1923-03-15

PRIVATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 73 from the Senate, for the relief of Harriet Ethelwyn Kingsley.-Mr. Rankin.
Bill No. 74, respecting the Montreal Central Terminal Company.-Mr. Rinfret.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. C. A. GAUVREAU (Temiscouata) presented the first report of the Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons on Printing.
Report in conformity with the provisions of section 38B (2) of the Civil Service Act, 1918, (as amended by chapter 22 of the statutes of 1921), setting forth the positions in the public service in Canada which have been excluded in whole or in part from the operation of the said Civil Service Act during the year 1922, together with the reasons for such exclusion and the regulations prescribed and approved by His Excellency the Governor in Council for dealing with such positions.-Hon. Mr. Copp.

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

Mr. McTAGGART:: 1.	What are the names and dates of appointment of the Dominion Stock yards agents at Prince Albert and Moose Jaw stock yards?
2.	Did either of these men see overseas service, and if not, what special qualifications have they that gave them preference over returned soldiers who applied for the positions?
3.	Were these appointments made through the Civil Service Commission?
4.	If so, why was the returned soldiers preference clause of the Civil Service ignored, when making these appointments?

Questions


Hon. Mr. COPP:: 1.	Prince Albert, D. A. McKenzie, October 14, 1920; Moose Jaw, Charles N. Stetson, February 1, 1923.
2.	Neither of these appointees had been on active service overseas. They proved to have the necessary qualifications for the vacant positions which the ex-service men did not
possess.
3.	' Yes.
4.	The returned soldiers' preference clause was not ignored. It provides that in order to obtain a preference, the returned soldier candi-, dates must pass the necessary examination. In this instance none of the ex-service candidates passed the examination.


CANADIAN GOVERNMENT RAILWAY GROUP-SALES TAX
Sir HENRY DRAYTON:: By a return tabled on February 28, 1923, it appears that goods purchased by the Canadian Government Railway Group (not for resale) were on December 2, 1922, ruled exempt from sales tax on or after May 24, 1922, such railway group comprising in all aome fourteen different railways. The ruling was retroactive and exempted purchases on or after May 24, 1922.
1.	What was the amount of purchases made by said railway group between May 24 and December 2, 1922 in respect of which the ruling was made, and what was the amount of the sales tax payable thereon ?
2.	What is the estimated amount of revenue lost by the department under this ruling?
3.	Was the former practice under which the sales tax was collected on purchases by railways irrespective of ownership changed owing to alleged insufficiency in the statute or on other legal grounds or as a matter of government policy?
4.	If owing to alleged insufficiency of the statute or other legal grounds is it the intention of the government to bring down further and remedial legislation?


Hon. Mr. BUREAU:: I should like to be allowed to answer the hon. gentleman by informing him that since the reorganization of the Canadian National Railways, sales tax is being collected from, or paid by all railways. I hope that will satisfy my hon. friend.


BUSINESS PROFITS AND INCOME TAXES
Mr. CANNON:: 1.	What amount was collected under the Business Profits War Tax Act for each of the following periods; eighteenth of May, 1910, to thirty-first of December, 1916, and for each of the calendar years, 1917 to 1920, inclusive?
2.	What amount of Business Profits War Taxes were due and unpaid at the expiration of each of such periods and what was the number of tax payers in arrears at such dates?
3.	Were legal proceedings taken against such tax payers prior to 31 December, 1920?
4.	If so, what was the number of such proceeding* for each of said periods?
5.	Were any promissory notes received and held by the department concerned in respect of such taxes?
6.	If so, under what provision of the statutes, order in council, or ministerial authority?
7.	How many promissory notes were so received and held by the department concerned and what was the total amount of such notes for each of said periods?
8.	Were all of such notes paid when due?
9.	If not, were legal proceedings instituted?
10.	What amount of Business Profits War Taxes were unpaid on the 31 December, 1921, and what was the number of tax payers in arrears on that date?
1.	What amount was collected under the Income War Tax Act for each of the following periods: 24 May, 1918, to 31 December, 1918, and for each of the calendar years 1919 to 1921, inclusive?
2.	What amount of Income War Taxes were due and unpaid at the expiration of each of such periods and what was the number of tax payers in arrears at such dates?
3.	Were legal proceedings taken against such tax payers prior to 31 December, 1921?
4.	If so, what was the number of such proceedings for each of said periods ?
5.	What amount of Income War Taxes were unpaid on 31 December, 1922, and what was the number ot tax payers in arrears on that date?


Hon. Mr. FIELDING:: As regards these two questions, I am advised that the preparation of the information asked for would involve a large amount of labour and expense and would consume much time. I hope that on further consideration, the hon. gentleman will not desire to press his questions.


GRAND TRUNK ARBITRATION
Mr. BEAUBIEN:: 
Hon. Mr. GRAHAM:: 1.	875,000.
2.	No.
3.	(a) By Grand Trunk Shareholders, (b) see answer No. 1.



THE BANK ACT

William Stevens Fielding: That the House do to-morrow go into Committee of the Whole to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved that it is expedient to revise the law relating to banking, to continue until the first day of July, 1933, the charters of the several banks to which the provisions of the Bank Act apply, to authorize the payment out of Consolidated Revenue fund of remuneration to auditors for special examinations of the affairs or business of banks which the Minister of Finance may require to be made, and to provide for the charge of fees in connection with the registration of securities taken under the authority of the provisions of the Act.
Private Members' Day

He said: His Excellency: the Governor General has been informed of the subject matter of this resolution, and has been pleased to recommend the same to the consideration of the House.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister) moved:: That on and after Monday the 19th of March instant to the end of the session, government notices and government orders shall have precedence on Mondays and Wednesdays over all business except questions by members and motions for the production of papers.


Right Hon. ARTHUR MEIGHEN (Leader of the Opposition):: I do not think the government can desire to take both these days immediately. If the motion carries it means that no more resolutions of private members can be considered at all. The hon. member for Burrard (Mr. Clark) has on the order paper a resolution as respects which he was promised consideration, as I am informed. But if this motion carries that resolution cannot be gone on with.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: What motion is that?


Arthur Meighen: Indeed, the most important resolutions among the notices of motions have not yet been considered. I refer now first of all to No. 12, the motion of the member for Burrard, which reads:
That, in the opinion of this House, railway rates westward from the prairie provinces should be reduced to an equality with railway rates eastward from said provinces for similar goods and distances.
I should think that one of the private members' days, preferably Monday, should be retained for some little time yet, perhaps two weeks.


Mr. E. J. GARLAND (Bow River):: I share the opinions expressed by the leader of the Opposition in this matter. There are on the order paper three or four resolutions dealing with the coal situation, and I think that this House is entitled to the fullest possible opportunity of discussing this question. There are also two or three other resolutions that are certainly of sufficient national importance to warrant this House going into them. After all, we have been sent here for the purpose of presenting to the House and the country the requirements of the various constituencies which we represent, and I do not think it would be wise at this time wholly to abandon private members' day. Perhaps if one day,

say Wednesday, were abandoned and Monday retained for a little while until the more important resolutions have been dealt with, it would meet the views of hon. members generally. .
Mr. PIERRE F. CASGRAIN (Charlevoix-Montmorency): There is on the order paper a resolution of very great importance, the first one, standing in my name, which proposes the amendment or abrogation of the Bankruptcy Act for the reasons stated in the resolution. On many occasions when the resolution was called I was quite prepared to proceed with it but was requested by certain hon. members who were evidently interested in it, to allow it to stand over until some other day. I. should not like the present motion to carry unless I were given a definite assurance that I should be able to proceed with this resolution. I would suggest that the motion of the Prime Minister be amended by striking out the words "on and," so that the motion would read:
That after Monday the 19th of March instant, to the end of the session, government notices and government orders shall have precedence, etc.
This would give me an opportunity to proceed with my resolution.


Mr. J. J. DENIS (Joliette):: Under the rules of the House notices of motions by private members have precedence on Mondays and Wednesdays until such time as the government introduces a motion, which is agreed to, to appropriate these two days to itself. It is well known that as far back as confederation-and possibly the system was followed before that time-a fairly reasonable time was allowed to elapse before the government brought in such a motion. When that motion is carried private members' motions can be dealt with only after government business has been disposed of, the result being virtually to debar private members entirely from presenting any resolutions to the House. This year it is my fortune, or misfortune, I do not know which, to have a very important resolution on the order paper. I am anxious to propose that resolution, but if this motion carries I shall be unable to do so. It may be said that I have had ample opportunity to bring it up, but we all know that members have been very busy, and furthermore the resolution that stands in my name is one that calls for considerable preparation. For that reason I have not been prepared to present it sooner. Nor did I think that the government would introduce the present motion as early as they have done. That opinion I based on last year's experience. Last year the session opened on 8th March and it was

Private Members' Day
not until 5th May that the Prime Minister submitted a motion of this kind to take effect on May 15. During that interval private members had an opportunity to proceed with their resolutions twice a week, and I thought that this year an equal length of time would be allowed for the consideration of euch resolutions. Last year we had ten weeks after the beginning of the session in which to discuss our resolutions; on the present occasion the motion to do away with private members' day is introduced six weeks after the opening of parliament. I have been asked more than once during this session by members on both sides of the House when I would proceed with my resolution, and I should be sorry if the fact that I had not moved it sooner-and I could not very well have done so-should preclude any discussion of the important, subject with which that resolution deals. Now, I have no advice to offer the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), but I may be allowed to quote his own words in regard to the subject matter of his motion. On Sth April, 1920, Right Hon. Sir George Foster moved, on behalf of the government then in power, a motion similar to my right hon. friend's. The leader of the Opposition of that day, the present Prime Minister, strongly opposed the motion on the ground that private members had not had sufficient time to present their resolutions. Sir George Foster, in reply to my right hon. friend, made this statement:
Always the experience has been that the leader of the government pays particular heed to the plea that has been made, and in good form and with good grace he allows another week. This squares the matter and nearly everybody is satisfied and amiable and complacent. Now, I am quite willing to do that and to give my hon. friend another week, if he will agree to the motion going through in that amended form.
Hansard then reports the present Prime Minister as follows:
Mr. Mackenzie King: We shall be thankful for small mercies if we cannot get anything better.
Now, I am asking to-day only for a small mercy in the shape of another week at least. I would move therefore that the motion be amended by substituting for the words "the 19th" the words "the 26th," which would give us the whole of next week in which to bring forward private resolutions.


Mr. J. A. CLARK (Burrard):: The suggestion of the last speaker (Mr, Denis) may be all right so far as he is concerned, but for those of us whose resolutions happen be in the tenth or twelfth place it gives rise to difficulties. In my case I have been quite prepared to go on. I put my resolution on the order paper early in the session but have not had an opportunity to proceed with it.
And I may say that the Acting Minister of Railways (Mr. Graham) assured me that I should be given an opportunity to take the matter up; he said he would see that I got that opportunity. I cannot see, however, how he can carry out that undertaking if private members' day is abandoned. I therefore strongly advocate the retention of private members' day at least once a week for a reasonable period in order that hon. members may have a chance to clear up the resolutions that were placed on the order paper in the early stages of the session.
Mr. Gauvreau and Mr. Johnston having risen together:


Mr. SPEAKER:: Mr. Johnston.


Mr. J. FRED JOHNSTON (Last Mountain) :: Mr. Speaker, I find myself in about the same position as the hon. gentleman who has just sat down (Mr. Clark). While I have little sympathy for hon. gentlemen whose resolutions have been repeatedly called and allowed to stand, I am not in that position. The resolution standing in my name was reached on the evening of 5th March, and at the direct request of the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding), who was leading the House at the time, I agreed to allow it to stand over. I took it from his statement that I would be given an opportunity to present my resolution at a later date. I hope the government will set apart a day for the discussion of what, as the Minister of Finance pointed out at the time, is a very important matter, and under the circumstances I think * it would not be fair that we should be debarred from dealing with this resolution.


Mr. C. A. GAUVREAU (Temiscouata):: Now I have my chance.


Hewitt Bostock: I would assure the hon. member that there is no ill will against him on the part of the Speaker. The rules of the House must be applied, and the practice is that when one hon. member speaks on his side of the House two other hon. members from the two groups sitting on the other side are entitled to follow.


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: I b'ow to your decision, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that those on the Conservative side should have a chance, too. I must protest in the strongest manner against postponing the motion of the Prime Minister. All the private members' resolutions were called I do not know how many times-and I am here every day, even Saturdays and Sundays.


Jacques Bureau: That is zeal.
Private Members' Day


Charles Arthur Gauvreau: I think it has been customary in the past for the Prime Minister to fix a date for the discussion of any motion that is very important. If we want to go home before the end of the summer it is time to curtail these motions. Most of them are absolutely nonsensical.


Mr. S. W. JACOBS (George Etienne Cartier) :: Mr. Speaker, I agree largely with the last words which dropped from the lips of the hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Gauv-reau), with the qualification that I do not think they have any application to my own motion. This naturally is a resolution of the most important character and I should not like to have discussion on it choked off by this sudden motion presented by the Prime Minister. I understand that at the present moment it comes in the nature of what is known as a feint attack; there is not really any intention of pressing it, but it is notice given to private members that motions on the order paper will have to be proceeded with in due time. If I am mistaken and the motion is intended seriously, I must make a plea for my own resolution, which refers to Hindu franchise, one of the most important matters on the order paper.	.


Mr. T. L. CHURCH (North Toronto):: Mr. Speaker, not 10 per cent of the time taken up with private members' motions has been devoted to motions presented by hon. members in this quarter of the House; most of the time has been devoted to resolutions introduced by the Progressives on purely academic questions. I have a resolution on the order paper, No. 11, in which ninety per cent of. the people of Canada are vitally interested. I have had many representations from municipalities and other public bodies requesting me to bring this matter to the attention of the House, but so far I have had no opportunity to do so. The resolution was called one day, but I could not proceed because the Prime Minister had arranged to give another motion precedence. I should like an early prorogation, but I do urge on the Prime Minister that he set apart an afternoon or an evening for the discussion of this very important question. I think it is only fair to the government that the country should know what it has been doing, and that an opportunity should be given for hon. members to present constructive suggestions on how to avoid a repetition of the disastrous conditions which have prevailed this winter through the lack of an adequate supply of fuel-conditions which will be still more disastrous next winter unless we take proper measures to ensure an adequate supply of coal.


Mr. W. C. GOOD (Brant):: Mr. Speaker, I hope that the Prime Minister wall accede to the request made by a number of members to extend the time for another week for the discussion of private members' resolutions. There are a number of very important resolutions on the order paper, and I am sure hon. members generally will be very much disappointed if we do not reach some of them. If the Prime Minister does not consent, I hope that the amendment offered will be voted on, for I shall certainly vote for an extension of another week.


Hon. CHARLES MARCIL (Bonaven-ture):: Mr. Speaker, if I may be allowed, I should like to make a suggestion. After an extensive experience in the House I have come to the conclusion that the government would be well advised, if they would avoid this annual discussion, to amend the rules to the effect that when a motion has been called for a third time, and not proceeded with, it be dropped from the order paper. The circumstances quoted by the hon. member for Joliette (Mr. Denis) apply in every case-the government of the day finds itself generally obliged to give one week longer for the discussion of private members' resolutions at the request of various members who have resolutions standing in their name on the order paper. Of the resolutions now on the order paper notices of nine were given in January, and they have all been called since then; twelve in February, and seven this month. These resolutions would all have been proceeded with if their sponsors had been ready. The only exceptions are one or two in regard to which an arrangement was made with the government to take them up on a special date. Therefore I think the only course open to the government to avoid this recurring trouble is to amend the rules in the manner I have suggested.


Mr. T. G. McBRIDE (Cariboo):: Mr. Speaker, although I have a resolution on the order paper, I think the time of this House has already been taken up sufficiently by hon. members speaking longer than they had any right to do. I am quite prepared to waive my right. Let us get down to business. I am fully prepared to support the Prime Minister's motion.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker, I need hardly say that the government has no motive in presenting this motion other than to expedite the business of parliament. There is no desire to deprive hon. members of any of their privileges. But I do submit, there is very much force in what has been said about

Private Members' Day
the number of times that many of these resolutions have been called, and it is hardly fair to the House as a whole that the business generally of parliament should be delayed in order that hon. members who have not taken advantage of their turn when it came should have this further extension of time. However, the government, I need hardly say, has no desire to press this motion unless it is going to carry, and from the discussion which has taken place I gather that possibly it is the consensus of opinion that some further extension of time should be granted-one day possibly, certainly not more than two days. If it would meet with the general approval of the House I would be prepared to amend the motion by changing the 19th to the 26th, thus allowing an additional week.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


Hon.   S@: Mr. Speaker, I am not at all sure that would meet the situation. I quite agree with my right hon. friend that a lot of these motions have been called many times, but I do not think the time of the House has been wasted in consequence; if I remember rightly, we went on with estimates and made considerable progress. Usually, private members' days are taken because the government has some real object in view; that is, there is government business that the House is seized of waiting to be done, and suffering by delay. I see no [DOT] such business on the order paper at the present time. The .government list is not at all long, and we have not any bills down that I know of. The Bank Act amendment bill has not been distributed yet; Speaking generally we have really had no government business outside of estimates. We usually hear about the budget speech before this motion is made; this year we have not heard a word as to the approximate date when the budget will be brought down. Yet the privileges of hon. members are to be taken from them. We do not want to delay progress, but I would point out that motion No. 11, in the name of the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church), deals with the question of the coal supply. That is not an academic question; it is a matter of immediate importance, and an opportunity for its discussion should be afforded. If we are to have only two more private members' days, it means that the debate on the resolution respecting the Senate will take up the whole of one day, one other motion will take up the next day, and the motion with respect to the coal supply will not be reached. We know how futile these resolutions respecting
the Senate are. If the government can assure us that the motion on coal will be dealt with, that meets the case so far as I am concerned.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I think the subject to which my hon. friend has just referred was considered at some length in the course of another debate in the House, and doubtless in other connections it may come up again. It is reasonable to expect that we can rely on the good judgment of those who have resolutions on the order paper not to take up too much of the time of the House in dealing with them. If hon. members will be seized of what appears to be the general wish they will be short in their speeches and not devote more time than is necessary to their resolutions. Certainly any resolutions in respect to which there has been an understanding should be taken up; where the suggestion has been made that they be held for consideration later, it would be desirable to arrange that they be dealt with. Apart from that, however, it seems to me that if an additional week is given, involving an additional two days for members' resolutions, that would meet the situation. I would like to move, therefore, with the permission of the House, to substitute "26th" for "19th" and to present the motion in that form.


Arthur Meighen: I have no objection to the resolution being amended, but I am opposed to it as amended, because there will not be time for reasonable discussion of important resolutions. This, I think, is the earliest that this motion has ever been pressed -I speak only from recollection; I have not checked the dates-and it is done in a session in which the government business has been expedited the most. That is to say, there has been on the part of hon. members less delay of government business than I have ever seen in this parliament. Not only has there been nothing in the way of obstruction, but every facility has been given for reasonable progress, and the progress has been rapid, in a session when there is less government business than there has been, perhaps, in any session for years. There are only the estimates, and there is a bill regarding combines; what else is there? There are two others that are being considered by committees, but that is all we have this session. It is true that if a motion is called and passed by, and the House has then to adjourn, time is lost, but if the House simply gets to another resolution that is disposed of, or if it gets to government business, time is not lost; and that has been the practice this session.
Easter Adjournment

Two additional days for private resolutions will not enable the House to reach the motion of the hon. member for Burrard (Mr. Clark), the motion of the hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church), or the motion of another hon. member who sits opposite. In the two days we can get through with perhaps the first and second only, at least with nothing more than appears on the first page. To have the motion carry as with the proposed amendment means wiping out everything beyond the first three or four motions.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am very anxious to meet the wishes of hon. members, though it is a little difficult to oblige my fight hon. friend (Mr. Meighen) in everything. In his first remarks on the subject he said that if the government would give two more Mondays he would be satisfied.


Arthur Meighen: Two weeks, I said.


Jacques Bureau: Two Mondays.


Arthur Meighen: I meant to say two weeks, but two Mondays would be a great deal better than a Monday and a Wednesday. In fact, one Monday is as good as about three Wednesdays.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: If my right hon. friend will agree to two Mondays I am prepared to amend the resolution in that
form. I think that ought to suit us all.
*


Arthur Meighen: I will agree to two Mondays and a Wednesday.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.
[DOT] -


Arthur Meighen: I think if hon. members will look at Hansard they will see that what I said was two weeks.


Jacques Bureau: If Hansard has not been corrected since, it was two days.


Arthur Meighen: Well, Hansard has not been corrected-at least, not by me.


Jacques Bureau: I am willing to leave it to Hansard, then.


Arthur Meighen: What I had in mind was that two weeks would be necessary, that is, two Mondays and two Wednesdays. I am not speaking for anybody in respect of motions except hon. members of this group; there are others just as much interested and whose rights are just as clear as ours. And what does the government want? They will get through in plenty of time; I do not know what their object can be. We shall have a very short session, with very little done, and all these matters will have to wait over for another session.


Jacques Bureau: It is an occasion of rejoicing to hear that statement with respect to a short session.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I suggest that the motion read, "after Monday the 26th.".


Mr. GRAHAM:: That will give you two Mondays and a Wednesday.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Strike out the words "on and" in the first line and substitute "26th" for "19th."


Hewitt Bostock: The motion as amended will read as follows:
That after Monday the 26th of March instant, to the end of the session, government notices and government orders shall have precedence on Mondays and Wednesdays over all business except questions by members and motions for the production of papers.
Motion, as amended, agreed to.



EASTER ADJOURNMENT

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. W. A. BOYS (South Simcoe):: I would like to ask the Prime Minister if he would intimate to the House the intention of the government regarding the Easter adjournment. I have seen notices in the press of a somewhat extended adjournment, and I am asked questions from time to time by members interested but cannot give them any information. It is necessary that they make their appointments and secure their reservations without delay, and I shall be glad if the Prime Minister could tell us when the adjournment will take place and what its duration will be.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: In the matter of the
Easter adjournment the wish of the government would be, as in these other matters, to ascertain what suits the convenience of the House as a whole. The adjournment will be from Wednesday the 28th of March; the 29th, I understand, is a holiday. The government had thought that if adjournment were taken from that date over the following week, until the 9th of April, that would probably best suit the convenience of hon. members. It would permit, those who are from the West to go to their homes and give opportunity for consideration during the Easter recess of matters which may come up afterwards for discussion in the House. We cannot hope to please every individual member, but speaking generally, if it meets with acceptance the government proposes that arrangement.


Thomas George McBride: I think
the people from the West out in British Columbia should get some consideration. We
'Mr. Meighen.]

Supply-Immigration
are down here and have to stay here until the session is over. What are we going to do during these ten days when the House takes recess? I think there are a great many of us who want to get through the business of the House and get home as early in the season as possible, and I do not see why we should close down that long. I would say not more than four or five days at the outside.



THE BUDGET

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Henry Lumley Drayton: Perhaps I might facilitate the business of the House by asking the Minister of Finance what is the date fixed for the budget?


William Stevens Fielding: I would not like to deprive my hon. friend of the opportunity of repeating that question another day.



WEDNESDAY EVENING SITTINGS

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:	.
Charles Arthur Gauvreau: May I ask the Prime Minister when the government intends to start "Wednesday evening sittings?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I would
not want to suggest next Wednesday, but I think after the Easter recess we might take Wednesday evening.



ALBERTA COAL

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Edward Joseph Garland: I wish to ask the government if a communication has been received from , the Alberta branch of the Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy asking for appointment of a federal committee consisting of a mining engineer, a freight expert, and a business expert, to report upon the feasibility of shipping Alberta coal into Ontario? And, what is the intention of the government in the matter?


Mr. STEWART (Argenteuil):: A communication was received in my office two or three days ago from a committee of that organization. I have not yet had time to present it to the government.
Mr. JAMES LARKIN
On the Orders of the Day:


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: According to press reports, Mr. James Larkin has been Refused admission into Canada. May I ask the government on what grounds such action is taken?


Charles A. Stewart: I have no knowledge of the gentleman mentioned having been refused admission into Canada. The matter has not. come to my notice before.

The House in Committee of Supply, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
Royal Candian Mounted Police-salaries, $37,225; contingencies, $9,000.


Hon.   S@: This is practically the same amount as last year; there is a decrease of $37.50.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Immigration outside servicer-salaries, $700,000.
Samuel William Jacobs: I do not know that I can preface my remarks on the question of immigration now before the House, in a better way than by reading to the Committee an editorial from the Montreal Star of Tuesday, February, 13, 1923. It is very short, and I trust that the members of the Committee will bear with me while I put it on Hansard;
51st Month
It is now fifty months since the armistice. The cessation of war should have been Canada's golden opportunity to increase her population.
Australia and New Zealand seized the opportunity and are benefiting enormously, adding huge capital accretion to the national assets. Canada with folded arms has stood still. The old coalition government attempted nothing, did nothing and did'nt want to do anything. The Liberal government has shut its eyes to the situation, permitted the waste of time of enormous value, then attempts to propitiate the public by promises that mean nothing but delay and suggest nothing but cowardice in dealing wtih the greatest problem that ever confronted the Canadian people.
If the Liberals are to be as inert as the Conservatives or Coalitionists, our country will never take its natural place amongst progressive nations. This Dominion needs a saviour. Its best interests have been neglected.


Arthur Meighen: There has one come now.


Samuel William Jacobs: Does the hon. gentleman refer to me? I should not be the first of my race that acted as such.
I was glad to note from the remarks of the Acting Minister of Immigration and Colonization (Mr. Stewart) that he did not dignify the proposition which he brought down on Wednesday last by the name of a policy. We have no policy before this country in the matter of immigration. During the tenure of office of the Union government, and later of the National Liberal and Conservative government-as I think they called themselves- nothing was done at all, absolutely nothing; and it gave me a splendid opportunity to make attacks from time to time upon the ineptitude of that government, and I took
1164	COMMONS
Supply-Immigration
occasion to predict that when our party came into power the fog and miasma, if I may call it such, of Unionism would yield to the sunshine of Liberalism.


Arthur Meighen: Before the hon. gentleman gets to that much more appropriate subject, will he tell the House the actual number of immigrants secured during the time he is complaining of?


Samuel William Jacobs: I do not think the number of people who came into the country during that period is a fair test of the immigration which was received, because the war held up for a number of years a large number of people who were in Europe, from coming to this country. I do not think it is quite fair that the Union government should claim that all these people who came back including even the soldiers, should be looked upon as regular immigrants.


Arthur Meighen: There is none of that kind claimed at all, and the records do not include them. The records only include immigrants who are immigrants, that is, those who have come for the first time to settle in this country. The hon. gentleman knows that. There is none in the House knows it so well.


Samuel William Jacobs: If they came in, they came in notwithstanding the protest of the government. I had myself a great deal to do in bringing some of them in. In any event we expected nothing from that government, and we got what we expected. But at the present moment when we have here, in "the seats of the mighty," on the treasury benches a galaxy of all the talents of the Liberal party, I must express my surprise and my astonishment that we are simply following in the way of the Philistines,-nothing is being done at all. We have a commercial proposition put before us: We are going to go into partnership with a company known as the Canada Colonization Association


An hon. MEMBER:: No, no.


Samuel William Jacobs: -a company which has no president so far as I know, and has no general manager. It is a company which shows its astuteness in many ways worth while. As I understand it they have received large sums of money through the Canadian Manufacturers' Association. I believe a call was made on members of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association to give their support, in a monetary sense, to this organization. Each member of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association was invited to contribute according to the number of men in his employ to this patriotic

movement. In that respect, as I say, they show a considerable degree of commercial ability. To extract large sums of money from the members of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association is in itself no mean feat.


Edward Joseph Garland: Can the
hon. member inform the House exactly how much was extracted from this association?


Samuel William Jacobs: Well, *it is rather difficult
to find out how much money the Canadian Manufacturers' Association and its members contributed to the public weal; I am not in a position to say. 1 do know, however, that a call has been made throughout the country for support for this patriotic scheme and-[DOT]


Mr. CHAPLIN:: The hon. gentleman said
that an assessment has been levied. What proof has he of that?


Samuel William Jacobs: I have the statement from a member of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association who was asked to contribute $15,000 to this scheme, that is, in proportion to the number of people whom he employed; and he said he promptly ushered to the door the gentleman who applied. I do not know whether the hon. member himself has contributed any such sum as that. He would probably know and I am sure we would be glad to learn from him what the amount was.


James Dew Chaplin: I can tell the hon. gentleman, not one cent. The hon. gentleman said that a levy was made. I object to that statement. I do not think it is true, and I do not think it can be substantiated.


Samuel William Jacobs: I did not mean to convey
the impression that a levy was made, it was just a friendly application to members who felt that this was a worthy object. Well, after this work was concluded we find that the president of this colonization association, Sir John Willison, retired precipitately from the presidency-why, I do not know. The minister in discussing this matter the other day did not give any information to the House as to why this organization, which will have hundreds of thousands of dollars of the money of the people of Canada, has no president. That is something, I think, which the country itself would like to be enlightened about. Without a president they nevertheless went on- probably they found that they could get along as well without a president; it may be they felt that it would be better for their purposes if they jettisoned Sir John Willison. They eame before the Department of Immigration and secured $100,000, with the understanding that they would obtain 200 families

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to settle on the land. Well, 200 families do not seem to be a very large number when we consider that during last year as many as 10,000 people have left the farms and towns of Canada in one month to go to the United States. In any event we are to be out our $100,000. I am not complaining particularly about that phase of it: "Any port in a storm;" "A drowning man will grasp at a straw.". The minister had no policy at all to bring before the government, he felt that anything was better than nothing; and when the
4 p.m. Canadian Colonization Association showed up he looked upon them as friends of his because, to a certain extent, they helped him out of the situation in which he found himself just previous to the meeting of parliament.
I want to say this, Mr. Chairman, before going very much further: I feel like the father who was about to chastise his child- it pains me more than it does the child. It is not a very pleasant matter for me, a Liberal of many years standing, to get up and snipe my party and the minister from my seat in the House. But this is something that transcends party, this is a national problem. I feel very strongly upon this question of immigration. I have discussed immigration ever since I came into the House. I have delivered what I might claim to be my annual address on this subject to the House ever since 1918. So far my words have fallen on deaf ears; I am a voice in the wilderness. But I trust that in time the government will see that this is a matter which vitally affects every person in this Dominion, and that unless we awake to the seriousness of the situation we may find ourselves before long in the shades of opposition-I was going to say, which we will fill so acceptably, but which we did fill for an entire decade. We will find that our kingdom will have been taken from us, and that some persons considered more worthy to reign in our stead will be occupying the government benches.


Mr. FORKE:: Look over this way please.


Samuel William Jacobs: I want to tell my hon. friend the leader of the Progressives (Mr. Forke) that if he is prepared to accept my policy on the immigration question, I will go over to his side of the House and support him on that question. In fact, in order to show how seriously I look upon this matter, I would go so far as to join the Labour group in the other part of the chamber if I found they would do something for immigration.
This w'hole question of immigration has become acute, Mr. Chairman, owing to the
conditions which have been brought about in the United States through the closing of their doors to immigration of all kinds. Ever since the American government put the three-per-cent quota into effect we have been suf-ferring from it, and I will tell you why: The United States, for over a hundred years, have had their doors open to immigration. They have received vast numbers of immigrants of all kinds, of all classes, from Europe, and they have incorporated them into their nation and made men out of them. Suddenly the door is closed. People who have been accustomed to receiving hundreds of thousands of workmen find that they cannot get them any longer, and where do they turn? They turn to the north, and in that way our people are being drawn off the farms and from the cities in order to supply the demand for people in the United States. That is why 10,000 people a month are leaving our country and going to the United States where they are attracted by very large wages. I am told that in some of the border cities of the United States carpenters receive from $12 to $20 a day as wages. How is it possible for us to keep our people in this country when they are attracted by such enormous wages on the other side of the line? We in our unwisdom felt that what is good enough for the United States is good enough for us, and we put up the bars in almost the same sense as the people of the United States. We carefully scrutinize, we microscopically examine every workman who wishes to come into this country to take the place of those who go to the United States. That is why our people are being attracted from the farms and from the cities in Canada to the larger fields in the countiy to the south. Now, if the minister would realize what is going on he probably would not, with a mere wave of the hand, tell us that in this country there is no room for artisans, no room for city labour, but that what we have to do is to concentrate our energies on settling people on the land.
I point this out to the minister. As soon as wre have those people located on farms, they find that things, particularly in the West and, in fact, throughout Canada, in the farming line, are not what they were led to believe, and they flock into the cities in order to obtain the larger wages which are given to all classes of labour in the cities.


Charles Marcil: Higher
wages and shorter hours.


Samuel William Jacobs: Yes, the glare of the gaslight, the movies, and the general social life in the cities. That is what attracts people
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from the farms. I venture to predict that if you colonize the West within the next three or four years with half a million farmers, it will be a question of only a very short time when a large body of those people will find their way into the cities, on the principle that if you place two bales of hay in front of a donkey, the animal will make for the larger bale of hay. Why do people go into farming? Because they feel they can make a living. They leave the farms because they feel they can do better in the cities. A farmer who makes $1,500 or $2,000 a year on the farm, working himself, his wife and his children from five o'clock in the morning until sundown or even late at night, is entitled to something more than $1,500 or $2,000. But if that farmer, his wife and his entire family were to locate in a city, they could make twice that amount of money, with shorter hours, better conditions and a better social life.
My suggestion to the minister is that at the time when he is seeing to it that people are placed on the farms, he should also see to it that vacant positions in the cities are filled by people who are accustomed to live in the city. In that way, the farmers will not be attracted to the cities, because the positions there will be taken up. But if you have a vacancy in one place and place an opportunity for leaving in another, it is only natural that the vacancies will be filled particularly if it is found more profitable to fill them. If you make farming pleasant and profitable, and if you surround it with all the advantages which life in this country can give, you will attract people to those farms and those waste places. At the same time, if you see to it that positions in the cities are filled by city dwellers, then you have solved the problem. But nothing of the kind is being done, and the reason of it is that, as our dear old friend Sir Sam Hughes used to say in this House: "There is an unseen and hidden hand somewhere that is arresting the progress of the government." He liked to dwell on the unseen hand.


Mr. BEAUBIEN:: Would the hon. member be so kind as to deprive the farmer of an opportunity of bettering his condition by going into the city, by bringing in a considerable number of men to fill up the cities?


Samuel William Jacobs: The question is one of the survival of the fittest. I am looking after the interest of the country as a whole, not after that of any particular farmer. I believe the farmer in the end is very much happier on the farm than when he comes into the city. He does not see the thing in that way; but after a while, after it is too late, he comes to realize that he should never have left the farm.
fMr. Jacobs.]


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: How could the farmer be so happy when the hon. member has mentioned all the social conditions that exist in - the cities and the very different conditions on the farm?


Samuel William Jacobs: The farmer must work out his own salvation in that regard.


Charles-Philippe Beaubien: The hon. member, then, is, trying to work out the salvation of the country.


Samuel William Jacobs: It must be made profitable for the farmer to live on his farm. His freight rates must be reduced to such a figure that he can actually live on the farm. I am not altogether a free trader yet; I have not been converted to that school of thought; but we must reduce, to a certain extent, the tariff on his agricultural implements, his implements of production, and do other things of that kind.


Edward Joseph Garland: To what extent-two and a half per cent?


Samuel William Jacobs: I shall be glad if my hon. friend will come to my room to-morrow, when we can discuss the whole matter fully, and I am sure we shall arrive at a conclusion which will be satisfactory to us botlj. We have been told that we are going to have farm labourers brought to this country. That is one of the planks in the platform, if I may so call it, of the department. Would the Acting Minister of Immigration tell me what he is going to do with farm labourers if there are no farms? The farmers are scarcely able to maintain themselves, on their farms, working with their own families. How then are they going to pay farm labourers if farming is not profitable ? Farming is a seasonal occupation. The farm labourer is used for the seeding and for the harvest, and at the end of that time there is, in a general way, not very much work for him to do. He accordingly finds his way into the city. He is not accustomed at first to doing anything else and he forms a queue for the soup kitchen and the bread line, when unemployment is rife, because it is this class of people not accustomed to city life and who do not know how to cast about when times of stress come on, who are filling up our cities and who create the unemployment question. They are the very first people who come into the cities to swell the tide of unemployment.
Then we are going to bring in female domestic servants. I ask the Minister of Immigration how long he thinks a female domestic is going to be employed in service at $20. $25 or $30 a' month, when that young woman can go into a factory and get twice

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that salary with reasonable hours of living, eight hours a day, and instead of receiving $5 or $6 a week, she perhaps receives $30, $35, or $40 a week. How long can you keep such women in domestic service? Why not say to them: "Come into the country; look about for yourselves. If you want domestic service, enter domestic service. If you want to enter factories, enter factories." But to have watertight compartments , such as are sought to be built by the minister, in which it is declared that this person must go into this service and that person into that, is a mistake; it is against the law of nature and all economic law and it will never succeed. The result will be that we shall always be without domestic servants and without farm labourers, and these people will be filling the factories where they can secure large wages.
I have spoken about the hidden and unseen hand. I should like to read to the committee something which will show the African in the woodpile. This is a despatch from Ottawa, dated January 28, and headed:
Tom Moore fears cheap labour here. Immigration policy would open the door to it, he says.
The despatch reads:
Ottawa, January 28.-Speaking here Saturday night, Tom Moore, president of the Dominion Trades Congress, expressed his views on the Canadian immigration policy. An analysis of a statement made by Sir Edmund Walker showed that the immigration policy was really the opening of the door to admit cheap labor, Mr. Moore contended.
While it has been said that Canada wanted settlers for the land, the lid was being lifted by prominent financial men who wanted more settlers to reduce the labor costs, and Mr. Moore urged that the admission of all classes of immigrants would not be beneficial to Canada, for if cheap labor was allowed in to compete with the established citizens, living conditions could not be ameliorated. The speaker reviewed the achievements of organized labor in Canada, stating that great difficulties had been surmounted and the lot of the workingman greatly improved.
I should like to say a word or two in regard to that. In passing, I might say that this gentleman is now a director of the Canadian National Railways.	'v


Mr. HANSON:: Who appointed the gentleman?


Samuel William Jacobs: I do not think that requires any answer. When this gentleman spoke I rather fancy he spoke as president of the Trades and Labour Council and not as a director of the Canadian National Railways. I do not know whether he has yet converted Sir Henry Thornton to his views, but there is room for conversion, because the last time I heard Sir Henry Thornton speak he was in favour of a strong and vigorous immigration policj^ not restricted to the farms. I must
express regret that a director of the National Railways should declare himself on matters of this kind. It is not fair to the country; it is, not fair to those interests that are advocating a proper immigration into Canada; and by reason of the fact that he is a director of the Canadian National Railways, what he says carries more weight probably than it otherwise would. This man is a paid official of the Trades and Labour Council. He is a sort of glorified walking delegate. He is paid for this purpose, and it is his duty to keep wages as high as possible if he thinks that will enure to the benefit of labour generally. But I must express the fear that Mr. Moore, occupying the high position that he does, is not very much of an economist. He ought to know' that where wages are inflated as they are now everything is proportionately dear. For instance, the labourer who pays $40 to $45 a month for his dwelling, which is really worth only $15 or $20, pays the higher rate because he cannot obtain dwellings at any lower figure, the reason being that we do not permit people to come into this country to build houses. There is a scarcity of builders in Canada. You cannot get people to build because they are all going to the United States to get the high wages to which I have referred. So that, although the labourer gets $45 or $50 a week for his work, it is, I venture to say, materially less in reality than the $20 he got before the war. Let us look at the situation. The farmer has already undergone the deflation process. He is obliged to sell his products at 60 to 70 cents in the dollar, but is obliged to pay for the commodities he has to buy, such as manufactured products, not 100 cents, but 150 cents, in the dollar. Why? Because we are obliged to pay labourers more than they are worth. And if you do not cut down the prices of commodities by reducing wages, how is it possible for the farmer ever to get on? It cannot be done. Deflation must take place equally and equably all along the line. But where there is this lop-sided deflation you are bound to suffer as you are suffering now in the West. So that Mr. Moore does not understand the economic situation at all; he is killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. We cannot very much longer stand the conditions that are now prevailing. You pay for your clothing, your boots and shoes, and everything that you need more than twice what you paid for them before the war, but you are getting for your products just the same' as you got at that time. And that is going to go on so long as we do not get the cost of labour reduced to the same proportion as the prices of farm commodities.
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Mr. CARROLL:: Does the hon. member say that we Should have lower wages in this country?	.


Samuel William Jacobs: I am saying that we ought to have the same ratio of wages for labourers as the farmer gets for his products. The present condition is ridiculous. What is the use of getting $50 a week wages when you have to pay i't all out for your upkeep?


Edward Joseph Garland: Does the hon. gentleman not think that it would be better for us all round if, instead of reducing the wages of labour to what the farmer receives for his work, we raised the farmer's returns in keeping with what labour receives?


Samuel William Jacobs: The hon. gentleman ought to know that the prices of farmers' commodities are fixed in the world's market. Liverpool fixes the prices for farm produce; they are not fixed in Canada. You are confronted with the Argentine, with Russia-at least you will be faced with Russia shortly if not now-with Italy and every other producing country in the world; and it is idle for us to say that we can fix prices here. We tried to fix prices through a Board of Commerce and we know what happened. It cannot be done; Nature must take its course; and I leave this thought with hon. gentlemen of the committee, trusting that they will see that there is something in the argument I have tried to make.


Mr. KELLNER:: I think that if you reduced the wages of the working man you would decrease his buying power and the farmer would consequently get less for what he sells.


Samuel William Jacobs: How could a reduction in the wages of the labourer decrease his buying power if there were a deflation all round? If he gets, say, $30 a week for his labour and has to pay $10 or $12 for a pair of boots for each of his children, himself and his wife, $40 or $50 for his suit of clothes, and $10 a month for rent, supposing he got half that amount in wages, how could his buying power be reduced if all these other expenses were proportionately lowered?-if he paid $20 a month for his house, $20 for a suit of clothes, $5 for boots, and so forth. After all, what is money? It is simply purchasing power; considered in any other light it is nothing. And if the labourer could purchase with $25 exactly what he can get under present conditions for $50, wherein is his purchasing power reduced?


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: Does the hon. gentleman advocate a simultaneous reduction all round, or is the workingman's wages to be reduced first?


Samuel William Jacobs: I am now advocating the bringing in of people and letting them fend for themselves. If we had 100,000 persons brought into this country at the present time, does the committee not see how the wheels of commerce would be accelerated? We should have to have dwellings for these people, they would have to be set up in business, and everybody would be doing something until they got to work and produced for themselves. We have more than enough in this country for every one who wants to come and work. But through the narrow-sighted policy of our governments we have interfered with the natural laws governing immigration and we find ourselves therefore in the present deplorable conditi.on. Someone the other evening referred to the alleged lowering of the standard of living. May I refer the member who introduced that question to an address of Sir Clifford Sifton delivered in Montreal on February 26 in which he speaks of the standard of living. He is reported as follows:
"Criticism is made," said Sir Clifford, "that these people have not as high a standard of living as our own people have. A lot of nonsense is talked on that score. They will have the standard of living of pioneers, and what they can get out of the soil. You cannot get the higher standard of living out of that soil I speak of. and you must get the man who will be satisfied with what he can get from it if you are going to settle it.
"That standard of living would probably be as good as that of the men who were the pioneers of Ontario and Quebec. My own ancestors were Ontario pioneers, and they did not worry about standards of living, but cleared the land, and when they had time they built schools and churches and otherwise laid the foundations for the present conditions. They suffered hardships, but they made a prosperous Christian community, and turned out men whose names have become household words in the history of Canada.
Now, with regard to the complaint that we have unemployment so extensively at the present time that it would be dangerous to bring more people in, I would say that this is one of the stock arguments of our friends who wish to repress immigration into our cities. In this connection I may cite a report of a debate in the Ontario legislature on February 13th. I quote the heading as well as the report itself:
Plenty of work on Ontario farms: $35 to $40 a month and board; farmer can't give more. Must get men.
"There is plenty of employment in Ontario but unfortunately there are a considerable number of men vho are not in a position to take advantage of the ipportunities of employment offered," said Premier Drury yesterday in the House.

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It was an interesting discussion bringing out a sharp difference of opinion as to whether there was an unemployment problem or not. Several labor members claimed that there was a pressing problem of men out of work and quoted a re'cent return that ten thousand people were unemployed.
Minister of Agriculture Doherty, on the other hand, while admitting there were people without jobs, explained that about thirty applications a day were being received by his department from farmers seeking farm help and it was imposible to supply this demand.
The debate started when K. K. Homuth (South Waterloo) read from the Liverpool Echo an interview given by S. Harris, of the Canadian Army and Navy League, that there was no unemployment in Canada at present except those who would not work. He contended that there was unemployment and people should not be encouraged to come to Canada at the present time. "There are a great number of farmers," said Sam Clarke (West Northumberland) "who would be tickled to death"-
The words are his, not mine.
-to get men who could do the work at $40 to $50 a month and their board. But they cannot get them. There will be a 20 per cent shortage of labour on the Ontario farms by April 15. People can get any amount of work out in the country and if the people would only realize that $2 a day in the country is as good as $4 a day in the city, and keep away from the cities, there would be no unemployment.
G. G. Halcrow (Hamilton East) read a reply from the Minister of Labour that the average wage paid by the farmers was $8.36 a week, with board, and continued.
"As far as I am concerned, I would not be willing to leave a wife and family in the city facing rents and high cost of living and go out to work in the country at $8.36 a week. I would rather stay in the city and all starve together."
"Move them all out," Mr. Clarke interjected.
''There is work in this province for every man who is able to do the work that is offered him," said Mr. Doherty. "If the farmers are to get the labour they need we must bring in people who are prepared to work on the farm. The farmers are paying $35 to $40 a month and board, which is exceedingly fair, in fact, it is only because they are sorely in need of help that they are offering this amount, in view of the low prices they are receiving for their products."
I think that is an effective answer to those who say we have unemployment in the cities. We have people idle in the cities, it is true, but if men engaged in seasonal occupations have an opportunity to go out on the farms and earn money I see no reason why they should not seize the opportunity; and if they ignore it, I do not see why we should concern ourselves further with them, indeed, we ought to wash our hands of them altogether. Undoubtedly it is our duty to see that work is provided for them, but not a paticular kind of work or work in a particular location.
Another citation with regard to unemployment. This is an article from the Gazette of February 28th, incorporating a report from the Dominion Statistician. It says:
According to reports received, compiled and tabulated by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics employment at the beginning of February showed considerable revival from the contractions recorded at the commencement
of January, when losses incidental to the holiday and mid-winter inventory period, supplementing seasonal declines, had reduced activity to a marked degree. The reaction was somewhat more pronounced than that registered at the beginning of February of last year, and considerably more so than at the same period in 1921. Statements for the month under review were compiled from 6,253 employers of labour whose pay-rolls aggregated 733.063 persons as compared with 707,859 at ihe commencement of January. This increase of over 25,000 workers caused the index number to gain slightly over three points, standing at 89.5 as compared with 86.3 on January 1, and with 78.9 on February 1, 1922. Practically all the recovery was recorded in the manufacturing industries, (notably in iron and steel), but logging and coal mining also afforded more employment. Activity in transportation and construction continued to decline, although the shrinkage was on a rather smaller scale than in the preceding months.
This would go to show that we really have no unemployment situation at the present moment.	.
My hon. friend from Centre Winnipeg (Mr. Woodsworth) referred the other day to the fact that there are 6,000 unemployed people in the city of Winnipeg. We all know that during periods of depression the unemployed from the country districts flock into the cities. Winnipeg has a population of 250,000, and the district round about must comprise, I should judge, nearly 1,000,000 people, when we take in the Eed river and the Assiniboine and Saskatchewan river valleys. Out of all those people in that district merely 6,000 were found to be unemployed in the city of Winnipeg-a negligible number.
Now, we must investigate and find out why those people are unemployed. As is well known, we have a large number of returned soldiers, men broken by their military service overseas. It is impossible to get them to remain in any vocation. They wander about, their former life having unfitted them for steady employment. Then we have the human flotsam and jetsam found in all large cities: these people never work. Of course, they have to be provided for in a certain way, but if we are to be deterred from encouraging immigration by there being a few hundred unemployed people in this or that part of the country, why, we shall never have any practical immigration policy.
I feel, Mr. Chairman, that I have already taken up too much of the time of the committee in discussing this subject, but it is one on which I feel very strongly, as my friend, the Acting Minister of Immigration and Colonization (Mr. Stewart) knows. He,has in various orders in council a number of rules prohibiting people from entering this country. All kinds of what I would call if I were permitted-I have been permitted and I have called them before-fool regulations, nonsensical rules. Those rules do not accomplish the purpose

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intended, but they keep out very many people who would be valuable acquisitions to this country- For instance, one order in council declared that no person unless possessed of $250 could enter this country. I understand that this order has been abrogated. But in place of this monetary qualification, another regulation quite as good, even better, has been put in force. After all, $250 is not a very large sum of money for a person to have in his possession. I have known of cases where $250 did a great deal of good, and in fact the same, sum was instrumental in enabling many immigrants to pass the immigration officers. Now it is not necessary to be possessed of $250 in order to enter this country. In place of that regulation we have something much more effective as a restriction. No man of the artisan class who is not a British citizen can come to Canada unless his passport has been vised by the Canadian agent before the immigrant goes aboard his ship. That, I admit, is a very effective restriction. If the artisan is a British citizen he can enter, although even a British citizen used to be debarred unless he possessed $250. If he is an American citizen he does not require the $250 either. The United States take in as many Canadians as are prepared to go there; the Dillingham Act. I understand, does not apply to citizens of our country. But when a Canadian who has left Canada and gone to the United States attempts to come back to his own country he is prevented from doing so on the ground that he has lost, as the order in council says, his domicile-and that is what the minister calls a proper rule. Last year we barred 10,000 Americans from entering Canada at the border-why, I do not know; probably for the reason that from the point of view of their occupations or callings there were no openings for them in Canada at the time. Now, there are hundreds and thousands of people who could come into this country and earn a living as well as any of us can, and who would be an asset to Canada. I do not say they would engage in work in factories, or that they are of the artisan class, but they are small traders, small merchants and so on, who may have been crowded out by the conditions in the United States and elsewhere and who want to get a foothold here. People of this class have always made a success in Canada, but they are not permitted to come in. And, who, do you think, decides whether or not there is a vacancy for a member of the artisan class who seeks entry into Canada? The Department of Labour, so worthily presided over by my hon. friend the Minister of Labour (Mr. Murdock). When an applica-

tion is made for an artisan to come into the country a report is asked for from the Minister of Labour. He probably turns the thing over to the Trades and Labour Council, of which Mr. Tom Moore is the president, and in due course we are notified that there is no vacancy for that particular person and that it is not in the public interest that he be permitted to come in. Is it any wonder that I protest against rules of this kind? We have a lopsided system that will never work. We have a watertight scheme that is bound to fail, because it is not natural. I hope the minister will realize that before it is too late.


William F. Carroll: Before the hon. gentleman leaves the question of passports to immigrants from central Europe, may I ask what is the effect of the regulation to which he refers?


Samuel William Jacobs: The effect of it is this: the Canadian official has his instructions and he will not vise their passports, and the result is that the intending immigrants cannot get on board the vessel.


Mr. MARTELL:: What information is before the Canadian official to show that that sort of man is not wanted in this country- provided he does not know otherwise?


Samuel William Jacobs: He has the information supplied to him from time to time by the Department of Immigration.


Charles A. Stewart: May I be permitted to make a correction? I am prepared to sit here and take all this warm medicine, and when hon. members get through I shall have a few things to say. But there is one statement made by my hon. friend that I cannot allow to pass. The instruction given to the agents on the Continent is that there is a place in Canada for physically and mentally fit people from the countries from which we have been accepting immigration. In fact we have been accepting immigrants from former enemy alien countries in cases where their friends were prepared to guarantee that they would be respectable and decent citizens in Canada. But there is no bar on the physically and mentally fit individual who wishes to come to Canada to farm or to seek employment as a farm labourer.


Samuel William Jacobs: I admit there are no restrictions at all; if a person wants to go on a farm or become a farm labourer, he gets in without any trouble and in due course he finds his way to the city. What I want to have is a direct route.

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Charles A. Stewart: Does my hon. friend suggest that we are being lied to on the Continent in respect to getting people into this country?


Samuel William Jacobs: What I mean is this: when they get on the farm they cannot make the farm pay; then they drift into the city. That has been the burden of my complaint during the whole of this afternoon. We have tens of thousands of persons of British and Canadian stock who started on farms in Canada and who are now in the cities. It is not reasonable, therefore, to conclude that those who come here to go on the land, subjecting themselves to the rigors of the West, having no knowledge of the conditions or of farming in a large way such as is carried on in that part of the country-at best they have been engaged only in intensive farming or market gardening

it is not reasonable, I say, to conclude that these people will remain on the farms but will find their way to the cities. I venture to say that ninety per cent of the members of this House to-day were born on a farm or at one time lived on a farm, but ultimately wandered away to improve their position in life. The hon. Minister of Immigration himself, started out as a farmer; now he is a statesman. Why did he not stay on the farm? Because l}e found it more pleasant and more profitable to become a statesman; and here he is. I venture to say that fifty per cent of the people who are now on farms to-day in the Canadian West would, if they had the opportunity, flock into the cities and help to swell the urban population. I know something of what farming is in the West. It may be a surprise to many hon. members to know that I myself was born on a farm.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Is my hon. friend a statesman now?


Samuel William Jacobs: Well, I may say that "Hope springs eternal in the human breast."


Mr. STEVENS:: My hon. friend also probably remembers that "Hope deferred maketh the heart sick."


Samuel William Jacobs: Well, that may apply to my hon. friend, who is an ex-statesman. I would invite the Minister of Immigration and the Minister of Labour to come to Montreal: I will get together for them a mass meeting of from 4,000 to 5,000 people; we will fill the largest hall in the city. These people will consist altogether of artisans, and the two ministers can get the benefit of their views as to whether there is need in Montreal an I
other large cities for immigration of the class that I have advocated. Many of the departmental officials to whom I have referred are first-class men and I have nothing to say against them, but in other cases dry rot has set in, and when that happens the official is of no possible use to the department; in fact, he is a drag on the wheel. Such people ought to be superannuated or otherwise removed and live persons put in their places who could give the Minister proper information upon these vital matters. The Minister, I understand, is managing five or six different departments; he is doing the best he can, but after all he is only human and he has to take his information from people who are living in the past, who are in the nineteenth century, not in the twentieth; who do not know of conditions in the large cities. How many of them have gone to the large cities and interviewed the artisan classes or the employing classes to find out just what the conditions are? Where they got their information I do not know, but what I do know is that they have made a very sorry fist of it if they have given information to the minister upon which he has based his so-called policy which he brought down to the House this week.
I trust that I may have an opportunity later in the discussion when questions arise out of particular estimates to speak a little further. For the present I should like to have some reply, effective or otherwise, or an attempt even at a reply, to what I think is an arraignment against the department and something which calls for an answer from it.


James Dew Chaplin: The hon. gentleman who has just addressed the House (Mr. Jacobs) admitted that he was a voice in the wilderness. He admitted also that he was sniping the government from behind. To alleviate the force of his blow, after a little sniping at his own party he seeks to draw the Canadian Manufacturers' Association into the fray as being in some way connected with the Canada Colonization Association with which this government have made some arrangement. I repudiate that statement absolutely. The Canadian Manufacturers' Association, except as individual citizens, had nothing whatever to do with it.


Samuel William Jacobs: That is correct. I agree with my hon. friend that it was the members individually of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association who were invited to contribute to the Canada Colonization Association.

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James Dew Chaplin: I am glad to have that statement from the hon. member because that was the suggestion I took exception to.


Lewis Herbert Martell: That is what he said at the outset.


James Dew Chaplin: The hon. member from Nova Scotia might be quiet for a moment. He will have an opportunity later. I would like to put a few questions to the minister regarding this association with which he has made an arrangement, but before doing so I want to emphasize further what I have to say with respect to the organization that has been referred to. I want to read a sentence from a letter of the Canada Colonization Association written within the last two or three months, and you will see then whether the Manufacturers' Association have anything to do with this association and who has to do with it.


Lewis Herbert Martell: My hon. friend referred to the hon. member from Nova Scotia. I will tell him that the hon. member from Nova Scotia represents a free-born constituency and is not a counsel for the Canadian Manufacturers' Association.


James Dew Chaplin: I understand, Mr. Chairman, that I have the floor. The sentence I wish to read is as follows. This association speaking of itself, says:
It has the approval and support of the Imperial, federal and provincial governments, the co-operation of the Canadian Pacific Railway and the government-owned railways.
There is no word' there or in this whole letter regarding the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, but there is word of the federal government, and I think the hon. member who has just spoken might take the responsibility himself, as a supporter of this government, when it admits that it has made an arrangement for the payment of public money to this corporation.
In the course of his address the hon. member (Mr. Jacobs) told us that this company was without a president. I should like to inquire from the minister who are the officers at present of this association, and would also ask him to give us some further information regarding it. Surely we have a right to know with respect to this company, even if it is a charitable organization, which is good enough for this government to make a contract with of the magnitude it has, what is its personnel and everything regarding it.


Charles A. Stewart: The president until recently was Sir John Willison. The vice-president of the company is M. A. Brown. The general manager for western

Canada is Mr. Howard Everett, and the general manager for eastern Canada, Mr. George Creelman, of the city of Toronto. These are the main officers.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Is there any one from Nova Scotia a member of that company?


James Dew Chaplin: Would the minister tell us who the directors of the company are?


Lewis Herbert Martell: Is there a Nova Scotian in that company?


Charles A. Stewart: I have not that information.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Will the minister say
there is or there is not?


Charles A. Stewart: I could not say that.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Nova Scotians do not deal that way.


James Dew Chaplin: Did the minister say he did not know the directors?


Charles A. Stewart: I have not
that information at hand.


James Dew Chaplin: Would it be too much to ask the minister to let the House know at some future time who the directors are?


Charles A. Stewart: Very well.


Mr. RINFRET:: I admit that my first
words will be to express my sympathy towards the Minister of Immigration (Mr. Stewart). Since he has brought down this policy he has been subjected to criticism not only from both wings of the opposition, but also from behind. I venture to say that if instead of framing his policy he had waited until he was in the House and had heard the different suggestions made to him, and had then tried to put them together, it would have been a tremendous task because I have never yet heard in a debate in this House such a merry-go-round of contradictory statements as have been made here regarding immigration. I will take the stand that even if he has not, as is evident, succeeded in satisfying everyone, yet we should have much sympathy with him in the situation in which he happens to be placed, and understand by the very phases of this debate how complex this problem of immigration is,
An hon. member speaking during the course of this debate stated that the main questions of Canadian politics were the railway question and immigration. Some go further and claim that by increasing population in this country the government will go a long way towards wiping out the railway deficit. It will be

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time enough, in my opinion, to deal with that phase of the situation when the railway estimates are before the House, but the problem of immigration in itself suggests so [DOT] many comments that even at the risk of reiterating what has already been said to-day, one feels that one cannot refrain from expressing his own views.
The minister the other day defined the government policy. He stated that in his opinion it was imperative that Canada secure more people. He argued that the financial burden was heavy on the present population, and that increased immigration would lighten it. He also considered it urgent that some selection be made of the immigrants who apply for admission to this country, and he volunteered the opinion that we should not have too many immigrants for the cities on account of the unemployment situation. With that summary statement I will say that personally I find very little fault. The reasons for an increased immigration are perfectly obvious. We live in one of the largest and richest countries in the world. One who travels across this country from ocean to ocean is astonished at the immense possibilities of Canada. It is a country vast as a continent, but its richness lies dormant in the soil beneath for want of the required number of miners, tillers and workers to bring it to light, and if immigration was imperative before the war I contend that it is even more so now under the present conditions.
We have inherited an enormous war debt. In 1896 our net debt was only $225,738,079. In 1911 it had grown to 326 millions and some odd thousands, and in 1922 it stood at $2,366,861,252. In my opinion it has grown at a rate out of all proportion to our population. It is urgent, not only to increase the number of tax payers in this country, but also to increase the production of wealth and the potential paying ability of the community as a whole.
Now, let us look at the figures of our population. From 1911 to 1921 the increase by immigration to this country was 1,975,393. The natural increase in population was 1,836,407, giving what should have been a total increase of 3,811,800 persons. Yet the net increase during that period was only 1,562,851. In other words, as has been stated before, not only did we lose the total number of immigrants that came into Canada during those ten years, but also 273,000 of our natural increase. I will say at once that I am not placing a definite value at all on these figures. I am one who thinks, in common with many others, that the figures of the last census
75i
are not correct. For example, we in Montreal contend that the population of that large city has been underrated by the census figures to the extent of fully 100,000 people. But taking the facts as they are, it is very clear that we need more immigrants if we hope to maintain our population at the figure at which it should stand.
Some say-it has been said in this debate- that we need not spend any money on immigration because all the immigrants we induce to come to Canada leave us, and therefore the money is misspent. But we have no proof at all, Mr. Chairman, that the 1,800,000 people who left us during the ten year period referred to had been immigrants. On the con-traiy, I claim that if we had had no immigration at all during those ten years the conditions that brought about the exodus from this country to the States would have had their effect to a certain degree, and instead of reporting an increase in population-however small it may look to us-we would probably have had a decrease. And touching this subject I will say, that although I have much sympathy in theory with the efforts made towards repatriation I do not entertain any great hope that that phase of the government's policy, even with the co-operation of the provinces, will have very much effect. I think it is much harder to entice any citizen to come back to this country than to prevent him from leaving, or than to replace him by another citizen through the medium of immigration. Therefore I think it is obvious- and we might in the confusion of opinions expressed in the course of this debate agree, at least, on this point-that we should try, in some way, to increase the number of our immigrants. But it is also true that we must exercise some care in their selection.
As to the country of origin let me say very frankly that this, to my mind, is of much less importance, than the character of the individual immigrant. We may get good settlers and we may get bad settlers from any country on the earth. It is quite natural that we should try to secure a large number of immigrants from the British Isles. It would also be natural for us to try to secure a number of immigrants from France and Belgium. Here let me say that it is very hard to get any immigrants at all from either of the last two countries mentioned. It is well known that even in normal times Frenchmen do not emigrate to other countries, that they are very strongly attached to their native land. If that is true in normal times, how much more true must it be in this period of after war reconstruction. The French government itself is very anxious at this moment to keep its
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French children on the soil of France in order that the efforts towards reconstruction be brought to their full fruition. Furthermore, we all know that there is a decrease of population in France due to the falling off in births, and that there were very heavy losses during the war. It is also well known that any immigration propaganda in
5 p.m. France is prohibited by the govern-of the republic. Such propaganda was barely tolerated before the war; now it is very strictly prohibited. Therefore, I would like to state, in all frankness, that although we are very desirous of securing settlers from France and Belgium, it would appear to be a very hard task, and for my part I would not feel inclined to blame the government too severely if the stream of immigration from these two countries does not flow to Canada more copiously than it does at present.


Mr. SHAW:: Do I understand that the laws of Belgium prohibit emigration from that country now?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I was alluding more particularly to France. I will frankly admit that I am not positive as to what is taking place in Belgium. I am inclined to think, however, that it would be somewhat easier to procure immigrants from the latter conutry, more especially in view of the fact that the population of Belgium is very dense. Nevertheless, it is a fact that it has always been very hard to attract immigrants from both these countries.


Mr. BROWN:: There is a large number of Belgians in the West.


Charles A. Stewart: That immigration is under government supervision.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I frankly admit, for I believe in being frank about these matters, that I have much sympathy with the proposal made by the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St George (Mr. Marler) as regards immigrants from those countries with which we were at war during the great conflict. Such immigration, however, must be under regulation; we must be very careful in admitting such immigrants to this country. Again I say I have no prejudice at all against immigrants coming from any country in the world; I attach much more importance to the character of the individual than I do to the country of origin.
As regards the question of regulations, I will not go into it fully as my hon. friend from George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs) has done. Nor will I say that I endorse all that that hon. member has said. But I would
(Mr. Rinfret.]
suggest, in a general way, that the regulations be made less rigid in their application, and that the authorities use some discretion in regard to individual cases. I place little faith in any stringent rule which is not intelligently applied and carried out with discretion.
I must say also that I was much surprised, during the course of the debate, to hear so many hon. members opposite object to the immigration of farmers and farm help. I think they are the very immigrants that we do require and that there is unlimited space for them in Canada. The average farmer succeeds very easily in feeding and maintaining his family. The exodus from the rural parts of Canada is not due, in my opinion, to inability to secure subsistence; it is due to the lure of the city, which exerts its influence on well off and very prosperous far-, mers.


Mr. KENNEDY (Edmonton):: Does my hon. friend suggest that all the incoming immigrants require is space?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: They require space where they can get busy, where they can live and subsist. The hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs) just a moment ago read a report of a sitting of the legislature at Toronto, which report, in his opinion, went to show that we needed immigrants in the city and that we did not need them on the farms. Yet what did he read, but simply this, that farmers in Ontario were all asking for help? He was blaming 'the men in the cities who needed work for not going on to those farms to help those Ontario farmers; I think every line of the report that he read was ample proof that, in that part of the country at least, if men were needed, they were needed as farm help by Ontario farmers. I am not so sure that we need immigrants in the cities. It is all very well to say that at present there is little unemployment and that most people who really care to work can find work. I know very well that some people will refuse work under any conditions. I will also agree that others will claim that they are entitled to work according to their willingness and taste, their own opinion as to what should be their standard of living; but I claim there are to-day, especially in large cities, quite a number of men who cam not find any employment whatever. We have heard the hon. member for St. Lawrence^ St. George, for whom I have great respect, venture an opinion somewhat in opposition to that, and the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier has said the same thing. I should like to agree with them. Perhaps we

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may agree on this point. Every Saturday morning when I am in my office in Montreal,
I have about a hundred callers asking for work. If the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George or the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier will tell me where I can send those men, I shall be very grateful to him. In agreement with the government policy, I would strongly object to any immigration effort which would tend to increase the number of unemployed in. the large cities of Canada. We want immigrants for the farms; but we have an over supply of population in the cities, and the very fact that there is a tendency to leave the farm for the city is no proof at all that the policy is wrong. On the contrary, does it not show that we should do our utmost to send as many men as we can to the farms and to restrict a3 many as we can from entering the cities?


Edward Joseph Garland: How is the hon. member going to prevent them from entering the cities?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I agree with the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier when he says that you cannot prevent nature from following its course; but I think by taking the necessary precaution to ensure that any immigrant coming into this country is a farmer or has farming aspirations, we shall go some distance towards that goal. The fact that something is hard to prevent, is no argument at all that we should not attempt to prevent it. It is, on the contrary, ample argument that we should have a policy that will do the utmost to secure that result.


Mr. MARLER:: My hon. friend will, perhaps, remember that I said I agreed with assisted immigration as regards agriculture, but I would allow immigrants who present themselves voluntarily to come to the cities.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I agree with that. I think my hon. friend is closer to my views than some hon. members opposite, and I am glad to record that.
The minister says that he intends to spend money in advertising this country and letting everyone know of its great possibilities. That is very sound and to that I do not object. But he also intends to spend pretty large sums of money with special organizations whose business it is to secure immigrants. He has contracted with the Canada Colonization Association for ten months at a figure of 8100,000, provided that they procure a minimum of 200 families during the ten months. I believe that is their proposal. Taking the average family at five, which I believe is a reasonable
figure, that will mean a minimum of a thousand settlers who will cost this country a hundred dollars per head. That is paying a very high price, and unless the minister is able to get a much larger number than the minimum stated, he is hardly getting a commensurate return for the money spent.
There is another proposal to spend $600,000 in connection with the British Empire Settlement Board. I understand that board has been working in connection with the Australian government, and while the reports that I have read may not be accurate-I say again you get reports on this matter which are very contradictory-I do not see that the results have been very favourable in Australia. The immigrants which this board has been able to send to Australia have been moderate in numbers and rather low in quality. I believe in attracting immigrants in the ordinary 'way, but the amount seems very large.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What number does the hon. member say that Australia got?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I have not that before me.
I was speaking in a general way.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the hon. gentleman's information as to the morale of the immigrants which Australia got?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: Perhaps the hon. gentleman, when he speaks in this debate, will discuss that point.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend made an assertion.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I think I qualified the statement. I do not object altogether to the large sum of money; but it should not be spent unless we are sure of having good results. I have quite a large amount of confidence in the present government. If I were sitting on the other side of the room, I would probably be more inclined to be cautious. But I am voicing the opinion in a general way regarding the Settlement Board and the Colonization Association, that this is not the best way to secure immigrants for this country.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Does my hon. friend know who are the members of this company with which he alleges a contract has been entered into by the government? If it is Sir John Willison who is connected with it, I do not wonder at the hon. member's doubting.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: The Settlement Board or the other company?
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Lewis Herbert Martell: The company with which a contract was entered into on the basis of 200 families.


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: That is the Canada Colonization Association.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Who are the members of it?


Louis Édouard Fernand Rinfret: I do not know. The government has contracted with the company at a certain figure. I am giving my opinion as to the principle of any such contract, no matter who are the members of such a company. I say, in a general way, whether it be the Settlement Board or the Colonization Company, I take little stock in the work of any such company which indulges in wholesale bargaining for immigrants at a certain figure, for a certain consideration, whether their idea be to get paid for the work they do, or to free another country from a certain surplus of population that they do not want, but that they would like us to absorb. I think that the immigrant who is attracted to this country because he thinks the place is worth while, and comes of his own will, is on the average a better prospect than any immigrant who has been influenced and attracted into the country by companies whose interests are merely to live up to a contract, or who possibly are engaged in relieving other countries of an overflow of population.
I would direct the attention of the minister to this more especially, and ask him if he is going to apply his regulations at all rigidly- to be much more stringent with any flow of immigrants sent out at so much per head by any settlement board or company than with the average immigrant who comes on his own responsibility because he has discovered that Canada will very likely prove a fine country for him to live in.
No matter where these immigrants may come from, I say that we should see to it that they shall become good Canadians. What is assimilation?-asked an hon. member during the course of the debate on this question. Centuries ago a Roman pro-consul put a similar question to the multitude: "What is truth?" Now, we all know what assimilation is; we all know what the word means. It means not only that a person coming into this country should be able to speak or should learn one of the current languages of the country, but it also implies the obligation to interest himself in the country's general welfare and become a part of its social and economic life. Any body of immigrants, call them Doukhobors, Mennonites, or by any other name you choose, who retain their 
peculiar class identity after their arrival in this country and who continue to lead a separate and distinct life from the great Canadian body, falls short, in my opinion, of all that is implied in the term "assimilation." Differences, racial or otherwise, are numerous enough in this country without our adding to their number.
Now, it is often charged that hon. members' utterances on this subject lack consistency and preciseness. Quite a number of questions have been put to every speaker, questions very kindly in their phraseology; and I have done my best to answer such questions. Some, I admit, I could not answer. Possibly that has detracted somewhat from the logical sequence of my speech; and it might have been more advantageous to a proper conclusion of my remarks had I been allowed to travel a continuous and uninterrupted route. However, before I resume my seat I should like to sum up my remarks briefly. We need immigrants, but we should not pay too high a price for them. We need them on the farms and not in the cities; and they should be subject to regulations moderately and discreetly enforced. We should advertise this country, too, as well as improve its living conditions, so as to retain within its borders the citizens we already have. In the expenditure in connection with the Canada Colonization Association and the Empire Settlement Board, I have little faith; and I trust that the government will promptly discontinue such expenditure if it fails to bring proper- and unexpected-results.


Mr. IRVINE:: Most of us appreciate the
courage displayed by the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs) in attacking members of his own party, and particularly the Minister of Immigration (Mr. Stewart). But I was not very deeply impressed with the policy which the hon. gentleman would substitute for that offered by the minister. I think the hon. member went out of his way a good deal to find justification for a criticism of labour in Canada, and he characterized the policy of the Minister of Immigration as a watertight compartment.
I am sorry I cannot say as much for his policy; in fact, it was leaking all over. I wish to show in a few sentences how he misrepresented the policy of labour with regard to immigration.
If I understood the policy as outlined by the minister and by those who have supported him, I should say it seeks by immigration, fir^t, to reduce taxation, secondly, to increase production, and in the third place to bring prosperity out of the economic chaos in which

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we find ourselves at the present time. We all agree that these are noble purposes; the intentions back of them are very good; and I think we shall have to extend our sympathy not only to the minister himself but to the Cabinet as well in dealing with the situation that faces Canada to-day. We fully realize that the government did not create these economic conditions which they seek to alleviate through an immigration policy; we frankly admit that they are not responsible for them in any way andi that they cannot materially affect them by legislation at this time. We must recognize their problem as one that calls for the consideration not only of the Cabinet, or of the minister or of any party, but of parliament and of the people of Canada as well. The government are in a wilderness of . economic difficulties to-day, no doubt because of following to some extent what I would call a vague and unanalyzed tradition.
It has been stated by some of the speakers that have been supporting the policy of the minister that, following the assumption of power by the Right Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Canada experienced a great period of prosperity; and it is assumed that, by continuing an immigration policy similar to that which was in force during the regime of the late right hon. gentleman, a corresponding prosperity will ensue. Now, there have been periods of prosperity so-called and periods of depression. These alternate; and a period of depression is simply a sign of the coming prosperity, and vice versa. But prosperity does not come merely because an immigration policy of any kind is in force. It is not detracting in any respect from the greatness of Sir Wilfrid Laurier to say that his immigration policy was not what constituted the prosperity attributed to his regime. There are many economic factors that enter into these cycles of prosperity. There is such a thing as a world situation to be considered, where the producers of a country can find a market for their produce. There is manipulation of credit, by those who control the financial system of a country; there is inflation as well as deflation of credit, reflecting itself in high prices or in a slump in prices, as the case may be. Then there are favourable crop conditions, and hundreds of other circumstances to be taken into consideration. So that we must not assume, merely because prosperity happened to obtain during a certain political regime in Canada, in which an immigration policy was fostered, that we shall therefore usher in again a similarly prosperous period by the adoption of another immigration policy of the same kind.
I submit that there is no connection between an immigration policy and prosperity, except that prosperity may attract immigrants whereas immigrants do not necessarily bring prosperity in their wake. The government are evidently aware of the unfavourable economic conditions that prevail, and have attempted >
to bring forward an immigration policy by which in part they seek to remedy these conditions. The government are conscious of enemies of the state as for instance unemployment, high prices of commodities, high taxation, and an enormous national debt-these enemies are besetting the nation, and the government is striking at them. I think it is striking in the dark, assisted ably by the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs).
Now, it is all very well for us to criticize, and I think most of the criticisms we have listened to so far have not contained much of constructive value. I purpose to advance the ideas of labour with regard to immigration, and I hope that the government will at least listen to my suggestions, if they do not follow them in detail. I scarcely anticipate that the hon. Minister of Immigration will adopt the policy of labour in toto, but I do hope that he will give it consideration. Speaking for myself, and attempting as best I can to interpret the opinions of labour on immigration, I want to state that they are not opposed to immigration. The attack made by the hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs) would lead the House to believe that the policy of Labour in this country was opposed to every kind of immigration under all circumstances. It is true that we oppose certain policies of immigration that do not make for permanency, policies which do not take proper care of immigrants after arrival, policies which have been inaugurated with an absolute disregard of conditions prevailing at the time. These are the reasons for our opposing immigration on certain occasions, but our opposition is not to be regarded as permanent.
That all hired labour outside of Canada must be secured through the employment service of Canada is one of the requirements which the labour organizations of this country demand from the Minister of Immigration. And it is not difficult to see why they should urge this requirement. I understand that last year certain companies in this country requested that several thousands of miners be immediately shipped in from Belgium to work our coal mines. That request was investigated by a certain organization in this country, and it was discovered that there were already enough miners here to take care of all our
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requirements; in fact there were more than were necessary to operate our coal mines. In such circumstances it surely would have been folly to bring from Belgium a thousand or more miners who had specialized in that particular line, and thereby less fitted by that very specialization to take up other vocations, even if opportunities offered themselves. That is one reason why Labour is opposed to certain policies of immigration under certain conditions.
We want an immigration policy that', first of all, will contain in itself the elements of permanency when put into operation. Much emphasis has already been laid upon the fact that Canada is an immigration sieve, that we take in immigrants on one side and drop them out on the other, that we are losing to the United States and perhaps to some other countries more immigrants than we take in, notwithstanding the expenditure which has been made to attract them here. The problem for Canada, according to the Labour view, is not so much one of immigration as one of emigration and colonization. How, then, do we propose to colonize? Here are a few suggestions which I would submit for the consideration of the minister dealing with this question.
First, I submit that a colonization scheme should be devised to settle our vacant lands close to railroads. That immediately brings us face to face with the high price of lands. How are we going to settle immigrants who come here with very little money on lands that are close to railways? These are the high-priced lands, the lands that, somehow or other, have been secured by favoured individuals in this country. The minister said that he thought approximately $1,500 would be a very fair beginning for an immigrant to settle upon the land. How far would $1,500 go in purchasing land valued at the lowest possible price at $20 per acre, some of it as high as $50 per acre very near a railroad? How is that immigrant going to begin with $1,500 to pay high interest charges on his purchase, to equip himself with the implements necessary for farming, and to feed himself for at least a year? I tell you what would happen-


Lewis Herbert Martell: I would ask my hon. friend, why should the taxpayers of -Canada pay one cent to any person to come into this country? If people want to come, let them come so long as they are not physically unfit or Bolshevist. It is better to keep one good Canadian here than to bring in fifteen hundred foreigners.
fMr. Irvine.]


William Irvine: Mr. Chairman, the hon. member has stated my position about as clearly as I could state it myself. I am not advocating that we pay money to bring people to this country. I am trying to show, as the basis of my opposition to the present immigration policy that after paying money to bring them in we cannot keep them here.


Lewis Herbert Martell: We should not pay anything.


William Irvine: What will happen with a $1,500 beginning is that the immigrant will have to look for work in the city to pay the interest charges on the farm which he will never be able to own. Fifteen hundred dollars will not go very far in purchasing land. So some scheme must be found to free our land for the use, first of all, of the people who are here now landless; and secondly, for those who may subsequently be brought in. In pursuing this idea we should have an examination of all lands listed, and there should next take place an expropriation of all lands held at unreasonable prices. I have used the term "expropriation." Let me modify that and say, let us tax that land in order to free it. Such a procedure will increase the revenue of the country, while at the same time forcing the land from the hands of the exploiter and into the hands of those whom we are bringing into this country to increase production.
In the next place, we request that assistance should be given for the building of farm homes either to the labourers on the farms that we propose to bring in or to the fanners themselves.
Now, it may be asked: Whom should we first colonize; when lands have become available? In answer to that question-assuming of course that we are going to introduce single tax and free the land quickly-I submit it as a reasonable proposition that it is better for us to begin to colonize the people who are already in Canada than to go outside for others while our own people are walking the streets. If we cannot colonize the people that we already have, by what process of reasoning does the Minister of Immigration presume to be able to colonize new comers? That is a question which I should like him to answer when he replies to all the tirades of criticism to which his policy has already been subjected. If, then, it be a sane and good policy to put people on the land, we want first of all to colonize our land with the people already here, those in the unemployed ranks at the present time, and those who may be employed but who would rather go on the land if they saw an

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opportunity of making a living there. I am not going to deal with farming conditions. These, I presume, will be dealt with by the hon. members representing the farming interests of this country, and dealt with well, I have no doubt.
Colonization opportunities, I insist, should first be offered to all residents in Canada, and the employment service offices should be used as recruiting offices in this connection. Let me for a moment in this respect refer to the child immigration policy of the Minister of Immigration. I think he proposes to encourage the bringing in from other countries of children somewhere around the age of fourteen years. I may not be quite correct in stating that age. However, let me point out what happens to the children of Canada, and ask the minister if we should not try by some means to keep our own children alive before we begin to import others from outside countries. The number of children who died in the respective provinces last year before they were a year old was as follows: Prince Edward Island, 180; Nova Scotia, 1,311; New Brunswick, 1,299; Ontario, 6,763; Manitoba, 1,533; Saskatchewan, 1,814; Alberta, 1,391; British Columbia, 602; Quebec, 11,389. This is an enormous death rate among children, yet we are to go over to Great Britain or elsewhere and bring in others.	It is true that those
we intend to bring in are older than those referred to in these statistics, but if we could keep this large number of children alive they would make far better citizens than any children we could bring in, even if we went to Scotland for them. It was recently found in Alberta, the great farming country that is to be laid open for these immigrants, that 1,500 children were suffering from malnutrition. If we cannot feed our own children now; if we cannot keep alive the children we have brought to life in this country, why should we seek to bring others in from other countries ?
I understand that it is the law in Ontario that children shall go to school until they are sixteen. Does the minister want to bring in children at the age of fourteen and put them to work-that is what I call cheap labour- with farmers, thus violating or helping to violate the law of the province and lowering the educational standard of the community? If not, what provision is he going to make that these young boys and girls coming from Great Britain, leaving the opportunity of getting an education there, shall, in spite of doing chores and becoming the servants of farmers, have an opportunity at least to get as good an education as they would have got had they
stayed in their native country;-indeed, as good as any other child in Canada gets under the present law?


Charles A. Stewart: Every child coming into Ontario or any other province from an outside country who is under the age for leaving school will come under the provisions respecting school attendance.


William Irvine: In accordance with the law?


Charles A. Stewart: Yes.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Does the hon. member not think that Canada can get all the people of all sorts and classes she wants without spending money to bring large numbers here who will starve or be drugs on the Canadian market?


William Irvine: I am glad that the sentiments I" wish to express are echoed from the government side. I shall come to the advertising in a few moments; for the present I am trying to submit a constructive policy embodying the expressed opinions of organized labour in regard to immigration.
We believe that some organization should handle the colonization scheme that I have suggested. I would add to that suggestion that the Soldier Settlement Board or some similarly qualified organization should be charged with the work of surveying and reporting upon available lands for settlement in all parts of the Dominion, keeping in view the fact that it is our own people we first want to colonize. If we succeed in doing that, it will be a good argument for the getting of more people to colonize. All this might be summarized .in that well known and well worn phrase, "Back to the land." Getting back to the land ought to begin here; if we follow some such scheme of colonization as I have suggested and get our own people on the land, we will not need to advertise for others to come in from outside.
Our manufacturers to-day are highly protected, on the ground, as they say, that they are infant industries, and so on, and that they want to be sure that their investments are safeguarded. All that labour is asking in regard to immigration policy is that their interests may be, not protected, but given some consideration. Labour desires that it shall have the right to live, not that it shall be degraded and destroyed by any immigration policy whatsoever. If the Canadian Manufacturers' Association can claim protection from this parliament for their machinery and their investments, it is surely fair and reasonable that labour should ask parliament not to advocate or advance a policy that would imperil the rights of labour to get
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Lewis Herbert Martell: Does my hon. friend know who it is over in England who selects the immigrants that we do not want?


William Irvine: My hon. friend, being closer to the Minister of Immigration, is in a better position to answer that question than I am. I am certainly not asking for any selection of
	.
immigrants, but I am saying that from such an advertisement as I have quoted, it is not likely we shall have any great rush, and if we have no great rush of immigrants to this country we shall not have the resultant difficulties we have had during the last few years. I want to finish this quotation to show that South Africa has taken a different course with regard to advertising from that which we have followed in Canada:
This is being increasingly realized; the stream of migrants to the union of South Africa is comparatively small, but it is select and continuous.
The people who in recent years have gone to the union of South Africa are people not only of means but of judgment. They went only after weighing the prospect. What satisfied them may merit investigation by you. Is it not worth looking into?
Now if South Africa is getting the immigrants that have judgment and capital, I submit that in view of the present economic conditions in Canada the only immigrants we could hope to get would be those without judgment, and I do not think it would be good policy for us to spend $200,000 or more in trying to get into this country immigrants who have no judgment.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Mr. Chairman, I want to say frankly that I rise to oppose the minister's immigration policy. My great objection, of course, to the minister's policy is his endorsation of the Canada Colonization Association. I am very sorry that the minister has apparently taken a place in this great national colonization scheme that is lower than that taken by the Colonization Association. I had hoped that at least he would be the leading figure, the chief authority in the whole matter. I have an article here that was released for evening papers Winnipeg and west of Winnipeg, Monday, September 11, 1922, and also for morning and evening papers east of Winnipeg, September 11. It starts as follows:
The Western Ca*nada Colonization Association, in close co-operation with the federal and Imperial governments and the Canadian railways have worked out a well matured land settlement policy, which is to be put into effect forthwith.
That in the first place is my objection to this whole scheme. The date of announcing this policy was in September of last year. Just about that time we had harvested one of the largest crops that had ever been grown and matured in Canada, and it seems to me, reading between the lines and considering the whole question, that the people who were interested in this scheme remembered the good times we had in Canada as a result of the crop of 1915. I remember reading how in southern Alberta the farmers went to various loan company officials who refused to

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accept payment of mortgages in full. Possibly in this case the Canada Colonization Assoeia-toin was expecting a return of that sort of prosperity and was ready to climb on to the band wagon. At least, that is the impression I have received from reading their literature and putting that together with the date of the announcement of the policy. However, " the best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley," and it must have been so in this case. We have not had a return, of prosperity since the tremendous crop that was grown and matured in western Canada last year. In fact, I doubt if the country is as well off on the whole as it was one year before.
I want to examine further the manifesto of this association. In the leading paragraph we have the problem and the solution stated, as follows:
The British and Canadian governments have joined with the Canada Colonization Association and the Canadian railways in a co-ordinated land settlement plan covering all the provinces. An efficient colonization machine is being set up and will begin to operate forthwith. Colonization in Canada has been at a comparative standstill ever since 1913. Yet nothing is clearer than that effective land settlement on a comprehensive scale is the only available solution of the country's pressing economic and financial problems. By increasing the farming population and agricultural production throughout Canada, we shall lower freight rates, stimulate business, lighten the burden of the national debt to every individual family, lessen federal, provincial, and municipal taxation, and go far to eliminate the seflous annual deficit on the National Railways.
The scope of the plan is comprehensive enough. It promises a great deal, promises what no group of men anywhere can guarantee. The first promise it makes is that it will bring back prosperity. That is a very general statement.
It is also claimed that it will lower freight rates. Now anyone who studies the question of freight rates in Canada during the last ten years will, I think, come to the conclusion that increased population does not necessarily mean lower freight rates. Of course, there may be circumstances to take into consideration; the circumstances during the next ten years may be altogether different from those during the last ten years.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Can the hon. member
tell me who is the Deputy Minister of Immigration and where he is at the present time?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: No, I have
not been investigating that matter. This national scheme of land settlement, presided over and controlled very largely by the Canada Colonization Association, according to this manifesto promises a great deal. Some of the things that it promises will, I think, be fulfilled, but considering all the statements made
in this manifesto I think it shows a great lack of real consideration for the welfare of the intending immigrant.
I have no objection, in fact, I am very anxious like any other Canadian to see our railways prosper, and the country as a whole, but unless we give the intending immigrant every consideration, and a great deal more than he will obtain under this land settlement plan, we can never have an ultimately successful immigration policy. The first thing we learn, according to this manifesto, that the settler is going to do is to lighten our burden of debt. That means that the settler will have to assume a certain portion of our national debt when he comes into Canada as a settler. Though I am not a prophet, and have never professed to be, I would not mind guaranteeing that that promise regarding the incoming settler will be absolutely fulfilled regardless of what government or governments may be in power for the next ten or fifty years.
Regarding the lowering of freight rates, I do not think we have any real justification at the present time for saying that the mere incoming of immigrants will lower freight rates.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Will the hon. member not admit that if the railways get increased traffic they will have greater earnings, and that consequently we may ask for a reduction in freight rates?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: (Edmonton): That is a different thing from what the Canada Colonization Association is preaching in this manifesto.


Herbert Meredith Marler: I asked the hon. member a question. Does he not admit that?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: That it is possible? Yes. I certainly do. I wonder if the benefits that are supposed to accrue to the people of Canada, or to the people who are already here are passed on, or if the intending immigrants are informed as to both sides of this question. I remember in the Highlands of Scotland, away back in the year 1900 and a few years following, the very roseate literature that we used to get on immigration. I remember that on the front page of these pamphlets there would be a picture of a tar-paper shack, and two or three pages further on an illustration of an experimental farm and generally, beneath the picture was written "After a few years." Of course, railways and other conveniences found mention. I believe, however, notwithstanding the literature issued in the Old Land by the Department of Immigration that the works of Ralph Connor exercised the greatest force in interesting the people. I want to say further that
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in any literature sent abroad, either by the government or by this or any other like association, the effort should be to tell the truth as nearly as possible, and not seek to create a false impression. When the advantages which may accrue to settlers coming to Canada are dilated on there ought to be, side by side with that statement, some account given of the disadvantages which the new arrivals will have to face.
The men who were behind the present scheme when it was announced-and I suppose that their spirit controls its operations even at present, at any rate to some extent- were not farmers, and yet they were associated in a movement to induce farmers to settle on the lands of western Canada. The president of the association at that time was Sir John Willison who has written a book entitled Reminiscences, Political and Personal. Now on page 10 of that work we find the following:
But one may love the woods and the fields and not like farming. I got away from the farm as soon as I could, and I have not wanted to return. Nor have I ever heard that there was any desire that I should. It is often said that a good farmer has been spoiled to make a poor lawyer or a poor doctor. Whether or not I am a good journalist, no one who knows will suggest that I was likely to become a good farmer. The fashion changes. It is a sure word of prophecy that the movement towards the cities has spent itself. Moving pictures, rural mail delivery, good roads, motors, bath-rooms, house furnaces, and many other devices to save labour, enhance comfort and relieve isolation, make the country ever more desirable, and better prices give the farmers an increasing but still inadequate return for their labour. In a democracy rooted in the soil lies the sanity and stability of human institutions. But we cannot all be farm?rs, and to many of us a call comes that will not be denied. Whether we go to town or country, still blessed is he that findeth himself.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: When the committee rose at six o'clock, I was dealing with this national land settlement plan as advertised in the western papers on September 11. The plan is, according to the language of the advertisement, to drum up settlers in the United States and also in Great Britain, though I understand the association is not operating in Great Britain at the present time, to bring them to Canada and to settle them on the land. The first thing that must be ascertained with regard to a settler is whether he has enough cash to start on a quarter section of land. He is to be settled on unoccupied land. The vast majority of such settlers will, of course, come from parts of

the country which have been fairly well developed, where they have bams, houses, fences, water supply and other necessary things for the successful operation of a farm. To take men of that type with what little stock they may bring along with them, to place them on unoccupied quarter sections and to ask them there to make a payment of two dollars an acre and to sign an agreement that they will pay the balance in thirty-two years with interest at 6 per cent, even though under the agreement they have not to pay any principal for the first two years, is something of a problem.
The weakness in that scheme lies in this. Supposing a settler comes from some one of the fairly well-developed western states to Canada, and buys land on the recommendation of the association or any officer of the government. He can hardly be said to be doing that of his own initiative. From my knowledge of farming and of the real estate business in general, as it has been and is 'being carried on in western Canada, I think more mistakes have been made through men buying farms or lots pn the recommendation of others, be they real estate agents or otherwise, than in any other way, and this has been a great detriment to the country. To bring settlers in from the United States, regardless of the organization that is instrumental in bringing them in, or from Great Britain, should any come from there, and avail themselves of the services of this Canada Colonization Association, and to tie them down, or as Sir John Willison says, to get them rooted on the land with an initial payment of $2 an acre and an agreement to pay the balance in thirty-two years, before they have had time to become fairly well acquainted with the seasons and the general conditions prevailing in the country is, to my mind, a big undertaking and one of the principal weaknesses in this scheme.
Life on the farm in western Canada, especially, is a life of loneliness in many cases, and if there is one thing above everything else a settler needs, if he is to make good, it is self-reliance and personal initiative. If settlers are brought into this country by a shepherding organization, many settlers will very likely be brought in who would not on their own personal initiative have come in, and the result will be, I am afraid, that we shall have a larger percentage of failures under this scheme than possibly we could have had under any other plan. I came to this country something like twenty years ago; I have gone through the various stages of homesteading and so on, and my experience has

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been that the easiest thing in all those twenty years was to emigrate and that the hard experiences came afterwards. If we are going to settle 15,000,000 acres in western Canada under this system, I am afraid we shall have a very much larger percentage of discontented settlers than we have at the present time. It is much easier for a settler to become discontented and it is much more likely that he will become discontented under this plan under which he is advised to buy land by an organization such as this, than if he came of his own initiative and took up land because he wanted that land and because he was led to want it through his experience in and knowledge of the country.
We are advised further that this association, through its officers, is going to set up what it calls "community clubs," which, apparently, are going to look after those settlers after they come to Canada in order that they may not drift to the cities. It will be very difficult to prevent them from doing that, and that phase of the operations of the organization is practically worthless. After the settlers have been established in communities and they have those local community clubs organized, I find in this circular what the clubs will do:
(a)	prepare a chart of its particular district which will indicate occupied and unoccupied farms.
And so on.
(b)	assist the officials of the Canada Colonization Association in securing listings of land.
(c)	Report on vacant lands and land valuations in each district.
Apparently, after these community clubs are established in various districts, they are going to be used to further the interests of the Canada Colonization' Association.
(d)	Induce local farmers to write their friends "back home," advising them of the advantageous opportunities for land settlement in their neighbourhoods.
I am afraid we have in this something that might become a rather dangerous principle. The settler pays his $2 per acre down in the first place, and then he signs an agreement to pay the balance in thirty-two annual payments with interest at 6 per cent. After he pays down his initial $2 per acre, he gets two years without paying any principal; but I am afraid that to take hold of a raw quarter section and to grow anything more than feed for stock during those two years, will be more than the average settler can do. Although the ordinary farmer is not a man who is very ready with his pen or fond of writing letters, it is possible that some of them might be induced, through a promise of an extension of time on some payment that might be overdue, to rvrite to their friends back home. I
am afraid we are being asked to endorse something that is not in the best interest of the settlers who might come to this country through the agency of the Canada Colonization Association.
It is stated that the landowner will pay the Canada Colonization Association $2 per acre. There may be some dispute in regard to this. This manifesto would indicate that the owners of vacant lands would pay the association $2 commission. It is open to dispute, however, as to just who will pay that $2. It may be that conditions will be such that land cannot be raised in value an extra 82 to meet that commission; but from a knowledge of real estate practices in the country I am afraid there is a chance that in a great many cases this is what will be done. We have not solved the problem for the settlers in bringing them in in this way; and I will go further and say that encouraging settlers to come in this manner, who would not otherwise be likely to come, is not a very good guarantee for their future success as farmers, at least in western Canada.
There are others, however, who are going to benefit from this organization. Thousands of absentee owners of unoccupied lands along the railways are tired of paying heavy taxes and super taxes on these unproductive holdings and would gladly dispose of their property at prices and on terms that would facilitate purchase by incoming settlers. The absentee landowners will be benefited. I also find that the American as well as the local land men will be provided with business. I find here that the former Minister of Agriculture of the province of Alberta will shortly tour the British Isles speaking in support of British agricultural emigratidn to lands in Canada. The statement is made, too, that others will be employed by the Dominion government and the association in an endeavour to work up this great land settlement plan. The association, it is said, has a subscribed capita! of $1,500,000. It does not show in this manifesto how much of this has been actually paid up. So far, I do not know; and I am wondering whether anything more has been paid in in cash than has come from the federal treasury. The expectation of the officers in charge of the organization is that between $30,000,000 and $40,000,000 will be earned in commissions in the next ten years, to be disbursed in the working out of this plan; and it is further stated that the plan is non-profit sharing. Well, there are various ways of sharing profits, and I think that profits are often paid in salaries. And, of course, if they are paid in salaries and good salaries in some cases, dividends may
11S4

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not be necessary. I have no confidence in this plan, and I would much rather have seen the minister control the whole immigration policy himself through his department and its officials.	[DOT]
A good deal has been said about the value of British and American immigrants to Canada. We have been given to understand a great many times, not only on the floor of this House but also in agricultural papers throughout the country, and from other sources, that these settlers could bring to us a knowledge of intensive farming which we need very much in Canada. I do not quite agree with that view. I believe that we do need a little more intensive rather than extensive farming in Canada; but I do not believe that the new settlers coming in from the United States or Great Britain are the people that are going to show us how to carry on this farming. I believe that the demonstration is more likely to come from the men who have been through the mill in the past few years of our country's history and who know the mistakes that may have been made. What are the conditions on farms in the Old Land? On farms of 100 acres there you have good fences, good stone buildings, and every convenience at hand. You will find possibly five persons on such a farm besides the tenant, who generally goes around managing the business. Who could not farm intensively under such conditions? Do you think settlers coming from the Old Country are going to apply those same intensive conditions here, where one man would have to tackle a whole quarter section himself, in addition to building fences, herding stock and putting up his buildings, possibly all at the same time? That is a different matter. The Old Country settler coming out here and settling on land under this plan might find, after he had done his day's work, that he had no good pasture to put his stock in for the first summer, and he might be driven to the necessity of merely hobbling his horses and turning them out at night while he rolled himself under his tent or retired into his cabin, whichever he might happen to have, in the hope that Providence might be kind enough not to allow the mosquitoes to drive them away before morning.


Herbert Meredith Marler: .Does the hon. member approve, or does he not, of inviting British settlers, agriculturists, to come here?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: I approve of inviting British settlers to come, but not under this plan, which would place them on the land before they had any knowledge of the country.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Would it be impertinent to ask the hon. gentleman whether he could suggest a better method of getting them here?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Just allow them to come; they will come if conditions are fairly reasonable.


Herbert Meredith Marler: That does not answer my question.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Let the hon. member state his question again.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Under what conditions
would my hon. friend suggest inviting settlers to come here if they are not competent to take up farming of this description?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Let us inform these people just how conditions are here. We have immigration agencies in the Old Land. I suppose there are still immigration agents in Glasgow, Edinburgh, London and such places, and they could give the people a fair knowledge of the facts, placing before them both sides of the situation. They could come if they wished, and I think there would come as many as we can assimilate and settle under present conditions. But when you undertake to drum them up, according to the language of this pamphlet, you have a different problem altogether on your hands.
I am very much interested in this question of immigration, and nothwithstanding anything I may have said against this plan, I am in favour of seeing a reasonable number of immigrants come to this country. But I am opposed to this plan because I think we are putting the cart before the horse; we have not finished with the colonization plans we have had under way for the last number of years, in the West at any rate. The most recent undertaking of this kind was the soldier settlement scheme. I happen to represent a constituency that possibly has the largest block of land settled in the last ten years-I refer to West Edmonton as the constituency and the Peace River country as the settlement. We have in that country Britishers, Americans, French Canadians, Germans, Russians, Hungarians and all the other nationalities now represented in Canada. And I want to say to hon. gentlemen that I do not see very much difference in all those settlers. As one hon. member said this afternoon, it is not so much a question of nationality as of character; there are good and bad people in all nationalities. But those settlers are having a hard time. There is a large German settlement in the Peace River country. I must say that they are very good settlers, and they were good citizens during the war.

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Mr. MICHAUD:: What about the other settlers, were they good citizens, too, during the war?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Yes. These German settlers have had an agent in Mexico lately to see what the prospects are down there, because they have been so greatly disappointed in the railway facilities promised them and which they require so urgently. From 1918 on a large number of soldier settlers came into the Peace River country. They took up homesteads, of course, back from the original centres of settlement. In 1910, 1911 and 1912 the good clean prairie land was picked up, and a great many of the soldier settlers are back on the poplar-covered land.
I do not tlynk we have yet done our duty by the settlers in this country. A great many of them who came in from the United States have informed me that wherever they went during the years previous to 1911 and 1912 they were met by immigration agents of the various railway companies advertising the country and describing the proposed railroad through to the Pacific coast, and inducing them to come in in the belief that before they got well established all those railway facilities would be provided.
Now, I suppose it may strike some hon. members that the Peace River country is so far away that we should not use it as an example. But we have settlers also in West Edmonton who are located right along both sides of the Grand Trunk Pacific and that branch of the Canadian National Railways running northwest from the city of Edmonton, and among these settlers are many ex-soldiers. It may surprise the committee to be informed that settlers in the Peace River country are just as well off as those located along the Grand Trunk Pacific fifty or seventy miles from Edmonton; but this is undoubtedly the case not only as regards those settlers located in the brush lands but those who have settled in the more open stretches. And one of the main reasons why I am opposed to the present immigration policy is that I do not think we have done our duty by the settlers who were induced to come into the country by promises of railway and other facilities. I do not suppose the government is prepared to spend a great deal of money for the construction of branch lines in western Canada. My constituency is not the only one that needs such accommodation, but we have been very anxious to get a railway built from Grande Prairie south to the Canadian National railway, thus giving us a short cut to the Pacific coast instead of hauling our produce two thousand miles and more to the east. However, unless we get relief of that kind I fear
we are going to lose the settlers who have * gone in there and tried to establish themselves during the past ten years. Therefore I cannot see the wisdom of drumming up settlers in the United States while we are losing the men who came in on the strength of these promises ten years ago.


Samuel William Jacobs: Is it not a fact that about twenty thousand settlers have left that district?


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: No, not
yet. Ten thousand probably have left during the last four years but there was a population of 18,800 when the last census was taken. There are still about three million acres of settlement in that district, and the population, as I have said, is approximately about twenty thousand. The land is just as fertile as any in Canada. I repeat, the reason I am opposed to spending money to drum up settlers at the present t:me is because we can get the same results by retaining the settlers we have already if we are able to give them the railway facilities that they so urgently require.
Now, it may seem unreasonable to say that this government must fulfil all the promises and pledges given by immigration agents ten or fifteen years ago. I know it is difficult to pin down a corporation to redeem the promises made by an agent who may have acted more or less without instructions. Similarly it may be hard to pin down the government at the presept day to redeem all the promises made to these settlers in days gone by to induce them to come into the country; but the settlers are there, and if we are willing to spend a few million dollars to bring in more settlers, surely it is the part of wisdom to spend money to retain the settlers that we have already on the land. It will take the new settlers at least five years to become acquainted with the climatic conditions of the country and be as efficient farmers as those already settled there, while the latter have their equipment and are ready to go ahead under reasonably favourable conditions. I would make that constructive suggestion to the minister and government in the hope that he will be able to adopt it.
I hope also some means will be found to assist the returned soldiers located on these brush lands to clear their holdings. Most of them that I have seen during the past summer will pay about twice -as much to clear their farms as it will cost to buy new land under the method of clearing by hand.
I think in some instances mistakes were made. However, there is a way of clearing this land by fire, and I hope the department

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remove a great number of these unemployed
to the different dominions.
I am of opinion, Mr. Chairman, that only those immigrants desirous of living on the farm should be, at present, admitted to Canada, and what is more, be granted a little money to keep its people at home.
So as to relieve the industrial centres already too congested, the advantages of land settlement offered to foreign immigrants should also be offered to Canadians. I know, sir, that the government has already done a great deal in that way by settling the veterans on the land. In so doing they but wrote another page in the history of Canada; for the soldiers of the Carignan-Salieres regiment, those of the Scotch regiments who took part in the battle on the plains of Abraham, were the first in our country to drop the sword for the plough.
If it is good policy, sir, to encourage immigration on the farm, we must of all necessity encourage them to remain on Canadian soil. Statistics show to our regret, that most of the immigrants entering Canada between 1881 and 1922, have practically all left the country to emigrate to the United States. Sir Clifford Sifton refuses to blame the different governments that have succeeded one another, or put it down to the tariff, for the emigration of our people to the neighbouring republic. He acknowledges that with the exception of the French Canadians and a few others wishing to better themselves, those who left us were not worth much to Canada, and, they would have become, in a very short time, parasites.
The hon. Minister of the Interior intends to do a great deal to "repeople" Canada by encouraging a farming class of immigrants to this country who could buy farms on easy terms and by being given help from certain provinces so as to give to this campaign a more conclusive and practical object. The government gave proof of national spirit by organizing a special campaign encouraging the return to their native land of those French Canadians who left to establish themselves in the manufacturing centres of New England. If our friends on the opposite benches only wish to recall the fact, it was under the Conservative administration that the exodus of our people began. An hon. member belonging to the Progressive party, who is certainly not aware of the spirit of justice and equity which prevails in Quebec in regard to the distribution of government grants, asked the hon. Minister of the Interior, if the funds expended for the above-mentioned campaign would be applicable to the English speaking

Canadians. If so, there would be no grounds to be scandalized if we so insist on the repatriation of the French Canadians, because as pointed out recently by l'Ecole Sociale Populaire, in a communication to the Minister of the Interior, should not the province of Quebec which has been paying for the last twenty-five years for the recruiting of foreigners destined to other provinces, keep its people?
Canada has been up to now, if we are to put faith in statistics,-and statistics are occasionally reliable-a sieve for immigrants brought here at our expense. Henceforth, our immigrants should be possessed of a different spirit and their only desire before coming across to our country, should be to live here forever. I know, Sir, that we shall never be able to prevent all our immigrants from resisting the powerful attraction of the great country to the south of us; however, so as to diminish the attraction of that great magnet, let us make life easier for all the citizens of Canada by a wise and judicious administration. The government has decided to allow a certain class of immigrants to enter the country. Very well, but to keep them here we must first train them. The recruiting agent should certainly show practical results in the country where he is called upon to work, but we must give him an agriculturist, as an assistant who can advise the future settler on the character of the arable land, in the province where he intends to settle. Let not the immigrant come here and tempt fortune in a haphazard way.
What are to be the means employed to bring this campaign to a successful issue? An intelligent and truthful publicity carried on by agents speaking perfectly the language or the dialects of the country where they are sent to work.
Is the Civil Service Commission capable of selecting such agents? I refuse to believe it. The selection of such agents should be left to the minister, because qualified applicants may be easily found.
Mr. Chairman, shall this immigration be to the benefit only of the western provinces?
I do not think so. Let us consult the statistics of last year; the immigrants that settled in Ontario were more than 38 per cent, in the West 42 per cent and in the East about 18 per cent. While the other provinces were losing almost all their immigrants, Quebec, during the last twenty years, has kept the 500,000 immigrants it received plus 146,000 the natural increase of its population.
The government's project, as recommended by the hon. minister is very acceptable, since

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he provides in the majority of cases for the reimbursement of the money which he will have paid out to draw settlers to this country. The collateral securities that the immigrant will have to put up in certain instances will shelter the government against any loss. Let the government watch over the selection of those who are to settle here. The worthy immigrant may become intolerable and the latter may change and become undesirable.
Let the repatriation of our people take precedence over all the other means to "repeople" Canada. Let a thorough examination, both in regard to moral and physical fitness of the future citizens of Canada, be made at the embarkation port, and let us be especially assured that the applicant possesses the spirit which will allow him to accept the ways and customs of our country. Let us not commit that great blunder that befell a governor of a large French colony, who wanted "his black subjects to accept progress against their will." Our new settlers should be before and above all assimilable and we should not be obliged to alter entirely their notions in order to have them co-operate with us.
The primary requirements to be heeded, sir, are those in connection with human activities: when to act, how to act and in what limits to act?
A wise and prudent answer to each of these questions, will contain the whole policy of our government on the subject of immigration.
A scrupulous attention given to the selection of the new seeds which it is the intention to sow on Canadian soil* will produce presently a new wheat whose maturing ears, under this same sun of liberty and tolerance, will ripen into a truly Canadian nation. Such united efforts witout favouring sectionalism as regards the interests of the different provinces of confederation, will promote the progress of our beautiful Canada and enable it to fulfil the sublime destinies that Providence has reserved for it on this continent of America. That, sir, will be the eager aim and desirable outcome of a sound policy of immigration.


Miss MACPHAIL:: Mr. Chairman, I
have listened with a great deal of interest to the debate on immigration which has now been going on for some time. Some one made the statement to-day that possibly ninety per cent of the members who sit in this House were born on the farm; it would be interesting to know whether that estimate is true. If it is, I can only conclude, after listening to what a great many of the members have had to say, that some of them at least have very short memories; they have forgotten what living on a farm means. I thought 76J
from the speech of the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Marler) that he did not understand farming until he said that a person with a sound brain, much courage, and two pairs of capable hands could make a living when he turned his attention to cultivating the soil. I concluded then that the hon. member did understand farming. I was glad that the hon. member representing another Montreal constituency (Mr. Jacobs) spoke today because he made life on the farm and the difficulties which just now attend it so very plain that he saved me the trouble of doing so.
I believe that the real difficulty in Canada to-day is that there is too much difference between the standards of living of urban and rural people, and I believe that if we could re-adjust the rewards of life and effort we could solve the whole problem. Because the way to deal with the immigration problem is not to bring in new settlers, but to spread the present population more evenly over the country, in that way relieving congestion in the cities and avoiding the scarcity of population in the rural districts. I think that one of the things that makes people fight shy of working with their hands in this age is that as a nation we do not sufficiently respect those who toil with their hands. We have almost forgotten the biblical injunction that we were to earn our living by the sweat of our brow. I am amazed-and I feel that I would not be fair to myself, to my people or to the members of this House if I did not say so- I am truly amazed at the sentiments that are expressed by some of our well-groomed luxuriously living friends. They evidently have not had their brow wet with sweat for some time, or if they have their hands were not soiled with work on that occasion. I want to say right here that I respect more a person who knows what a good honest day's work is, a person who works with hand as well as brain, and -who works so hard that he or she goes to sleep aching with weariness, than I do those people who disdain the very idea of toil and try to make it appear to the world that they do not understand what actual work means.


Jacques Bureau: So say we all.


Agnes Campbell Macphail: I think that that is
at the very basis of this problem in Canada.
In connection with this immigration scheme one hon. member recommended bringing in servant girls to Canada to work in homes, to do the work that the woman of the house would do if she did not have a servant. But that girl is not considered the social equal of
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those for whom she works. Why not? If her character and her brain are as good is she not the equal in every way of the woman of the house who hires a servant simply because her husband is in a financial position to enable her to do so? I think it is time we were trying to even up social standards and not make such a difference between those who work with their hands and those who work with their heads-work exclusively with their heads, I mean.
I do not see why there should be such a great anxiety to bring into Canada more farmers and more farm labourers at this particular time. The farmers are already, with the help of the experimental farms and the 9 p.m. many things that have taught them how to produce abundantly, producing more than they can get rid of. There is no shortage of production, and yet it is sought to bring in more people into Canada to further produce when we are unable to consume what is already grown. This must have the effect of throwing upon the , markets of the world a surplus which must be consumed somewhere.
I am very much opposed at this time to any large expenditure of money for immigration purposes. I believe that the immigration offices which have been kept open for years should remain so, and that immigrants,-fit in body and mind-that offer to come here should be accepted; but that any great scheme of what I might call artificial immigration should be launched at this time is, I think, a mistake. A great deal has been said here about farming conditions in western Canada, but very little has been said about fanning conditions in Ontario. Consequently one would judge that people on the farms in that province were having a very pleasant time. That is not true. Farming in Ontario is right now passing through very strenuous times, and suffering more than it has done for a great many years. I received a letter, not more than a week ago, from the director of our organization in the township of Proton, Grey county, and in it he said that farming in Proton this year would not return them 3 per cent on the money invested. He also stated:
AH that is keeping us on the land is the fact that we cannot get off.
This letter did not come from a fanatic but from a man who is a successful farmer, as successful as farmers can be under existing conditions. I have heard it said many times that we have passed through the worst of the economic distress. I hope that is true, but I do not. believe that it is. If the revival of trade in Canada is to depend on the increased 
buying power of the agriculturist, I feel quite sure that that revival is yet some distance in the future. The unsettled condition of Europe has very much to do with poor prices for farm products. The depreciation of the currency in many European countries which prevents them from buying food which we so abundantly produce, and the high tariff against us which prevents our sending our foodstuffs into the United States, all make it look to me as though a revival of good times in Canada would be very slow in coming. If that be true, then why are we going to spend this year a vast sum of money, an increase of a good deal over a million dollars, to bring settlers to Canada to put on the land, to live under conditions which the people who have been on the land during good times cannot live through? If we want to help things in Canada, I would make this suggestion to the Minister of Immigration (Mr. Stewart) amongst the many dozens of other suggestions he has received. If he wants to cheapen living and to make life more livable in Canada, I would suggest that he import more manufacturers, doctors and lawyers and cheapen the cost to the producer, so that when we take sick we shall not have to spend so much in order to have a doctor come and see whether we are going to die or not, and when we scrap with our neighbour over something, the lawyer will not get the property of both.


Samuel William Jacobs: That does not happen in Quebec. It may in Ontario.


Agnes Campbell Macphail: I know we have some very gracious lawyers from Quebec. I am glad to learn that they would not do such a thing.


Jacques Bureau: The same is true of the doctors. They would not see people die.


Agnes Campbell Macphail: I really think this is not the scheme of the common people, neither the farmers nor the labourers, nor the ordinary working business people. I really believe this scheme has been carefully prepared by those most interested in immigration, by those who would reap the reward of the labour of the immigrant. They have always been interested in immigration and they will always continue to be. I think it is quite possible that railway and steamship magnates, financial knights, land corporations and the government which they control, have more to do with this scheme than the people. The United Farmers' convention, in December of last year-and I am proud to call myself a representative in the House of Commons of Ontario agriculture-passed this resolution:

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Resolved that this convention is utterly opposed to any system of state-aided immigration of agricultural workers or prospective land owners until economic conditions are so changed as to ensure the retention on the land of a fair proportion of those born there.
The whole question of immigration is one of economics. If you can make farming conditions in Ontario, in Quebec-because the farmers in Quebec are not very well represented in this House-in the Maritime provinces and in western Canada, livable, so that the people who work long hours, who have hands which bear the marks of much toil, who are faithful, who have courage, can, as a reward of their toil when applied to the land, have a fair amount of the good things of this life, whether those good things are in pleasure, in enough property to keep them in comfort in their old days, in culture or anything else-when that is true, that is all the immigration agency you will need; and until that is true, until farming in Canada is able to hold the best blood that is bom on the land, you can spend all the people's money you want to spend in bringing people out and putting them on the land, but the best that are there wijl leave until conditions are rectified.


Mr. NEILL:: I will leave to members from the prairies to discuss this question more immediately in relation to the farming industry there, because they are so much better qualified to do so. I will only say that I do not at all approve the suggested arrangement with this colonization company.
There are two minor matters to which I wish to allude briefly. The first is this, and so far as I know it has not been mentioned by any of the speakers. The Minister of Immigration (Mr. Stewart) told us, in fact we know that there is in vogue to-day a system whereby the railway agents of the Canadian Pacific and the Canadian National become agents of immigration to the extent that they solicit applications from farmers for labourers, and then they gurantee immediately and speedily to supply that labour from Britain or Europe. I object to that because the government have gone to a good deal of expense to inaugurate a system of employment bureaus,-and they have shut down private employment bureaus-the idea being that wherever any scarcity of labour existed, application would perforce be made to the nearest government bureau and they would keep in touch with labour conditions throughout Canada. If there was a shortage of labour in one place and a surplus in another, they would be in a position to supply,-to feed the labour out-where needed. If a demand arises, as it so often does on the prairies, for labour which is of a mere seasonal character, they are generally able to supply it from the farms or towns of Ontario where that labour could return. But under this system, these railway agents act as immigration agents and the result will be confusion. Suppose the employment bureau has decided that a certain amount of labour of an agricultural character is required and they have provided for that. They suddenly find that these so-called railway immigration agents in the prairies have got orders for a certain number of farm labourers and they have rushed them in, in excess of those that have been provided for by the bureau. The system is not a good one, in any case; the people who solicit emigrants in the Old Country or Europe should not be those who have a direct pecuniary interest. Very' often these agents in the Old Country are paid so much a head, and experience has showm that this is not a desirable practice. This system of having railway agents act as immigration agents is calculated to promote confusion with government bureaus, and the labour organizations strongly protest against it.
The other thing I want to draw attention to is the fact to which the minister alluded yesterday when he said: "We have no immigration agent in Norway". If there are in the world any people who make suitable settlers, they are Norwegians. I hardly put them second to the inhabitants of the British Isles. The latter are superior because they are familiar with our language, but beyond that, Norwegians and Swedes are in many cases better fitted to be pioneer settlers in this country than men from the British Isles, because in Norway and Sweden conditions in the rural districts are very similar to the bush districts of Quebec, northern Manitoba and British Columbia. Therefore, those people take more quickly to conditions existing in Canada when they come here. They make sturdy industrious settlers of the finest type, and they are very readily assimilated; in fact, the second generation cannot be distinguished from our native-born. They are a distinct advantage to our nation because they improve our blood. It is a notorious fact that nations in the northern part of Europe, brought up in a hard climate and under severe conditions, are of a more virile type than the peoples of southern . Europe. We were told last year when this question was under discussion, that we had an agent at Bucharest and another at Warsaw. I would suggest that they be [DOT]taken away from Bucharest and Warsaw and put into Norway and Sweden, and we would
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get a better class of settlers from those countries.


Charles A. Stewart: I am sure the hon. gentleman did not hear my remarks correctly yesterday. What I said was that we were prepared to go into both those countries the moment their governments would allow us in. We quite appreciate everything the hon. gentleman is saying. The moment we have that permission we will go in, but so far we have not that permission.


Alan Webster Neill: Does the government of Norway object?


Charles A. Stewart: Yes.


Alan Webster Neill: I have a clipping which I took out pf a local paper and which is headed:
Norwegian fishermen on their way to the Coast.
I may say that the Norwegian makes the very best class of fisherman, next shall I say to the Scot. It says here that:
Twenty Norwegian fishermen bound for Vancouver and Prince Rupert to engage in fishing at these points passed through here to-night.
Now, that is a forerunner of the fishing immigration that I anticipate, and I think I can justly anticipate it in consequence of the steps the government is taking in deference to the report of what is termed the Duff Fisheries Commission to reduce the number of Jap 'fishermen. It is claimed out there by the . cannery men that ruin stares them in the face if they cannot have the labour of the Japanese; and yet within a few weeks of the publication of this report we find Norwegian fishermen on their way to take the place of these Japanese. And there are many more who will follow.
Now, that is all the criticism I wish to offer on the so-called policy as some hon. gentlemen sneeringly designated it, of the Minister of Immigration. I will go further. I will say that I congratulate the minister- and I say it in no spirit of sarcasm at all- not altogether on the policy that he has brought down but on that portion of it which he has not given to us. I say that, I repeat, in no spirit of cheap sarcasm, because I believe he has done a better service to this country in omitting a good deal of the policy which it was reported he would bring down. We heard a great deal about a much heralded immigration policy that would be introduced by the minister, but we did not hear anything about it from the minister himself. We heard it from a carefully arranged system of propaganda which was used to educate the public and incidentally to educate the minister himself into the idea that we should have the bars
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flung down entirely and a huge bold immigration policy put into force. First of all, those who were anxious to see such a policy put into effect ran to the minister and told him, "We must have this policy because it is needed in the interests of the country." Then, they ran to the public, through the medium of the newspapers and other sources, and told the public in bated breath, "Oh, the minister is going to bring down a grand, broad policy"; and they return to the minister and tell him that the public expects this policy and he must come through. But I give the minister credit for having withstood the influences that were brought to bear upon him. That the pressure was great we have only to listen to some of the speeches that have been made here to be convinced; and we leam as much from the press during the past six months.
There is no question that there was a skilfully arranged propaganda to force the minister into such a position that he would have to bring down practically an open-door policy. There are a number of people, perhaps I might call them unthinking people without implying any reflection on their intelligence, who have not thoroughly studied 'this question, and who have a vague idea that after the Liberals got into power in 1896 there ensued a wave of prosperity. The Liberals have preached that so often that no doubt a number of people believe it; and I think they almost believe it themselves. Associated with that fallacy also is an equally vague idea that the prosperity that prevailed at that time was correlative to the big immigration policy that was in operation in the years immediately subsequent to 1896. But we must bear in .mind what the conditions were at that time. It is absurd to say that because something was successful then it will necessarily be successful now, when conditions have changed. What were the conditions then? There was absolutely free land, and abundance of it, close to the railways, and the markets of the world were crying for wheat. There was at least one transcontinental railway being constructed and later on there was another which took up the surplus labour that was not disposed to go on the land and become farmers. But what are the conditions to-day? There is no free land now. Land has been quoted at $18 to $25 an acre, and while that might not be costly under some conditions, it is surely costly in comparison with land which was got for nothing and which my hon. friends to my left say they can make nothing out of to-day. Hon. gentlemen to my left declare that out of that land which was free originally, a living 'cannot be derived to-day.

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I am justified therefore in the assertion that land is costly now. Besides this, it is remote; because if it is eighteen miles from a railway, my hon. friends to my left state-and I have every confidence in their correctness in this regard-it is beyond the limit at which you can profitably haul wheat to the market. So that summing up, there is no free land to-day, what land there is available is costly, it is remote, there is no railway construction, and there is practically no market, or at any rate a restricted one for wheat. And I shudder to think what the conditions in the prairies would be to-day if we had to compete with the wheat that Used to go to the European market from the south of Russia. If that wheat were being unloaded on the market to-day the conditions in the prairies would be a good deal worse than they are.
An hon. member on the opposite side, the name of whose constituency I regret I have never ascertained, but whose charming personality will never be effaced from my recollection, spoke about the unseen hand, the hidden interest. He also mentioned something about an Ethiopian in the woodpile. Well, I too seem to be able to smell an Ethiopian in the woodpile; but it is a different woodpile, and a slightly differently coloured Ethiopian. I maintain that there is good reason for the assertion that the real insistent demand, what I might call the original demand, for this bold immigration policy of letting down all the bars comes from but two sources. It is true it is put forward by many other bodies now, no doubt many were innocently intrigued by the skilful propaganda that has been carried out. There are many men who firmly and honestly, I think, believe that we should have such an immigration policy and who had nothing to do with the origination of this propaganda. But I am firmly convinced that the real insistent demand for this flood of immigration-cheap labour is really the term- comes from but two sources with which I will briefly deal. The first one is the transportation companies, and that applies as well to our own railways and steamships. I have here a cutting from a paper of last October, which says that the transportation men, a number of high officials of the railways and steamship companies waited on the Hon. Charles Stewart, and presented to him a memorandum urging the adoption of "an aggressive immigration policy." The companies represented at the conference were the Canadian Pacific Railway, the Canadian National Railways, the White Star Dominion Line, the Cunard Line, and Anchor-Donaldson Line, and no doubt they represented other interests allied to them.
Now just consider the way in which these people submit this demand of theirs to the minister. They do not come and say "We represent a transportation company or a steamship company and we want the job of bringing over immigrants." Not at all; they were not so crude. It is the naivete of the thing that amuses me. They come and tell the minister, "We, acting on the high principle that what we suggest is in the best interests of Canada, demand in the name of Canada this bold immigration policy." This is very much on a par, I think, with the action of a delegation that might come to this House as representing, say, the interests of the brick manufacturers. Suppose such a delegation should say to the government that they demanded, in the name of the good of Canada, that we should pass a law, by reason of the danger of wooden houses being easily destroyed by fire and because of their short duration, that all houses should henceforth be made of brick. Now, what would be the first idea that would suggest itself to one's mind? Why, one would say, "You are not a good witness; you are an interested party. You may be acting for the good of Canada, but we have a shrewd suspicion that your mind is more filled with bricks than with any high principles about the interests of Canada."
The parallel, I think, is complete. It would be better, we should say with the Scriptures, to let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth. If the transportation companies want to bring people over to this country it is their legitimate right to do whatever they can to secure for themselves that traffic. But when they presume, in the alleged interests of Canada, to dictate to the minister what policy he shall adopt, that is entirely another thing and they are going beyond the bounds of reason.
The other body which, I claim, is at the back of this demand for a bold immigration policy is the large corporation of employers in Canada. Their ideal of a proper industrial condition is that there should be always a large surplus of idle population, a sort of bank of idleness, a bank of reserve labour from which they can draw when they need labour and obtain it without much competition and which, when they have used it to meet an emergency, they can put back on the shelf for the general public to warehouse against the time when it may be needed again. They want such a bank of labour which they can draw upon at their convenience and foist off upon the public when they are done with it.
Now, that used to be a popular idea and the world saw nothing wrong with it, but times have changed and the world has learned
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Mr. McMASTER:: Will the hon. gentleman permit a question? Why is the immigrant from southeastern Europe undesirable?


Alan Webster Neill: For many reasons. In many
instances he is not an agriculturist; he runs ' to small businesses and to city life. The principal reason, however, is that he is born in a southern climate and has not the vitality and the virility of the men from the north of Europe. He does not assimilate; he remains in colonies of his kind. Where we find the Norwegian soon calling himself not Jonsen but Johnstone, and may be governor of the state or a candidate for the presidency, the other man remains in his own environment and is more or less a city dweller.
I was going to say that for the reasons I have enunciated I appreciate the moderation of the policy brought down by the Minister of Immigration. But I do think he has made a slight mistake in his dealing with the prairies; I think he has, in a measure, put the cart before the horse. The idea seems to be to bring in a lot more farmers and that farming on the prairies will then be prosperous.
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I suggest that the other method be adopted; make your farmers prosperous on the prairies, and the immigrants will come of their own accord. It may be urged that that is a trite saying: "Yes, make them prosperous, but how?" My friends to the left, the Progressives, say, by a free trade policy. I think, Mr. Chairman, they do not say it with quite the assurance or with quite the emphasis they did last year. I may be wrong in that, and if so I olfer my apologies, but I do not think they are quite so insistent upon a policy of free trade as a panacea for all their evils as they were a year ago. At any rate, if it were to be at all successful it would have to be complete free trade; anything less than that would be so trivial a reduction in their costs as to be immaterial. Very well; we will allow for the sake of argument that if we have absolute free trade we benefit the farmer, but at the expense of the eastern portions of Canada, of the manufacturers of the East. That is too big a price. I do not want to be a party to ruining the eastern provinces for the benefit of my prairie friends. On the other hand, it is equally unthinkable, equally fatal for us to allow the prairie provinces to be depopulated-because that is eventually what must take place if they do not get relief.


Mr. GOULD:: The hon. member is making a presumption that is not correct. I do not know that the group of which I have the honour to be a member has ever taken the stand on free trade that he presupposes ; neither is it on [DOT] record on any of our platforms or incorporated in any of our teachings that we support that principle. It is something that has been thrown at us; it is not something we have subscribed to in any particular.	[DOT]


Alan Webster Neill: I am very glad to hear my hon. friend's statement. I would answer it by referring to the pages of Hansard.
If, then, we cannot agree on free trade, what is the remedy? Unfortunately the obvious remedy is an impossible one-reciprocity with the United States. That is out of court for the present; we cannot achieve it however much we may desire it. But there is another remedy that I suggest, and it is even more iconoclastic than the one I enunciated before about the population. Let us meet the United States people on their own ground. If they say they are going to have high protection, then we must say that we are going in also for protection. But if we do that, we should go in for all-round protection applied not only to the manufacturer but also to the farmer of the prairies. The

question then arises, how can you protect the farmer when his goods are exported? The suggestion I make is that in view of the long railway haul, the only one in the world applying to the production of wheat and therefore handicapping the prairies to a very serious extent, we should adopt a system on a sliding scale of bonusing the wheat of the country and thus put the prairie farmer on the same level as the eastern manufacturer. I know my friends will hold up their hands in holy horror and say that that is an unsound economic principle. But I do not care anything about theories or principles of that description. I never studied economics, but I learned in a hard school that where there was a grievous evil, a practical remedy should be applied to it. I suggest this as a practical remedy. Germany a few years ago, speaking in terms of the life of a nation, was almost solely agricultural-more so even than Canada is to-day, but by the adoption of this system; by the payment of bonuses to her native or imported industries, she had a long chance to become the economic mistress of- the world. Had she not gone mad in 1914 she would by this time practically dominate the world in matters of trade. That is the system I suggest we should use to-day. It may be all wrong; it may be against economic principles -but suggest a better one if you can! Now, speaking for my own district-because I would not presume to state the views of other parts of Canada-I believe the "middle of the road" policy, as he called it, of moderate immigration suggested by the minister will meet with the approval of my constituents. I will go further-and here I speak only personally; I think it will conduce ultimately to the best interests of Canada.


Mr. DENIS (St. Denis) (Translation):: Mr. Chairman, the immigration question is to my mind the most important of all those which have been debated during the present
session.
The hon. Minister of the Interior has given us a masterly outline of the policy which he proposes to follow in this respect. I must offer him my sincere congratulations and at the same time promise him my entire support. Our country, although in its infancjq has before it a most brilliant future. It has known days of prosperity as well as days ol depression. At present, it has a population of over 8,000,000. Its territory is very extensive. The natural resources are abundant, in fact inexhaustible. The soil is very fertile and large areas only await vigorous hands to yield crops sufficient to feed the whole of Europe. Although our industries are somewhat

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at a standstill, owing to unstable trade conditions, they are gradually picking up as the market becomes firmer. Our labouring class reduced to unemployment through the shortage of work are experiencing a rather serious crisis; however we notice a change for the better in their conditions. Nevertheless, I think it would be a great mistake at present to believe and especially to state, even on the floor of the House that the labouring class are satisfied with their present conditions. I congratulate the government for closing the gates to all the labouring class of immigrants. Its duty at present, is to better the living conditions of the workman by supplying his family and himself with the means of existence; as long as the normal economic situation is not reestablished we must not open wide our doors but keep them well closed.
I consider, Mr. Chairman, that the first duty of a good government is to furnish to all citizens the means of existence, it would be an unnational and unpatriotic policy to bring in immigrants belonging to the labour class, when misery still reigns in many homes as a result of unemployment. What we want, at present, in this country, are settlers, real settlers, it matters little whether they be English, French, Belgian, Italian, Jew or Scotch, as long as they can be assimilated, are sound' of body and mind, are not bolshevists, anarchists, nor socialists, are thoughtful of the moral and religious conditions and obedient to the laws of our country.
For the last few years, Mr. Chairman, farming, if I am to believe the doleful stories of our hon. friends the Progressives, does not give the same returns as it did previous to the war. I am of the same opinion; however, although the Condition of the farmer is very precarious, I think there is some exaggeration. That the western farmer's plight is more serious than that of the eastern farmer, I am ready to acknowledge. The hon. Ministe" gave us the true solution when he said: If we wish colonization to progress in the west, we must avoid past mistakes and not sell to the new settler more land than he can cultivate. The hon. Minister considers that 160 acres of land constitute a large farm; it is, indeed, ample for a settler if he desires to farm it with good results. That there mav be other reasons than those I have just given, that contribute in making farming in the West a poor paying proposition, such for instance as the high price of labour, the high freight rates and lack of transportation facilities, I admit; but I think the keynote of success for a farmer is to make the most of every inch of ground at his disposal and that all his
efforts must be concentrated with that aim in view, bettering as much as possible his method of farming and adapting it to the conditions of his land so as to husband its power of production indefinitely.
I do not wish, Mr. Chairman, to detain any longer the attention of the hon. members of this House, however before closing my remarks I would ask the hon. Minister to use discretion in his choice of immigration agents. Each country has its particular ways and the agent must necessarily be familiar with these conditions. I doubt very much if an agent having only English at his command and unacquainted with the particular ways of the people would be a success in Belgium or in France. Every agent must be fitted for the position, if we wish that the money we are going to vote be profitable to the country.
In the past, Sir, the government made use of the agents of transportation companies. I think it was a great mistake, for these agents were more interested in increasing the number of passengers, so as to show large increases in their business, rather than bring into the country desirable settlers. What we are in need of are settlers capable of being assimilated, sound of body and mind, desirous of entering our country with a view to settling down and become part of the great Canadian family and contribute to its prosperity.


Mr. MacLAREN:: During this debate there have been innumerable views put forward regarding the subject of population and of immigration. The only common ground that I have observed in the debate is that there should be an increase in population, that it is of great importance and of value to the state. It has been put forward that increase in population may be secured by increase in the birth rate, decrease in the death rate, diminotion of the exodus and by immigration.
As regards the first point, an increased birth rate, I do not know that I can give the minister any very valuable suggestions on how it can be secured, but I would wish to make use of a phrase which has occurred several times during the debate, and that is to let nature take its course. As regards the diminution of the death rate, that is necessarily a slow process. To attain it is a process of gradual education throughout the country, and that is now going on. We all recognize the advance that public health is making in the country. I do not think it reasonable to expect the advance in public health and an improvement in the death rate to occur in more than a gradual way, and that is now going on in as satisfactory a way as we can reasonably expect. There-
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fore, the minister cannot look to that as any substantial basis upon which to increase the population.
Then we come to the checking of the exodus from this county. What can the government do in this particular? I do not think that I can suggest anything to the government to secure this beyond what they could do if they saw fit. It would be a declaration to the country of a fixed determination to carry out a protective tariff policy. Now, while this at the present time is somewhat in force, it is not frankly put before the country. It is not put forward by the government as an article of their faith. The difficulty arising from this is that the country lacks the stimulus to the expansion of trade and industry that it otherwise, I believe, would secure. That being the case, and I presume that it will not be the policy of the government to make any such declaration, it comes to this, that the minister and the country will have to fall back upon immigration. I grant you that in any case the policy of immigration must be a very large and important factor under all the circumstances. Whatever the tariff policy of the government may be and whatever the death rate may be, I believe we must still look to immigration as a very important part of any policy to increase the population of this country. That being granted I ask, what principle should we adopt in carrying out our policy of immigration. I believe the principle we should adopt is to bring these people into those districts where they are needed, where the industries and occupations are suffering from a shortage of men to carry them on. That should be the true principle underlying our immigration policy, and I think that is the principle the minister proposes to carry out. The hon. member for George Etienne Cartier (Mr. Jacobs) this afternoon advanced the view that we should bring in immigrants, doubtless artisans and mechanics, and place them in the cities. In this way the labour market in the cities would be supplied and the tendency to drift from the rural districts into the centres of population would be lessened. It does not seem to me, however, that that can be regarded in any way as sound advice to the government, first of all because artisans are not needed to the same extent that farmers are; but in any case the adoption of such a policy would produce a condition of unemployment-without the advantage of populating the country districts. I therefore think the true principle is to attract to our country men of a class of occupation that we lack in Canada.

As regards the volume of immigration at which we should aim, I am not one of those who believe in crowding the country too rapidly. There is no advantage in it; quality is always better than quantity. I think the minister would be well advised were he to admit immigrants in generous numbers but under regulation and always governed by the idea of quality, the purpose being to procure suitable men who will be of substantial value to Canada.
Having advanced this view I would now ask: How are the immigrants to be distributed throughout the Dominion? That is an important question and One that, in my judgment, has not been given the attention or received the consideration in past years to which it was entitled. What has happened? The large proportion of immigrants arriving in Canada has been directed to the West. That was quite natural because the field of settlement lay there. The free lands were there, the movement was along the line of least resistance, and therefore an enormous number of immigrants proceeded to the West. I do not say the West received too many immigrants; I do not think it did. I do say, however, that other portions of Canada have not received the attention which was their due. It was an advantage to the whole of Canada for a large number of immigrants to go to the West, but other portions of the country should also have received attention.
The minister has referred to the various ways in which he proposes to deal with the different portions of the Dominion. Now, the needs of the country vary very greatly; so do the previous occupations of the immigrants. Their aspirations are also widely different. It is well that they should go to different portions of the Dominion, as prompted by their own wishes and in harmony with the needs of Canada. This is a matter in which we are keenly interested. This phase of the question has not received that attention from past governments that it was fairly entitled to, and we hope that the minister will now be able to make good this past deficiency. I am afraid, however, from what I heard him say this afternoon that his policy will not meet this situation. I will give my reason for that opinion. The minister has outlined an elaborate programme for the West. What is proposed to be done with respect to the East? The minister has an official in the United States who is occupying his time in repatriating Canadians to the province of Quebec. As regards the Maritime provinces the minister states that he has an official in London who is familiar with the needs of New Brunswick, that is Mr. Bowder. Now, Mr. Bow-



IS, 1923

[Stage Direction]
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der has been in the employ of the Dominion government in London since the first of November, having been taken on on a ninety days' certificate. He had previously been in the New Brunswick office in London for some considerable period and remained there until that office was closed. After having served the ninety day period, an exten-
10 p.m. sion of another ninety days was granted. It does not seem to me, under the circumstances, that any very great regard has been shown for an officer holding such a responsible position. I do think that an official capable of doing effective and reasonably valuable. work in connection with the province of New Brunswick should hold a position of a more definite and permanent character than Mr. Bowder has been given.
Charles A. Stewart: I may tell
my hon. friend that we have made application for his permanency. Of course, that will be settled by the Civil Service Commission.


Murray MacLaren: I am very glad to hear that. I know that Mr. Bowder made application to be appointed an immigration agent and that the Civil Service Commission took the position, on the advice, I -think, of the Department of Justice that as he was a resident of Great Britain he could not be appointed an agent. Perhaps the minister will have an opportunity of looking into this matter further.


Charles A. Stewart: My hon. friend's statement is news to me; I had not heard that. Does my hon. friend say that the Civil Service Commission would not appoint a Britisher to the office?
Mr. MacLAREN; The circumstances are these: I happen to know Mr. Bowder; I have taken an interest in him for several years. I received a letter from him dated London, February 8, 1923, in which he states:
I have been employed, on instructions from the Minister of Immigration and Colonization in the Dominion Emigration office. London, as a temporary employee on a 90 days certificate, which was renewed for a similar period again on the 29th ult.-
And so on. He tells me that he has applied to be appointed an immigration agent and asks me to interest myself in the matter. When I received his letter, I wrote to the Civil Service Commission, and this is the reply from the secretary of the commission under date of February 22:
I have your letter of the 20th instant enclosing some correspondence from the above named-
W. R. Bowder,
-who is anxious to obtain employment in connection with Canadian emigration work in the Old Country. His
letter has special reference to vacancies now being filled by competition under the auspices of this commission in Great Britain. In this connection he mentions in his letter that he had been, promised advice in the event of a vacancy occurring but that he received no notification of the above-mentioned vacancy, but had his attention called to it through an advertisement in the Gazette.
In reply, I am instructed to say that Mr. Bowder's application is on file in this office and would not be overlooked in the event of an bpportunity offering to consider him, but in the particular case under consideration, namely, the present vacancies in Great Britain, the commissioners have decid'd that applicants resident in England cannot be admitted. This decision was reached on the advice of the Department of Justice in view of the large number of candidates apparently possessing the qualifications required and resident in Canada.
I may add that information to the above effect is being sent to Mr. Bowder.
Mr. Bowder, I believe, has lived both in England and in Canada, and his residence at present in London grew out of the fact that he was in the New Brunswick London office. Perhaps the minister will have an opportunity of further investigation upon that point; but I would submit that an official holding such a position and suitable, as I think Mr. Bowder is, should have the status, the influence and the permanency of a permanent immigration agent.
I was trying to describe what I thought was too scanty consideration of the Maritime provinces in connection with the immigration policy. There is another point. I instanced the fact of there being in the United States a Dominion official whose duty is to secure and repatriate Canadians to the province of Quebec. The minister has told us that there is an official from Halifax who is now at Boston and who has a similar function. Perhaps the minister can inform us if this official at Boston is co-operating with the New Brunswick government.


Charles A. Stewart: Yes. I suggested to him when meeting him in Chicago, I think, in October last, that he should go back to both provinces and get full information as to the requirements in these provinces.


Murray MacLaren: If there is co-operation
obtained especially with the local government, that may be of advantage; but I see this difficulty, that he is representing two provinces, or perhaps three, and if that be the case, I do not anticipate that we, in New Brunswick, will get very great results from that arrangement. At the present time, there are in New Brunswick hundreds of vacant farms. I would suggest to the minister that he consider whether there could not be in reference to New Brunswick a somewhat simi-
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lar arrangement on a smaller scale to that which he now has in reference to Quebec, under which arrangement there will be an official whose duty it will be to secure the return of former New Brunswick residents to New Brunswick. One would certainly rather see them all go to Quebec than not come to Canada. One does not wish to take any limited view; but we want to take the view that there is something coming, and I should like to have heard the minister say that he had a little more definite policy for each province. There must, of course, be a general policy; but if the minister would say we hope to do something for Quebec, something for Prince Edward Island, something for Nova Scotia and something for New Brunswick, we would feel there was something tangible in his policy. At the present time I feel that New Brunswick will get very little out of the policy as we have heard it enunciated. I may be mistaken about the matter; I shall be very glad to confess my mistake if the minister's policy should prove to be different; but I believe if we can secure a more important appointment in the government's office in London, if we car have an official who will care especially for the repatriation of New Brunswickers from the United States and who will co-operate with the New Brunswick government, we shall make a substantial advance, something that is worth while.	v
As I said, there are in New Brunswick hundreds of vacant farms and while, naturally, it is easier for the Dominion government to concentrate more on the parts of the country where they have lands of their own, surely the duty of the government is to care for all the provinc.es. It is probably more difficult for the government to do that, but that is not sufficient reason why the needs of the provinces should be overlooked. I do not direct these remarks especially at the minister. He is only enunciating his policy, but what I have heard does not satisfy me that there is enough in it to make it a success for New Brunswick. What I am referring to more particularly is our past history, and: statistics will show that immigration to New Brunswick and, I presume to the other Maritime provinces due to the Dominion government's policy, has been extraordinarily small. I believe the minister can get more value for the money he spends in bringing men to take the vacant farms, than by putting the money into some of the other schemes he proposes to put it into. Perhaps the minister would be good enough to go further into this.


Charles A. Stewart: What my hon. friend is asking for has been promised

the New Brunswick government, that is, that Mr. Bowder would be operating in the Old Country, and that they would have a man who would work in their interest. They did not discuss the abandoned farms with me; but I wrote the particular agent who is operating in the United States in the interest of New Brunswick to keep closely in touch with the New Brunswick government and to try to fill the necessities as they arose of the province of New Brunswick. The same applies, of course, to Nova Scotia.


Murray MacLaren: I think, with the minister, that is a vital matter. The local government will necessarily be familiar with the situation; its co-operation is essential, and there is no difficulty in obtaining the cooperation of any provincial government. There may be as regards expenditure of money, but that is a different matter.
The other point to which I wish to refer is this. I should like the minister, when he is replying to the many suggestions that have been made and the views that have been put forward, to tell us what arrangements are being made regarding the distribution of farm labourers and domestic servants. I understand that it is the policy to bring these two classes into the country in addition to farmers, and with that I am fully in accord. I think these are three classes of people who should receive the preference. Domestic servants and farm labourers are not the classes that would come from the United States. We cannot look to that country for them; we must go beyond the seas, and I hope especially to Great Britain. Are there any plans as regards the distribution of domestic servants throughout the country? Will these immigrants and the farm labourers be distributed throughout the Dominion?


Edward Joseph Garland: I cannot wholly support the remarks which have been made expressing sympathy with the minister in regard to his policy, or rather his lack of policy. I cannot fall in line with the statements of my iconoclastic friend from British Columbia (Mr. Neill) who spoke a few moments ago except in so far as they deplore the attempt that has been made, and which has been wholly successful, to induce the minister and the government to adopt what will eventually become an absolutely open-door policy. If that is not the aim of the department why the appalling increase in the estimates this year?-why an increase of $1,316,400? In the past you can trace where in a decade hardly more money was spent than we propose to spend this year in the increase alone.

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I shall have something to say in regard to that feature of the question in a moment. But I want to assure the minister of one thing, and that is that I am absolutely in favour of justifiable immigration. And when I say justifiable immigration I mean immigration that is purely voluntary and absolutely selected. In other words, it will be essential to maintain in European countries, whence immigrants can come, and in the United States, a staff of men inspecting medically and otherwise those who propose to come of their own volition.
The present policy-it seems that is the only word we can use to express ourselves in regard tcT the statement that has been presented by the minister-bears, as the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill) and others who sit behind the minister have said, the earmarks of pressure from some Ethiopian, or something of that kind. I entirely concur in that statement. Indeed, we cannot do otherwise than believe it. We find in a despatch printed in a western paper, forwarded from Ottawa, the statement that the inspection of intending immigrants before they depart from European ports to Canada is to be continued, and I want to congratulate the minister and his department on their firmness in this matter. But why should it be necessary for the minister to declare himself on behalf of Canada in this regard? It is because the transportation companies had asked that this system be dispensed with, according to the despatch. If this is true I want to brand it as one of the most appalling attempts that have ever been made in this or any other country to secure tonnage, for we can call it nothing else, for the steamship and transportation companies at the expense of the unfortunates who may be deported.


Charles A. Stewart: I have no
brief for the steamship companies, but in fairness to them I should tell my hon. friend that there came from them no such request at all. There are a great many despatches that are issued from the capital and I may say that I knew nothing about this one. But the steamship companies would much prefer inspection on the other side of the water, and in fairness to them I think I should make that known.
Mr. GARf.AND (Bow River): I am glad to hear the minister say so. But if that is the case there has been a great change of heart on the part of these companies since his predecessor, Sir Clifford Sifton, held office. Speaking before the Toronto Board of Trade
not so long ago, Sir Clifford Sifton said that the shipping people were very hostile to attempts made to confine immigration to certain desirable people. The report says:
They did not care what kind of people-
I want you to note the words.
-were brought to Canada. All they wanted to do was to bring the people here.
I sincerely trust that that attitude on the part of the transportation companies has been overcome. I have listened with the greatest attention to the minister and have carefully noted the declarations of the government from the outset this session, and I have not heard a single word that would encourage me in the belief that the administration now in power in this country is about to launch any definite policy of amelioration or alleviation of conditions as they exist today in the agricultural districts. Undoubtedly, the programme of propaganda that was carried on during the summer must have inspired the hon. member for Comox-Alberni to the outburst he was guilty of a little while ago which I certainly enjoyed. But some of the propaganda is illuminating. We find that open-door immigration is urged upon the department in order to settle up vacant lands lying idle. And these are the reasons given:
For example, the settlement of one township of land now lying vacant and undeveloped would mean the construction of quite a group of new farm residences, barns, outbuildings, fences, etc., with a resultant demand for lumber, hardware, cement, and other building materials. It would mean an additional school or two. Farm machinery of all kinds would be re-auired. New roads and possibly bridges would have to be constructed calling for more road machinery, steel, cement, culverts and labor. The manufacture of these things would call for the profitable investment of capital, the employment of skilled workers in the work of manufacture, and of unskilled labor in the production of needed raw materials. In the haulage of raw materials to the factories, and food and clothing for the factory workers, and the finished products from factory to consumer, the railways would secure much needed traffic, and, as the township became producing, return traffic to the markets of the world.
We do not read one solitary word about what is to happen to the settler when he comes here; it is all filled with what is going to accrue to the great manufacturing and transportation interests. An hon. member (Mr. Marler) the other day rather intimated, perhaps unintentionally, as I am quite willing to believe, that we painted the picture of deplorable conditions in the West in too lurid a fashion. I assure him that, on the contrary, we do not paint it nearly as bad as it actually is. I have not yet heard a single member on this side of the House tell of the things which I could show the hon. gen-
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tleman, if he cared to witness them next summer, day after day in my own constituency. Let me try to give him an example.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Let me ask the hon.
gentleman a question. Are the western prairies worth while bringing immigrants to, or not?


Edward Joseph Garland: Will the hon. member explain just what he means by that question?


Herbert Meredith Marler: Yes, I would like to know, is it possible for selected settlers to make a livelihood on the prairies providing they possess average intelligence?


Edward Joseph Garland: Mr. Chairman, under present conditions on the prairies I say it is absolutely impossible-absolutely impossible.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Then it is absolutely no use to bring immigrants to the prairies at the present time?


Edward Joseph Garland: Absolutely. That is what I shall endeavour to demonstrate before we get through. In my opinion there is no use spending millions lavishly to bring people to this country when those already here cannot make a living. An hon. member on the other side of the House said to me one day recently that the peasant from southeastern Europe who will dig himself into a hole or live in a sod shaek is the kind of man Canada wants. Well, even those poor devils are just as badly off as the rest. If you bring them in they will stay a little while and then leave us.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Do I understand the hon. gentleman to say that everyone is insolvent in the three prairie provinces?


Edward Joseph Garland: The actual condition is so close to it that we might as well call it so. In the province of Alberta out of 80,000 farmers 20,000 are absolutely insolvent, and the majority of the remainder are approaching that state rapidly. Thirteen million dollars will be required this year alone to renew farm mortgages in that province. In the southern portion that comes under the operation of the Drouth Area Relief Act no less than $25,000,000 of debt has been administered by the commissioner in charge of that act. That was the amount of indebtedness turned over to him to endeavour to apportion among the various creditors, but which has of course not been paid.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Will my hon. friend inform the committee who created these particular

mortgages and for what reason? Was it on account of over-buying or anything of that description? Possibly not.


Edward Joseph Garland: Let me inform the hon. gentleman of this fact. Shortly after the war was over a policy of financial deflation was commenced and carried out with the most ruthless brutality by those who alone can carry out such a policy. The immediate result was deplorable. Let me give my hon. friend an example of my own. In the fall of 1920 I think it was-I speak from memory and am not quite certain that my dates are absolutely correct-had I been able to thresh and dispose of the crop I would have been able to pay all my debts. But I did not get it threshed that year until October, nor did my neighbours, and by that time the rapid toboggan of prices had commenced, and when we actually got our grain to the market not only were we unable to pay our debts out of the proceeds but we had to carry over heavy liabilities to the following year. Pressure was exerted by the banks-very gently at first, but very steadily, and we had to meet it. Subsequently our debts piled up and mortgages had to be taken out. Just to meet the mortgage interest and renewals alone that amount of money which I have mentioned was required. This is official information issued by the government of the province of Alberta.
Of course deflation has not been the only factor. Drouth has had something to do with the trouble, but this does not apply so greatly to the north. A particular instance I wish to cite is that of a very good friend of mine living in the district of Hanna ordinarily a fairly good district. He is interested in the work of parliament. I thought I would send him a copy of Hansard, and this is the letter I received from him in acknowledgement:
I received the first copy and my wife and I are very thankful to you for sending us Hansard this year. I assure you we appreciate it very much. In view of our financial condition we had discussed very seriously what item of our household expense we could dispense with or retrench in order to get Hansard as we wanted it very much.
Is it not lamentable that they had to squeeze and corner to find $3? That is not all. He also took the opportunity of telling me something about the conditions there. I know them fairly well but not in any detail. I may say that this man is one of those who works from daylight to dark, he never spares himself, and does not drink alcohol or smoke. He is a married man with a small family. He writes:
The financial position in this locality, as indeed I believe in all Alberta, is very serious. Farmers are unable to meet their taxes and consequently the schools
are closed.


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Those are the facts, Mr. Chairman.
The banks have told us that not one cent will they advance until the indebtedness of the municipality to these institutions has been met. In Dowling lake municipality we have only three schools running at- the present time and in two of these schools the teachers are waiting for their salary until it becomes available. God only knows when that will be. Loan companies are compelling practically every farmer who is in arrears with his interest to become nothing but a tenant on land which we spent the best years of our life opening and developing, and now instead of owning the land we become tenants. I sold a 50-lb. hide last month for $1.80, 45 pounds of hide, 5 pounds dockage. The same day I bought a little pair of shoes for our little girl, the cheapest I could get, weight about 5 or 6 oz., price $3. Where is it all going to end?
That is the desperate condition these men are in. No one can appreciate who does not live among them the suffering, the misery, the depression, the despair they go through year after year. And the day has gone by-I think the House was warned of it last spring -when the hopeful effort of former years will be put into the preparation of the land for this season's crop. I had the honour of going around my constituency last summer speaking at meetings. Sometimes I had to take long drives at night time, and on three different occasions in the southern part of that country we met people driving towards the United States border by night. On one occasion a party was stuck in a sand hole with a Ford car piled to the top with blankets and bedding. These are the conditions. Does any hon. gentleman' think we can take an inexperienced immigrant from any part of Europe, put him out in that country without capital and expect him to make a success of farming? Do hon. members think that men with a capital of from SI,500 to $2,000 can go out there and make a success of it? They may remain a little while, but if present conditions exist- there is the root of the trouble-and if an attempt is not made to curb the exploitation of these people by the combines and by the transportation companies-which my hon. friend from Pontiac (Mr. Cahill) spoke of as bleeding this country white, and I agree with him, if such enormous sums must be paid out in dividends to the shareholders of the Canadian Pacific railway and other corporations every year, then I say there is little hope for the West. It would be far, far better not to bring settlers into that country.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Does my hon. friend suggest that the Canadian Pacific Railway shareholders should go without their dividends? I merely ask for information.


Edward Joseph Garland: As long as the great mass of the people who are helping 77
build up this country are not getting any dividends whatever, although they are doing far harder work than the shareholders of the Canadian Pacific Railway, I would say most emphatically, yes. I think we should endeavour to curb the profits of these corporations and allow the people who are working to build up the country to get some gain for their hard labour.
I cannot understand the attitude of some hon. gentlemen who talk of progressing from the farm to the city. Is it really progression? Should it be regarded as such? Why do we hear hon. members say that the ambition of the young, of those who want to get ahead, is to leave the farm and go to the cities? Why should it be so? Yet we find in the delightful pamphlets sent out by the Department of Immigration the most glowing prospects that await the immigrant who engages in agriculture. Listen to what we send to Europe. WTe say:
Come to this country. The call of the West is no vain call. It beckons the courageous, the thrifty, the industrious, from the Mother Country particularly, to a life that is essentially democratic and independent, to an industry that assures the most encouraging returns, the basic and the noblest industry in the world-agriculture.
And yet we are told that it is progression, that it is only the ambitious that leave agriculture and go to the cities. There are many more similar statements in these publications, and I think the minister would be well advised to go over them very carefully. I find the grossest misrepresentation in these statements. The poor man in a foreign country; the English or Scotch crofter, the Irish hill peasant, who read this sort of thing and saw that picture on the cover would think this was a land of milk and honey and golden grain; that there was nothing to it but to come here, get a quarter section, and become a millionaire. I suggest that the minister revise these descriptions. I could paint a different picture, and it would be more truthful than this is.


Andrew Ross McMaster: And less encouraging.


Edward Joseph Garland: Exactly, and it would be my intention that it should be so, under present conditions.


Samuel William Jacobs: Was the hon. member himself attracted by one of these pamphlets?


Edward Joseph Garland: I was. But unlike many other immigrants I went to the agent and discussed the matter very thoroughly with him. The first thing he told me was "You will not need hob-nailed boots in Canada, and you do not need to take any tobacco over there, because they grow it,'r

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seriously under-populated-and no one will question that. He said further that he did not favour sending out the nation's youngest and best. He preferred the family migration, or the block settlement system. He believed it would be cheaper for the government to bear the whole cost of sending out emigrants, and even to buy the land on which they settle, than continue the present system of doles and poor-law relief.
The only thing I have to say with regard to his remarks is this. Emigration may be an excellent method of getting rid of the English poor, but I am afraid that that class would not be very suitable here. These men who suggest buying land in Canada or some other of the dominions might just as well buy land in Greenland and settle these people there. Their chances of success^ would be just as good, and the land would be a whole lot cheaper. Even at that, Mr. Chairman, the members of the British House of Commons are not altogether easy in their minds. In spite of the delightful literature that is sent over there, and the glowing language, I have no doubt, of those who speak on emigration in England, the members of the British House of Commons are doubtful as to the suitability and feasibility of this thing. Sir Mitchell Cotts, a National-Liberal, discussing this matter in the House of Commons, December 6th, 1922, suggested that a party of members of the House of Commons should visit the Dominion and watch the settlement of immigrants here. I wonder why they thought that was necessary? We know why it was necessary. Too many, as an article in the Journal not long afterward said, had fallen into the hands of land speculators who had exploited them to their own advantage. Too many had found it impossible to make a living out here. I have in my own district a number of Englishmen of a very fine type, from Yorkshire. They came there many years ago and homesteaded with myself. These men, every one of them, hate the day they came in here, and they are Britishers, not foreigners. Their wives regret their coming and are continually talking about the lovely place they had back home in Yorkshire. One of these men worked for the Earl of Ripon, and he is everlastingly talking of the glorious times he had on the Earl of Ripon's estate.


Andrew Ross McMaster: Is not that generally true of English people, even if you put them in a part of the country such as the Eastern Townships in Quebec, where things are not nearly as bad as in Alberta?


Edward Joseph Garland: I have no doubt the hon. member asked that question for the purpose of making that statement. It may be quite true.


Andrew Ross McMaster: No, I asked for information.


Edward Joseph Garland: Although I have lived for almost two years in Sherbrooke county, Quebec, I know nothing about the part the hon. member speaks of. The part I lived in is devoted almost entirely to mining. But the hon. member may be quite correct. I do know some splendid young English settlers in the West, and splendid English families, who are striving hard but are in a condition of desperation. I would be glad to take any hon. members of this House out with me this year and show them in my own constituency these things I am talking of. After all, Mr. Chairman, this thing of spending millions of dollars on immigration can be characterized as indirectly bonusing the transportation and steamship companies. That is what it amounts to. It is advertising in foreign countries and securing tonnage for them. The people of this country are not going to stand for it any longer.
Again, when we bring these people over here, we cannot keep them. I need not stress that point as almost every speaker who has preceded me in this debate has pointed out how rapidly immigrants are leaving this country. If further evidence is wanted I would refer hon. members to the fact that President Harding of the United States, supported by many members of congress, has been discussing: seriously the bringing in of an Immigration Registration Bill. The reason given is this: Growing out of complaints of the Commissioner General of Immigration of increased activity in the efforts to smuggle immigrants through from Canada, and from Mexico, into the United States over the international boundary, congress is showing a disposition not only to grant ample funds for the enforcement of the immigration laws, but there is also serious discussion of an alien registration law. We are, Mr. Chairman, simply being used as a back door for those who want to go to the States and do not wish to or cannot enter the country directly. I have no doubt that when the quota plan from foreign countries enforced by the United States is used up we will have a tremendous influx of settlers into Canada. There will be no question about it. They will come in but they will not stay here; they will, if they can possibly do so, cross the border into the United States. Representative L.

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B. Rainey, of Alabama, in a recent speech, urged larger appropriations to prevent the smuggling of emigrants from Canada into the United States. And may I point out, the minister knows it as well as I do, that every disgruntled settler, every man who leaves this country in a dissatisfied or discontented frame of mind is not the kind of man who will speak well of this country; he will try to prevent other people from coming here.
I have great hope, Mr. Chairman, that in the future conditions will be changed, but I doubt very much if they will be brought about very rapidly by the present government. I see no indication of the activity that is desirable on their part. The conditions are much as they were a year ago. The government have had a year but appear to have no policy for remedying present conditions Hon. members from the Maritime provinces have cast a few joking remarks in our direction. I am quite sure those remarks were made in the best of humour and were not intended to be sarcastic. But it is well to point oCFt to them that conditions in the Maritime provinces do not appear to be much better than conditions in the West judging from newspaper reports. I find in the Shelburne Gazette a despatch from the Bridgewater Bulletin containing the views of its New Germany correspondent. I think the hon. member for Lunenburg (Mr. Duff) knows the district very well. The despatch in question is as follows:
Our New Germany correspondent sends us the following item: "Charles Lohnes and family are removing to the United States. This is one of the many families of this town and vicinity who are leaving. It is lamentable to see our country being drained of its best native blood. The Methodist congregation alone has lost fifty of its members through removal within a very brief time."
Again we find the following from Nova Scotia:
The exodus of young men and women from Nova Scotia to the United States was spoken of at length and deplored and Mr. MacKenzie suggested high taxes as a cause. It was his opinion that no more unskilled labour should be introduced into Nova Scotia until present farm production was being absorbed.
I just give these few extracts in passing.
I would now like to deal with the general question of immigration in this country past and present. I was particularly interested in the speech delivered by the Acting Minister of Immigration and Colonization before the University Club, Ottawa. As reported in the Citizen of January 19, he said amongst other things the following:	[DOT]
Particularly affected by these conditions was the farmer. Farming would not again be profitable until
the commodities which the farmer had to purchase came down to the same price level as the commodities he had to sell. The same applied to other lines but to a lesser extent.
I quote next the following:
Agriculture, Mr. Stewart said, was the basic industry and all other industries were permeated and affected by it.
Further on I find this:
All of Canada's free land, Mr. Stewart said, was so far from the railroads as to be hardly practical to farm and the Canadian government would have to make the present railways pay before starting on extensions.
But the most delightful statement in his whole speech-and I ask hon. members to listen most attentively because these are the words of the minister who has come before us to-day and asked for an increase of $1,316,000 odd-is the following:
Extreme conditions of deflation in the farming communities of the West had resulted in the impossibility of making the farm pay th*'re. "What is the use," asked Mr. Stewart, "of bringing people to the country if they cannot exist."
Is there &ny justification for voting money for such a purpose after an admission of that character by the minister himself, made in public in this city? But let us go further and see if there is any justification whatever.
I was interested enough in this question to seek information on it, and I secured from the Bureau of Statistics the figures of the population of Canada in each of the census years from 1871 to the present day, also the figures of the immigration .into Canada in each of these ten year periods. I am sorry to say that the bureau was unable to supply me with the figures showing the natural increase, that is the number of births over deaths, in these periods, until we come down to 1901. But 1 again inquired and I found that I would be justified in using 15 per 1,000 per year as about the average rate of increase. It sometimes varies, last year I found it was 16.4, or something like that, but with that information I have worked out the following: In 1871 the population of Canada was 3,689,257. The immigration into Canada in that year was 362,893, a total, not making any allowance for natural increase of 4,052,150. The census year of 1881, that is at the end of the ten year period, shows a population of 4,324,810. Working out the natural increase I find that it should amount to 553.350. I do not make any allowance whatever for the increase from year to year but simply take the population at the commencement of the decade, and estimate it on that only, not on the increase, so that I am well within the figures when I give you 553,350 as representing what
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