bonds in England if we are not entirely destroying it. That is not fair. The people have invested their money in good faith.


Francis Cochrane: No, they had to act
in bad faith to gelt to Toronto. The Toronto Electric Light company agreed that they would sell out to the city. And to get there they virtually sold out to the Toronto Electric Light Company.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: In 1917 the city had the right to take over the works.


Francis Cochrane: Not of the Electric
Development Company but of the Electric Light Company.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: We have no proof of
that. We just had a statement to that effect. The solicitors for the Hydro-Electric and for the city of Toronto made that statement but they furnished no proof to the committee that it was true. They only surmised that might be true. But, in the meantime, they ask us to enact clause 5 to take away the rights of the people who put their money into these bonds. I see no reason why Toronto should not buy
it these corporations if they want to take them over.


Francis Cochrane: They will buy them
Out, but they do not want to buy out the Electric Development Company.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: What- good is the Electric Development Company?


Francis Cochrane: That is not part of the agreement. They (are buying out the Toronto Electric Light Company and this is an .attempt to get in there in perpetuity and to secure an eternal franchise by improper means.
Mr. -NESBITT:	That is purely a surmise. They have furnished no proof that that statement is correct. In the meantime they ask us to enact ia clause to do away with a statute passed by this Parliament. They said that Parliament did not know what it was doing. I believe that the Parliaments that have gone before knew what they were doing just as much as we do now. I have no doubt that the .people of Toronto were very glad to get that, power transmitted to them at that time. Now they have other power and they want to cut off the rights of this company which were acquired 10 years ago.


Francis Cochrane: The Toronto Electric Light Company got their franchise in To-

ronto long before the Niagara power was developed. They developed their power by coal. Then the Toronto Niagara Power Company had a franchise for Niagara. Trie franchise which they got was only for a certain number of years. The Power Company conceived the idea that if they got control of the Toronto Electric Light Company they could have a perpetual franchise and develop electricity at Niagara. That is a different thing altogether. If this Parliament gave them that right they gave them something which was unfair. The municipality has the right to control its own streets and if we did wrong once there is no reason why we should perpetuate it.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The other part of the clause makes it impossible for anybody to interfere with the streets of a municipality in the future. I believe that the municipality has the right to control its own streets


Francis Cochrane: Ever since I have had anything to do with the Railway Committee there has been a clause in every Bill protecting ' the rights of the municipality. For the last six years this Parliament has not given a charter to any company carrying with it the right to interfere with the streets of a municipality. We have put in a special clause to protect the municipality. In this we are doing nothing but what is fair and just to the people.


John Howard Sinclair: I sympathize with the views of the hon, member for Carleton, N.B. (Air. Carvell) and the hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt) and I voted against this clause in committee. I am still of the same opinion. I am especially opposed to that part of the section which . has a retroactive effect. I agree with the minister that a city ought to have control of its own streets. But when we go back for ten years for the purpose of. taking away from a company right, which they acquired in a proper and legal way from this Parliament, and which they have exercised ever since, I think we do something for which there is no justification. Their title to the rights which they claim was sustained by the highest court in the Empire, the Privy Council. We are undertaking in the latter part of this section to take away and nullify the rights that were given the Toronto and Niagara Power Company under a decision of the Privy Council. That is confiscation. While I agree with the minister that in the future the city ought to have the right to control its own streets, and while I would vote for that, I

do not agree with him that we ought to put this retroactive clause in because it would mean taking away a right that was given to this company by an Act of Parliament, and a right which has been sustained by the decision of the highest court in the realm. There is no doubt that it is confiscation. A letter explaining the position was written to the chairman of this committee which I do not think has yet been placed on Hansard. It is as follows:
National Trust Company, Limited,
Toronto, May 26, 1917i Joseph E. Armstrong, Esq., M.P.,
Chairman of Committee sitting on Revision of Railway Act,
Parliament Buildings,
Ottawa, Ont.
Dear Sir,-
We are trustees under a bond mortgage dated March 1, 1903, securing an issue of bonds of The Electrical Development Company of Ontario, Limited, maturing in 1933. The total amount of this issue now outstanding is $9,669,500, and of this amount approximately $2,500,000 were issued directly to the British public, and an additional $5,014,000 is held by the British. Empire Trust Company, Limited, of London, England, as security for the debenture stock of the Toronto Power Company, Limited, which debenture stock was issued to the British public. The practical situation, therefore, is that the loss which would be occasioned by any impairment of the security for the bonds of The Electrical Development Company of Ontario, Limited, would primarily fall upon British investors.
As trustees under the said bond mortgage, we hold here as part of the mortgaged premises the whole of the $1,500,000 of bonds and practically all of the capital stock of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company. By reason of these holdings, the bondholders of the Electrical Development Company are entitled, as one of the most important parts of their security, not only to the benefit of the physical assets of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company represented by its present and future transmission and distribution lines and other properties but also to the benefit of all its franchises, rights and corporate powers.
The Toronto and Niagara Power Company is a Dominion company incorporated by Chapter 107 of the Statutes of Canada, 2 Edward VII (1902). We are advised that under its Act of Incorporation'the Toronto and Niagara Power Company has, amongst other rights:
(a)	The right to supply hydraulic, electric or other power by means of cables, machinery or other appliances;
(b)	The right to acquire, construct, maintain and operate works for the production, sale and distribution of electricity and power for any purpose for which such electricity or power can be used ;
(c)	The right to construct, maintain and operate lines of wires, poles, tunnels, conduits and other works In the manner and to the extent required for the corporate purposes of the company, and to conduct, store, sell and supply electricity and other power and with such lines of wire, poles, conduits, motors or other conductors or devices to conduct, convey, furnish or receive such electricity to or
from any person at any place, through, over, along or across any publie highway, bridges, viaducts, railways, water courses, or over or under any waters, etc., and
(d)	To erect poles, construct trenches or conduits or do other things necessary for the transmission of heat or light as fully as the circumstances of the case may require, provided the same are so constructed as not to incommode the public use of streets, highways or public places, or to impede the access to any house or other building erected in the vicinity thereof, or to interrupt the navigation of any waters, the company, however, being responsible for all damages which it causes in carrying out or maintaining any of its works.
The powers of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company including those above mentioned, may be exercised without the consent of any municipal corporation, the right of the company to so exercise them having been, as we are advised, affirmed by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council In the case of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company v. Corporation of the Town of North Toronto, 1912, A.C. page 834.
"We have been apprised that your Committee is now considering Bill No. 13, an Act to consolidate and amend the Railway Act, certain provisions of which, if enacted in the form in which they appear in the copy of the Bill which we have seen, would seriously limit and impair the rights, powers and privileges of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company, and would correspondingly affect the security for the bonds of The Electrical Development Company of Ontario, Limited.	*
It is, of course, obvious that the value of the undertaking of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company depends wholly on its ability to market the power which it transmits from Niagara over its transmission lines, and an impairment of its ability to effect such distribution would, therefore, result in serious loss to the holders of the bonds of the Electrical Development Company.
As trustees for the bondholders of the Electrical Development Company of Ontario, Limited, under the circumstances above set out, we beg respectfully to submit that the provisions of the draft Act to consolidate and amend the Railway Act, above referred to, should be so amended as not to impair or limit the charter rights of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company, or that the Toronto and Niagara Power Company, should be excepted from their operation, so long as any of the bonds of the Electrical Development Company of Ontario, Limited, remain outstanding.
Tours faithfully,
Trust Officer^
I have no brief to act for any of these parties. I never had any consultation with any of them. I never heard anything in connection with this question except what I heard publicly before the committee. My objection is that we are confiscating a right to which this company is legally entitled. I am surprised that the minister is making such a proposal to the House. I have great faith in his fairness, and I was able to agree with him on nearly everything in connection with this Railway

Act white we were considering it, excepting this one thing. I cannot make up my mind to agree to the course pursued by the minister in regard to this matter, and I want to put myself on record as opposed to it, and to vote against it.


George Perry Graham: I am not sure that there is any reason why I should take up the cudgels for Toronto, but I want to state the other side of the case. The minister has briefly outlined the situation, but it must not be forgotten that in Ontario, under a Provincial Act, there has been undertaken a work that has not been undertaken elsewhere. The Hydro-Electric Commission, acting by virtue of a statute of Ontario, has undertaken and put in force what is without doubt the greatest public work of this kind anywhere in the world, controlled by the province and by the municipalities. It can be understood that in connection with such a scheme as that difficulties will be met with in the way of vested rights held by companies, and it must not be forgotten that privileges granted to companies by this Parliament and by the Legislature of Ontario previously, never contemplated the situation that has arisen; and, in justification of this amendment and of some very drastic legislation, perhaps in some instances too drastic, passed 'by the Ontario Legislature, it must be remembered that the object of all this was to remove obstacles from the way of the full development of the Hydro-Electric system, in a large measure that accounts for this amendment, although the explanation may be a little intricate and might not be of interest to this House. In view of the object contemplated and of what has been accomplished and what is to be accomplished in the future in the way of bringing electric power not alone to the cities and towns but to the doors of the farmers throughout the country, I am prepared to go a long way in voting for legislation that will remove impediments from the path of that great enterprise.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: My hon. friend talks of the great work the Hydro-Electric has done, and with that I have no quarrel. He talks about the objects of the Hydro-Electric, and no doubt they are the very best in the world. But the Hydro-Electric Commission are not the only people in Canada who are taking electric power to the people in the cities and towns, and to the farmers as well-and others are delivering it a great deal cheaper than the Hydro-Electric Commission. They are not the only philanthropists in Canada. Because Ontario as a province is trying to work out a great scheme which they say

will be for the benefit of the people of Ontario, does that give them a legal right to step in and confiscate property which men have honestly acquired and for which they have paid good money? A public corporation like the province of Ontario should be the last class of people to do a thing like this. I could understand a private corporation attempting to do it to get the better of a competitor. But here is the great province of Ontario, according to the statement of the hon. member for Renfrew (Mr. Graham), wanting to confiscate private property and to create class legislation. If they want these properties why do they not buy them and treat the owners as any white man would?


Francis Cochrane: Why do not your people carry out their agreement?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: My people?


Francis Cochrane: Yes.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I have never spoken to a man about this. I was not even here when Mr. McCarthy presented his case. I have never had a conversation with any one with respect to the Toronto Electric Company or the Toronto-Niagara, or anything in connection with this case. I am protesting against this as a matter of principle, and trying to point out to the minister the terrible consequences that may follow legislation like this, and, worse than that, surreptitiously smuggling it in in a general Act.


Francis Cochrane: How is that?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Putting it in at the end of
a general clause. By section 374, subsection 1, "company" is defined. Then subsection 2 provides as follows:
(2)	Notwithstanding anything contained in any Special or other Act or authority of the Parliament of Canada or of the legislature of any province, the company shall not, except as in this section provided, acquire, construct, maintain or operate any works, machinery, plant, line, pole, tunnel, conduit or other device upon, along, across, or under any highway, square or other public place within the limits of any city, town, village or township, without the consent of the municipality.
Subsection 3 provides:
(3)	If the company cannot obtain the consent of the municipality or cannot obtain such consent otherwise than subject to conditions not acceptable to the company, the company may apply to the Board for leave to exercise its powers upon such highway, square or public place.
The board holds an investigation and makes an order which is binding on the company and on the municipality. That is

the general law of Canada. That is the law that hereafter will apply to every corporation in Canada incorporated by this Parliament. And then what? They stick on two clauses after that, I say, surreptitiously- and I use the word advisedly-two clauses which no man in the world would understand unless the special circumstances were brought to his attention. Toronto is not mentioned; the Toronto Electric Light is not mentioned, the Toronto-Niagara is not mentioned, the Hydro-Electric is not mentioned-one of the finest pieces of underground grafting I ever heard in my life. And the Minister of Railways wants this Parliament to enact that and make it the iaw of the land. It is an outrage, nothing short of it.


Mr. BARNARD:: I consider this legislation objectionable on two grounds. I do not pretend to speak from an intimate knowledge of the facts, but from a hasty perusal of the proceedings which took place before the Special Committee on this Bill, it appears to me that this particular company whose rights are in question obtained certain charter rights in connection with the city of Toronto from Parliament. Those rights were the subject of litigation, which was carried to the Privy Council, and in the result the rights of the company were upheld. On the faith of that decision I presume the company has made certain expenditures. It is important, if those rights are going to be taken away, that before they are so taken away the company should receive compensation. I object to subsection 5 upon another ground. If this Parliament sees fit to take certain rights away from a particular company, the Toronto company, let them say so.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That is right,


George Henry Barnard: But to frame a general clause and say that every company which had charter rights since 1906-


Francis Cochrane: Thi is not for Toronto alone. It is for Ontario.


George Henry Barnard: Well, for Ontario, but I venture to say that this legislation is hitting at one particular company. I may be wrong in. that; I speak subject to correction. If the legislation is intended for the province of Ontario, the fact should be stated. I object to firing a charge of grape shot when you don't know where the pellets are going to land, and that is what you are doing here. You are dealing w'ith every company incorporated in Canada since 1906, and taking away certain rights
which may have been "given, and, on general principles, I submit the legislation is altogether objectionable and should not be adopted.


Francis Cochrane: A power company from Montreal came here last session and they had the same rights as these people have. The Railway Committee took those rights away from that company and inserted a clause similar to this section. There was not any squeal about it then.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: But they had not done any work


Francis Cochrane: Yes, they had, but these people had not.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Yes, these people have built the line.


Francis Cochrane: What line?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The Toronto-Niagara
Power Company.


Francis Cochrane: That is not for Toronto
alone.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I do not know what other locality it can serve.


Francis Cochrane: There are lots of places between those two points that it can serve.


John Howard Sinclair: Can the hon. minister inform us if there is any other company affected by this section, except the Toronto company?


Francis Cochrane: The other companies thought their powers were taken away from them.


John Howard Sinclair: This section reads:
Notwithstanding the provision of section 3 of this Act, it is hereby declared that the powers of any such company have been so restricted since the date of the enactment of Chapter 37 of the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1906, that is to say, the 31st January, 1907.
It not only applies to the Toronto-Niagara company, but it applies to any company that dates since that time, if there are any such companies in Canada. We were informed that no other companies were affected by this section, excepting the Toronto-Niagara company. I do not know whether that is the case or not, and I question if the minister or any hon. member can say whether we are interfering with the rights of any other company by this legislation or not. But the legislation is certainly vicious, inasmuch as it is retro. active. I do not want to be misunderstood. I want to vote for a clause that will give the city of Toronto the power to deal with

this, question tor the future, but I do not want to vote for a clause that dates back to 1906, and takes away certain rights which that company legally and properly enjoyed at that date, and enjoys to-day. If it is right that the city of Toronto should have the right in the future in the public interest, let us give that right, but let us not, in order to do so, introduce such a section into the General Railway Act of Canada when we do not know who will be struck by it. We are not certain how far this provision goes, and I want the minister to consider that point. There may be other companies that have obtained rights as far back as 1906, which rights may be affected by the legislation we are passing here.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: I had the privilege of listening to the representatives of the Toronto and Niagara Company and ^presentatives of the Hydro Electric Commission. These representatives were before <s on two or three occasions, and they gave 4 great deal of exhaustive evidence in sup-oort of both sides, but let me call attention ,o the fact that while this legislation is somewhat retroactive, it is also legislation ,n the public interest. Let me read from a .etter the hon. gentleman from Guysborough quoted a few moments ago, and look at *he powers the Toronto-Niagara Company nad granted to them by the Parliament of Canada in 1902, and then- consider whether-you would agree to extend similar powers to any other company in the Dominion of Canada. The powers granted to that company were as follows:
(a)	The right to supply hydraulic, electric or other power by means of cables, machinery or other appliances;
(b)	The right to acquire, construct, maintain and operate works for the production, sale and distribution of electricity and power for any purpose for which such electricity or power can be used;
(c)	The right to construct, maintain and operate lines of wire, poles, tunnels, conduits and other works in the manner and to the extent required for the corporate purposes or the company, and to conduct, store, sell and supply electricity and other power and with such lines of wire, poles, conduits, motors or other conductors or devices to conduct, convey, furnish or receive such electricity to or from any persons at any place, through, over, along or across any public highway, bridges, viaducts, railways, water courses, or over or under any waters, etc., and
(d)	To erect poles, construct trenches or conduits or do other things necessary for the transmission of heat or light as fully as the circumstances of the case may require, provided the same are so constructed as not to incommode the public use of streets, highways or public places, or to impede the access to any house or other building erected in the

vicinity thereof, or to interrupt the navigation of any waters the company, however, being responsible for all damages which it causes in carrying out or maintaining any of its works.
I should like the committee to pay particular attention to the following paragraph:
The powers of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company including those above mentioned, may be exercised without the consent of any municipal corporation, the right of the Company to so exercise them having been, as we are advised, affirmed by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in the case of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company v. Corporation of the Town of North Toronto, 1912, A.C. page 834.
If this legislation was not brought forward at this time and placed on the statute book, this same company could go into any town, city or village in Canada, erect poles and carry on their operations in direct opposition to the wishes of any of the municipalities in Canada. They can carry on all these operations, in spite of any of the men who represent these municipalities, or the people who are living in them. We believe that that is not in the public interest. Therefore, the committee decided that they should insert this, section, which will compel them to do as subsection 4 of this section of the Bill compels them to do. That section reads:
(4)	Nothing contained in this section shall be deemed to authorize the company, nor shall the company have any right, to acquire, construct, maintain or operate any distribution system or to distribute light, heat, power or electricity in any city, town, village or township ; or to erect, put or place in, over, along or under any highway or public place in any city, town, village or township any works, machinery, plant, pole, tunnel, conduits, or other device for the purpose of such distribution without the' company first obtaining consent therefor by a by-law of the municipality.
We are asking them to come under the same law which all other companies are compelled to come under to-day, which requires them to obtain the consent of the municipality, before they are allowed to erect their poles and continue their operations.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: As far as I am personally concerned, I was one of the first members of the Railway Committee that insisted that what we call the standard clause should be put in all railway charters.
I also insisted upon that when they came back for a renewal of charter. The member for East Larabton read subsection 4 as if we were objecting to it. We are not objecting to subsection 4. We have put in all recent Acts a provision giving the municipalities the absolute control of their

own streets. I think the member for East La mb ton unintentionally misled the committee by reading that clause and saying that we objected to it.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: I hope the
thon. gentleman will not put into my mouth words that I did not utter. In the early part of my remarks I called particular attention to the fact that this was retroactive legislation.
iMr. NESBITT:	I think my hon. friend
said, a kind of retroactive legislation. Certainly the latter part of his remarks tended to give the impression that we were opposed to giving the municipalities absolute control of their own streets. That is not the case. What we object to is subsection 5, which Teads:
The provisions of the last preceding subsection shall apply to and restrict the powers of any company heretofore incorporated by Special Act or other authority of the Parliament of Canada notwithstanding that such provisions may be inconsistent with the provisions of such Special Act or other authority, and notwithstanding the provisions of section three of this Act; and it is hereby declared that the powers of any such company have been so restricted since the date of the enactment of chapter thirty-seven of the Revised Statutes of Canada 1906, that is to say, the thirty-first day of January, 1907.
We contend that it is not fair to have al-_ lowed ithese people to invest their money under that Act


Francis Cochrane: They never invested
their money under that Act.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: What did they invest it under?


Francis Cochrane: The	Toronto Electric Light Company have invested their money.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The Toronto-Niagara
Power Company built their plant.


Francis Cochrane: They	built it long
after they got the franchise and long after they invested their money in the streets of Toronto.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: They built it under that special Act. That is what we are objecting to. My hon. friend wishes to make that provision retroactive, practically confiscating the bonds sold by the company in England on the credit of this country.
Mr. CARVEnL: I do not accuse the member for East Lambton of trying to mislead the committee, but when he takes the trouble to read all the clauses of the special Act under which this company was incorporated twenty years ago he unwittingly
misleads the committee. I am afraid-I do not say it offensively-that my hon. friend has not grasped the real contention. We do not ask that any company have the right to use the streets of any municipality without the consent of that municipality. All we ask is that the provisions of section 374 be left alone. Make them general; do not make any special cases or discriminations.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: If the retroactive clauses are left out, will this same company not have the power to go into any municipality in Canada, erect poles and carry on operations without the consent of that municipality?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No, certainly not; that is what I am pointing out. The section as drawn is a perfectly reasonable section and should be applied to every corporation in Canada. First, it defines " company." Secondly, it provides that the company shall not erect poles, plant, or lines without the consent of the municipality. Subsection 3 provides that if the company cannot agree with the municipality, reference is had to the Railway Board. That is all that we ask in this case. We ask that the Toronto Electric Light Company shall be placed in the same position as any other corporation in Canada. The member for Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) has pointed out that this company received its charter from this Parliament eighteen or twenty years ago. It is in evidence before the committee-and this, I think, is absolutely undisputed-that the company sold bonds in England to the extent of $15,000,000.
Mr. COCHRANE [DOT]_ There is no evidence of that.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That statement was
made by a reputable solicitor; 1 forget his name. My hon. friend did not challenge the accuracy of his statement at that time, and I am sure that he will not do so now. They expended that money in good faith under their charter. If the Parliament of Canada provides that this company cannot go on any further without the consent of thfe Railway Board, that is all right, because they are being treated the same as every other corporation in Canada. Twenty years ago Parliament gave rights to corporations that they would not think of giving now, and it is quite right that some of these provisions should be abridged. But it is monstrous to take away from one particular company the rights on which they borrowed money and sold their bonds; to hold them up, and say:	You cannot pro-

- ceed even if the; Railway Board says you can; you are entirely bound by what the municipality says. The principle of appeal to the Railway Board in such cases is exactly the same as the right of expropriation on	the part of a railway
company.	If the railway company
did not have the right of expropriation, you would never have a public work in Canada; somebody would always be selfish enough to hold up the enterprise because they could not get what they wanted for the right of way.


Mr. CURRIE:: My hon. friend knows that in the United States there is no such right as he speaks of.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: They have the right of eminent domain in the United States. No railway on earth could be built without that right.


John Allister Currie: Not a bit of it.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: They have the right of eminent domain in the United States. A gentleman who knows as much as my hon. friend does ought to know that.


John Allister Currie: You do not know everything.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: But you do; that is why I think you ought to know this. If my hon. friend will look at any of the works on eminent domain published in the United States, he will find not merely books, but volumes, on the exercising of that right. What applies to the farmer in respect of right of way ought to apply to the municipality. We must have electric light and power companies. The world is moving; Canada is moving; but we cannot move properly unless we have all the modern appliances that make life better. But you will run up against a selfish municipality just as you will run up against a selfish farmer, and you should have some power to	prescribe	the	conditions under
which this right of expropriation shall be exercised.	The first three subsections are perfectly fair; the city ought to have control of its own streets. But if the municipal authorities are unreasonable; if they want to live as they have lived for fifty years, somebody ought to have the right to step in and decide the matter. All we ask is that the law be applied to this company the same as it is to all other companies. I move that subsection 5 be struck out.


Mr. NICKLE:: Before I came to the meeting of this committee, I had not an 
opportunity of giving very careful consideration to section 374. But reading it here this evening it seems to me that subsection 4 is diametrically opposed to subsection 3.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: There is no doubt about it.


William Folger Nickle: Subsection 3, as I read it, seems to vest in the Railway Board the discretionary right of determining whether or not a company shall have the right to exercise its powers, providing the municipality and the company cannot agree.
Subsection 4 however, seems to override subsection 3. lit says that, unless a by-law of the municipality is passed, then no matter whether the board consents or not, it is impossible for the company to go on with its work. If I were asked to construe that section it seems to me that I would be driven to the conclusion that the two subsections were so antagonistic that it would be very difficult to know exactly what was meant. But my .inclination at the present time would lead to the construction that subsection 4 was the prevailing subsection, and that nothing could be done even if the board consented.
Turning to subsection 5, it seems to me that the latter part of that subsection contains a very dangerous clause^the clause that states that no matter what a company may have done subsequent to a certain date that work were illegally done if the consent of the municipality had not been obtained, even although the provisions of the .company s private Act may have been respected. I do not know the particular case that w.as aimed at by this section, if, indeed, there be any particular case, but certainly it seems to me unreasonable that we should legislate in such a way as possibly to deprive certain companies of the value of their .property. Because unless they .had obtained the consent of the municipality any works they had erected subsequent to 1907 they would have no right to continue, even although such work might have been done pursuant to their private Act. This might turn out to be legislation of the most radical kind in certain cases; it might be confiscation.
I think this matter should be carefully considered before the committee gives its consent to the enunciation of a principle as broad as I .consider this to be.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: My hon. friend has
raised a very important point. On first thoughts I would -ask to have both subsections 4 and 5 struck out. Subsection 4,

or 'the first part of it at all events, although. not in the same words as subsection 2, is of the same legal effect. In the latter part of subsection

4 my 'hon. friend will find one of these little gentlemen again, the meaning of which nobody knows unless he happened to be present at the meetings of the special committee and heard it explained. It says:
Provided that this subsection shall not prevent the company from delivering or supplying such power by any means now existing or under the provisions of any contract now in force for use in the operation of any railway or for use by any other company lawfully engaged in the distribution of such power within any such city, town, village or township.
That in plain English means this: The Toronto Electric Light Company have at the present time wires for bringing energy from Niagara Falls to Toronto for distribution to the Toronto Street Railway Company. They also supply power to certain industries, and to some extent supply electric light. Now that corporation, or the gentlemen who represented it, were willing that they should be allowed to continue doing what they have been allowed to' do up to the present time. Their attitude was: "Thus far and no further shalt thou go. You can still supply power for the railway, still supply power to the industries you are already serving, still go on supplying electric light, but you cannot expand. You have to stop right there, and never go one step further unless the city of - Toronto want you to." That was the reason for the introduction of subsection 4. In my judgment both subsections. 4 and 5 should be struck out. The clause would he perfectly intelligible and perfectly fair without them. I think that if subsection 4 is allowed to remain in the Bill it will still be regulated by subsection 3. If they could not agree upon the location of the poles, or whatever it might be, they could apply to the Railway Board. I think that subsection 4 is dangerous and ought to come out in to to.


William Folger Nickle: I do not want to follow my argument any further, but I should like to know what the hon. member for East Lambton thinks of my contention with regard to the construction that should be put on the latter part of subsection 5. I am thoroughly with him to the extent that municipalities should control their streets, but I want to know whether in his opinion the latter part of subsection 5, as drafted, would make it legal work that had been done pursuant to a special Act, if the consent of the municipality had not been obtained under subsection 4.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: I do not know that it is up to me to attempt a legal argument, but I may say that I have gone over the evidence that was presented to the committee very carefully, and I am satisfied that this legislation is in the public interest.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: I have listened to the hon. member for Carleton and the hon. member for Kingston, and I think I understand the points they are making. I understand them to say that this company had the right under their original charter to erect poles and construct other work without consulting the city. We are now asked to pass an Act which will make it incumbent upon them to have obtained that consent; the clause is retroactive. Are we not making the company trespassers ab initio as regards all the work they have done?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: They have to get the consent of the municipality.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: This legislation is to have effect from the time they got their charter.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Not when they got the charter, but a few years afterwards.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Under this Act the provision that the consent of the municipality shall foe obtained will be deemed to have always been in their charter. We are creating them trespassers from the very beginning, for having erected these poles and done all this other work without authority, and that is a very awkward position for them to be put in. They will be subject to all the drastic penalties that companies are liable to who violate their legislation. The Attorney General of Ontario might obtain an order confiscating their charter, because if this provision is to be made a part of their charter then their charter has been violated, and they are subject to confiscation of everything they have done under it. That is of far-reaching effect, and -we should certainly hesitate before putting a retroactive clause of that kind in their charter.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: It is being put in the general Railway Act ol Canada.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: This general Act covers the special Act of the company, and therefore it is just the same as if this provision was in their charter. We are attempting to pass very drastic legislation which will cause the company to forfeit their rights because they have violated the law of the country.
Mr. A. 0. MAODONELL: I was not able to he present during the early part of this

discussion, but I took a very active interest in this Bill, as hon. members who were present will remember, when it was before the special committee. I do not know to what extent the section has been explained this evening, but I can assure the committee it received most thorough consideration by the special committee to whom the Bill was referred. Part No. 16 of the Proceedings of the special committee appointed to consider this Bill gives a record of the people who asked to have this clause put in. It is dated the 18th of May.
The people who came to that meeting asked the committee to pass this legislation. Among others present and made this request were the united municipalities of all Canada. The municipalities have organizations in the various provinces, and a Dominion organization. They came here as a Dominion organization and asked to have it inserted. The Hydro Electric Power Commission of the province of Ontario asked to have it inserted. They represented more than one hundred municipalities which have money in similar enterprises. The Ontario Government sent a man down here to advocate the insertion of this clause, and subsequently a very lengthy and a!ble memorandum was presented by the Ontario Government which was read by the chairman of the committee, and which will be found in No. 22 of the proceedings of the committee held May 31. The city of Toronto and other municipalities were represented. This is not a local^ matter concerning Toronto, or concerning the province of Ontario. It is Dominion-wide. On general principles I am opposed to retroactive legislation, but this is the only thing to meet the present condition, and I think its passage is justified. The different interests which asked for this legislation did so in part upon these grounds: In the year 1902 a company was formed and given a charter by the Parliament of Canada, under the name of the Toronto and Niagara Power Company. Under sections 12 and 13 of that Act this company can go anywhere and erect poles. It is true they are operating in the Toronto and Niagara district, but they are not confined to that, and' by their charter they can go anywhere in Canada without consent of the municipalities through which they go.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Will my hon. friend
allow me to ask him a question? Is it not true that *by the provisions of subsections 2 and 3 of section 374, they could erect poles only by permission of the Railway Board, if the municipality objected?


Mr. A. C. MACDONELL:: No. My hon. friend is not correct, because that is not the question involved.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Then let me read what it^ says, because I do not think my hon. friend has read it aright:
Notwithstanding anything- contained in any special or other Act or authority of the Parliament of Canada or of the Legislature of any province, the company shall not, except as in this section provided, acquire, construct, maintain or operate any works, machinery, plant, line, pole, tunnel, conduit, or other device upon, along, across or under any highway, square or other public place within the limits of any city, town, village, or township, without the consent of the municipality.
Section 3 says if they cannot agree they go to the Railway Board.


Angus Claude Macdonell: Let me point out to my hon. friend that power companies have two objects in view, and the general Railway Act provides for those two different classes of operation. The first is transmission lines-poles-which is not in any way touched by the clause now under consideration. This is absolutely under the general provisions of the Railway Act, and it is in the same position as the lines and poles of any other power company or of any telephone or telegraph company. What is aimed at here, and what is provided for, is the distribution of power, which is the second thing a power company does. The amendment under consideration in no way interferes with, impedes, or touches that transmission right. All that is dealt with in subsections 4 and 5 is the distribution of power, which is prohibited for the reason that this company had authority to distribute power without consulting anybody or any municipality, and is the only power company which has that right.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Does my hon. friend mean to say that the words "shall not, except as in this section provided, acquire, construct, maintain, or operate any works, machinery, plant, line, pole, tunnel, conduit or other device upon, along, across, or under any highway, square or other public place" do not mean the distribution of power?


Angus Claude Macdonell: That is the
general law to-day.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Of course it is. That is what I say.


Angus Claude Macdonell: There is nothing new in that. The only new thing we are dealing with here is subsection 5, which makes it retroactive.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Then you get away from your distribution.


Angus Claude Macdonell: No, I do not. What those who came before the committee asked was that power lines and power distribution should be separated from telephone and telegraph distribution because there has been so much litigation and such contradictory decisions with regard to the transmission and distribution of power under the Dominion Railway Act. In section 374 we are dealing entirely and exclusively with power. It is better so, and any court can so understand it, because it is not mixed up with otner distribution systems. As my hon. friend from Carleton, N.B. (Mr. Carvell) has just pointed out, subsection 3 is the same as the General Railway Act. The amendment under consideration in no way affects the transmission of power. It simply deals with the distribution of power. Subsection 8 of section 247 of the Railway Act, 1906, makes this provision with regard to the distribution of power and the erection of poles for that distribution.
Nothing oontained in this section shall be deemed to authorize the company to exercise the powers therein mentioned for the purpose of selling or distributing light, heat, power or electricity in cities, towns or villages, without the company having first obtained consent therefor by a bylaw of the municipality.
That has been the law for years, and that is the law to-day, for the protection of municipalities. The highways of the municipalities were sacred to the municipalities and could only be invaded for the purpose of running lines of poles for the distribution of power with the copsent of the municipality. For main lines, such as this company has, provision is made in the very section which we are now discussing. There it will .be found that provision is made for the transmission through municipalities of power by use of main lines and if the municipality does not consent, then the Railway Board is consulted and an arrangement is made. This company has, and will always have, the right to transmit power and to have lines wherever 'it wants to put them subject to the approval of the Railway Board, but the company shall not act as a distributing and selling company without the consent of the municipality.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: What will they do with the power then?


Angus Claude Macdonell: That has been the law always. The municipality has the right to say whether a company shall act
as a distributing and selling company within its confines or not. That is a proper law. The Toronto and Niagara Power Company is not a general distributing company. It has main lines and it sells its power wholesale as I understand it. The section which is now under consideration in no way impairs or takes away one iota of business or the right which it has exercised in the way of transmitting power because it does not act as a general distributing company. It is a wholesale company producing power at Niagara Falls and transmitting it to Toronto and other places.
It has main lines to accomplish this purpose and there is no interference with its operations in that resipeet. It goes on with its main lines just as it did before.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: If it does not interfere with them why does the hon, gentleman want this clause in?


Angus Claude Macdonell: I will come tc that. This company was incorporates in 1902 before the Railway Commission wa, appointed. The Railway Commission was appointed in 1903 and there was no tribunal to which reference couid be made in an Act of Parliament to settle disputed P 'ints between a municipality and a railway or power corporation. They were given wonderfully wide powers to go anywhere they chose, not only to carry their main lines through any municipality with or without the consent of the municipality but also- and here is the rub-to act as a distributing or selling company in any community and to sell their power without the municipality's consent. That is what this section is aimed at. The Toronto and Niagara Power Company commenced operations in North Toronto. They were running their lines wherever they chose and the corporation^ of the town of North Toronto said:	You
cannot do that; you will have to comply with subsection 8 ,of section 247 of the Railway Act 1906, which provides that the company shall not do these things without the consent of the municipality. The Toronto and Niagara Power Company declined to accept 'that view of the matter and in defiance pf the municipality proceeded to erect poles. The municipality of North Toronto pulled down the poles, litigation followed, the case went to the Court of Appeal of Ontario and the Court of Appeal decided in 1911 that the company were bound by the Railway Act, that the Railway Act applied to railway, telephone, telegraph and power companies and that no power company could invade the streets of any municipality without the consent of

the municipality.. The Court .of Appeal decided that and the matter was thought to rest there. It did not. The Toronto and Niagara Power Company took the matter to the Privy Council.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Would my hon. friend
read the law pf Canada under which that appeal was taken to the Privy Council and then compare it with subsection 2 of section 374? I have not the Act before me, but I would like to have a comparison of the two.


Angus Claude Macdonell: I have the
Railway Act, 1906, and section 247 is the general sectipn providing for " lines and wires on highways; consent of municipality; travel and access; wires; poles; trees; supervision " etc., etc. That is the general law in regard to wires, lines and poles in municipalities along highways, public places, etc. Section 247 has eight subsections and the eighth subsection is the one which has caused the mischief. I have already read it. It is as follows:
Nothing contained in this section shall be deemed to authorize the company to exercise the powers therein mentioned for the purpose of selling or distributing light, heat, power or electricity in cities, towns or villages, without the company having first obtained consent therefor by a bylaw of the municipality.
That is the general Railway Act. The Court of Appeal of Ontario decided that it bound the company notwithstanding the fact that the company by its special Act *has power to erect poles, lines and so on without consent.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: IIow would you have to read that subsection of section 247


Angus Claude Macdonell: If my hon.
friend will please-


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I thought my hon.
friend wanted to get- the whole story as we went along but if not I will not interfere with him.
Mr. A. 0. MACDONELL: My hon. friend is also my learned friend and we both understand Cjourt proceedings and I would prefer to proceed. As offsetting the Railway Act the company set up the charter it had.
This is the only company that still possesses its. original wide power of going everywhere or anywhere without license. A number of power companies have been incorporated by the Dominion Parliament, and they have come here from time to time-I am talking now within the knowledge of members of this committee-to get amendments 
to their charters in various ways, extending their powers, adding to their borrowing powers, adding to their capital and so on. And in every case where they have come here, they have been saddled with these public-safeguarding clauses, because many of these charters are old charters. During this present session the Continental Light, Heat and Power Company of Montreal, which was I think incorporated in' 1897, came hare and was saddled with half a dozen of these public-safeguarding clauses. They had a 'charter very similar to this charter. Since this Toronto and Niagara Power Company never came here to get an amendment, there .has been no opportunity to .amend its charter by adding the safeguarding clauses, anad therefore it became essential that some provision be made in some way to restrict these wide powers. The company was not satisfied to be bound by the general Railway Act of Canada, as interpreted by the Court of Appeal of the province of Ontario, and, as I said, appealed to the Privy Council. The case is reported in the Law Reports, Appeal Cases, 1912, at page 834. In this case the Privy Council reversed the decision of the Court of Appeals of Ontario, and held that the Toronto and Niagara Power Company was not bound by the general Railway Act, and that it did not need the consent of a municipality to go anywhere, that it was absolutely at large to go where it pleased, without leave or license, under the special Act of 1902. Does any member of this committee agree that that .is a safe or fair thing to permit, that a power company should have the right to go anywhere in Canada in any street, highway, square or public place, cross it, to do as it pleases, without any consent, and to set up in that community [DOT]as a distributing company selling power? In this case the Toronto and Niagara Power Company were the plaintiffs, and the corporation of the town of North Toronto, defendant, on appeal from the Court of Appeals for Ontario. The head note is as fol- [DOT] lows:
Held that by sections 12 and 13 of their incorporating Dominion Act, II Edward VII, chapter 107-
That is the Toronto and Niagara Power Company incorporating Dominion Act.
-the appellants-
That is the Toronto and Niagara Power Company.
[DOT]-were empowered to enter upon the streets of North Toronto without the consent of its municipal council for the purpose of erecting poles to carry power lines for the conveyance of electricity.

Held, further, that section 90 of the Railway Act of 1888 as amended by the Railway Act of 1899 and by section 247 of the Railway Act of 1906,-
That is the section I have read twice.
-the effect of which would be to give the respondents

That is the municipality.
-a veto upon the appellants' exercise of their powers, is inconsistent with the said sections 12 and 13 of the .special Act, and consequently by section 21 thereof-
That is the power company Act.
-is rendered inapplicable to the appellants; section 247, moreover, applies only to companies within the definition clause of the Act of 1906, that is, railway companies; while subsections 3 and 4 thereof save the appellants' powers under their special Act.
What the Privy Council decided was this, that although our Railway Act is burdened with definitions of a company and what constitutes a company coming under the Act and being subject to the Act, a power company, according to the Privy Council, does not come under the Railway Act. The Privy Council held that, inasmuch as this was not a railway company, it was not bound by the word "company" as defined by_ the Railway Act, that the Railway Act, in so far as power companies were concerned, only referred to or related to railway companies that were selling or distributing power, and did not have any reference to the general power companies, and this I submit is entirely contrary to the spirit and intention of the legislation. Let me read a paragraph from Lord Haldane's judgment on that point, in which he admits that the intention apparently was that all these companies should be included under the term "railway company," and that a railway company in the definition of "company" included these companies, yet the strict meaning of the Act, according to the Privy Council, excluded a power company from the operation of the Act, and the power companies were not bound by the Act at all. Lord Haldane said:
The Parliament of Canada, not unnaturally, anxious to avoid dangers of this kind,-
That is the kind of conflict that arose in this case.
-accordingly passed general statutes conferring upon the municipal authorities large powers of control. Section 90 of the Railway Act 1888, was amended by the Railway Act of 1899, which added to it a subsection illustrative of this kind of control.
This is important. The Railway Act of 1899 was afterwards embodied into the Act of 1906.
The new subsection enacted that when any company had power by any Act of the Parliament of Canada to construct and maintain lines of telegraph or telephone or for the conveyance of light, heat, power, or electricity, such company might, with the consent of the municipal council or other authority having jurisdiction over any highway, square or other public place, enter thereon for the purpose of exercising such power. ... If the powers conferred by this section displaced the less restricted powers of entering without any consent conferred by the Act of incorporation the appellants are in the wrong.
That is the power in the special Act.
Their Lordships have, therefore, to determine this question. They have to bear in mind that a Court of justice is not entitled to speculate as to which of two conflicting policies was intended to prevail, but must confine itself to the construction of the language of the relevant Statutes read as a whole.
Now, under that reading, they excluded the intention which Lord Haldane recites was the spirit and foundation for the section of the Railway Act which I have read, but he says he must construe it literally, and the court construed it literally according to their interpretation, and the effect of that was that the appeal was dismissed and the Toronto and Niagara Power Company was left absolutely at large.
That is, it is free to go where it pleased, without leave or license. It is not bound by the Railway Act, according to the judgment of the Privy Council. It is not bound by any of the safeguards of the Railway Act. It has never come to Parliament for a moment, so that it can be reached and safeguarding provisions enacted, and there it is to-day. The only way of reaching it is by 'the provision made in this legislation. As I have said, this legislation was asked for by the united municipalities of Canada, not only Ontario, but outside of Ontario, by the Ontario Government, and by various other municipalities and communities, including the Hydro-Electric Power Commission, because, unless this clause is enacted this company can invade any place without anybody's consent, or leave or license. The necessity for making the section retroactive was this: this power company is not selling retail power; it is a producer of power.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: Has it got the power, although it is not exercising it?


Angus Claude Macdonell: They have the power, but I believe they are not exercising it.


Daniel Duncan McKenzie: We have to deal with them as they are constituted at present. We cannot take advantage of the fact that they are not selling it.


Angus Claude Macdonell: This is simply a matter of fair dealing. We are not taking away from the company any of its business or curtailing its power, and the concluding part of subsection 4, which is aimed at preventing this company from acting as a distributing company without .the consent of the municipality, reads as follows:-
Provided that this subsection shall not prevent the company from delivering or supply, ing such power by any means now existing or under the provisions of any contract now in force for use in the operation of any railway or for use by any other company lawfully engaged in the distribution of such power within any such city, town, village or township.
So that nothing is being taken from them, and their status is preserved to them. They cannot extend, and the reason why the retroactive clause is asked for is this:	It
does not hurt anybody to begin with. It is a precaution. I am a member of the committee and I am not advocating anything special except that I want to see what the committee has done, by a vote of nine to three, goes through the House. This clause was explained at length and questions were asked, and it was proved, to the satisfaction of the committee that the Toronto Electric Light Company, and the Toronto-Niagara Power Company, and a number of other kindred companies, are practically an association of companies under one aegis or management, or whatever you like to call it. I do not ask hon. members to take my word for this; it is contained in the memoranda submitted to this House by the Government of Ontario, which was sent to the chairman of the committee and read by him. There was only one arrangement. The Toronto Electric Light Company had a contract with the city of Toronto, which expires in two or three years, and what is apprehended, and it was alleged before the committee, and the statement was actually made, that the Toronto Electric Company, which has an expiring and perishable franchise, expiring in two or three years or thereabouts, will, it is expected, turn over to the Toronto-Niagara Power Company all its business, poles, plant, machinery and equipment, and then the Toronto-Niagara Power Company can continue ad- infinitum to operate the Toronto Electric Light Company the same as if there had been no contract between the Toronto Electric Light Company and the city of Toronto, and this retroactive clause is inserted to prevent that improper act. It hurts nobody. It is an insurance, a precaution, and a public safe-
guard. The same thing might happen in other communities. The Toronto-Niagara Power Company may go elsewhere and purchase electric light or power companies that have perishable and expiring franchises and then the business will pass over to the company with a permanent franchise forever. I have tried to make myself understood; I do not know whether I have done so or not, and I appeal to the fairness of the committee to pass this legislation to protect municipal rights, to protect municipalities and the public. The people came here from all over Ontario and from some parts of Quebec to ask that this be done, and there is nothing wrong in it. It is a safeguard. We are not saddling this company with any more safeguards than any other company is saddled with, but we ask that this clause be retained, for the purpose of carrying out the wishes of the people to whom I have referred, who came here with their counsel, and argued the matter at very great length, and answered every question put to them by the members of the committee. No matter was more fully or fairly dealt with by that select committee, and I appeal to this committee to carry out what was done by that committee, and to pass the section as framed.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I am afraid I cannot pay the hon. gentleman from Lambton the same compliment as I paid the hon. gentleman from Toronto, because the hon. gentleman from Toronto knows what he is talking about personally. That is not intended to be offensive in any way, but my hon. friend from Toronto is a good lawyer and has followed the case.


Angus Claude Macdonell: I have taken public interest in it.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: A perfectly proper interest. My hon. friend has spent half an hour arguing before the committee, as though we were the Supreme Court, showing us what the Privy Council decided, and he said that unless something was done, the company had power to extend its lines as it liked, into Toronto or any other municipality. That is true. But my hon. friend forgot to tell the committee the law on which the Privy Council made its decision. My hon. friend knows it all right, but I want to give it to the other members of the committee. I refer to section 247 of the Railway Act of 1906, which reads as follows:
When any company is empowered by special Act of the Parliament of Canada to construct, operate and maintain lines of tele-

graph or telephone, or for the conveyance of light, heat, power or electricity, the company may, with the consent of the municipal council or other authority having jurisdiction over any highway, etc.
Then it provides that they can do certain things, and here are the conditions. First, there shall be accessibility of traffic to the public, then a provision that the wires shall be not less than 22 feet above the ground. No trees shall be cut down unless it is necessary. Then it is provided that the opening of any street, square or other place for the erection of poles or for the carrying of wires shall be subject to the supervision of such person as the municipal council may appoint, and there shall be temporary removal of wires, and all that sort of thing. All these things are when the company is authorized to do certain things under a special Act. Subsection 8 provides:
Nothing contained In this section shall be deemed to authorize the company to exercise the powers therein mentioned for the purpose of selling or distributing light, heat, power or electricity in cities, towns or villages without the company having first obtained consent therefor by a by-law of the municipality.
But unfortunately the special Act incorporating- the company did authorize them to distribute, and the Privy Council held, and rightly, I believe, that as this section 247 refers to special Acts, and as the special Act of this company gave it the actual power to distribute, they had a right to distribute it. That is the law. I want to call attention to the fact that the gentleman who prepared this Bill, Mr. Price, was not before the committee. Evidently he is a lawyer of distinction, because he has put in our hands a memorandum showing the legal effect of every amendment or change that was made in the Railway Act. When Mr. Price drafted this section he included telegraph, telephone and power companies all in one section. The subcommittee, I think for the purposes of my hon. friends from Toronto, divided it up and put telegraph and telephone companies in one section and electric light and power companies in another. Mr. Price says:
The provisions of this present section requiring telegraph, telephone and power companies within the legislative authority of the Parliament of Canada to get consent of the municipality or leave of the Board before putting their wires upon, along or across any highway or public place will apply notwithstanding anything to the contrary in any Special Act or in any other Act and notwithstanding any power or authority conferred by or under any Act.
My hon. friend has spent half an hour setting forth the decision of the Privy Council under a special law referring only to the special Act of this company. But subsection 2 of section 374, as presented to this committee, is as follows:-
Notwithstanding anything contained in any special or other act or authority of the Parliament of Canada or of the legislature of any province, the company shall not, except as in this section provided, acquire, construct, maintain or operate any works, machinery, plant, line, pole, tunnel, conduit or other device upon, along, across, or under any highway, square or other public place within the limits of any city, town, village or township, without the consent of the municipality. ^
Mr. Price absolutely met all the conditions of the Privy Council case. He provided that notwithstanding anything in the special Act a company may not erect a pole, line, or conduit, whether for distribution or transmission-


Angus Claude Macdonell: When Mr. Price drew that memorandum no attention had been drawn to the Toronto-Niagara Power Company or the Privy Council decision so far as I know.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I am not prepared either to affirm or to deny that. If my hon. friend says that is true I accept his assertion.


Angus Claude Macdonell: He may have dreamt it, or had it in his mind, but no public decision or reference had taken place.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: These cases dragged on for three or four years; Mr. Price is too good a lawyer not to have known that they had been before the Appeal Court of Ontario and the Privy Council. My hon. friend (Mr. Sinclair) tells me that Mr. Price refers to the Privy Council case in his memorandum. Mr. Price says:-
Putting lines and wires upon highways and public places. Here an important change is made. It had been held by the Privy Council that "company" in former section 247 was confined to railway company and that power companies, etc., which were given powers in their Special Acts to construct upon highways, could, where there was no restriction in the Special Act, do so without any consent or leave and without being put upon any terras or conditions. (See judgment Privy Council given July, 1912, in Toronto and Niagara Power Co. v. North Toronto (1912) A.C., 834.)
So that Mr. Price knew all about it. My hon. friend's argument, therefore, comes to an end.


Angus Claude Macdonell: That does not alter the case at all.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: His argument goes up in smoke. The first three subsections provide that the company cannot erect a pole or



string a wire, either for transmission or distribution, without the consent of the municipality. My hon. friend draws a distinction between transmission and distribution, but that is only a technical point. Usually a line which has high voltage is called a transmission line; when the voltage is somewhat reduced, it is called a distribution line. However, under the provision as drafted by Mr. Price, a company may not erect a line, pole, or anything that carries electricity, in any municipality without the consent of the municipality. And, if the municipality is unfair, the right of . appeal to the Railway Board is provided, and it is for the Railway Board to set out the conditions under which this distribution and transmission shall take place.


Angus Claude Macdonell: I did not know that Mr. Price had been aware of the case. But Mr. Price's opinion, as quoted by my hon. friend shows that the Privy Council was wrong in its decision; that it gave a decision against the spirit and intent of the Railway Act. What is asked for here in the retroactive clause, is that that decision be repealed, dating back to the date of the coming into effect of the law.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I cannot accept any
such argument as that. The Privy Council is the last count of appeal in this Empire, and it ill becomes my hon. friend to say that its decision was wrong.


Angus Claude Macdonell: Did Mr. Price not try to put it right, in the language that my hon. friend Tead?	-


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No. As a result of the decision of the Privy Council, Mr. Price found a condition which, in his judgment, ought to be remedied. This Parliament is the only body having power to remedy that condition, and Mr. Price drafted this section of the Railway Bill with a view to remedying it. But my hon. friends from Toronto are not satisfied that matters of this kind should, in case of dispute, be left to the Railway Board. Notwithstanding the fact that in every other like case the matter is referred to the Railway Board they want it differently in Toronto. Therefore they pult in two extra clauses, declaring what the law should have been ten years ago and absolutely preventing the companies concerned from going to the Railway Board. They take it out of the power of this company to extend its lines except with the consent of the city of Toronto^-and they know that the company cannot get that consent. Knowing that, they re-
fuse that, appeal to the Railway Board which may be had in all other cases. In no case that came up during the whole discussion of this Bill did I not say: leave it to the Railway Board. I gave my vote on numerous occasions, and in those cases* where the matter, did not come to a vote,
I gave it as my opinion:	leave this to
the Railway Board.
I believe the Railway Board is one of the finest institutions in the British Empire.
I think they are trying to work out the railway law of Canada on just as good lines as they possibly can. I have such faith in them that no matter what railway matter comes up I would say, leave it to the board.
I say so to-night. If a question comes up between the Electric Light Company and' the city of Toronto, I would say, 'leave it to the board. There is no more reason why Toronto should not be governed by the general law any more than my little town of Woodstock, or any other town in this Dominion.
There is just one other observation I cannot refrain from making. My hon. friend says, "If you don't put in these retroactive clauses the company may go to some other town and buy a plant there and give the people electric light." What a crime that would be! Think of allowing any company to go to another city and supply people with light at competitive rates. Why in Montreal they are fighting rings around one another just to get competition; it is the very thing they want. Down in our country those gentlemen who have been unfortunate enough to invest their money in electric light are in constant fear that the municipalities will come into competition with them. But in Ontario, for Heaven's sake keep away from competition ! If you don't put in these retroactive clauses these men will go to some other town and give the people cheaper light than the Hydro Electric. What a crime that would be! I only need to refer to these matters to show the absolute unfairness of the whole transaction.


William Folger Nickle: I am considerably impressed by the argument advanced by my hon. friend from South Toronto. If I correctly understood him, the effect of this legislation will be this: In so far as the transmission line goes, that is the line for the carrying of power from one part of the country to the other, if municipalities cannot agree with the company then there is an appeal to the Railway Board for the purpose of determining the terms and con-

ditions upon which the transmission line shall be constructed.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Does my hon. friend find the word "transmission" or any definition of either a transmission or distribution line in subsection 2 of section 374?


William Folger Nickle: No, I do not find it
there. It seems to me that this is an omnibus clause that defines in general terms the nights of the company and rhe methods of procedure. Subsection 2 of section 374 is restricted by subsection 4 of the same section. 'Proceeding with my argument, if I understood the member for South Toronto, the rights of the company for the purpose of the construction of a transmission line depend on subsections 2 ia:d 3 of section 374. It they are able to mate a contract with the municlpilities through which their line passes then the contract is legal and binding, but in the. event of any municipality acting, to use the expression of my hon. friend from Carle-ton, as a dog in the manger to prevent the construction of a transmission line, then there is an appeal to the Railway Board to determine the terms -and conditions upon which the transmission line shall be constructed.
When it comes to the question of the distribution of power, that is the selling of power within the municipality, subsection 4 governs, and the principle is there recognized that the municipalities shall have control of their streets, and if they are not disposed to make a contract with any company there is no right of appeal to the board. This Bill recognizes, so to speak, the autonomy of the municipality. That was the point which I overlooked in my original remarks.
The hon. member for South Toronto made two statements, and I should like to know if he is very sure of his facts. In the first place he said that there is no .other company with similar powers under a Domin-* ion charter. I also understood him to say that this company has no distribution plant, the value of which will be affected if the second subsection of section. 5 is enacted and becomes law; in other words, there is no distributing plant owned and constructed by the Niagara Power Company pursuant to the terms of the special Act, such construction 'being illegal provided this Act is retroactive.


Angus Claude Macdonell: 
William Folger Nickle: My second question was this. The last paragraph of subsection 5 says:
It is hereby declared that the powers of any such company have been so restricted since the date of the enactment of chapter thirty-seven of the Revised Statutes of Canada 1906, that is to say, the thirty-first day of January, 1907.
If that becomes law, anything done by the Toronto & Niagara Power Company under its special Act for the purpose of constructing a distributing plant would be illegal if a by-law had not been passed. Have I the assurance of the hon. member that the company has no distributing plant in any municipality that will he illegally constructed provided this section becomes 'aw?


Angus Claude Macdonell: I know of no such plant whatever. I believe the facts are these: The Toronto & Niagara Power Company supply the Toronto Railway Company and the Toronto Electric Light Company with power. I know of no distributing plant they may have; I am not saying that they have not any.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Was it not stated before the special committee that the company was supplying industrial concerns with power?


Angus Claude Macdonell: The concluding part of subsection 4 preserves all these existing contracts.


John Howard Sinclair: It was stated before the committee that the Toronto* & Niagara Power Company were supplying power in the city of Toronto, and that they had erected poles and were proposing to sell them to some other company. It was stated that this legislation was introduced for the purpose of enabling them to sell the poles to the other company.


Angus Claude Macdonell: My hon. friend is quite correct in saying that they had erected poles. The litigation that provoked this amendment arose out of their action in erecting poles, but those poles were, I believe, for the transmission of the power to the Toronto Railway Company and the Toronto Electric Light Company.


John Howard Sinclair: I do not think there is any doubt that what we are trying to do is to take away the right of distributing power in the city of Toronto. The transmission of power does not enter into the question at ' all. The only question is whether we shall make the legislation retroactive. We all agree that for the future we do not want to give them the right to put a single pole in the streets of Toronto without the con-* sent of the municipality.


Angus Claude Macdonell: Neither in the streets of Toronto nor anywhere else.


John Howard Sinclair: But the question is
should we go back ten years. That is the point we disputed in the committee, and the point we are raising now. _


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Blain):: Shall the section be carried?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I move that subsection
5 be stricken out.
Amendment negatived on division. Yeas, 13; nays, 32.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 376-Provisions governing telegraphs and telephones.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Subsection 8 has been added. It says:
No order made under the preceding subsection shall apply to the interchange of local conversations between persons using the telephones of two competing systems or lines where such systems or lines terminate upon switchboards located within the municipal limits of the same city, town, or village, except in the case of- rural party line telephones
	'	.
in non-competitive areas, and then only when the Board shall deem such interchange to be cl sizable and practicable.


Robert Francis Green: In line 42, page 151, of the draft Bill, the words "as to compensation" appeared. On the motion of the hon. mem

.ber for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt) these words were stricken out. There was quite a discussion oveT this amendment, and there seemed to be some question as to what the striking out of these words meant. The legal gentlemen on the committee said, if the word "compensation" was struck out, it would mean that the board would not have power to award compensation in any case, whether they thought it justifiable or not. The hon. member for South Toronto (Mr. A. C. Macdonell) said:
From a layman's point of view Mr. Nesbitt's argument is irresistible, but the present Act has the word "compensation" in it. I am simply taking the middle course in this matter as far as I can see it. The word "compensation" is in the Act now, and if we strike it out any court interpreting that amendment would say w'e intended to remove absolutely any compensation whatever. The word "terms" would mean physical conditions. So that, if we retain the word ."compensation" and add the words "if any," we make it plain to the Board and everybody that we do not intend there shall be compensation unless in the opinion of the Board it is justifiable to allow it.
Some of the lay members took exception to the reasoning of the hon. member for South Toronto, and other members argued along the same lines. In my opinion, the words "as to compensation" should have remained in as the Act was drafted. That seemed to be the opinion of quite a number of the members of the committee. The hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt), understanding it differently, said:
As mover of the amendment I may say iti was not by any means my intention to take away from the Board the power to order compensation if in their discretion they! thought it ought to be allowed.
Since the committee passed upon that particular section I have made inquiries in many quarters as to the meaning of cutting out the words "as to compensation," and all the legal gentlemen with whom I have had an opportunity of discussing the matter have agreed that the effect is that the board will have no power to award compensation even if in their opinion it is right it should be awarded. I therefore move:	,
That subsection 7 of section 376 be amended by inserting after the word "terms" in line 42, page 151, the words "as to compensation if any."

That will leave the matter in the position that if the board is of the opinion the companies are entitled to compensation, it may award compensation.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: My hon. friend (Mr. Green) has stated the position I took excepting that, when I asked that it be reconsidered, I stated that my reason for doing so was that the Bell Telephone man said that he did not have a fair opportunity to be heard and I had no idea of withholding the privilege of being heard from any person.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: 
Robert Francis Green: If they were here asking that these words be struck out they were here asking something that was unfair to other people who had their money invested, and who had a right to be compensated if, in the opinion of the Board, they should be compensated.


John Howard Sinclair: I think the principal thing is to leave the Board free to determine it one way or the other. There are cases where there should be no compensation and it was contended that if we left the word " compensation " in, the Board would be under obligation to give compensation in every case. That was not desirable. I note that the proposed amendment has the words " if any " at the end, and if that means that it is left to the discretion of the Board to give compensation or not it may get over the difficulty. As my hon. friend from North Oxford says, this was regarded as a matter of great importance by the rural telephone companies of Ontario. There were eight or nine hundred of them represented, and they were all deeply interested in having these words left out. 1 do not know what view they would take of the amendment of my hon. friend, because it is writteii a little differently from the language of the old Act. It may mean that if there is a case for compensation then the Board may give it.


Mr. SEXSMITH:: I agree entirely with the sentiments expressed by the hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Nesbitt). The rural telephone people were here and they were very anxious. I thought that what they asked was perfectly right and just. We

are all well aware that the Bell Telephone Company is a great company. We know that this company would crowd every other company off the earth if they could. I understand that the section as it was passed by the committee was satisfactory to the rural telephone companies. I think it should remain as it was.


Mr. THORNTON:: The matter was, as the hon. member for Guysborough (Mr. Sinclair) said very fully threshed out here and the independent companies that were represented went home satisfied with the decision of the committee. The word " compensation " was struck out. The section provides that:
The Board may order the company to provide for such use, connection or communication, upon such terms as the Board deems just and expedient, and may order and direct how, when, where, by whom, and upon what terms and conditions such use, connection or communication shall be had, constructed, installed, operated and maintained.
That fully covers the ground. The conclusion was that if the word " compensation " was in the Act the Board would be compelled to compensate the company that had the trunk line. As a matter of fact, the local lines bring an immense amount of business to the Bell company.


Francis Cochrane: That is only where there are two lines in competition.


Charles Jonas Thornton: That is true. They do not say that the local company should not be compensated in that case. But the whole ground is covered by the clause which I have just read. The representatives of the independent companies went home fully satisfied with the decision that was reached that day after it had been threshed out before the committee for two days. I think it would be very unfair to those people if at this last moment this snatch verdict should be attempted in this committee.


John Albert Sexsmith: It would be hard to decide what the Bell Company w'ould call competition. If they have a central office out in a township, does that mean that no other company can go on and organize?
I do not think the Bell Company have any reason to find fault or complain about this clause, and I would urge that it remain as it is.


Mr. BOYCE:: The amendment does not bind the board to award compensation, but gives power to award it in cases where it is called for. If the word "compensation" is omitted, having been in the old statute, then any court will interpret that as taking

away from the board jurisdiction to award compensation.


Charles Jonas Thornton: The board in cases that came before them took the ground that because the word "compensation" was there they were bound to award compensation. The local company had to pay not only the ordinary long distance rate but had also to pay a surcharge based on the number of their subscribers.


John Albert Sexsmith: As I understand it, the independent companies are perfectly willing to pay the long distance rate, but the Bell Telephone Company ask a surcharge in accordance with the number of patrons that a private company may have, that charge sometimes running up into hundreds of dollars. That is absolutely unfair to the private company. It shows that the Bell Telephone Company want to have a monopoly, a continuing monopoly, and to make it impossible for any independent company to put up a rural line and have the same service.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Oh, no Mr. SEXSMITH: Oh, yes.


Charles Jonas Thornton: All the power that the board requires to control the situation is to be found in the clause in this Bill. The Bell Telephone Company is amply protected by that clause. I protest strongly against the insertion of the words proposed.


John Albert Sexsmith: Who is to determine when compensation is due?


Robert Francis Green: The Railway Board will have the right to decide and will decide under the conditions laid before them. My hon. friend (Mr. Thornton) is speaking of the physical conditions as to how the connection shall be made. There is no question that if the word " compensation " is left out, having been in the old law, no compensation will be permissible under any circumstances. I am not asking that the word be put back as it was before, as it might then be claimed that compensation must always be given. I am asking that the Board of Railway Commissioners may be the judges of all the terms, including compensation, if any. I am making it clear, I think, that it is not compulsory to give compensation, that they may be the judges, having all the circumstances before them and, under those circumstances, they may award compensation if, in their judgment, it is necessary.


Charles Jonas Thornton: That is all provided for right here in the Act.


George Perry Graham: Can any one tell me why, even in the draft Bill, there seems to be a serious omission from the old Act? The section says, " Upon such terms as to compensation that the hoard deems just." In the old Act I think it says, " As to compensation or otherwise." Why was the word "otherwise" left out? That meant terms as to compensation and otherwise, which would include everything else, the physical condition and so on. Having had something to do with the introduction of this law in the first place, and putting this matter under the Board of Railway Commissioners, making it possible for the local companies to have connection with the trunk lines, I am greatly inclined to the view that we ought to be as lenient as possible, and make terms just as easy as we possibly can for the rural companies. It is only a few years since these rural companies were inaugurated throughout the whole country, and these systems have been paid for by the farmers themselves, largely hy the organization of small companies, and these companies 'have brought the farmers to the market. They can sit in their own houses and find out what the market is every morning, if they like, and keep track of business in a general way, without coming to town. The information is brought to them direct. If tlie committee, after fully considering the details and hearing all the parties, decided to strike that out, I am inclined to vote to leave it out.


Francis Cochrane: The trouble is that
the men who moved to put it in went back on it.


Donald Sutherland: I was not on the
committee which had the drafting of this Bill in charge, but I know something of the conditions affected by these two woids that it is moved to insert in the Bill. The rural telephone companies in the district from which I come have been victims of these two* words that it is moved should be inserted, and every subscriber on the rural lines in the vicinity of the town of Ingersoll, has had to bear the expense of the charges that have been made by the Bell Telephone Company on the local companies. The ihon. gentleman who has moved the amendment got the word compensation and " competition " somewhat mixed up. I believe there is a connection between the two words, and that the Bell Telephone Company discriminates against competing companies, which are in operation in places where the Bell Telephone Company is doing business. The Bell Company makes them
pay a bonus. That is the object of inserting those words, and I do not think it is fair. I do not think there is any argument to justify allowing the Bell Telephone Company, which has been given every possible freedom and franchises that any company could naturally expect and much more, to bring pressure to hear on these local companies to keep them outside of the district where the Bell Telephone Company are doing business, when they themselves refuse tp extend their lines out into the country. These local companies have developed, and some of them have amalgamated, and today they are actually competing, in some of the smaller towns, with the Boil Telephone Company. The Bell Telephone Company are exacting a heavy compensation from the Ingersoll Telephone Company, and the Ingersoll are unable to get redress from the Railway Board, and I think it is unfair and unjust to insert those two w.ords in the Bill. I think the committe who have had this matter in hand have evidently looked into the wisdom of eliminating them, and have acted on the evidence that was submitted to the committee, and I think when they have the evidence there that we should hesitate before adding tp this section the words which they eliminated.


Robert Francis Green: I do not want to delay the committee, but I do not want the committee to misunderstand the situation. It is true this matter was before tihe special committee f.or a long time; it is true there were representatives of both sides there, and it is true they put their cases forward as strongly as it was possible for them tp do. It is also true that the committee, on a vote of four to two, finally struck out the words which were in the original draft " as to compensation ". If that particular meeting had been more numerously attended, I have an idea that those words would not have been stricken out. My hon. friend says I was a little mixed as between the words "competition" and "compensation." It is true, when I meant to say the one, my tongue slipped, and I said the other. But I want to point out to him, and to the other members of the committee, that all that the rural telephone people are asking for has been granted them in the Bill, with the exception of where they come into competition with the Bell Company or with an established company. Why is it that it is not fair to give them, these connections without compensation? Because it would put them in this position, that just so long as they are doing a rural business, and in territory that would not be

covered by the other companies, they get all these connections without compensation, and they come into a town where there is already a telephone exchange, which telephone exchange may have long distance lines built with their capital, serving a long distance public. You give these independent telephone companies the right to go into that town and in addition to that, if you give them the right without compensation to use the long distance lines of the company that are already constructed, you put them in the position that they can offer to the public their phones at a lesser rate than the other company can afford to, because the other company has a large investment not only in the phones in the town, but in the long distance line. The independent companies can have the right to use those lines without compensation if these words are not put back.


William Wright: Does the Bell Telephone Company not charge the general public a fee that is sufficient to cover all the expenses of those- lines?


Robert Francis Green: Yes, it is presumed they do, but at the same time, why should another company be allowed to use the Bell Telephone Company's long distance, or any
other company's long distance line?


William Wright: Because that long distance is practically a monopoly.


Robert Francis Green: It puts the independent company in the position in the town, of competing with the Bell Telephone Company, or any other company that is in a similar position, and offering to their subscribers their phones at a lesser rate, with all the privileges of the established line.


Charles Jonas Thornton: No, the hon. gentleman is wrong there.


Robert Francis Green: I was before the committee and listened to the arguments, and my judgment is that that is the position they are in, and if we refuse to put those words in, you are putting the independent company in a position to use the other man's capital for the purpose of competing with him, because the independent company has no overhead charges, and no investment in the long distance line, and therefore can sell a cheaper service to the public in the same territory that these people are in.
It is only fair and right that the Board of Railway Commissioners, when these matters are put before them, would be in a position to judge of them as they find them.
If they find that in competitive fields the Bell Telephone Company or any other com-
pany are entitled to compensation, that compensation should be given.


John Albert Sexsmith: I cannot understand my hon. friend's argument. He says that this provision will place an independent company in a position to do rural business cheaper than the Bell Telephone Company could do it, owing to the fact that the Bell Telephone Company have overhead charges to meet in connection with their long distance service. The hon. gentleman will surely admit that the Bell Telephone Company charge enough for their long distance service to cover all overhead charges and to pay dividends.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Do they not place a surcharge upon the long distance service?


John Albert Sexsmith: Suppose a municipal telephone system having four or five hundred subscribers wants to be connected with the Bell Telephone Company at Peterborough. The Bell Telephone Company say: Even though you agree to pay long distance charge, we are not willing that you should use our lines unless you pay a surcharge or an overhead charge in proportion to the number of subscribers you have on your rural route. If this amendment goes through, instead of having a surcharge you will have this compensation. There is in my own riding a large township that could not get any telephone service until the municipality took hold of the matter; now they have a service. Of course, they made amicable arrangements with the Bell Telephone Company.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Under this Bill they have legal right to connection without the payment of compensation,


John Albert Sexsmith: Yes, and without the surcharge. But will this compensation take the place of the surcharge?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No.


Mr. EDWARDS:: Do I understand the hon. gentleman to argue that the local company should be entitled to use the Bell Company's long distance line at the same rate as that which the Bell Telephone Company charges to its own customers?


John Albert Sexsmith: Not exactly. I am a subscriber of the Bell Telephone Company. They ask me, as one of their subscribers, to pay a certain charge for long distance service. Why ask the independent company to pay an extra charge?


George Perry Graham: The man who has not a telephone at all can get the long distance service at the same price as you can.


John Albert Sexsmith: Exactly; the man who has not a telephone walks into a city telephone office and uses the long distance service; he pays the same as I do. The same may be said in respect to the independent companies. A man who has not a telephone walks into the telephone office at Peterborough, talks over the long distance wire, and pays the same amount for the service as the rural subscriber. The independent people are willing that that be done; I do not see that there is anything wrong about that.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: The compensation that the rural companies object to is for the right to use the long distance lines. For instance, the Ingersoll Telephone Company has to pay $300 a year for the right to connect with the Bell Telephone Company. But an additional charge is- made for each conversation, the amount being divided between the rural company and the Bell Telephone Company. I have a connection on my farm with a rural telephone company. We pay an additional ten cents to the Bell Company for long distance conversation; half of that goes to the rural company with which I am connected and half to the Bell Company. The Ingersoll company and the other companies that appeared before the committee did not object to that, but they did object to paying compensation for the right of having conversation over their lines that were connected with the Bell Telephone Company's lines.


John Albert Sexsmith: Suppose I go to a
long distance telephone office in Ottawa and ask to be connected with Montreal. I inquire as to the charge and am told that it is fifty cents. Suppose, then, somebody living outside the city and being served by an independent company ask the Bell Telephone Company to allow him to use their phone to Montreal. They say:	We
want you to pay fifty cents., the usual charge; but, because you are on an independent line, we ask you to pay an additional ten cents.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That is subject to the
board. Tf the board says that the extra ten cents shall be paid, it has to be paid. Otherwise, the charge cannot be made.


John Howard Sinclair: My objection to the
proposal of the member for Kootenay (Mr. Green) is that it will be taken advantage of to prevent competition. The wording
of the law as it exists to-day is: "upon such terms as to compensation and otherwise as the board may direct." When there is no competition, the rural company connects with the other and you get your message through at the same rate as the general public pay. If there is competition in the locality, then the extra charge ie put on.
If an independent company aekis for the right to send long distance messages, the Bell Telephone Company says:	Are you
going to compete with us for local business? If they answer yee, the Bell Telephone Company says:	In that case, you
must pay an additional charge. If you agree not to compete with us for local business, we will let you connect with our lines and send your long distance messages at the same rate as the general public pay. That is the difficulty I find in supporting my hon. friend; the present section will be used for the indirect purpose of preventing competition.


Robert Francis Green: The other sections give the board the right to make the connection; the only question, therefore, is as to the terms upon which the connection is made.
I do not look upon this section as interfering with competition or as being intended to prevent competition.
I think my hon. friend will agree with me, if he has ever tried to do business in a city where they have a competitive telephone system, that it is a nuisance to the subscriber and to the man who tries to do business over it; the people do not get nearly the same satisfaction they would get from a single telephone system. I have no intention whatever of preventing competition, but, generally speaking, I think the day for competition in telephone lines within a circumscribed area in a city is over. The public have tried it on more than one occasion, and it has nearly always failed.


George Perry Graham: Is not this a fair way of putting it? If there were two trunk telephone lines they would both pay a bonus to these independent companies for their business. As there is only one, the penalty of an extra charge is imposed.


Donald Sutherland: This is evidently a club that is being used by the Bell Telephone Company to keep the local telephone lines out of the district now being served by the Bell. The hon. member for North Oxford has stated that they exact a charge of 10 cents for the use of a long distance phone, and that the charge is equally

divided. I think the local company gets 3 cents, and the Bell Company 7 cents.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Yes, as regards the Inger-soll Company.


Donald Sutherland: These two words in the section enable them to exact from the Ingersoll Telephone Company $300 a year. The Bell Company wish to keep the local companies out in the country. The Bell Company and every other telephone company is a public utility. They have received a franchise from the people on the understanding that they are going to serve the public.	.


George Perry Graham: They are on the highways too.


Donald Sutherland: And on the streets of our cities and towns, and a nice mess they do make of our streets with their telephone poles and wires strewed all over. The municipalities are absolutely helpless; they cannot control the companies to whom they have given a franchise. I think this was a very wise provision on the part of the committee, and 1 think it would be folly on our part to reinsert the two words which have been eliminated.


John Allister Currie: Evidently the Bell Telephone Company was primed and getting ready for this amendment, because in various places all over the country where there are independent lines they have been extending branches of their own from the cities and towns into independent territory. So that if this law is passed they can say that nearly all the country is under their jurisdiction. I have in mind a numbeT of places into which the Bell Cimpany have extended their lines from the city and towns and where they give the same service as they give in the town without any extra charge. Independent telephone companies are also operating in those sections, and they are entitled to some consideration, and should not be crushed by this amendment. The only argument that can be made for this amendment is that there is possibly some mythical connection between the man with a local telephone and the long distance lines. It is well known that any man can go into any of the pay telephone stations in the cities and towns and get a long distance call for exactly the same price as the man who subscribes $40 or $50 a year for a local phone service. So far as the cost of lines is concerned, it is alsp well known that the best machines you can get only cost about $15, and $2 or $3 worth of wire will string a whole lot of telephone 
poles. So there is nothing in the story that the Bell Telephone have made a big investment in plant which entitles them to receive, as my hon. friend here says, the privileges of a beneficent monopoly. They get their money back the first year. The day has not yet come when we in this Parliament are prepared to stand up and vote for any concern establishing a monopoly. We axe not going to vote, I hope, that any one who enters into competition must pay a monopoly charge. If we are to do that, we shall be legislating next that nobody can run against us as candidates for this House unless they pay a certain amount by way of compensation.


George Perry Graham: I believe we could put that through.	,
'Mr. CURRIE: Perhaps. I believe that the time is coming in the province of Ontario when all the local phones will be owned and controlled by the municipalities. and the municipalities will give as good a service as the Bell Telephone Company for less money. Then why should the Bell Telephone 'Company be allowed to extend their operations from the villages, as I have described, and then say that the farmers lines must be shut off as they are competing in the Bell area? That is not the intent of this Bill, and I think it would be very dangerous legislation for this House to acknowledge that the Bell Telephone Company has any rights above any other company.
I think this Parliament went a little tco fax in the first place in granting the right to the Bell Telephone Company to extend their lines all over the- country without compensation of some sort. The Bell Telephone Company at the beginning paid a fee for a franchise in every town in which they operated, but to-day they are paying no fee because they have established a monopoly; they are not even paying taxes. They now have the hardihood to ask Parliament for compensation if somebody starts a system in competition with their own. There is no argument in favour of the insertion of these words, and I trust that Parliament will not support the amendment which, if carried, would practically kill off all the local telephone systems in the country.


Mir. T. J. STEWART:: I am surprised at the sympathetic attitude of my hon. friend from Kootenay towards the Bell Telephone Company. I do not think he knows as much about them as I do. There has never been a bigger monopoly in this Dominion than

the Bell Telephone Company. They will get all there is coming to them; no matter wihiat we do, they will not get the worst of the deal. They use our streets in Hamilton and do what they like. If we accept what compensation they offer us for the use of our streets, they give it to us; but if we do not, we go without anything. They charge us $45 a year for an office phone, $30 for a house phone, and $2 a year for the use of a desk phone that costs them about 75 cents.
If we move to a summer home in the coun- [DOT] try, we have to pay $16 for a telephone, no matter how short a time we use it. This is the company that the hon. member for Kootenay is sympathizing with. I can assure him that I have no sympathy with that company. They are the biggest robbers that ever existed in this Dominion, and if this Parliament did what it should the Bell Telephone Company would have no trunk lines in this country. We would own them ourselves. We have paid for them over fifty times already, I believe. I say that the Bell Telephone Company are not deserving of the least bit of sympathy from this Government.


Robert Francis Green: I was not expressing any
particular sympathy with the Bell Telephone Company. I do not know anything about the Bell Telephone Company, good, bad or indifferent, except that I use their phone in the city of Ottawa. This legislation is Dominion-wide. It will apply to the telephone companies in every province, and not in Ontario alone. I cannot see why we should legislate for the whole of Canada to keep some particular law you have here or think you have.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Before the question is pat I would like the committee to understand that this compensation is for the right to be connected, not an additional charge for messages. I have the statement of the Tn-gersoll Company. The messages "in" were 9,371, the messages "out" were 5,019. The total revenue was $1,436.05, out of which the Bell Company got $1,007.30 and the Ingersoll Company $431.70. The Ingersoll Company had to pay $300 for the right to get that, and that is what they object to.
Amendment negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 387-Cattle getting on railway.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: There have been very frequent changes in this part of the Act iir years past, and while there does not seem to be very great objection to the companies' liability for damage under the present law, serious objection has been urged where it is the custom to have cattle and horses running at large. Therefore, several changes have been made in regard to "exceptions," "gates not kept closed," "gates wilfully left open," and "fence taken down."


John Albert Sexsmith: Would it not be wise to let this clause stand? I think there are many members who would like to discuss it.


Francis Cochrane: The Bill has stood for a long time now.


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think section 387 is pretty well corrected to cover our country interests.


John Albert Sexsmith: There has been a great deal of loss in the past because the crossings are not very well protected.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: That was very well threshed out in the committee.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I will explain to my hon. friend the change which has been made, and I think he will be perfectly satisfied. Section 294 of the old law provided that:
No horses, sheep, swine, or other cattle shall be permitted to be at large upon any highway, within half a mile of the intersecton of such highway, with any railway at rail level, unless they are in charge of some competent person or persons, to prevent their loitering or stopping on such highway at such intersection, or straying upon the railway.
Subsection 3 says:
If the horses, sheep, swine, or other cattle, of any person which are at large contrary to the provisions of this section are killed by any train at such point of intersection, he shall not have any right of action against any company in respect of the same being so killed or injured.
Subsection 4 provided:
When any horse's, sheep, swine, or other cattle at large, whether upon the highway or not, get upon the property of the company and are killed or injured by a train, the owner of any such animal so killed or injured, shall, except in the eases otherwise provided for by the next following section, be entitled to recover the amount of such loss or injury against the company in any action in any court of competent jurisdiction, unless the company establishes that such animal got at large through the negligence or wilful act or omission of the owner or his agent, or of the custodian of such animal or his agent.
Section 295 provides that no person whose horses, cattle, or other animals are killed or injured by any train shall have any right of action against any company in respect of such horses, cattle, or other animals being so killed or injured, if the same were so killed or injured because of any person leaving the gates open.


John Albert Sexsmith: That is a private crossing.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That is a farm crossing, what you call a private crossing. He has no right of action if the gates were not kept closed, or if they were wTil fully left open, or if the fence was taken down, or if the cattle were turned within the railway enclosure, or if they were on 'the railway without consent. It was decided by the courts of Quebec, Ontario, and I think, Manitoba, that if a man allowed his cattle to run around his buildings and they got on the track and were killed, he had no action against the railway company. I know of a case where a man had his cattle in an ordinary farm-yard, in the winter. He did not keep the bars up, or the gates closed, and the cattle got out and got on the track, and were killed. The courts held that he could not recover because he had been guilty of negligence, and should not have allowed his cattle to roam at large. If my hon. friend takes section 387 of the Act as amended, he will find the railway company is practically an insurer, and practically must pay for any damage occasioned, unless it can show it kept proper gates and lawful cattle guards. Of course, if it does that, and an animal gets through the company should not pay. To all intents and purposes you may say the company now insures the lives of the animals, provided they maintain proper gates and lawful cattle guards.


John Albert Sexsmith: What is a lawful cattle guard?


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: The board has the power to prescribe what shall be a lawful cattle guard. I cannot tel'1 offhand what the regulations are, but I have sufficient faith in the board to feel that they will provide the best cattle guard known to them.
There have been a great many thousands of dollars spent by the Government, and I know it has been a question as to which is the best cattleguard. I think they have all come back to the old slat on an inclined plane. However, that is the general principle of law. You will find that all the rights of the farmer are protected. Of course, if he leaves his gates open, or throws down his fences, or turns his animals loose upon the highway, he has no right to claim compensation and the company should not be liable.


John Albert Sexsmith: There has been a great deal of loss suffered by farmers. I remember a man who had twelve or fifteen cows; 
they got out on the line during the night through accident and were killed and he got no compensation. They talk about having a cattleguard. The hon. member for Carleton says that they have wooden slats in some places and that in others they have iron. Of course, these guards are frequently out of repair. They have another kind constructed of square sticks and the cattle walk right over it.


George Perry Graham: The cross-eyed steer did not stop for that.


John Albert Sexsmith: No.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I had a stronger case than that in the last six months. A client living within thirty or forty rods of a small country station and siding lost some stock. In New Brunswick our farms are not fenced on the road. We have no highway fences, and this man's cattle were around his premises as they ordinarily were. They got on the track where there were neither fences nor cattleguards. When I came to go into the matter I saw by the authorities that I had no chance of winning the case. The farmer was guilty under the decisions of allowing his cattle to stray away and he had no right of action.


Robert Cruise: It is a great hardship to have to fight a railway company before the courts. In my own constituency there have been a lot of cattle killed in years gone by, farmers have suffered great losses and very seldom have they been able to get compensation for those losses. I would like to read a portion of a letter to explain what has happened in the constituency of Dauphin. The writer says:-
A few years ago there were several horses killed on the track at Valley river inside the fences and the case was taken to the Commission, asking for damages. Chairman Mabee ruled that the claim was just but it was beyond the power of the Commission to compel the railway to put in guards that were of any use or to recompense the farmer for loss sustained.
While the Railway Commission ruled that the guards were inefficient and that the railway should pay damages for the animals that were killed; they had no power to force the company to pay. The Railway Commission should have power to make a railway company pay a farmer for cattle that are killed. If the railway company are liable there is no reason why the Commission should not have power to compel them to pay damages and not put the farmer to the expense of enforcing his claim in the courts. The writer goes on to say:-

There has been at least five times the stock killed on the main line between Dauphin ana Ashville as there has been between Dauphin and Valley River. The line to Valley River has no fence and the Ashville line is fenced.
The reason for that is that the cattle-guards are absolutely useless, and if the cattle get over the cattleguard and stray upon the railway, when the train comes along, they are fenced in there and cannot get out. I am speaking of wild, unsettled land. Where the railway track is not fenced there is not so much danger. The letter continues:-
The stock walk across the cattleguards and are then trapped between the fences. The slaughter has started this year again. Two horses were struck Saturday morning; one killed; the other had its leg broken. As a precaution we farmers are going to fence across the road at the crossings, putting a gate at each side. How long that will be allowed to stay I don't know, but something has to be done if we are going to have any use of the thousands of acres of vacant land that the settler has to pay the taxes on, both school, municipal and patriotic, and build roads past. In our school district there are over twenty quarter-sections that do not hear taxes and a number more that the tax is very light. The same with the war appropriation ; it is distributed to the districts in proportion to amounts received so the only way to get anything off this vacant land to keep stock and pasture it. We get a lot of advice about keeping more stock, producing more, our duty to our country, etc., but very little about our country's duty to us. There ;s very little encouragement to keep stock if the railway is allowed to slaughter them as they have in the past.
The Kailway Commission should have power to force the railway company, where they find they are liable, to pay the farmer without putting him to any more expense. It is very important that the farmer should get protection along that line to encourage him to increase his stock. I am sure that hon. gentlemen opposite know what it is to fight a railway company. Any farmer of small means has no chance whatever if he goes into court against a railway company. They will beat him if they can. I would respectfully ask the Minister of Railways to consider this matter and see if he cannot give the commission more power to force the railway companies to pay for any stock that they are entitled to pay for.


John Albert Sexsmith: The other evening we passed a clause prohibiting cattle being allowed to run on the road within half a mile of the railway, although we admitted that we did not have authority to do that. We assumed that we had that right, and now we give the railway companies the benefit of another clause here which says that:
Where any such animal, by reason of being at large within half a mile of the intersection of a highway with any railway at rail level contrary to the provisions of section 278, is killed or injured by any train at such point of intersection, the owner of such animal shall not have any right of action against any company in respect of the same being so killed or injured.
It seems very extraordinary that, having passed one clause, which we practically admitted the other night we had not power to pass, we give the railway company the benefit of another section, that if cattle are running within half a mile of the railway and accidentally get on the track and are killed, the owner will not have any claim for damages.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: Does my hon. friend realize that these cattle are at large within half a mile of the railway crossing, that they get on the track at the crossing and are killed at the point of intersection? The railway company must run their trains, and the man who permits his cattle to run at large with nobody looking after them and to get on the highway crossing should not have any right to come back on the company.	.


John Albert Sexsmith: That is not the point.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: That is what the subsection does.


John Albert Sexsmith: I know, but we passed that other clause making it illegal to allow cattle to run within half a mile of the railway, and we could not pass this clause if we had not passed the otheT. Because we assume in this section that since it is illegal for an animal to be on the road within half a mile of a railway, if it strays oil the railway and is killed it is illegally at large and the company have no liability.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I do not agree with my
hon. friend. If the animal is killed on the intersection of highway and railway _ the company is not liable, but if the animal strays from the highway on the railway right of way, unless the company have competent gates or cattleguards, the company is responsible. That is provided in the first part of section 387. Thus, even if you allowed your animals at large within half a mile of a railway, and they got across a defective cattleguard and were killed, you could still recover from the company. But if they were killed at the point of intersection they would have no business to be there and the company would not be liable.


John Albert Sexsmith: My observation has
been that cattle have no difficulty in get-

ting over the guards; they simply walk over. It seemed strange to me that we should make reference to that clause in this one.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On, section 388:	Fires from locomotives
-liability for fire caused by locomotives.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: This has been amended by inserting in' the part of the first section providing that the insurance on property destroyed by a fire caused by a locomotive shall be deducted from the total amount of damages sustained by any claimant, the words:
Where the company has used modern and efficient appliances and has not otherwise been guilty of negligence.
It was thought unfair that the railway company should have the benefit of the owner's insurance against fire in a case where the fire was- due to the company's negligence.


Mr. DEMERS:: I beg to move an amendment to the first clause of this section. The section begins:
Whenever damage is caused to any property by a lire started by any railway locomotive, the company making use of such locomotive, whether guilty of negligence or not, shall be liable for such damage.
I would propose to strike out the words "making use of 6uch locomotive" and to substitute: "operating the railway on which the locomotive is moving," and to add at the end of the first paragraph of this clause the following proviso:
Nothing in this clause shall prejudice the right of the said company operating the railroad to recover such damages from the company whose locomotive caused the Are.
My reason for proposing this amendment is that there are many companies having only a right of way on other lines For instance, in my riding the Delaware and Hudson and the Central Vermont have a right of way on the Grand Trunk, and the Rutland has a right of way on the Canadian Pacific. Two years ago I had a case against the Grand Trunk for damages to property caused by fire started by a locomotive moving on the Grand Trunk railway line. The Grand Trunk especially pleaded that it did not make use of that locomotive, but that that locomotive was owned and used by the Delaware and Hudson. As it happened, I won the case, although I do not know what would have happened on an appeal. It is quite impossible for a farmer,'for instance, to determine which company is making use 
of the locomotive which caused the fire. If the words of this clause as it stands now were to be interpreted literally, the Tight of action would be illusory, and I think we should make it clear in order to remove, if possible, all ambiguity.


George Perry Graham: Then you would sue the Grand Trunk and the Grand Trunk would come back against the Delaware and Hudson.


John Allister Currie: Why did not my hon.
friend sue both parties?


Marie Joseph Demers: 
Edward Walter Nesbitt: I think that ought to be considered. The law clerks should look into it.


Charles Jonas Thornton: This clause was pretty fairly discussed by the special committee some weeks ago, and whilst I was somewhat interested in it, the more we looked into the matter, the less objection could be taken to the clause as it stands. I quite recognize the difficulties that the hon. gentleman has referred to, but railways have some rights which should not be altogether overlooked, and my principal objection at the present time is that, whilst the railways have rights, owners of property along the railway have rights as well, and they are up against a great many difficulties. 'Insurance companies do not consider them very good risks, and in that way do not care too well to take them. My principal objection is to subsection 2, which reads as follows:
No action shall lie against the company by reason of anything in any such policy of insurance or by reason of payment of any moneys thereunder.
If any of these properties are insured a.nd a fire occurs, the owners of the properties have to get their insurance money. In the meantime the owner of that property might find that some of the locomotives were defective, and that these defective locomotives were the cause of the fire. I would be quite satisfied if we struck out the words " or by reason of payment of any money ".


Edward Walter Nesbitt: I should think the clause suggested by the hon. gentleman would have to be submitted to the legal department. We threshed out the insurance matter pretty fully in the committee.


Francis Cochrane: I think it had better
stand, and I will keep the amendment till the next sitting of the House.
Section stands.
On section 392-Limitation ,and defences.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Mr. Prices's note in regard to this section is :
In subsection 1, the words "and notwithstanding anything in any special Act may" are inserted, to ensure, uniformity as far as possible.
The company's right to plead not guilty by statute, without giving any particulars of its grounds of defence as is required from ordinary litigants is taken away by subsection 3. It was felt to be unfair that the company should have special privileges in this regard, and such defences, at all events, seem out of keeping with the simplicity and non-technicality of modern legal procedure. In the fourth line we change the word "one" to "two," and make the same change in the sixth line.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: It is a pretty important change.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Yes, it was pretty fully discussed.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: You are extending the time in which to bring an action to two years.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Yes. The Railway Brotherhood were most insistent in that request. They urgently pressed their claim, and were able to show that it was practically impossible, where a man had been seriously injured, in a year's time to be able to show exactly what was likely to occur, and they wanted it to be extended to two years.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 393-Disobeying orders of the hoard.
Joseph Elijah Armstrong: This is a new provision, intended to make the powers of the board more effective.


George Perry Graham: We have proceeded too rapidly on some of these clauses, not however on the one relating to telephones. However, we will not lose any time by adjourning now.


Francis Cochrane: Let us go on for 15 minutes.


George Perry Graham: Supposing I talk for fifteen minutes, what will happen?


Edward Walter Nesbitt: Let us stop.


Francis Cochrane: Let us go on.


George Perry Graham: Section 393 is altogether new. We have had no explanation of what the new provisions mean. The chairman reads three or four lines, and asks us to take Mr. Price's statement. We want to know what this clause means, and not what Air. Price says it means. Whoever is in charge of the Bill should tell us what it means.


Francis Cochrane: It is not all new.


George Perry Graham: It is marked new.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: It merely calls attention to the disobeying of the orders of the board, and the liability of the officers of the company, and the liability of the officers of the municipality or corporation, and other liabilities, and prosecutions. I might call the attention of the committee to the fact that, in the tenth line, after the word "director" we inserted the word "and," between "director" and "managing director" and struck out the words "and superintendent" in the same line. These are the only changes.


George Perry Graham: That is a change from the draft, but this is a new clause.


Joseph Elijah Armstrong: Alerely a reconstruction.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: It is not a reconstruction; it is an entirely new section. To some extent it is a reconstruction of the clause in the draft Bill, but it has not appeared in the Railway Act before.


Francis Cochrane: Part of it has.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: No, it is all new. Subsection 2 provides:
Wherever it is proved that any company has neglected or refused to obey an order of the Board made under the provisions of this Act, the president, the vice-president, each vice-president where there are more than one, and every director and managing director of such company shall each be guilty of an of- * fence for which he shall be liable to a penalty of not less than twenty dollars and not more than five thousand dollars, or imprisonment for any period not exceeding twelve months, or both, unless he proves that, according to his position and authority, he took all necessary and proper means in his power to obey and	carry out, and	to procure	obedience	toand	carrying out of,	such order,	and that	hewas	not at fault for	the neglect	or refueal	to
obey the same.
Suppose a divisional superintendent or district superintendent was ordered to do a certain thing. Would it be proper to submit him to a penalty of $5,000 when he was really carrying out the instructions of his superiors? It seems to me that this is rather drastic provision.


George Perry Graham: If I had had opportunity during the last few minutes, I would have called your attention, Mr. Chairman, to the fact that there was not a quorum present. I think that we had better adjourn.
Progress reported.



THE MILITARY SERVICE BILL.


[Stage Direction]
On the Order being called:
House again in Committee on Bill No. 75, an Act respecting Military Service.-Sir Robert Borden.
George Perry Graham: In reason, I ask that the House adjourn. It is now ten minutes after twelve; we have sat on the Railway Bill since three o'clock. It is easy for hon. gentlemen-I do not mean any member of the Government; they are always busy-who have not been in the committee to come in now and wish us to go on sitting for some time. No one on this side of the House dreamed that this Bill was going on to-night in committee. I think that is absolutely unfair, and I protest most absolutely against going on.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I do not think that the Government, or any member of it, can claim that any member on this side has unduly tried to prevent the passage of this Bill through committee. The Solicitor General himself must agree that the criticism has been fair; that there has been no unreasonable criticism. It is after twelve in the morning. The leader of the Opposition and gentlemen who have taken a very active part in the discussion of this Bill are not here. So far as I know they had no knowledge or intimation that the Bill was to be taken up at this stage. It seems to me to be very unfair to ask us to take up this Bill this morning.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: It is needless for me to say that there was no intention of being unfair to the Opposition, or to any member of the Opposition. I understand that the intimation was given that the committee would sit on this Bill .and go out of committee to-night. Apparently that intimation did not reach hon. gentlemen opposite.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I never heard of it. My hon. friend (Mr. Tobin) came in about five minutes ago and said to me: do you know that the Government intends to take up the Military Service Bill to-night? I said: surely not. He said: I wa3 told so in the 
lobby. I said: it cannot be possible, we have had no notice; I do not believe that the Solicitor General would do it.


Mr. TOBIN:: I got that information from the chief whip.


Arthur Meighen: I am sure that that information did not reach hon. gentlemen opposite. 1 simply wish to explain. As the Bill has been amended in committee, we could not get the third reading to-day without a day's notice, and it would seem to me that hon. gentlemen might, if we do not go on now, raise no objection to our going on with the third reading this afternoon. The Bill has been reprinted and is in the hands of hon. gentlemen, so that there should be no objection this afternoon to our going on to the third reading if we do not now proceed in committee, but wait for committee until this afternoon.


George Perry Graham: This is the most important Bill that has come before the Parliament during many years. Personally, I would prefer that the Bill should have a third reading to-morrow-I can only speak for myself; I have not had an opportunity of consulting with any person.


Arthur Meighen: You mean this afternoon.


George Perry Graham: On Thursday; I would not have any objection. I can only speak for myself, because I did not dream that the matter wouid be brought up at this stage. Personally, I would rather have the third reading on Thursday, because I have to leave on the eleven o'clock train to-night.


Arthur Meighen: At the request of the leader of the Opposition, the Bill was not taken out of committee. If, therefore, it is understood that we go on with the third reading to-day, I certainly shall not ask the committee to go on now, against the pro, tests of hon. gentlemen opposite.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I would like to put myself on record as the member for South Renfrew did. I would have no objection to the Bill being read this afternoon if it were understood that the vote, if there be one, be not taken until after eight o'clock. Some hon. gentlemen, not knowing that the matter was to come up, having received no intimation in that regard, have some very important business affairs to attend to in Montreal to-morrow afternoon, but will be back here at eight o'clock. I know that the Government cannot meet the wishes

and convenience of every member, but to my knowledge these gentlemen have gone away, having, as I say, received no intimation whatever that this Bill was coming up. It would be only fair, therefore, to put off the vote, if there is one, until after eight o'clock.


Arthur Meighen: I see no objection to that.


Mr. MIDDLEBRO:: It is only fair to say that at eleven o'clock on Wednesday morning I informed the chief Whip on the other side that the Bill would be taken out of committee on Wednesday in order that we might have the third reading on Thursday. If there is no objection to taking the Bill up in committee and having the third reading to-day, that is satisfactory.


George Perry Graham: Personally speaking-the leader of the Opposition may take objection, I do not know-I may say that if the Whips made an arrangement that the Bill be brought in on Wednesday, that arrangement was not kept.


William Sora Middlebro: That the Bill be taken up in committee at this sitting, so that we would be within the rules.


George Perry Graham: I leave it to the Chief Whip himself whether sitting until twelve o'clock on another Bill would be complying with that arrangement.


William Sora Middlebro: The agreement was the we should 'have the third reading at the next sitting of the House.
Mr. ' GRAHAM:	A man may write a
letter and if you do not reply and state your objections, it is taken for granted that you agree with him. The hon. member for North 'Grey has said that we could have the third reading. For myself I would prefer it that way, but the leader of the Opposition and other hon. gentlemen who are not now present might take some other view. When the Prime Minister was asked last night what business would be taken up on Wednesday he said: "The Railway Bill, and any other Bills on the Order Paper, and then Supply," which would indicate that he had not the Conscription Bill in his mind.


William Sora Middlebro: One of the reasons
for desiring to go on with the third reading now is that otherwise it would have to be postponed probably until next Tuesday in order to fake a vote.



MILITARY SERVICE ACT, 1917.


[Stage Direction]
House in committee on Bill No. 75, respecting Military	Service.-.Sir Robert
Borden (resumed from Friday, July 13).
Mr. Rainville in the Chair.
George Perry Graham: I protest again. It is
absolutely unfair, and as far as I am concerned I shall take no part in the discussion. I have supported this Bill at every stage and propose to support it, and I do not think I am entitled to treatment of this kind fr.om the Government.


Arthur Meighen: I stated on behalf of the Government that I did not feel like pressing this over the protest of hon. gentleman opposite, but in view of the arrangement made by the whips I say that hon. gentlemen should undertake that no objection will be raised at the next sitting of the House on the technicality that we did not give notice of the third reading coming up. It could be no more than a technicality, because xthe Bill would have been reported the other evening but for the request made on 'behalf of the leader of the Opposition. The Bill has been reprinted, and is in the hands of the. hon. members of this House, and I do not think, it is asking too much to go on with it. However, we are ready to defer to the wishes of hon. gentlemen opposite, even in the face of an arrangement that has been made; I stated that plainly before the . Speaker left the Chair. But I think we should have an understanding clear and definite that we will not be held up at the next sitting of the House and asked to defer the third reading until next Tuesday. Surely that is not unreasonable.


Frank Broadstreet Carvell: I am in the same position as my hon. friend from South Renfrew. I have given the Government all possible assistance in the passage of this Bill. I had not the slightest intimation that it was coming up to-day. We went into committee on the Railway Bill at three o'clock, and I think the hon. member for South Renfrew and I have given the Government every possible assistance in getting it passed. There are no two members in this House, except the Minister of Railways and Canals and the hon. member for Lamb-ton (Mr. J. E. Armstrong) who have sat here so continuously since three o'clock as the hon. member for South Renfrew and myself, and in view of that, and our atti-



tude towards this Bill, I do not think it is fair to ask us to bind people who are not here.
Progress reported.
On motion of Hon. Mr. Reid, the House adjourned at 12.20 a.m., Thursday.
Thursday, July 19, 1917.