1922-04-25

[Stage Direction]
Mr. GEO. H. BOIVIN (Shefford) presented the first report of the Select Standing Committee appointed to supervise the Official Report of Debates, as follows:
Tuesday, 25th April, 1922.
The Select Standing Committee appointed to supervise the Official Report of the Debates beg leave to present the following as their First Report:
Your Committee have had under consideration certain matters relating to the publication in the Official Report of the Debates, of answers to questions which must necessarily take the form of long and elaborate tabulated statements covering matter not read in the House and not always of immediate and general public interest.
Your Committee considers :-
1.	That the publication of the said answers greatly increases and complicates the work of the Printing Bureau, augments the chance of error and endangers the prompt issue of the Official Report of the Debates;
2.	That the printing of the said answers greatly increases the expense of the publication of the said Official Report;
3.	That the rights and interests of the members of this House and of the general public would be thoroughly safeguarded by the passing of such questions as Orders for Returns, leaving to the Joint Committee on Printing the responsibility of deciding which of the said returns are of sufficient public interest to warrant printing and publication;
4.	That the said returns are always available to members in the office of the Clerk of Sessional Papers;
Your Committee recommend that in future any question placed upon the Order Paper, the answer to which must take the form of long and elaborate tables or tabulated forms, shall at the request of the Minister laying the answer upon the table of the House, be passed as an order for a return as provided by section 4 of Rule 37 of the Rules of the House of Commons.
All of which is respectfully submitted,
Geo. H. Boivin,
Chairman.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. J. A. C. ETHIER (Laval-Two Mountains) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 56, to amend the Bankruptcy Act.
Some hon. MEMBERS:: Explain.


Mr. ETHIER:: The purpose of this bill is to designate the court before which the petition shall be presented. Paragraph 4 of section 4 of. the Bankruptcy Act is amended by strikng out the word "locality" and substituting therefore the words "judicial district", in order to avoid costs to creditors. I will make a fuller explanation on the second reading.


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

[Stage Direction]
On the motion of Hon. W. S. Fielding (Minister of Finance), it was resolved that the House do go into Committee to-morrow to consider the following proposed resolution :
Resolved, That it is expedient to amend the Schedule to The Currency Act, 1910, as amended by chapter nine of the statutes of 1920, by changing the millesimal fineness of silver coins from 4 to 6, and by providing that this enactment shall apply to silver coins heretofore struck since the first day of January, 1920, and also to amend the said Schedule, as amended by chapter six of the statutes of 1921, by striking out the millesimal fineness of nickel five cent coins.

[Stage Direction]
On the motion of Hon. W. S. Fielding (Minister of Finance), it was resolved that the House do go into committee tomorrow to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved. That it is expedient to amend the Penny Bank Act, chapter thirty-one of the Revised Statutes of 'Canada, by providing that a proportion not exceeding one-half of such moneys as are received on deposit elsewhere than at the place where the chief office of the bank is situated may be deposited by the bank In such chartered banks or other financial institutions as the Minister of Finance may designate as depositaries, and to provide for withdrawals from such depositaries.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. THOMAS SALES (Saltcoats) :: I should like to draw the attention of the Government to this despatch which appears in this morning's Citizen, under date of Winnipeg, April 24:
The Manitoba court of appeal to-day delivered judgment in the stated case of The King versus the Manitoba Grain Company, declaring section 215 of the Canada Grain Act ultra vires of the federal parliament. This section of the act stated that ''no person shall engage in the business of selling grain on commission or receive or solicit consignments of grain for sale on commission, in the western inspection division, without first obtaining such annual license from the board.
The appeal arose from a conviction registered in the provincial police court last year, when Magistrate OR. M. Noble fined the Manitoba Grain Company $500 for selling grain without a license. The case has aroused considerable interest owing to the fact that the validity of the Canada Grain Act was attacked by counsel for the defendant company. At the time of the conviction Magistrate Noble granted a stated case.
In this connection I should like to ask the Government what action it intends to take in this matter in order that producers of grain may be protected from the many

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mushroom grain companies which will inevitably spring up now that sections of the Canada Grain Act are held to be ultra vires.


Sir LOMER GOUIN (Minister of Justice) :: I have looked over the record and I find that two cases were instituted in the Manitoba Court of, Appeal in connection with the very same affair. One was laid on 21st October, 1921, and the other on 31st December, 1921. I am informed by my officials that there were two stated cases. As we did not know exactly in what case judgment was rendered, we wired this morning asking for copies of the judgment rendered yesterday, and as soon as we are in possession of that judgment, we shall be in a position to inform the hon. member on the subject.



NEW CANADIAN LOAN

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Hon. W. S. FIELDING (Minister of Finance) :: Mr. Speaker, I should like, with the permission of the House, to make an announcement which, I am sure will be received with pleasure on all sides of the House. Late last night, or to be more accurate, this morning before the House adjourned, I stated that the Government had sold $100,000,000 of Canadian bonds in New York, and that they would be placed on the market to-day. I have pleasure in announcing that the books were opened in New York this morning; that the loan is a complete success; that it has been over subscribed, and that the books are closed.


Sir HENRY DRAYTON (West York) :: I notice that in the announcement of the Minister of Finance yesterday, it was stated that certain commissions were to be taken off. What were they?


William Stevens Fielding: The Government received a net price of 97J. The bankers were free to place the loan on the market at any price not exceeding par. They placed it at par and that leaves the bankers and brokers concerned 2i per cent for their services.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That would be $2,500,000 on the issue?


William Stevens Fielding: If my hon. friend's
calculation is correct, that is right.


Henry Lumley Drayton: No doubt my hon. friend knows whether I am right or not; I make it $2,500,000. Now, in view of the very immediate success of this loan,
properly mirroring, as it does, the extreme high standing of this country and the large amount of idle money at present locked up in New York, is my hon. friend quite sure that he has not made this loan altogether too generous in favour of the American investor?


William Stevens Fielding: I shall be glad to discuss that question at a later stage, and particularly to place it in comparison with the commissions allowed on some loans placed by my hon. friend.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think there is a novel provision in connection with this issue, under which any unfortunate subscriber who desires to live in Canada in the future is to be taxed, while the subscriber who stays in the United States is not to be taxed. I suppose this has nothing to do with any immigration policy that the Government contemplates.


William Stevens Fielding: My hon. friends opposite sometimes accuse us of following their example. It is a rather bad thing to do, because their example is not always a good one. In this case, however, the provision in that bond with respect to taxation is copied from an issue made by my hon. friend.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: But the issue made by us was in Canada.


William Stevens Fielding: I am referring to an issue made in the United States. However, if we are to talk seriously on this question, we cannot tax an American citizen in the United States; but if this bond at any time is held by a citizen in Canada, subject to the laws of Canada, it must pay the tax.

The House again in Committee of Supply, Mr. Gordon in the Chair:
Railways and Canals-salaries, $191,970 ; contingencies, $29,500.


Hon. W. C. KENNEDY (Essex, Minister of Railways and Canals) :: There is very little, if any, change as compared with last year. The vote is less and the number of employees fewer than was the case last year; but I may say, in justice to my predecessor, that this reduction was made before I took charge in January last. During the time I have been in office there have been no new appointments. There are two vacancies, one caused by death and the other by resignation. The increases in vote are statutory, and the change in the designation of certain em-
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ployees is the result of the reclassification. When I took charge I told the deputy minister that I was anxious that we should have efficiency, first of all, but with that efficiency we should economize as far as possible. I believe that these estimates have been prepared with that end in view. As we proceed I shall be glad to give any explanations that may be required.


Mr. STEWART (Lanark):: There are four increases in salaries to the higher-paid officials of this department, three increases of $180 each and one of $300. As the minister says, these are statutory increases, but I desire to make an observation with reference to the salaries of the higher-paid officials. In the consideration of civil government estimates for some of the other departments, the opinion was expressed, from both groups on this side of the House, that, having regard to the general tendency towards deflation, the salaries of the higher-paid officials might very well be left on the basis of 1921. 'In connection with this department, in regard to which I have some little knowledge, I think that if the higher-paid officials had directed their unquestioned talents to private and corporate interests with the same devotion as they have applied themselves to the public service, they would be in receipt of very much larger salaries than are provided in these estimates. I entirely support the vote under consideration.
I have no intention of precipitating any general discussion on the railway situation under this vote, as I understand it to be the custom, under the civil government vote, to confine the discussion exclusively to matters of civil government, the general policy with regard to the railways being discussed on the general estimates. But I want to ask the minister a question which, I think, is pertinent, even at this time. The Toronto Globe has been for so long a time intimately associated with the Liberal party and its policies that, in Ontario at least, an editorial statement by that journal is taken as carrying almost the same force as an expression of government policy when the Liberal party is in power. I wish to refer to the leading editorial in the Globe of yesterday. That editorial, dealing with the question of the National Railways, contains two statements:
The Globe believes there are big enough men in the ranks of Canada's railway operators to carry the national system to success, and that Mr. Kennedy will discover and make use

of their talents. Some of them will doubtless be found in the service of the Canadian National and the Grand Trunk; some may even be drawn from the Canadian Pacific.
Further on it says:
In the end, perhaps, it may be found that there is room within the National System for the C.P.R. itself on terms that will be equitable alike to its shareholders and to the public.
The question I would ask the minister is, does the editorial in the Globe reflect the policy of the Government? Is the policy of the Government in accord with that editorial; or is that editorial intended as a feeler to test public opinion in reference to this important matter?


Mr. KENNEDY (Essex) :: Like everyone else in the province of Ontario who reads the Globe, I pay considerable attention to its editorials, and I had the pleasure of reading the editorials in question. My hon. friend, as a former minister of this department, knows that the minister is also receiving suggestions as to what he should do in railway matters. The Globe, I suppose, has, like many other papers, kindly made suggestions. Beyond that I do not know anything about the editorial. I would say that it reflects simply the ideas of the editor. As to its reflecting the policy of the Government, I have no doubt that the Government will lay down its own policy when the right time comes.


Mr. HANSON:: The right-of-way agent is Mr. Fraser, I believe. Is he confining his duties to the old National railways, or is he right-of-way agent for the whole system?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: He is the departmental right-of-way agent and does work in the East that may be necessary for the department and for the railways also.


Mr. MacKELVIE:: My excuse for asking the minister a question which would more naturally be considered under the main estimates is that it would relieve considerable anxiety on the part of a number of my constituents if I could have some assurance from him that the pronouncement he made When [DOT]these estimates were last under discussion, that no new rails would be laid this year, is not, like the laws of Modes and Persians, entirely unchangeable. I have in mind, Sir, that road of which I have no doubt you have some knowledge-the branch line running from Kamloops to Kelowna through the Okanagan Valley. That road has been practically completed for two years so far as the grade is concerned, at an ex-

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penditure of five million dollars, involving, of course, a very heavy annual charge for interest, while the depreciation on the roadbed at a conservative estimate must amount to 20 per cent per annum. Good and ample justification could be given for the completion of that line this summer in order that it may be ready to handle this season's fruit and vegetable crops. This road would be second to no other branch line as a feeder for the National railways, and the minister will, I am sure, agree that our National railway system stands very much in need of additional business. The latest figures I have available are for 1919, when from three stations in that district, Armstrong, Vernon, and Kelowna, 320 full cars of fruit and vegetables were shipped and 165,000 odd packages of express; in addition there were shipments of live stock, hay and other products. One section of that line passes through the Salmon river district in which lies probably the most valuable gypsum deposits in the world; they are practically one hundred per cent pure.


Mr.   CHAIRMAN@: Order. I would draw the attention of the hon. member to the fact that this subject hardly comes under "Civil Government."


John Armstrong MacKelvie: I was going to crave the indulgence of yourself, Mr. Chairman, and the minister, for the reason I gave at the outset. I am deluged with telegrams and resolutions from the local Boards of Trade asking for an immediate response, and if the minister could give some assurance to allay their anxiety I should be much obliged. He has a reputation, well earned I am sure, of being a thorough business man.. For business reasons alone the outlay necessary to complete this line could be amply justified.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Like my hon. friend, I have had many representations in connection with this particular line. But may I say to him that his district is not alone in making representations for railway accommodation? From all parts of the West I have had similar representations of their transportation needs. The policy of the Government in respect to the laying of new lines this year is simply this: We felt that, the new board coming in, the responsibility for any capital expenditure should properly belong to that board, and that for the time being, until they have had an opportunity of ascertaining whether the expenditure would be warranted, we should not go on with any new
work. However, we are impressed with the necessity of doing something in the district my hon. friend has mentioned, and I can promise him that when the new board is appointed every consideration will be given to the matter.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Militia and Defence-Allowances, Active M-ilitia, $120,000.
The CHAIRMAN:: Shall the item carry? Carried.


Mr. SPEAKMAN:: Just a moment, Mr. Chairman. I think some of us heard the word "carried " before we got to the page. This is rather too important an item to be carried without any discussion whatever, and we would like a statement from the minister in reference to it.
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Militia and Defence) : I hardly expected it to go through so rapidly as that.


Alfred Speakman: You are quite right.


Mr. GRAHAM:: The militia estimates,
I might say, have been pared down to a point as low as is compatible with national safety; in fact, I have been criticized quite severely for some of the reductions. I think it is well that Parliament should discuss this question. Our militia force was not a mushroom or accidental growth, it took a good many years of development before Canada became of sufficient importance and exercised autonomy to such a marked degree that she undertook her own militia defence. The matter was discussed in the Imperial Parliament on several occasions, and it is a well-known fact that not a few of the members of the British House of Commons and some members of the British cabinet opposed Canada being allowed-if I may put it in that form-to have, control of her militia, because it was feared that it would tend to encourage the idea of too great independence and would weaken the tie that binds us to the Motherland. That fear, of course, has been dispelled, because the principle enunciated by Lord Grey as far back as 1851 has been fully borne out by our subsequent history, namely, that the greater the responsibility you place on what might be called the subordinate body, the stronger becomes its attachment to the head. So it has been with the Dominion, as year by year she has developed, greater responsibility has been placed upon her to manage her own affairs, and instead of the tie that binds us to the Motherland being weakened, that
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Mr. ARTHURS:: Why is the principal
reduction in these estimates confined to the permanent force?


George Perry Graham: The reduction will not
interfere materially with the efficiency of the force, being in large measure among officers and non-commissioned officers, under a rearrangement that the chief of staff proposes to make.


James Arthurs: Does the hon. minister say that the reduction in' the noncommissioned officers will be a move towards efficiency?


George Perry Graham: I would not like to go
so far as that. My hon. friend is a military man, and he is confronting me with a technique that I am not familiar with. It would be a reduction of the units in various parts of the Dominion, and a rearrangement under a new plan. As I was pointing out, now that we have assumed the status of a nation we must carry on those departments which are incident to that status. Hon. gentlemen have said to

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me: Why spend money on the militia, seeing that it is non-productive? I reply: Why spend money on fire insurance when it is non-productive? Let there be disorder in any part of the Dominion that the Militia Department is unable to cope with, and immediately we would be criticized because we were unprepared to meet the emergency. Could we, Mr. Chairman, let it be known throughout the entire world that Canada is a country where the militia is ineffective, where the mounted police is to be reduced almost to the vanishing point, where the naval service is to be of little account, and where the flying force is not to function? We would become the mecca of a class of people that would not be desirable in the best interests of the country. It is our duty, even though the militia be not productive, to maintain it at sufficient strength to preserve order and good government within the Dominion. The militia is not productive, but it is highly protective, and if it were not for this force Canada would not be in the position she occupies to-day.
I wanted to make these few observations because as a nation we are at the present time looking forward to standing side by side with the other nations of the world. If we are to realize our aspirations, we must accept the responsibilities that go with those aspirations and be prepared to carry on our share of defence work as part of the British Empire, and that share, so far as the militia is concerned, is provided for in the estimates I am now presenting.


Mr. MARTELL:: Does the minister mean that he is going to increase the militia expenditure in this country under present conditions, when people want to get back to a peace basis and are desirous that the militia should be cut down practically to an infinitesimal point?


George Perry Graham: The estimates are not being increased; they are being decreased. So far as the amount is concerned; if we compare this year with 1913-1914, when we were on a peace basis, the estimates this year are less; and if you take into account the present purchasing power of the dollar as compared with 1911-1912, I submit the estimates presented to-day are less than they were that year.


Lewis Herbert Martell: I congratulate the minister on that.


Mr. HOCKEN:: What is the reduction in the number of men in the permanent force?


George Perry Graham: The estimate made by the department and the Chief of Staff is
that when the reorganization is completed the reduction will be in the vicinity of 400 or 500 all told.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: But this vote shows an increase of about $100,000 over last year for clothing and necessaries. How does the minister account for that?


George Perry Graham: I might point out to the hon. member that there are two branches of the force, the permanent force and the volunteers. The $100,000 which my hon. friend mentions is for the volunteer force, which is not, strictly speaking, the militia.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Is the volunteer force larger this year than last?


George Perry Graham: It is exactly the same, but we have reduced the amount for annual drill by $100,000. There is also this to be taken into consideration. After the war there was a good deal of clothing on hand, but as that is used up more is required. More clothing may be required in certain lines one year than another. For instance, we have stocks on hand now of certain lines, but in other lines our stock is diminishing.


Mr. CAMPBELL:: The expenditure for 1919-1920 for cadet service was $390,000 and to-day it is $450,000. What is the explanation of the increase?


George Newcombe Gordon: We have not come to that item yet.


George Perry Graham: I am not averse to discussing all the items now, but answering first my hon. friend from West Toronto (Mr. Hocken), if he will look at the increase he suggested in the item for clothing and necessaries, he will find that it is merely a cross-entry, a simple matter of bookkeeping. It is a decrease in war-like stores, transferred from one account to the other.


Mr. SHAW:: I want to congratulate the minister for having made a reduction in the estimates as compared with last year.
I think he is entitled to some credit for giving us this evidence of economy on the part of his department. At the same time it is only fair to say that I have an objection to register, and it is that the reduction is not sufficient. Without going into details of these items, which I presume will be taken up separately, I should like for a moment to compare the estimates of this department with the amount of less than $5,000,000 asked for by the Department of Agriculture, which is the fundamental and basic industry of this country. I know very well that you cannot always very
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reasonably compare these estimates under the circumstances. But take the estimates of other departments of the Government.
I find that the Health Department, for instance, is asking something under $1,000,000; Administration of Justice, slightly over $2,000,000; Immigration and Colonization, slightly over $2,000,000,-and I think no one will under-estimate the value and significance of the work for which that estimate is being asked,-Fisheries, slightly over $1,000,000; Mines, slightly over $500,000; Labour Department, the main estimates for which are something under $1,500,000; Dominion Lands and Parks, almost $5,000,000; Soldiers' Land Settlement, approximately $12,000,000; and finally, may I just mention the estimates for the Department of Trade and Commerce which total slightly over $3,000,000. I think in comparison with these other necessary and fundamental departments of government, the estimate for the Militia Department is out of all proportion. I realize, of course, the necessity for maintaining in this country not only a militia, but a Militia Department, properly staffed and properly officered, and I have nothing to say with regard to the efficiency and effectiveness of our miltia. I think perhaps it is true, as the minister has stated, that the militia generally has served satisfactorily; but I do think in view of the estimates for other departments of government, there should be a very substantial reduction in the militia estimates, especially as we have just come through a long war, and have had a conference at Washington on the limitation of armaments, and particularly in view of the very difficult economic conditions that prevail throughout this country. I do not propose to move any amendment, but I want to urge upon the minister the necessity for doing something far more substantial than he has done in reducing the estimates of his department.


Mr. GUTHRIE:: I should like to say a word on the question of the total amount which the minister is asking for on this occasion, and the remarks which have fallen from my hon. friend from West Calgary (Mr. Shaw), that they show a substantial decrease from the vote of last year.
The vote of last year was $11,954,000, and the total expenditure until 31st March this year, I think I am safe in saying, was under $10,250,000. I have not received the figures yet, but from my knowledge of the department up till the end of December and from estimates I have been able to make

since, I think I am within the mark when I say that $10,250,000 will cover every dollar that was spent last year. This year it is proposed to expend $10,788,000. So the reduction is rather more apparent than real, is it not, Mr. Chairman? However, under all the circumstances which we have in Canada to-day, if we are going to maintain a militia force in this country that is to be of any practical use, I do not believe that the minister can cut very much below the figure he has submitted to the House on the present occasion. I am inclined to think that in some instances his figures are too low; in some others perhaps they may be slightly too high. But it is not correct to say that Canada is one of the nations which is engaged in extravagant military expenditure. I went to some pains just a year ago to make a comparison as between Canada and every other country in the world, just to see what we were spending and how our expenditure compared with our neighbours. My hon. friends who are inclined to be critical can go to any country on the face of the glohe, civilized or uncivilized, they can inquire in Europe, in Asia, in America North or South, and they will find that comparison shows that Canada is a long way below the lowest of them in all classes of expenditure on armaments-so far below the lowest that one is almost ashamed to make the comparison. These figures were all submitted by experts to a Financial Conference held in Brussels in October, 1921. The figures are accurate, they were submitted as a result of a call by the League of Nations; and in every comparison you make, the expenditure in this country for military purposes is almost nothing as compared with similar expenditure by our nearest neighbour whether it be a British Dominion or whether it be an independent country. The charge that we are extravagant in this respect, is entirely unfounded, if you compare our expenditure with what any other nation in the world is doing. Now, I submit that the minister has cut these estimates to just about as low a figure as he can go. There may be some details, perhaps, that will stand some paring down; but on the whole I doubt very much if he can go any lower without actually injuring the service.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Are there not many
things in connection with the Militia Department that could be dispensed with in view of other public services being starved?

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Hugh Guthrie: I do not know about
any public services that are being starved, but the point I make is this: If it is the wisdom of this House that we should maintain in Canada a reasonable militia force as was done in the past, if it is the judgment of the House that we should have a militia force at all, then you cannot pay much less than the minister proposes to pay for it this year. On the other hand, if in the judgment of the House the force should be wiped out then he could save that money and apply it to something else. You cannot have your cake and eat it,-if you are going to have a force, and if this force is to be an efficient one, it is going to cost you what the minister is asking for.


Lewis Herbert Martell: What is the wisdom
of permitting drill halls to be lit up all through the winter months and having parades there in order that officers may display their gold braid, while people are starving in this country?


Mr. DUFF:: I think, Mr. Chairman, with your permission and that of the minister it might be as well to allow us to deal with the whole series of items connected with this subject instead of limiting the discussion to one item alone. I think that has been the usual practice in previous years.


George Newcombe Gordon: The items all form
separate resolutions, I am sorry to say.


William Duff: I think that would be the quickest way-to deal with the entire vote. I also would like to congratulate the minister upon reducing the total estimate from something over $11,954,000 to $10,788,000; but I would like to say that I think, in the present condition of affairs in Canada, in future this expenditure can be greatly reduced. Of course the Minister of Militia has only been in charge of this department for some three months and it was impossible for him in that time to consult the excellent staff of officials he has surrounding him in the department, to discuss matters thoroughly with them, and get such a grasp of affairs, that he could, in respect to a number of the militia items, curtail the expenditure. But the people of Canada are expecting the Minister of Militia to do that in the next twelve months, so that when he presents his estimates to Parliament in 1923 he may make it manifest that those estimates have been cut to the fullest extent compatible with the best interests of the country. I agree with the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) and with the minister too, that it is necessary to have a militia force in Canada, but it seems to me that that force should be managed as economically as possible. I believe it is possible to have a skeleton organization;
4 p.m. I do not think it is necessary to spend some of the large amounts which are being expended in connection with this department. Undoubtedly it is necessary in different sections of Canada to maintain such units or organizations that if it were necessary, owing to trouble, to call out the .volunteers the needed personnel for taking charge of these units would be available; but I do nofr think it is necessary to spend large sums of money in connection with the militia. The people of Canada irrespective of politics will support what the hon. member for Calgary has said in this regard. I believe too that the people will back up any government or any party that will cut to the lowest possible point not only the militia expenditure but the so-called naval expenditure, which latter is absolutely a waste of public money. I am not criticising the present minister, for he has only been in charge of the Militia Department for three months, but I would like to call his attention to one item. I do not wish to ask the minister to reduce his estimates by resolution of this committee. I have a great deal of faith in the minister and some of his officials; they have the best interest of the country at heart just as much as my hon. friend from Calgary or any other member, and although the item to which I am about to refer appears in the estimates I do not think the minister will spend one dollar of that money during the coming season. The item to which I refer is Annual Drill, $1,400,000. The minister and his officials have already shown their good intentions by cutting this item down from $1,500,000 as it was last year to $1,400,000 this year.- The mere fact that this item appears in the estimates does not mean that there is any necessity for its expenditure. The hon. member for South Wellington, who was minister of militia in the National Liberal and Conservative Government, told us a few moments ago -and I presume that in so doing he was endeavouring to present himself with a bouquet-that, although last year when he was minister the militia estimates called for $11,954,000, they only spent $10,250,000 or thereabouts. Now, Sir, I have such confidence in the present Minister of
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Militia that although his estimates call for $10,780,000 it will be a matter of great surprise and disappointment to me if when he comes to present the militia estimates next year he does not show that instead of expending any such sum he has only paid out some six or seven million dollars. Reductions such as that in this expenditure are what the people of this country want. There is one sum that need not be expended this year, as I have already said, and that is $1,400,000 for annual drill.


George Newcombe Gordon: I call the hon. member's attention to the fact that that item has not yet been reached. We are now considering the item of Allowances, Active Militia-$120,000. Shall the item carry?


Mr. VIEN:: The total of the several items is $10,788,000 and I think that on the title given to all these items we could discuss the whole question.


Richard Burpee Hanson: What does this appropriation of $120,000 mean?


George Perry Graham: If the rules of the
House would not be violated by his doing so, I should like my hon. friend (Mr. Duff) to conclude his remarks. Suppose we carry the first item, and then he can discuss the first one on the second.


William Duff: Before we proceed to the next item, I should like to suggest to the committee that, instead of discussing one item alone, we do as we did in previous years, discuss the whole appropriation. If necessary, I would make a motion that the whole appropriation be discussed.


George Newcombe Gordon: I am instructed that it is the rule of the committee that these resolutions should be discussed separately. There may be some items in this resolution, but there is, at present before the committee, one resolution, namely, No. 89, Allowances, Active Militia.


William Duff: When I was interrupted by the Chair, I was endeavouring to say that the hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie), who was Minister of Militia in the late government, in the remarks which he made a few minutes ago, when he was discussing what he termed reasonable expenditure on the service, compared the total expenditure in Canada with expenditures in other countries. It is quite true that the expenditure for militia purposes in Canada is much smaller by head of population than similar expenditure in any other country; but we must agree that

conditions in Canada are altogether different from conditions in other countries. For instance, nobody in Canada wants to have conditions as they are in Russia to-day. I have read in the newspapers of two or three men in Canada who have said that we should have conditions as they exist in Russia to-day; but I do not belong to that class, and I believe ninety-nine per cent of the people of this country would be strongly opposed to our having conditions as they are in Russia to-day. Furthermore, I do not believe anybody in Canada with any common-sense wants to have conditions as they are in France or in any other European country. Consequently, it is not necessary that the people of Canada should vote for militia purposes such large expenditures as must be made in other countries. Therefore, I do not think that the argument of the hon. member for South Wellington should have very much weight and effect when he says that we should spend large sums of money for militia purposes, because, forsooth, other countries are spending large amounts.
As I said a moment ago, it seems to me that the estimate for annual drill should not be spent this year at least. If ever the necessity arose, we have in this country 400,000 men who are available at any time for service of this kind, in order to maintain peace and order in Canada. It is a well-known fact that during the late war, the men who were gathered in at a few moments' notice and who were outside of the active militia of this country, made the very best soldiers which Canada or the United States or any other country sent to the war. Men who were taken from ordinary avocations in life in this or any other country, after a little training, made as good soldiers as other men who had spent many years in military service. With the available material in this country, if anything happened, we do not need to have a great standing army. I have no objection to the estimate for the permanent force. I notice the minister and his officials have cut down this amount by $755,000. That is a step in the right direction, and the minister should be congratulated that, at this stage in the affairs of Canada, in our present financial and industrial condition, the estimate for the permanent force has been reduced by $755,000. I notice that the item for the Dominion arsenal at Lindsay shows a reduction of $218,300.


George Newcombe Gordon: I would draw the hon. member's attention to the fact that

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all these items will be reached in due course, but the item at present before the committee is No. 89, Allowances, Active Militia.


William Duff: If you are going, Sir, to confine me to the one item, I will bring my remarks to a close; but it seems to me that we should be allowed to discuss the whole appropriation. If, however, you rule in that way, I must bow to your ruling. I want to say, in conclusion, that the people of Canada are anxious to see this Government reduce expenditure on militia, navy and anything else of this character, to the lowest possible amount, and this department under the present minister will receive the thanks of the country if, instead of spending $10,000,000, the amount is cut down as low as possible.


Lewis Herbert Martell: I have a few observations to make in regard to this appropriation, and they shall be brief.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Lewis Herbert Martell: My hon. friends say "hear, hear." Aill the "hear, hear'b" in the world will not prevent me from giving expression to the views that, as a representative of a constituency in the federal Parliament, I have been sent here to present to this House.
I want, first of all, to congratulate the Minister of Militia and Defence upon the fact that he has, to some extent, decreased the militia estimates. I have every respect for the Minister of Militia and Defence, but I want to assure him that I believe he has taken too much advice from officials in his department who are fonder of gold braid parades than of the interest of the people of this country. It seems to me that, while we require a certain militia in this Dominion, this militia should be reduced to the finest possible point. We have heard ini this House debates about unemployment; we know that agriculture in Canada is being starved; and now, even though this country is in dire straits financially, and whilst the minister-and I congratulate him personally and not his officials upon this fact-has decreased the estimates, this vote for militia is being maintained in order that we shall have in Canada people who, fresh from o'er the seas, give native Canadians the feeling that they are being looked upon with an easy sort of tolerance. These people want to have gold braid matches in order that they may parade before the people of this country their connection with Sir So-and-So and Sir Somebody Else. The people
of Canada do not care whether you have an ancestor, a family tree, or not, so long as you are able to do an honest man's work with brain and hand; and we, in this Dominion, as a young nation, a nation within the British Empire, a nation that has a right to control its own affairs, want the least possible amount of militarism. I pray the indulgence of the minister while I ask him that he be good enough to dto his utmost to see that these estimates are brought down to the lowest possible point.
What do we find as regards militia camps in this Dominion? Some people who go to these camps seem to forget that they are Canadians at all; they seem to assume, during these camps, a sort of autocratic spirit, and the idea is to grind down the young intelligent Canadian, who goes there primarily for instruction that may fit him, if the time ever came, to defend his native land. The minister, if I may be figurative, is on the hilltop listening to the murmurs of the far off sea, but he fails to realize that young men must be fitted to brave the stream of life. He looks upon the distant sea, but he does not note the rushing tide below him. In my opinion the Militia Department of Canada exists to-day for no other purpose than the holding of gold-laced parades. We are asked to spend the sum of $10,788,400 for gold-lace parades and nothing else, while agricultural exhibitions in the country cannot receive any aid from the Department of Agriculture. We are told that a dire financial condition exists in this country which makes it impossible for us to give one or two thousand dollars to these exhibitions, and yet we can spend over $10,000,000 of the people's money on gold-lace shows. We have heard the question of unemployment discussed on this floor. Children are crying for want of food and clothing, and shoes, and workmen find their slim pay envelopes altogether inadequate to supply their families with even the barest necessities. In the face of that, what justification can there possibly be for spending such a huge sum as this on a mere empty show? I shall certainly vote against the item.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The minister might
state what is meant by "allowances, active militia." I might say to my hon. friend for Hants (Mr. Martell) that if he is sincere in his declarations he should get up and move that the vote, or some of the items thereof, be cut in two. We could thereby judge of his sincerity.
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Lewis Herbert Martell: If you put that motion I will vote for it.


An hon. MEMBER:: What courage!


George Perry Graham: In regard to command
pay, drill instruction, etc., there are certain allowances given to the officers f.or the number of men brought into their companies and trained. Then there is an item of ,$20,000 for the care of arms. Where there is no caretaker the different officers are allowed a certain amount to defray the expense of looking after the arms. There are allowances for postage throughout the Dominion, and to cover contingencies, etc., and allowances to trumpeters. Each trumpeter who qualifies is given $3 annually. These things make up the amount of this particular item.


Milton Neil Campbell: I should like some information in regard to the permanent force.


George Newcombe Gordon: That is a separate
item.


Milton Neil Campbell: It is impossible to
discuss these various items separately. If you cut one estimate it automatically affects the other, and the militia should be considered in conjunction with the permanent force.


Mr. GOOD:: I desire to question your
ruling, Mr. Chairman, in regard to the separate consideration of these items. How can you discuss the general aspects of the whole question if you are to be unduly restrained in considering the bearing of one particular vote upon another?


George Newcombe Gordon: Bourinot at page 425
says:
As in other committees, each resolution must be proposed and discussed as a distinct question, and when it has been formally carried, no reference can be made again thereto. Neither is it regular to discuss any resolution before it has been formally proposed from the chair. Each vote or resolution is necessarily a question in itself to be proposed, amended and put as any motion or bill in the house.
That is the authority on this question.


William Duff: That ruling holds good so
long as the minister submits his items as separate resolutions. The minister, if he desired to do so, instead of placing before the committee a list of fifteen or sixteen separate resolutions, could embody them in one resolution covering the whole amount, so that they might the more freely be discussed. I would ask him to do that in deference to the wishes of the committee.


George Newcombe Gordon: These resolutions,
prepared by the treasury board, appear before the Chairman as separate items. I have only one item before me now, No. 89.


William Duff: Could the minister not change the form in which he has placed the items before the committee, so that we might discuss the whole question from every point of view?


George Newcombe Gordon: That could be done by the unanimous consent of the committee.


Arthur Meighen: There is no real difficulty in the matter. The resolutions, it is true, are all for separate items or classes of expenditure, but in the consideration of each item, its relation to the whole may certainly be discussed, and the size of the whole vote is undoubtedly open to discussion. As I understand the ruling of the Chair, it is simply that the question as to the correctness of any particular item not immediately under consideration shall not he discussed. That is quite right, and I do not think that such a ruling hampers hon. members on either side. The relation of any one class of expenditure to another, embraced in the resolution, can be discussed, and consequently the question can be considered as to whether or not there should be a gross reduction. But the rightness or wrongness of any item not under consideration, the Chair has ruled, cannot be discussed. It does not seem to me that there is any restriction to be complained of.


William Duff: When I was speaking I thought that the Chairman ruled that I could discuss only one item. I was proceeding to deal with other items and he called me to order. Before we go further I want to know whether we are to be confined to just one item, or whether we can discuss the whole militia vote amounting to over ten million dollars.


George Perry Graham: Like the leader of the Opposition, (Mr. Meighen) I do not see that there is much difficulty in the way. I think we can proceed calmly. Each one of the items is an entity in the whole, and in discussing one you can certainly refer to others. The bearing which this item has on the others is discussable. The Chairman is merely trying to avoid any discussion in detail of all the items under one particular vote, and then going over the same items all over again when we take them up in their order. These resolutions have been submitted to His Excellency and must be discussed in their order; but I see no objection to a general discussion of the status of the militia.

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Mr. WOODSWORTH:: What I have to
say, Mr. Chairman, concerns not, perhaps, this particular item so much as the underlying principle of the maintenance of any-think like a large force in Canada. Some of us are not in a position to discuss the particular items; it is obvious that one item might be reduced and others left as they are, and that the efficiency of the force might thereby be impaired.
The minister has suggested1-and I think we can all agree-that the time has come when Canada is quite capable of administering her own affairs. The question arises, then, as to the principle on which we propose to administer our affairs. It seems to be taken for granted that we must follow the example of European nations and proceed to arm; in fact, the minister says that we must have all the departments necessary for the equipment of a nation. Now, I should like to challenge the implication that in order that we may become a self-sufficient nation it is necessary for us to maintain a military force. At this particular time we are talking about international disarmament; it would seem that the best way to bring about international disarmament is by national disarmament. We in Canada are in a peculiarly good position to accomplish this. We have the Pacific on the west, the Atlantic on the east; we are bordered by a friendly nation to the south; why should we be prepared to resist aggression on any of these fronts? We have made it a boast that throughout the past century we have had no warships upon the Great Lakes, and we have said that that in itself is the greatest safeguard we have against warfare between the United States and ourselves. What is true in regard to warships on the Great Lakes is equally true in regard to armed forces; we need not seek to protect ourselves against aggression from the south. It may be said that we ought to be prepared to protect ourselves against any unnamed enemy who might arise from some unexpected quarter and seek to injure our nation. I take it, however, there is a growing sentiment on the part of a large number of the Canadian people that since we professed to have gone into the great war to end war, now that the war is over we should try to get back to an absolute peace basis. This Parliament succeeds the one which administered affairs during the period the war was in progress. Now is the time when we should decide whether or not an armed
force means or makes for peace. I for one -and I think I voice the sentiment of a considerable number-have been led to doubt that very much.
It has been further suggested that perhaps we ought to protect ourselves because of probable internal disturbance, I submit that our position in this country is very different from that of European states; we have no subordinate races that must be kept down or are in danger of rising against the nation as a whole, I do not think we have any classes that are particularly dangerous. A good many of our forefathers came here in order to escape the military burdens of Europe; why should we proceed to set up military forces in this country similar to those which they left in Europe? If we provide for the needs of the people, there is no doubt that we shall have a loyal population. Who are we, anyway? We are all anxious to make a living for ourselves, anxious that our families shall have a decent education and so on; that is the feeling of the Canadian people. Under these circumstances, what group is there that we need fear? Now that the war is past we ought to reconsider this whole matter and decide whether we need maintain military forces in this country. Instead of being an insurance against trouble they are rather, it seems to me, provocative of trouble.


Mr. HUGHES:: After listening to the discussion and after giving the matter some little consideration, it seems to me that the first thing to be done is to decide upon a policy. The first question is, if we want a military force, why do we need it? Do we fear invasion or aggression from any other country? Are we preparing for a war, and if so, against whom? If that is out of the question; if aggression or invasion on the part ol any other country is not to be thought of then should we have an armed force t( preserve internal peace? I think we should, there is no city in the Dominion that does not require a police force, though we are a peaceable people. Then, if we should have a national force, the question is, of what size should that national force be? Having decided that, we can reasonably proceed to have a national force as large as necessary, but no larger. If we are preparing for or expect another war, if we anticipate foreign trouble of any kind at any time in the future, what size of force do we need? It seems to me that these are the questions that should first be
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settled. 1 do not think we should anticipate any trouble from foreign countries.
I do not think we need fear any aggression on the part of our southern neighbours. We fear no trouble from Europe; we need anticipate no trouble from the Eastern countries across the Pacific. Then the question is-i Come back to it-what size of force is necessary? That we should have some force there is no doubt, but I think the present force is too large for internal purposes, and the general policy should be adopted of cutting it down to the lowest possible point. If the force is maintained1 beyond what is necessary, it is a waste of money, and money is very much needed for other and productive purposes. I shall have a few words to say on the next item- I may not, I suppose, speak on it now, Mr. Chairman-but in my judgment the annual drill is a waste of money. I know it was cut out a few years ago, and I do not think we had the annual drill last year. In any case, it was not general; it may have been held in some places.


George Perry Graham: This estimate is lower than the one last year.


James Joseph Hughes: I know it is, and I think it should1 be lower still. Now, I used to drill some years ago and I know it was just a holiday. While the country was rich and we had money to spend, perhaps there was no great barm in it, but we have not the money to spend now. I know that captains in the militia, in order to make up the full complement of their companies, had to take men much over age, and in the cavalry regiments horses were used that would be no good for war purposes. The men who went to drill looked upon it simply as a holiday. When war actually broke out very few of them were available or of any use. The young men of the country, and middle-aged men too, volunteered in large numbers and made good soldiers, but only a small proportion of the active militia were available or were any good.


Mr. LANCTOT:: It is no good at all.


James Joseph Hughes: My hon. friend says that it is no good at all; well, I pretty much agree with that. If there is one item in this appropriation that ought to be cut out it is that which provides for the annual drill-and there may be others.
To summarize what I have said: the first thing to be done is to decide what policy we should pursue, whether we fear, or expect, or anticipate, aggression from any

country within the next few years. If we do not anticipate anything of that kind, then we should not provide for it. We have no money to waste; we have no money to spend on frills.


William Charles Good: The hon. member for South Wellington (Mr. Guthrie) intimated that we ought to be ashamed of our situation as compared with the situation in some of the European countries. I suggest that we ought rather to be proud of it. In regard to the total figures as indicated in the estimates, I would like to call attention to the fact that a dollar goes a good deal further this year than it did last year, and when allowance is made for that, possibly the comparison between the respective amounts is not as attractive as it might otherwise seem.
I would like to emphasize the sentiments that have already been expressed by several hon. members to the effect that we are spending relatively too much money on the militia. So far as my observation has gone, militia quarters and militia activities are rather in the nature of gold braid and fuss-and-feathers entertainment-a sort of social club-than anything of a strictly protective or military character. I do not say that unkindly or with the idea of reflecting upon any other person who may be connected with the militia. But so far as my observation goes, things tend inevitably that way, and it is not a good way; it does not do the country any good. And occasionally we have exhibitions, that are, to say the least, disgraceful.
In regard to the need for preserving order at home I do think that the member for Kings, P.E.I. (Mr. Hughes) is right when he says that we are overstaffed or "over-forced" so far as the militia is concerned. We have had a great deal of talk about unemployment and about unrest, and I think that lurking in some peoples' minds there is a thought that the militia may be necessary in order to put down agitators.- people who are stirring up the unrest which has arisen out of bad industrial or social conditions. Now, let me make this suggestion if $5,000,000 that is voted for militia purposes could be transferred to the solution of the problem of unemployment, we would not need so much miltia and we could have a much happier solution of these labour difficulties and this unrest than we can possibly bring about by maintaining or increasing a force capable of suppressing anything of that nature, I feel very strongly that if that is in our minds at

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all, we ought to get rid of it; it is not the right way to handle problems of that sort.
I do believe, of course, in having sufficient police to maintain law and order. But we must not think that we have to have a large and still larger force for that purpose, because difficulties of that type ought to be handled in an altogether different way. I therefore repeat my suggestion that the diversion of a very large part of this vote along other lines would be very much more satisfactory to this country.
As I said a little while ago, a serious difficulty presents itself to any of us who wish to suggest a reduction in the total vote. If we consider the vote item by item, there are few here who understand the details sufficiently to be able to say that this or that particular vote ought to be cut down by such and such an amount. I feel that the total vote ought to be reduced, but I cannot put my finger on any particular item. I suggest that, if it is in order, we should be able at some time during the discussion to move a reduction in the total vote without having to move a reduction in each particular item. Of course, if we go through each item and pass it, we are not then in a position to move any reduction in the total.


Thomas Vien: I do not believe there is any difference of opinion among the members of the committee on the question whether we ought to maintain a militia in Canada. I do not think any hon. member would move that the militia should be dispensed with. That being the case, it comes down to a question of proportion, a question of quantity. With what has been said on both sides as to the restrictions which should be made effective with regard to our militia expenditure I am in full sympathy, and I would be much more critical of the items on this page of the estimates were we not to have in the near future a reorganization of the Department of Defence, which will mean that the Minister of Defence will have to look into the reorganization of the militia as well. If it were not for that, I would, with many members on both sides of the House, ask the minister not to expend the money that we are going to vote to him. But I do not think it would be wise under the circumstances, either on this item or on the total vote of $10,000,000, to go into the details of where a cut should be made. It is a good thing, I think, that the opinion of so many members has been expressed and that that opinion has been unanimous with 73
regard to the desirability of curtailing militia expenditure and reducing it to the minimum. But some of the items will, I think, bear investigation and in connection with them some hon. members may wish to draw to the attention of the Government the desirability of not expending the total amount voted. I have been connected with the militia for about twenty years now, and I know something about it. During the last ten or twelve years money has been spent foolishly, lavishly, in many centres, and curtailments are , absolutely necessary. For instance, on the staff of each of the various districts the minister has a paymaster, an assistant paymaster and an auditor. Why should there be any necessity for having these three officers in each of the districts? If the paymaster is a responsible officer, no more audit beyond what the Auditor General does and what the General Paymaster does, should be needed. I grant that during the war the volume of business transacted in every district may have justified the appointment of auditors, but the war has been over for three years now, and I think we can dispense with the services of the auditors in the various military districts. That is only one instance. I have asked the minister to give me some information by letter, and I shall have something to say when we come to the item for the general staff. I think that we could dispense with a number of officers who are now employed on the general staff. I pointed out to the minister and the House the other day that we had seventeen generals in Canada to manage the affairs of the militia, whereas ten years ago we could manage the whole business with two or three generals, who were paid between $4,000 and $5,000 each, as compared with between $6,000 and $9,500 which these generals are drawing to-day-* and we have seventeen of them. Yet when the minister, carrying out the policy which now receives the approval of the committee, puts some of these men on the superannuation list, he is criticized by the former Minister of Militia (Mr. Guthrie) and his friends, who almost shed tears on the retirement of these great generals. These generals are being superannuated on a very generous basis indeed. To cite only one case, that of General Burstall, whose name was mentioned the other day, I am told that he is being superannuated on $6,000 a year, which is $2,000 more than the salary he drew in 1914.

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Roch Lanctôt: More than Mr. Doherty, the ex-Minister of Justice. .


Thomas Vien: Some of these cases will bear investigation. I would urge upon the department the necessity for further curtailing the list of staff appointments. We have too many generals in Canada; we have too many officers on the permanent staff. I know that it is the intention of the minister, in the reorganization of his department, to bring about this reform, and if we were not on the eve of passing a bill reorganizing the whole defence of Canada I would be much more inquisitive as to the item we are now discussing and much more critical as to the amounts we are asked to vote. We have curtailed the expenditure by $1,000,000, and I am sure that the minister will not expend all of the $10,788,000 which he is asking for. I am in full accord with the hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. Duff) when he suggests that next year the Minister of Defence, as he will then be called, should be able to come to this House and tell us that instead of expending $10,000,000, he has spent only $8,000,000 or $9,000,000.


Roch Lanctôt: Five million.


Thomas Vien: My hon. friend says $5,000,-
000.	That raises the question how much the militia expenditure should be curtailed. If you have a militia you have to give them some training, or you do away with the militia altogether. I would cut down the annual training-and this will probably be one of my suggestions when the item comes up-to a minimum, for a few years to come. We are in no immediate danger of an uprising within this country or of an attack from outside. I think we could take a holiday for a few years in many lines of military activity. So far as that is concerned I wish to support heartily the remarks which have been made by the hon. member for Lunenburg and some hon. members on the opposite side of the House, urging the minister in the reorganization of his department to curtail expenditure as much as possible and not to expend the amount which he is now asking for.


Mr. CHURCH:: where the officers and non-commissioned officers of the militia get their real training in military matters. In view of all I have said I maintain that the expenditure provided in the item under discussion is necessary and I hope it will not be curtailed to any further extent. I believe that the present Minister of Militia, like those who immediately preceded him in that office, is well disposed towards the militia, but I hope he will not proceed too far in the direction of economy and injure the militia beyond repair. While it is necessary to have economy we do not want to carry that policy to an undesirable extreme so far as the militia is concerned, otherwise the force will be simply as it was in the days of 1812 and 1813. If disaster to the militia is contemplated that result will be obtained by adopting the advice of some of the critics whom we have heard this afternoon.


Mr. GOULD:: In rising to speak upon this subject I might ask the same question that has been so often heard among our neighbours to the south, "Who won the war?" My hon. friend who has just spoken seems to claim the credit for the militia of Canada, but I am sure there is no hon. member but will acknowledge that it was the laymen-the men picked from the prairies and from the industries in our towns and cities, the men who desired in their hearts to go out and help the Motherland to defeat the common enemy, and not the trained militia who exerted the greatest influence in winning success. The militia wlw had been in training for years were a very slight factor in the winning of the war.


Mr. MEWBURN:: Will my hon. friend tell who formed the first Canadian contingent of 30,000 men that went overseas? Will he tell me how many Ontario militia were in that force?


Oliver Robert Gould: That is a mere side issue and does not disprove my argument. My hon. friend from North Toronto (Mr. Church) has claimed the credit for the militia of doing all these wonderful things. I maintain that if you take an equal number of men from our farms and factories who have the right spirit and enthusiasm they are the equals in performance of the organized militia. When I spoke upon these estimates last year I endeavoured to point out that the money we were asked to vote was not for the maintenance of a defence department for Canada. I tried to

show that the greater part, or at any rate a large part, of the money we were then asked to vote was being devoted to useless purposes. I also stated that in a good many instances, in my humble opinion, the money went to feed parasites. I expressed the opinion that the condition of agriculture in Canada, and the state of unemployment, was such that we ought not to be asked to maintain a military aristocracy, who were living on the fat of the land while the rest of our people were working too long hours and contributing heavily to the public treasury through taxation. It does seem to me that we should discuss here the general principle as to the desirability of such expenditure. As the hon. member for Centre Winnipeg (Mr. Woods-worth) has said, it is at the commencement of a new parliament that we should come to a distinct understanding as to whether we are going to continue military expenditure upon the scale on which it has been maintained in the past. I desire to ask who is the common enemy who threatens us? Why do we want a defence force in this country? These are questions which should be discussed at this time, and if the will of Parliament is that the voting of such moneys should continue we will submit to that decision. Otherwise, such large appropriations should not be continued to be asked for these purposes. It seems to me that a little Peace Conference should be called in Ottawa at this time to decide upon the policy we should follow in the future. Throughout the world different countries are calling for a stop to military expenditures nevertheless in Canada there are individuals clamouring that it be maintained, and trying to imbue the people with the idea that there is a common enemy to be feared and met. My hon. friend from North Toronto, of course, likes to have large military expenditures in the city from which he comes. But when he speaks for North Toronto and takes this attitude I have a right to speak for Assiniboia, a purely agricultural constituency, and take a contrary stand. I think I am right in saying that the greater part of the revenue which this Government receives from the province of Saskatchewan comes from my own constituency, and what do we get in return for it? In former years the views of the agricultural people of Canada have not been adequately expressed here, but they now have a fair representation in Parliament, something they have not had before within the lifetime of this Dominion. The representatives of agriculture are here

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now and they are going to stay, because they have a real mission to perform, and one of the aims of that mission is to see that this unwarranted expenditure is reduced.


Mr. MacLAREN:: I notice that a number of those who have spoken have criticised the expense of the militia on the ground that at the present time there is apparently no need of it. I would like to point out that when trouble arises, or when war breaks out, we do not receive notice. We do not get any such notice as that after a certain number of days a certain nation will proceed to war. That is not the way wars break out; as a rule they break out in the most unexpected manner. Who expected in June, 1914, that war would be declared in August following? I venture to say that no one in this Dominion made that prophecy. The militia of Canada is necessary up to a certain point in order that we may be ready for emergencies, because the most important point of all is that we do not receive notice of trouble. We may say that there is not likely to be any trouble to the south or to the north or anywhere else, or to be internal trouble; but these things arise with startling rapidity. It is the duty of every man in this country to protect his home and family, and, therefore, I say that the existence of the militia is necessary up to a certain point for the purpose of being prepared.
Another point to which I wish to refer is the training of men. There is, amongst members of the House, a great misapprehension in reference to trained men. Men were not taken off the farms nor from the towns and put into the front line without previous training. The men, who went to the front at the first and who were able to carry on until they were supplemented by others, were men who had already undertaken and undergone military training in this country. It was no time to put untrained men into the line, and a certain time for training is required. Apparently a number of members who have referred to this matter seem to think that men can be picked out and, in a short time sent to the front; but men required intensive training for about four months before they were put into the front line.
My other and last point is that the whole list of estimates, as submitted by the Minister of Militia (Mr. Graham), appears to me to be a very reasonable and necessary amount. I have no doubt that, under the
new organization, this amount will give us efficiency; but I do not think it is desirable, wise, or safe to attempt to carry on the militia of this country with a smaller amount than that for which the Minister of Militia has asked.


Mr. BAXTER:: I do not want to make any lengthy remarks; but there are a few words which might well be said to the committee, because, I am sure, no hon. member has any desire to misrepresent things as they exist. We are, I understand, considering only the first item of this appropriation, and in connection with that, remarks have been made which might lead the committee and the people generally to believe that unwarranted expenditure on gold lace is involved in these items. It is very easy to use the phrase " gold lace "; the words slip easily from every member's lips. They will, no doubt, be bandied about throughout the country, and they will succeed in adding to a prejudice which, unfortunately, exists in certain quarters towards the militia. Would hon. members be greatly surprised if I called their attention to the fact that, in the first item, not one pennyweight of gold lace is involved? Would they also be somewhat astonished if I told them-and if my assurance is not sufficient, it can easily be backed up by many hon. members in this House-that the officers of the militia of Canada pay for their own gold lace out of their own pockets, and they pay the customs duty upon it themselves? Let us deal with plain facts; let us not indulge in slurs and sneers against a large body of gentlemen who are contributing their time, brains and wealth towards keeping up the militia of Canada and who are getting not one dollar of return for so doing. That happens to be the fact; it may not be popular; it is not a good thing on which to make a stump speech; but it happens to be the fact, and, as regards the particular estimate under consideration, I will invite the careful attention of members to some of the items involved in it. One item is " care of arms." Hon. members will realize that, throughout this country, sometimes in armouries, but very often, in the rural districts, in the homes of commanding officers, rifles which have cost this country millions of dollars are placed, and they have to be taken care of by the officer commanding the unit who is responsible for those arms. The allowance for looking after those arms used to be $40.
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Mr. IRVINE:: Are those rifles that are being cared for Ross rifles, or some others?


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: I do not know anything about the Ross rifle. I am not talking about the Ross rifle; I am talking about the rifles that are the property of the Dominion of Canada and that are distributed in many places throughout Canada, the rifles which would be used if any active use should be required of rifles either inside or outside of this country by our militia.
There is equipment as well, as I am reminded, various clothing. There is not only the clothing, but there are the belts and other equipment; there are, in some places, guns, and these have all to be taken care of. In the days that I can speak of, I know the allowance to a rural commanding officer was $40 a year for looking after the rifles and equipment of his company or battery or whatever the unit happened to be. The allowance is a modest one; I do not think it has been increased, but the minister will correct me if I am wrong in so thinking. Where there is an armoury kept up out of the public funds, this allowance is not paid; but where the country saves the expense of a caretaker through some person undertaking to do this work in connection with his unit, he received the modest sum of $40, for this very valuable service. If this service was not performed, the rifles would be destroyed by rust, and millions of dollars of this country's investment would become nothing. That might possibly suit certain people in this country; but I do not think it suits the great majority of this Parliament, or the vast majority of the Canadian people.
The commanding officer is allowed $40 for postage which he has to spend, in rural districts especially, in communicating with members of his unit who live at considerable distances. He has to arrange, prior to annual training, to find out where his men are to see that they are got in, to see to the distribution of clothing to them, and to see that the clothing is returned after the season is over. If that service is not performed, that clothing is lost and millions of dollars are lost to this country. Therefore, hon. gentlemen who wish to reduce this item are really endeavouring to lessen the necessary services for taking care of the property of the country. One hon. member said-and I think he was candid-that he did not know how to attack these estimates in detail be-

cause he did not know what they stood for. I would suggest that the hon. member first search the Auditor General's report for the details in order that he may know what the items are, and then he will be in a position to criticise; but he should not rush blindly in and endeavour to strike out an appropriation which may mean the destruction, the loss to this country, of ten-fold, yes, a hundred-fold, of the amount involved in this appropriation.
Another item is "command pay" which is somewhat similar to what I have been explaining. The amount for drill instruction is received only when a man actually gives the time or some instruction in drill or hires someone else to do that work. I do not see how it is possible to maintain the services rendered under this item for one penny less than the amount involved. It is certainly no answer to talk about gold-lace which is worn by officers at their personal expense. If hon. members were keeping in touch with the militia, they would know that, since the war, gold lace has practically disappeared. There is no waste of money for ornament or show; the service is simply practically what a farmer does if he puts a house over his reaper or binder instead of exposing it to the weather, as, unfortunately, happens to be the case in some parts of the country with which I am fairly familiar. It is simply reserving a man's capital. If you want the capital of the country wasted, strike out an item like this and let millions of dollars go to pot.


William Irvine: My hon. friend (Mr. Baxter) has demonstrated what a great loss to the country it would be if we did not take care of old clothes and rifles at a cost of $120,000. Well, I think it might be advisable to burn these old clothes and destroy these rifles and save that $120,000. We shall have to spend $120,000 next year, and at that rate it would take only a few years to buy new rifles. An expenditure like this is only a waste of money. These estimates can be reduced by about $5,000,000, and I should like to know whether this is the time to bring in a resolution for that purpose.


George Perry Graham: If such a thing were done there would be no militia force in the Dominion.


William Irvine: If it is proposed to reorganize the militia, it might facilitate and hasten that re-organization if the minister knew exactly how much money he had to

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spend upon it. If we vote the full $11,000,000, or thereabouts, it is not likely that even he will hurry with the re-organization.


Mr. PUTNAM:: What was the approximate cost of the annual drill for the average year preceding the war?


George Perry Graham: If hon. members will allow the item now before the Chair to pass, I could better explain that question on the next vote.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Annual Drill, $1,400,000.
George Perry Graham: These estimates are on the pre-war basis. Of course, the entire work of deflation has not, perhaps, yet taken place, but as the cost of everything approaches normal the expenses will be proportionally reduced. The drill in 1913, before there was any war at all, cost $1,800,000. The amount asked for this year, after the war, is really less than the pre-war vote, notwithstanding the fact that the dollar in 1913 was equal to approximately $1.75 now.


Lewis Herbert Martell: What was the financial condition of Canada prior to the war, and what is it now?


George Perry Graham: Undoubtedly it was better before the war, but in 1913 it was not too promising. At that time we were on the verge of hard times, as was indicated by several banking institutions in the world. That, however, is not the question. Do we need annual drill? That is the question.


Roch Lanctôt: What were the estimates in 1910, when there was a Liberal party in power with a good government?


George Perry Graham: The last I have are the estimates for 1910-11, but I may point out that, although brought down by the succeeding government, they were the estimates of their predecessors. The expenditure in 1910-11 was $7,067,000. That was practically equal to the estimate of to-day, if indeed it was not more, considering what the dollar could buy then as compared with now. Clothing for the troops now costs 50 per cent, 75 per cent and sometimes 100 per cent more, and so does maintenance. The salaries paid to all officers since the war have been higher because of the increase in cost of living, as recognized by every business man in the country. This year it is proposed to train half, or, at
most, 60 per cent, of the number of men trained in 1911. The purpose is merely to keep up what one hon. gentleman referred to as skeleton training, and'not full training at all. Full training, as my hon. friends who have been ministers will know, would cost three or four times more. I consulted with General MacBrien, the chief of staff, one of the best men in the Dominion in his position, a man who is careful financially and who made a wonderful record in the war. He is an honour to his calling, and he thinks it is necessary, if we are to have a militia in Canada, that we should keep up some training. If I were asking the committee to sanction a scheme of extensive training I should be open to criticism, but this does not provide for more than 60 per cent, or at most 65 per cent, training. I was criticised by a Toronto paper the other day for reducing the number of days from sixteen to nine. This vote provides for the training of 60 per cent of the force for nine days instead of sixteen, and the only criticism that I have heard so far is that the reduction has gone too far. I would leave it to hon. gentlemen who had sons, relatives and friends in the war. Are your boys, who have come back, looking to be trained? I do not think they are. But if any emergency arose and you needed men, do you think it would be fair for the men who went through hell for four years to be asked to undertake the same task again, without our calling upon the younger men to do some drilling to take their place? I do not expect that there will be war, but if we are to keep up a militia we must have some young men enter the militia every year. It is not fair to those who have gone through three or four years of war that we should stand aside and say we will not train others to take their places but will let them shoulder the burden as they shouldered it before.
Now, in discussing this matter with General MacBrien I took it up from every angle. I asked him what the effect would be on the militia if we had no training. There is a certain overhead expense we must keep up in connection with the officers and organization for the training that is given every year. General MacBrien gave it as his considered opinion that if we do not provide some training for our young men we will do an injustice to the militia that this House will hasten to rectify, perhaps in three or four years, at the expense five times as great as the sum I am asking for to-day. That being the case, I leave the decision to the House. I am strongly
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in favour of having some training given each year to our young men. Our men who went overseas, God knows, had fighting enough. But those men have sons and brothers who are anxious to receive training and be ready to enter the permanent militia if required. If we expect to retain a militia force without that training, we may as well be prepared to abandon the service altogether.
Reference has been made to the permanent militia that did go overseas-and that did not go overseas, as one hon. member said. Let me point out that if it had not been for our trained officers you would never have got thirty thousand men across the ocean in the time you did. And many of the boys who were anxious to go were the sons of the men who had been in the permanent militia, the men who were trained in our militia camps-the camps we propose to hold this summer-were the men who were put in charge of our boys and trained them. As a result these boys were fit to go overseas in a few weeks; but without that training they would have had to remain here indefinitely and Canada would not have been able to achieve the proud position which she now occupies.
I am not a military officer, or a military man, but two of my boys trained as officers, and my experience was that an officer has to supplement his militia pay with a good deal of his private funds to keep up his company. The money we vote for training does not go into the pockets of the officers; they have to pay out hundreds of dollars of their own money to keep up their regiments. When it is charged that officers are living in luxury and having a lot of government money to put in their pockets, I know from my own experience that those officers spend a lot of their own money as well as all they get from the Government to keep the militia alive.


Sydney Chilton Mewburn: With regard to this item for annual training, I concur with what the hon. minister has said, particularly with the last part of his statement. The annual pay granted for the training of our militia does not go into the pockets of the officers, as some people seem to think. I am speaking particularly with regard to the training of what is known as a city corps. For years prior to the war I do not think any city corps that trained and drew its annual drill-pay ever put one cent of the money into the pockets of its officers, non-commissioned officers, or men; that money went back to maintain the efficiency of the corps which the gov-

eminent did not grant sufficient funds to keep up. Since the armistice the old militia units have been pretty well shot to pieces.
I take issue with some hon. gentlemen regarding the militia which did not serve overseas in the first instance. The first Canadian contingent mobilized at Valcar-tier was composed, to the extent of over 98 per cent, of officers, non-commissioned officers and men of the active militia. Now the active militia are endeavouring to get on their feet once more. This annual allowance for training is the only means by which these units can rehabilitate themselves. The foundation of the old city corps was kept together during the war period by those ex-officers and others who were too old to go overseas, hoping that when the war was over the old units would come into being again. That has taken place. The officers, non-commissioned officers and men of those respective units that served overseas have to the extent of pretty nearly 90 per cent gone back to their old units again, and those officers are bringing in the new generation of our young men to educate and train them in the work, but they are not getting one cent of pay for doing so. This annual drill-pay will be contributed back to the Government in the maintenance of those units that have been a credit to the country in the past, as the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church) said, and I think they will continue to be a credit to Canada as long as Canada is a nation.
I think the vote should not be cut down one cent.


Thomas Langton Church: Increase it.


Sydney Chilton Mewburn: In fact, I should like to see it increased. As the minister goes along, he may not require the whole amount. I know last year a small percentage was spent in training simply because the ranks were not filled up rapidly; but large numbers of the units to-day, as I know personally, are up to their old peace establishment of 1913. All the more credit to them. They are not getting any pay out of it. The item of command pay is in the same category. A small allowance was given to officers commanding corps for command pay, but I do not believe that any officer in our militia ever put a cent of that money in his pocket. We have heard talk about gold lace. I would point out that any equipment officers had was paid for out of their own pockets and never a cent was contributed out of the money voted by Parliament.

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Roch Lanctôt: I have listened with a great deal of surprise to what has been said this afternoon respecting the militia of this country. The hon. member for Prince Edward Island comes nearest to my view in his remarks. I am always astonished when I contrast the attitude of a minister putting his estimates through with his attitude when he sat on the other side of the Chair. When we are on the Opposition side we have not the same views regarding expenditure. I remember very well that last year the Prime Minister of to-day found the militia vote too heavy and moved to cut it down by fifty per cent. I was pleased to support him. Now I am surprised to-day that one of his ministers should, in the first session of this new Parliament, ask for practically the same amount of money to be spent for militia purposes as was required last year. As we all know, our national revenue has in the meantime fallen off very materially. But notwithstanding that, it is now proposed to spend the same amount of money on the militia as was spent last year, although we were supposed to have been engaged in a war to end war. Not only so, but quite recently we sent representatives to the Disarmament Conference in Washington. Is it any wonder that the farmers of this country are tired of the schemes of politicians here in Ottawa to spend money for nothing?
The Minister of Militia said a few moments ago that we are spending very much more money to-day because everything is dearer. We are not surprised to learn that the pay of the militia is higher than it was in 1910 and 1911. But we farmers have also to pay more for our men than we did before the war. What do we do to meet this? We simply reduce the number of our employees. I can speak from personal experience in regard to this, because before the war I used to hire four men all the year around for my farm work at a total cost of $1200; but now that I have to pay $500 or $600 to each man I have to get along with two assistants; I cannot afford more. Now, if that is the condition with the farmer, it is equally the condition with this Government. Things have changed since 1919. We have spent, I understand, over two billion dollars, for what purpose? "To win the war" as we say in this House. Our financial condition is bad and will be for a century to come, I suppose; will any hon. member say this afternoon that we are to raise more soldiers to go into another European war? For myself, I say no. The people of my county
will not be satisfied with any suggestion made by hon. members of the Opposition in this House that the militia estimates are too low. I do not like that kind of business. I do not like to receive compliments from my opponents or to have them suggest that we are not spending enough money for militia purposes. I rather think that we are spending too much, and that is what I used to say when I sat on the Opposition side. Now that I am sitting on the Government benches I have not changed my view, nor will I do so.
One of my colleagues declared ..his afternoon that we should not cut out the entire amount of the vote for training the young men because we have experts at the present time in the Militia Department, and we must use those experts. In reply, I may say this: I want to keep the experts, and if they are not busy during the coming spring and summer, why should they not do some training among themselves-the colonels, the majors and the generals of all kinds? And. when they are tired of that training I invite them to spend a few weeks on a farm and work during haying time and harvest time. That would be great training for them.
I do not know what force would actually be required to keep peace in our territory. But our people are all good people, and I think a force of eighteen hundred men would be sufficient for the whole country. The rest of the men can be sent to the east or to the west, wherever they are needed on the farms. The farmers will pay them, so that the country will not be obliged to meet that expense, and the result will be a benefit to the country as a whole.


Mr. MORIN:: In the beginning of his remarks the hon. member stated that another hon. member shared his views, and he referred to him as the member from Prince Edward Island. I think he meant the member for Hants (Mr. Martell), did he not?


Roch Lanctôt: No, I referred to the member for King's, P.E.I. (Mr. Hughes), who said that we were spending too much money on the militia and that we should arrange to have a force no larger than necessary to keep peace within the country.
Now, when we did have a great militia force the country could afford to pay for it. In 1912 and 1913, and in the first part of 1914, the government of the day were preparing for war and we had war. Now the war is over; we have no money to spare for anything that is not necessary, and I
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therefore intend to move that this item of $1,400,000, in its entirety, be cut out of the estimates for this year. Let us sign an armistice for two or three years under which we shall stop spending .[DOT] money for nothing, and if the time comes when we have need of soldiers, we will find a way, as we did in 1914, to get the men we need.


Hugh Guthrie: I listened with a great deal of interest to the remarks of the minister (Mr. Graham) on this item. As he spoke I recalled what took place in this House last session and the session before, when a similar item was under discussion. I could not help wishing that I had had the present minister's assistance on those occasions when I was trying to explain, in my humble way, why this vote of a million and a half for annual drill should be granted. I took the ground, it so happens, that he has taken to-day. I pointed out that the threlf or four hundred thousand men who had fought for three or four years in France or Flanders were, perhaps, the most finished soldiers in the world. They certainly required no more training; besides they had done their bit, if any men in this country or any men in the world had ever done their bit, and should not be asked for further services. I tried to show the House that it was advisable to bring on a new crop of trained men, and that for that purpose this money was necessary. But on both occasions hon. members now sitting opposite did not take that view of the situation. In the session before last the leader of the Opposition himself, now Prime Minister, moved to reduce this item by between eleven and twelve hundred thousand dollars, to leave, I think $300,000 odd as the amount for annual drill. And listen to his argument on that occasion. The present Prime Minister stated, page 3675 Hansard of 1920:
X would ipoint out that we have in this country at the present time an army of experienced men who need no drilling, men who have been through the war and have suffered its hardships. No amount of drilling in the world will make them more efficient than they are to-day, and until we are through with the work of demobilization we can well afford to dispense altogether with annual drills.
In other words, we should ask the very men whom the minister pictured in such glowing terms a moment ago-we should ask these heroes of the war to do the work that younger men should do. We should call upon them to defend the country in order that the present crop of young men that is growing up should be exempted.

The House, I am glad to say, negatived the motion of my hon. friend the Prime Minister. It was his view then that this item should 'be reduced by between eleven and twelve hundred thousand dollars, and he so moved. But now he is Prime Minister; he is head of the Government that comes in with the same vote, reduced by $100,000, and there is no explanation from him of the changed situation. Last session in this House the then member for West Kent, Mr. McCoig, now a senator, who always prided himself on being a farmer member, moved that the vote be reduced by $750,-000-a pretty substantial reduction. Every member of the Opposition, now sitting on the Government side, who was in the House just eleven months ago, voted for that reduction. They are there to-day, ranged behind the Prime Minister and his friends, supporting practically the same vote they condemned twelve months ago. Into the House at the present moment steps my hon. friend the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) . He took the same view a year ago. I have before me his statement on that occasion. He said:
But, I do humbly submit this is not the time for these things. My hon. friend the member for Quebec South (Mr. Power), himself a gallant returned soldier, the other day reminded us of an important fact. We have 400,000 trained soldiers in Canada to-day-the best material for fighting that the world has ever produced. These men can be called upon if any emergency arises.
That is pretty definite. He goes on:
Why we should anticipate any emergency at this time it is not easy for anybody to conjecture. If there ever was a time when we had need of tout little military expenditure it is to-day, and I believe the men who will be most ready to confirm that view will be the returned soldiers themselves.
That is all the difference between promise and performance. They sat in opposition a year ago and condemned the proposed expenditure. They voted loudly for its reduction and they gave the reasons I have just quoted to the House. And so for the last two sessions. What, then, must they think to-day of the Minister of Militia in their own Government who proposes practically the same vote, with just as good reasons, the same reasons as were given to the House last year and the year before, the same solid, substantial reasons, because I maintain the vote should be granted, and granted without hesitation. But what shall we say of the sincerity, of the honesty, of men who on two occasions during the last two sessions have deliberately voted to reduce? Do you wonder

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that some of their own followers have been misled? Do you wonder that my hon. friend who last spoke in the committee is a little disappointed? Do you not believe that he had reason for thinking when he came to the House this session that there would be something substantial by way of reduction? I am glad there is not. I am glad they have in the new minister a man who sees the necessities of the situation, and a man strong enough to maintain what is the proper stand in connection with it.


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: I wish to
point out to my hon. friend who has just taken his seat (Mr. Guthrie) that there is something very different in the situation as it presents itself to the House this year, and as it presented itself two years ago and last session. May I remind my hon. friend that two years ago when we took exception to this vote, his government had in the estimates a vote running into several millions of dollars, I think, for the purpose of demobilization. We in opposition at that time took the position that until demobilization had been completed, until the Government had got through spending millions of dollars on demobilization, there was no justification for putting in these large amounts for the purposes of annual drill.


Hugh Guthrie: Have you not got that
vote this year?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: No, we have not. We may have some claims, but not for the purpose of demobilizing the men from overseas.


Arthur Meighen: It is just christened
under another name.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Not at all.
At the time I speak of, the Government were still bringing men under arms from across the sea. There is nothing of that kind in the estimates at this time. There is a great difference. When exception was taken by those of us in opposition at that time to the expenditure on account of annual drill, it was because the Government was asking us at the same time to vote millions of dollars for the purpose of demobilizing men who had been serving actively. We contended that as long as we were paying out money for demobilization purposes, we should not be asked to pay further large sums for annual drill. That is a very different situation from the one that presents itself at the present time, when demobilization has been completed,
and we have to decide whether we shall continue to have a militia in this country or abandon it altogether.


Hugh Guthrie: I cannot allow my hon. friend to get away with that statement, because it is not correct. He says that at the time we were bringing men home from overseas. I will challenge him to prove that statement. Demobilization at that time was completed, and the hon. gentleman who sits beside me (Mr. Mewburn) retired as Minister of Militia in 1919. Between 300 and 400 men were kept in Great Britain packing up material to be shipped to this country. These men were demobilized in the autumn of 1921. There may have been 200 or 300 men in Europe in the session the year before last, the session of 1920, engaged in packing up, but last session when the vote was made to reduce there was none. We were not bringing men home. The vote called the demobilization vote was not in the estimates for that purpose but it was for the purpose of paying war claims that had not then [DOT]been adjusted and paid, transportation claims largely, claims with the British Government, and claims of shipping companies. Between $30,000,000 and $40,000,000 was in the estimates for that year and last year between $6,000,000 and $7,000,000 was there for the same purpose. This year the Government has changed the wording of the vote. Instead of calling it demobilization they have called it "Adjustment of War Claims." It appears on page 71 of the estimates, and amounts to $8,411,800. If my hon. friend says he moved to reduce this vote in 1920 because there was a demobilization vote, I tell him that he has one there in the estimates now under a different name. If the motion to reduce was made last year because we had between $6,000,000 and $7,000,000 for demobilization, I tell him that he has a larger one still in the estimates under a different name.
Why not let us have a candid statement? They were in opposition in those days and they were pandering for what they supposed was popular support; they were pandering in this House, without thinking the matter out as they should have done, for popular support, and they boldly proposed on both occasions to cut this vote down to the vanishing point, where it would have been absolutely worthless as a vote for that purpose, and on each occasion the Government had to muster its followers and vote the motion down. Twelve months have gone and they are now in power and
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in a position to carry out their ideas. Do you think they intend to do it? Is it any wonder that my hon. friend down there feels disappointed that he has been fooled in the matter?


Roch Lanctôt: There is nobody to fool me in this House.


Hugh Guthrie: I do not believe anybody in this House can fool him, but he had reason to expect at all events that these deliberate actions of the Opposition only twenty-four months ago would be put in practice at the first session of Parliament. I am glad they were not put in practice. All I want to do now is to show the hollowness of the contention of the Opposition in former years, and particularly in view of what the Government proposes to do at the present moment.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: If what my hon. friend says is correct, then he deceived the House in the matter of demobilization, as he did in the matter of the purchase of ammunition. He told this House in regard to ammunition for artillery purposes that there was need for a very large vote running into a hundred thousand dollars or thereabouts, because the ammunition for artillery purposes had to be manufactured in our Canadian arsenals. We found out afterwards that my hon. friend was bringing in from the Old Country ammunition, high explosive shells, amounting it is estimated to $6,000,000, out of a credit which was to this country's account in the Old World. He has still to account to Parliament for that expenditure, and I will expect before this debate is over that he will do so. If what he says is true about demobilization, he deceived us in the same way in that regard, for he distinctly led us to believe that the reason why we had to vote this large sum for demobilization was because men were still overseas and had to be brought back, and our contention was, if that were true there was no necessity for voting money for annual drill in Canada.


Hugh Guthrie: I assume that my
hon. friend will verify his statement. What I said will be in Hansard and I assume that my hon. friend will produce it. I am going to deal with the ammunition question, but as it is six o'clock it would be hardly worth while starting on it now.


William Stevens Fielding: It might be explosive.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the Chair and the House took recess.
After Recess
The House resumed at eight o'clock.



ESQUIMALT AND NANAIMO RAILWAY COMPANY

[Stage Direction]
Mr. TOLMIE moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 6 respecting the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway Company.
Mr. NEILL:: Mr. Speaker, I have an
amendment. I beg leave to move, seconded by the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Speakman) :
That the House do not now resolve itself into Committee of the Whole on the said bill but that the said bill be referred back to the Standing Committee on Railways, Canals and Telegraph Lines with instructions that they have *power to amend the said bill by striking out the word "two" in line eight thereof and inserting the word "one" in lieu thereof, and by striking out the word "five" in line fifteen and inserting the word "three" in lieu thereof.


George Perry Graham: Will the hon. member
explain what this means?


Alan Webster Neill: I will be very glad to explain. This is Bill No. 6 "An act respecting the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway Company". The railway in question is a subsidiary of the Canadian Pacific Railway. The bill grants that company authority to build a railway or rather, I should say, renews the authority for them to build this extension of a railway in Vancouver Island from a place called Courtenay to Duncan Bay, a distance of thirty-six miles, in the district that I represent. The bill extends for five years the period in which the company can build this railway which is only to be thirty-six miles long. The bill itself says the company may begin construction in two years and complete the road within five years; but as a matter of fact it really gives them five years to begin and end the construction of the railway because the company do not come, in that regard, under the ordinary provisions of the Railway Act of Canada which requires the expenditure of fifteen per cent of the value of the line within two years upon construction. That provision does not apply to the present bill, it is overridden by a special clause, so that the company really get five years in which to begin to build the railway. Now my amendment will reduce the period in which the company must begin construction to one year, and the period within which it must complete the line to three years. I wish to disavow any spirit of hostility to the Canadian Pacific Railway

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Company in any way whatsoever. I believe they are a great and very well managed company and I would be very glad to see them running our National railways. But that has nothing to do with this situation. If the company are as anxious to build this railway as they say they are-and my constituents are equally anxious-then we are all united on the subject. In that case we want to do the Aaron and Joshua act and hold up the hands of this railway Moses who seems somewhat inclined to let the tide of railway construction, the tide of battle, go against him as in the case of Moses of old.
I can give three reasons why this railway should be built at once:	In the first
place the company have had five years to build it and have not done so. But apart from that, the construction of the railway would provide a great deal of very necessary work. We hear much in this House about unemployment and we hear of hundreds of thousands of dollars spent in alleviating unemployment, very largely in non-productive work the greater portion of which is a loss. Then too, there could be no more opportune time than the present to build this railway bearing in mind the question of labour. Labour is probably as cheap now as it will ever be, unless the cost of living takes a very great change of which there is no immediate prospect. In addition to that, if this enterprise were proceeded with, it would give a very great amount of very much needed work for the people in that vicinity and relieve the labour situation on Vancouver Island and in Vancouver city. As you know there is a great deal of unemployment in Vancouver at the present moment. In the second place access would be given to a great number of people who have been living there hoping, and praying and expecting this railway for something like fifty-five years. Comox Valley is one of the oldest settled districts in British Columbia. It is a very fine, fertile valley, and these people went in there many years ago with "the sure and certain hope," as the Church of England Prayer Book says, of the railway coming along, and they are living in that hope to-day. Not only that, Sir, but it would lay open to settlement large areas of fine agricultural land. These areas would be made easy of access and would be most suitable places for settlement by some of that herd of immigrants we are told it is the policy of the Government-they have a vote of something like $400,000 in the estimates for the purpose-to bring into the country. We
are told these immigrants are coming along, and the Government could not get a more splendid or more fertile valley in which to locate them-if they are going to get them- than in the same Comox Valley. As I say this railway would give access to those lands.
I have cited the arguments in favour of having this railway built. Now, as to possible arguments against it. I am handicapped in that regard because I cannot think of any such arguments, and having to speak first in this discussion it is hard for me to anticipate any possible opposition. The only way in which I could anticipate any opposition is to revert back to the statements made to the Railway Committee when this matter was under discussion there. I may say in passing, Sir, that the transactions in the Railway Committee revealed to me, as a new member of the House, a somewhat remarkable condition of affairs. It appears that, according to the rules, and the dictum of a gentleman named Bourinot-who I understand is an authority and has been dead for some time-when a railway bill of this character comes before the Railway Committee there is allowed to appear before that committee and argue the merits of the case the learned counsel of the law employed by the railway in that behalf. That occurred in this case and I have no objection whatever to the appearance of the counsel in question; he did not abuse his opportunities in any way whatever. I merely state that he was allowed to present his case as fully and as often as he thought necessary. But when it came to the member who represents the district through which this railway is to run, on account of his not being a member of the committee he was not allowed to represent the views of that district at all. As a matter of fact I was able to make some observations concerning the bill because it was not known at that time that I was not a member of the Railway Committee. When it was discovered that I was not a member of the committee, owing to my honesty in not voting when a vote was taken, immediate objection was raised to my activities, and had it not been that Providence-ever kind to the under-dog- sent to my assistance an angel disguised- perhaps I should say thinly disguised-in the fleshly form of the hon. member for Hants (Mr. Martell), I would not have been able to get my amendment before the committee at all. At any rate there is the condition of the rules. It may be

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argued-I have heard hon. members assert that I have exaggerated the case-that even though an hon. gentleman is not a member of the committee he is allowed to go there and speak his mind provided he does not vote. As to that, let me say that the question was brought up in the Committee on Agriculture a few days ago and it was decided-absolutely decided on the authority of the gentleman I mentioned a moment ago, Bourinot (page 469) -
"That a member of the House who is not a member of the committee has no right whatever to attend such committee for the purpose of addressing it, or putting questions to the witnesses, or interfering in any way with the pr oceedings."
If that is one of the rules which I and other new members are supposed to receive with reverence, to handle with loving care and to hand on, unimpaired, to our successors, then I would suggest that the sooner we have a bonfire of those rules the better, and let us start out with a fresh set of rules more in accord with those that would be common and customary in an ordinary commercial or industrial undertaking. Let us get a little more down to business and have a little less of these rules. As I have said before, I understand the author is dead, so he will not feel hurt at any criticism, but I think he should have taken some of those rules with him.
I now propose to deal with the arguments advanced before the committee. I think, however, "argument" is an ill-advised word, for argument suggests, does it not, a basis of fact and a superstructure of logic? I could not help thinking, when I heard the statements made in that regard, that both the logic and the facts were somewhat wobbly. I will not call them arguments; I will call them statements made in that connection. The first one was that this was part of a big railway, a main railway I think was the expression used, from Victoria at the south end of the island to the north end of the island; that 140 miles had been built, and there was a general impression given that there was a vigorous and aggressive building movement going on and that, whenever they had a moment to spare, they turned and dug a few more miles of this railway. It is true that the railway runs from Victoria; but it does not run to the north end of the island, and the company has not a charter to do that. It stops at Duncan's Bay. The railway has been built from Victoria to Courtenay, 140 miles having been built

recently, we were given to understand. Of this 140 miles, 75 miles were built under the terms of the union of British Columbia with the confederation. That takes us back a good many years, and it was built, not by the Canadian Pacific, but by a gentleman by the name of Dunsmuir who received, for the building of those 75 miles of railway, a large sum, I forget the exact figure, but practically enough to build the road, and he also received a grant of practically one-third of Vancouver island. This grant took in everything, base metals and coal mines as well. One of the members for Vancouver the other night, in speaking of the natural resources of British Columbia, mentioned this land grant to the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway, and he said that it was conservatively estimated as being worth $25,000,000. When one considers that there are six or eight very valuable coal mines on the island and a vast quantity of timber and base metals, perhaps he was right; but at any rate, enough money to build the railway and $25,000,000 worth of land were paid to build 75 miles of this railway thirty-eight years ago. Therefore, I do not think it enters very much into the consideration of whether this franchise should be extended to-day or not. Twenty-eight years later, they took another burst of railway construction and they built another sixty-five miles. That was some twelve years ago; and if we are going on the same geometrical progression of railway construction, the cycle when another burst of railway construction to complete this thing will come around will, so far as I can figure it, be the year 1948. I am wrong-1946 was the correct date. About that time I fear-I will not fear, but I trust many of those men, including myself, who have waited so long and faithfully for that railway, will be in a happier country where railways will not be needed and where politicians are excluded also. In that happier clime I would hate to meet my constituents and hear them say to me: "You did not get that railway built." Another statement that was alleged as a reason why this extension should be granted and against my proposal to shorten the period in which it would be built, was that there was a lack of funds. Lack of funds for the Canadian Pacific to build thirty-six miles of a railway in a comparatively level country! A bait was thrown out to the Progressive members who were present. It was suggested that it would not be fair to the rest of Canada for the

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Canadian Pacific to concentrate all their building energies on this 36 miles of railway on Vancouver island. But I think the Progressive members and other members who were present have sufficient acumen to understand that their opportunities of getting railways will not be impaired, even if the Canadian Pacific are compelled to spend their vast resources in building 36 miles of a railway on Vancouver island, the work being spread over three years. I may mention that it is supposed-I would not guarantee this-that the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway is one of the most profitable extensions of the whole Canadian Pacific. I do not believe the Canadian Pacific, that great company with its high standing and reputation, would approve its apologists who say that it would impair its credit or finances if it built that railroad in three years instead of five. About 30 miles from this identical place, I travelled over a logging railroad 40 miles in extent, and as well built and ballasted as the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway is, and that railway was built by that logging company without any subsidy from this House and without any fuss being made about the matter. I saw that road built simply to get out logs, and there are many reasons why it would be more advantageous to build this particular road.
Another statement that was made as a reason why they should be given practically unlimited time was-I will prove later on, that this is only a precursor of more similar bills, for there is no intention of building under this bill-" you might as well give it to them for if you do not, no one else will build the railway." There may be a certain amount of cynical truth in that statement, because, if there was any prospect of opposition, this railway would have been built long ago. We will consider that point later. The one thing that I am certain of is that no other railway company is likely to come here asking for a charter as long as the great Canadian Pacific has a blanket charter to build this line.
There is one of the best water powers in British Columbia along the line of this railway, and I am told that negotiations are going on to-day by a large English syndicate to harness that power. For that purpose they would require to have a capital of between three and four million dollars. Suppose I come here next year on account of the Hydro-Electric Company asking for a charter, what a howl would go up. I would be a destructionist, a financial Bolshevist and everything else: I would be interfering with vested interests, and I would be howled down. But why not give these people an opportunity?
Apart from that, there is another aspect to which I should like to draw the attention of the House. Some years ago, when the railway boom was prevalent and everybody was building railways, the Canadian Northern, now the National railways, got a charter on the Island to build from Victoria up to Courtenay, the place I am now talking about. They spent $3,000,000 and they got the railway graded, but no steel on it, as far as six miles from the west coast at Port Alberni. Since then they have laid steel to Cowichan lake to get out some valuable timber there. That has been done by the government; it shows that they have it in contemplation, and there is no reason to suppose that they will let the $3,000,000 which they have already spent there, lie idle. It may be in time to come they will extend it, and if they do extend it, the line will run from Victoria to Courtenay and from there north. We were told in 1896 that a vast industrial boom took place on account of the accession of the Liberal party to power. It may be- I do not know-that history will reproduce itself and we shall see another industrial boom. If that is the case, it may well be that, in the course of a few years, the Canadian National Railways may find it possible to continue the railway further north. Amongst other industries that I might mention that would be touched by that line is the anticipated radium mine of British Columbia. I am proud of it. I do not believe there is another spot on the North American continent where radium has been found except in the district I have the honour to represent. Now, radium is not found like placer gold nor is it as easily gathered and put into a suitcase; it is found in rocks and involves an expensive process of handling. It is found within ten or twenty miles of the line of this railway; and this Is the day, and British Columbia the place, of unexpected development. We never know the moment some big company may take hold of it, and it might well be that if this railway is not built under this charter some other corporation might be found to build it. The most fatal objection that was raised was the one on which the lawyers and politicians are alike agreed: it was the fatal one of precedent. We find, Sir, that precedent haunts the very precincts1 of this House. It was stated that we had in the

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dim past established the precedent that two years to commence and five years to finish was the ordinary rule with regard to railways, and: that because we had once laid down that rule, therefore we must forever adhere to it. Now, it would be all very well if this were a big railway, or even if this were the first time that these people were asking for this concession. But this is the second reincarnation of this railway, and it does not necessarily follow that they should have the same time in which to build and finish. They know now what they are up against and have had ample time for preparation; and if an extension is granted now they will come back two years hence, asking another extension. In any case, this custom that is spoken of with such awe and respect has been in force only for a few years; and are we never to learn from experience that if certain legislation or certain regulations do not produce the object aimed at, we should abandon hoary-headed precedent and strike out for ourselves? Are we never to take a chance? Perhaps hon. members of the Government would not be sitting where they now are if the electors, on December 6th last, had not decided to take a chance ; and I think that the chance taken by the electorate was quite as great as the chance we should take in getting away from precedent now. It is yet in the womb of time whether the wisdom of the country was justified in her children on that occasion; but, I think, the chance the people took on that occasion was, if anything, much more desperate than the one I am asking the House to take to-night in abandoning precedent for once.
There is something else I want to point out. It has been the custom of this House always to defer to the findings of the Railway Committee. Word will go around that the railway committee has investigated the subject, and we must stand by their decision. At the bottom of members' minds is the idea: "It will save us the trouble of making up our minds for ourselves if we accept the findings of the committee." Well, may I remind the House of the precedent which we established quite recently? Only a few days ago there was introduced into this House a report of the Agricultural Committee in connection with the Wheat Board. That report had been unanimously arrived at in the committee; yet,, when it was brought into the House it was torn to pieces, the House unanimously deciding to send it back whence it had come. But this legis-

lation, which I am asking to have returned to the Railway Committee, was carried only by a narrow majority in a comparatively small meeting of the committee. I think, therefore, that we have ample reason for not adhering to the principle that because the Railway Committee passed on the question we must necessarily be prohibited from exercising our own judgment as well.
There is something else about the bill which more than ever convinces me that it is not intended to build under this charter, but to continue for another series of years the present state of things. We are all aware, Mr. Speaker, of the custom in connection with all these bills-and I have another one, No. 5, before me now- to insert a clause specifying the amount of bonds that are allowed to be issued against each mile of railway to be built. That clause was in the original act relating to this railway; but is it in this bill? It is not. They did not think it worth while putting it in. And they have either forgotten, omitted or neglected to put in even the customary clause giving the wretched bill a name. Are they so ashamed of this poor foundling that they have disdained to give it a title in the ordinary way? And when we find the omission of another clause with regard to the spending of 15 per cent in the two years, we are more than ever driven to the conclusion that they regard the whole thing as a stop-gap and have no intention of building under it. If they did intend to build, would they not have put in the clause about the bonds for the money to be provided to build with and would they not have given the poor foundling a name? They will be coming back two years from now and two years thereafter; and will simply regard this as a blanket charter from year to year and from decade to decade. This is unfair and unbusinesslike. It is unfair to the men who are living in that district, the pioneers who are expecting a railway; it is unfair to the men of the past, and unfair to the men of the future; for some hon. members may not realize that immigrants coming from the old country are very often misled by legislation of this character. Real estate men who have farms and lands to sell will show those immigrants this bill and say: " Look at that! There, under the imprimatur of the Government of Canada, is the assurance of a railway." And the poor deluded immigrant, unfamiliar with our system of doing business, will think this railway will be built. I have known

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cases where men have gone in and built a home ahead of the railway on the strength of such a promise and the railway was not built for twenty-five years. It is not fair to the people who are already there, nor to those who may come hereafter, and I am not asking for anything unreasonable. I simply want a fair and just compromise. I am not saying that we should compel them to live up to the old charter, in which case they would have to begin operations immediately; I am merely asking that they shall begin operations within one year and complete within three years.


Hon. S. F. TOLMIE (Victoria City):: I have listened with considerable interest to the remarks that have been made with regard to the construction of this railway. I am familiar with the conditions prevailing on Vancouver Island and particularly with the proposed route of the railway in question. The Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway is asking for an extension of the line from the present terminus at Courtenay to a point at or near Duncan Bay, a distance of some thirty-six miles. This is not through country that is not fairly well supplied, at some reasonable distance, with water communication; it is located on an island, and there are fair roads through a good part of that country. The case of the railway company was presented to the committee and thoroughly threshed out, and it received the approval of the committee. Conditions have not yet reached normal, and we know that certain expenses are high in connection with railway construction, although prices have a downward tendency; and it is only fair to grant the reasonable request made by this railway-not an unusual request either-for an extension of time in order to complete the road. There is no other railway in that section of Vancouver Island this proposed line could couple up with except the railway now in operation and having its terminus at Courtenay. I do not think there is much danger about settlers being deceived. A settler should know enough to keep his eyes open when coming to Canada, and he should be very diligent in protecting his own interests. Anybody can tell a settler that a railway is to be built in some place or other. It is the settler's business to protect himself by securing proper information. I trust the House will accept the finding of the Railway Committee and grant the extension of time.


Thomas Vien: The question involved in this discussion has already been fully threshed out before the Railway Committee. That it was not possible for the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, or any other company, to build the railway is quite evident by the fact that nothing was done under the charter, and the Canadian Pacific Railway Company now comes before Parliament for an extension of time. If no extension is granted, it is pretty certain that no other company will build this railway. Even if the extension is granted, it will be fully six or seven months before the promoters are ready to begin work in the field, because financial arrangements will have to be made and extensive engineering plans prepared. So it is not likely that within the twelve months' extension which my hon. friend (Mr. Neill) proposes the Canadian Pacific Railway Company will be able to commence operations. As a matter of fact they are asking for an extension oi two years. Neither before the committee nor before this House, has it been proven that any other company intend to undertake this work if the Canadian Pacific Railway Company default. If another company were ready to proceed, provided this charter were not renewed, then there might be some ground for refusing the request of the promoters; but in the absence of any such competitors I think the full extension of two years should be granted. Obviously, an extension of only one year would not be sufficient to enable the Canadian Pacific railway to complete construction and it would only necessitate their coming back and asking for a further extension next session. We are asking therefore that the time be extended for two years.


Alan Webster Neill: If the hon. member will permit me? When he says "We are asking for an extension" whom does the "we" refer to?


Thomas Vien: I mean the members who advocate the granting of the promoters' request. I am not surprised at my hon. friend's question. The remarks of those of his friends who were opposing the bill before the Railway Committee almost led to a row on that very same point. The as. person that the hon. gentleman is trying to cast upon us is weak indeed. I think, Mr. Speaker, that we should not curtail the extension of time which the petitioners have asked for, but should give them such further time as will allow them to commence the work and carry it to completion. If



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they do not begin construction within the specified time, then my hon. friend's argument can be advanced should the petitioners come back for a further extension in future.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Mr. Speaker, I have much pleasure in supporting the motion of the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill). I think he has taken a very reasonable view of this proposition. The railway company have slept on their rights, so to speak, for a number of years; and whilst my hon. friend from Lotbiniere (Mr. Vien) says that if another company could show that it intended to build this road it would be a good reason for not extending this charter, I submit, in all deference to his opinion, that having this charter upon the statute books is inferentially a prohibition against other people coming in and undertaking construction. If a company were incorporated for the purpose of building this road, when they put their stock upon the market they would at once be met by the assertion- and it would be an assertion of fact- that the Canadian Pacific Railway Company already held a charter for its construction.
We all know that the Canadian Pacific Railway Company is	a large	and
powerful i corporation, so much so that when a member rises in the House to oppose it, he is to a great extent courting political oblivion.	But
when principle is involved it matters not to me whether it is the Canadian Pacific Railway Company or any humble body of people associated for the purpose of building a railway, I think they are both entitled to equal consideration. So it is incumbent upon Parliament, I submit, to see that neither directly nor inferentially is an embargo placed upon any project to build a railway. As I have already stated, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, or its subsidiary, has had this charter for a number of years, and on divers occasions has come to this House for an extension of time. To-day a further extension is being sought without any legitimate reasons therefor being given.
The motion of my hon. friend from Comox-Alberni gives the petitioners an opportunity within the next twelve months to prove their 'bona fides. If they begin construction within the next eight or nine months, or even within the next eleven months, they will have amply demonstrated to Parliament and to the country that they are serious in regard to this matter, and I am sure they would have no trouble

in getting a further extension of their charter to complete the railway.
It is all very well to have railway charters upon our statute books, but I submit that it is in the best interests of the people that no charter be granted to any individual, firm or corporation for the construction of a public utility unless ample evidence be adduced to Parliament that the promoters are financially able to begin construction of the work for which authority is sought. Because, as I have already said, if we enact legislation for the construction of a public utility, it inferentially has the effect of debarring others from building that utility. It is time we called a halt to permitting a corporation or an individual, either the mighty Canadian Pacific or the humblest individual in Canada, to hold charters for the purpose of keeping other people from building railways in a particular section, or of building them when it suits their own convenience, not the convenience of the public at large. I am not a resident of British Columbia-


An hon. MEMBER:: Hear, hear.


Lewis Herbert Martell: My hon. friend says "Hear, hear," but I assure him that I am a resident of a greater province-Nova Scotia. I am submitting to-night, however, the same arguments that I would submit were this a charter for a railway in my own province. What is the case of British Columbia to-day, as it has been so ably set forth by the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill) may be the case of Nova Scotia to-morrow; and Sir, in this age of democracy it is necessary that everything possible be done to retrieve the mistakes that have been made in the past, in order that we may at least retain for the people of the future the rights which are legitimately the rights of the people and not of any corporation.


Hugh Guthrie: Mr. Chairman, shortly before the committee rose at six o'clock, and while we were discussing this item of $1,400,000 for annual drill, I had taken occasion to comment upon the fact that last session a motion had been made in this House by the then hon. member for Kent county to reduce the amount then in the Estimates for annual drill by
9 p.m. one-half, and that the present Prime Minister of Canada and those now supporting him on the Government side had solidly voted in support of that reduction. I had likewise commented on the fact that in the year previous, in the session of 1920, my hon. friend the Prime Minister had himself moved in respect to this item, which then stood at the sum of $1,500,000, a motion that it he reduced by the sum of $1,150,000, to leave it the net amount of $350,000, and I made some comment on what I think I can reasonably call the change of front on the part of my hon. friend the Prime Minister in respect to this particular item. He moved the motion himself in this House in the year 1920.
This afternoon shortly before six o'clock he attempted to make a justification of his change of position. He attempted to justify his change of attitude, because to-day his Government has laid before the House a proposal to expend $1,400,000 for annual drill, by stating that in 1920 conditions were different, that we had then a large number of men practically under arms, undemobilized, and that that fact was present in his mind when he made the motion in 1920. I endeavoured, in reply, to point out to my hon. friend that he was entirely mistaken in that view, that we had very, very few men undemobilized when he made
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his motion, that there were overseas only some 200 or 300 men who had not been returned to Canada. Then my hon. friend replied to me in language to which I think I may fairly take exception, or, at all events, I may ask him to justify the statement he made. He used this language:
If what my hon. friend says is correct, he deceived the House in the matter of demobilization as he did in the matter of the purchase of ammunition. If what he says about demobilization be correct, he deceived us in the same way in that regard, for he distinctly led us to believe that the reason why he had to vote this large sum for demobilization was because the men were overseas and had to be brought back and our contention was that if that were true there was no necessity for voting money for annual drill in Canada.
I do not know, Mr. Chairman, that I am what you would call over-sensitive in regard to language that is used in reference to myself, hut when the statement is made from his place in Parliament by the Prime Minister of this country that I have deceived the House in regard to the matter of demobilization, and that by reason of my deception my hon. friend then leading the Opposition made a motion to reduce the amount for annual drill in 1920, I think I may fairly ask him to justify his statement by telling the House just what I said in justification of the charge he has made against me. I have in the interval taken a look at Hansard, and I find that on the 16th of June, 1920, my hon. friend entered upon a fairly elaborate discussion of the militia estimates. I am going to quote from what he said (Hansard, page 3646):
But the point to which I wish particularly to direct attention is the minister's endeavour to draw a comparison between the expenditure on militia and defence at the present time and amounts that were voted prior to the war. The minister seems to think that at the present time we ought to vote an amount at least equal to amounts that were being voted prior to the war. That is where I take direct issue with him. Before the war it was pretty generally anticipated ; it was certainly said in official quarters that a menace was threatening the world, and that it was necessary to meet that menace by increasing our military and naval forces.
That argument was used as the ground for increasing military expenditures, and it was largely in anticipation of the danger of a great international disturbance that this country voted for military and naval purposes the sums of money which were appropriated at that time. But conditions are wholly different to-day. There is no world menace. Where does the minister expect invasion from?
May I ask the same question again tonight of my hon. friend?
The minister says that this expenditure is needed for the defence of Canada-defence against whom?

I ask my hon. friend the same question to-night.
There is no answer; there is no answer to be made. There is not an hon. gentleman on the other side who will say that a single nation at the present time has any hostile intention or attitude of hostility towards this country, or that there is the slightest danger of Canada being invaded from any quarter. Yet the minister asks us to-day to vote a sum that will bear comparison with expenditures voted on the eve of the terrible situation which occurred in 1914. I might further point out that prior to 1914, that, to be correct, during the period of the Liberal Administration, because the minister referred to that period, we had surpluses, not deficits in our public accounts, and we had a small national debt. To-day we have a colossal public debt; we have obligations that are wholly different, and we are not in the same position to begin to meet them. It is one thing to lay out sums of money on different appropriations when there are plenty of funds in the treasury, but it is quite another matter when the nation is trying to cope with an enormous deficit and to meet obligations such as the country heretofore has never been faced with, and when conditions are such that there is the strongest reason why we should economize in every possible particular, and especially in those particulars in which no satisfactory reason can be shown for large expenditures.
But the most important consideration of ail is this. The minister has spoken about the need for training camps, permanent barracks and the like. Prior to 1914, it was necessary to have men trained as soldiers; we had no trained men, or very few, but what is the position to-day? We have in this country to-day an army of trained men, the most efficient soldiers that will be found in any part of the world, so that the situation is wholly different from what it was prior to the war. The need for training to-day is not what it was prior to the war. We have the experience, knowledge, and attainments of thousands of men as our security and safeguard if there be need for such at the present time. That is a reason why, on this particular score, much could be done in the way of reducing expenditures.
I followed my hon. friend on the same date. I tried to give him full particulars, these are the particulars in which he charges I deceived the House. As reported at page 3676 of Hansard for the same day I stated, in reply to my hon. friend:
There are still undemobilized of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, of all ranks, 2,386 men out of a total enlistment of over 390,060. There is no other country which took part in the war that can show that result, or anything like it. Of these men 1,334 are employed in the depots in this country on military work; 632 are patients undergoing treatment in hospitals; 420 are on the medical and nursing staffs, orderlies and attendants in hospitals ; making a total of 2,386 undemobilized out of well nigh 600,000. In addition we have in England undemobilized 36 officers, 154 men and 63 members of the air force who have been transferred to the Canadian Expeditionary Force, or 253.
That, surely, Mr. Chairman, was a plain, direct unequivocal statement of the extent

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to which demobilization had proceeded on that day in June when my hon. friend made his motion. Now, lest it be said that on the vote for demobilization, which is a separate vote, something was said by me, I have looked that reference up too, and I find that in reply to questions I said on the 30th June, as will be found at page 4552, that we had only between two and three hundred men undemobilized in Great Britain or overseas. I gave particulars that same day of the whole proposed expenditure of the Militia Department in connection with the thirty-eight millions for demobilization. This statement will be found at pages 4550 and 4551 item by item, showing what part of that vote was to be expended in Canada, showing likewise that $9,745,000 of it was to be expended by the Overseas Ministers in Great Britain- every detail, every particular as to money and as to men, and my hon. friend sat in his place and heard my statement. The statement made by my hon. friend in regard to me to-day is the statement which I have read to the House-namely, that my hon. friend based his motion for a reduction in 1920 upon the fact that I had deceived Parliament in connection with the demobilization vote, and that annual camps were not necessary in 1920 because large numbers of men were then coming from overseas to Canada and these were highly trained soldiers. I take exception to the language of the Prime Minister, very grave exception. If he made his statement recklessly, if he made it in a moment of heat, I suppose he can explain it. The Prime Minister has had to turn many pretty sharp corners this session. I have no doubt he had to lie awake at night sometimes to think up new excuses for his many changes of front. I do not mind what excuses he gives to the House for his latest change of heart; I do not know what has caused him to change his opinion in regard to annual drills-it matters not one whit to me. But I ask him if it is quite fair that he should seek to offer as an excuse for his change of opinion a baseless statement that somebody else has deceived the House of Commons? Did my hon. friend not take the same position last year just twelve months ago? Did I deceive him twice on the subject? I do not think I uttered a word in connection with the subject last year; if I did he will produce it to the House now. But I am dealing with the expenditure of 1920, and I have gone over the records and if there is anything else to be stated I trust my
hon. friend will give it to the House. Certain it is that so far as I am aware I gave the House in 1920 the fullest, the fairest, and the most exact statement of the situation as it then existed. The true reasons for the motion to reduce annual drill by $1,150,000 in 1920 which actuated my hon. friend were given by him to the House on that occasion when he admitted to the House and which I quoted a few moments ago.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Chairman, when we speak of demobilization my understanding is that it is the reverse process of mobilization. When forces are being mobilized they are being brought out for a particular purpose; when they are being demobilized they are being disbanded for a particular purpose. I maintain that when the minister asked this Parliament to vote millions of dollars for the purpose of demobilization, the people of Canada and the members of this House understood by that term that the money was for the purpose of demobilizing the forces that had been mobilized, and if he was trying to get money for any other purpose he was deceiving the House. That is the position I took and I say it is a right and proper position. Now in regard to what I said this afternoon as to my hon. friend deceiving the House in the matter of shells, let me indicate to him just what I have in mind and-


Hugh Guthrie: Well, we have not come to that item yet; we are dealing with the vote for annual camps.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I know my hon. friend is very anxious to get away from this, but he has brought up the question himself and I think he had better stay and hear the matter discussed. He has referred to the Hansard of 1920. I shall also refer to the Hansard of 1920 when my hon. friend came before the House to secure an appropriation from Parliament for the purpose of purchasing munitions. On page 3,717 of Hansard, June 17, 1920, I find the following:
Mr. Lemieux: Is it not a fact that the Quebec arsenal was quite sufficient for our needs, except for a certain period during the war when munitions were urgently needed on the other side? In normal times, would not the Quebec arsenal be amply sufficient for the needs of our militia?
Mr. Guthrie: As between the two arsenals I think Lindsaj? would be the better adapted, but there are military reasons for maintaining both arsenals. I believe the construction of the two arsenals was advised by a high military authority, for reasons which are obvious. I believe that either one has the capacity to turn
11G6
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out a suffloient output in peace times. Neither of them is being operated to its capacity at the present time.
Mr. Lemieux: How many men are there at the Quebec arsenal?
Mr. Guthrie: At the present time, nearly 500. All our heavy ammunition and quick firing ammunition, as well as a large part of our rifle ammunition, is made at Quebec. Lindsay only manufactures at present small arms ammunition ; I do not think it has the equipment for making artillery ammunition.
Mr. Lemieux: I am informed that the munitions turned out by the Quebec arsenal were highly commended by military authorities during the war. Is that a fact?
Mr. Guthrie: I understand that our ammunition has been very highly commended, both that made at Quebec and that made at Lindsay. I doubt if any better ammunition is turned out anywhere.
I submit that, when my hon. friend told this House that all our heavy ammunition and quick-firing ammunition, as well as a large part of our rifle ammunition, were made at Quebec, he led every member of this House to believe that the appropriation, which he was asking Parliament to vote for purposes of ammunition, was necessary because we had to get that heavy ammunition from the arsenal at Quebec. That was in 1920. I now come to the Estimates of 1921, when my hon. friend was asking Parliament to appropriate money to pay for the salaries of inspectors of munitions. What did he say? At page 2782 of Hansard of April 29, 1921, I find this statement:
Mr. Guthrie: The inspector of ammunition at Quebec is Mr. Keightley. We have two arsenals, one at Quebec and one at Lindsay. From these arsenals a large amount of ammunition has been turned out, running into many millions, and in that connection it is necessary to have a competent inspector. No loss can be greater or more consequential than that resulting from defective ammunition. The item is reduced this year by 525,000 ; we have brought it down to the lowest .possible figure. There has been no attempt to disguise these items; they are carried now as they have been for fifteen or twenty years.
A little further down he made this statement:
Mr. Guthrie: This item covers arms and ammunition.
Mr. Power: Is this for small arms or for artillery stores?
Mr. Guthrie: About 200,000 rifles came back to Canada at the end of the war, and of these about 40,000 are at the present moment being overhauled. Many of these arms as returned were found to be more or less defective from wear, rough usage, or loss of some trifling detail affecting the serviceability of the whole arm. After these 40,000 are nepaired, they will be put back into stock. The amount of money involved in stores of arms and ammunition is very large; we have the stores on hand now, and they must be kept in shape and continually examined and inspected; otherwise, on

account of deterioration, heavy losses are liable to be incurred.
I submit that, when my hon. friend asked Parliament for the appropriation for that purpose, he clearly led the House to believe that all the ammunition that was required was in storage in this country at that time; that there were large quantities of it, and that, for that reason, he had to pay a large amount for salaries to inspectors of munitions, for whom he was asking a particular appropriation at that time. I ask the committee to keep together in mind these two statements-the statement on June 17, 1920:
All our heavy ammunition and quick-firing ammunition, as well as a large part of our rifle ammunition, is made at Quebec.
And the statement of April 29, 1921:
The amount of money involved in stores of arms and ammunition is very large; we have the stores on hand now, and they must be kept in shape and continually examined.
Those statements, in the absence of any other reference to munitions available from any other source, I contend, imply and can only imply that we were getting all our munitions in this country and that, for that reason, Parliament should vote the amounts that were asked for. The committee should note what the Minister of Militia and Defence of that day said, which is in the paragraph preceding the one about munitions :
About 200,000 rifles came back to Canada at the end of the war, and of these about 40,000 are at the present moment being overhauled.
He spoke about arms coming back from the other side. Nothing was said about munitions. He made it perfectly plain, or rather he tried to convey the impression that all our munitions were manufactured in the arsenal at Quebec. Elsewhere in the debate, I think it will be found that he defended the fact of the amount asked for being so large by stating that it was because wages had gone up at the arsenals where these munitions were being produced. It was in the light of that discussion, of those statements, that this House appropriated money for munitions, for high explosives for the artillery. What do we find? I have in my hand a memorandum of gun ammunition entered at the outport of Levis, Que. I will not go any further back than May of last year. Remember it was in April of last year that my hon. friend's statement was made to the effect that we had all the stores here, and that he got the appropriation for the purpose of munitions. What do I find according to the customs entries :

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Date of Entry.
31st May, 1921 ; primers, guncotton,
howitzer shells, etc	$ 334,340
16th July, 1921 ; percussion fuses,
tubes, etc	 12,600
2Sth June, 1921 ; fuses, shells, quickfiring, shells, breech-loading, 8-inch
howitzer	 91,320
loth August, 1921; shells, cartridges
and fuses	 202,863
15th August, 1921; shells, cartridges
and fuses	 509,405
24th August, 1921; shells and cartridges	 488,269
24th November, 1921; fuses, cartridges and shells	 731,553
24th November, 1921; fuses, cartridges, shells,	detonators, etc	 509,103
Total	$2,879,453
Or between May, 1921, and November, 1921, within this last year, a total importation, according to the records of the Government itself, of high explosive shells and cartridges to a value of $2,879,453. If there is not deception there, I should like to know where deception is to be found. If this country was entitled to that quantity of munitions, why did my hon. friend not tell the House about these matters? Why did he not, when he was asking this House to vote money for high explosive shells, say that we had a right, if we had it, to bring from the Old Country, out of some credit to which we were entitled there, munitions to the extent of $2,879,468 ? He said not a word about that; nor would the country have known anything of it, if it had not been that, passing the port of Levis one day, I saw one of these Government merchant marine ships laden with high explosive shells, and made an inquiry of my hon. friend. What did he say when I spoke of the matter?
Despatch from Guelph, Ontario, October 22:
"No munitions," said Hon. Hugh Guthrie, Minister of Militia, at one o'clock this morning, "have been purchased since the war excepting a few spare parts to put in shape such material as we have in Canada."
And in further correspondence I had with the then Prime Minister and the Minister of Militia, which correspondence I shall ask to have brought down so that every hon. member may have the privilege of reading it, they admitted that these high explosive shells were paid for out of a credit to Canada's account in England. What is a credit? It is the same as an appropriation by Parliament. It represents the money of the people of the country ; it represents what the people have paid out in the form of taxation one way or another. It is out of that money that
this $2,879,453 worth of high explosive shells has been paid. What is to be done with these shells? Of the shells I saw, every box was marked " To be fired or destroyed before June 1925 otherwise they would be of no value. My information went to show that these shells have been sent all over the country, deposited not in one province but in half a dozen provinces; and I am told, I believe rightly, that the only place in Canada where the militia would think of firing them is the camp at Petawawa where the artillery practise. Whether I am right or wrong in that regard I stand ready to be corrected. But the point is this: we have bought, according to government records, a couple of million dollars' worth of high explosive shells, representing one-fifth of the whole appropriation which is asked for the department for this year. What are we to do with these shells? I am told that they are no good for ordinary practice; and they must be destroyed, according to the indications on the boxes themselves, within a certain period. I shall place on record the statement my hon. friend gave me, and which came from his department, when I wrote him inquiring what had been ordered. This is only a part of the quantity that has been imported. Earlier in the same year, as far back as July 15, 1920, I find that there was an importation of shells and cartridges to the value of $355,865. Not a word was said to this Parliament about any shells or cartridges having been brought from England at that time, but Parliament was asked to vote money in order that this very class of thing might be purchased from the arsenals in Canada which, according to the statement of my hon. friend, made all the heavy artillery munitions. Here are the munitions received from Great Britain, according to the schedule he has given me:
MUNITIONS RECEIVED FROM GREAT BRITAIN Schedule "B"
Description	No. ordered	Received to date	Still dueSection No. 28 Cartridges, Q.F. 18 pr. Shrapnel, Mk. 1A plugged.	103,000	103,016	NilCartridges, Q.F. 18 pr. H.E. Shells, plugged	
Cartridges, Q.F. 13 pr. 9 cwt. A.A. Guns:- Shrapnel plugged	4,000 [DOT] 2,500	2,500	NilCartridges, Q.F. 13 pr. 9 cwt. H.E. plugged	2,500	2,500	Nil
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Hugh Guthrie: Let me refer to the first matter. My hon. friend has put forward what, in my judgment, is a very, very, lame excuse for the language he used this afternoon. He has not attempted to justify it. I am going to put myself in the judgment of the House in regard to this whole incident. But when a man in the position, and of the ability, and intelligence, of my hon. friend puts forward the lame excuse in this House, that the trouble arose because he always believed demobilization was the opposite of mobilization, and consequently was misled by something I said, such an excuse is ridiculous. He sat within twelve or thirteen feet of me, when I explained to him every particular, every item, told him where every man was both here and overseas. Does he insinuate that he moved to reduce this item because he was misled, because he thought the demobilization was still going on and was completed? It would have been much more fair, much more candid on his part, much more manly, I think also if he had told the House: I did make that motion to reduce this item in 1920 just for the reasons that are stated in Hansard, and I was not misled. But I am going to leave myself entirely in the judgment of the House and let the House decide upon a review of all the facts. However, such is the lame excuse which the Prime Minister puts forward to justify his change of front. He has turned some sharp corners this session,-perhaps this is the sharpest corner he has had to turn. I still think the manly way would have been the best way for him to have explained his difficult position.
Now, in regard to the other matter, I absolutely deny the charge that I in any way misled or deceived the House in regard to ammunition shipments and had my hon. friend, the Prime Minister, not gone to Levis and become alarmed and over excited at what he saw there, we never would have

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had this tremendous ado about something which is capable of a very simple and very satisfactory explanation. The explanation has been given to my hon. friend by me in written form, but he has not seen fit to use it to-night. Even after he received that explanation during the late campaign he did not see fit to use it, but he went from platform to platform shouting at the top of his voice as he did in the city of Guelph according to the report in the Toronto Globe: This ammunition matter constitutes one of the gravest political scandals, if not one of the gravest political crimes, that was ever committed in the Dominion of Canada.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Hugh Guthrie: There are a good many "hear hears" by members who don't understand and I am going to explain the matter briefly to the House. The shell transaction took place before I became Minister of Militia, but I do not seek to shield myself on that account. I have concerned myself enough about it to make inquiries from Sir Edward Kemp, who was at that time Overseas Minister of Militia, and also of my hon. friend from East Hamilton (Mr. Mewburn) my predecessor in oifice, in whose time the (whole transaction took place. I have also gone to the trouble of ascertaining definitely from the Deputy Minister of the Department-who is present on the floor to-night-and from the chief of the general staff, who was personally concerned with the matter, all the facts I could possibly gather.
When I stated in the newspaper interview quoted by my hon. friend and which I gave over the telephone at one o'clock in the morning, that no ammunition had been purchased since the armistice down to date, I said what was absolutely true, or else the officials in my department had not told me all that was going on. The statement was absolutely true-not a dollar's worth of ammunition had been bought. Ammunition had certainly been manufactured in the government arsenals but none had been purchased since the armistice.
How did this matter arise? When the armistice came, it came suddenly. Canada, like the other allied nations, did not know there was going to be a sudden cessation of hostilities on November 11. We, like the other allied nations, were preparing for a year or two years more of war, and we were accumulating large stocks of warlike material of every kind-guns, ammunition, shells, all kinds of military equipment, clothes, medical stores and the like, and when the armistice came we had tremendous quantities of all kinds of military supplies on hand in France, in Belgium and in Great Britain; we had also a tremendous supply in Canada.
Let me deal first with the supplies overseas. The practical question immediately arose: What are we going to do with all these stores? How shall we dispose of them? In ordinary peace times our militia could not use them in a generation, no, I have been told by the officers of the department that we could not use them in two or three generations. A great deal of that war material will deteriorate by lapse of time just as in the case of these high explosive shells which so alarmed the Prime Minister, and which bore on the containers instructions that they were to be used before a certain fixed date, otherwise they would go bad, and be of no use whatever.
What then were we to do with this large accumulation of warlike stores? There is the technical and proper term, and that is the term I have used from time to time in this House, What was Australia doing ? What was New Zealand doing? They could not use their tremendous accumulations, nor could we use ours. We simply pooled them all. We all turned our warlike stores over to the British government, and the British government took records of them and agreed to store them for us until some final disposition could be decided upon. We knew we could make use of some of them in our militia in Canada, and the overseas ministry, presided over at that time by Sir Edward Kemp, and. General MaoBrien, one of the most capable officers this country has ever turned out, and with some others, acting on behalf of Canada, determined that the best course to take was to withdraw from this tremendous surplus store of our own supplies what we could utilize in militia training in Canada. Thereupon lists were prepared of such part of that military equipment, including guns, munitions and all kinds of warlike stores, which it was considered we could use in this country. After these lists were prepared and submitted to the British War Office, they said in regard to guns: We will hand over to you absolutely new guns to take the place of your guns which have seen service, because we have a tremendous stock of new guns on hand, and we will take yours over at inventory prices. For use of those guns we selected a supply of appropriate ammunition.
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If one branch of military science has been developed during the war more than another it was the artillery branch of the service. Guns which we were using in Canada at the beginning of the war became absolutely useless as the war progressed. We had to have new modern guns. New guns require new ammunition high explosive ammunition-and such ammunition had not previously been manufactured at any of our government arsenals. What was the use of eighteen pounder high explosive guns if you had no high explosive shells? We had the guns, and we drew out of the general pool as part of our share a sufficient quantity of shells for those guns for the use of our millitia troops in annual training.


Thomas Vien: Will my hon. friend allow me a question? Do I understand him to say that no high explosive shells, either of the eighteen pounder or higher calibres, were manufactured in Canada?


Hugh Guthrie: None were manufactured in our arsenals. We had no machinery for the manufacture of them, so the Superintendent of Arsenals has reported. I understand such shells were made in Canada by some of the munition plants, but I am talking of the government arsenals. We drew out such material as we could reasonably use, and I admit that to the ordinary civilian mind the list appears to be a pretty long one, but if the hon. Prime Minister will consult the Minister of Militia, or the Deputy Minister, or the Chief of Staff, I think he will find that under modern war conditions we had a reserve of just one day's artillery supplies in this country. That is what we have-one single day's supplies. I have received a written memorandum from the Chief of Staff to this effect. It is not a very heavy supply of reserve artillery ammunition under modern war conditions, is it? I do not understand the technique in many of these matters, and therefore I have to be guided by what competent officers tell me, and such is the information I have received, upon very high authority.
Well, we selected what was coming to us, or rather what General MacBrien and his committee of officers in England thought was proper for us to have for militia training. My colleague, the then Minister of Militia (Mr. Mewburn), and the Overseas Minister of Militia, Sir Edward Kemp, both agreed upon the matter, and the question then was: How were we to ship it out to Canada? Immediately after the war we

could not get shipping, but as shipping later became available all of this war material, including guns, ammunition, and all kinds of military equipment, was from time to time sent forward to Canada. There was a great lot of it we could never use in Canada. What did we do with the surplus? We were in a bad fix in regard to a lot of our equipment unless some other government would take it over. We could never use it in Canada. Finally the British government agreed to take the whole surplus off our hands. A valuation was made of it, and the War Office allowed us,
I think, three million dollars or thereabouts for the balance of our equipment which we did not desire to bring back to Canada. It was all purely a question of salvage. What,
I ask, was the best thing to do under all the circumstances. Was it not better to sell the surplus to the War Office and bring back to this country such portion as we could reasonably use? Many of the guns which we decided to bring back had never been seen in Canada before, or, indeed, any guns like them. The ammunition for these guns had never been in Canada before, or anything like them. Bringing the guns, we would need the ammunition. My hon. friend the Prime Minister in some of his speeches assured his audience that some officer in Ottawa had told him that high explosive shells were never used in artillery practice or training. If he had gone to Pete-wawa or Sarcee or Camp Hughes in 1921 when the troops were there, he would have found them firing 18-pounder high explosive shells. If he had gone to Pete-wawa last year he would have found the same thing, and if he will go there this year when the artillery is in training he will see our troops firing the identical shells that he saw landed at Quebec last October, brought here for the purpose of training the Canadian militia. What were we to do with our surplus war material if we did not use it in that way? We used what we could-we saved that money to the country, because otherwise we would have had to purchase or manufacture additional war material-and what we could not use in our militia we got the government of Great Britain to take off our hands at a valuation of $3,000,000. In addition, of course, we had on hand this tremendous supply of war material here in Canada, sufficient to carry on the militia of this country for thirty or forty years under peace conditions. We did the very same thing in Canada as we did in England; we

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selected out of these unused stores as much as we could reasonably utilize in our militia before it should rot or become worn out through old age, and we stored it in the various depots throughout Canada. But there was a large surplus which we could	not use in	many years
and we handed this surplus over to the War Purchasing Commission, who sold it for the best price obtainable-something like seven or eight millions of dollars.
This is the story of the so-called shell scandal, and that is the whole of it. That is the story of the shipment of shells which so excited my hon. friend the Prime Minister during the late campaign. Is there anything wrong about it? There is a little quibble about a word in Hansard; perhaps I had better explain that circumstance. In recent years we have maintained two arsenals, one at Quebec, which is equipped with machinery to turn out certain kinds of artillery and rifle ammunition; another at Lindsay, Ontario, where rifle ammunition only is manufactured- this is the only kind of ammunition which the machinery there will produce. Certain kinds of artillery ammunition can be made at Quebec. All the artillery ammunition which we manufacture in Canada we do make at Quebec; none of the artillery ammunition made in Canada is made at Lindsay. That is the idea which I intended to convey in the language I used as quoted to-night by the Prime Minister. I was asked how many men were employed at the various arsenals and what were they making, and I said: " All the artillery ammunition is made at Quebec." I should have said: All that we make in Canada is made at Quebec; none is made at Lindsay. But it is upon that mere quibble, upon that single word, my hon. friend the Prime Minister has had the effrontery to get up in this House and rest his whole case.
May I explain again the matter of the demobilization vote. During the war none of our war expenditure was charged to the Militia Department; it would not have been fair to so charge it. While active hostilities were proceeding, all such expenditure was charged to a vote called " war appropriation." All supplies, all stores, all guns, all transport-everything was charged to the war appropriation vote, nothing to the Militia Department. We were at war; it was war money we were spending, and a special report of the expenditure from time to time was laid on the table of the House giving every item in detail. I myself laid either one or two
such reports on the Table, and i 9 p.m. they are still available. At the end of the war we adopted a special vote called the demobilization vote. By act of this Parliament we defined what " demobilization" should include. This act is 9-10 George V, chapter 33. It provided that a certain sum should be appropriated not exceeding $250,000,000, towards defraying any expenses incurred by or under the authority of the Governor in Council during the year ending March 31, 1920, for the following purposes:
(a)	the defence and security of Canada;
(b)	the conduct of naval and military operations in or beyond Canada and the demobilization of the Canadian forces;
(c)	the promoting of trade and industry, and transportation facilities therefor;
(d)	the carrying out of any measures deemed necessary or advisable by the Governor in Council in consequence of the war; and
(e)	payments made or expenditure incurred during the fiscal year ending the thirty-first day of March, nineteen hundred and nineteen, for the purposes mentioned in The War Appropriation Act, 1918, and in excess of the amount authorized by the said act.
That act passed for the first time in 1919, and, I think, was re-enacted the following year and, the next year again in the Appropriation Act. Yet a man of the intelligence and parliamentary experience of the Prime Minister of this country comes before the House to-night and tries to lead the House to believe that he did not know what the demobilization vote was. Well, there is the statute. Why did he not read it? I have no doubt he heard it discussed in the House at least twenty times during each session; since it was passed. The demobilization vote was a continual subject of discussion. I think my hon. friend himself was here in the session of 1919, when the act was passed. Surely his professed ignorance as to what demobilization included makes the excuse he has tried to offer in regard to my first objection a very lame one indeed.
Now, I have given a full account of the "shell scandal" from the point of view of the Government of that day. All the records in connection with the whole transaction are in the Militia Department. The overseas papers are all in Canada now; the overseas minister relinquished his office some time before the Government was defeated and his records will be found in the department. All the particulars are there, and the Prime Minister, if he wishes to do so, can delve into them to the bottom. The same officers are in the department to-day as were there when I was in office, and full information
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can be had from them. If my hon. friend can find anything wrong in the transaction, anything unbusinesslike in the transaction, anything deceitful in the transaction, let him find it, and make it known to the House. I for one am prepared to say that in anything the Militia Department did in that connection it acted wisely and in the interests of the people, and the Government did wisely to conclude the arrangement with the British War Office which I have outlined and brought that ammunition back to Canada and saved the expense of buying it in the future.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I do not wish to prolong this discussion unduly, because I think this matter will be better threshed out before the Public Accounts Committee. And I hope the committee will look into it; I am sure that the papers to which my hon. friend has referred will bear examination. When my hon. friend uses the word "effrontery," I think he had better have some regard to his own behaviour. After listening to the explanation he has made of the bringing in of these thirteen or fourteen shiploads of high explosive shells, the House will not have very much difficulty in finding a characterization that will be suitable for his action. When he talks about being manly, I think he might have discarded the lame excuse he laboured under at the outset of intimating that this matter came under his predecessor in office, an hon. gentleman who did not happen to be in the Chamber at the time but who sits beside my hon. friend on other occasions. Every word I read to the House to-night was from the lips of my hon. friend. They were not the words of his predecessor; they were his own words. He has not touched the point of deception which I brought up, which was this: If he knew, as he said he did, that Canada was entitled to these shiploads of shells, why did he not tell Parliament that at tba last session, when he was asking us to appropriate money for the purposes of munitions?
Why did he not the year before, if he knew this country was entitled to munitions amounting to $6,000,000 or more from the other side,-why did he not tell Parliament then? I tell my hon. friend that the people of this country will not believe that it was a mere matter of accident that he did not tell this House that we were entitled to all this quantity of ammunition from the other side if we were so entitled. That will not go down with the people of Canada, and my hon. friend would be the last person

to accept any such statement from anyone else that might happen to make it. Altogether, there were I think thirteen or fourteen {Merchant [Marine shiploads of these shells brought into this country. My hon. friend says that they were all obligated for during the time that his predecessor was in office. According to his statement he knew that, and yet he told the House absolutely nothing about it, but came before the House and asked to vote a sum of money for artillery ammunition, telling us that all the artillery ammunition was made in this country and that the money was needed on that account. All of the shells that came in have come in since the debate in which my hon. friend made his statement to the House.
Now in regard to these being our stores, it may be perfectly true, as was said, that there was a certain pooling of supplies after the armistice and that Canada was entitled to draw what she needed out of that pool, but there was a financial settlement made later, according to the Prime Minister and the Minister of
10 p.m. Militia himself, which placed to Canada's account a certain credit. That credit represented the money of the people of, this country, and if I am not wrongly informed, I think the minister's letter will show that these shells have come out of that credit. He talks about our own stores. If these shells to the extent of $6,000,000 or more in value, had not been brought in Canada would have had to its credit $6,000,000 more on the other side.


Hugh Guthrie: How? That was our
equipment. How would we have had $6,000,000 for it?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Was there
not a financial settlement made in 1921?


Hugh Guthrie: The financial statement of 1920 included this. This was our material. We took back what we wanted of it, and the rest we sold for about three million to the British government.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: All of this
represented material which could either have been retained in the possession of Canada as stores, or credited as cash.


Arthur Meighen: Who would buy it?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: In the balancing between this country and the-


Arthur Meighen: It is a case of sale.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend has told us he brought stores over here

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and turned them over to the Purchasing Commission, for sale in this country.


Hugh Guthrie: No. That was the
supply in Canada that was sold.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It comes
pretty much to the same thing. If I understand my hon. friend now, what he did was to turn over to the Purchasing Commission supplies that we had here. The Purchasing Commission sells them, and then he brings out these supplies from the Old Country to take their place.


Hugh Guthrie: All we had in Canada
that we could not utilize we handed over to the Purchasing Commission, and they sold it for approximately $7,000,000 or $8,000,000. All we had in England that we considered we could utilize in our militia we brought back to Canada and what we could not utilize, we sold to the British government for about $3,000,000.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: As I said,
I think this is a matter that can be better gone into and threshed out by a committee than at this particular moment. My hon. friends may smile, but I think it is still owing to this House that the ex-Minister of Militia should explain why, if Canada was entitled to these supplies, if she had them in her possession at the time, he told this Parliament .nothing about it. He should also explain why he asked of this Parliament, and accepted from this Parliament, appropriations for the purchase of munitions when, according to his present statement, we had these very munitions in our possession.
I wish to say this further, and I think this is a matter that can be decided at the present time irrespective of anything else: The quantity of high explosive shells that he has brought into this country is far in excess of any use that can possibly be made of them by the militia of this country. Apart from the questionable nature of the transaction, these shells have cost us an enormous sum in the matter of transportation and distribution. They are costing this country at the present time a large sum on account of inspection and storage, and I venture to say that they will not be used but will be destroyed before the time for which they are due. Now perhaps my hon. friend will tell the House just why he said nothing whatever about any munitions to which we were entitled when he was asking us to vote money for munitions and when he knew that after his appropriations had
passed he was going to bring in ship loads of these munitions.


Hugh Guthrie: When the vote for munitions came up, I did inform the House that a certain amount of military stores- that would include munitions-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Hugh Guthrie: Well would it not? On one occasion I defined what the term military stores included. The vote I asked from the House was fully explained, in the printed estimates last year, a copy of which I hold in my hand, just as it is explained in the estimates this year. You will find in those estimates specifications of every kind of ammunition for which the vote was taken, just as you find it for this year. What we selected in England was largely what we did not have in Canada, and what we did not propose to manufacture here. A very large part of it is what we could not make with our present equipment. I suppose, had I been specifically asked whether the term military stores included ammunition I could have said yes. I certainly mentioned guns, and I think I described some of them. I certainly mentioned other military equipment, but I was not asked specifically in regard to shells. When I presented the estimates and asked for the vote, I gave the exact specifications of what we proposed to make with the money Parliament voted to us, just as it is set forth in the estimates to-day.


Mr. POWER:: May I respectfully suggest, Mr. Chairman, that the discussion which has been going on for nearly an hour has been out of order and could have been held much better under another item, that of Ordnance, Arms, etc.
The item which we are at present discussing is an item of $1,400,000 to be devoted to annual drill and training of the militia. Last year when this item came before the House, the then member for Kent, now a member of another House, moved that the item be reduced by the amount of $750,000. At that time a largo number of members now sitting on this side of the House supported the motion of the hon. member for Kent that $750,000 be struck from the vote. In order to be fair to the government of that day, we thought that $750,000 was a lot to ask a Tory government to take from military expenditure, but to-day the Government in power is supported by members who, at any rate during the last campaign when they were
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in opposition, announced that they were anti-militarists. In order to give them and the Government an opportunity of showing that the principle which they advocated in opposition will be the same principle which they advocate when in power. I move, seconded by my hon. friend from Laprairie (Mr. Lanctot), that this item be reduced by $1,100,000. I would move that it be reduced by the sum total of the vote, but perhaps there may be some small outstanding accounts which require to be paid, and I would not wish to deprive any of the citizens of Canada of their just recourse against the Government in case there is any money	due.
In moving this amendment to the resolution I would suggest that we are opposed to such ian expenditure because, in the first place, we have no money for such a purpose. We have been told time and again by the members of the Opposition and by our friends the Progressives that the country is on the verge of bankruptcy. If such is the case we surely have no means that will permit us to indulge in useless expenditure, and expenditure on militia camps, or for military training, at the present time is, to my mind, a useless expenditure. I understand from the minister that we have reduced the period of training from sixteen to nine days. I respectfully submit, Mr. Chairman, that nine days' training is not sufficient for the making of a soldier and cannot be of any use for that purpose. We heard last year from distinguished soldiers -the then member for Skeena, Mr. Peck, the then member for Edmonton Mr. Gries-bach, and others, who have held high rank in the army that it took six months steady, continuous and intensive training to make a man fit to be placed on the fighting line. I submit that nine days training-one day of which is spent in going to, and one day in returning from, the camp, while Sunday is devoted to church parades in any God fearing province-means that we really have only six days in which to teach men to form fours. That, I think, is not sufficient and I submit it is not in the best interest of the country that we waste our money in merely giving a holiday to those who can find any useful employment in the country.
I would go further and say that there is no necessity, even though it were useful, for such military training to-day. It was pointed out by my hon. friend from Assini-boia (Mr. Gould) that in these days we hear nothing but reports of peace conferences on disarmament, and we spent some thoust*Ir. Power.]
ands of dollars in sending a representative to the Disarmament Conference in Washington. The whole world is talking of disarmament, and we have treaties between the most important powers tending to that end. As has been pointed out for years by members on this side, we are in no immediate danger from any enemy. Last year the then Minister of Militia stated that the militia estimates had been cut down to the lowest point consistent with safety. I repeatedly asked him the question-safety from what, safety from whom? From whom are we liable to attack? Who is about to attack us? The minister could not give me a reply at that time; and I do not know that he can give me a reply to-day. I think it is well known and clearly understood that there is no immediate danger of this country being attacked; that we do not need to at once begin to train the youth of Canada, and that further, the training of young people in the usages and the glorification of war will do more to make new wars than any other propaganda. I say, Sir, that if you teach the youth of this country to use arms, that if you constantly hold before them that the supreme and the sovereign means of settling any difficulty is by the arbitrary method of force, you will lead them to the conclusion that there is no means of obtaining truth and justice in this world but by the use of force. So that for the three reasons I have mentioned:	First, because we have no
money; second, because such training would be useless, and, third, because there is no necessity for it, I very reluctantly-because I think the members of the House who know me realize that I am a very strong party man; I believe in party government, and I believe in Liberal party government above all party governments, I am very reluctantly obliged in order to be consistent with my stand on former occasions and with what I have said throughout the country and particularly in my own constituency during the last election, to ask for this reduction in the estimates.


George Newcombe Gordon: The question is on
the amendment moved by Mr. Power that the item of $1,400,000 for annual drill be reduced by $1,100,000. Shall the amendment carry?


Miss MACPHAIL:: 
Mr. HOEY:: I would1 like to ask the minister, through you, Mr. Chairman, if it would not be possible-in view of the reduction in the cost of living, in view of the increased purchasing power of the dollar, and in view of the fact to which my hon. friend from South Wellingt m (Mr. Guthrie) has already referred, that this decrease is more apparent than real-to reduce this item of $1,400,000 by $400,000. I think we might perhaps agree on a compromise of that kind. I make the suggestion because I have in my possession, as the Minister for Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. Beland) is already aware letters from men who have recently developed tubercular trouble but who are not considered eligible to make any claim for
remuneration. I am of opinion-and I should like to test the committee in this matter-that this money could be better spent in looking after the fatherless, the widows, and disabled soldiers who were stricken and maimed in the great conflict than spent in this way. In view of what I have stated, I think this item of $1,400,000 could be reduced by $400,000, and I do not think anybody would suffer in the interval. Our paramount duty at the moment is not to provide for the training of men until we have seen to it that men disabled in the great conflict are adequately looked after.


Oliver Robert Gould: I have noticed with some interest the co-operation which is taking place between the ex-Minister of Militia and Defence (Mr. Guthrie) and the Minister of Militia and Defence (Mr. Graham). What one says the other appears to corroborate. Incidentally, even when the civil government estimates of the department were before the House, I was quite interested in noting that the ex-Minister of Militia and Defence tendered his services to the present Minister of Militia and Defence, advising that the list was complete; that it had been reduced to the lowest possible point. It seems to me that we in this House should ask the question: Who are the advisers of the minister? As a matter of fact, I have asked questions, similar to this on several previous occasions, while the civil government estimates have been before the House. There must be, in the Government or in the various departments, individuals who advise the min-, isters, and it seems to me that the time has arrived, in the annual protest which we make on the floor of this House against gross expenditures of money, when we must issue notice to those individuals who advise the ministers in their departments, that there is, throughout the country, a strict demand for economy, and that the people are going to see that they themselves who furnish this money have representatives or advisers in connection with the spending of that money, who know the position thoroughly. That is, the individuals who are the advisers must take the dual position of understanding the stand of the people who furnish the money as well as of understanding the spending of the money. This is not a newly-found fault or idea with me. It appears to me that the individuals who advise have said unto themselves: "Oh, well, Parliament will provide the money; all we have to do is to find the
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means of spending it," and they have not had a proper conception of the attitude of mind of the people who, away back home, are watching the activities of the people here, and who are wondering if those whom they have sent to Parliament are going to vote these huge sums of money simply upon the request of those who are, perhaps, the advisers of the ministers.
I recollect a question which I asked last year of the then Minister of Militia and Defence. My question which had to do with Military District No. 12, which is located in Saskatchewan, was if it was the intention of the minister to discontinue Military District No. 12? My question was prompted by the fact that this district had been established during the war period upon the distinct understanding and promise that it would be discontinued immediately upon the termination of the war. The Minister of Militia and Defence replied to my question by stating that Saskatchewan had proved to be such a good recruiting ground that they had decided to keep the district in operation. It was news to me and to the people back home that the part of this country from which I come, supposedly at that time filled with Bolshevists, should be accounted by the Minister of Militia and Defence as a good recruiting ground. Certainly, that was an inconsistent position, and we are justified in assuming and believing, from the reply of the minister, that he was capable, in that respect, of taking a somewhat dual attitude. That military district is still in existence, and I have some figures which I wish to place on Hansard, not particularly for the benefit of the gentlemen in this chamber, but for the people back home who will tomorrow read Hansard. I have made complaints on the public platform that I thought there was extravagance in this department, and I want to cite a few figures in relation to Military District No. 12. I have stated on the public platform that I believe an undue proportion of the moneys voted was going to officers, and I have in my hand figures to show the proportion. In Military District No. 12, that is in Saskatchewan, we have:
18th Battery, C.F.A., 3 officers, 3 N.C.O's, 19 men.
31st Battery, C.F.A., 4 officers, 7 N.C.O's, 42 men.
44th Battery, C.F.A., 4 officers, 8 N.C.O's, 43 men.
77th Battery, C.F.A., 3 officers, 9 N.C.O's, 85 men.
12th Brigade, C.M.G., Headquarters staff, 4 officers, 1 N.C.O. ; No. 1 Company, 2 officers, 7

N.C.O's; No. 2 Company, 6 officers, 5 N.C.O's, 13 men ; No. 3 Company, 5 officers, 8 N.C.O's, 60 men.
12th Signal Company, C.S.C., 5 officers, 11
N.C.O's, 57 men.
I might say that the other military districts, in many cases, show the same proportion, and, in my humble opinion there are far too many officers for the number of men shown. I think I stated last year that they average practically one officer to every two men, and we are being asked to provide money for salaries for those officers.
The economic condition of this country does not warrant such expenditure, and the people have given a distinct mandate to us, who represent them on this floor, that they will no longer abide by the decision of those who advise the minister to ask for huge sums of money to be voted to provide for these inordinate expenditures. I have made repeated protests on the floor of this House; soon I hope to see the fruits of my labour and the co-operation of others who have worked with me, in the reduction of the estimates of this department of Government. I am pleased to link my forces with those of the hon. and gallant member for Quebec South (Mr. Power) when he asks for a reduction in these estimates. I am very sure that, under the present economic conditions of this country, under the wish and will of the people, expressed because of the promises made throughout the length and breadth of Canada by us who asked that the confidence of the people be reposed in us, the time has arrived when the people have a right, in this first meeting of a new Parliament, to demand that these expenditures should be reduced. Consequently, I feel obliged to vote for the adoption of the amendment.


Mr. RINFRET:: It is rather an unusual spectacle to find the Government in discussion over a certain matter with its own friends, and the situation was made even more interesting this afternoon when it was found that the Government, on this point, was receiving support from members of the official opposition. But that is a situation which is likely to arise when we have a sudden change in government. Hard as the new administration may strive to drive away from the methods of the old regime, yet members on this side may find that they are not driving fast enough, and they may ask for more radical reforms. I quite understand the position in which the minister finds himself. When he took charge of the office he found an established department, an established staff, and fixed

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customs. And I will give him credit for the fact that he at once proceeded to use the pruning knife and was able to announce that he would reduce his estimates this year by over a million dollars. The significance of this reduction is fully apparent when it is remembered that he has to meet statutory increases in salaries, ranging as high as half a million dollars. If we recall, however, that not later than twelve months ago we on this side moved to reduce a similar estimate by 50 per cent, the Government must not be surprised if it finds, even on this side of the House, some members asking for a substantial reduction. There is no sort of economy more to the liking of the people than any saving that can be effected in the Department of Militia, unless it be in the Department of Naval Service. I heard this afternoon, in regard to this item, the argument that after all we are not spending more than we did in 1910, because the value of the Canadian dollar has depreciated. Well, we must bear in mind, along with that fact, the different conditions that existed in 1910. Then we were rich and prosperous; we had surpluses and could spend, not only on urgent matters but also on useful works even though they were not of immediate necessity. Such is not the case now. Last year we had to face deficits amounting to some $200,000,000, and although the Government this year has reduced expenses to a large extent, I regret that the revenue of the country is also decreasing; and it is possible after all that the balance sheet this year may be similar to the one we had last year. I say, therefore, that we cannot use that argument, that we are not spending more than we did in 1910, because the value of the Canadian dollar has dropped. What would you think of a business man who would argue that because he spent $15,000 some ten years ago, when his business was prosperous, he must spend $25,000 this year, when he faces bankruptcy, simply because the value of the dollar has gone down?
With regard to the matter of annual drill, I do not think we can consider this an essential part of the regular departmental work. I know that many members of the force are of the opinion that these drills in the country during the summer time are mere camp feasts or holidays, and I think it would be only proper if the holiday this year were enjoyed by the taxpayers. 1 am not prejudiced; I will not commit myself as regards the future; but I must say that unless a stronger argument is advanced for the maintenance of this
particular institution I shall have to vote for a reduction of the vote.


Mr. CARMICHAEL:: Prior to the last Dominion election a certain newspaper published in this country made the prophecy that the Progressive party might not be the dog that would do the barking at Ottawa for the next three or four years, but would be at least the tail that would wag the dog. It seems to me that the tail is beginning to wag the dog just a little bit away from the old bone of contention back to the real issue before the House in the consideration of these estimates. I desire to ally myself with the motion that has been made across the floor reducing the amount from $1,400,000 to the handsome sum of $300,000. Even $300,000 is a large sum of money for this purpose, when we consider item No. 51, at page 22 of the estimates, which provides for seed, feed and fertilizer control only the sum of $275,000. I was in our western country during the Easter recess and saw some of the conditions as they exist there this spring among the farmers of my own constituency. I found more than one bank closed and the farmers unable to get loans to buy seed. More than one farmer came to me personally and asked if I would finance him to buy seed because he could not be accommodated through the banks. Yet here in our estimates we find only the small sum of $275,000 apportioned by the Parliament of Canada to the business of financing the people for seed for the important industry of agriculture. I submit that agriculture is of far more importance to the Dominion of Canada than the matter of annual drill, which includes pay, subsistence and allowances to officers and men of the active militia during training, as well as transportation and other local expenses. I think that the few thousand men who will profit by this allowance of $300,000, if the amendment carries, are a small body indeed compared with the several hundred thousand men who came from the agricultural lands of this Dominion and showed their worth during the late war.


Thomas Langton Church: If I understand the principle of responsible government, it is the duty of the Minister of Mi'litia and the Prime Minister, and other members of the Cabinet, to defend this vote of $1,400,000 which they have recommended to Parliament. In 1920 there was voted; by the House for annual drill, etc., $12,500,000, only $10,000,000 of which was spent. The reason the other $2,500,000 was not spent

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was that only the city units were drilled at their headquarters. It is all very well for my friends on my left to bring in an amendment like this and think it is economy. It is false economy and not in the interests of the people of this country.


Robert Alexander Hoey: Let me correct the hon. member. The motion to reduce the vote was not moved by hon. members to his left.


Thomas Langton Church: I am glad to hear my hon. friend make the correction, but some of the sentiments expressed by hon. gentlemen of his party endorse the sentiment of the amendment. Now, Mr. Chairman, I think we are at the parting of the ways in this country in regard to militia matters. If this motion to reduce the vote were carried we might as well close up the Militia Department altogether, and it would be a sorry day for the people of Canada if that were done, not only for Quebec but for Ontario and other parts of the country as well. As I have said, the reason why the balance of the appropriation of $12,500,000, amounting to $2,500,000, was not spent in 1920 was the fact that after the war it was difficult to organize and put on a peace footing what might be termed the country regiments. The $10,000,000 expended was largely spent in drilling city corps of the large cities like Montreal, Toronto, Hamilton, London, Halifax, Winnipeg, Vancouver, etc. It was devoted to what you might call the city units in the various military districts in Canada. With the small amount of money voted last year the minister reopened the military training camps from coast to coast for the country corps. I attended the Niagara camp at the request of the commanding officer, and I cannot speak too highly of the work done there by the units in training, but I was surprised to hear the discontent among the men both of the rural and the city battalions. Some of the officers of a very fine battalion, the 31st of Grey, then under the command of Colonel Carmichael, a member of the Drury Government, and an excellent soldier and officer, told me that the returned men were getting disgusted at the cheap way the camp was run. The militia estimates were cut down, necessitating the units putting their hands in their pockets to keep things going. I heard the same complaint from men from my own city. The company funds were all exhausted during the war. The 13th battalion, formerly under the command of that fine soldier and patriot-my hon. friend from 
East Hamilton (Mr. Mewburn), handed over $30,000 of their funds for the recruiting of their war regiments. In a word, the various militia units after the war were bankrupt. I think 206 units attended the camps last June, and the officers who raised those units brought them into camp only 20 to 25 per cent strong because of the insufficient allowances and expenditure by the Militia Department.
I do not say it is the fault of any particular person or party, but, after all is said and done, we must keep up our defensive forces, and if any one doubts the wisdom of this he has only to go back to 1812, when we are told General Brock could not induce the old legislative assembly to grant him sufficient funds to defend the country. What would have happened to Canada if we had had no militia at that time? The legislative assembly then cut down the estimates for annual drills and defence with the result that General Brock got disgusted and is said to have written to the authorities at home requesting to be recalled. A debate similar to the present one took place in 1911, 1912, and 1913, in this House on militia estimates.
I venture to say, that more than 80 per cent of the men from Toronto in the first contingent for overseas were men who belonged to the militia, and had it not been for the military training they had received from militia units the late Sir Sam Hughes would not have been able to send over our first contingent of 30,000 men within a few months after the outbreak of war. The value of preparedness has been demonstrated over and over again; indeed, it has been stated by many eminent military experts that if the British Empire had been as well prepared on land as on sea in 1914 we would have had no war at all.
If we are to have any militia force at all we must have annual training camps, and it is undisputed that those camps today are not what they should be. The money spent on these annual camps is wisely spent, but if you whittle down this vote too much you might as well throw the money into the Ottawa river for all the good its expenditure would accomplish, as it would be inadequate to produce proper results. I do not believe the people either of Quebec or any other province are asking for this reduction. It is false economy and not true economy to reduce this vote, and I hope the Minister of Militia and the other members of the Government will arise and defend the item, as

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responsible government in my view requires them to do so.
Objection has been raised that these camps inculcate a military spirit. Well, in the days of stress and strain when the war broke out was it not a good thing that we had plenty of young men imbued with that military spirit? If not, we would have cut a sorry figure in the war and in recruiting and Canada would never have rendered the service she did to the Mother Country and to civilization.


Mr. HALBERT:: I am sure every member fully appreciates what was done by the Militia Department during the war, and by our young men who enlisted and went overseas. But to-day we are trying to get away from war conditions, we are trying to re-establish ourselves on a peace footing. As a young member a couple of sessions ago I listened with a good deal of interest to our delegates who had attended the Peace Conference while they told us that the signing of the Peace Treaty was to end war for all time to come. We were encouraged to believe from what they said that the day had come when swords would be beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning-hooks. I am sure we will rejoice at the dawn of a new day when disputes between nations will be settled by ballots and conferences instead of bloodshed and slaughter. Now, we have spent as Canadians a great deal of money in connection with peace conferences and conferences on the reduction of armaments, and some are wondering if we cannot reduce very largely the expenditure on the militia for a year or two in order to pay the expenses of peace conferences and peace treaties. If we are going to have peace I do not think it is a good sign to prepare for war. I do not anticipate a war in the near future, and I do not think anyone else in Canada does. If any trouble is apprehended, then our peace conferences and our negotiations for the reduction of armaments are all in vain. I think the time has come when we should devote more attention to preparing for peace and reestablishing peace than preparing for war. Now, we appreciate the militia just as much as many other people who are advocating it so strongly to-night. The member for North Toronto seems to be terribly excited over the thought that if this vote is not granted the militia will go to pieces and Canada will have no protection. Now, we have a great many trained men in Canada to-day, and in view of the present
75J
financial condition of the country we were wondering if some saving could not be made. That is the reason why some of the members on both sides are talking about this reduction.


Sydney Chilton Mewburn: When my hon. friend says there are a large number of trained men, I assume he refers to the men who fought at the front.


Robert Henry Halbert: Yes.


Sydney Chilton Mewburn: Is it the hon. member's suggestion that in the event of trouble -and God forbid that we should have trouble-we should call on these men who went through four years of hell and ask them to do this duty again instead of its being done by newly trained men?


Robert Henry Halbert: We are not looking
for war, we are preparing for peace, and we are spending money for that purpose. We have men going over to peace conferences with a view of preparing for peace. T may say that I had perhaps as many friends in khaki as the hon. gentleman had, so I am not speaking from that point of view. I say I respect the militia; we want the militia, but this is a time when retrenchment is necessary. In the minister's opinion, if the military drill for this year were postponed, would it to a great extent decrease the efficiency of. our militia, and what would the saving be? The hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power) who is opposed to militarism, has told us that this training is for a period of six days. Well, I really do not think the absence of six days' training would affect the efficiency of the militia of Canada, which has been trained for so long. I really do not think it would for one year, but I want the minister's opinion on it.


George Perry Graham: The object is not to continue the training of the boys who were overseas, but to use the officers who received that training to train new young men. I would not ask this House to vote one cent for the further training of the boys who have been trained overseas; I want to give them a rest. The suggestion that the annual drill is for a period of six days, or, in the case of the city corps, nine days, does not leave a fair impression. Some of these men might be trained a good deal longer than they get paid for training, the idea being to keep up their efficiency. My Chief of Staff, General MacBrien, who is a level-headed man and has given great service to the country,
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does not, as has been suggested, make his living in the Militia Department; he loves the work and has been selected above a great many for the position. Ten days ago I put the question squarely to him: If we cut out military training for one year what effect would it have? He said: "The effect would be disastrous on any attempt to maintain an organization of voluntary militia throughout the Dominion of Canada." That is the reply he gave me. I have no desire to spend the people's money, but hon. gentlemen talking of economy should remember that some economy has been practised. I venture the assertion that there has been more economy in the cutting of these estimates than has been exercised by any business man in the House in connection with his annual expenditure during the past year. The department has been established since the war on a basis of efficiency and strength by men who have served overseas. On going into a department, the minister, of course, has his own difficulties as well as the officers. But I want to remove an impression which has been created: the officers of the Militia Department have given me every assistance. If hon. members knew the men of whom I speak, they would resent some of the things that are said about them. They are men of practical experience in military matters, and very good business men, some of them. Now, the purpose of the motion is to do away with the annual drill, and if it were adopted I would look for a general degeneration, if not an entire wiping out, of the militia spirit on the part of the young men-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


George Perry Graham: Now, I do not like to hear that applause within four years of the time when we applauded so many of our young men who evinced that spirit. We applauded every suggestion that the young men of Canada don the uniform in order that we who were older might he defended, and we applauded vociferously every man who enlisted. I am not a militarist, any more than any hon. member of this House-not nearly so much, perhaps as some of those who have spoken to-day. But I do feel that as a Canadian I have a duty to perform, not only to Canada but to the British Empire and to the civilized world. I may be asked how it is that we have any militia vote at all when other countries are disarming. But I ask any hon. member to name a country which has not a militia at the present time and is 
not maintaining one? Other countries are disarming to a certain extent, but not any more in proportion than we in Canada are, not any more than we are doing in these estimates.
It is not a question of who is going to gain or lose a few votes. It is not simply a matter of the expenditure of money. This is a question of a real national policy, a policy that affects every man and woman living in Canada to-day, and that will affect their children as well. Do we propose, as a young nation, to shirk the responsibilities of a nation while asking for all the privileges? We asked for a seat in the Genoa Conference; we asked for a seat at the Disarmament Conference at Washington; we asked for a seat at the meeting of the League of Nations; we'asked to be allowed to take part in the formula.	11 p.m. tion of the Versailles treaty;
and now when the time comes that we should maintain our position as a young nation, are we going to shirk, and go back one hundred and fifty years and become Crown colonists to be looked after by Great Britain and not by ourselves? We have a status to maintain as a young people with aspirations, and I must sink my individuality as I believe every member of the House ought to do, in what we might think a little present benefit, because we will be judged as a Dominion in a measure by the part we take as a young nation in the galaxy of nations forming the British Empire and among the nations of the entire world.
I might go on, if it were in order, to mention the navy as well, but I shall leave that until I come to it. We are endeavouring to amalgamate the defence forces of Canada into one department with the object of obtaining efficiency and greater economy, but if the House is to take the attitude that it refuses to grant any money to carry on these services, why amalgamate the defence forces at ail, if we are not going to have any such forces? I do not feel strongly on this question on any personal ground. It makes no difference to me personally whether a dollar is voted, but if we are going to strike out, or reduce to the point where it is practically striking out the item for annual training, we are saying to the young man of Canada and to the boys in the cadet service; we do not want you to be trained any more. We smother your aspirations for getting together to develop your manhood and your physical self, as well as getting your military training.
Questions
We have talked a good deal about this to-day, and as we were all up late last night I think we had better rise and think this matter over. I move that the committee rise and report progress.


Robert Alexander Hoey: I notice that the minister did not answer the question I put before. I deprecate the amount of heat that has been brought into this discussion. I think we should discuss these items calmly and dispassionately as Canadians-


George Newcombe Gordon: I would point out to the hon. member that there is a motion before the Chair that the committee rise and report progress. That motion is not debatable.
Item stands.
Progress reported.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King the House adjourned at 11.10 p.m.
Wednesday, April 26, 1922