1923-06-22

[Stage Direction]
Mr. COPP (for Mr. Malcolm) presented the second and final report of the special committee appointed to inquire into the operation of the Civil Service Act.
He said: I beg to give notice, on behalf of Mr. Malcolm, that he will move on Monday next that the second and final report of the special committee be concurred in.

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Mr. H. B. McGIVERIN (Ottawa) moved that rule 103 relating to the posting of private bills in the lobby and in the votes and proceedings be suspended for the remainder of the session.
Mr. STEVENS:: I think, if I recall rightly, the custom has been to make a motion with regard to any individual bill that appears to be too late for the usual notice at the end of the session, and not to propose an omnibus resolution of this kind.


Mr. McGIVERIN:: This has been the custom for many years toward the end of the session on account of bills coming from the Senate. There are three or four divorce bills coming over on Tuesday or Wednesday which will have to be considered by the Private Bills committee, and a delay of twenty-four hours at this stage might prevent one or more of these bills from being passed this session.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I think such a motion should be preceded by a report from the Private Bills committee.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 223 (from the Senate), for the relief of Jessie Anne Epstein.-Mr. Duff.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. JACQUES BUREAU (Minister of Customs and Excise) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 237, to amend the Petroleum and Naphtha Inspection Act.
Henry Herbert Stevens: Explain.


Mr. BUREAU:: If hon. members will look at the bill they will see that the measure speaks for itself. The amendments proposed are indicated in italics. The object of the proposed change is to permit the sale of naphtha. Under the present act the Governor in Council can regulate the possession, storage and transportation of naphtha and its sale is restricted except for certain purposes. In its present form the act reads:
Naphtha shall not be sold or offered for sale in Canada for illuminating purposes except,-
(a)	for use in street lamps in which only the vapour is burned; or
(b)	for use in dwellings, factories and other places of business when vapourized in secure underground tanks outside the buildings in which the vapour so generated is used for lighting.
We want to make regulations so that the sale will be permitted for lighting purposes. This is rendered necessary by the invention of the Coleman lamp which has been put on the market and is going into general use. Doubtless hon. members are all familiar with the Coleman lamp. The insurance companies and the best experts in the United States have declared that it is perfectly safe. As the law now stands, a dealer or a man who has naphtha in his possession cannot sell it for illuminating purposes except as restricted by the general statute. The purpose of the present bill is to permit the sale of naphtha for illuminating purposes under regulations to be made by the Governor in Council.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Strictly speaking this bill should have been preceded by a resolution but, perhaps, at this stage of the session that requirement might be dispensed with.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


Hewitt Bostock: When shall the bill be read a second time?


Jacques Bureau: Now.

Audit Board
Motion agreed to and bill read the second time.


Hewitt Bostock: This bill will be considered later on, under government orders.


Jacques Bureau: It has been printed.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister) moved, seconded by Sir Lomer Gouin:
That on and after Tuesday the 26th day of June until the end of the present session, the House shall meet at 11 o'clock in the morning of each day, except Sundays, and that in addition to the usual intermission at 6 o'clock, p.m., there shall be also, an intermission every day from one till 3 o'clock p.m., and that the various committees of the House be at liberty to sit during the sessions of the House.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister, for the Minister of Finance) moved that the House go into Committee of the Whole on Monday next to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to bring in a measure to provide:-
1. That the Governor in Council may appoint a Board of Audit to hold office until the first day of July, 1925, and to be composed of four members, one of whom shall be the Auditor General, one the Deputy Minister of Finance, and the two remaining members shall be public accountants of high standing;
2.	That the public accountants, members of the said board, may be paid for their services such reasonable sums, not exceeding $3,000 each, in any one year as the Treasury Board may allow; and that the Treasury Board may allow the payment, out of any available appropriation, of necessary amounts for skilled assistants engaged by the board;
3.	That the said board shall have the following duties and powers:-
(a)	to inquire into and report upon the present system of audit of the public revenue and expenditure of Canada and to make recommendations for the more effective control of the same;
(b)	to inquire into the systems of accounting employed by the Canadian National Railway Company and its constituent companies and any commission or other public body whose operations are carried on by appropriations from the treasury, and such other undertakings or services belonging to or receiving aid from the government of Canada as the Minister of Finance may direct, and to make recommendations with respect thereto;
4.	That the members of the board shall for the purposes of these resolutions have the same power as is given to the Auditor General of Canada with respect to the various departments of the Dominion government.
He said: His Excellency the Governor General has been informed of the subject matter of this resolution and commends it to the favourable consideration of the House.
Motion agreed to.
271 i

[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister, for the Minister of Finance) moved that the House go into Committee of the Whole on Monday next to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to bring in a measure to continue in force certain of the provisions of The Finance Act, 1914, and to provide:-
1.	That the Minister of Finance may make advances to the chartered banks and to the Savings banks to which the Quebec Savings Bank Act, 1913, applies by the issue of Dominion notes upon the pledge of certain securities, such advances to be repayable within one year with interest at such rate as may be from time to time fixed by the Treasury Board.
2.	That the provisions of the proclamation dated 3rd September, 1914, made under the authority of the Finance Act, 1914, so far as they authorize the chartered banks to make payments in their notes instead of in gold or Dominion notes, and so far as they suspend the redemption in gold of Dominion notes be continued in force for a period not exceeding three years after the date of the coming into force of any enactment founded on this resolution; provided that the Governor in Council by proclamation may declare and proclaim an earlier date for the termination of any enactment which may be founded on this resolution; and
3.	That the Governor in Council during a period not exceeding three years after the date of the coming into force of any enactment founded on this resolution may by proclamation from time to time and for any period or periods declare and proclaim that the export of gold coin, gold bullion and fine gold bars from the Dominion of Canada shall be prohibited except in such cases as may be deemed desirable by the Minister of Finance and under licenses to be issued by him; provided that the Governor in Council by proclamation may declare and proclaim an earlier date for the termination of any enactment which may be founded on this resolution.
He said: His Excellency the Governor General has been informed of the subject matter of this resolution and commends it to the favourable consideration of the House.
Motion agreed to.
PERSONAL EXPLANATION -Mr. GERVAIS
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. THEODORE GERVAIS (Berthier):: Before the orders of the day are called, I would like to explain a statement reported in yesterday's Hansard when I interrupted the hon. member for Portage la Prairie (Mr. Leader). I am reported to have said:
He was simply saying that you were not consistent.
These words are quite correct, but they did not apply exclusively to the hon. member for Portage la Prairie. The hon. member for Laprairie and Napierville (Mr. Lanctot) in his speech, had referred to the Progressive members sitting opposite, mainly those coming from the province of Ontario, and when the
Imperial Conference

hon. member for Portage la Prairie spoke of consistency, I used the words I have just quoted. My allusion was to the members designated by the member for Laprairie and Napierville, and not exclusively to the hon. member for Portage la Prairie.



REDISTRIBUTION

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. ROBERT FORKE (Brandon):: A matter of great public importance was referred to in the Speech from the Throne. The session is now nearing an end. I do not know what has happened, but no mention has been made of the question of redistribution. Is it likely that that committee on that subject will make a report? Or what steps will be taken in connection with this matter? Can the government give any information?


Hon. E. M. MACDONALD (Pictou, Acting Minister of National Defence):: I may
say, Mr. Speaker, that I had expected to hold a meeting of that committee this week, but owing to the fact that a great many members, the larger number being from the Ontario constituencies, were absent, I have been unable to hold the meeting. I propose giving notice of the meeting for Tuesday next, when these members will have returned from the elections, and the matter will be dealt with.



THE UNION BANK

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Robert Forke: I ask leave to move the adjournment of the House, under rule 39, for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely to call attention to certain statements appearing in the press, apparently of an authentic nature, regarding the financial position of the Union Bank of Canada and the necessity of safeguarding the public interest in every possible way.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Perhaps my hon. friend
will consent to allow this motion to stand over, until eight o'clock this evening. I think the Finance Minister will be in his place at that time. I think it would be preferable to take up the matter then.


Robert Forke: That will be quite acceptable, with the stipulation that we have the right of way at eight o'clock.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Certainly, that is understood-after Private Bills.



APPEALS FROM CONVICTIONS

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. W. G. McQUARRIE (New Westminster) :: I desire to ask a question of the
Minister of Justice (Sir Lomer Gouin) in reference to Bill No. 106, which stands in my name on the order paper. This bill is entitled "An Act to Extend the Right of Appeal from Convictions for Indictable Offences." That bill, of course, cannot be reached at this session. I wish to ask the Minister of Justice (Sir Lomer Gouin) if he would consider the advisability of taking over this bill as a government measure for next session. It is a very important measure. It was passed unanimously by the Senate after a full and complete investigation by a special committee, whose report also I believe, was unanimous. I think Canada is the only country in the world where the right of appeal is not given.


Sir LOMER GOUIN (Minister of Justice):: I cannot make a promise that I will take the bill over as a government measure. I understand this is a very important question, and we are now in communication with the attorneys general of the provinces in regard to it. The provinces are interested because they have to pay for the administration. I am now studying the question. I do not promise that next session I will ask my colleagues to make this a government measure; but it is a very interesting point and it is possible that we shall make it a government measure.



IMPERIAL CONFERENCE AND ECONOMIC CONFERENCE

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day.
Mr. GOOD:: When will the House have
an opportunity of discussing the agenda of the Imperial Conference and the Economic Conference to be held this fall?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I have mentioned, I think, several times, that when the Supplementary Estimates are brought down, they will contain an item to make provision for the Economic Conference and the Imperial Conference, and that will be the appropriate time, I think, for the discussion to take place. I hope the Supplementary Estimates will be brought down possibly by Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. I cannot give my hon. friend a definite assurance, but I will endeavour to see that that item is brought up at an early stage.


William Charles Good: Will it be brought up not
earlier than Tuesday?

Dairy Industry Act


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes, I will
promise my hon. friend that it will not be brought up before Tuesday.



DAIRY INDUSTRY ACT, 1914. AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
Hon. Mr. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) moved that the House go into committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to amend the Dairy Industry Act, 1914, by providing:-
1.	That a minimum standard of fat in butter be established;
2.	That the Governor in Council be empowered by proclamation to permit the importation, manufacture and sale of renovated butter in Canada;
3.	That the manufacture, importation, selling, offering or having in possession for sale of milk or cream which contains any fat or oil other than that of milk be prohibited;
4.	That regulations may be made respecting (a) records being kept by manufacturers and dealers in butter, renovated butter and cheese, and for the examination of such records by inspectors; (b) the importation, manufacture, inspection, marking, advertising and sale of renovated butter; (c) the registration of all cheese factories and creameries in Canada, and the compulsory use of an assigned number on the product of each factory or on the packages containing said product;
5.	That penalties for violation of the regulations be increased, and methods established for proving the guilt of persons charged with infractions of the act as amended, and for the procedure to be followed in all such cases.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On clause 2.
Mr. TOLMIE:: Can we get an explanation
of this from the minister?


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: This whole resolution was associated with the Dairy Industry Act, which was discharged from the Order Paper two or three weeks ago, with one important difference, that difference being in clause 2 which we are now discussing. The reason that I have incorporated this clause in the present resolution and did not have it in the resolution when it was previously before the House, is this. Last year when the discussion was up on the oleomargarine question, I took the ground that, in my opinion, a better solution of the question of a cheap spread for bread was renovated butter and not oleomargarine. Last year the House did not take my statement very seriously, and as the question was not before the House, I suppose they were justified in assuming that attitude. At the same time I gave my assurance that if the oleomargarine resolution met with the same decision last year as it has this year, I would immediately advise my colleagues that in my estimation it would be
a good idea to remove the prohibition on the manufacture of renovated butter. Inasmuch, however, as the vote of the House last year was in favour of continuing the manufacture of oleomargarine, there was no call for such action. This year I had no occasion to make any remarks with regard to the question of oleomargarine, as the matter seemed to be in a fairly good condition, and I was afraid that possibly I might spoil it by saying anything. Nevertheless, had I said anything, I would have re-stated my position as regards renovated butter as a cheap bread spread for the poor man. I feel calleid upon to implement that pledge of last year. I will read from Hansard just one extract indicating what I said, and I will not read any more than is necessary. I said:
I am prepared, if my colleagues will agree with me, to take that prohibition off by legislation this session-
That was last session.
-as a means of giving real relief; as a means of giving butter which is not 2 per cent butter-some of my friends here claim that they have had enough 2 per cent-but 100 per cent butter with 100 per cent food content.
That was ray statement last year and although I did not repeat it in the House for the reasons I have indicated, I have repeated it in letters to various individuals throughout Canada. I stated to these parties that I recognized that there was an argument in favour of some kind of cheap spread for bread for people who could not-or felt that they could	not-afford	to buy
creamery butter; that inasmuch as oleomargarine was a commodity of which nobody knew the ingredients, it was, in my estimation defective in food properties. As the House has decided to revert to the old order of things by a resolution passed recently, I am here to carry out my statement as regards the manufacture of renovated butter.
As this is a comparatively new question, the people of Canada do not know much about renovated butter. It has been prohibited for twenty years, and because it has been prohibited for so long it is a comparatively new question to possibly ninety-five per cent of the people. What is this new article and what is the history of its prohibition? In order to give an answer to that question, we have in this resolution and in a bill associated with it, merely asked that the Governor in Council be given power by proclamation to provide for the manufacture of this product. It is not proposed to authorize this immediately. A period will elapse, to be determined by the amount of requests for the manufacture of renovated butter. If nobody

Dairy Industry Act
calls for the manufacture of it, if the labour organizations, the women's organizations, the miners' organizations, the lumber organizations, and any others, make no requests, the chances are that no proclamation will be issued, inasmuch as this would indicate that there was no demand.
Why am I bringing in this bill? In the first place, because I want to carry out my statement; and, secondly, because I believe there is room in our domestic economy for such a product as renovated butter. The question is a considerable one that presents many phases, and later on, if the discussion is protracted, I may find it necessary to deal with some of the details. In the meantime my primary object is to meet a demand which I am convinced exists. There has been some criticism with regard to the question of importation. Some critics take the ground that there would be no objection to providing a market for the dairy butter made by the pioneer settler, by putting it into proper shape to be sold before it deteriorated to too great an extent. It sometimes happens that butter shipped to an outside market becomes bad when it is a long time in transit; occasionally it is not shipped in refrigerator cars, and by the time it reaches Minneapolis, say, or New York, it is in a worse condition than renovated butter manufactured and sold on the Canadian market. There is the assurance, ns embodied in the resolution, that the manufacture of renovated butter will be legal only upon the issuance of a proclamation; and personally I would not mind incorporating in the bill a provision that no such proclamation should be issued within a year, or at least until there was an evident demand from those most concerned. I want to assure the committee that I have no desire whatever to thrust anything like this upon the market if there is no demand for it; but there is undoubtedly a certain amount of demand on the part of the wholesale produce dealers who handle our dairy butter. People have repeatedly written to me, particularly from the West, wanting to know, inasmuch as this article is produced by farmers, and was the only kind of butter we had fifty years ago, why it should be banished from the country in summary fashion, having to climb a tariff wall of eight cents a pound to get into the United States. It is further pointed out that the local country stores experience considerable difficulty in finding a market for it. It is urged that provision should be made for the manufacture of it in Canada, and I think it may very reasonably be inferred from all the circumstances that there is at least suffi-

cient demand to warrant the action we propose taking. The night the oleomargarine debate concluded, about ten days ago, some hon. gentlemen asked me why I did not bring down a measure with regard to renovated butter; and one person particularly pointed out that inasmuch as the poor people weie going to be deprived of oleomargarine there was no reason why this other substitute, or rather this form of butter, should not be manufactured. That, Mr. Chairman, is briefly a summary of the situation. I may remark, by the way, that I have referred the matter to my colleagues who have agreed to the proposal, believing it to be a good one.


William Charles Good: Will the minister explain to the committee how renovated butter is made? What is the composition of it? Is it defined?


William Richard Motherwell: I have been trying to ascertain the quality of the product during the past five or six years; in fact, before coming here at all I was interested in the subject. The moment that the manufacture of oleomargarine was permitted there immediately arose the question why this product should be banished from the market. I have had some correspondence with American manufacturers in reference to this matter, and one letter that I have received is particularly interesting. I shall not read the whole of the letter because I think it is rather too long to put on Hansard. But it is from ao authority in Chicago, a man who, I may say, is not a manufacturer of renovated butter but a real dairyman whose interests are rather, if anything, opposed to this product. Still inasmuch as renovated butter is a recognized and standard article on the market, being quoted just the same as creamery butter, it is well that there should be no misapprehension regarding its nature and value. Renovated butter is usually quoted about halfway between creamery butter and oleomargarine. About a fortnight ago oleomargarine let us say, stood at 30 cents-I am not giving the exact figures, of course, but the proportions are true-while creamery butter was quoted at 40 cents. Renovated butter then would fetch 4 cents more than oleomargarine and 6 cents less than creamery butter. Sometimes the variation is exactly midway between the two extremes of oleomargarine and creamery butter. The letter to which I have referred comes from Mr. G. L. McKay, secretary of the American Association of Creamery Butter Manufacturers. It is not addressed to me personally, because I am not acquainted with Mr. McKay, but my department is constantly in touch with the organization of which Mr. McKay is

Dairy Industry Act
secretary, and the letter from which I am about to quote was written to Mr. J. A. Ruddick, the Dairy and Cold Storage Commissioner. Mr. McKay gives a good deal more information than we asked for, but it is all very interesting. We merely inquired, by telegram, the value of renovated butter as a food product as compared with butter and other articles: we were anxious to know what part these mysterious vitamines played in this particular foodstuff. Mr. McKay says: There is nothing about renovated butter that should make it in any way unwholesome. Ladles or farm butter is gathered together and melted at a moderate heat. The pure butterfat or oil is pumped from the melting vat into funnel shaped tanks and air is blown through it, and that removes any odours that may adhere to the fat.
I may explain here that one of the reasons why dairy butter does not always keep is the fact that it is salted with exceedingly coarse salt, and often there is too much water left in it. Frequently, too, an excess of buttermilk or curd is left in the butter and its keeping properties are consequently impaired, so that it becomes rancid if not kept in cold storage.
When the oil becomes odourless it runs into cold water where it goes back into butter flakes, looking very much like butter granules. A starter is added to this,-
Sometimes people take this word "starter" to indicate a chemical compound, but it is nothing more nor less than sour cream. It is put into the churn to promote acidity. Seldom do we find dairy butter made from entirely sweet milk; there is always a slight acidity to it.
-and the granules in the same conditions stay in the starter for some time, and it is then worked in the usual manner. Some pour the starter into the oil, X understand, before it runs into the water to be congealed:	in other words, renovated butter is butter
that has not been made right on the farm. It contains too much salt, or too much water, or too much curd. It is usually churned at too high a temperature and contains a lot of curd. Coarse salt is frequently used, and butter of a poor character is the result.
I will venture the suggestion, without knowing much about the business of some of my hon. friends opposite, that they have often been tempted themselves to raise the temperature of cream to make it "come."


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: Does the
minister speak from experience?


William Richard Motherwell: I do.


Mr. SHAW:: Might that remark be considered a reflection on members on this side?


William Richard Motherwell: Not at all; I think it ought to be taken as a compliment. If hon. gentlemen are not familiar with these
things, then there is something lacking in their agricultural knowledge. Mr. McKay says:
The business has gone back in this country-
That is, the United States.
-very much due to the fact there are not as many farmers now making their own butter. The centralized system has extended so much in our country and covers such a wide territory and cream is shipped such a long distance that the farmers that used to make their own butter and trade it for groceries are selling their cream to the centralizers. Cream buying stations are scattered all over tihe United States. The farmer now brings in his cream in a crock or pail if he only has two or three cows, and if he has more he brings it in a can. It is only in scattered districts that the farmer is still making butter.
As far as purity goes, I can see no reason but what renovated butter is as clean and pure as any butter that is made.
As hon. gentlemen know, it depends on the buttermaker. I think half the people of Canada would prefer dairy butter if they could get it of good quality. In many instances they can and do get a good quality, because the product of a home dairy, made from one herd, under the supervision of one person who is a capable buttermaker, is at least quite equal to the average creamery butter.
I have seen some of it that would score 94 or 95. This depends somewhat upon the quality of the raw material, or the quality of the butter that was melted and the manner of making it. In scoring contests I have run across it several times put in as creamery butter. I invariably have been able to detect it by letting it dissolve in my mouth.
One of the reasons why renovated butter was prohibited was not because of its quality generally, but because those in charge of the dairy industry at that time were afraid that it might be mixed with creamery butter and jeopardize our market in the United Kingdom. Since then, however, we have instituted a grading system, so that this objection does not apply to-day as it did twenty years ago.
There is a slight oily taste. Then if it is broken apart on the trier, the grain is rather fine and glistens a little more than the ordinary creamery butter.
The word "grain" is not used very much now; we speak of "texture".
I talked with Mr. W. S. Moore, commission merchant, who used to be head of a large process factory, after receiving your telegram.
It used to be called "process butter".
He recommended it very highly although he is not dealing in it at the present time. He said that he has bought as much as ten or twelve carloads of ladle butter from northwest Canada a year, and he thinks in a country where there are a lot of farmers butter made especially of an irregular quality that a renovated factory would be a good thing.
In the wire sent to this gentleman there was no suggestion that we wanted information of this kind. Apparently in view of the situation
Dairy Industry Act

in the United States he wondered why Canada did not renovate its homemade butter. Thi3 is a long letter and I do not think I need read any further.


Robert Forke: During the debate on oleomargarine the trouble feared seemed to be the mixing of butter with oleo. Is there any danger in this case of the mixing of oleomargarine with butter?


William Richard Motherwell: I do not anticipate any danger from oleomargarine inasmuch as the right to manufacture it will expire in August and it cannot be offered for sale after March next. But there is a danger of this renovated butter being mixed with creamery butter, and therefore if its manufacture is permitted it will have to be subject to the stipulation that it be manufactured in an entirely separate building, so there will not be the least temptation to work it into creamery butter. That is the danger which exists to-day with regard to oleomargarine. As a matter of fact "manna" consists of oleo mixed with butter. This bill prohibits the mixing of any foreign fats with butter. It provides that butter shall consist of eighty per cent butter fat, and this leaves no room for foreign fats as the other 20 per cent consists of salt and water.


Mr. KNOX:: Where does the minister expect to get a market for the renovated butter?


William Richard Motherwell: Very much the same market that oleomargarine now supplies-those who want a cheap spread. In the United States renovated butter is made of such a generally high standard that the market is not confined to the poorer people, the price being within six cents of creamery butter. I hope the committee, Mr. Chairman, will not look upon me as an ardent advocate of the use of inferior butter. I am not anxious to press renovated butter upon an unwilling country. I simply want to redeem my promise that this opportunity of obtaining a cheap spread would be given.
As a pioneer in Manitoba, I am sure the hon. leader of the Progressive party (Mr. Forke) must have made a considerable amount of butter. I can recall the time, too, when the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Hopkins) was a trail blazer in improving dairying in the old Northwest Territories. They will remember that at that time there was nothing but dairy butter made; and this has always been the case with our early settlers. At the present time, the surplus of our dairy butter after supplying the home requirements has to get over the eight-eent American tariff wall and the handicap of express and freight charges. The result is that the price paid to 
the frontier man is very very small, especially since the Fordney tariff went into force. Consequently this is one of the advantages of introducing renovated butter at this time if the people want it-a home market will be provided. Nobody is going to force renovated butter on the people; and that is why we want an educative campaign throughout the country. The people do not understand what renovated butter is. It is simply the dairy butter that most of us were brought up on, which, having become rancid, is put in a condition fit for food. I am sure that any pioneer in Canada who had to keep the wolf from the door, as I and many others did, by making dairy butter, will have compassion upon the frontier man who still relies on his output of dairy butter during the summer for his grocery supplies. It is an advantage that works both ways: The use of renovated butter creates a market for the man who produces dairy butter and affords a cheap spread to those who desire to use it.
Do not imagine that I am trying to press this matter unduly; I want to give hon. members an opportunity to say what they think about it. Those who were in favour of a cheap spread being provided when we were discussing oleomargarine should hold up both hands for this measure. I am satisfied not only as to the quality of renovated butter, but as to its food content. I could read further on in this letter a statement about the vitamines that it contains, and if half the value attaches to vitamines that the scientists claim, that consideration is a very important one, especially when comparison is made with the other cheap spread that we have discussed.
I merely want to give an opportunity for an educative campaign by bringing this enactment into effect by proclamation. If the committee likes, I will incorporate in the bill a provision that the proclamation shall not issue for at least twelve months, so that the country may have an ppportunity of discussing it. The hon. member for Victoria City (Mr. Tolmie) when Minister of Agriculture, brought down one of the best pieces of legislation introduced by the late government, namely, the Dairy Produce Act. That act was put into force by proclamation and the proclamation did not take place until nearly two years after the act was passed. That act met with a good deal of opposition from certain members. We are always fearful of changes in procedure which we have followed for forty years or so. It is not often I am in a position to speak in complimentary terms, not of the hon. member for Victoria City, but of the late government. I want to say to their credit, however, that they did put

this progressive legislation on the statute book, and we waited 'for two years before it was proclaimed law. During that time an educative campaign was carried on; the dairymen were finally ready to accept it, and you do not hear a murmur about it now. The system of grading butter and cheese as provided by that act simply glided into force, without leaving even a ripple on the surface. I am sure the hon. member for Glengarry (Mr. Kennedy) will corroborate what I say as to the wisdom of that procedure. So it will be with this legislation; in
4 p.m. fact, the proclamation - will not issue at all if the people do not want it-I am sure I am not going to force it on them. But if they do want it after oleo goes out in March, I think it would be fair to give them the opportunity-that is all.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: With regard to clause 2
of this resolution, I may point out that for a number of years the manufacture or importation into Canada of renovated butter has not been permitted. During those years Canada has made greater progress in her dairying than in any other period of her history. I have listened with a great deal of interest to the remarks of the hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) in describing renovated butter. He said it was a product made from butter that contains too much salt, too much water, or too much curd-and he stopped there. The description would have been more accurate had he added, too much smell. He also said it was one hundred per cent butter fat, but he neglected to say it might be one hundred per cent rancid butter fat. If ordinary dairy butter does not have any of these objectionable features, there is no reason why it should not find a market in this country without any difficulty whatever. He speaks also about the pioneering that was done in the past, about our frontier farmers and about how we had to sell our dairy butter when there were no creameries. I remember those days very well indeed, but even then we had people who made butter of first-class quality in the dairies, and others who turned out a product that was as much butter as axle grease and commanded about the same price. I remember well the introduction of the creamery system, a step which put dairying on its feet in British Columbia. If in these outlying districts they cannot turn out a good quality of butter by the ordinary methods, then the next best thing is to encourage a co-operative creamery system. By doing that we can get away to a good start in the dairy business in these districts. A
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good deal of objection can be urged against the introduction of this renovated butter. There is this about oleo: It is made from fresh ingredients, under the strictest possible inspection, with sanitary conditions prevailing in the abattoirs or packing houses in which it is manufactured that do not obtain in the average dairy. It is proposed by this resolution to permit a man to make any kind of dirty butter; to keep his cream separator as dirty as he likes-to wash it once or twice a week instead of twice a day; to milk his cows with dirty hands and as a result to get dirty cream; to keep the cream too warm; tc chum the butter badly, with the result that it is off in colour, in odour or in texture We propose to say to that man: Never mind; we are going to make you prosperous; we will provide a place where you can take your butter and have it deodorized so as to make it fit to eat. In my opinion it would be much better to begin with the farmer himself, to do what we can to teach him how to keep the cream; to impress upon him the necessity for cleanliness in his dairy; then, where there are three or four hundred cows in one locality, to encourage if possible the establishment of co-operative creameries. The dairyman should be taught right from the beginning that he cannot make a living out of the dairy business by milking a scrub cow and by producing a brand of butter that has to be deodorized at one of these factories before it can be sold. By following a system of that kind we can help to put the dairying of Canada on a much firmer basis than by any such proposal as is offered in clause 2 of this resolution.
Now, what is butter? According to United States law and the regulations governing its manufacture, butter is a food product made exclusively from milk or cream with or without salt or colouring matter. Renovated butter is described as butter which is subjected to any process by which it is melted, clarified or refined and made to resemble genuine butter. So you see the United States does not recognize renovated butter as genuine butter. In the United States large quantities of adulterated butter are manufactured; and I notice that the hon. minister has not referred to this in his resolution. The United States Government defines adulterated butter to mean a grade of butter produced by mixing, re-working, re-churning in milk or cream, refining or in any way producing a uniform, purified, or improved product from different lots or parcels of melted or unmelted butter or butter fat in which any acid, alkali, chemical, or any substance whatever is introduced or used for
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the purpose or with the effect of deodorizing or removing therefrom rancidity; or any butter or butter fat with which there is mixed any substance foreign to butter as herein defined with intention or effect of cheapening in cost the product; or any butter in the manufacture or manipulation of which any process or material is used with intent or effect of causing the absorption of abnormal quantities of water, milk or cream. In the United States special taxes are applied to these products. On renovated butter there is a tax of a quarter of a cent per pound, and on adulterated butter a tax of ten cents per pound. Now, the general practice followed in renovating butter is to melt it at a temperature of fifty or sixty degrees. I wish to draw attention to this fact: That by melting at that low temperature you do not obtain any of the effects you might look for in properly pasteurized cream or milk, so that any germ contained in that butter may still remain. The water is separated from the oils that have been melted and then the impurities, the soluble impurities are washed out with clean water. Then it is aerated to remove the bad odors. After being laundered in this method it has neither taste, nor colour, nor odor, and to make it taste like butter it is necessary to restore its granular texture. This is done by spraying the liquid with ice cold water. Then butter colour is added to make it look like June butter. Finally the lactic sharp flavour which is so much in demand in good butter by adding a starter, or in other words lactic acid bacteria. Then the product is rolled out and worked in the ordinary way. It has been shown, though, that an oxidization takes place in this bleaching process. You will remember that in the oleo discussion it was brought out that the absence of vitamines was indicated very largely by the colour of butter; that the white winter butter was very low in vitamine content, while the June grass butter was highly yellow in colour indicating a richness of vitamines. So when this butter is washed out and bleached in this laundering process I have just described it has been lowered in vitamine content to a considerable extent. It therefore has not the same food value that ordinary butter would have. But, dressed up as it is in its new clothes, with a new smell, a new colour and so forth, it is quite suitable for fooling the public as far as butter buying is concerned. Then it has been shown not to be a good keeper. Professor Clayton, Master of Science, of Liverpool University, says:

Cleanliness is most essential at every stage during renovation and even then the keeping qualities of the product are much inferior to those of ordinarv butter.
Showing you how necessary it will be, if renovated butter is allowed to be produced in this country, to carefully guard against its being mixed with any product which we export to the Old Country.
In my opinion the legislation proposed is a retrograde step. As I pointed out a while ago the dairyman who has a cow perhaps that is giving 125 pounds of butter fat a year, is being jollied into the belief that he can continue *to make butter in a creamery in which his cream is carelessly kept, whilst his cow is housed in a dirty stable in winter, he is to be permitted to send the product down to the butter laundry where it will be deodorized and sold to the people. I do not think we should do anything of that kind. The sooner this man is informed that he cannot hope to carry on dairying successfully either with a scrub cow, or with such scrub methods on his dairy farm, the better it will be for him and for the dairy interests of Canada. In fact the government will be doing him a special favour to inform him on that point. There is nothing in this proposition for the farmer as far as I can see. The average dairy cow of Canada will yield from 125 to 150 pounds of butter fat in the year. Let us say, to give her the benefit of the doubt, she averaged 150 pounds and that her lactation period lasts 300 days. This would give her average as half a pound of butter fat per day. This bad butter, I understand, sells at from ten to thirteen cents a pound according to smell and appearance. We will give the benefit of the doubt again and allow twenty cents as the average for the year. That would be a return of just ten cents per day per cow for that farmer, and perhaps that butter needs deodorizing before it can be sold. Anyone will see that this is a hopeless proposition; it will benefit somebody. The man who operates that factory will buy this butter just as cheaply as he can, will put it through this renovating process, and then sell it at a fairly good price. It will also be a benefit to the butter speculator who will buy a certain quantity of butter when it is cheap, place it in cold storage, and then wait for a rise in the market. Quite frequently that butter goes off colour and goes off in condition, and if there is a renovating factory in the country he can always send the product down to the laundry, have it done over, and then serve it up again. This is decidedly unfair to the maker of good butter in Canada-to the man who keeps

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a good herd of cattle, who is careful about his dairying methods, who observes cleanliness in the care of his separators, and milking utensils and milking operations. It is particularly unfair to the producer of butter in British Columbia where we have a fine creamery system established for a long time and which has rendered very excellent service to the dairy business. In addition to making butter of very excellent quality in British Columbia we are also importers; we bring in hundreds of tons of butter from outside points into that province to supply the wants of the people there. Therefore, if renovated butter is permitted then the British Columbia producer of good butter will have to compete with this much cheaper and inferior article. There is also a very great danger, as the minister has pointed out, of mixing this renovated butter with our export butter for the Old Country. I should just like to quote what has happened in the United States in this regard. I quote again from "The Butter Industry in the United States," page 157:
The amount of butter exported from this country has decreased considerably since 1890, when nearly 30 million pounds were exported. In 1914 the amount exported was less than 4 million pounds. This decline is due to several causes. With the appearance of oleomargarine and renovated butter large quantities of this stock were sent abroad marked as finest American creamery butter. This deception soon destroyed our reputation for making good butler, just as our reputation for making good cheese was lost by exporting adulterated and filled cheese.
Let me quote the Dairy and Food Commissioner of Michigan. In a report which deals with renovated butter he says:
One can scarcely conceive how the ill-made and spoilt country butter, after lying for weeks in the hot storeroom of the country merchants and becoming positively nauseating, can be worked over and made sufficiently deceiving as to be sold for creamery butter. The fact remains that that is done, and in Michigan, at least, tons of this worked-over renovated butter are sold for good butter with greater or less deceit.
Now, with regard to the mixing of oleo with butter, the test, for oleo is very similar to the test for this renovated or process butter, making it easy to find oleomargarine when it is added to creamery butter for the purpose of fraud, but being rather more difficult to discover whether any process or renovated butter has been added to the good article. Mixing this inferior butter with the good article which we propose to send over from Canada to Great Britain would have a tremendous effect on our British market, if we are going to get any hold on that market. With regard to the proposal to import this inferior butter from the United States, I think this is nothing short of outrageous. Why should we furnish a market in this country
for this outcast material from the country south of the line? We are about twenty years 'behind the times, too, in our move to introduce renovated butter into Canada. Let us see what has happened in the United States. In the year 1903, 54,658,790 pounds of renovated butter was made in the United States, and in the year 1921 this had decreased to 6,099,110, or a decrease of something over almost 90 per cent. In the meantime creamery butter has increased very considerably. To meet the situation of this man on the outskirts, who is situated in the newer provinces, distant from the market, my idea would be to instruct him as fully as possible, perhaps in co-operation with the provincial government, giving him full knowledge of the necessity of having the right kind of cow in his dairy and of dairying along the proper lines. This can be done through the Farmers' Institutes. It was done that way in British Columbia. I had to do with the organization of several creameries in that country, and I was working on institute work for the provincial government. If can be done through our printed matter, which is turned out by the Department of Agriculture in very large quantity every year, and it is very excellent matter. The encouragement of the establishment of co-operative creameries, the buying of the cream on grade, and then the full education of the farmer to the fact that if he wishes to succeed-and I stress this many times over-he must get the right kind of cow, and produce the turned-out products that will promise to him the largest possible price. Every one of us who has had any experience in the dairy business knows that we must get the highest price by producing the highest priced article, if we ever hope to succeed, which means that we must work 365 days each year. We should do everything possible to develop our export market, and I do not know what effect, with our butter, perhaps, falling back a little on the British market, it will have to advise the Britishers over there that we have now taken up the renovated butter making in Canada -something we never did before. I am sure it will not improve our position. I think we should turn out the best possible article, inspect the butter very very carefully, and add, as I have proposed "Canada approved," such as -we have attached to many of our agricultural products in this country, as an indication that we stand behind the goods. I think it is very regrettable that the hoa. minister has brought this important resolution before the House at this late date. We are very short of information.
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What I would like to know before coming to any final decision, on this matter is: What proportion of the 240,000.000 pounds of butter manufactured in Canada last year was it necessary to find a market for in this country, and what proportion of that butter that has to be marketed was in such bad condition that it would require renovating before being sold? Then again what proportion, if any of this butter that is not fit for use comes from our creamery establishments? With this information and other information at hand, we would be in a very much better positin', to go into this matter in an intelligent wav, and I sincerely hope the hon. minister wall kindly consider postponing this part of the resolution until next year, when the matter can be brought up early and we will have plenty of time to get the information.


William Richard Motherwell: I think my hon.
friend has made the very best of what I think is not a very good case. I cannot help feeling some sympathy with the phase of the situation he suggested, namely, not dealing with it at the present time. That is exactly what the resolution does. We are not taking action at once. We are asking power to take action by proclamation. We can insert in the proviso that that proclamation will not issue until twelve months have elapsed, to afford an opportunity to discuss it in the House or in the country or next session, or if the committee thinks otherwise exclude it altogether. I will run over some of the objections raised by my hon. friend. He has raised a lot of objections, some of them very ingenious, and I have to compliment him on his remarks. He refers to the butter, and says that the chief characteristic is too much smell. Of course, it has a bad smell. Anything that you let deteriorate has a bad smell. My hon. friend has spoken about the cream this year that goes to some of our centralized creameries standing around until the top is blown off the can. Of course that would produce one of the most objectionable odours you could get-


Robert Forke: No, it is pungent, but not
disagreeable.


William Richard Motherwell: That is a matter
of taste.


Robert Forke: No, it is a matter of smell.


William Richard Motherwell: It is a question of neglecting it. I wonder how eggs would smell if not put in cold storage and if let lie around like butter. We all know the story of the dairy butter; after you have supplied the home markets, it is taken to the store and the store accepts it, reluctantly as a rule, and usually trades it off. They accept it in exchange for

goods. They have not enough of it to make a small shipment. It takes ten days or two weeks to accumulate enough for a shipment and it is not in cold storage during that time, it is usually in the warehouse where conditions are not favourable for it; and it is sent down to some wholesale produce dealer, perhaps in Edmonton, Winnipeg or Regina. It is accumulated in carload lots and sent out to the country. What can we expect it to be like? It must have a certain amount of odour. Use creamery butter in the same way, and what would it smell like? Use any article, the finest food in the country, in this way and what would it smell like? You can get a bad smell very easily. You can get it sometimes off the breath of very healthy people and you would not like to annihilate them or banish them from the country because of the odour. Lack of care will develop this smell in any food product so that there is nothing in that argument, except a rather clever presentation that does not really go very far, because it applies to anything which is neglected and there is sometimes the grossest kind of neglect in the handling of the dairy products of Canada. What are we going to do with this material? That is the proposition. Can we make any better use of it?
My hon. friend speaks of permitting this, or encouraging this. We are not encouraging it. We are dealing with a question that is unavoidable. There will always be a frontier in Canada for the next hundred years, or maybe longer. I have known of this for fifty or sixty years. My father before me was for seventy-five years experiencing frontier conditions, and the men who follow us will experience them. Can we take care of this matter? It is not encouraging dirt. The finest creamery butter in the world has dirt in it. It is said that the people of the city of New York eat a ton of manure every year. That is unavoidable. You cannot avoid some dirt in the finest creamery butter or milk. I am calling things by their names, and before I am done, I have a few more names to deal with. My good friend cannot get away from oleomargarine. We are not exactly dealing with oleomargarine.


Robert Forke: We are going to deal with it.


William Richard Motherwell: It has been brought up. The hon. member for Battleford (Mr. McConica) in his very excellent address on oleomargarine, took the ground that he did not want it because he did not know what it was. The ground was well taken. Hon. members and the people do not know what is in it, and if they did, they would not want to eat it. What is oleomargarine? Home-

made oleomargarine is nothing more than ordinary gut fat, such as we used to make, and still make, soap out of. The leader of the Progressive party (Mr. Forke) knows that.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: Would the minister kindly define "gut fat"?


William Richard Motherwell: It is not kidney fat at all events. Gut fat is any fat that may be found on the alimentary canal from the esophagus to the rectum.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: That is just according to the minister's definition, but that is not generally accepted. Oleomargarine is manufactured from the caul and ruffle fats, good, clean, heialthy fats, and they are recognized as edible fats. There are edible and non-edible fats. The edible fats are those that are generally defined as those that are obtained without real danger of becoming contaminated by the breaking of the intestines. These fats, I may say, are just as wholesome as any part of the muscle adjoining them, or any other part of the viscera, such as the liver, heart, and so on.


William Richard Motherwell: There are plenty of things that you can get from the animal that are clean, that you would not want to eat. The fat that oleomargarine is made of is not kidney fat. The fats are to be found on any part of the abdominal duct or the alimentary canal, or anything you choose to call it, the stomach and the caul go into it with the rest. I have taken this fat off animals when I was a young man, and I know exactly what it is. I know the source from which it is got. When my hon. friend was describing the beauties of this article the other day, he spoke of it as "selected." To what extent is it selected? If one of the intestines breaks, it is selected from the rest, and that is the extent of the selection. None of the kidney fat goes into oleomargarine, except in one particular, and I will describe that, seeing that we are discussing this-


Henry Herbert Stevens: The minister is out of order.


William Richard Motherwell: I am, but I did not raise this question.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, the minister did.


William Richard Motherwell: I think my hon. friends have had enough of the ingredients of oleomargarine, and we will leave the rest for a future date, if that is desirable.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: I want to say that all this is absolutely selected under the close supervision of the minister's employees.


William Richard Motherwell: Of course it is.
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Simon Fraser Tolmie: And they are just as good inspectors as are to be found in any other country in the world. Their certificates are accepted in other countries. The minister says that if an intestine breaks, that passes.


William Richard Motherwell: No, I said if it does, that is selected. I have had one of my chief inspectors come to my office voluntarily and tell me exactly what goes into oleomargarine. He is the one that knows, because he supervises the process, he stands over the cauldron.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: I have dissected these animals from one end to the other, and I have seen the work of the inspectors.


William Richard Motherwell: I said that when an intestine breaks, it is selected out. That is the selection. You would not have it remain in.


Robert Forke: I do not know whether I am in order or not, but from the minister's remarks, one would imagine that oleomargarine was past and gone, buried forever.


William Richard Motherwell: I did not say that.


Robert Forke: I want to point out that the question stands now entirely on its merits. It is not settled.


William Richard Motherwell: Certainly.


Robert Forke: Some day the decision will have to be made for or against oleomargarine.


William Richard Motherwell: Certainly.


Robert Forke: The minister was very clever during the debate on oleomargarine, but we shall get even with him yet.


William Richard Motherwell: I did not speak at all on the oleomargarine debate. That was not necessary.


Robert Forke: I am not making insinuations of an unpleasant character at all. I do not mean that.


William Richard Motherwell: I did not take it that way. I did not make a speech on the question of oleomargarine when the matter was up this session. A year ago I did, and I then gave a promise that an opportunity would be given to the committee to discuss the question of renovated butter. I am carrying that out. Apart from that, there is a very decided merit in connection with the question of renovated butter. Let me continue my remarks, because my hon. friend has made a number of very interesting statements, and I think they require a little investigation and examination.
My hon. friend said that I did not refer to re-churning. I did not-I did not refer
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to a number of things; I thought everybody knew that renovated butter is re-churned. I knew that in the old days, and even to-day a farmer who puts away a tub of butter in the fall, or even in the spring of the year, for his own use, quite frequently has some of that butter left over when the next freshening season comes around. When he makes new butter-I do not know whether this is done now, but it was done-the old butter is cut into small particles, and it is churned up with the first new churning just as the cream is breaking into buiter. The whole thing is mixed together. That is exactly the process which we are speaking of now in connection with renovated butter, with the additional advantage that it is melted in the factory, and it was not melted in the home.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Does my hon. friend commend the practice?


William Richard Motherwell: Not for sale, but if
a farmer chooses to use up the last twenty or thirty pounds of old butter by re-churning it -and that is the very essence of renovation- and he uses it at home, that is his own business. My hon. friend displays his whole ignorance of home practice. This is being done yet.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Not so much now.


William Richard Motherwell: It is perfectly correct for them to do that. Why should they waste butter?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Does my hon. friend approve the practice?


William Richard Motherwell: Not for the market.


An hon. MEMBER:: What for?


William Richard Motherwell: For home use.


Henry Herbert Stevens: How does the minister know this is done?


William Richard Motherwell: I know it is done. How do I know my hon. friend does not know anything about the matter? Because that is so apparent. It is spoken of as having no taste and colour. It has both. How could it be sold for export if it had neither taste nor colour? I want to reassure the committee that I am merely trying to search out for some more excellent method of getting a cheap spread for the poor man's bread than we have had yet. If we cannot find one, we shall have to do without it. As regards the yellow in oleomargarine, do hon. members know what the yellow comes from? It comes from the kidney that is in the old dairy cow that is made into canners and cutters. It is the skeleton of where fat used to be on the
fMr. Motherwell.]
kidney, but this is dried up and there is just the skin to it. The marrow out of the old dairy cow is shot into the oleomargarine, and that gives the yellow colour and the appearance of vitamines. That information came directly from the chietf inspector of the Health department, whom my hon. friend considers as good authority and the information was not asked for but was given voluntarily.


Robert Forke: May I interject that I am going to be a vegetarian from this day on.


William Richard Motherwell: We have to make
a choice between two things that are not first-class; we have to take the thing that is nearest to first-class. I am not advocating renovating blitter on the ground that it is as good as creamery butter. It is a second-rate article. Do we not have second-rate wheat, third-rate wheat? Would you depreciate that as an article of diet because it is not all first-class? That is nonsense. The letter which I read a few moments ago indicates that the essential fats are all in renovated butter. That, I think, is as good an authority as has been produced yet.
Then it is said that this is good to fool the public. It is not good to fool the public, for everyone knows what it is; and at all events, whatever it may taste like, it is certainly butter. It is not an aggregation of intestinal attachments coming from those questionable places where they produce soap grease. I do not believe our people deserve to be fed on that sort of thing even if they are poor. If hon. gentlemen want to revive the question of oleomargarine I can discuss it at any time with them. In the meantime I must impress upon the committee the fact that the charge is wholly unfounded, if anyone does make it, that this article is not wholesome. The further statement is made that renovated butter is not a good "keeper.'' Well, that is true. When you make anything of this nature you cannot expect that it will keep for any length of time, for the simple reason that the fibre of it, if I may use that term, is destroyed. Nor does anybody seriously suggest that it is a good keeper; it is not recognized as such; it must be used as quickly as possible, for it is not intended to keep. It has been rancid, and we know perfectly well that once any foodstuff becomes rancid, while you may be able to restore it to its original state for a time, it unquestionably will not keep. This product is decreasing in quantity in the United States and they are coming to Canada for it. I want the committee therefore to know as

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much about the matter as does my hon. friend from Victoria (Mr. Tolmie), my hon friend from Vancouver (Mr. Stevens) or any other hon. gentleman who undertakes to speak about it.
We are told that this is a retrograde step. To the superficial it may seem a retrograde step to manufacture an article that was formerly banished from the country. But the question has been forced upon us as a result of the war: can we possibly find a cheaper spread for the poor man's bread than creamery butter? That is the issue we have to settle. We never had to consider it before the war because creamery butter has always seemed to be more or less within the reach of all. And inasmuch as we have always had a frontier people in Canada, in most of the provinces except the Maritime country, whose frontier is the sea, we must recognize the fact that there are places where the people cannot have access to creameries, so that the manufacture of this product under proper conditions should not be prevented.
The suggestion is made that the manufacture of renovated butter will encourage dirt, and that the product will have to be sent to the butter laundry. How will it encourage dirt? I should like to know. Let me inform the committee that some of our best butter makers are frontier people. The difficulty consists simply and solely in the lack of facilities for making the best butter that will keep; and if the very best creamery butter made in Canada were subjected to the same conditions, in regard to temperature, as a good deal of renovated butter is, you would have the same results. This, I think, is a libel on the makers of dairy butter themselves. Very often these people have not the proper facilities; they have no ice, nor have they any milk house. They have to get along in the best way they can, and the trouble does not lie in the fact that scrub cows are kept for dairy purposes. Scrub cows have nothing whatever to do with the matter.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: I never suggested for one
moment that you could not make good butter from a scrub cow. What I said was that you could not make butter profitably from that kind of cow. I pointed out clearly that it was possible to make good dairy butter in the country with the facilities generally found, but that the trouble was due to carelessness on the part of the butter makers. Sometimes you find	two butter
makers side by side, one making good butter and the other a product that is little better than axle grease, the difference being entirely
in the care or the lack of care as the case may be. I was an inspector under the provincial government for a number of years and I ought to have a fair idea of the situation.


William Richard Motherwell: I say that the
scrub cow should not be introduced into the subject at all. For that matter there is no reason why a scrub cow may not give good milk, though it may be little in quantity. Tf it is healthy and free from tuberculosis it should be able to produce milk with a fair percentage of butter fat. Renovated butter is described as being worth so much. I indicated a little, while ago the most recent price, which was quoted at 34 cents in Chicago; and the fact that it was only 6 cents lower than the price quoted for creamery butter seems to me to show that there could not have been very much wrong with the smell iff it.
It is stated that the manufacture of this article is going to benefit the factories. I am glad to see that the hon. gentleman is ready to admit that someone will be benefited. But, we are told, the frontier people will be gouged. Now, how can anybody say that the factory people, in the manufacture of renovated butter, will gouge anyone to any greater extent than they are gouged at present? There will not be any superfluity of renovated butter factories because the number will be limited by license; and a thorough system of inspection will ensure that the product is properly made, so that no deleterious compound will be allowed to enter into its composition. The fact is that these are all imaginary difficulties that are suggested to make the best possible case against the product; and the same arguments would hold with reference to anything else.
Now, Mr. Chairman, I had some more notes of what has been said but I cannot put my hand on them; evidently they are so bad lhat they thought it best to hide themselves. No wonder, because they were so ridiculous lhat they were not worth talking about. The question of importation, however, is one that we might discuss. It is one thing to take care of poor butter made on the Canadian frontier, but it is ridiculous to worry very much about the foreign article, because none of it is going to come in over a 4-cent tariff wall that is raised against ordinary butter. The United States people want our butter; it is not we who want theirs, because our butter is going into that country over an 8-cent barrier. It is simply impossible for imported butter to come from the United States into Canada. But even if it did come in, what would you do? Would you suggest putting an embargo against it? I have
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thought the matter out, and such a course I cannot countenance for a moment. If there were a possibility of butter coming from the United States I would discuss the matter with my colleagues, the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) and the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding), to see what practical steps could be taken to meet the situation. But we do not want to put on an embargo; we do not want to do anything unfriendly. And the fact is that an embargo is not necessary under the present market conditions. We have discussed on previous occasions the undesirability of embargoes in reference to coal, pulpwood, and one thing and another, and anything of that character should be considered with exceeding care before being proposed and internationally discussed.
LeWme say once more that the quality of this class of butter depends upon the care that is taken of it. Originally a great bulk of this butter was quite edible and good; but it is made under such primitive conditions in the matters of temperature, salt and facilities for keeping it, that there is a danger of its becoming bad soon after manufacture. The drawback is the lack of cold storage facilities; and many people have no milk houses, so that the keeping properties of the product are not very good, and it is apt to get rancid if it is delayed too long a time in transportation. Notwithstanding all these things, however, renovated butter has been found to be a good article of diet, as is shown by the very fact that the price is only 6 or 7 cents lower than that of creamery butter.
I am the last one on earth to advocate anything that would put our dairy industry in jeopardy. In the short time I have been in office I have done everything possible with the money at my disposal to get a new stride on our dairy industry. One of the first steps has been to get rid of these spurious substitutes masquerading as real dairy products. If the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) were here, I am sure I would have a valiant champion of this resolution with respect to filled milk and filled cream. These are prohibited, as is also the filling of butter with foreign fats. The whole tenor of the measure I have introduced in the last two years has been to aid the dairy industry of Canada. If the provision of renovated butter for the poor man's spread is going to jeopardize the dairy industry to any extent, we will have to seek some other solution; because Canada will have to depend on its dairy industry as the cornerstone of agriculture.


Mr. CARROLL:: We have had many kinds of butter offered for sale in this country, some bad, some good, but the name of the latest variety, renovated butter, is more or less misleading it seems to me. In the old days a class of people went around the country collecting old rags and bottles. My hon. friend, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) is developing a new industry, for in a few days, if this bill passes, we shall see another class of people going around our backwards calling for old dairy butter. Then after they have renovated this rancid butter the minister says it is good enough for the Canadian people.
Renovated butter and oleomargarine were dealt with by the Privy Council during the war. For some reason, good, bad or indifferent, those who had control of our dairy interests in those days refused to have anything at all to do with renovated or adulterated butter, but they did suggest that as a war measure we should allow the manufacture and importation of oleomargarine. In the United States renovated butter is described as:
22 Butter which has been subjected to any process by which it is melted, clarified and refined and made to resemble genuine butter, always excepting adulterated butter.
A few days ago the minister took very strong exception to oleomargarine because it was made to resemble butter. But the statute of the United States, which I have no doubt he is following in this matter, says very distinctly that renovated butter is melted and refined and made to resemble genuine butter. Is there anything wrong about that?


William Richard Motherwell: It is butter.


William F. Carroll: It is rancid butter. If it was genuine butter it would not need renovation at all.


Mr. HOCKEN:: It is decayed butter.


William F. Carroll: Yes. The minister says it is for home consumption, but he is not putting it on the market. How is he going to get it into the homes of the people if it is not marketed through some medium?


William Richard Motherwell: I did not say that. Some hon. gentleman asked me how it was made. I said it was made in the farm homes to-day and used for home consumption by those who made it. It is not melted, it is cut into fine pieces and churned.


William F. Carroll: If it is renovated it is not genuine butter. The dairy industry in the United S.lates has been safeguarded by the imposition of a 2 per cent tax upon renovated

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butter and a 10 cents per pound tax upon adulterated butter. I read a report a few days ago to the effect that it is absolutely impossible to distinguish between renovated butter and adulterated butter. This is the definition of adulterated butter in the United States statutes:
"Adulterated butter" is hereby defined to mean a grade of butter produced by mixing, reworking, re-chuming in milk or cream, refining, or in any way producing a uniform, purified, or improved product from different lots or parcels of melted or unmelted butter or butter fat, in which any acid, alkali, chemical, or any substance whatever is introduced or used for the purpose or with the effect of deodorizing or removing therefrom rancidity, or any butter or butter fat with which there is mixed any substance foreign to butter as herein defined, with intent or effect of cheapening in cost the product, or any butter in the manufacture or manipulation of which any process or material is used with intent or effect of causing the absorption of abnormal quantities of water, milk or cream.
In the United States they treat rancid butter with an acid, alkali or chemical and make it into what is called adulterated butter. My hon. friend is going to take this rancid butter -which is picked up in our back yards, and which the dairy people refuse to market-and renovate it without treating it with any acid, alkali or chemical. Butter may be renovated and be without smell or taste, as the hon. minister said. But I say it is all taste and all odour, and will so remain notwithstanding its being designated as renovated butter.
If this butter is to be allowed to be brought into the Dominion, we are likely to have another industry. At present we have the rum bootlegger, and last year we had the cigarette bootlegger. Now we are going to have the renovated butter bootlegger, who will see to it that butter renovated or adulterated in the United States is brought in here without paying any tax. My hon. friend is being led astray by the fact that there is a loud ciy in Canada for a butter substitute. Renovated butter is not a butter substitute: it is a bad butter; it is a rancid butter; it is a rotten butter. If the minister can show the committee any means whereby he can renovate a butter without using an acid and thereby making it an adulterated butter, then he is a chemist for whom this country has been looking for some time.


William Richard Motherwell: I was just wondering where my hon. friend got his authority for what he says about using acids. Is there anything else in it except the lactic acid that is generated in milk or cream that is sour?


William F. Carroll: I am glad my hon. friend admits that degeneration takes place.


William Richard Motherwell: Not at all.


William F. Carroll: Why impose upon the people something that is degenerated? If from 1914 to 1918, when the people were considering the matter of substitutes for butter and other foods, they refused to have anything to do with renovated or adulterated butter, then I cannot understand why in a time of peace, when there is no cry for substitutes, we should go back to a period that we have long since outlived. My hon. friend talks about a spread. Is he aware that the official spread for bread to-day in the British navy is oleomargarine? The British navy is developing the best athletes in the world. I do not say they are doing it on oleomargarine, but I do say that the physicians of the English navy, who are noted for their judgment and fair-mindedness, have approved of a regulation making oleomargarine the official spread for the navy's bread.


Mr. McBRIDE:: We are not talking about oleomargarine now; we are debating the question of butter.


William F. Carroll: Well, I am talking about both. But I shall not disturb the dreams of my hon. friend very much longer. I am not a dairyman; I have not a cow and perhaps never will have one, but I have some interest in the people of this country. A week ago the minister stood in his place and opposed the manufacture and importation of a product which is recognized in the British navy as a substitute for butter. He now tells the committee that it is necessary for the poor man of this country that the manufacture and importation of renovated butter be permitted. I do suggest that in view of all the circumstances he should give the matter a little more serious consideration than he has given it.


William Charles Good: I have been listening very
attentively to the discussion, but I have not got complete light on the situation yet. It has been stated that it is more difficult to detect renovated butter when mixed with ordinary butter than it is to detect oleomargarine when used in the same way. If that is the case, it will be difficult to prevent fraud.
What means will be adopted as a
5 p.m. protection against fraud or misrepresentation? Furthermore, in regard to the chemical changes which may be produced in butter through its being kept for long periods at a fairly high temperature, how far is it possible to remove the various products of decomposition which result from these changes? It may be fairly easy to deodorize the product to a certain extent by aeration, but it strikes me it is a very

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much more difficult process effectively to remove the products of decomposition. Then, I should like to know something about the question of sterilizing. It has been maintained that butter used in the manufacture of renovated butter would be not so good on the average as creamery butter. Of course, a good deal of the butter manufactured under primitive conditions is perfectly clean, or at least as clean as the average creamery butter. But I am inclined to think that the butter that will find its way into the renovating factories will be a product which has been manufactured by careless people under conditions which may bring about contamination. I do not think there is anything in the renovating process which is designed to afford protection against disease germs, and I would like to have some information on that point. It does seem to me that the minister is adopting a very extraordinary attitude after his vote the other day on the oleomargarine question.


William Richard Motherwell: I beg my hon.
friend's pardon; I did not speak on it the other day.


William Charles Good: I was not referring to the
minister's Speaking on it; I was referring to his voting on the question. It is not necessary on all occasions to speak to a subject in order to indicate one's attitude. I have always been of the opinion that, under proper regulation and supervision to guard against fraud and misrepresentation, oleomargarine is a perfectly suitable food product, and I sincerely hope that before the end of the present session, perhaps in connection with this bill, the House will have a chance to declare itself on this particular issue, wholly apart from the issues that entered into the discussion and the vote the other day. The minister talks about the poor man's spread. It is necessary for us to have some regard to that phase of the question, but it seems to me that this renovated butter is likely to be a poorer, a more dangerous poor man's spread than oleomargarine. I have no objections to renovated butter; in that respect I hold the same view as I do in regard to oleomargarine. I do not object to it provided that we can certify as to its quality, as to its wholesomeness, and provided also that we can protect the public against fraud and misrepresentation. Until we get more information on these points it seems to me that we are, to quote the old saying, "straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel." I hope the minister can give the committee some further infor-marirn on these questions Let me repeat

them again, because I think the minister was not paying attention when I started to speak.


William Richard Motherwell: I think I heard the questions.


William Charles Good: There is the question of misrepresentation, the question of removing the products of decomposition, and the question of sterilization.


William Richard Motherwell: I think the hon. gentleman's attitude is quite reasonable. But the resolution provides exactly what he asked for. We are not going into this matter in such a tremendous hurry. The hon. member for Cape Breton South and Richmond (Mr. Carroll) seemed to think that to-morrow or the day after the bill became law, we would be shouting renovated butter round the streets. That is not so. Here is my proposal: If the House sends this bill to the select standing committee on Agriculture my intention is to follow the same course that we have adopted in the case of three or four other bills, bring the experts of the Department of Agriculture before the committee to give evidence on the very things my hon. friend speaks about. What else can you do? You cannot bring these experts before the House. Furthermore, I am prepared to suggest now that the word "importation" be struck out from the bill. I will discuss the matter with the proper authorities and see if that can be done without doing violence to our international relations, or being accused of anything that would look like unfriendliness towards other nations. I do not like to see that word "importation" used. I will be quite frank with the House and say that the experts in the Dairy branch differ on this question. Some of	them do	not	like it.After this has	been	prohibited for	twentyyears they do	not	like the	idea	of reintroducing it.	Others take	the	ground
that it never should have been prohibited, that it should have been permitted all along. We will submit evidence to the committee from experts, and to the extent the witnesses seem to favour a departure in the matter we will give the industry the benefit of the doubt. But let us try to get to the bottom of the matter.


William Charles Good: Does the minister propose to
submit this bill to the committee on Agriculture after its second reading?


William Richard Motherwell: When reference of a bill to a committee is proposed it is always done after a second reading. Any section of this bill could be eliminated in the Agriculture committee without destroying any principle embodied in it. As a matter of fact, the bill

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to amend the Live Stock Act was so completely changed in committee that we had to reprint it.


William Charles Good: When will the bill be submitted to the committee?


William Richard Motherwell: Just as soon as possible. I understand we are going to have morning sittings next week so that we would have to do it on Monday.
Now, just let me run over two or three matters that have been raised during the discussion. Certain members have described the product we are dealing with. It was stated by the hon. member for Victoria City (Mr. Tolmie) that this renovated butter is so good that it is sent over to the United Kingdom from the United States and passes there for creamery butter.
An hon. "MEMBER: It is mixed with other butter.


William Richard Motherwell: Well, it is mixed if you like. But even so, it cannot be as bad as it has been described; you cannot fool people that way.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: The minister is hardly giving to what I said the interpretation I intended. What I tried to point out was that there had been so much fraudulent shipping of oleomargarine and renovated butter to Great Britain that it had caused a serious falling off in the export of American butter to that country.


William Richard Motherwell: But we cannot have the product so good that it is taken for creamery butter, and at the same time so bad that the smell of it is enough to knock you down. I have promised to have this bill referred to the committee on Agriculture. I believe there is a question involved that is worth looking into, and worth solving, for the purpose of meeting the dairyman's views on the one hand and the views of the man who wants cheap butter on the other. If we can do that we shall be performing a good service. Let the bill go to the committee on Agriculture, and if they feel that any section is wrong or is unwise it can be eliminated. There is nothing mysterious about that. We. removed three or four sections from the bill to amend the Live Stock Act. I should like to see the word "importation" struck out and I will move that that be done now. I do not like the thought of importation, but I am not a bit afraid myself of any importation taking place. I think it is only an imaginary difficulty, something that will never arise. But even imaginary difficulties sometimes hurt more than difficulties that are real.
272J


Henry Herbert Stevens: This resolution and the
matter it deals with are very important. It will not do for the minister to answer a civil question put to him across the floor by a somewhat crude intimation that the questioner is ignorant of the subject he is talking about. I must say that outside of the Minister of Agriculture I think I can compliment most of the members of the government, when in committee of the whole, with at least behaving with attentive courtesy and giving civil answers to those who question them in a polite and proper manner.


William Richard Motherwell: That is terrible.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The Minister of Agriculture seldom presents anything to the House which calls for debate without making more or less of a burlesque of the whole proceedings. He has not abandoned or departed from his record in that respect this afternoon. I therefore think it would be better for me to address what observations I have to make more to the Prime Minister than to the Minister of Agriculture.


William Richard Motherwell: That is politeness
itself.


Henry Herbert Stevens: My remarks have greatly to do with the propriety and desirability of advancing this legislation at this late period in the, session. May I point out to the Prime Minister this: In the first place there is decided opposition to this legislation in the country. I have in my hand a telegram from the Fraser Valley Milk Producers' Association. This association consists of 1,800 farmers in the Fraser valley who have banded themselves together for the marketing of their products, that is milk, butter and other products. It markets its products direct to the consumer, and perhaps is one of the best and most highly organized co-operative associations in existence in Canada. The telegram reads as follows:	*
We understand that resolution is being introduced in parliament permitting the importation, manufacture and sale of renovated butter. We strongly protest against the government granting such permission. Same will be very detrimental to the dairy interests of this country.
I submit this to the Prime Minister. I have already submitted it to the Minister of Agriculture and I think it would perhaps add to the burlesquing of this matter if I read the minister's letter to the House.


William Richard Motherwell: Will my hon. friend read his own letter as well?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, if it is desirable.
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William Richard Motherwell: If my answer is
read I should like my hon. friend to read his letter to me.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I will read them both.


William Richard Motherwell: Sure.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I have received another
telegram from George Sangster, on behalf of the Vancouver Island Milk Producers' Association, incorporated in which are, perhaps, the main dairymen and producers of Vancouver Island. The telegram reads as follows:
Milk producers of Vancouver Island absolutely opposed to resolution to permit importation, manufacture and sale of renovated butter. Please use every effort to defeat this measure as we consider it would impose unfair and impossible competition and deal a death blow to the dairy industry.
Here are two large associations-and I submit this to the Prime Minister in particular- I suppose numbering upwards of 3,000 members, of dairymen, with mostly large herds, 20, 30, 40, or 50 head of cattle, all marketing their products directly to the people, and both these associations declaring that this measure is very very detrimental. On this request I base my argument. This product has been barred from the Canadian market for 20 years. Why, within one week of the end of the session, introduce legislation to permit the manufacture of this product in Canada-I shall deal with the proclamation feature later -without giving opportunity to such interests as these to whom I have referred-and doubtless there are other interests in other parts of Canada-a fair opportunity to be heard before the committee on Agriculture? It will be at once recognized by this committee that there is no possibility whatever of the dairy interests of Canada being heard next Monday morning. That is an absurdity. It is only an evidence of the insincerity of the minister and the deliberate desire on his part to rush this measure through, not only without due consideration, but without a remnant of fairness to the industries so vitally interested.


Mr. NEILL:: Did these two large dairying interests in British Columbia not make similar representations against oleo, which the hon. member ignored?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Not to me. I am merely reading what I have received. I admit, with reference to the mild indictment of my hon. friend that, perhaps, I am not as well posted, or as well qualified, to speak on this question, as some hon. members. I see across the way my hon. friend from Fraser Valley (Mr. Munro) who, I know, is well qualified to speak. He represents one of the best dairying districts in Canada, but, on the other hand, let

me say to the minister that I am not altogether void of knowledge of the dairy business. I spent a great many years in my early days on an Ontario farm, and I have been interested in western farming for the last ten years. I do not parade that fact, because I think it is inadvisable for one who is not actually and definitely a farmer to emphasize the fact that he knows something about farming. I used that fact as a retort that I am not wholly ignorant of the subject. The minister challenged me to read my letter to him and his letter to me. I will do so. My letter to him is dated June 18, and reads:
Ottawa, June 18th, 1923.
Hon. W. R. Motherwell,
Minister of Agriculture,
Ottawa.
Dear Mr. Motherwell,
I enclose herewith two telegrams from the Vancouver Independent Milk Producers' Association and the Fraser Valley Milk Producers' Association, Vancouver, objecting to your bill to provide for the manufacture and sale of "renovated" butter.
I beg to advise you that it is my intention when this matter comes before the House, to urge for the withdrawal of this bill for this session and suggest the submission of the whole subject to the Agricultural committee next year. I see no reason for haste in the passing of such legislation and, furthermore, I most respectfully submit that your action in promoting this bill is wholly inconsistent with the attitude you took, as Minister of Agriculture, in recently opposing the manufacture and sale of a perfectly wholesome food, namely, oleomargarine.
You undoubtedly know that in the process of manufacturing so called renovated butter deleterious chemicals are used and I am amazed that you, as Minister of Agriculture, would be so indifferent to the creamery and dairy interests of this country as to introduce such a bill.
I therefore earnestly suggest that you withdraw this bill for this session and refer the whole question to the Agricultural committee next session.
Yours very sincerely,
H. H. Stevens.
That is the letter I wrote to the minister. His reply is dated June 19th, and reads:
Ottawa, 19th June, 1923.
The Honourable H. H. Stevens, M.P.,
House of Commons, Ottawa.
Dear Mr. Stevens,
Your favour of the 18th instant just received.
Replying I have to thank you for your quite decided views regarding renovated butter. I may say that I have myself been endeavouring for a number of years to estimate the value of this product as a cheaper spread than creamery butter for those who do not feel they are warranted in paying the higher price.
Last year when the oleo. discussion was up I promised the House that, in the event of oleo. being prohibited. I would advise my colleagues to make legislative provision to remove the prohibition of the manufacture of renovated butter, on the ground that the fat of the latter consists of 100 per cent butter fat, contains all the essential vitamines and growth properties, and consequently would seem to be a more logical, cheap spread than ordinary gut fat, which has usually been used as soap grease in times past and even yet. However, even in a matter so obvious as this, experts seem to differ.

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It is my intention to have this question discussed before the Agricultural committee-not next year but this year, when a number of authorities can be asked to give evidence in the same manner as I have done with my other bills this session.
I think you are a member of the Agricultural committee and I should be very pleased to have the benefit of your advice and suggestions when the matter is then under discussion. I might point out also that the provision with respect to renovated butter is merely one section of a bill, the balance of which, I feel confident, will meet with your entire approval. Your suggestion, therefore, that the bill be withdrawn will, I think, be opposed by yourself when you understand all the circumstances.
Thanking you for your favour, I remain,
Yours very truly,
W. R. Motherwell.
There is nothing in that of any importance, but I read it because my hon. friend desires to have it read.
Let me turn to one or two other phases of the matter. My hon. friend says he mentioned this a year ago. Now he says that one of these resolutions provides that the legislation will be ineffective for a year at least. He will promise the House that the proclamation will not be made until after next March. This is what I want the committee to consider: After mentioning this over a year ago why did the minister not introduce it early in the session and let the committee deal with it while the sittings of this House were proceeding? t If, on the other hand, it was not desirable to introduce it early this year, so the committee could study it, and it is not his intention to bring the legislation into effect until after next March, why not let it stand over till next year and give the committee of Agriculture an opportunity to discuss it properly, and give the interests affected an opportuninty to appear before the committee? In order to take that stand, it is not necessary for me to be opposed to the matter on principle at all. I am merely dealing with the desirability of forcing matter through during the last days of the session. Surely, nothing will be lost by postponing this for a year, when for over twenty years there has been no such commodity produced in Canada. Who is to be hurt? The minister himself says, "If there is no demand for it"-I have his words here, because I always find it necessary to write them down, if I wish to put a question in regard to them-"the proclamation will not be made; if there is a demand we will issue the proclamation." Why not wait and delay the legislation, to see if there is a demand? Why not wait to give those affected an opportunity to express their views pro or con?
There is another matter I wish to refer to. Most able reference has been made by
my hon. friend from Victoria (Mr. Tolmie) who speaks on all such subjects with authority, and not only with authority, but with ability, and in a manner becoming the dignity of the House. He referred to the fact that the whole effort of the agricultural departments of the provinces and the Dominion in connection with the pure foods administration of the country has been pressing towards making a highclass product, and obtaining better methods of dairying and creamery butter production, and he pointed out that one of the effects of encouraging the use of renovated butter was to encourage the reproduction of inferior or carelessly made butter. The minister said that butter would deteriorate. He said "It will get rotten and does get rotten." He also said, "If you expose eggs to the weather, to the sun and the warm temperature, will they not get rotten?" But is the minister proposing next session to bring in a measure for renovated eggs-to make rotten eggs marketable? That is the next thing we shall hear about, from the Minister of Agriculture. As I listened to the minister this afternoon going through that effort to ridicule the splendid and scientific presentation of this question by the hon. member for Victoria City (Mr. Tolmie), I thought his indictment of the dairy industry of this country was one of the most damning that I had ever heard. If anyone took seriously the utterances of the Minister of Agriculture this afternoon, that the butter products of this country were produced as he intimated they were, that the slaughtering of animals and the extraction of the various parts were carried out in the manner he described, that would be one of the most injurious things to the dairying industry anil the butter production industry of Canada.


William Richard Motherwell: What has the slaughtering of animals to do with the dairy industry?


Henry Herbert Stevens: I wondered myself when my hon. friend pictured, in a somewhat disgusting fashion, the puncturing of the intestines of an animal.


Robert Forke: I would suggest that til's argument is getting a little rotten.


William Richard Motherwell: I was not talking about butter then.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The presentation by the minister of the case from his standpoint this afternoon was not in the interest of the promotion of the production of butter this country.
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Thomas George McBride: Is the president or the manager of this Fraser Valley Milk Association the same person who, when the question of reducing the price of milk in Vancouver was up, said: "To hell with the public"?


Henry Herbert Stevens: I do not remember the incident mentioned by my hon. friend, nor do I know. I do not quite see the pertinence of the question. All I know is this-and I know this from personal acquaintance wi 1>
many of them-that the Fraser Valley Milk Producers' Association is what I said it was, namely a combination of some 1,800 farmers, dairymen, producing milk, marketing it directly to the people of Vancouver, New Westminster and other centres, and manufacturing very large quantities of butter. Outside of that I know nothing more of what the president may have said in a fit of temper or may not. have said.
While the minister may accuse me of ignorance of some matters which may seem to be very familiar to him, I, at least, as a public man, or as a private citizen, ought to have some interest in the promotion of the dairying business and the foreign trade of Canada. One of the things we have been striving as a nation to do for the last twenty years is to raise the general standard of our products, to bring these products to such a uniformity of standard that they will earn a place on the British or European market in competition with the highly developed dairy industry of Denmark. In the very interesting booklets sent to me day after day by the minister-and if the minister issues these booklets, surely he expects us to read them -I was reading an indictment of the Canadian dairy industry to a certain extent on the very point that they were not keeping up the standard of uniformity of butter in Canada m competition with Denmark. Within a week they showed us figures that the Denmark exportation to the British market had increased enormously, while the Canadian exportation had decreased. That is something in wh'ch I am interested, and I do not intend to be silenced by the rebuff from the minister that I am supposed to know nothing about the subject. I am not speaking dogmatically, but many feel that the introduction of this resolution as regards the production of renovated butter in Canada on a large scale, will tend to lower the general standard cf Canadian butter produced for export. Let me tell the committee why. We know perfectly well that renovated butter is deodorized; the objectionable visible features, shall I say, are taken out of it, that is the question of odour and the question of bad taste, by 
certain chemical processes. It is washed in lime or lime materials and other things, and these are eliminated. When it is manufactured, as I am told by those who know and who are in a position to advise, there is, perhaps, difficulty at a glance to tell the difference between it and fairly good creamery butter, but the minute the inspector sees it, he discovers it. Take a shipment of say 60,000 cases of butter going on the London or Liverpool market, or wherever it may go. They test every one in 10 or 20, as the case may be, according to the usual method of test. It might be possible to slip into such a shipment quite a large number of cases of butter not up to standard. That has been one of the complaints against Canadian butter, that running through our Canadian butter there are at times inferior cases. What I wish to impress upon the minister, and particularly on the Prime Minister at this time, is that many of us think the introduction of this legislation will tend to vitiate the policy followed by this government and previous governments, namely of raising the standard of general dairy products. We do not wish that to be brought about. I am not saying it will, but at least let us have a reasonable time to study the question.


Mr. PUTNAM:: Does my hon. friend know whether the renovation prevails in any country except the United States?


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am not in a position to answer that question. I would not answer it because I cannot answer it correctly and definitely. Let me say this, in conclusion: It will be utterly impossible to give a fair hearing to this matter this session before the Agricultural committee. We begin sitting in the morning next week, and we hope to get through by the end of next week. These interests, therefore, cannot be heard. I have made certain representations, very weak, on their behalf; but they and other interests cannot be heard. The minister says that he does not intend to bring this proclamation in for a year. Then why pass the legislation? Why fix upon the country a definite statutory law, when you acknowledge that you have not had time for consideration, and when it is clear that these interests cannot be heard. So I ask the Prime Minister most earnestly that this measure, as regards renovated butter, should be allowed to stand over until next year, and that all interests should be heard before the Agriculture committee. Personally I shall be glad to abide by the decision of that committee, after a reasonable and fair hearing of the subject.

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William Lyon Mackenzie King: The minister has intimated clearly that his intention is to refer the bill to the Agriculture committee. That committee is, perhaps, in a better position than the House to decide whether it would be wise to have this particular clause stand over for another year. If the committee has the slightest doubt as to the wisdom of proceeding with that clause, the government would be only too happy to accept the finding of the committee on that point. It will, perhaps, facilitate matters, seeing that we are discussing the resolution merely at the moment, if the committee were to pass the resolution and let the bill go to the Agriculture committee, with the understanding that if that committee is in the slightest doubt about the wisdom of proceeding with that particular question, the government will not press that part of the bill. Moreover, coupled with that, the members may take into account the minister's assurance that he will see that the proclamation under which this would become law, will be, at least, one year's time distant from the present, and this would give the opportunity of another session of parliament to consider the matter if it were thought advisable to do so.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is really my strongest point. I wish the Prime Minister would consider it again after we pass from this stage. If you are going to consider the question in the interim between the assumed passing of the measure and the proclamation, would not it be better to consider the matter before the legislation is passed?


William Richard Motherwell: I have had the misfortune once or twice of treading on the toes of my hon. friend from Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens). That hon. gentleman does not like my style of debate. I am sorry for that; but I seem to get along very well with it, and as it is the only kind of style I have I am afraid my hon. friend will have to put up with it, however distasteful it may be to him. He calls that style a burlesque, and strange to say he appears to think that I should accept that description with good grace. I was not very long in the House, as a matter of fact, before the hon. gentleman began to apply such descriptive phrases to myself, as "the Minister of Agriculture's burlesque." And when I modestly suggest that he does not know anything at all about dairying, why, he gets mad. I do not see why he should take umbrage at a statement so obviously true. Now, we cannot expect to give without occasionally being asked to take, in return; and surely, as a sportsman, my hon. friend should be ready to take what is coming to him, especially when it is so richly deserved as on this occasion.
Just one word or two, however. The hon. gentleman says that I have not given a civil answer. I replied to the hon. member for Victoria (Mr. Tolmie) in the only way that I could possibly have replied to him. Sometimes such strange things are said that one can answer them only by ridicule, which, by the way, is very often the most effective method. An attempt is made at a description of chemicals. Is lactic acid a chemical? What do we usually mean when we talk of chemicals? Surely no one will describe as decomposition the natural process that takes place in the course of the manufacture of many e&cellent articles of diet such as bread, for example. Is there any decomposition in the manufacture of silage, or of any of those things in which certain necessary bacterial action takes place? If the decomposition which takes place in the manufacture of these things were the harmful process which hon. gentlemen seem to suggest, then some of the finest products we have would be noxious. So that when hon. gentlemen talk about "decomposition" in the way they do they only display a lack of knowledge of which it surely is no harm to remind them. If I delved into any question involving legal technicalities hon. gentlemen would most undoubtedly be justified if they reminded me that I was discussing a subject with which I was not particularly conversant.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: I did not say that the putrefaction that took place was not due to bacterial action. There are four or five kinds of bacteria responsible for the changes that occur in the process of decomposition.


William Richard Motherwell: I was replying in this instance to my hon. friend from Cape Breton (Mr. Carroll). Now, I am not trying to force this thing through, and I do not think that I have appeared to be particularly wedded to the question. I have as open a mind in regard to the matter as anyone in the committee, and I recognize that it would take a great deal of explanation to show why, after a prohibition of twenty years, the manufacture of this product should be permitted. It would be much easier for me not to introduce the subject if I wanted to take the course of least resistance. If the committee will accept the Prime Minister's suggestion, of referring the matter to the committee on Agriculture, I promise to use no more influence than my unassisted vote, if it does come to a vote, to put it through. And if there is any doubt on the part of the committee as to the wisdom of the action we propose, we will defer the question not for a day or a month only, but, so far as I am concerned at any rate,
Dairy Industry Act

forever. We do not want to jeopardize in the least degree the dairying industry of the country, but we do want to take care of a situation that may arise when butter suddenly runs up in price beyond the reach of poor people. If the suggestion of the Prime Minister is acceptable to the committee we will eliminate this section. There is no need for any heated controversy over the section. We will drop it and go on with the rest of the measure in the usual way.


William Charles Good: One serious objection to the procedure proposed by the minister is that Monday forenoon is apparently the only time the committee will have for the consideration of the matter, which is one of much importance. Moreover, the attendance in the com-mitte on Monday will in all probability be very small, owing to the fact that the election takes place in Ontario on that day. It seems to me that the wise policy would be to defer the whole matter for a year, so far at least as this particular clause is concerned, so that we may go into the particulars of it more fully in the meantime.


William Richard Motherwell: I realize the situation that will exist on Monday, but inasmuch as the House will not meet next week until eleven o'clock there is no reason why the Agriculture committee could not meet at ten o'clock so that we might have a full hour for as many days as might be necessary to discuss the subject. Indeed, I do not think it would take many days to dispose of the question after the committee had heard the evidence of the experts.


William Charles Good: There will be practically no members from Ontario present on Monday.


William Richard Motherwell: I am speaking of Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.


Mr. LADNER:: I do not wish to let the occasion pass without joining in the protest, not only against the principle of this legislation, but more particularly against the decision of the government to introduce it at this time. All hon. members are aware that many of the representatives from the dairy districts in Ontario are at this moment engaged in other matters than agriculture, and we have not their advice on this important question. It is very apparent that few people who are really interested in this legislation have had an opportunity of presenting their case to the minister, and certainly they will have no opportunity of appearing before the committee. The Prime Minister has suggested that when the matter is before the 
committee the government will not press this particular part of the bill. The minister himself has stated that he has an open mind with reference to the matter and is not particularly biassed one way or the other. At least, I regard that as his attitude. This legislation has been waiting 20 years now, and parliament has been sitting for the past six months. Yet the government desires to press this matter through in six days. On what ground are^ they justified in endeavouring to lailroad this legislation through parliament in so short a space of time? The minister himself has told us that if there is any doubt in the matter he is prepared to defer it not only for a day or a month, but forever. In other words, he expresses the willingness on the part of the government to do the fair thing by everyone interested and give the matter proper consideration. Under these circumstances, is there any reason why the whole subject, without being referred to any committee, cannot be allowed to stand over until next session in order that full justice may be done all persons interested? Large institutions like the Fraser Valiev Milk Producers' Association are vitally interested in this matter; and this particular organization, comprising some 1,800 members, have sent me a telegram stating their point of view. The wholesale producers who deal in this product as well as the consuming public, as represented in various organizations, will also undoubtedly desire to declare their position in the matter. For my part therefore I cannot see any reason why the minister or the government should object to the reasonable request of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens), which if voted on would, I am sure, be supported by the majority of the committee.


William Richard Motherwell: Since this subject has been on the order paper we have had no protests against the legislation apart from the telegrams that have come from British Columbia, where I am sure the people are not acquainted with the real facts of the case. From among all the members of the National Dairy Council I have not had one protest against it. However, with a view to getting into touch with some of those who are interested in the subject, I move that the committee rise and report progress.
Progress reported.



FEEDING STUFFS ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) the House went into committee to consider the following proposed resolution, Mr. Gordon in the chair:

Feeding Stuffs Act
That it is expedient to amend the Feeding Stuffs Act, chapter forty-seven of the statutes of 1920, and to provide,-
1.	That no person shall import into, manufacture, sell, offer, expose or have in possession for sale in Canada, any flour mill by-product resulting from the cleaning and milling of wheat for the production of flour by the usual commercial processes, unless,
(a)	the container or tag or label attached thereto is branded or marked as prescribed;
(b)	the bran, pure shorts, middlings or feed flour are free from admixture of any foreign materials;
(c)	the bran, pure shorts, shorts and mill screenings, middlings or feed flour meet the requirements as to protein and fat content, fineness and quality established by the regulations, and contain no crude fibre in excess of the percentage by weight as prescribed;
(d)	the shorts and mill screenings are first registered as a commercial feeding stuff and contain not more than the mill run of screenings and scourings removed from the wheat from which shorts was obtained.
2.	That no person shall manufacture pure shorts and shorts and mill screenings at the same mill.
3.	That the sale in Canada, or the importation, of any feeding stuff found to be adulterated or incorrectly or misleadingly tagged, labelled or named, shall be a violation of the act, and the minister may cancel any registration and prohibit the further sale or importation of any such feeding stuff.
Mr. ROBB:: Section 2 provides:
That no person shall manufacture pure shorts and shorts and mill screenings at the same mill.
It occurs to me that if this were put into force every mill in Canada would have to go out of business.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is rather interesting
to hear the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb). I was anxious to learn his views on the resolution. As far as I know, there should not be very great objection to the main idea behind this proposed legislation, but I do not want to appear to commit myself and others here to the principle in detail when we come to the bill, because I see there is some difference between the bill and the resolution, the details being more clearly set forth in the former.


William Richard Motherwell: I think it might
be well to explain how these amendments came to be proposed. As the committee are aware, the adulterating of mill by-products with screenings has been authorized by law during the last few years. A number of complaints have been made to the department, particularly by farmers, as to the bad effect that some of these mill feeds containing screenings has on young pigs, the deaths of a number of animals being attributed to such feeds. The hon. member for Lisgar (Mr. Brown) and the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) brought the matter to my attention some time ago, and I promised to bring down legislation to deal with the trouble. Before doing so I thought it well
to consult the advisory board which the Seed Control Act provides for. This board represents the milling, live stock, dealers and other interests concerned. It met in this city and this bill is the result of their cogitations. The very section the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) calls attention to is a compromise. Mr. Cornell, secretary of the National Millers' Association, and Mr. Watts, secretary of the Dominion Millers' Association, were present, and they, on behalf of the milling interests, accepted this as a compromise. Middlings have to be sold in their purity because this is the only article that can be fed to young pigs, there being too much fibre in bran for them to assimilate. The millers take the ground that inasmuch as we compel them to sell middlings and bran in a pure state they should be allowed to make some disposition of the screenings the farmers sell with the wheat. They suggest that they be permitted to mix shorts with screenings as a feed for dairy cattle, to whom it would not be deleterious. Shorts is simply fine bran.


Mr. LOVIE:: The millers pay nothing for
the screenings, which really belong to the farmer, being treated as dockage. What right, therefore, have the millers to mix these screenings and sell them as cattle feed?


William Richard Motherwell: I am not pleading
that the millers have any right to do so. I am simply pointing out that several interests are involved in this matter and that after discussing it for two or three days this resolution was the compromise they reached. I appreciate the point raised by my hon. friend, but the fact remains that screenings do get into wheat to a certain extent and are paid for as wheat.


Mr. GOULD:: Were the western millers
represented in the conference?


William Richard Motherwell: Mr. Watts and
Mr. Cornell between them represented the organized millers of Canada. I expected that the question would be raised, because there was a feeling of resentment against mixing these products at all. Inasmuch as a certain amount of dairy feed is required, it is suggested that screenings should be mixed with shorts for the purpose. I should like to have the views of the hon. member for Victoria and Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) and the hon. member for Glengarry and Stormont (Mr. Kennedy), both of whom I understand have had a good deal of experience in dairying. There was a three day discussion on this somewhat involved question-the advisory board is there for this very purpose-and it does seem to be a fair compromise. It is
Feeding Stuffs Act

now provided that you cannot put any of these things into this mill stuff, even after you have bought it from the farmers and paid for it.


Mr. KENNEDY (Glengarry):: I would like to commend the minister for the main principle involved in this resolution. When the Feeding Stuffs bill was introduced in 1920 I took occasion to suggest to the then Minister of Agriculture that he provide in his bill that bran, pure shorts, middlings and those feeds that are generally looked upon as standard feeds be sold in their pure state. The bill which was passed at that time contemplated the mixing of screenings and other things with those feeds. I was glad to see the minister bring down a measure for the purpose of ensuring that these feeds particularly should be sold in their pure state, but I am a little sorry to see him weakening to the extent of suggesting that he does not care about the rest so long as middlings are sold in their pure state. That principle is just as important in its application to bran and shorts as it is in its application to middlings.


William Richard Motherwell: Does my hon. friend think it makes the shorts a less desirable dairy feed if the screenings are ground and mixed with it? I am not too sure about that myself. If they are good screenings, the result is an excellent feed, but I admit that it depends on the nature of the screenings. Shorts is only fine bran; there is very little middlings in it.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: The mixing of screenings with shorts or bran or any of the feeds specified in this resolution will certainly lower their feeding value. If a miller wishes to compound a feed or to make a feed out of the screenings he takes out of the wheat, why should he not, if it has any feeding value, sell it on its own merits, having the contents set forth on a tag as specified in the regulations applying to all feeds? If there is any feeding value in his product he can do that and sell it at a lower price, but he should not be allowed to mix screenings which are of low feeding yalue-some are and some are not-with these feeds. I suggest that the minister carry out the main principle of his resolution.
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the chair and the House took recess.

After Recess
The House resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 207 (from the Senate), for the relief of Abraham Brooks.-Mr. Baxter.
Bill No. 209 (from the Senate), for the relief of Clara Welleena Bristol.-Mr. Duff.
Bill No. 210 (from the Senate), for the relief of Emma Jean Walker.-Mr. Hocken.
Bill No. 211 (from the Senate), for the relief of Ella Maude Gee.-Mr, Church.
Bill No. 212 (from the Senate), for the relief of Enid Louise MacDonald.-Mr. Porter.
Bill No. 213 (from the Senate), for the relief of Mary Theresa Maclsaac.-Mr. German.
Bill No. 208 (from the Senate), for the relief of Jane Edna Near.-Mr. Guthrie.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 224 (from the Senate), for the relief of John Samuel McDonnell.-Mr. Jacobs.
Bill No. 226 (from the Senate), for the relief of Mary Elizabeth Conkey.-Mr. Church.
Bill No. 227 (from the Senate), for the relief of Margaret Marie Pope.-Mr. White.
Bill No. 228 (from the Senate), for the relief of Loretta May Girard.-Mr. Hocken.
Bill No. 229 (from the Senate), for the relief of Birdena Frances Wallace LeMay. -Mr. Guthrie.

William Lyon Mackenzie King: I promised my hon. friend from Brandon (Mr. Forke) that we would take up the matter to which he referred this afternoon as soon as the private bills were disposed of. I understand it will be nine o'clock before the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) will be able to take his seat, and if my hon. friend from Brandon will allow that matter to stand till that time we will take it up then.


Robert Forke: All right.



FEEDING STUFFS ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
House again in committee on the resolution of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) to provide for the amendment of the Feeding Stuffs Act, Mr. Gordon in the Chair.
William Charles Good: It seems to me that the point raised before six o'clock is worth a little

Feeding Stuffs Act
further discussion, as to whether or not the miller should be permitted to incorporate any of the ground screenings in the mill offal.
I do not think this matter has received very much attentionTand I think it should receive further attention before the resolution is adopted.


William Richard Motherwell: I may say that
after six o'clock I took advantage of the opportunity of discussing this matter with a number of members opposite, including the hon. member for Glengarry (Mr. Kennedy) who is not in his seat and I understand will not be in the House this evening. I have the suggestion made by my colleague the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb), and the intimation that he did not think the resolution as drafted practicable with respe't to the mixing of screenings with shorts, especially under subclause 2 which says:
That no person shall manufacture pure shorts and shorts and mill screenings at the same mill.
That provision he thinks, as a practical miller, is impracticable, and I am disposed to give some heed to an authority of that nature, especially when it is accompanied by such a practical suggestion as that made by the' hon. member for Glengarry and Stormont (Mr. Kennedy), who suggests that all the by-products of the mill should be manufactured in their purity and sold in their purity. That is to say, we would have pure bran, pure shorts, pure middlings, and pure low grade flour. This is my suggestion: Inasmuch as the screenings are bought and paid for as wheat, millers should be permitted, in grinding those screenings, to mix with them any of those by-products that they may think are necessary in order to make those screenings acceptable to the market as long as they call the product screenings. In other words, these mill screenings, let us say, are ground and mixed with a portion of either bran or shorts or middlings, if the millers so desire. They will not mix middlings, because that is too expensive, but they may find it convenient to mix some shorts with the screenings. So long as they sell that as mill screenings, I can see no objection, particularly in view of the fact that they have bought and paid for the whole gross product as wheat. That is the alternative proposition. Because of its simplicity and the opinion of the Minister of Trade and Commerce that the present draft, with the exception of the first section, is not practicable, I should like to have the other suggestion of the hon. member for Glengarry discussed by the committee. If that is acceptable to the committee as a
practical solution after it has been discussed,
I am disposed to accept it.


Mr. CALDWELL:: I am pleased that the minister is inclined to accept the logical suggestion made by the hon. member for Glengarry (Mr. Kennedy), and I hope concurred in by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. I think this is the logical conclusion. There should be no objection to selling mill screenings if there is any feed value in them, but they should not be camouflaged as shorts or anything else. If the millers see fit to mix bran or shorts in the screenings to make the mixture more palatable and of a better feed value, I can see no objection to that, so long as it is sold as screenings; but I do object to screenings being sold as shorts, or as a mixture of shorts and screenings, because, though it is provided in the bill that they should use only the run of mill screenings in the shorts, that is the screenings taken from the wheat from which the shorts are made, I see a difficulty in carrying out the regulation. It would be almost impossible to carry it out, and I think the minister's suggestion is the logical solution of the situation.


Oliver Robert Gould: Before the House rose, I asked the minister a question concerning this. I might state that on all occasions when bills of this nature have come up, since I have had the honour of being in this House, I have protested against the conduct of millers in the past when they have mixed buckwheat, wild oats, and so forth, in bran, and have sold that as bran. I have been charged as high as S30 a ton for supposed bran which contained a large proportion of wild oats for which they paid nothing. It is a fact that milling companies in western Canada have their initial points throughout the country, and invariably their elevators are constructed without cleaning machinery. As a result of that, they gather in wild oats and buckwheat, which is prevalent and current in the West. They deduct the weight of this largely by guess, and no remuneration for this at all is offered to the individual, although they, in selling back feed stuffs put this value on it. I have protested against milling companies being allowed to use wild oats and even pigweed, and then returning the product to us as bran, shorts and various mill feeds, although they paid nothing for these things. As the minister explained this afternoon, these have a deleterious effect on young stock. With the provision that bran shall be sold as bran, and shorts as shorts, and the other by-products
Feeding Stuffs Act

similarly, possibly a provision might be incorporated that, as pigweed has not much milling value, it might be mentioned in the bill that pigweed could be screened out and whatever there might be in the way of other oats, tame oats, flax, wild buckweat, would make a very good commercial feeding stock to be sent back and sold as such. I commend the action of the minister in segregating the bran and shorts and things of that nature. I might protest that under the Grain Act milling companies at initial points, might be obliged to pay somewhat more for these foreign seeds found in grain, because milling companies which have gathering points on the prairies have an advantage over straight grain companies, in that not having cleaning facilities at their elevators throughout the West, they do not pay for these things.


Mr. MACLEAN (Halifax):: Is it correct
that wild oats are sown on the prairies?


Oliver Robert Gould: Wild oats have not been
particularly sown. Persons who sow wild oats do not boast of how many bushels they reap per acre. Some wild oats may make fair feed, but not for young calves.


Alan Webster Neill: I would go further than the
suggestion of the Minister of Agriculture. I would have not only the bran and shorts pure, but the screenings pure. There is no necessity to allow people who are selling screenings to mix shorts or anything else with them, even though they are going to be compelled to call that screenings. I know how soon an arrangement of that kind can enlarge itself, so to speak, and pretty soon there would be a great deal of shorts in it, and it would be called by some composite name, more or less calculated to deceive people. Let us have these things pure. Let those who want to buy or who have that class of stock that can eat screenings mixed with something else, buy it themselves and mix it themselves. Then the}^ will know what they are doing, and there will be no possibility of adulteration or fraud, or even of renovating. It is just as illogical to mix shorts and screenings, as, I dare say, to mix oleomargarine with butter and then sell it as butter.


William Richard Motherwell: My hon. friend
thinks that will appeal to me.


William Charles Good: I should like to suggest that the remarks of the hon. member for Comox-Albcrni (Mr Neill) should be given serious attention. I can very easily see how the opening might be used for the gradual ad-

mixture of various products with the screenings, disguising them and probably defeating the very object we have in view. It seems to me that the legislation contemplated is, in the main, admirable. It is something that has been needed for a long time, and I should like to endorse it very much. The minister, however, might go just a little further and make it necessary for those who wish to feed screenings, to do their own mixing, and not to have the mixing done at the point of manufacture. I might mention, too, in that connection, that I think it is very necessary to have these screenings tagged-probably that is compulsory anyway-with tags stating the composition of the feed. I should like to know also whether or not provision is made for the elimination of unpalatable and poisonous weeds from these screenings. Is there any law applying to that?


William Richard Motherwell: The argument of
the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill) seems quite logical on the surface, but when one remembers that these screenings are bought and paid for as wheat it would seem to partake of the nature of poetic justice that the millers should be allowed when grinding the screenings to mix with them a proportion of shorts in order to produce a better compound for the market. I am not an advocate of the millers, but I certainly do not think that we should go so far in our restrictions as to hurt unreasonably not only them but ourselves, in refusing to concede to them what I regard as nothing but an elementary right. There is a certain amount of dockage in wheat no matter how excellent in quality it may be, and I do not think it is too much to ask that the millers should be allowed to mix with the screenings some amount of shorts to make it more acceptable to the market. I know that there are certain screenings that cannot be improved by any addition of bran or shorts, but there are others that possibly might be improved by the admixture, and I cannot see any objection to the permission to the millers so to mix their screenings, provided that the product is sold as soich. As I say, I am not advocating the cause of the millers and I merely put forward this suggestion with a view to eliciting the opinions of the committee. We are interested in seeing that justice is done everybody, and at the same time we want to be fair to ourselves.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I suppose this might be
called "renovated feed?"


William Richard Motherwell: I do not know.

Feeding Stuffs Act


Mr. HALBERT:: I want to support the
minister in the proposal he makes. We must be fair to everyone and if the millers desire to turn out a certain grade of screenings I do not see that there can be any harm in their being permitted to add a certain amount of shorts so long as they label the article as screenings. The millers want to bring the stuff up to the market demands, and what the minister suggests is, I think, only fair.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: I want to impress upon the minister as forcefully as I can the necessity when making regulations to insist that all screenings shall be ground as finely as possible. There are certain noxious weeds which are very small and are exceedingly difficult to grind. This is true particularly of mustard seed, and the regulations should provide that the grinding shall be so thorough as to preclude all possibility of these noxious weeds passing into the feed with the likelihood afterwards of germination.


Alan Webster Neill: I can see no necessity, from any sense of poetic or any other form of justice, for granting the request of the millers that they be allowed to mix shorts with their screenings. I have a long experience with the habits and methods of millers from the point of view of the purchaser and I am not a bit afraid that they will fall into bad financial waters through any such act. They are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, and we need have no concern about them so far as this matter is concerned. This proposed adulteration will work out, as adulteration in all cases works out, in this way. The agent of the milling company comes along and says: "We have a nice line of stuff we call screenings at $20 a ton." The dealer says, "Well, that is a big price to ask for it because you don't pay anything for the stuff except the price of the sack and the filling of it." "Oh," he says, "but there is 50, 60, 70 per cent of shorts in it. While we call it screenings to comply with the law it is really mostly shorts, and the mixture is so much better." Now, no one will know exactly how much shorts the screenings will contain, because the percentage will not be marked on the sacks, and you will really buy a pig in a poke, as the saying is. The fact is that nobody will know what he is getting if this mixture is permitted, whereas if the screenings were sold by themselves the consumer could mix it to suit himself. Young pigs will require a different food from that which is given to older animals, and the main thing is to sell a pure article. This principle animated hon. members in discussing the question of oleomargarine. Hon. gentlemen were opposed
to any adulteration creeping into the manufacture of butter, and the same thing should apply here. There is no question whatever about justice in the matter; if the millers have bran to sell let them sell it as bran; if they have screenings to sell let it be so labelled. But do not allow any adulteration.


Oliver Robert Gould: The hon. member for Victoria and Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) expressed the same opinion I hold in regard to noxious weeds. It is a well-known fact that in the grinding of mill feeds the smaller weed seeds are not crushed, especially mustard seed, with the result that they are capable of germination subsequently. I think that mustard seeds should be eliminated from the feeds. These seeds are a burden and an expense to the man who ships them and milling companies naturally look upon them as a nuisance unless they can be allowed to re-ship them in some other form. The Minister of Agriculture knows very well that to send these seeds back to the country is merely to intensify and perpetuate a menace. I think that the bill should provide at least that the percentage of these seeds that are included in mill feeds shall be stated. This principle was embodied in a bill which was discussed in the Agriculture committee on a former occasion, and I believe it is an important safeguard. With regard to the question of mixing bran and shorts in screenings, I think the sense of the committee is rather against the suggestion. If there is to be sold good shorts properly milled and kept dry I do not think there will be any difficulty in securing a good market for it.


William Richard Motherwell: To meet the consensus of opinion in the committee in regard to paragraph (c) of the resolution, I move that it be amended by striking out the word "pure" in the first line, and the words "shorts and mill screenings," and inserting after the word "flour" the words "or screenings," so that the paragraph will read:
-the bran, shorts, middlings, feed, flour or screenings meet the requirements, etc.
With regard to the matter raised by my hon. friend from Comox-Albemi, that is something that will be dealt with by regulation and we shall try to meet his views as far as possible.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
William Richard Motherwell: I move that we strike out sub-paragraph (d) and paragraph 2, because they are contingent upon the first paragraph and can be dispensed with now. Then paragraph 3 will become paragraph 2.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Petroleum Inspection Act
[Stage Direction]
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in. Mr. Motherwell thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 233 to amend the Feeding Stuffs Act.
Motion agfeed to and bill read the first time.
Hewitt Bostock: When shall the bill be read a second time?


William Richard Motherwell: With the consent of the House, Mr. Speaker, now.


Hewitt Bostock: By unanimous consent.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: When does the act come into effect?


William Richard Motherwell: In the absence of any stipulated time it comes into effect when assented to, I understand.


William Charles Good: We have no copies of the bill, Mr. Speaker.
Motion agreed to and bill read the second time and the House went into committee thereon, Air. Gordon in the chan.
Progress reported.



PETROLEUM AND NAPHTHA INSPECTION ACT AMENDMENT

Jacques Bureau: Mr. Speaker, this afternoon the bill to amend the Petroleum and Naphtha Inspection Act was given second reading, and then you thought it advisable to postpone the committee stage until later during the sitting. I think we might take up the bill now.


Hewitt Bostock: By unanimous consent.
Mr. BUREAU moved that the House go into committee on Bill 238 to amend the Petroleum and Naphtha Inspection Act.
Alotion agreed to and the House went into committee on the bill, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Regulations for sale and use of naphtha for illuminating purposes.


Mr. GARDINER:: Can we have this bill distributed?


The CHAIRMAN:: There are only proof prints here. I will read the sections.


Jacques Bureau: Naphtha is not sold for
illuminating purposes now except under certain regulations for street lighting or whenever the vapour of naphtha can be used from tanks placed outside the building. There has been a lamp on the market for a number of years called the Coleman lamp, in which naphtha can be used without any dan-

ger whatever according to reports of experts, but as the law stands you cannot buy naphtha for this lamp. These amendments are intended to do away with this disability by giving the Governor in Council power to control the sale of naphtha.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Alarine and Fisheries) moved that Bill No. 236, to amend The Canada Shipping Act, be read the second time.
Motion agreed to and bill considered in committee and reported.
Mr. LAPOINTE moved that the bill be read the third time.
Thomas Wakem Caldwell: Will the minister explain the provisions of this bill?


Mr. LAPOINTE:: I gave the explanation yesterday. The law as it is gives the Governor in Council power to suspend the coastal laws as applying to vessels of a foreign country which extends similar privileges to Canadian vessels. We are asking the power to suspend the coastal laws in other circumstances in cases of emergency when it is in the interests of the Canadian people that such action should be taken. The coastal laws have been suspended on two or three occasions in a way that was hardly legal, and that has demonstrated the necessity for this amendment.


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. A. ROBB (Minister of Trade and Commerce) moved that Bill No. 235, with respect to Freight Rates for the Carriage of Grain by Lake and River Navigation, be read the second time.
Robert Gardiner: Has the bill been distributed, Mr. Speaker?


James Alexander Robb: Yes. -


Robert Gardiner: I suggest that if any other bills that have not been distributed to the members of the House are to be considered to-night, they should be immediately placed before us so that we shall know what we are voting for.


Hewitt Bostock: I understand that copies of this bill were distributed this afternoon.

Lake Grain Rates


Mr. E. J. McMURRAY (North Winnipeg):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Centre Vancouver (Mr. Stevens) spoke truly last evening when he said that this bill was one of paramount importance and should receive the careful consideration of the House. 9 p.m. At the outset I may say that I am entirely in accord with the action of the government in bringing forward this much-needed measure, and I extend to the government and to the hon. minister who is fathering the bill my congratulations for their courage in taking this step. Undoubtedly they are dealing with large and powerful interests that are dominated by prominent men in this country; they are dealing with a subject which must, as the minister himself said, present considerable difficulty so far as legislation bearing upon it is concerned. The people of Canada are to be 1 congratulated that the government, upon these matters being put before them, moved promptly and with despatch. It is courageous legislation, and the result of its enactment should be greatly beneficial to the people of western Canada in particular and to the people of Canada as a whole. The rates affecting the transport of the products of that part of our country which is far removed from its market, situated as it is in the centre of this wide continent-freight rates by rail and by lake- constitute one of the most important problems that we in the West have to deal with.
It is quite appropriate that the Liberal party, which broke the Canadian Pacific Railway monopoly by the effecting of the Crowsnest pass arrangement in 1897, an arrangement which was practically re-established last year, should, upon accession to power in these latter times, break the shipping monopoly that had fastened itself upon the people of western Canada. But the present government have gone further than that: During this session they have enacted an anti-combine bill, a measure that will enable those administering the criminal law to secure the necessary evidence in connection with any alleged combine. Under the criminal law as it existed the great difficulty was that you could not get the evidence, but under the anti-combine bill the evidence can be procured if a case exists. That, together with the bill that has just been passed enabling us to bring in legitimate competition against those who are dealing unfairly in the matter of privileges they enjoy under our shipping laws, should be ample protection, so far as the Great Lakes are concerned, to the producers of western Canada and should result in benefit to the whole Dominion.
There was appointed in February of this year, following the reports made to the government, a royal commission composed of three able men. Mr. Levi Thomson, a man who had lived for long years in western Canada, a man thoroughly familiar with the grain trade, a man who had had parliamentary experience and also was trained in the reception and weighing of evidence, was on that commission-undoubtedly a very suitable appointment. Mr. McLean was also there, a man with experience in dealing with rates; and Mr. Tremblay, a business man. Now, it was suggested last night in the course of the debate that this board should be composed of shippers who knew something of the shipping trade. That was not necessary at all, because the shipping interests were represented by the very ablest counsel that money could procure. All the facts that they could possibly present in their favour were laid before this commission. The government was represented by an able western counsel, a man of great experience in rate matters, a man whose practice for the last four or five years had been very wide in that particular field. That gentleman knew exactly where to go to get evidence, and how to bring it before the commission. So that, after all, it is not a question of the knowledge of the commissioners themselves. If you get fair-minded men, of moderate and reasonable view, men of sound and capable judgment, who can weigli and appraise the evidence brought before them by experts you make a judicious choice. In that respect the government selected, very wisely, an able commission, a commission against whom no charge of partiality could be advanced; and those hon. members who have read that commission's report will find that the statements made therein are moderate, reasonable, thoughtful and fair. There is in it nothing extreme, nothing unusual; the report is judicial in tone and judicial in language and thought.
Now, the story which the report of that commission unfolds is one of the most remarkable stories of trade and commerce ever told in this or any other country. The Great Lakes afford the only real outlet for our grain because the cost of transportation by rail is, as you all know', too high to permit it to be used entirely as a roadway for that grain. Some thirteen or fourteen years ago two enterprising young Duteh-Americans by the name of Wolvin, -who had had their training in the western United States and were operating from Duluth, came up into Canada and in company with one Norcross engaged in shipping on the Great Lakes. They gradually worked up a combination and this monopoly
Lake Grain Rates

became very strong. For thirteen years it grew stronger and stronger, and bolder and bolder as each year went by. Finally, apparently undaunted by anything, they imposed on the shippers and producers of western Canadi extortionate and unusual freight rates which culminated last year in discrimination against the very country that gave them its protection under its shipping rules. Finally there was created an organization which proceeded to intimidate its victims whom it compelled to take shipping space at its own rates over their own lakes. Like a leech or a weasel ;t fastened itself on the main artery of western Canada's trade and proceeded to bleed the West and the western producer slowly to death. Not only was that the prospect in sight, but there was even the likelihood of competing Canadian shipping being driven from our Great Lakes as Van Tromp the countryman of the Wolvins, once boasted he would drive British shipping from the seas.
The evidence shows that the method pursued by this company was to secure the cooperation of the Canada Steamships Limited. The Canada Steamships Limited was formed on the 17th June, 1913, with its head office in Montreal, and an authorized capital of $25,000,000. Among the directors we find the names of prominent men, at least one of whom is a member of this House, and another the head of the Canadian National Railways at this time.


Mr. DUFF:: Sir Henry Thornton is a director.


Edward James McMurray: Yes, and R. M. Wol-vin, one of the individuals to whom I have alluded. There was formed in Winnipeg about the same time a company known as the Standard Shipping Company. The latter entered into an arrangement with the $25,000,000 company, the Canada Steamships Limited. This arrangement was most unusual in the shipping trade in the fact that it was reduced to writing. The purport of the contract was that this company, with headquarters in Winnipeg, was to have the sole right, so far as Canada Steamships Limited was concerned, to charter all space upon its vessels. In return for this it was to be given insurance placed upon all cargoes. These companies insisted that all grain shipped should be insured. There was an insurance company in the United States with whom every man in the West, who is shipping grain, was obliged to place his insurance, and this insurance was set at just twice the rate which could be obtained in other places. The loss incurred by all those who shipped grain .was very large. I think the United Grain Grow-
[ Mr. McMurray.]
ers last year claimed they lost $36,000 by being compelled to take this insurance; and the total loss in respect of all shippers ran into thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars.


William Duff: Do the grain shippers of the West simply insure their grain from Fort William to Montreal, or do they have a through rate from Winnipeg to Liverpoo1 or some other point on the other side?


Edward James McMurray: My understanding is, the rate is from Fort William to the port on the lakes to which the grain is shipped. If it is going to Port Colborne the rate is to that place; if to Montreal the rate is to that port.


William Duff: Why do they not get through insurance from Fort William to Liverpool?


Edward James McMurray: The Standard Shipping Company, to which I have just referred will not permit them to do so.


William Duff: What do you mean by the Standard Shipping Company?


Edward James McMurray: The Standard Shipping Company is the company in Winnipeg which made this bargain with the Canada Steamships Limited that they would insure all the cargoes that were placed on board its vessels. Now, a singular thing in connection with this matter is, that before the contract would expire-I think it was to expire 1928 -it was renewed for another period of twelve years, so that it would not terminate until 1940, the full intention being that this monopoly that had been settled upon by the shippers of western Canada was to be continued for a long period of time. The commission found as a fact that a combination existed. They found that these various shipping companies on the lakes met in Toronto on the 4th of May and entered into what the commission found to be a combine. Then they met on the 8th May; and again on the 28th July they met in the city of New York. Their finding was that there was a combination. What did this combination do? They first exacted a tribute from the people of western Canada of double insurance on every cargo sent out. They discriminated against Canadian ports. They shipped from Fort William to Buffalo at a lower rate than they would ship from Fort William to the Georgian bay ports, although there was a difference in distance in favour of the Georgian bay ports of 316 miles. These rates were found to be actually fixed at the meeting to which I refer, and confirmed at a subsequent

Lake Grain Rates
meeting. Apparently all the shipping interests on those lakes were in this combination. We find them going so far that a grain buyer, I think it was in Chicago, declared that he would not be held up under these conditions at all, and proposed to charter a boat, to send it up to the head of the lakes, and bring down the grain independently of them. This proposal was met by a warning given to the shippers in Winnipeg that they would have difficulty in securing space for the shipment of grain. Probably it was not in those words, but to that effect. It would be interesting to read the summary of the findings of this commission. The first thing they find is as follows:
In the opinion of your commission a tacit understanding between these operators as to those rates existed during the whole season, and measures should be taken to prevent its continuation.
The second thing they found was:
Rates on grain between Canadian ports were discriminatory as compared with rates charged by Canadian operators on grain and other bulk freight between Canadian and United States ports, and as compared with those charged by American operators on grain and other bulk freight between United States ports.
It was contended by the shipping companies, as suggested by my hon. friend from Comox-Albemi (Mr. Neill), in his illustrations before the House last night, that this discrimination might be caused by congestion in the ports, but in the fourth paragraph of the summary of the findings of the commission they say:
Congestion was as bad at Buffalo as at Port Col-borne, and was worse than at Bay ports; Therefore, discrimination cannot be justified by congestion.
Another contention set up by these shippers was that the advantage was with the American ports and that the vessels going in could operate at a lower rate on account of the fact that there was a return cargo

that was coal-going northwards; but the evidence showed that coal only constituted on this occasion some 22 per cent, and I think over a period of years some 29 per cent; so that all these vessels were coming back light, American as well as Canadian, and the concluding words of the commissioners were as follows:
It would seem, however, that in general, the advantage possessed by the American vessel in respect of coal is not so great as represented.
As an offset to that the commission state in paragraph 7 of their finding:
On the other hand, it has been admitted that labour costs were lower on the Canadian side than on the American.
They find these rates were unjustifiably high, and in paragraph 8 they say:
After making due allowance for additional cost of operating and handling to which the grain was subject, but which did not apply to ore and coal, there is still an excess of earnings from the transportation of grain between Canadian ports over earnings from the carriage of other bulk freight, which shows high and unjustifiable rates.
Then they say in paragraph 9:
The increase of the 1922 rates over those of 1921 by Canadian vessel operators was so great as to be high and unjustifiable.
Paragraph 11 reads:
The season of 1922 was characterized by high levets of rates which cannot but have been detrimental to all those engaged in the production and disposal of grain.
They found that it was injurious to the farmer who produced the grain, and the reason for that was forcibly explained yesterday by the hon. member for Saltcoats (Mr. Sales). Paragraph 11 continues:
And it is therefore essential that through control of the upper levels of rates the competitive principle which has been relied upon by parliament in the case of water transportation should be permitted to be operative.
That is there must be free competition on the lakes. Paragraph 12 of the report reads:
The difficulties in the way of controlling rates on lake-borne grain are such that your commission is of the opinion that the only feasible method of rate control through a regulative tribunal is through maximum rates.
They have considered apparently, as they naturally would, all the possibilities of restoring competition among the shipping interests, and they came to the conclusion that the only possible release that could be given would be by the fixing of a maximum rate. They also suggest the power to suspend the coastal laws in respect to the grain trade be conferred upon the Governor in Council. It is suggested in this connection that the Dominion Bureau of Statistics should keep statistical records of the port cargoes in the coasting trade, such records to be based on returns from the vessel or vessel companies operating. As the bill was just put in my hands a short time ago, I do not know what provision there is for the suspending of these coastal laws. My own impression is that these coastal laws should be suspended on recommendation made to the government by the board or commission which deals with these rates. I believe that that would be a fair thing, because we are putting the control of this matter in the hands of an independent tribunal. We are giving them power independently of parliament to fix the

Lake Grain Rates

rates. Why should we not also give them power to lift the coastal shipping regulations. It is possible that we are lifting this matter as far as possible out of politics. It is said that we have lifted our railways out of the control of politics, in order that they may be fairly and properly operated in the interest of the people; and I submit that it would give satisfaction to the people of this country to feel that there was a tribunal independent of parliament, independent of the people and of these shipping companies, to deal with the question of the lifting of these coastal laws. It is in the interest of the government itself to prevent any criticism that might be fairly levelled against it through some misunderstanding on the part of the people of Canada, if they thought the coasting laws should not be lifted. A charge might be made against the government in the future, and the government be absolutely innocent. But if there is an independent body that has the confidence of all concerned in the country, that charge would not be levied against the government; the government would consequently be in a better position, and the people of Canada would be fully satisfied. I do not know whether that clause is in the bill or not; I have not read the bill; but speaking for myself, I would respectfully urge the minister and the government to give it consideration.
The commission points out the inequality of this insurance "hold-up." I use a common term, an opprobrious term, but that is the correct term to use. I am glad to see that the minister has inserted in his bill a drastic and strong provision, malting it prohibitive for a chartering broker to have anything to do at all with placing insurance. It was charged in our Banking committee not long ago that banks are interfering with the functions of insurance, and compelling people who placed their securities with them for loans, to insure through .them. That is absolutely unfair in this case. A man shipping his grain should have the right to go out into the market and to buy insurance in open competition if such can be had.
Some questions have been raised in connection with this bill by hon. members on this side of the House. The senior member for Halifax (Mr. Maclean), last evening expressed a sentiment, that is no doubt believed in by many members on both sides of the House, when he enunciated the old doctrine of "laissez faire" of the Manchester School of economics, holding that legislation cannot ultimately correct; that the only corrective thing can be competition. I would remind my hon. friend that in the days
{Mr. McMurray.l
when the Manchester School flourished, England was reaching out for wider and wider markets, and competition existed in the effort to secure those wider markets. A great change has come over the economic world since then. Large combinations in restraint of trade have come into existence. The principle of watered stock now exists, and as regards practical measures, the doctrines of Cobden, Bright and John Stuart Mill are almost useless1 when it comes to devising an instrument curtailing monopolies that exist to-day. The condition is exceptional in that w'e have a monopoly, like that of the old German robber barons of the Rhine, who levied toll on all who passed up and down the river, controlling the single outlet for our grain, and I do not believe that if those members of the Manchester School were situated as the people of Canada are to-day they would contend that the doctrine of "laissez faire" applies or could apply. Can you tolerate licensed robbery under an economic doctrine of "laissez faire?"


Mr. SALES:: Does the hon. member wish
to infer that there is watered stock in the Canada Steamships1 Company?


Edward James McMurray: Does the hon. member suggest that there is not?


Thomas Sales: I did not. I was asking the hon. member.


Edward James McMurray: If I suggested it?


Thomas Sales: Yes.


Edward James McMurray: I made no suggestion
at all. I said simply that they had $25,000,000 worth of stock. My hon. friend can draw his own conclusions.
The second point made by the senior member for Halifax, was that he doubted the legality of this measure which we now are placing on the statute books. I gathered from his speech that he had two points, first, that this is not sound economics; second, that it is not legal. He did not state in what the illegality consisted, but I presume he thought it was an interference by the Dominion government with matters that were purely provincial. I do not think lake Superior or lake Huron is part and parcel of the province of Ontario. They are Dominion waters; they are international waters, and navigation, laws belong solely to the Dominion. I respectfully contend, because I have a very high opinion of my hon. friend's standing as a lawyer, that in this he is wrong. In my opinion if the government has jurisdiction anywhere, it is in regard to navigation on inland waters. I would go further and say that if there is any

Lake Grain Rates
42S1
doubt at all about the matter, we shall put the law into force and let the other fellow, the monopolist, fight it.
The hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens), feared that we could not fix rates from American ports to Canadian ports and vice versa. He seems to think, if I gathered his remarks correctly, that there was a danger of driving this shipping from Canada.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am not affirming or denying whether that is correct or not. I did not make the argument or the deduction which my hon. friend makes.


Edward James McMurray: Did he simply raise the query then, that that might happen?


Henry Herbert Stevens: I made the statement that we could not fix rates between a Canadian port and an American port, or between an American port and a Canadian port, and that that would affect the usefulness of the measure.


Edward James McMurray: Then I misunderstood my hon. friend's argument. What we can do is this, we can fix rates that will be fair and reasonable. The tribunal appointed will, I submit, be composed of men of reputation for fairness and ability. They will probably have associated with them an efficient staff that will gather all data that is needed in order to arrive at a right and proper rate. I think the shipping interests need have no fear whatever that they will not receive at the hands of this properly-appointed tribunal, fair and proper treatment. If they are treated fairly and properly, there need be no fear of their discriminating against Canada. As a matter of fact, they cannot discriminate against Canada more than they have done already. Even if there is danger of their withdrawing from operation in Canada, there exists in this country a condition of affairs that no self-respecting government, when the facts are laid before them, can possibly tolerate any longer, and the government must act in the matter irrespective of consequences. The government must not be intimidated by any argument of that nature.
This combine that had the audacity to charge these terrific rates and to impose an illegal and altogether improper insurance on the shipper had the temerity to intimidate the people of Winnipeg. There is a series of interesting telegrams that passed between the members of this combine. They appear at page 19 of the report and I think that in all fairness to those who may come after us they should be placed on Hansard so that there may be no misapprehension if the subject
ever comes up again for discussion. These telegrams display the same intimidating attitude to those who had the courage to appeal to this government for protection against the injustice and the predatory measures practised against them. When one reads and carefully studies this report, when one ponders the evidence, one is appalled at the boldness of these men who secured control of the only shipping channel for our western grain. The name "Wolvin" is significant, and it is difficult for anyone to speak dispassionately and calmly as he realizes that significance in its fullest extent. The nearest synonym that I can suggest for it, if it has any English equivalent, would be the word "wolverine." The wolverine is described as a "voracious, sagacious and ferocious animal," and apparently these men exhibited all these qualities, because they were certainly voracious, they were undoubtedly sagacious, and to the shippers of western Canada they were beyond any question "ferocious." Hon. members will realize the audacity of this whole matter when they read the telegrams that were exchanged, as disclosed in this report. Mr. Emderby, of the Canada Steamship Lines, despatched the following message to Mr. L. H. Wolvin, the man handling the Standard Steamship Companies in Winnipeg which collected this illegal insurance. The telegram is dated September 27, 1922:
Better get those instructions to Winnipeg in writing about booking no more cargoes until this coasting law question settled. Our agreement was now (no?) new business. Make your instructions to them absolutely definite.
That is to say, if the government delayed in settling this coasting law question they would hold up the entire grain movement at . the head of the lakes. On September 15, 1922, the following telegram was sent:
L. H. Wolvin, Esq.,
Central Shipping Co.,
Postal Telegraph Bldg.,
Chicago, 111.
We are not chartering any more Canadian boats for September loading. Think it best to clean up what we have and if we have open space we can get pretty nbarly whatever we ask for it. We are doing some October but thought perhaps we had better hold off on this also except with Sid Smith he is figuring half million lastaff abstract which we should supply him and then raise rate. Answer.
W. W. Hall.
This man had to get his grain out on the market and he started to curry favour with these shipping barons; so he was to be given an opportunity of getting his half million out before the rates were raised. On October 3, we find the following telegram from the same man, Hall:
Lake Grain Rates

L. H. Wolvin, Esq.,
c/o R. A. & W. M. Williams,
Kirby Bldg.,
Cleveland, Ohio.
Hope you are able to advise us soon with regard to ore and want to point out to you that before taking care of O'Donahue we had better take care of Sid Smith who was first to wire Minister of Marine this morning at length explaining situation as it really is with regard to shipping, and he is as badly in need of tonnage to fill his sales as any other shipper in the building and will be in very bad hole if we cannot help him out on some grain on or before tenth. He just showed the difference between willingness to help us and careless attitude that most of others had.
W. W. Hall.
All this occurred in Canada, and it is nothing but straight intimidation. These people dared to punish those who would not openly advocate the rates under which they themselves were operating.


Mr. MARTELL:: Does not my hon. friend believe that people who own shipping should have a right to barter in the market for the highest possible price for their commodity, and if they refuse to accept any other than their own price should they be compelled to do so? In other words, ought not the matter to be regulated by the law of supply and demand?


Edward James McMurray: In open competition,
yes; but not under combines, which are illegal.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Where has any combine been proven?


Edward James McMurray: If the hon. member had been listening to me for the last forty minutes he would agree, I think, that it has been absolutely proven.


Lewis Herbert Martell: I should like the hon. gentleman to state in two or three words where there has been proved to be a conspiracy .1 restraint of trade.


Edward James McMurray: The hon. gentleman
evidently has not read the report of the com-rmssion. If he has, then his memory is foggy.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Not in the least.


Edward James McMurray: The very first paragraph in the summary states that there was a combine:
-and in the opinion of your commission a tacit understanding between these operators as to those rates existed during the whole season, and measures should be taken to prevent its continuation.
I have not found that there was a combine; the tribunal appointed to consider the question unanimously decided that there was.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Who were the practical shipping men on the commission?


Edward James McMurray: I went into that question before the hon. member came in.


Lewis Herbert Martell: I am not trying to offer any factious opposition.


Edward James McMurray: There is one more telegram I want to put on record. On October 11, 1922, there was a telegram from L. H. Wolvin, Cleveland, Ohio, to W. W. Hall, Winnipeg, as follows:
OKay Smith's Bay charter. Keep this strictly confidential. Do not want to offer Stewart anything just now account of Ottawa. Where can I telegraph Stewart?
Stewart was the man in Winnipeg who had the courage and the backbone to protest against this combine and to appeal to the government for protection. Smith, who was the first to wire tire Minister of Marine, was to have protection; he was to be taken care of by these concerns. But Stewart, the manly man, the man who had the courage to stand up and fight for himself as a man should, was to be punished. I should like to see the telegram that Sid Smith sent to the Minister of Marine.
Now, Mr. Speaker, there is disclosed in this very brief report, which is evidently written by reasonable and fair-minded men, such an appalling condition of affairs as I do not think has ever before existed either in this country or in the United States. No school of economics can justify this abuse or apply a remedy; parliament itself must intervene. Who is going to compete against this gigantic organization known as the Canada Steamships Company with its S25,000,000 capital in ships? One company that did try in Winnipeg was intimidated and told it could not get space. The head of that company, rich and wealthy though he was, and a powerful magnate in the United States, could not get his grain down the lakes, and I presume he had either to cancel his contract or take space at the rates dictated by the combination. Where such a combination is in absolute control, and there can be no competition, can any hon. member seriously and honestly argue, whether he be committed to the policy of free trade and the doctrine of the Manchester School -and I believe in it very strongly myself, but I recognize that changing conditions have modified its applicability and, indeed, made it impossible of application, such as when strong forces absolutely shut out competition [DOT]-can any hon. member contend for a moment that the government should not intervene? I do not think so, I feel confident that he will agree with me in my submission that the government must take action. In the United States government control is exer-

Lake Grain Rates
cised on the regular routes by virtue of the Alexander Act, which is referred to in this report. Even with this limited jurisdiction the commission finds that competition is kept alive on the American side, but it found no evidence of any competition on the Canadian side.
I congratulate the government upon having the courage to introduce legislation that will,
I believe, curb these great and powerful interests, prevent their again exacting extortionate rates from our shippers in the West, and put an end to the discrimination which those interests have exercised against our ports in favour of American ports. I do not think that this legislation will drive our grain away from its natural outlet down the St. Lawrence river to Montreal and Quebec. It is undoubtedly in the interests of western Canada, as well as of Montreal and Quebec, it is undoubtedly in the interests of all people, including our millers, that this combine should be broken. I do not think that we may have to deal with it harshly. I think that the publicity which will attend the work of investigation and examination by the Grain Commission, coupled with the power of suspending the coasting laws, will effectually curb this combine without inflicting any injury upon it.
I feel that criminal proceedings should be taken against these men who have so flagrantly and audaciously defied the laws of this country-the very laws that gave them protection and enabled them to operate their business. When the labouring men of Canada were charged with illegally combining-as happened in western Canada a few years ago -the Dominion government did not hesitate to invade the jurisdiction of the province of Manitoba and insist upon their trial. I think this Liberal government should deal feat-lessly with large interests, no matter how powerful they may be, in the same way a3 they deal with the humblest citizen in the land when occasion demands it. The question came up last night as to where the jurisdiction lay for prosecution. As was properly stated by the Acting Minister of National Defence (Mr. Macdonald), the criminal law of Canada is administered by the provinces. I believe that the criminal prosecution undertaken in Winnipeg by the Dominion government serveral years ago was a most unusual invasion of the provincial field and was done under the War Measures Act. This government to-day cannot come into the province and prosecute this combine without invading provincial rights. The province of Manitoba has full jurisdiction to arraign its citizens for misdemeanours against the state, a jurisdiction which is common to all the provinces, and would not tolerate any invasion of its jurisdiction by the Dominion authorities. It would be a breach of the constitution for the Dominion government to attempt such invasion. In a word, while we desire to punish T,hese men severely, we must ourselves respect the law of the land. But there is nothing to hinder the government laying criminal charges against these men in the proper courts of Manitoba, and then it rests with the attorney general of the province to proceed. I am sure that so far as western Canada is concerned, the attorneys general would co-operate with the Minister of Justice in any criminal proceedings that may be considered advisable.
I think the men forming this oppressive combine should be dealt with under the criminal law. Such a course would be a step towards wiping out this stain on Canada's honour. And I am confident that the men in question would receive a fair trial in our criminal courts. I am also confident that the passing of this legislation wall ensure fair treatment of our shipping interests. Therefore I am strongly in favour of the bill with the exception which I have mentioned.


Mr. L. P. BANCROFT (Selkirk):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for North Winnipeg (Mr. McMurray) has read some very interesting telegrams regarding the combine: on the Great Lakes, but there is one message that the hon. member did not read, and as I am sure it will interest the House I propose to put it on Hansard. It is from Mr. Roy Wolvin to his Winnipeg agents, and reads as follows:
Nye Jenks-	.
This is the Chicago firm.
-working for another cargo Chicago-Buffalo, trying to write their own insurance.
This is the crime.
I am getting very tired of trying to uphold the situation of the vessel-broker. We are in a wonderful position to break every vessel-agent on the lakes, and I w'ant you to notify our Winnipeg agents that if one of them produces a boat to load at Chicago that I am absolutely through and will do business for nothing until everyone of them are out of the game, which you know I can do and will do. Solicit them all. Show them this telegram and tell them I mean every word I say.
I just wanted to add this to the telegram? lead by the hon. member.


Mr. CAHILL:: Who signed that?


Leland Payson Bancroft: Roy Wolvin.


William Duff: The bill introduced this evening in pursuance of the resolution moved by the Minister of Trade
Lake Grain Rates

and Commerce (Mr. Robb) last night purports to regulate freight rates for the carriage of grain by lake and river navigation. Before that bill passes I would like to express my views in regard to it. Last evening the hon. leader of the Progressive party (Mr. Forke), referring to some of the ships of the Canadian Government Merchant Marine carrying grain on the Great Lakes, made the witty remark that he saw I was waking up. Well, Sir, I not only woke up on that occasion but I have been rubbing my eyes a good deal since. When I read this resolution on the order paper and had a chance to read the bill which was submitted by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) I rubbed my eyes and wondered exactly where I was. I remember that three or four years ago in different sessions of this House, Mr. J. E. Armstrong, then a member of this parliament, introduced a resolution providing for the regulating of freight rates on the Great Lakes. At that time Mr. Armstrong was sitting on one side of the House and the present Minister of Trade and Commerce and a number of gentlemen now sitting on this side were occupying benches opposite. I listened at that time with a great deal of interest to the able speeches Mr. Armstrong made in his attempts to prove to the government and parliament of that day that freight rates should be regulated, and I listened also with interest to the speeches made by my political friends sitting with me on the opposite side. As I say, I have been rubbing my eyes to-night, as I realize that the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce is trying to regulate freight rates on the Great Lakes. The party which I supported two or three years ago, in different speeches, opposed Mr. Armstrong's motion, and, I think I am correct in saying, voted against him on more than one occasion.


Edward James McMurray: The conditions have become worse since then.


William Duff: It is all very well to say that, but to my mind the conditions are no worse today than they were then.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


William Duff: It is not a matter of fixing the freight rates; it is a matter of getting after the combines. I want to say right here and now, with all due respect to the different hon. members who have spoken in favour of the resolution and the bill which is now introduced based upon it, that they have not put up one argument in favour of fixing the rates. Any argument they did put up that had any force was in favour of getting after the combines, and I am with them as far as they want 
to go in that regard. But neither the hon. member for North Winnipeg (Mr. McMur-ray), the leader of the Progressive party, nor any other hon. member who spoke on this question proved to my satisfaction that it was necessary to fix rates on the Great Lakes; what they did prove was that a combine existed between different shipping companies on the Great Lakes. Well, just a few 10 p.m. days ago we introduced a combines bill, and I say that if there is a combine the government should go after these men and prevent a recurrence of what has been happening during the last few years. But the various speakers kept clear of any argument in favour of the fixing of rates on the Great Lakes. Their whole case was based on the alleged existence of combines; their whole wail was that these steamship companies had amalgamated to fix rates and to make the shippers pay double rates of insurance, and that there also was a combine in regard to the brokerage and the making of arrangements respecting cargoes for the 1 different boats. That was their whole argument.


Mr. MILLAR:: May I ask my hon. friend a question?


William Duff: I suppose so.


John Millar: 
William Duff: I do not know why my hon. friend asks me that question. All I have said is this, that in their speeches to which I have had the pleasure of listening, the hon. member for North Winnipeg, the leader of the Progressive party and others have made out no case for the fixing of rates by the government on the Great Lakes or anywhere else. I did say that those speeches had proved that there was a combine, that different vessel owners on the Great Lakes had combined to fix rates and to make shippers insure their cargoes with them; and I say that condition should be remedied. It is the duty of the government to try to remedy it if at all possible.


Edward James McMurray: May I ask my learned friend a question?


William Duff: I am not your learned friend.


Edward James McMurray: My hon. friend-I beg his pardon.


William Duff: I am a sea lawyer.


Edward James McMurray: May I ask my hon. friend what he would require in the form of

Lake Grain Rates
evidence to satisfy him as to the necessity for fixing rates?


William Duff: That is rather a large order. Some hon. MEMBERS: Oh, oh.


William Duff: If my hon. friend had given us any evidence to demonstrate the necessity of fixing rates, he would not have had to ask me that question. I repeat that my hon. friend although he is an able lawyer, has given this House no reasons why the government should bring forward this bill to fix the rates on the Great Lakes.
I was saying that my hon. friends on this side of the House who opposed the fixing of rates two or three years ago are now bringing in this legislation. There must be some reason for that. I have been rubbing my eyes; as the hon. leader of the Progressives said, I have been waking up and wondering What is the reason.


Edward James McMurray: My hon. friend had better rub them a little more.


William Duff: I am going to rub them a little more, and perhaps the hon. member for North Winnipeg will rub his and my western friends will rub theirs when they hear what I am about to say. I have a good deal of sympathy with the people who live on the prairies. The hon. member for "Bowlegged" river laughs again, but I repeat that I have a good deal of sympathy with the people on the prairies, and I proved it last year when I was a member of the special committee on freight rates and on the Crowsnest pass agreement. I have sympathy for my western friends, because I believe in a lower tariff. I do not believe in protection, and I say to my western friends that in my opinion you could not have a worse kind of protection than that which is contained within the pages of Bill No. 235. If my western friends were consistent in regard to Liberal principles they would not, in my humble opinion, support this legislation.


Mr. BEAUBIEN:: AVe will suspend the
coastal laws, then. That will produce the desired result.


William Duff: Will that satisfy my hon.
friend?


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: Certainly.


William Duff: Well, we have done that; so you do not need this legislation at all.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: I did not understand that it was already done.


William Duff: Oh yes, it is done. You are satisfied; you will vote with me, so that is all right.


Robert Forke: I do not want to interrupt my hon. friend, but I would call his attention to the fact that this legislation docs not exactly fix rates. It will only fix a maximum rate; it will not interfere with competition. When the rates get so high that they are out of reason, then the board can fix the maximum rate. It is not a case of fixing the rates all along the line-I do not suppose that will ever occur.


William Duff: Then the legislation is not necessary.


Robert Forke: It is there as a safeguard.


William Duff: I say it is bad legislation; I say it is not Liberal legislation. I want to tell my hon. friends from the West that the man who is most anxious to get this legislation is Sir Clifford Sifton, a director of the British Empire Steel Corporation and of Canada Steamships Limited. Now, there is a nigger in the woodpile somewhere, and before my hon. friends from the West throw up their hands and vote for this measure they had better ask the Minister of Trade and Commerce to put it back for a while and find out why Sir Clifford Sifton is so much interested in the matter. I say it is not going to help the farmers in the West at all.
I do not know whether Sir Clifford Sifton has some interest in Winnipeg or not, b it I find that these rates are going to be fixed by the Board of Grain Commissioners in toe city of Winnipeg. There is something wrong when we find Sir Clifford Sifton's name associated with this project. I do not say he had any influence on the government in the matter of bringing in the bill, but the fact remains that Sir Clifford Sifton', a director of i he British Empire Steel Corporation and Canada Steamships Limited, is one of the men who wants this thing more than anybody else.


Robert Forke: I would ask the hon. member whether he has any proof for that assertion?


James Alexander Robb: I would like to say to my hon. friend right now, in justice to Sir Clifford Sifton, that I have here a registered list of the directors of Canada Steamships Limited, dated March, 1921, and that the name of Sir Clifford Sifton does not appear upon it. It is a sworn list.


William Duff: Perhaps Sir Henry Thornton has been put on in his place. If the Minister of Trade and Commerce wants to take the part of Sir Clifford Sifton in this matter all right, I am satisfied; but if this
Lake Grain Rates

is true of the Canada Steamships Limited it is true of the British Empire Steel. Both are very closely associated.


Edward James McMurray: May I ask my hon.
friend what the relationship is between the Canada Steamships Limited and the British Empire Steel?


William Duff: Well, I should like to say
to my hon. friend that if he brands them both as wolverines they are the same brand of wolverines, if that will satisfy him. But Mr. Wolvin and Mr. Norcross are two gentlemen who are connected with both the British Empire Steel and Canada Steamships Limited. I would not refer to them as wolverines. I think they are gentlemen and big business men in this country, men who have done a lot for Canada; and even if they do charge excessive rates on the Great Lakes that is no reason why they should be called wolverines or wolves in sheep's clothing.
Now, Sir, this bill provides that the Board of Grain Commissioners for Canada, with head office in Winnipeg -are to fix the rates-
Mr.	ROBB:	Fort	William.Mr.	DUFF:	I thought the head	office
was in Winnipeg.


James Alexander Robb: No, Fort William.
Mr.	DUFF:	They	are to fix the	rateson grain on the	Great	Lakes. Well, it	seems
to me, in the first place, that they are not the right people to do it even if it were necessary.


Edward James McMurray: Fix the maximum.


William Duff: It does not make any difference, I said fix the rates. I say the Grain Commissioners are too close to the grain trade to have the fixing of the rates on other peoples property, on vessels which are owned by other people and not by the government who appointed those commissioners. I also want to say that if we are going to have paternal legislation of this kind-and it seems to me we are running mad in the matter of restrictions, regulations and paternal legislation of all kinds-we should also get the Grain Commissioners, or somebody else to fix what should be the maximum price of grain. For instance, we who come from the Maritime provinces and from the province of Quebec and who have to buy flour, may petition this government to fix the maximum price of grain. Why not? If the western representatives and the government think it is necessary to fix the price for the carriage of grain why should it not also be necessary to fix the price of the grain itself?


Robert Forke: Does the hon. member
not see how absurd that argument is?-and I do not wish to make the remark in any way at all offensive. Does my hon. friend imagine that any combination of farmers is possible in the Dominion of Canada to fix the price of grain in any shape or form? How can my hon. friend make such a comparison? How can he put the farmers in the same position as six vessel owners combining to fix prices for the carrying of grain; there is simply no comparison.


William Duff: I was not aware that the farmers fixed the price of grain.


Robert Forke: You assumed that they did.


William Duff: Oh, no.


Robert Forke: You wanted the maximum price of grain fixed.


William Duff: When I referred to the western farmers I meant the men who fixed prices in the West. I say it is just as reasonable that the price of grain should be fixed-it makes no difference whether by farmers or the grain exchange at Winnipeg-
Mr, FORKE: You mean the government should fix the price of grain?


William Duff: Yes, I say it is just as reasonable for the government to fix the price of grain in the interest of the Maritime provinces, the province of Quebec, and, the province of British Columbia as it is for it to fix the rates for the carriage of that grain from Fort William to Port Colborne, or to Montreal, or anywhere else. I say the principle is bad, and if the government is going to make a practice of introducing paternal legislation, it has as much right to go on and fix the price of everything.


An hon. MEMBER:: Fish. '


William Duff: Yes, fix the price of fish, lumber and everything else. I say this is legislation that is not in the interest of the country. I am sorry to see the Minister of Trade and Commerce bringing in a bill to try and fix the maximum grain rates on the Great Lakes.
Now, Sir, if the government want to help the western farmers they can do so without interfering with private enterprise. We must not forget that whether these shipping companies have been charging too high a rate or not, the fact remains that the vessels engaged in that trade belong to those who fix the rates. If the rates are higher than the shipper thinks is justifiable there is no reason why he should use these boats. The government can provide a remedy. The govern-

Lake Grain Rates
ment has a remedy in its own hands without interfering with private enterprise. And what is that remedy? We have two lines of railway, one rimning from Winnipeg to Quebec, and another from Winnipeg to Montreal.
I would suggest that if the government wishes to do something in this matter, if it really wishes to help the western farmers, it should reduce the rate on grain carried on the Canadian National Railways from Winnipeg to Quebec and Halifax. That would be the proper way to act in this matter, not to introduce legislation which interferes with private enterprise.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: Why not lower the rate on the Transcontinental railway to Quebec?


William Duff: I am not saying they should do that. What I say is, if the government desires to help the western farmer, instead of interfering with private enterprise, instead of interfering with men who have invested, as we have been told, $25,000,000 in building this one line of steamships, it should lower the rates on its own railways. If the government is going to fix the rates for the carriage of grain, or other commodities, on the Great Lakes why should it not do it everywhere else? Most of this grain from the western prairies crosses the Atlantic ocean to the old country, or goes from Alberta to Vancouver and thence through the Panama canal to the United Kingdom. If the western people want the government to fix the rate on grain on the Great Lakes, why not ask it at the same time to regulate the water rates on grain from Vancouver through the Panama canal to the old country? There is just as much reason why it should be done in the one case as in the other, and just as little reason for that matter. The whole principle is wrong. The leader of the Progressive party speaking last night, I think, asked why more ships of the Canadian Government Merchant Marine were not used to carry grain on the Great Lakes. My information is that some of them did carry a small quantity of grain. Of course those ships can carry grain. The canoes which are used for pleasure on the Rideau canal could carry grain. So could the boats used on the Winnipeg river. But the question is whether or not such a canoe or boat is fit to carry grain from Fort William to Port Colborne and Montreal. The same thing applies to the ships of the Canadian Government Merchant Marine. The question is not whether they can carry grain, but whether they are adapted to the carriage of grain at a rate that would be profitable.
My contention would be-and I am only saying this for the benefit of my hon. friend
the leader of the Progressives-that the Canadian government ships are not suitable for the carriage of grain, they are not equipped for it, and they cannot either load or discharge their cargoes as quickly as the boats which were built purposely for the business. The Canadian Government Merchant Marine boats cannot carry grain at the same rate that either the American or Canadian boats owned by the other shippers on the Great Lakes can carry it. Consequently it is useless to encourage them to put these boats on the lakes to compete with the other boats. If you encourage them too much they are liable to put some boats in the service and, the boats not being suitable for it, they would lose a great deal more money than they are losing at the present time.
It is said that grain is carried from Canadian ports to American ports cheaper than it is carried from Canadian ports to Canadian ports. How is this bill going to help in that matter? Grain will still be carried by American tonnage or American bottoms from Canadian ports to American ports at whatever rate the owners of the ships desire to fix for the carriage of that grain. This bill cannot regulate rates on the American boats. I understand also that grain is carried in American bottoms from American ports to our Canadian ports of Montreal and Quebec, and certainly this government has no power at all to fix the rates which these boats shall charge for the carriage of grain. It is also a well-known fact that the amount of grain carried by the Canadian boats is very much smaller than the amount carried by the American boats. How is the government going to regulate this matter and accomplish any good to the western farmer, when the great bulk of the grain is carried in American bottoms and tonnage, over which the government has no control. In my opinion this bill will benefit the western farmer very little, if at all, and will have the effect of putting the Canadian steamship lines and other lines on the Great Lakes out of business.
It is quite possible that the Board of Grain Commissioners are experts on grain and also other lines of business; but it is rather a difficult matter for anybody who has not had any experience, and has not the knowledge, to decide how much should be charged by these steamers for the carriage of this or any other commodity. For instance, the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb), approves of the freight rates charged by the steamers which were subsidized by the gov-
Lake Grain Rates

eminent. But I venture to say-and I think the minister will admit-that he cannot in parliament to-night say whether in his opinion these rates which the different steamships charge are reasonable or low or excessive. In my opinion, if there is going to be any rate fixing, it is not fair to the owners of these steamship lines that the Board of Grain Commissioners at Fort William should fix the rate at which they should carry the freight. It is a different thing altogether for the Railway Commission to fix freight rates on the railways, and I think hon. members will agree with me. I have heard them protest against rates which were fixed by the present Railway Board. Even the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) protested, and my friends on the other side have told me on different occasions about the way the Railway Board fixes rates. There is a difference between the Railway Board fixing rates and the Board of Grain Commissioners fixing rates for this reason: That the Canadian National Railway and the Canadian Pacific Railway as the senior member for Halifax (Mr. Maclean) said are really monopolies, because they run through certain territory, and nobody else can do business in that territory but themselves; therefore the government has a right to control rates. But the Board of Grain Commissioners is not the right and proper body to fix rates for steamship lines. How are they going to know what rates should be fixed? For instance, under this bill the Board of Grain Commissioners will meet some time or other and fix a rate. How are they going to fix it? What are they going to base the rate on? To show the silliness of the whole business, if there is a combine to-day, and if the steamship companies get together and increase the rates, will hon. members tell me they are not going to fix their costs and charges, if they want to? Will hon. members tell me that, when they lay their statements before the Board of Grain Commissioners, they cannot show that commission that they should get certain rates? And the Grain Commissioners are in such a position that they will not know whether their statements are correct or not. I say this measure is not going to help the western farmer, and that the rates under this bill will be just as high, as far as the western farmer is concerned, as they are at the present time. It would be far better in my opinion if the hon. members who are now supporting the bill should say to the government "Get after the combine, if any exists, in regard to the present rates; make the steamships go into competition with one another," be-
cause when there is competition there can be no fixing of rates for more than a few days at a time.


Robert Forke: The hon. member has already said that the Board of Grain Commissioners is not a fit body to say what the rates should be.


William Duff: I did not say they were not
a fit body. I said I doubted it.


Robert Forke: That they were not competent.


William Duff: I do not say that; but go
on.


Robert Forke: How would they know when a combine existed, if they did not know it by the results, by finding out that exorbitant rates are being charged on the lakes? How would they find out that a combine existed? We only know about a combine when there is no competition and when excessive rates are charged. Who would be the judge to say when the charges were excessive? You have thrown doubt upon the ability of the Board of Grain Commissioners.


William Duff: I do not know exactly how
to reply to my hon. friend. He has said there was a combine. I do not know about that. I am taking his word, and the word of the hon. member for North Winnipeg (Mr. McMurray) that a combine exists. I am saying that some doubt has been cast on these three gentlemen in regard to their ability to say whether a combine exists or not. I am not saying so, but I am told that not one of these gentlemen knows anything about shipping or the cost of operating steamships. I do not know whether a combine exists or not, but I am willing to take the word of the hon. leader of the Progressives, and the hon. member for North Winnipeg. But I do say that you are going to have a combine when you get the Grain Commissioners to fix the rates, because the rates will be all the same.


Robert Forke: Oh no.


William Duff: And I say if the matter is
left open, and people are allowed to secure their space as they require it, and bid for the space with different companies, that will break up the so-called combine, and the western farmer and grain operator will have a better chance to get lower transportation rates on the Great Lakes than they will by the operation of this bill. The whole thing is the combine; and the leader of the Progressives and his friends and my hon. friend from North Winnipeg should unite with me

Lake Grain Rates
in saying to the government that the combine should be broken up; and if you break up that combine we will not need the legislation proposed to-night which, in my opinion, is bad legislation.


Robert Forke: Who is going to prove the
combine? Tell us some way to find it out?


James Alexander Robb: Hear, hear.


Robert Forke: When can we prove a
combine?


William Duff: I am sure there are certain
ways of proving a combine. That is not very difficult. We have proven a combine in connection with the Canadian Government Merchant Marine, for instance, on the Atlantic ocean. That was not very hard to prove.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Under the Combines Bill as passed through this House this session, is it not possible for any person who has reasonable cause for believing, and who will state on information that he has1 reasonable cause for believing and does believe that a combine exists, to have that combine investigated? I think that is the whole tenor of the Combines Bill, which was put through this session.


Mr. PARENT:: Has it been sanctioned?


Lewis Herbert Martell: We must hope that it is
going to be sanctioned. We have as much reason to hope that it will be sanctioned as we have to hope that this bill will be
sanctioned.


William Duff: I agree absolutely with the
hon. member for Hants (Mr. Martell), that anybody who has a reasonable belief-


Robert Forke: Six persons.


Lewis Herbert Martell: It would not be diffi-,
cult to get six persons out west, if they thought so.


William Duff: Exactly. There is no difficulty to prove a combine. What this government should do is to get after the combines or profiteers under the act which the hon. member for Hants cited. I am satisfied, from the speech of the leader of the Progressive party, and from that of the hon. member for North Winnipeg, that there is a combine. I say that a combine has been proved with regard to insurance rates, if the statements of my hon. friends are correct. If it is true that the Canada Steamships Company or their agents or officials or anybody else, refuse to give space in their steamers to shippers of grain, unless they insure with them at double the rates which other companies charge, that is proof that it is time to get after them under the Combines Bill, and to
show them that they cannot do that sort of thing any more. But this government has no right to fix rates on water carriers any more than to fix rates on anything else. That is not Liberalism, and it is the height, and the worst kind, of protection. I am surprised to see my hon. friends from the West who want lower tariffs, and who believe in free trade and Liberal principles, coming to parliament and asking for proteation, when it suits themselves to do so. I should like to know who asked for this legislation, because in looking up Hansard and reading the debate which was introduced in this House by Mr. Armstrong, I notice that amongst other hon. gentlemen who spoke against legislation of this kind, was the late Minister of Railways and the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs). In the speech of the latter hon. gentleman, I notice that he read a letter from the Montreal Com Exchange Association. I need not read it, but it refers to a speech made by Mr. Armstrong, and they say:
The committee of management of this association earnestly hopes that you' will use your influence towards procuring the rejection by the House of that bill....
It is needless to recapitulate them-
That is the reasons why they oppose the bill.
-here further than to say that, in the interests of the grain trade via the port of Montreal, the continuance and growth of which is of such vital concern to the port and indeed to the country, it is important that water carriers be left free to make such rates as market conditions may warrant from time to time, and that grain shippers may be, in the future, as they have been in the past, in a position to take advantage of the lowest rates they may be able to secure by negotiation with the water carriers.
I presume the Montreal Corn Exchange Association are users of large quantities of space or tonnage in ships on the Great Lakes. It seems to me that the opposition coming from them is worth while considering. I cannot believe that it is in the interest of shippers to have this legislation go through. I feel that if there is open competition, and if this combine which is alleged, were broken up, there would be no necessity for this legislation, and in fact, whether the combine is broken up or not, this legislation should not pass this House. No case has been made by the minister himself, or by other hon. members who have so far spoken, to prove that fixing of rates will be beneficial to the western farmer in the shipping of grain. I, for one, protest against the passing of this bill, and I say that it should not go into effect.
Lake Grain Rates


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the House went into committee thereon Mr. Fortier in the chair.
On section 1-Short title.
James Alexander Robb: Before proceeding with the consideration of the clauses, I wish to make tome observations out of courtesy to my hon. friends the preceding speakers. The hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. Duff) made reference to the Armstrong bill introduced at previous sessions, and I am frank to admit that I am opposed to the Armstrong bill, but the Armstrong bill was quite a different measure from the one under consideration. Admitting, however, for a moment, that it was not a different measure, conditions to-day and conditions existing last season, were quite different from conditions that prevailed at the time the Armstrong bill was introduced. I have under my hand the rates for the seasons from 1913 to 1922. For instance, in [DOT] 913, the average rate for the season from Fort William to Port Colborne, was 2.43 cents a bushel, and the average rate to Buffalo was 2.43 cents a bushel. In 1914, the average rate to Port Colborne was 1.48 cents a bushel, and the average rate to Buffalo was 1.63 cents a bushel. In 1915, the average rate to Port Colborne was 1.71 cents a bushel, and the average rate to Buffalo was 2.63 cents a bushel. Let us come to 1922, and we find that the average rate to Port Colborne was 3.81 cents a bushel, and the average rate to Buffalo was 4.49 cents a bushel. But during the months of May, June, July, August and September, there was a discrimination ranging from three-quarters of a cent to one and one-half cents a bushel against the Canadian ports. The change in the rate to Buffalo was because at that time the port at Buffalo Lecame congested.
As regards the two measures before the House running concurrently, the measure just passed by the Minister of Marine and Fisheries (Mr. Lapointe) and this measure, the real teeth of the legislation are in the bill passed by the Minister of Marine and Fisheries. We found very little opposition to that measure; it went through. But the opposition to this bill is because this bill provides the government with the information which they must have in order to consider intelligently the situation in suspending the coasting laws.
I respect the opinions of my hon. friend from Lunenburg because I know that he is a shipping man with considerable experience in all departments of the business. I am sure that he is perfectly competent to spea*k 
upon all shipping questions, and I gather that he is fully aware of the importance of this matter. The importance of this measure does not consist in the fixing of a maximum rate; we find the importance of it, the teeth of it, in the gathering of the information, the tabulating of it, the publication of that information, and the publication from day to day, during the season, of the space that has been booked and the space that is available for shippers. That is where we find the very teeth of this measure; and it is in that respect that it is opposed. It is opposed not because there happens to be in it a clause that gives the board the right, if they deem it wise, to fix a maximum rate, but because the measure provides machinery upon which the government can act intelligently and arrive at a decision that will justify the suspension of the coastal laws.


Robert Forke: I do not see any provision in either of the bills enjoining the board to report to the government in regard to the abrogation of the coastal laws. The government will have to secure information and it seems to me that the board would be the proper authority to secure it. It would therefore appear necessary to incorporate a provision to that end in either of the bills.


James Alexander Robb: As we proceed with the bill my hon. friend will observe that a part of the duties of the Board of Grain Commissioners will be to advise .the minister from time to time concerning conditions. Of course, they will be in a position at any time any complaint comes in to supply such information as is found necessary. The coastal laws are themselves a question of international importance. Would it be right to confer upon a commission the duty of recommending their suspension? The government of the day must take the responsibility; and the government that had the courage to bring in this measure will not lack the courage to suspend the coastal laws if that is considered in the public interest.


Oliver Robert Gould: I had intended asking the minister a question but he has anticipated it.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Do I understand the minister to say that the Board of Grain Commissioners, who know absolutely nothing about shipping, will be charged with the duty of advising the government in regard to the suspension of the coastal laws, to allow foreign ships to come and ply between one Canadian port and another? '


James Alexander Robb: The preceding government and this government have both taken the -e-

Lake Grain Rates
sponsibility of allowing, at certain seasons, United States vessels to come into Canadian ports.


Lewis Herbert Martell: You could always do that.


James Alexander Robb: We have the right to give a permit for that purpose, but we have not the right to allow foreign ships to ply between one Canadian port and another.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Does the minister propose to create a law permitting foreign vessels, either American or any other, to ply between one port in Canada and another? If that is the intention I must protest against it. The minister is very much older in politics than I am, and he no doubt is aware that this matter of permitting vessels other than Canadian or British to ply between various ports within Canada has always been a very vexed question with our people.


James Alexander Robb: It is a vexed question to-night.


Lewis Herbert Martell: In days gone by governments have been memorialized and pamphlets circulated in protest against such permission. It was always pointed out that trade would follow the flag, and Norwegian and other vessels, it was stated, were driving our own ships from our own seas. If the minister proposes to pass any laws by means of which foreign vessels can come in and ply between different Canadian ports in competition with our own vessels, then I will vote against the bill.


James Alexander Robb: My hon. friend apparently has not been in the House all evening. My colleague, the Minister of Marine and Fisheries (Mr. Lapointe), to-night amended the Shipping Act along these very lines to enable the government to suspend the coastal laws in certain waters during certain periods if necessary, for instance, in connection with the carriage of grain on the upper lakes.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Surely that cannot refer to the Atlantic seaboard, because if it did I can tell the minister that few members from Nova Scotia would support it.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: It covers the Atlantic as well.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Well, it should not be done.


Ernest Lapointe: My hon. friend knows that there is no intention to apply it there.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: The power is general.


Ernest Lapointe: Yes; of course, it must be.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Interpretation-"Board".
Lewis Herbert Martell: Does the minister say that the members of the Board of Grain Commissioners are qualified to deal with shipping matters? It is all very well to establish a board at the city of Winnipeg, but these men can know absolutely nothing of shipping, which is a peculiar branch of trade. It is almost impossible to estimate what the costs will be. You may insure your vessel, or you may not get insurance at all. In other words, you are governed to a very large extent by the waters in which you are engaged and by the elements, so that it is absolutely impossible for anyone living in an inland city like Winnipeg, unless he has been a seaman brought up on the shore and has been engaged in the shipping business all his life, to be able intelligently to advise upon the various questions that may arise in connection with the shipping business. The more I see of this sort of thing the more it strikes me that there is growing a tendency towards paternal legislation; and by and by there will be no such thing as private enterprise in the country at all. If this continues men will be loath to invest their money in any industry, particularly in the shipping industry if it is to be subject to governmental control; because there is no business which is more at the mercy of fortuitous circumstances of various kinds than is the shipping industry. I do not see why there should be any desire on the part of governments to interfere with the law of supply and demand; and in this particular instance, with regard to the shipping business, I cannot see wherein this interference can be justified. There are so many peculiar hardships and risks to be encountered in the shipping industry, which are not to be met with in any other business, that under the best conditions a man is circumspect in any investment he makes in this direction. But when the industry is to be controlled in this manner, when shipowners are not to be allowed to hire their ships at the best rates they can secure, it will certainly tend to discourage enterprise. I am firmly convinced that the best course in this connection would be to leave the matter to the law of supply and demand. I certainly think that it is an absurdity for the government of a country to step in and dictate what rates shipowners shall charge for the carriage of certain cargoes. This session we have passed through parliament an Anti-Combines Bill which provides that any six persons who have reasonable and probable cause for believing that a combine exists may lay information accordingly and have the matter thoroughly investi-
Lake Grain Rates

gated by a commission; provision being made for punishment, if the case is proved, of those who constitute any such combine, or those who are accessory either before or after the fact. Now we are giving power to a board to fix rates. So with respect to shipping combines this Anti-Combines Bill is apparently intended to be ignored by the minister in the belief that it is worthless. I voted for that measure, believing it was in the interests of this country to regulate combines and restrict unlawful combinations in restraint of trade. But here we have the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) admitting that he has no faith in the bill put through this House by the government of which he is a member.


James Alexander Robb: Not at all.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Well, that is the only reasonable inference to be drawn. We have the minister endeavouring to restrict all sorts of private enterprise and initiative. I claim that tlie sooner we get away from this paternalism the better it will be for the Dominion at large. It is all very well for my friends from the West to come here and prate day after day and night after night about their grievances. We all have grievances. We in the East are just as hard hit in regard to our local interests as are the people in the Wes-, but we do not come to the government and expect it to be a fairy godmother and legislate against every private industry in the country in order that our particular grievances may be set right. We are prepared, as the hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. Duff) aptly expressed it, to stand upon our own legs.


Robert Gardiner: Would the hon. member be willing to apply the same rule to our protected industries?


Lewis Herbert Martell: My hon. friend is getting into the question of protection versus free trade. I am just as much a low tariff man as is my hon. friend, but I have sense enough to know that we cannot do away with tariffs to-day and have sufficient revenue to run the country. I declare to-day that a tariff for revenue is absolutely essential because our people are not prepared to bear any more direct taxation. Now, my hon. friends from the West, who know absolutely nothing about shipping, who do not know the stem of a ship from the stern, the rail from The keel, or larboard from starboard, come here and ask the government to introduce legislation to kill the shipping industry of the country. I am surprised, Mr. Chairman, that the government has been so lax as to listen to the importunities of these men in their endeavour to place upon the statute

books legislation intended to build up western Canada, or to remedy some imaginary grievances of the West, at the expense of the shipping interests of the Dominion. We of the Maritimes are shipping people, and, i s I said before, are prepared to stand upon our own legs, to give fair treatment to every industry in the country. But in the name of everything that is fair, if we believe in this Anti-Combines Act, why do we not allow it to operate in this instance? The act contains full power for the regulation of shipping rates or combines. If it is workable, and I believe it is, then in the name of Heaven let us get away from this paternalism and work out our destiny ourselves without constantly coming to the government and asking it to be a sort of fairy godmother to us.


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: I quite agree
with most of what my hon. friend from Hants (Mr. Martell) has just said, but I am afraid it will be very ineffective in this committee tonight. If hon. gentlemen would take the time to study the bill and appreciate all that is involved in it, it would have very little sympathy or support from them. When we come to control rates we get into the biggest problem the human mind can grapple with. I doubt very much if hon. gentlemen have given to this question the amount of consideration it deserves. It cannot be treated in a cynical fashion and laughed at as if it were not important. It is important. It would not be possible, I believe, to make this legislation apply in my province of Nova Scotia, nor in New Brunswick, nor in Prince Edward Island. Our people would not submit to it, no matter who approved or supported it. It. would not be possible to get a hundredth part of one per cent of the population of the Maritime provinces to support such a proposition as is contained in some of the clauses of this bill. I have in mind particularly the references to rate control, which is price control. But I rise especially to call the attention of the minister to paragraph (d) of the interpretation clause:
"Lake and river navigation" includes all the rivers, lakes and other navigable waters within Canada.
I want to make sure that this legislation is not going to extend beyond a certain area. I turn to section 3 and I see that the words "by lake or river navigation" are imported into the section. Just what the effect of this will be I do not know. I thought this bill was expressly limited in operation to the area of the Great Lakes, but "lake and river navigation" is capable of a very wide definition. and is made applicable to "all the

Lake Grain Rates
rivers, lakes and navigable waters within Canada." It is possible to read into section 3 the meaning that while the filing of rates with the Board of Grain Commissioners is specifically applicable to those shipping companies that "carry grain for hire between Fort William or Port Arthur and any other port or place in Canada or the United States," it is also applicable to the hauling of grain between Montreal and Halifax, St. John or Sydney.


James Alexander Robb: How?


Alexander Kenneth Maclean: By reason of the definition given to the words "lake and river navigation." I call the attention of the minister to this. I do not know what suggestion to offer at the moment to make the meaning clear.


William Duff: Subsection (d) of section 2 distinctly states:
"Lake and river navigation" includes all the rivers, lakes and other navigable waters within Canada.
In other words as the hon. member for Halifax says, the Board of Grain Commissioners may attempt to fix the rates not only on the St. Lawrence river but on every small river and stream in Canada.


Mr. EVANS:: I did not mean to say anything on this bill, but after the insults thrown out by the member for Hants (Mr. Martell), and after what the member for Halifax has
said, I can hardly forbear to enter the discussion.


William Duff: I rise to a point of order, Mr. Chairman. I understood the hon. gentleman to say that some members had thrown out insults in regard to this matter. I submit that the hon. gentleman is out of order and should withdraw this remark.


John Evans: I abide by your ruling, Mr. Chairman, but when a reflection is cast on our intelligence and on the class we stand for, I take it as an insult.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


William Duff: Withdraw.


John Evans: In the discussion-


William Duff: Mr. Chairman, I rise to a point of order. I ask for your decision.


John Evans: On this lake rate discussion-


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Fortier):: Every member has fully explained his position, and I do not think the point of order is well
taken.


John Evans: In the discussions of this
Great Lakes question we are faced with the same problem this year as we had to deal with last year in connection with the railway rates-the same, indeed, as we had before us this year in regard to the banking question so far as rates of interest are concerned- where the laws of supply and demand are set aside as having nothing to do with the question. The part of western Canada-


Lewis Herbert Martell: Do I understand my
hon. friend to say that in connection with the railway rates question the law of supply and demand should be set aside? If so, would he apply that principle to questions of tariff and trade?


John Evans: The hon. gentleman will
have the floor later.


Lewis Herbert Martell: My hon. friend cannot
answer.


John Evans: The part of Canada particularly interested in this bill is the agricultural part, the part adapted to the growing of grain and the raising of live stock-an ever-growing industry. Agriculture on any considerable scale commenced only with the advent of the railroad somewhere about 1885. Since that time the agriculturist in that part of the Dominion has had a continuous fight against the protected interests of this country. We have practically no industrial concerns in western Canada, and the organized interests of eastern Canada have taken advantage of our position in that regard, with the result that all the earnings of our people have gone east and have not been used for our benefit; the greater our earnings have been the greater has been the bondage we have laboured under. I say now the time has come when we can no longer stand the elimination of competition among all with whom we have to do in the way of distribution of commodities, the public utilities, and so on. The lake freight question is only one of others, but it is a case in point to show how our position has been taken advantage of; it is a marked factor in increasing the cost of production to a point where we can no longer compete with our products in the world's markets. Two or three years ago one of our farmers' companies, in an effort to keep down the cost, tried to go into the export business for at least a part of their grain, but we found ourselves up against one of the most complete and ruinous combines that ever existed in this country as regards shipping and insurance on the Great Lakes. It was not until the last crop moving season that the situation became unbearable.
Lake Grain Rates


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 4-Receiving and tabulating of such charges.
Oliver Robert Gould: I should like to ask the minister if he would accept a recommendation from the Board of Grain Commissioners if in their opinion they deemed the time opportune for the cancellation of the coasting laws?


James Alexander Robb: We are asking the Board of Grain Commissioners to assemble the information that will enable us to decide.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.

Cattle Embargo
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King the House adjourned at 11.05 p.m.
Monday, June 25, 1923