1923-06-05

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 193 (from the Senate), for the relief of Lillian Beryl Brayman.-Mr. Ryck-man.
Bill No. 194 (from the Senate), for the relief of Roland Bergeron.-Mr. Carruthers.
Bill No. 195 (from the Senate), for the relief of Florence Cohn.-Mr. Church.

Dairy Industry Act

Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) moved:: That the Order of the House for the second reading of Bill No. 186, an act to amend The Dairy Industry Act, 1914, be discharged and the said bill withdrawn.
He said:	On the occasion when this bill
was before the House last week I made a fairly full explanation of the reasons why I ask that this motion be carried, and I do not think it calls for any further explanation at this time.


Right Hon. ARTHUR MEIGHEN (Leader of the Opposition):: This bill has rather a
checkered history, which I think should be reviewed. The bill was introduced pursuant to a resolution about a week ago. As introduced it provided merely for certain corrections in the Dairy Industry Act of 1914. The corrections were of a minor character, rather numerous in total, but none of them of far-reaching consequence. The minister, on introducing the resolution and carrying it through committee, told the House that there was nothing in the bill respecting oleomargarine at all. He did so in response to a query from the hon. member for Victoria City (Mr. Tolmie):	Nor was there in such bill any
reference to oleomargarine. The subsection which dealt with that subject in the original act of 1914 was left intact. That was the form in which the resolution went through, and the form in which the bill was introduced and was passed on by this House for a second reading. If there is any rule of parliament that is obvious, and that at the same time is vital, it is that when parliament	passes an act, first,
second and third reading, or any stage, the act remains as so passed by parliament, until varied by parliament.


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: Is my right hon. friend not mistaken in saying "second reading"?


Arthur Meighen: I said "first." The bill received only a first reading.


Mr. FIELDING:: The right hon. member said "second reading."


Arthur Meighen: If so, I should have said first. The preceding resolution doubtless received its regular readings. The bill was introduced and read a first time only. Having been read a first time, the bill so read was the bill before the House and that was appointed for second reading, and no other bill. Rule 53 of this House provides that bills when read shall be certified by the
Clerk of the House in order that the terms of the bill so read may be officially stated and officially known. The time for second reading arrived; the Order of the Day was called by the government on Thursday last, and instead of moving the second reading, the minister rose and stated as follows:
Owing to certain changes having been made by parliamentary counsel in the drafting of this bill which while not changing the meaning of the measure, make it more different and more difficult to explain, I mew that the bill be discharged from the order paper with a view of redrafting and resubmisson to the House.
Whereupon I asked the minister:
Will the minister explain how the bill is mo* difficult to explain if the meaning is not changed?
I invite the attention of the House to the minister's repfy. This is an example of vacuous profundity which I do not think has any parallel in the annals of parliament:
As drafted by parliamentary counsel portions of the former bill were inserted that were not in the bill submitted to me.
Does any hon. gentleman know what that means? In the first place, after a bill passes this House a first reading, . parliamentary counsel has nothing to do with it. It is the bill as passed that comes up for second reading. In the next place, what should come up for second reading was all that was in the bill as passed. But the minister says that parliamentary counsel put in the bill something that was in it before and that was not submitted to him. I really do not know what was in the minister's mind and I have sought, though sought in vain, to delve to the bottom of it. He proceeded:
That makes the bill appear quite different from what was contemplated, and the intention of the draftsman and counsel would be more difficult to explain.
Subsequently the minister proceeded to read the bill as printed, for the bill as printed differs wholly from the bill as passed. The bill as printed provided a clause excluding oleomargarine from Canada in the plainest possible terms. I have the bill before me, and it says:
Section 5 of the said act is repealed, and the following is substituted therefor:
This is the new bill:
5. No person shall-(a) manufacture, import into Canada, or offer, sell or have in his possession for sale, any oleomargarine, margarine, butterine, or other substitute for butter, manufactured wholly or in part from any fat other than that of milk or cream.
The minister's explanation of the meaning of this addition, which he says was inserted by parliamentary counsel after the bill was read a first time, is really equally interesting. The minister told the House that the bill
Dairy Industry Act

had been so changed that, as it stood now, it appeared to authorize the manufacture or sale of oleomargarine.


William Richard Motherwell: That should be "prohibit."


Arthur Meighen: It should have read "prohibit"?


William Richard Motherwell: I think you will find that is corrected in the revised Hansard.


Arthur Meighen: I will read those words:
Notwithstanding that, however, on the face of it the bill as now drafted appears as if we were authorizing the manufacture or sale of oleomargarine.
The minister now says that he should have said "prohibit."


William Richard Motherwell: In the revised Hansard my hon. friend will find it reads that way.


Arthur Meighen: On the next page I find the same thing repeated, so the minister duplicated his mistake. Perhaps, as is suggested from behind me, that is on the principle that two negatives would make an affirmative.


William Richard Motherwell: It does not affect the situation, anyway.


Arthur Meighen: It affects the minister. The minister says at page 3456:
Yet I find another bill on the order paper apparently authorizing the manufacture of oleomargarine.
He used the word "authorized" for "prohibit" twice, in two separate speeches four or five pages apart. I do not know what was wrong with the minister.' I could not understand his explanation then.


William Richard Motherwell: That is the reason why I wanted a new bill.


Arthur Meighen: He made no explanation. He simply either deliberately or otherwise befuddled the House. Why is he withdrawing this bill? What is the object of withdrawing it? The bill before this House is not the printed bill; the bill before this House is the Very bill which the minister introduced. Because something else is printed, that does not make it a bill of this House. I was not aware, when the discussion was on in the first place, of the actual facts. I sought to become aware by listening to the minister, but I made no progress.


William Richard Motherwell: That is what I thought.


Arthur Meighen: I have learned the facts since. Certainly the minister thought no one

would make progress. No human being would make progress listening to him. He had everything upside down. What I argue is this: The House passed the bill a first reading and this is the bill before the House.
Mr. MACKENZIE-KING: My right hon. friend says that the House passed a bill on the first reading. He says that this is the bill which passed the first reading. I have the bill that passed the first reading with the mark on it. This is not the bill to which my right hon. friend refers.


Arthur Meighen: I know that. The Prime Minister does not get my point. Somebody might get up a bill purporting to be a bill up for second reading on the order paper; but no bill can be up for second reading that is not passed by this House on the first reading. It is the government's business to get the bill passed in the House. The bill passed the House exactly as it passed it for first reading. Because this is a bill printed on a sheet and called Bill 186, that does not make it Bill 186. Bill 186 is Bill 186 as it passed this House on its first reading.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: May I read the clause of the bill as it passed this House on the first reading?


Arthur Meighen: Yes.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: If my right hon. friend will look at the legislation, he will find there are five clauses. Clause 1 there is no question about. Clause 2 in the bill that passed this House on a first reading begins:
Section 5 of the said act is amended by adding at the end of paragraph (b) thereof the words "or less than 80 percentum of milk fat" [DOT], and by striking out in paragraph (c) thereof, in the second line the words "what is generally known as", and in the third line thereof the words "nor add any milk or cream or butter."
That is all there is in the second clause of the bill which passed the first reading in this House. When the second reading was called there appeared on the order paper the bill which I hold in my hand now, section 2 of which reads:
Section 5 of the said act is repealed and the following substituted therefor:
5. No person shall-
(a) manufacture, import into Canada, or offer, sell or have in his possession for sale, any oleomargarine, margarine, butterine, or other substitute for butter, manufactured wholly or in part from any fat other than that of milk or cream.
That section was inserted by the law officers of the House after the first bill had gone to them. It was inserted without the knowledge of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell), who knew nothing whatever

Oleomargarine
about it and who, as soon as he learned that the clause had been incorporated in the bill, immediately took exception to it and on that ground asked to have the bill withdrawn.


Arthur Meighen: What the Prime Minister has stated, up to his assertion that this clause was inserted without the consent of the Minister of Agriculture, or without his knowledge, is exactly what I said myself. The Prime Minister puts it this way:	He says
that when the bill came up for second reading another bill appeared on the order paper, and he proceeds to quote a clause referring to oleomargarine as section 2 of that bill which repeals section 5 of the act. What I am arguing is that such a bill did not appear on the order paper; what was on the order paper was a motion that Bill 186 should be read the second time. Because another printed bill appeared-not Bill 186 that passed the House, but another bill with an added clause in it- that did not make it Bill 186. Bill 186 is Bill 186 as passed, and consequently that is the government measure yet, the measure they intended to introduce and to have to go through all the stages in this House. Neither parliamentary counsel nor any other officer of the House, with or without the instructions of the minister, can alter a bill as passed by parliament. It is a strange thing to me that parliamentary counsel should do anything of the kind without the authority of the government, or at least the authority of any department of the government. I cannot see how he can, without any authority whatever, add to a bill a clause a hundred times more important than all the rest of the bill.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That is exactly what I have stated-without the authority of any minister of the Crown.


Arthur Meighen: Did he have the authority of any officer of the department?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I cannot say
as to that. The ministry is responsible for the measures it introduces.


Arthur Meighen: The ministry is responsible for the conduct of its officers, and if any officer of any department or of this House took upon himself to alter the records of the House, then it is the business of the government to bring him to book. I cannot believe that parliamentary counsel would insert a clause of this consequence without any authority at all from the department. It may be that the minister did not directly confer it; but whoever did, if he did it without any authority, it is the duty of the government to get the
explanation which that officer can give. And beyond the question of the responsibility of the government for the conduct of its officers and of the officers of the House, there is this further fact which I would impress upon hon. members again: the bill before parliament now is not the altered bill, because a bill cannot be altered by an officer; it can be altered only by parliament. The bill now before us is the original bill the government introduced. Now, why does the minister withdraw a bill which he introduced and which, in every speech that he has made since, he has stated to be all right?
Resolution (Mr. Motherwell) agreed to: bill withdrawn.



OLEOMARGARINE

William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker,
I beg to move:
That the notice of motion in the name of Mr. Carroll, respecting a measure to amend the oleomargarine act, have precedence over all other business, except the introduction of bills, questions, and notices of motion for the production of papers, on Wednesday, the 6th June instant.


Arthur Meighen: * I suppose, Mr. Speaker, that this is the closing scene of the drama; we are now at the stage that the government wished to reach. What is the result of it all? The government is afraid to, or it cannot, bring down a policy with relation to the subject of oleomargarine. One minister smiles in delight over the impo-tency of an administration of which he is a member. This government is going around like one of the birds of the air-I think it is the cuckoo-that lays its eggs in the nests of other birds knowing that those other birds can take care of them, hatch them and i ear the young better than it can itself. This is a cuckoo government. It cannot propound or give birth to any policy on oleomargarine, but it hopes in some way or other to escape governmental responsibility by laying this egg in the nest of the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Carroll), trusting that fertility may result. Why cannot the government face the situation? Governments have faced greater difficulties.


Mr. MACDONALD (Pictou):: What is
your policy?


Arthur Meighen: Our policy is on the
statute books to-day, where it has been for years. We faced the matter as a government.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: What is your policy now?
Business oj the House


Arthur Meighen: Let the government
bring down its policy.


Mr. BUREAU:: Cuckoo!


Arthur Meighen: What is to be thought
of a member of the government sitting in his seat helpless to propound what should be a government measure, calling upon the opposition to furnish the administration with a policy? The government, in a word, is simply endeavouring to escape the responsibility that rests upon it by seeking if possible to get over a difficulty along some bypath, led by the hon. member for Cape Breton South (Mr. Carroll).


Mr. LAPOINTE:: Fine!


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. E. M. MACDONALD (Acting Minister of National Defence) (for the Minister of Justice) moved that the House to-morrow go into committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
Resolved, (1) that it is expedient to amend section seventeen of the Judges Act, as enacted by chapter thirty-eight of the statutes of 1914, and to provide that the salaries of the judges of the Circuit Court of the district of Montreal shall be as follows:- The senior judge of the said court, $8,000 per annum, and three other judges of the said court each $7,000 per annum; and to provide that the provisions of section ten of chapter fifty-six of the statutes of 1920 shall not apply to judges of the Circuit Court;
(2) That section two of the Act to amend the Judges Act, chapted fifty-nine of the statutes of 1919, relating to the salaries of local judges in Admiralty, be repealed.
He said:	His Excellency, the Governor
General, having been apprised of the subject matter of the resolution, has given his consent thereto and commends it to the consideration of the House.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
William Lyon Mackenzie King: On a previous occasion
1 promised my right hon. friend (Mr. Meig-hen) that I would submit a statement regarding any legislation which the government intends to bring down before the close of the session.
The Minister of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. Beland) has already given notice of a bill to amend the Pension Act arising out of the recommendations of the royal commission that has been investigating the subject of pensions.

There are also to be introduced a bill to amend the Returned Soldiers' Insurance Act and a short amending bill to the Department of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment Act arising out of the report of the royal commission on lake grain rates, there will be a bill to amend the Shipping Act, giving the government power by order in council to suspend the coasting laws.
A bill concerning a close season for halibut fishing in Pacific waters.
A bill to amend the Fisheries Act to reduce the fee for salmon cannery licenses.
A bill for further advances to the harbour commissioners of Montreal.
A bill to amend the Biological Board Act.
In connection with the Department of Finance there will be a bill to amend the Income Tax Act and bills respecting the Finance Act and the Audit office respectively.
There will also be a bill respecting the guarantee of railway bonds already authorized.
A bill providing for the three-year branch line construction programme, of which mention has been made by the Minister of Railways and Canals.
A bill to amend the Dry Dock Act of 1910
A bill to amend the Feeding Stuffs Act.
A bill to amend the Dairy and Cold Storage Act.
A bill to amend the Public Archives Act. It is proposed to change the name to the Department of Historical and Public Records.
Possibly there will be other legislation based on the reports of the committees to which have been referred the Bank Act, Redistribution, the Civil Service Act and matters pertaining to agriculture. There will also be Supplementary Estimates.


Arthur Meighen: I would suggest the Prime Minister might go back and get another Speech from the Throne.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: To oblige my right hon. friend, I would be pleased to do that, Mr. Speaker, if any of these measures were of considerable length. Most of them are brief or of relatively slight importance.



MORNING AND SATURDAY SITTINGS

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. L. H. MARTELL (Hants):: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the right hon. leader of the government when we may expect to have morning and Saturday sittings? Many of us in the extreme East, and probably most of those from the extreme West, are anxious to get home.

Imperial Conference


Mr. JACOBS:: What about Sundays?


Lewis Herbert Martell: Sundays are all very -well. We have been waiting five or six weeks to get home. When may we expect morning and Saturday sittings?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It will depend on the progress we make with the legislation brought down.



ST. JOHN EMPLOYMENT OFFICE

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. MURRAY MacLAREN (St. John City and Counties of St. John and Albert):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to draw the attention of the Minister, of Labour (Mr. Murdock) to the report that he proposes to discontinue the Dominion-Provincial employment office at St. John. If this report is correct, will he state to the House the reasons for his proposed action?


Hon. JAMES MURDOCK (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, there has never been a Dominion-Provincial employment office at St. John. We have now in the hands of the Premier of New Brunswick a copy of the agreement which has been utilized by the premiers of the other provinces for the creation and maintenance of Dominion-Provincial employment offices, and it is the hope of the Labour department that such agreement will be signed by him and that thus, we will have a Dominion-Provincial employment office in St. John and at such other points in New Brunswick as may be desired.


Murray MacLaren: Do I not understand there is or has been an office in Moncton, as well as another in St. John, and a third somewhere else in the province?


James Murdock: These have been Dominion-municipal employment offices.


Murray MacLaren: I think only partly.


James Murdock: The agreement has always been between the municipalities and the federal Labour department.



MOOSE MOUNTAIN FOREST RESERVE

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. O. R. GOULD (Assiniboia):: Mr. Speaker, I desire to ask the government if they have been advised of the serious state of affairs in the Moose Mountain Forest Reserve due to insect pests, and if they are taking active steps to prevent the threatened destruction of this reserve?


William Richard Motherwell: Yes, Mr. Speaker. The Entomological branch of the Department oi Agriculture has the matter under consideration and has sent an official to my hon friend's constituency.



IMPERIAL AND ECONOMIC CONFERENCES

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Centre Winnipeg):: Mr. Speaker, will there be an opportunity for discussion of the matters that are to be placed upon the agenda for the Imperial and Economic conferences?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The government will have occasion to ask for the passing of an estimate to make provision for expenses in connection with these conferences, and at that time I should think there would be ample opportunity to discuss matters pertaining thereto. If not, a time can be specially arranged for the purpose if so desired.


Arthur Meighen: Does the Prime Minister propose to state to the House the lines of policy he intends to follow or the specific proposals he will himself advance on the occasion of these conferences?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I shall be glad to answer any questions that may be asked. I happen to have here the latest information the government has received with respect to what is anticipated to be taken up at the proceedings of the Imperial Conference, and I might give it to the House. The despatch requests that the information be given in a general form, and therefore I will only outline the main features.
As in 1921, the opening meeting will include statements as to the general position on the main issues of Imperial policy. The preliminary statement may be followed by a report on foreign affairs since 1921, and by a consideration of the present problems and future policy. A discussion as to naval, military and air defences. A review of the naval situation resulting from the Washington Conference and arrangements for future cooperation in all branches of defence. At some stage of the proceedings attention will be given to the principles referred to it from the Imperial Economic Conference regarding Imperial air and wireless communications. There will probably be certain economic questions of special importance. Australia suggests the discussion of the marriage of women with foreigners. That I think, Mr. 3454	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Speaker, by way of an outline of what is anticipated for the coming conference, contains about all the information the government has thus far received.


Arthur Meighen: The Prime Minister stated that he would answer any questions asked him. I would like him to regard my question now placed before him as a request that he do lay before the House a statement of the lines of policy he purposes following on behalf of this Dominion at these conferences and of any proposition he intends to advance himself. I do not mean at the present moment; but that a time be fixed for his doing so.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My right hon. friend will appreciate that it is only possible to do that in so far as the government is aware of the questions to come up for discussion at the conferences. I may say broadly that certainly with respect to anything of importance involving expenditures our attitude will be that it must be subject to future ratification by this parliament.


Arthur Meighen: It always has been.



WAYS AND MEANS


[Stage Direction]
The House in Committee of Ways and Means, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
William Stevens Fielding: I desire to invite the attention of the committee, Mr. Speaker, to the first resolution to be found on page ii of Votes and Proceedings of Friday, May 11, providing for a 10 per cent discount in regard to goods coming under the preferential tariff when imported direct through our Canadian ports:
1.	Resolved, that the Customs Tariff, 1907, be amended by repealing section five, and substituting therefor the following:
5. That the importer of goods entitled to the benefits of the British Preferential Tariff shall be entitled to a discount of ten per centum on the amount of duty computed under such tariff, when such goods are conveyed without transshipment from a port of a country enjoying the benefits of the Britsh Preferential Tariff into a sea or river port of Canada.
Provided, however, that this discount shall not apply to duties on any of the following articles, viz., wines, malt liquors, spirits, spirituous liquors, liquid medicines and articles containing alcohol, sugar, tobacco, cigars and cigarettes.
Provided further that this discount shall not apply in the case in which the duty does not exceed fifteen per centum ad valorem, or, in the case of a specific duty or a specific and ad valorem duty combined in which the computed rate does not exceed fifteen per centum ad valorem, or to goods admitted into Canada which have the benefit of reductions provided for in the Canada-West Indies Trade Agreement, 1920.
2.	Resolved, that the Customs Tariff, 1907, be further amended by adding after section 8A the following as section 8B and 8C:-

8B. The Governor in Council may authorize any Minister of the Crown to enter into negotiations with any authorized representative of the government of the United States with a view to the making of a commercial agreement between the two countries on terms that may be deemed mutually beneficial. Any agreement so made Shall be subject to the approval of the parliament of Canada.
8C. If the President of the United States, under authority of the United States Tariff Act of 1922, determines to reduce by fifty per cent the duties imposed by such Act on the following articles, that is to say:
Cattle; wheat; wheat flour; oats, barley, potatoes, onions; turnips; hay; fish as enumerated in paragraphs 717, 718, 719 and 720 of the said Tariff Act of 1922, the Governor in Council may by order in council make such reductions of duties on similar articles imported into Canada from the United States as may be deemed reasonable by way of compensation for such reductions on Canadian products imported into the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: I desire to change a word or two in paragraph 8C. It reads:
If the President of the United States, under authority of the United States Tariff Act of 1922, determine# to reduce by fifty per cent-
And so on. The American Tariff Act gives the President power to reduce by fifty per cent. It might be that he would make a reduction not of the full fifty per cent, and to meet that possibiliy I propose to leave out the words "by fifty per cent". The effect will be that if any reduction is made we shall be prepared to make corresponding reductions.


Mr. STEVENS:: Before we come to the latter clause I wish to refer to a matter which relates to the first clause you read, Mr. Chairman. I submitted to the minister a situation which was brought to my attention by the Vancouver Board of Trade and asked him to give it his consideration. The point is that quantities of British goods are shipped via the Suez canal and transshipped at Hong Kong en route to the Pacific ports of Canada. The Canadian Pacific liners, for instance, and the Canadian Government Merchant Marine run their vessels from Vancouver and Victoria to Hong Kong. They rarely, except on special trips, run further, but they do proceed between these points regularly and they pick up merchandise which is brought by British vessels to Hong Kong. In that there is no violation of the spirit of this clause, but if the act is interpreted as at present I think the goods could not be shipped in that way and still obtain the benefit of the new provision. Will the minister say whether or not that point has been considered? [DOT]


William Stevens Fielding: The hon. gentleman (Mr. Stevens) was kind enough to show me a communication he received on the subject, and later I received a similar communication. I have given the matter some consideration, but

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
the point raised is a debatable one and for the present I prefer to reserve a definite answer. If on further reflection it would seem desirable to interpret the clause in that way, I think the Governor in Council would have the power to do so. But we should like to give the matter further attention before making a definite reply.


Sir HENRY DRAYTON:: Does my hon. friend not think that the Governor in Council has to be given the power to which he refers?


William Stevens Fielding: I think the Governor in Council has the power now.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Under what resolution?


William Stevens Fielding: Not under any resolution here, but under the Tariff Act, which provides as follows:
The Governor in Council may by order in council extend the benefit of the British preferential tariff to any British country not named in paragraph (1) of section 3, and from and after the publication of such order in council in The Canada Gazette the British preferental tariff shall apply to goods the produce or manufacture of such British country, subject to the provisions of this act.
I think that is broad enough to give the government power; I am not sure we might not interpret it in that way without any further action. If it be a matter of debate I am persuaded the Governor in Council could so interpret the act at a later date. However, the point is new, and I would like to hear both sides of it before coming to a conclusion.


The CHAIRMAN:: The question is on the first paragraph of the resolution, dealing with the British preferential tariff.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I appreciate any consideration the government may give to the matter, but I would point out that we are passing the resolution and I am apprehensive that we shall not have a later opportunity of discussing the point that I have raised. I am doubtful whether under the Customs Tariff Act that power is given to the Governor in Council. It gives the government power by order in council to apply similar provisions to other countries, but in this case we are dealing with the British colony port of Hong Kong, which is merely a transshipping point. I know this question is new; that is why I brought it to the minister's attention a few days ago. The minister says he is open to argument. Well, the point I wish to impress upon the committee is that such procedure as I have referred to would be no violation of the principle of this clause. The principle of the clause, as I understand it, is that British goods brought to Canadian ports shall have
the advantage of this reduction. But when it comes to our western ports the steamship lines do not travel the whole route without transshipment, and that is the point of the matter. If the minister would include the port of Hong Kong in the resolution-or perhaps it should be Singapore-it would cover the whole question and would give to the Pacific coast the advantage of this provision. If that is not done, I suppose two-thirds of the British goods coming to Canada via the Pacific will not come under this proviso. Let me emphasize the point by one further observation. Some of the old established British steamship lines-the Blue Funnel line, the Elder-Dempster line-run what they call the around-the-world route. Their ships start from Great Britain, call at Hong Kong and then go direct through the Panama canal or to the South American ports; but Canadian goods, British Columbia goods, are transshipped at Hong Kong. I think I have made it clear that no violation of the principle of this clause is involved and it seems to me that if a definite stipulation in this regard is not made, the government should take the power to do what the minister declares he will do if he is convinced of the merits of the case.


William Stevens Fielding: If we have not the power to deal with the matter, before the bill is finally through I will have it further investigated. I think we ought to have the power, and if it is not within our power now I will have an amendment considered at a later stage. Hong Kong is a British colony but it does not enjoy the British preference. If it were a preferential tariff colony, the case might be very simple. However, I do not wish to give judgment; the point is of sufficient importance to justify further consideration, and I would like to reserve decision on it. But if we have not power to deal with it by order in council I can give my hon. friend the assurance that power will be taken before this bill is finally through.


Mr. LOGAN:: I rise to congratulate the government upon the adoption of this policy which has been very dear to my heart for a good many years. It is now nineteen years, I think, since I first introduced into this House a resolution embodying the principle of this part of our present tariff, and in 1907 I was able to move a resolution in amendment to the budget resolutions also embodying this policy. At that time, Mr. Chairman, it was accepted by the government as a principle, but the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier, then Prime Minister, stated that it could not very
3456	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
well be brought into force then because it would give a monopoly of transcontinental trade in British preferential goods to the one line of railway then constructed across this continent; but speaking upon this resolution and in moving an amendment thereto he said that it would be brought into force in December, 1911, when the National Transcontinental railway would be completed across this continent. Unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, in December, 1911, Sir Wilfrid Laurier had ceased to be Prime Minister, and so from that time until the present nothing has been done in the way of amending the British preferential tariff along this line. Last year I moved in this House a resolution embodying this policy, but advocating it be extended to the whole amount of the British preference. I regret that the present budget does not include my contention of last year in its entirety. I believe that the British preference in its entirety should be confined to goods brought into Canada through Canadian sea and river ports. But at last, Mr. Chairman, after long years, the principle has been adopted in the budget, and therefore it is that I feel personally pleased and very grateful to the government. I believe that even the ten per cent increase of British perference which will be allowed upon goods brought through Canadian sea and river ports will be of great benefit to the ports of the Maritime provinces. This is in line with the policy of building up Canadian trade which we have preached in this country since Confederation; it is in line with the policy of the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier of building up our Canadian ports; and I only hope that in another year it will not be ten or twenty per cent, but that we shall finally adopt the policy of confining the British preference in its entirety to goods thus brought into Canada.


Mr. GOOD:: It seems to me that the policy of the government in this respect is rather unsound. I do not know why we should not have the advantage of the further reduction in the British preference on goods coming through American ports. I cannot sympathize, although I would like to with the remarks of the hon. member (Mr. Logan), who has just spoken. Of course, if he looks at the matter solely from the viewpoint of the inhabitants of some Nova Scotia ports, it is another matter, but looking at it from the viewpoint of the Canadian public I think the policy in this particular respect unsound, and I wonder how far it may result in the shipping of goods by the long haul instead of the short haul. The more direct route into the central part of Canada is, I think,

from Portland. I understand that there at least the traffic could be made tribute to what are now the Canadian National lines, whereas if the goods come through Halifax or St. John they will go over the Intercolonial railway by a very long route or over the Canadian Pacific from St. John to Montreal. I have not very much to say further, but I would like to express my dissent from the principle involved.
Mr. FORIvE: I would like at this particular point to express my appreciation of any preference that has been given to British imports. I think a great many of
4 p.m. our difficulties so far as marketing is concerned would be solved to a great extent had we a larger import trade from Great Britain. Great Britain is our principal market for all our surplus products, and if we could in some way purchase what we have to import from the British Isles we would have return cargoes and perhaps could do a more profitable trade.
In regard to the ten per cent increase in the British preference, while I appreciate the sentiments of the hon. member for Cumberland (Mr. Logan) in respect to encouraging Canadian ports, it seems to me, looking at it from a western standpoint, that that ten per cent of British preference will be altogether blotted out by the increased transportation costs that will result from importing these goods through the Maritime ports and bringing them over the long haul westward. It is all very well this spirit of patriotism and encouraging our own ports, but when that is done at the expense of some other part of the country, it remains to be seen how much patriotism is in the matter after all. If we can find in the West that by the increased transportation cost over the long haul all the increase in the British preference is lost, then perhaps some excuse may be found for us if we are not very enthusiastic over the idea that is propounded in this scheme. It seems to me that if we are ever going to get anywhere both in taking our products to the market and in buying the stuff that we in this country want, the cheapest and the shortest haul will eventually be the one taken. I do not care for this trying to build things up artificially. It seems to me it will never get us anywhere. We must be prepared to do that which is best for all the people irrespective of what part of the country they happen to live in. In looking over the items I notice in the last clause dealing with cattle, wheat, wheat flour, oats, barley, potatoes, onions, turnips, hay and fish:
-as enumerated -in paragraphs 717, 718, 719 and 720 of the said Tariff Act of 1922, the Governor in Coun-

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cil may by order in council make such reductions of duties on similar articles imported into Canada from the United States as may be deemed reasonable by way of compensation for such reductions on Canadian products imported into the United States.
I do not see any reason for that word "similar". I think the clause ought to read: make such reductions of duties on articles imported into Canada from the United States as may be deemed reasonable by way of compensation for such reductions on Canadian products imported into the United States.
Because in the articles here enumerated we have really no trade with the United States, and to insert the word "similar" takes away the meaning of the whole passage. I would move, Mr. Chairman, that the word "similar" be deleted from the resolution.


George Newcombe Gordon: Will the hon. gentleman permit us first to dispose of paragraph (1) dealing with the British preferential rate? That has not been disposed of by the committee.


Mr. ROBB:: Just to show that this is not altogether a Maritime province question, I may say that one of the ideas in making the British preference applicable to Canadian ports was the hope that we might bring more ships to Canadian ports which would carry back across the water the products of Canada, and in that way divert to our Canadian ports some of the traffic that is now going to United States ports. Hon. members will surely understand that on the east the ports of Montreal and Quebec are nearer the West than the ports of Portland or New York, and on the west coast the port of Vancouver is nearer to the West. I submit it is more desirable that business should come into those ports than into the ports of Washington territory.


Mr. FORKE:: Why the necessity for putting in the paragraph? Why the necessity for making that regulation, if that is the proper route for them to take?


James Alexander Robb: With the hope that we will get vessels to carry away the products of our own country, and that we will get the long hauls for our own railways. My hon. friends must share in paying the losses we have been making upon our national railways, and if we can do anything to divert the long haul to our own railways, instead of shipping our wheat down to New York, if we can have more vessel space available at Canadian ports for that wheat, it seems to me that it will help not only the man on the prairies who is growing the wheat, but it will also help the eastern ports. It is not altogether a
Maritime question, it is a question affecting all Canada, in the hope that we may get greater revenues for our national railways.


Robert Forke: Will wheat go to Montreal, if it is cheaper to go by some other port?


James Alexander Robb: No; that is why we want to make it cheaper. We want more vessels in Montreal, and that will make it cheaper.


Robert Forke: It seems to me the trade will go where it has been going most of the time. If you are going to increase the British preference 10 per cent, to bring goods from British ports, the chances are that increase on the cost will be paid by the people who buy the goods. I cannot see it any other way.


Jacques Bureau: Why?


James Alexander Robb: If they get it back in reduced freights from Canadian ports, they will be benefited.


Jacques Bureau: The distance is no greater between Montreal and the West than between Portland and the West. Then you have the lake route, or you can have an allrail route from Montreal, and St. John and Halifax all through the winter time.


Robert Forke: Then why is it necessary to pass legislation to bring it about?


Jacques Bureau: To induce people to do it. The more ships you get in Canadian ports to carry back wheat to the Old Country, the more competition there is, and the lower the rate will be.


Mr. EVANS:: I am glad to see the British preference is reduced. It is to Britain that we shall have to look for many years to come for a market, particularly for our agricultural products, and while agricultural products are our chief exports from this country, the one thing to do, it seems to me, is to look for a return cargo, and the easier we make it, the surer we are of getting a return cargo. At the present time it is getting more unreasonable, as time goes on, to expect that our agricultural exports shall bear the cost of the trip both ways. With reference to the endeavour to compel British imports to come into Canadian ports, all I can tay is that the trade of this country, and the trade of all countries of the world, has to go in its natural channels, and no legislation can give any advantage to any Canadian port if it is cheaper to ship through other channels. I wish the government could have seen fit to increase the preference without any of these restrictions.
3458	COMMONS
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Mr. FORTIER:: Of course I agree with the government in the policy of the British preference, because I think it is really an opportunity for the development of our Canadian ports. But the government saw fit to make exceptions in regard to certain articles which are not affected by the British preference. I observe in this resolution the discount shall not apply to duties on certain articles-wines, malt liquors, spirits and so on. But woollen articles are not included. I have in my hand a petition from some of my constituents concerning woollen goods, and of course they protest against the British preference on British woollen goods coming into Canada, and they state that this preference will be of no benefit to the woollen mills in Canada. They also say the commerce, especially of that section of my constituency in which they reside, will be very much affected by it. This petition expresses the opinion that the farmers in that part of my constituency, joining with the industries interested in the woollen mills, are in sympathy with that part of the petition which refers to Canadian woollen goods. I think this special industry in which the farmers are so interested should receive the special consideration of the government, and I cannot help lamenting that this preference is given to British goods.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The hon. member for Cumberland (Mr. Logan) was not altogether correct in his remarks. He was quite right when he stated that he had been a constant and ardent advocate on the question of preference to our own ports, but he was quite wrong when he said nothing had been done towards crystallizing that principle in any way. For in the preferential agreement with the West Indies, in 1913 and again in 1920, there are sections covering this very question. Just confining my remarks for a moment to the question of the port, I want to ask my hon. friend the minister why it is right to extend the principle to 10 per cent-there is 10 per cent reduction in duty-while it is wrong to apply it in connection with the main British preference? It appears to me that the position as to each is exactly the same. The duties are the same, the articles are entirely the same. We have a further reduction made as a matter of principle. If that reduction has to be earned by going through Canadian ports, what is the minister's reason for withholding it from the larger question?


William Stevens Fielding: I am not quite sure that I gather the hon. member's question. We are

making certain exceptions because the duties are low, is that the point?


Henry Lumley Drayton: No, the point
is this: In connection with the present 10 per cent reduction the government are congratulated by the hon. member for Cumberland upon having crystallized into action a principle, that principle being the carrying of Canadian commerce through Canadian channels. What I am trying to find out is this. Why is it that the principle applies only to this 10 per cent reduction and not to the general preference?


William Stevens Fielding: The idea is to bring a
gentle pressure to bear upon importers to ship by way of our own ports. We do not want to go so far as to say that they shall be penalized beyond the 10 per cent reduction for going to other ports. This is a gentle pressure to do the thing which we hope they will do anyway, but we do not want to be so drastic.


Henry Lumley Drayton: We are not getting the business. It is not coming.


William Stevens Fielding: This has not been tried yet.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I rather thought it had been tried, and if the minister consults the people who are engaged in the transportation business, he will find that they have done their best to get the trade. I was just wondering whether there was not another reason-that, in the opinion of my hon. friend, this provision would result in this 10 per cent not being taken advantage of. If my hon. friend wants to get the business, I cannot see why he starts with something that can be looked upon only as a pin-prick. Is not the real motive or is the real motive-I do not know which it is-that what is given with the one hand in this 10 per cent reduction is taken back with the other by this "Canadian port" provision?


William Stevens Fielding: That is my hon. friend's unhappy way of putting the matter. I cannot put it more simply than I have. It is a gentle pressure to bring the goods through our own ports. We think this will come. If it does not come, experience will be the best teacher for us.


Henry Lumley Drayton: , I suppose we shall have to leave the matter in that way for the moment. The principle is wrong-


William Stevens Fielding: What principle is wrong?


Henry Lumley Drayton: The principle
of the "Canadian port" is wrong when applied

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in connection with the lower duty which might bring results. It is right when we have it dealt with in connection with this 10 per cent reduction. The hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. Evans) pointed out something which I thought would have weighed a good deal with my hon. friend. I confess that the hon. member for Saskatoon, after having made the argument, did not apply it. He pointed out that at present agriculture is carrying the cost both ways on the ocean trip, because we do not have proper return cargoes. I thought he would have been greatly interested, therefore, in seeing that there were return cargoes to our Canadian ports where we could have proper methods of control in connection with grain movements. That, however, may be something which the minister will consider further in making up his mind whether it is possible to make this something real or not.
What does my hon. friend think as regards the position of the woollen mills? In the first instance, I would ask him whether he found any decrease in the cost of woollen articles during the past year?


William Stevens Fielding: I do not think there was any decrease. Of course, I would not like to 'answer that definitely. The question of the cost did not quite enter into our minds in this matter. If my hon. friend means: Are the woollen mills satisfied with this?-frankly, no, they are not.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not mean that. I asked my hon. friend if there had been any difference, since his last budget was brought down, in the cost of woollens to the consumer?


William Stevens Fielding: I would not like to
answer that. I am not aware that there has been.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend is very wise in not answering-


William Stevens Fielding: Perhaps so.


Henry Lumley Drayton: -because the
figures of the Labour bureau, if I read them aright-and I am willing to accept at once any correction that comes from my hon. friend or his expert, if I read them wrongly- show that there has been an actual increase in the cost of woollen goods to the Canadian consumer.


James Alexander Robb: Has there not been an increase in the cost of the raw material-wool?


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend answers one question by asking another.


William Stevens Fielding: He is Irish.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I am dealing simply with one thing at a time. There has been an increase in cost, notwithstanding the fact that my hon. friend reduced the duty on woollens last year and increased the preference. Does my hon. friend know-and again I am going to accept his figures-if it is a fact in connection with woollens, having regard to the textiles turned out, that the yardage has decreased and importations have increased by about 52 per cent, I think the figures are?


William Stevens Fielding: There has been an increase; I have not the figures at hand. If the cost of woollens has increased in the meantime, might that not be a reason why an effort should be made to reduce the cost by reducing the duty?


Henry Lumley Drayton: The unfortunate thing is that the cost went up with the reduction in the duty.


Ernest Lapointe: Then we will increase the duty in order to reduce the cost.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I hear an echo from my hon. friend.


Ernest Lapointe: That is the logic of the matter.


Henry Lumley Drayton: We might as well deal with things as they turn out. It might be that the taxes on Canadian business, the added burden of production in this country, are the real reasons why we have so much more importation coupled with a higher price. Will my hon. friend dispute this figure that there has been an increase of over 52 per cent in the importations of woollen textiles.


William Stevens Fielding: There has been some increase. I do not quite see the bearing of this on my hon. friend's question as regards reducing the rates of duty.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my hon. friend desire to increase that importation at the present time by lowering the duty?


William Stevens Fielding: I would like to increase the importation and to increase the manufacture at the same time, in order that all business might be promoted and encouraged.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my hon. friend know how that can be done?


William Stevens Fielding: That is a matter of opinion.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my hon. friend know that the textile mills in Canada- and we heard from one of them in Quebec to-day-are working on an average only 30 per cent of their time, so that the net result

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is that Canadian workmen are working 30 per cent of their time, importations are increased accordingly 52 per cent, and the public are paying a higher price? Does my hon. friend want to aggravate that situation?


Robert Forke: Would the hon. member increase the duty and have another mill started?


Henry Lumley Drayton: That question, of course, I do not think my hon. friend is very serious about. It is a splendid thing to have a real sense of Scotch humour, but at present I do not know that my hon. friend is doing much more than making a joke. New mills?-of course not; unless something occurs in this country to improve conditions, we shall not need any mills at all. What is the use of talking about putting up new mills when our own mills are not operating more than 30 per cent of their time?


Robert Forke: That is just what I was wondering.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the price of knitted woollens since my hon. friend's last budget? Did they go up or down?


William Stevens Fielding: I will let my hon. friend answer if that affords him satisfaction.


Henry Lumley Drayton: No. I look
upon this as a serious question.


William Stevens Fielding: Certainly.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I would have
thought my hon. friend had studied Canadian conditions with a view of seeing what ought to be done in connection with his fiscal changes. I would have thought he would know conditions; I think he does know, and I again ask him.


William Stevens Fielding: I assure my hon. friend that we have considered all conditions. I never knew a time when an interest touched by the tariff did not become alarmed. Honestly and sincerely, I have no doubt, the woollen mills to-day are disturbed. I hope and believe that with the improved condition of business which is near at hand, their fears will prove to be mistaken. There is no industry which you touch in the tariff which does not represent to you that it is placed in peril. I quite respect the views of these manufacturers. I have been through a similar experience in days gone by. But I am glad to know that in most cases their anticipations of disaster proved unfounded. I hope it will be so in this case.


Arthur Meighen: The minister has been through a similar experience, he says. He did in the previous case what he will do here if he is in power; when in power before he put the woollen duties down to 23 or 23i per cent. Everything that was predicted at that time happened ; everything that was foretold from the opposition benches took place. He destroyed about half the woollen industry of the country, while he did not help the woollen consumer at all. With what result? He came back to parliament a few years afterwards and admitted that he had gone too low and that instead of helping the country he had hurt it. He therefore asked parliament at that time to restore the woollen duties back to 30 per cent, which rate just kept the woollen industries in existence. They have struggled along, but they have not done more than that. There are a great many of them; there is not just one large concern, but a goodly number have been kept in existence under the duty which the hon. gentleman decided to restore after an experience which alone could teach him. I suspect that he is travelling around the circle again at the expense of the people of the country; he will again learn by experience, but the people will suffer. He will realize his mistake after perhaps two or three years, and at a very great cost not only to the Canadian woollen producers, but to the Canadian consumer as well. What happens is this: The outside goods come in and displace the Canadian product; those goods are able to do this through the lower tariff. And this having happened, the Canadian manufacturers are forced to limit their hours of work, while their overhead goes up and their unit costs of production increase; and with each such increase the outsider gets the benefit because he is competing against a crippled industry. That is what the minister himself discovered twenty years ago. Why should he have to be taught it all over again? The reason is just in order that he may do his share of the log-rolling to get his budget through the House.


Robert Forke: I hope the minister will be benefited by the advice he is getting.


Arthur Meighen: He will benefit by "experience."


Robert Forke: It seems that this tale of the woollen manufacturers is a pitiful one indeed. I would tell my good friend, the ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) that one of the tragedies of Mark Twain's life was that people would not take him seriously. Now, I want the hon. gentleman to take me seriously; I am not joking. One of the troubles in

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connection with this industry is the inability of the people to purchase. There has never been any over-production; so far as I can see, the difficulty has always been in underconsumption. If the people could buy these goods there would be a market for all the woollen goods produced in Canada as well as for woollen imports. I wonder if my hon. friend knows how many people in this cold climate are obliged to go without proper underclothing in winter because of high prices?
I do not think that increasing the tariff will help that condition of affairs in any way.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I really thought that my hon. friend was joking when he referred to a new mill at the present time. I want to pay this tribute to him, however, that although he jokes he always does so delightfully. He must be joking, too, when he talks about the present situation. Does he think that he improves the purchasing power of the poor people by making woollen goods dearer, as we had them last year, with the Canadian mills not operating? There is no good purpose to be served by talking generalities; the simple fact is that the rates went up materially. I will ask the minister whether that was not true in connection with woollen knitted goods? My information is that it is absolutely correct; I am informed that the prices went up. Is that correct?


William Stevens Fielding: A great many articles went up in price, but I do not see what that has to do with the question of the duties that are to be levied.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I am trying to get at the facts.


William Stevens Fielding: The hon. member knows what the facts are; there is no need for him to ask me.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Is this correct or not,-


William Stevens Fielding: You say it is correct, and I have not disputed it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Is this correct-


William Stevens Fielding: Probably not.


Henry Lumley Drayton: -that the importation of knitted goods increased in bulk over one hundred per cent-I think it was 104 per cent?


William Stevens Fielding: It may be so; I have not the figures before me. But of what consequence is it?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Of what consequence is it? Was it not bad enough before,
when the home industries were shut down and men were out of work, without having an increase of 104 per cent in the importation of these goods? What harm is it?-the hon. member wants to know. No harm at all; of course not. It is of no consequence, of course, that Canadian workers go without work and that Canadian consumers are to-day paying higher prices than before. I should have thought that there was great harm in all this;
I should have thought that my hon. friend, when he was considering the question of reducing duties, would have thought it advisable at least to reduce the duties as they would affect the output of such companies as could well afford to stand the reduction and still keep going. My hon. friend well knows that since his last budget was brought down some of these mills have had to cease entirely. Foi example, is it a matter of no concern that the York Knitting Mills should have stopped operations?


John Evans: Can the ex-Minister of Finance tell us why these mills are shut down?


Henry Lumley Drayton: It is generally
known that the woollen industry, things being as they are in this country, is worked from the top down rather than from the bottom up, as it should be. The woollen industry has to go to Bradford for its tops, there being no place in Canada where our own raw materials could be put into proper shape for our manufacturers.


John Evans: I thought that was the
cheapest place of all.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Well, let us see what happens at Bradford. As I recollect, before the war Bradford converted woollen tops at an average of a penny half-penny; I am not sure of the figure, but I think it was around that sum; and the price of the tops was something around sixpence. Now, there is a combination in Bradford between the man who knits the tops and the man in the other branch of the business; and when Canadians have to pay an advance in the price of tops from 200 to 300 per cent, it is not difficult to see where the trouble lies. With wages in Canada much higher than they were in England, it is not hard, either, to realize the difficulties that our manufacturers have had to face. We have a mill started now; I do not know whether it has actually started, but at all events there is1 a mill being built at Trenton to-day. If that mill is allowed to get going and is properly operated, if it is not put out of business by sales taxes and cheque taxes, by this thing and the other thing, we ought to be able to get cheap tops in



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Canada on the one hand, and a decent price for Canadian woollens, on the other. There is no secret to-day as to why the Canadian woollen industry requires protection; the reason that these concerns are going out of business is simply that the protection has been cut down. They are working thirty per cent of their time, while they have to face an increase of one hundred per cent in imports' in knitted goods. If the minister is satisfied with such a state of affairs, I do not know that the committee can do anything by detaining him very much longer. He does not seem to be concerned about these tremendous increases in our imports; he does not seem to be moved by any consideration such as, for example, the fact that these businesses are running thirty per cent of time. And as a corollary, it is obvious that it does not in the least affect him that an industrial exodus from this country is now going on,- we need not wonder why.


Mr. ROSS (Kingston):: I am assured that the difference will not bring to us any decrease in the price of material. But there is another matter of interest in this: If we close down our woollen mills we are certainly putting our wool at a disadvantage because we are permitting the importation of material manufactured from the wool of southern countries, and it is a well-known fact that this wool will produce a finer fabric than the wool of northern countries. This is a matter of great importance to our agriculturists.


William Stevens Fielding: My hon. friend has given us some interesting theories of political economy. It is quite fairly established by the ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) that if you reduce duties you are increasing prices; that is his argument. We reduced the duties on certain goods in the budget a year ago. and the prices of such goods have increased; that is cause and effect, he says. That is a new doctrine altogether, and I give my hon. friend the benefit of it. Let us not misunderstand him. We reduce the duties and thereupon the prices increase; therefore you should not reduce the duties. I remember some years ago in a debate of that kind when a distinguished statesman was advancing the argument that by increasing duties they had reduced prices, a small boy interrupted "If you had only doubled the duties we would have got the goods for nothing." That is the logical result of my hon. friend's argument. My hon. friend distinctly declares that by reducing duties I am increasing prices. I am sure for the sake of his 
reputation my hon. friend does not wish to be taken seriously.


Robert Forke: He is joking.


William Stevens Fielding: I am suddenly discovering that these tariff changes are of vast concern and importance. I understood from the speeches in this House and elsewhere not long ago that the changes made were insignificant. Hon. gentlemen opposite could hardly find words sufficiently small to indicate the insig-ficance of the duties; but now we are discovering that these insignificant, trifling duties are destroying the industries of the country. So I am getting some new theories of political economy. I let my hon. friend, the ex-Minister of Finance, have his own statistics, I do not question them. He is advancing the view that large importations of woollen goods are injurious to the country. We have admitted for last year an importation of wearing apparel and knitted goods amounting to $472,-000-a large sum. I can imagine my hon. friend picturing to the woollen people of the country the awful evil that came to them by the importation of that one year. But if he will turn back to the year 1921, when the country had the good fortune of having the guidance of my hon. friend as Minister of Finance he will find the importation not $472,000 but $890,000. Now then, what happened? If the woollen industry of the country is bad under this importation of $470,000, what must it have been in 1921 under an importation nearly double?


Henry Lumley Drayton: I wonder if my hon. friend is dealing with the latest figures?
I said I was prepared for correction, I invited it. I want to try and get at the truth in connection with these matters. We too often have general statements made and not enough facts behind them. I stated what I had been told and I asked my hon. friend for the information.


William Stevens Fielding: I have given it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I have been told that during the latest period in connection with the manufactured articles of textiles there had been an increase of 52 per cent. Now, what period is my hon. friend referring to?


William Stevens Fielding: I am referring to the year 1921 in comparison with the year 1923-one of the last years of my hon. friend's experience in office in the new year in which I had the pleasure to have something to do with public affairs.

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Henry Lumley Drayton: My friend says that instead of being an increase there was a decrease?


William Stevens Fielding: A little more than one-half of what it was in 1921.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend says that there is a decrease?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, in knitted goods.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Take stockings, which are knitted articles, during the last period what does my hon. friend say the figures are?


William Stevens Fielding: I have no doubt my hon. friend does not need this information for his argument. He can go on.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Oh yes, I should like to know we are right.


William Charles Good: Mr. Chairman, may I submit to the hon. member for West York and others also the danger of being led into a fallacy when comparing the prices of woollens now with the prices at some time in the past when the general price level may have shifted in the meantime?


Henry Lumley Drayton: I was dealing with quantities, not prices.


William Charles Good: But I understood the hon. member to say that the price of woollens had gone up, therefore the British preference was of no value. I simply point out the danger he is being led into by comparing the price now with the price in the past without any reference to the general price level.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Quite right.


Mr. COOTE:: There has been such a note of pessimism injected into this discussion by my hon. friends to my right that I think it may be helpful to bring to their attention something which may cause them to regard the woollen industry with at least a little optimism. I have before me a short article taken from the Financial Post of recent date in regard to the stocks of two of the leading textile companies of Canada.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does not that refer to the Dominion Textiles?


George Gibson Coote: It refers to the Dominion Textile and Penman's.


An hon. MEMBER:: They have nothing to do with wool.


Arthur Meighen: It is worth reading, though.


Jacques Bureau: Penman's are all right, their products are all wool.
221 i


George Gibson Coote: Even if they manufacture cotton goods this article is pertinent. I was disappointed that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) did not in his budget propose a larger increase in the British preference, particularly on cotton goods. I think if there is one thing the people of this country are entitled to it is cheaper cotton goods, because very often they cannot afford to buy woollen goods, but as things stand we are making it exceedingly difficult for them to get even cotton clothing. This article says, in regard to Penman's and Textile:
Montreal.-Here are two stocks that have shown rather startling increases in their market values during the past year. Penman's which sold at 99 in 1922, is now at 159 and recently touched the highest point in its history.
That does not sound pessimistic.
The stock is paying 8 per cent this year, including a bonus of 2 per cent paid in February and taking this as the dividend return the yield to the investor at 159 is about 6.30 per cent, not a very high yield for a common stock. Dominion Textile during 1922 sold as low as 133. To-day's market prices are about 68 and allowing for the "three to one split" early in the year-
I hope hon. gentlemen will take note of that.
-this is the equivalent of 215 for the old stock. Dominion Textile's dividend rate is 12 per cent for the old stock, $4 a share on the new and the yield is 5.90 per cent, which is very low.
It is obvious, therefore, that the investor who buys either Dominion Textile or Penman's is looking for something beyond the present income return. There is justification for believing that these additional attractions are in the offing for both securities.
Penman's may follow the example of Dominion Textile and divide its stock into 'smaller units. There are disadvantages in having a stock selling at too high a price.
I suppose one of the disadvantages, Mr. Chairman, is this: That it makes it a little bit harder, or it takes a little more nerve, to go to the Finance Minister and ask for further protection for that particular industry.
Penman's at 157 has a somewhat restricted market that would be broadened if, for instance, a new company were formed that gave each shareholder two or three shares of stock perhaps of no par value for each $100 share he now holds. The number of shares available for trading would be increased and an increase in the dividend might be more likely. Now this scheme of dividing up Penman's stock has not been decided upon; but it i3 just what was done in the case of Dominion Textile and it is what many investors are looking for and it is because so many investors look for something of this kind that the stock has advanced to its present point.
It seems to me that it is time we got some worth while reduction of the tariff on some particular lines, and these are two of the lines on which a reduction is due to the people of Canada.
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In the case of Dominion Textile the high price of the stock is based upon the prosperity prevailing in the textile industry" which ensures that the company's earnings will again be very satisfactory. For many years Textile has earned a substantial margin over its dividend requirements. Dividends have been increased from time to time with regularity and now $4 per share is being paid on the new stock, equivalent to 12 per cent on the older shares. The present price of the stock discounts an early increase in the dividend, perhaps to $5 a share, which would mean that at 68 the stock would yield over about 7.30 per cent.
Remember, Mr. Chairman, that this is stock which has recently been split up to the extent of three shares for one.
Penman's is in the business of manufacturing knit goods, chiefly woolilens.
I give you the authority of the Financial Post against the word of some hon. gentlemen to my right and also to my left who have insisted that Penman's is not a woollen industry. I will repeat that sentence:
Penman's is in the business of manufacturing knit goods, chiefly woollens. It has had a somewhat remarkable earnings record. During the five years ending in 1920 it earned over and above the dividends paid, the full value of the common stock. This went back into the business.
Remember that this is an industry which is chiefly concerned with woollens.
Since 1920 earnings have not been so great, but increased in 1922 over the previous year.
Apparently the little reduction that the Finance Minister made last year did have the effect of increasing the earning power of this woollen industry.
The working capital position is excellent and the company has liquid investments greater than the amount of its bonds outstanding.
Dominion Textile has almost as excellent a record earning during the past five years a total of 116 per cent, out of which dividends, totalling only 45 per cent, were paid. This meant that 71 per cent went back into the business. There has been a steady sure growth to Textile's earnings.
When two stocks are selling at the highest levels in their history and have discounted, marketwise, the possible developments, is that the time for the investor to purchase thftn? A lot depends upon the general business and investment outlook. Be it said though that both Penman's and Dominion Textile are common stocks that offer a wealth of real assets that have demonstrated an ability to earn a substantial margin above dividends paid. They are both capably managed, the president of each company being the same able executive, Sir Charles Gordon. They are operating in a field that has not been overdone and that is practically controlled by Canadian mills with little competition from foreign firms, to some extent due tq the tariff.
That is quite an admission, surely, for the Financial Post.
Therefore granting the solidity of the stocks themselves the question of purchase price remains the problem.
1 do not want to weary the committee by reading the rest of it, because it is not 
particularly interesting so far as the main point is concerned. But before I leave this question there is one other thing I want to point out, namely, the profits that have been made not only by cotton mills, which I think every hon. gentlemen will admit were excessive, but also by woollen mills. It was admitted before a committee of this House, I think in 1919, that a certain woollen industry in the province of Quebec had earned 72 per cent on the capital invested. I would like to read some of the evidence taken before the Drayton tariff commission in 1919, but I do not want to weary the committee by reading too much. I may mention, however, that down in .New Brunswick evidence was given before that commission by the Hon. Senator McSweeney, who had asked permission to relate some experiences he had had in connection with the cotton combine, if I may be allowed to use that word. According to him the experience had been very disastrous for some of the shareholders down there. I shall read only the last part of his statement. He said:
The last report of Dominion Textile is a very good one showing net earnings, on a business of $23,000,000 of about $3,500,000. They are now paying ten per cent. But the worst feature of the whole thing in connection with Dominion Textiles was the $5,000,000 of stock given by these gentlemen to themselves. The directors in Dominon Cotton were directors in Dominion Textile, A. F. Gault, Sir Rodolphe Forget, Sir Herbert Holt, and the others, and this stock pays them, according to the investigation held in Ottawa,
I think before Pringle, 312 per cent annually. In other words, stock that cost them $10-


Mr. MARLER:: Perhaps the hon. member would give us more details. He is offering a bald statement about 312 per cent per annum, about $5,000,000 worth of stock, and so on. It seems to me that he is placing on Hansard statements that are not quite accurate. I am not definitely contradicting him, but what he has stated does not seem to be the case. I take exception to these large figures being placed on Hansard without some reasonable explanation of them.


George Gibson Coote: I was just quoting from
'the evidence given by the Hon. Senator McSweeney before this commission, that is all.


Herbert Meredith Marler: We are not bound, I
suppose, to accept what Senator McSweeney says as absolutely right, any more than we are bound to accept the statement of my hon. friend himself as absolutely right. Why should we take it for granted-why should the whole country take it for granted-that the statement now being placed on our journals by the hon. gentleman are correct? I

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repeat that I take distinct exception to that proceeding.


George Gibson Coote: Might I be permitted to quote from the Sessional Papers, volume 55, 1919, page 362. Mr. Daniels was being examined before the House of Commons Cost of Living Committee and was asked this question by Mr. Pringle:
Q. For 1918 you earned about 291 per cent?-A. Yes.
I wrill admit there is a slight discrepancy between the evidence given by Mr. Daniels and the statement made by the Hon. Senator McSweeney, but it is not very great. The Hon. Senator McSweeney says 312 per cent, and the witness says 291 per cent.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Who says 291 per cent?


George Gibson Coote: Mr* F. G. Daniels in his evidence before the Cost of Living Committee of the House of Commons.


Herbert Meredith Marler: He says, 291 per cent on what?


George Gibson Coote: It says:
Q. For 1918 you earned about 291 per cent?-A. Yes.
I could read two or three pages of the evidence to make it more clear, if my hon. friend desires.


Herbert Meredith Marler: I would not like to impose as much as that upon the hon. member.


George Gibson Coote: I would be very glad to do it if the committee would like to have it.


Robert Forke: This is old stuff anyway. We all know it is the fact. It has never been refuted.


George Gibson Coote: Now, Mr. Chairman, I will complete the reading of this article:
In ether words stock that cost him $10 a share is now in this depressed market worth $1,620 a share. Can you find any gold mine in the world doing better than that ?


Herbert Meredith Marler: Stock at $10 a share worth $260 a share?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Worth $1,600.


Mr MARLER:: Is my hon. friend (Mr. Coote) aware what condition the Dominion Cotton Mills Company was in when it was originally taken over around 1892 by the Dominion Textile Company?


John Evans: What has that got to do with it?


Herbert Meredith Marler: A great deal. I will tell my hon. friend in a moment what it has to do with it. The Dominion Cotton Mills at that time was not in a good condition, and it was only by excellent and careful management that the Dominion Textile Company is in the position it is in to-day-no other reason at all.


George Gibson Coote: I would remind my hon. friend that the Financial Post suggests that part of this prosperity may be due to the tariff. I think possibly it is only fair to Senator McSweeney in view of what the hon. member says, that I read his statement.


Herbert Meredith Marler: I think that would hardly be fair. The hon. member has dealt with that.


Hance James Logan: It is the late Senator McSweeney. He is dead.


George Gibson Coote: 
Herbert Meredith Marler: If the business people of Canada, those engaged in the various manufacturing industries, found they could not survive without a reduction of the British preference, and the mills had to close up as a consequence, would the hon. member approve of that? In other words, would he prefer to have the tariff reduced and the mills closed?


George Gibson Coote: I submit to this House, and to the hon. member who has asked the question, that I do not think it is a fair question at all.


An hon. MEMBER:: Why?


George Gibson Coote: Because I do not think any man should admit that the cotton industry or the woollen industry could not survive with a 10 per cent tariff. Let me ask my hon. friend this question: If 75 per cent of the people engaged in the agricultural industry, or of the people engaged in the industry of growing wheat, were to come to this House and say "We cannot produce wheat at a profit at the present prices which we receive for our wheat and at the present prices which we must pay for everything we buy which goes into that wheat," would my hon. friend opposite be willing to reduce the tariff to secure a lower cost of living? Apply that principle to the woollen and cotton industry. Would the hon. member agree that those who are engaged in growing wheat should have cheaper cottons and cheaper woollens, so that the prices they are getting for their wheat would allow them to purchase these things? I think that is a fairer question than the one the hon. member propounded to me.


Mr. MALCOLM:: My hon. friend from Macleod (Mr. Coote) is very much mistaken in his first observation that increasing the British preference would give us cheaper cotton goods. I did not wish to speak on cotton goods, but I would like to make an observation on that item. During last year the importation of knitted cotton goods from the

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United Kingdom was very small. We imported only 20,319 pairs of cotton socks and stockings from the United Kingdom, but we imported 544,538 pairs of cotton socks and stockings from the United States; so that the British preference plays very little part in the matter of importation of cotton hosiery.


George Gibson Coote: If the present tariff charge against hosiery from Great Britain were cut in two would we bring any more hose from Great Britain, or would the Canadian manufacturer simply meet the price and go on manufacturing?


James Malcolm: I am speaking of the importation of cotton hosiery. It would not make any difference in the cost of cotton hosiery if the British preference were increased, because the cotton hosiery does not come from Great Britain, but from the United States. But I rose to point out that in the knitting mill business in the province of Ontario there are employed a very fine class of Canadian citizens, under conditions quite different from the conditions prevailing in the Old Land. The mills in the province of Ontario are conducted under regulations which are advantageous to Canadian workmen and conditions that do not apply in the Old Land, and the Canadian manufacturers of knitted goods in the small towns of Ontario and in my own constituency are paying fifty per cent more wages than the current rate of wages in Scotland and England. We are working under a minimum wage law; we are working under the Workmen's Compensation Act and the Factory Inspection Act, all of which we are strongly in favour of, in order that the work men and working women may be placed under the best working conditions. There are hon. members in this House who came from Great Britain, and who came to this country to find better conditions, and we have them here. The only protection, or the only consideration, that the knitting mills of the province are asking is a tariff which will offset the additional labour costs they are bearing in Ontario. Beyond that they ask for nothing. I will point out to my hon. friends that $100 worth of merchandise represents about $40 worth of labour, or $20 need of protection. That is the actual protection that is needed for labour. Then again there is the duty on machinery and the sales tax on wool which is being removed by the Finance Minister's budget. The knitting mills in Ontario require just that much protection for that purpose, and if hon. members are fair with regard to tariff matters, and with regard to British preference, they must take into consideration this one vital point-do you
want your Ontario workmen, or your workman for that matter from any other part of the Dominion, to maintain the conditions under which he is working or do you want him to meet the competitive wages of Great Britain?


Mr. KENNEDY (Edmonton):: If the
Ontario workmen are enjoying better conditions in their work than the British workmen, would they not to that extent be more efficient?


James Malcolm: I can answer the question this way, that the efficiency of the workmen in a hosiery mill is not so much a factor as my hon. friend might suggest. It is a business, largely of automatic machinery; the machinery mostly all is imported. The worker's efficiency is regulated entirely by the machinery, and the conditions are identical in Scotland and in Canada, because our knitting mills have installed during the past few years the very best type of Scottish and English equipment. The machinery is exactly the same and the speed of operators, I am told by those who have studied the question, varies but little between the British and Canadian mills. The knitted goods men in this country point out that under last year's tariff there was a large increase in the importation of knitted goods from the Old Land, but I do not think they objected seriously to that. But this year they point out that the importation of hosiery from Great Britain will not arrive in this country at any lower price than last year under the tariff existing last year. One hundred dollars' value in hosiery last year paid $25 duty and $4.69 sales tax, or a total value of $129.69. Under the new tariff it pays for $100 value, $22.50 duty and $7.35 sales tax, a total value of $129.85, or 16 cents additional on $100 value. The domestic manufacturer under the old tariff would receive $100 plus the sales tax $2.25, making a total cost of $102.25 to the retailer. Under this new tariff his value was $100, but he must take credit for the saving of 3| per cent on his wool value of $50, making a saving of $1.88. Then he adds a sales tax of 6 per cent, which is $5.89. His total cost is $104.01, or an increase in cost of $1.76. In other words we are not delivering the British article at as low a price as we did last year. In fact, the price is 16 cents more and we are taking out of the Canadian knit goods manufacturer $1.76 or If per cent. Hon. gentlemen might think that was a very small thing, but on behalf of the small hosiery mills, I should like to say that 10 cents a dozen p urs is considered a good profit for the mill. Ten cents a dozen pairs will give a mill a reason-
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ably large earning. When there is no actual saving to the public by the new tariff condition, there is a good deal to be said in favour of these mills when a load of $1.76 per one hundred dollars is put upon them because in the total aggregate that load amounts practically to the earnings of their mills.
My hon. friend made some statements about earnings of cotton or textile mills. I am not inclined to doubt his statements but on behalf of the smaller industries in Ontario which are vital to the life of many of the small towns, industries which are financed without any watered stock, with the invested capital of men who have made all their own money and who have made it in the industries, I submit to my hon. friends this one consideration, that in applying a reduction of 50 per cent in the British preference, they would succeed in closing or making it impossible to work many of the finest and most hopeful small industries in Ontario, and that they would not give them the protection to which they are entitled owing to the different wages paid and the different standards of living asked for by provincial regulations. This is a point that my hon. friends must consider in dealing with these tariff matters and it is the only viewpoint I take with regard to the question. We talk a good deal about our living conditions in Canada and we hope to attract workmen and other men besides, by these better conditions which we offer them. That is correct. But if on the one hand we press for a certain condition and a certain rate of wages, and on the other we lower the rate of duty so that the payment of that rate of wages will not be permitted, we are leaving our workmen and our manufacturers between the upper and the nether millstones, so that they cannot survive.


George Gibson Coote: If I might use the words of the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Marler) my hon. friend, if I understood him correctly, made the bald statement that wages were 50 per cent higher in our Canadian mills than they were in Great Britain. Would he give this committee some statistics to show that that is the case?


James Malcolm: I am sorry I cannot give the hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Coote) the exact figures; but I can assure him that I will secure them for him and that the statement is quite correct that in the knitting industry in Ontario wages are 50 per cent higher than in the knitting industry in Scotland and England. I think the piece work wage for men in Scotland is about $11 [Mr. Malcolm.!
or $12 a week and the day wage is slightly less. I would rather not quote, because I am speaking from memory and I am not quite sure as to the figures. I shall however be glad to procure the figures for my hon. friend this afternoon. I have the figures in my office.


George Gibson Coote: Would my hon. friend be good enough to give the committee also some idea of the difference in the cost of living in England and Canada?


James Malcolm: I have no doubt the cost of living has a direct bearing on the cost of labour. That does not enter into this argument at all.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I rise in the first instance to congratulate the hon. member for North Bruce (Mr. Malcolm). He has given us a first rate exposition of what, ought to be the underlying principles of the budget. He has shown us that the protective feature ought to be and must be considered, that is of course if we are going to continue to function. He has shown us that he has no use whatever for that old bugaboo of a "tariff for revenue" which really never buga-booed at all. He has shown us that we ought to have consideration on the one hand of the cost to the consumer and on the other to the returns to the workmen. He has gone further; he has shown us very clearly what the effect of a muddled view of these things is. He has shown us for example that on the one hand there is less protection to the Canadian workmen, and on the other hand there is greater cost to the Canadian consumer. I was going to say-and I would not have said it nearly as well-something along the'same lines in answer to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) when he said, "This is a new doctrine and a new theory-advance tariffs and you get lower rates; cut them and you have higher rates." The whole thing runs together; there is only one issue here- the fiscal policy as a whole. At one time, for example, practically all tin plate utilized in the United States-my hon. friend knows this just as well if not better than I do-was imported, all the costs of transportation paid, all the costs of handling at the ports paid, and then a far higher rate was paid than you can buy tin-plate for to-day in the States. It is also true that by a high tariff costs were temporarily increased largely; but it is also true that it was not so very many years before those people were exporting that tin-plate, and that high tariff has very greatly reduced the cost in that country. It is also, of course, true that if

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you have enough people who are engaged in active competition one with another, you are getting your prices pretty well regulated in your local market. It is also true that those prices can be proper prices only if you have something like a proper volume of business. If you have not a proper volume of business and are working only 30 per cent of your time, your overhead must go up, just as happened last year with that reduction in the duty. It is also true that the English sellers, selling as they do in this market, take precious good care that the Canadian consumer does not get all the benefit of the Canadian preference, but the benefit of the preference goes to the man who is in the position to collect it, as he is just as soon as local production is down to such a point that local costs have to go up. There is no mystery about the thing. The Minister of Finance is extremely agile in taking one or two disconnected instances and having a "hurrah" on them; he is a perfect adept at that. He is an absolute wizard at the art of misrepresenting an argument; he is a wonderful politician. But just see how the hon. member for North Bruce answers him. Why, he says, under this budget-and he gives the exact figures-while you are reducing protection and, therefore, taking away the work from your own people, you are adding to the cost. It is all very well to have a trifling reduction, and I still say that the reductions in the mass were trifling. But if there is anything in this idea about cutting and slashing tariffs, the object should be to reduce prices. A little niggling reduction here and another one there is not going to do very much except to disturb Canadian industrial conditions; it is not going to reflect itself to any extent in reduced prices to the Canadian consumer. At any rate, that is what we have found. When my hon. friend comes down here and makes a tariff reduction on the one hand and then plusses it with a sales tax much greater on the other hand, what else is to be expected? Everyone knows that every word said by the hon. member (Mr. Malcolm) is absolutely correct; the figures are there and they cannot be disputed. An hon. gentleman opposite shakes his head. If he can discover how a reduction in the cost of living is brought about by a per cent or 3 per cent, or if you like, a 4 per cent reduction of duty on the one hand, and a sales tax of 6 per cent on the other hand, I cannot see it. The minister is an adept at putting the other fellow in the wrong.


William Stevens Fielding: When he is wrong.


Henry Lumley Drayton: He does it beautifully, and the other fellow need not be wrong at all. Now, I am going to go back to what I said before.


Jacques Bureau: "Far away from harm."


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend from Three Rivers says, "Back to the farm."


Jacques Bureau: "Far away from harm."


Henry Lumley Drayton: Well, I think
that if we did go there we should get more facts than we have got this afternoon. I will take the figures dealing exactly with the matters 1 submitted to my hon. friend. I find that my memory was somewhat below the actual truth in the matter of yardage. Speaking about the quantity of woollen yardage, I stated the increase and my hon. friend told me that it was absolutely untrue.


William Stevens Fielding: I did not say that; that is very harsh language.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I am giving the effect of what the hon. gentleman said. He is never harsh, but I believe in calling a spade a spade. He said that the figure I gave proved that I was absolutely wrong; perhaps I will put it that way. I will give him the figures taken from the monthly reports of the trade of Canada. These figures are prepared from the records of the monthly reports of the trade of Canada for ten months ending January 23, 1923, and a proportional allowance is made to give the figures up to the end of March, the comparison being as at the end of March 1922 and 1923. If I remember rightly, I think I said that the woollen yardage imported into Canada had increased some 52 per cent. For the year ending March, 1922, there were 12,208,523 yards of woollen yardage imported into Canada, and for the year ending March, 1923, 18,793,613 yards, or an approximate increase of 54 per cent. The next matter I took up was hosiery and socks. Speaking from recollection 1 stated that the increase in quantity in this direction was 104 per cent; I will now give the exact number of dozens of pairs imported. For the year ending March, 1922, there were 257,089 dozen pairs imported into Canada; for the year ending March, 1923, there were 610,372 dozen pairs imported, or an approximate increase, not of 104 per cent, as I thought, but 138 per cent. These are the figures I have, and as I have said, the source from which they come is to be found in the monthly reports of the trade of Canada. I believe they are absolutely correct, and the very shutting down of the mills would show that they are.

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Mr. BALDWIN:: The hon. member (Sir Henry Drayton) has made many criticisms regarding the closing down of mills and the suspension of operations, and the bearing of these conditions on the prices of woollen goods throughout Canada. I believe that neither the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) nor the woollen industry is to blame for this serious state of affairs. The fact is that within the past few months the great woollen industries of New England have invaded Canada and have purchased every pound of wool that has been available. They bought not only what was in storage throughout the country but what was on the backs of the sheep, for which they contracted. No doubt the mills have had to suspend operations, and we can easily explain the situation by taking as an analogy the wheat industry, for instance. When wheat is high, flour and other wheat products must necessarily be high at the same time. And the same thing holds true in regard to rubber. If a great rubber enterprise is strong enough to go abroad and contract for raw rubber at very low prices, the rubber industry generally must be affected. But not all the rubber concerns can do this' and our woollen mills in Canada could not have anticipated such enterprise on the part of industries that had been closed down in the United States for years; they could not have anticipated that these industries would be in a position to come into Canada and forestall them. So that I do not see that anyone can blame the Minister of Finance. My hon. friend (Sir Henry Drayton) has repeatedly asked the minister the question: "Are you not aware that the prices of woollen goods are increasing? Do you not know that several of the mills have, had to close down?" Well, had these mills been able to secure their raw material and circumvent the action of the New England industries, conditions would no doubt have been different to-day. That is the situation as I see it, and I believe I have stated it correctly.


Mr. WHITE:: I wish to protest against this change in the British preference; I believe that the continual reduction of the preference from year to year will have but one effect, and that will be disaster. What we are faced with now is a competition between the standards of living of the British workmen and of the Canadian factory hand. The Canadian manufacturer, under the conditions forced upon him by these reductions, is bound to reduce costs. Coming from a constituency in which there are about four factories making woollen and knitted goods, I am naturally more or less interested in this question. I re-
ceived a letter from one of them this morning stating that there had been a great increase in the importation of knitted and woollen goods from Great Britain since the change in the duty last year, and also pointing out that at the present time all the woollen mills in this country are experiencing the keenest competition they have ever known. As soon as the manufacturer is faced with the necessity of reducing costs, he has, among other things, to reduce wages. If his factory is working only part-time, perhaps four or five days a week, the pay envelope of the worker is very much reduced, and he in turn is forced to decide between remaining where he is or going where he can get a better living. And it does not take long for the Canadian worker to decide when to move over to the United States, particularly under present conditions. Very many members of the House deplore the fact that a number of Canadian workers have gone to the United States in the last six months, and it seems to me that a change in the tariff such as is now proposed accelerates rather than retards this exodus. After we have accomplished that we spend large sums of money inducing immigrants to come to this country and then move through the same circle all over again.


Robert Forke: I have a good deal of sympathy with hon. members who have spoken along this line. I should like, however, to ask them: Have they ever taken into consideration the standard of living of the people who are engaged in an industry that has to compete against all the world, that has no protection whatever? The most poorly paid labour in the world can compete with our agriculturists in the production of the staple article which they have to sell in the world's market. That is one primary fact that we must get into our minds to start with. I listened with a good deal of interest to the hon. member for North Bruce (Mr. Malcolm). He always speaks sanely and moderately, and I have no doubt he is quite sincere in his statements regarding our small woollen manufacturers. I saw an article in the Montreal Gazette the other day which no doubt contains a certain amount of truth, although I cannot vouch for it. It mentions that a box of apples packed by a Perth farmer brought him 40 cents. He placed a ticket in the box asking the purchaser to advise him what price he paid for the contents, and in due time he received a letter from a farmer in Saskatchewan stating that the apples had cost him $2.60. There you have the great spread between 40 cents and $2.60. When the hon. member for North Bruce stated that 10 cents

Ways and Means-Customs Tarif!
was a fair profit for the manufacturer on a dozen pair of stockings I should like him to have told us the retail price of a pair of such stockings. No doubt the information would be very interesting. I think a great many of our difficulties are due to this unreasonable spread between the price received by the producer and that paid by the consumer.
I should like to see our manufacturers and our farmers get a little closer together in order that they may the better understand each other's problems. I have no ill feeling towards the manufacturers.' It seems to be a generally accepted idea that we are fighting the manufacturers. This is not the case. We are fighting a system that we do not think is working out to the best interests of the people. I stated quite recently that the cost of living here is as high as it is in any other part of the world, whereas this ought to be one of the cheapest countries to live in. This is one reason why we cannot compete successfully in manufacturing. A good deal has been said this afternoon about the standard of living in the Old Land. It is forty years since I left Scotland. I knew a great deal about the woollen mills of Galashiels and other centres, having come from the border counties, and I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, that at that time the condition of the workers in those mills was just as good as the condition of the farmers on the plains of Manitoba to-day. So when the cost of living is blamed on the farmers I resent it. I question if there is very much difference between the conditions in that woollen district and in our maunfacturing districts to-day except in the cost of living. If a worker in the mills here or a mechanic wants to buy a cottage it costs him a large amount of money, and the cost of his food and clothing is also very high. Consequently, his living expenses being very high, the employer must pay him correspondingly high wages, and therefore is unable to compete successfully with the manufacturers in other parts of the world. We have a vicious system working in a vicious circle, and it seems to me that we are never going to get out of it, for apparently my hon. friend from West York (Sir Henry Drayton), like Ephraim, is "wedded to his idols."
I want to remove the idea that we are hostile to the manufacturing interests merely for the sake of hostility. I am always glad to see our manufacturers prospering. I should like to see all our manufacturing industries prosper, but if this is to be at the expense of the other sections of the community which, I claim, are engaged in the basic industries of our country, then I demur. I had a gentleman this day seriously proposing to me a minimum price for wheat. He was of opinion that if the farmers of this country could be assured of a price to cover the cost of production Canada would become enormously prosperous in the very near future because such a great impulse would be given to production. This proposal is not so absurd as it may appear at first sight once you look into it. When we remember how often we are told that it is absolutely necessary for our manufacturing industries to be helped along, why should the farmers on the prairie provinces continue to produce wheat at a loss to feed the poor people on the continent of Europe?


Richard Smeaton White: Does the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Forke) consider he would have done just as well had he remained working in the woollen mills of Scotland instead of coming to Canada?


Robert Forke: I never worked in the woollen mills of Scotland. I can tell my hon. friend the advice I got before I left the Old Land to come to Canada, and that was: Go where there is money. And being of the type that I am it is most likely that I would get it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: And you got itT


Robert Forke: I am glad to say, Mr. Chairman, that knowing the Old Flag waved over Canada, I decided to become a Canadian. I am here, and I want everyone to understand that I am a Canadian through and through.


Mr. MORRISON:: I have been very much interested in the figures quoted by those who have preceded me. The ex-Minister of Finance, (Sir Henry Drayton), pointed out that for the year ending March 1922, we imported 12,208,523 yards of woollen goods, worth $472,
000.	This amounts to only 6 cents per capita of our population. For the following year ending March 1923, the importation amounted to 18,793,613 yards worth $962,000, or under 10 cents per capita. It looks to me as if the two old parties are vieing with each other and spending much time trying to assure the manufacturers that their interests will be well looked after. Relatively speaking, these importations are trifling. When the manufacturers ask for protection they do not produce their books, they do not get down to business and prove that they really need protection. We are held up as a party that believes in ruining the manufacturing industries. That is altogether wrong. We want to see industries of all kinds prospering in this country, for we realize that it is to the national benefit that industries native to the country

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
should be prosperous. But we want to have a little share in the prosperity. I know there are Canadian industries making big dividends to-day. The secretary-treasurer of one particular industry told me that for twenty-five years they have never earned less than 20 per cent, and in some years even 50 per cent, and the stockholders have never got less than 10 per cent cash dividend; yet that industry is highly protected.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the name?


John Morrison: I am not going to enter into personalities. Other speakers have not given facts about their business, and I am not going to divulge personal confidences. But this discussion has been carried on this afternoon over relatively small matters, and as far as the tariff is concerned they look to me to be of no importance. The hon. member for North Bruce (Mr. Malcolm) said that 72,000 dozen pairs of cotton stockings had been imported from Great Britain in 1922 and 962,000 dozen from the United States. Well, what does that amount to when you come to consider the population? It is one dozen pairs for every seven or eight people in the country. I think we are spending a, good deal of time over the woollen and cotton manufacturers that is not getting us anywhere.


William Stevens Fielding: I do not know whether we will make veiy much progress by quoting statistics, though they are sometimes helpful. An irreverent person, possibly, with a sense of humour, has prescribed what he calls the three stages of inveracity: the lie, the blank lie-the word originally was not blank ' and statistics. I do not want to throw discredit upon statistics, especially those of the Customs department. But here is a very interesting point that is worth mentioning while we are on the subject, especially having regard to the warning of the hon. member for West York (Sir Henry Drayton) that we must deal with quantities, not values. In the fiscal year 1921 we imported raw wool to the amount of 9,250,000 pounds weight-not dollars. In the fiscal year 1922, we imported 12,500,000 pounds; in the fiscal year 1923, 18,250,000 pounds weight. Now, were we buying this raw wool and throwing it away? It seems to me that that raw wool must have been employed in the making of woollen goods here,-and somebody must have been busy.


William Charles Good: I would like to make a few
observations on some of the-


William Stevens Fielding: We are dealing with the British preference clause. My hon. friend moved a resolution regarding the reciprocity clause; we will deal with that after six o'clock.


George Newcombe Gordon: Shall paragraph one
carry.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I gathered from the tenor of the remarks of my hon. friend that we are going to equalize the duties under the French treaty as respects the duties on goods imported by Canada from Great Britain.


William Stevens Fielding: I did not make any
reference to it.	'


Henry Lumley Drayton: I rather gathered that was what we were doing it for.


William Stevens Fielding: That is the effect of it, largely.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think my hon. friend gave us that impression during the discussion of the French treaty; of course, ii he says not, I will take his word for it.


William Stevens Fielding: It was referred to, yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think that
statement is correct.


William Stevens Fielding: I said that we should
wait and see.


George Newcombe Gordon: The hon. member for
Brant (Mr. Good) has the floor. I thought the hon. member for West York was merely asking a question.


William Charles Good: Mr. Chairman, I wish to
make some observations on a few of the remarks that have been made during the last hour and a half. It is quite true that the problems we have been discussing are complicated. One of the causes of difficulty is the problem of distribution; the tariff is another item. I think it is just as well to remember that there may be a number of causes which give rise to a particular situation. Attention has been drawn this afternoon to the present industrial conditions in the United States, and I want to suggest that it is a pertinent question for us to ask ourselves why there has been an improvement in industrial conditions in that country, while there has not been such an improvement here. I am not going to answer that question, but it is a very pertinent one. We may interpret the facts quite differently. We may say it is due to tariff conditions when it may be due to entirely different conditions.
With regard to the standards of living, the hon. member for London (Mr. White) has

Ways and Means-Customs TarvJ
made the statement that the protective tariff is necessary for us to preserve a certain standard of living in this country. Now so far as the farmers are concerned, the Canadian farmer competes freely in the open market with the producers of India, who live on an entirely different standard, and I submit to the hon. member that we have to take into consideration the efficiency of the people who work and live under different conditions. I submit in all confidence that generally speaking he will find that those who live on a higher standard are more efficient; and that equalizes the difference in the standard of living.
With regard to the point raised by the hon. member for North Bruce (Mr. Malcolm) as to the wages being paid to workmen in Canadian mills, I submit to him and to the House that we must take into account, not the nominal wages, but the real wages the workmen receive; that is to say, the purchasing power of the money which they receive in this country as compared with the purchasing power of the money which the workmen receive in Great Britain, and if that is taken into consideration I think we shall find that the two sets of workmen are practically on a par. In that connection I would like to submit to the same hon. member and to the House that it is in the interest of the manufacturers that the cost of living, which is enhanced in this country by tariff duties, should be reduced. That will make the production of manufactured goods cheaper, and will not only enable our own people to get these goods cheaper but will also enable our manufacturers to compete to some extent in the foreign market.
With regard to the whole situation it seems to me that we ought to have some kind of fundamental principle to which to refer our specific acts. If we are going to adopt the principle and policy that every particular industry has got to be made to pay, and if we are going to subsidize them by state action until they do pay, then the only thing to do is to have a fair deal all round. The farmers sky, and I think they could prove with absolute certainty, that under present conditions they cannot produce wheat, particularly in our western provinces, and make ends meet. If we are going to follow the policy with regard to them that we have followed in the case of some of the manufacturers, we shall have to give them a subsidy or bounty on their wheat. I think a farmer could make a nice little profit with a bounty of 50 cents a bushel on his wheat. If we are going to adopt the principle, make it fair all round. But I submit that the whole thing is unsound, and if we are going to follow that principle we shall get led into all kinds of difficulties. I would like to see this government, as I have stated on previous occasions recognize that there are a lot of industries like people walking on stilts. They have to be got down to the ground, and they should be got down as quickly as possible, and then we shall have a condition where industries that are natural to this country will be developed, and industries that cannot be made to pay in- this country will not be maintained as parasites on the successful and indigenous industries. I think there has been, and is now, a good deal of fallacy in regard to a number of these questions.
Just one other point before I sit down. The hon. ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Dray-stated that in his opinion domestic competition would regulate prices, and therefore we did not need to take account of the tariff. I submit that under the protection of the tariff it is almost inevitable in a great variety of industries that manufacturers should get together and agree on prices, and pretty soon we have no competition. If we could maintain real active competition among the manufacturers, then the protective duty would not be so serious, but the fact of the matter is the tariff is an encouragement to combines, and pretty soon we are up against the situation where there is not any competition and the consumers are exploited for the benefit of a monopoly. If we could preserve competition it would not be so very serious a matter, because all profits tend to the same level, but where you have no real competition, and I do think that in many, many lines we have had no real competition at all, it is a very serious matter to maintain the tariff.
Resolution No. 1 agreed to.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
2. Resolved, that the Customs tariff, 1907 be further amended by adding after section 8A the following as sections 8B and 8C:-
8B. The Governor in Council may authorize any Minister of the Crown to enter into negotiations with any authorized representative of the government of the United States with a view to the making of a commercial agreement between the two countries on terms that may be deemed mutually beneficial. Any agreement so made shall be subject to the approval of the parliament of Canada.
8C. If the President of the United States, under authority of the United States Tariff Act of 1922, deter-
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mines to reduce by fifty per cent the duties imposed by such act on the following articles, that 'is to say:-
Cattle; wheat; wheat flour; oats, barley, potatoes onions; turnips; hay; fish as enumerated in paragraphs 717, 718, 719 and 720 of the said Tariff Act of 1922, the Governor in Council may by order in council make such reductions of duties on similar articles imported into Canada from the United States as may be deemed reasonable by way of compensation for such reductions on Canadian products imported into the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: I move to strike out the words "by fifty per cent" after the word "reduce" in the second line of paragraph 8 C.
The hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Forke) offered a suggestion in regard to an amendment here. If anybody in his behalf would like to take the matter up, I have no objection. It was on the second reciprocity resolution. Perhaps we had better wait a few minutes.


Mr. MANION:: I have no desire to hold up the resolution, but I would like the minister to wait a few minutes, in case the hon. leader of the Opposition might wish to say something.	.


William Stevens Fielding: Very well. We can go
on to another item.
Resolution stands.
Customs tariff-Schedule A:
3. Resolved, that schedule A to the Customs Tariff, 1907, as amended by chapter sixteen of the statutes of 1910, by chapter twenty-six of the statutes of 1914, by chapter five of the statutes of 1914 (second session), by chapter forty-seven of the statutes of 1919, by chapter twenty-seven of the statutes of 1921, by chapter nineteen of the statutes of 1922, and by order in council, be further amended by striking thereout tariff items:-83a, 99, 134, 135, 143a, 168, 235, 242, 281, 328, 348b, 365, 374, 386, 441a, 442, 469, 586, 638a, 670, 690a, 710b, the several enumerations of goods respectively, and1 the several rates of duties of customs, if any, set opposite each of said items, and to repeal section 1 (i) of Order in Council, P.C. 16/1556, dated fifth day of June, 1912, designated as item 760 of The Customs Tariff, and to provide that the following items, enumerations and rates of duty be inserted in schedule A:-


William Stevens Fielding: I wish to make a slight correction in paragraph 1 of resolution No. 3. I move to amend the resolution as follows:
That item No. 242 be struck out, and that Hems 581 and 581a be inserted after the item 469.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Customs tariff-Hemp seed for agricultural purposes:-British preferential tariff free; Intermediate tariff free; General tariff free.
William Stevens Fielding: The first item in this resolution is 72, "Hemp seed for agricultural purposes," is free under all the tariffs.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Customs tariff-Potatoes when imported from a country which imposes a customs duty on potatoes grown in Canada, per 100 pounds, British preferential tariff 20 cents; Intermediate tariff, 35 cents; General tariff 35 cents.
Arthur Meighen: This is slightly more than the previous rate.


William Stevens Fielding: It is a mere change from bushels to per 100 pounds, and the figures are believed to be the exact equivalent, within a fraction.


Arthur Meighen: Slightly over.


William Stevens Fielding: Possibly so.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Prunes and dried plums, unpitted, per pound: British preferential tariff £ cent; Intermediate tariff % cents; General tariff % cents.
Arthur Meighen: What is the effect of this change?	*


William Stevens Fielding: In the first item just read there is no change, but the next item, which we might read in connection with it, needs an explanation. That is the duty on raisins and dried currants, which I mentioned as having relation to the possibility of business with Australia. It will be remembered I explained to the House that, although the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) had not been fortunate enough to conclude an agreement with Australia, he had reason to believe a change of this nature would go a long way towards inducing the Australian government to make an arrangement with us, and for that reason the proposal was made that "raisins and dried currants" should be made free from Australia-free under the preference-while the duty of 3 cents, which is an increase, is to be imposed under the intermediate and general tariffs. On further consideration it occurs to us that while the object is a commendable one, we have this situation; that it may be some time before the Australian government will manifest their concurrence and offer any return. We propose by way of amendment to let that duty stand for the present, with the condition that we may bring in the new duty by proclamation by the Governor in Council; that is to say, when we get any intimation from Australia that she is willing to reciprocate this new duty will be imposed. In the meantime the old duty will remain. There has been some criticism in regard to this on the ground that it is a substantial increase of duty. The object I have already explained. As some months may elapse before we can get the Australian government to take any action, we think it is wise to make a provision that the duty for the present shall

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
remain unchanged, and that the other duty shall come into effect only on proclamation of the Governor in Council.


Arthur Meighen: Surely after the trip of the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb), we are not still without any results at all? If I remember rightly, the minister, by a policy of discreet silence and wise looks, rather led us to believe that he had made considerable progress in Australia. Is he not yet ready to disclose just the extent of that progress? Is the whole result of his visit to be that he is able to advise us to put a duty on raisins and currants.


James Alexander Robb: The Australian government will meet next week and we shall hear what they have to say.


Arthur Meighen: Would it not be well to hear what our plenipotentiary has to disclose in the meantime?


Jacques Bureau: It would be very undiplomatic to disclose it.


James Alexander Robb: My right hon. friend must exercise a little patience.


Arthur Meighen: I am led to infer that the extent of the progress made is indicated in the speech of the minister. Can we not get any further information? What does he expect to get from Australia when he goes back? Is all that he is looking for something that can be gained by giving Australia a preference on currants and raisins? Is there nothing else that would be more adequate compensation for what he expects to get by way of concessions from Australia? I have not seen very much in the way of tariff reciprocity or tariff reduction in evidence in the Australian policy of late, not on the part of the Labour party, nor of the Liberal party, nor of the Country party. The minister has been to Australia, and if he has not forgotten his impressions because of the length of the journey he took coming home, surely he can give us some idea of what the nature of this Australian treaty will probably be.


James Alexander Robb: My hon. friend will have to exercise a little further patience until our Australian friends have time to meet and to submit their proposition to their parliament.


Arthur Meighen: So as yet we have not got to the extent of even a proposition. The minister, in the midst of an election in Australia, went all the way around by the Fiji islands, called on Australia, received their hospitality, made speeches at their banquets, came back through the southern tepid waters, sailed along the coast of China-


James Alexander Robb: No.


Arthur Meighen: -not too far away, I hope, to be admired by the aborigines on shore. Then he bathed his intellect in the ancient lore of India, came along the Suez canal and, I suppose, explored the recesses of the Nile, possibly anticipated the march of Britain's aristocracy into the tombs of the Pharaohs. Finally he came home, and all we can get is that we are waiting for a proposition from Australia.


Jacques Bureau: My right hon. friend knows that you cannot disclose diplomatic relations without the consent of the other party.


Arthur Meighen: May we know who is likely to be the next missionary to Australia? From what I hear in this debate the chances appear to favour the Minister of Customs and Excise (Mr. Bureau).


Jacques Bureau: I wish they would.


Arthur Meighen: What itinerary would he likely take?


Jacques Bureau: I will consult my right hon. friend. He knows his geography so well and seems to have enjoyed those various climates.


Arthur Meighen: I have never seen them nor felt them.


Jacques Bureau: Then I will not consult my right hon. friend. He is drawing on his imagination.


Arthur Meighen: We attended to business when we were in power. With us the matter was not one merely of globe-trotting and pastimes of that sort. I think, however, the committee can readily conclude that there was no result whatever from the visit to Australia, and judging from the preparation being made in this budget, little hope may be entertained.


Ernest Lapointe: That is eloquence.


Oliver Robert Gould: I am pleased to note that
my right hon. friend is pressing this point with the minister and the government, because, while he stated that nothing was secured, the fact remains, according to the item under discussion, that we have received an extra three cents per pound duty, or an increase in price to the consuming public. Upon that basis it is not for us to suggest that other ministers should go next year, but rather we would suggest that they should all be kept at home. If that is a means of paying expenses, it is very expensive on the rest of us, particularly in the West, where not being able to grow apples and other fruits, we buy raisins and this article appears very

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frequently by compulsion on our tables. Why try to induce our Australian cousins to enter into a treaty with us if a treaty of this nature is going to be more expensive to us? If that be the case, we shall do without the treaty and build up a Canada of our own, or as the old phrase goes, attend to our own business absolutely, because I do not believe it is good policy to pay a price to get a treaty such as is indicated by this item. Possibly if this item should pass without any criticism whatever, other ministers might be inclined to go next year and bring us back further concessions of this nature. We have been protesting for a long time against this principle, and I protest at the present time against this thing of going any further.


Mr. BANCROFT:: I am glad the government has decided not to put into effect this increase of 250 per cent in the tariff tax on raisins and currants. This would mean, I believe, an increase of about 4 cents a pound to the consumer in Canada on this staple article of food. Based on last year's consumption, an increase of 4 cents a pound would mean $1,489,538 that the people of Canada would have to pay more for raisins, and currants because of this duty if it goes into effect. Last year we purchased over 30,000,000 pounds of raisins from the United States and only 280 pounds from Australia. If we purchased all the raisins that Australia produces, this would supply only one-third of our requirements.


Arthur Meighen: It would be some treaty.


Leland Payson Bancroft: Yes, it is quite a treaty. This new tariff means that we would tax the people of Canada approximately one and one-half million dollars for the purpose of hauling raisins and currants seven thousand miles from Australia. I am glad the government is not going to put this new duty into effect, at least for the time being.


John Evans: I should like the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) to give us some idea of the raisin business in Australia. This seems to be one of the most foolish items that has come out in the budget this year. Since we purchase so little from Australia, this thing looks to me like an excuse to raise the general tariff to three cents a pound. There is no excuse for this duty, by which we increase the price of a commodity which is so much needed by rich and poor alike. There is simply no excuse for making such a treaty on this basis yvith Australia, since the Australians cannot supply us with anything like the quantity we need

even if we take all they raise. The minister might give us some idea in regard to that industry in Australia.


James Alexander Robb: The Australian crop of raisins is considerable and is increasing yearly; and especially in the Madura district and in other parts where returned soldiers have been engaged, they have been producing a splendid quality of raisins in large quantities. There is such a bulk of raisins there now that some difficulty is being found in marketing them, and as hon. gentlemen may have noticed, they have been urging the British government to give them a preference in this direction. While it is true that in the tariff we are proposing to increase somewhat the duty on laisins, hon. gentlemen have lost sight of the fact that we are making them free in the British preferential list; that is to say, if raisins come from Australia or any other British possession they will enter Canada free. Bearing that in mind, it might be well to consider the policies of other countries in regard to this particular commodity. If my hon. friends want to have raisins absolutely free from any customs duties, I do not know where they could go to find a tariff that would suit them. Let me put on Hansard the duties levied in certain other countries. For example, in the United States there is a tax on raisins of 2 cents per pound; in Mexico 3 cents; in the Argentine republic, 3 cents under certain conditions and 5 cents under other circumstances; in Brazil 7i cents per pound. Free trade Great Britain has a tax on raisins of 21 cents per pound and gives under the British preference % of the total rate. So that after all we are only increasing our tariff by I of a cent more than the rate that now obtains in Great Britain, and we are going one better by making them free on the preferential list. Belgium levies a rate of 2-J cents per pound; Italy, 3% cents a pound; and a number of other countries have rates in proportion, ranging from $ cent up to 7 and 8 cents a pound.


Leland Payson Bancroft: Does the minister argue that the price of raisins in this country will be reduced by placing this commodity on the free list under the British preference?


James Alexander Robb: I do not think the price will be increased.


Mr. CHAPLIN:: Are the Australian raisins seedless?


James Alexander Robb: They are both.


James Dew Chaplin: I am informed by a large user of raisins in my own district that the

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Australian raisins are not seedless, nor are they as good as the others. I am glad to see that the Minister of Finance has set aside this particular clause for the time being. I have a telegram from certain manufacturers of mincemeat in my own district who use large quantities of raisins, and they tell me that such, a duty as this will be a great handicap to their particular business. The minister has reduced the duty on the British goods of their manufacture, while at the same time it is proposed to impose a duty on the ingredients that go into that article. That seems to be cutting on both sides of this business.


William Stevens Fielding: A case of mincemeat.


James Dew Chaplin: It is more than mincemeat so far as they are concerned. I do not know that a machine is necessary to put them out of business; that is being done pretty effectively now. The same company make plum puddings, and I fancy that the plum pudding business in Canada will go; and they will also be hurt, under the British preference, in the manufacture of jams. I heard the other day that the English people were putting a big tax on sugar. Now, when that sugar is exported into Canada in jams and in mincemeat the English manufacturer virtually gets a rebate of the tax on sugar. I should like to know whether there is any method of putting on an extra tax to meet the importation of sugar as embodied in these goods. Practically 65 per cent of the cost of jams consists in the price of sugar, and sugar in this particular case comes in practically free. It seems to me that these businesses are being injured to a considerable extent by this British preference, and it does strike me that it would not make much difference, if I were a manufacturer of this particular line of goods, whether I was hurt by my own relatives overseas or was put out of business by other means. If I am to be put out of business at all, I cannot see that it makes a great deal of difference whether it is done by Englishmen or by Frenchmen. No doubt there is a certain degree of sentiment in the former case; some hon. gentlemen might say-perhaps, that it would be preferable to be put [DOT]out of business by the English people.


Jacques Bureau: Suppose I said that.


William Stevens Fielding: This item must be considered in relation to the object we have in view. We have been anxious to cultivate trade relations with Australia; I think we all agree to that. The late government had been in negotiation with Australia with a view to coming to some understanding if possible in this matter. They laboured in all sincerity.
but I do not think they were very successful. We have now taken the matter up and are trying to come to some arrangement with the Australian authorities. If we agree that it is desirable to make some arrangement with Australia in order that we may have access to their markets for our own products, we must be prepared to meet them in some way by making some concession. We have offered them our British preference in return for the preference they give to Great Britain, but so far they have not been willing to accept this proposal. There is a hitch for the moment, but it has been intimated to us, not only by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) who has personal knowledge of the matter, but also by others interested in the Australian business, that if we make this concession in regard to the duty on raisins and currants it will go a long way towards disposing the Australians to come to terms with us. If they are pleased to take that view, foolish though it may seem to some people, and small though the point may be, we think it is worth our while, in view of the consideration that such a concession as this may influence the Australian policy in our favour, to do what is now proposed if the sacirfice is not too great. That is the whole story. Unquestionably we want to do business with them, but so far we have not been able to. This is proposed as one way of bringing about an understanding that will be beneficial to us, and I ask the House to agree to it on that ground. In the meantime, for the reason I have stated, some months will elapse before we shall do business with them and the duty will not be imposed immediately. If they meet us in the proper spirit and concede something which we consider will benefit the whole of Canada, the question is, is this a price we can afford to pay? We think it is worth considering.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I commend the minister for coming to the conclusion that the next time he undertakes to trade he will see that he has something to trade with.


William Stevens Fielding: I am going to get armed this time and see what the effect will be on those people who find fault.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I am not finding fault at all. When you are trying to trade on behalf of the country as a whole with another country it is a very good thing to have something to trade with, and I congratulate my hon. friend. How this particular item works out one way or the other I do not know, but I entirely agree with the principle that he should have something to

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trade with, and I only regret that my hon. friend did not find that out sooner. Before adjournment at six o'clock I was saying something about what I understood my hon. friend's intention to be that, having regard to the French treaty, the relative equality between England and France was to be maintained. I would ask him to be sure that his figures are correct in respect to brandies. He will remember that he told us that cognac and armagnac are the expensive brandies and would not interfere very much in our market with Scotch and Canadian whiskies. The information I have is that having regard to the currency as well as the cost of production, the distillery cost of the cognac brandy is $3 as against $7 for Scotch whiskey and $6 for Canadian whiskey. Of course, the excise duty on the Scotch whiskey remains at $10, while the cognac brandies would take the same excise duty as our own product, namely, $9. I am further told that the cost of laying these commodities down in bulk, including distillery cost, duty, sales tax and freight, would be $19.25 for the Scotch, $16 for the Canadian, and $13.10 for the brandy. If they were bottled getting down to the usual basis of a case of twelve bottles at 1| proof spirits, the cost would be $30.88 for the Scotch, $26 for the Canadian, and $21.65 for the brandy. Of course, after having told my friend about other figures, I hesitate to say that any are correct, but this is the best information that I have and I hope he will check the information he has with a view of seeing if his former statement is correct, for I imagine he desires to leave these commodities on a parity.


William Stevens Fielding: Although the matter has been disposed of, I am glad my hon. friend has called attention to it. I think we had better see what the competition of cognac brandy amounts to. Cognac is a common expression, but I think the cognac contemplated by the treaty is not the same article. Indeed, that was one of the points the French government attached very much importance to. They thought that a great deal of so-called cognac was not cognac brandy at all, and they did not desire a special concession for it, but they wanted to be guaranteed a fair rate for this particular cognac, which must be certified by government officials and be accompanied by their certificates. I think when that test is applied very much of the brandy my hon. friend refers to will be found not to come within the description at all. However, the information, some of which has come to me also, is rather conflicting. As the French treaty will not go into effect for some months 
I think we can safely let this remain for the time being and if from experience it be found that the French brandy gets any advantage over our Canadian spirits I would be prepared to give the matter consideration when this is in evidence.


Mr. LEWIS:: I do not see the connection between raisins and French brandies, unless the raisins are used for home brew.


William Stevens Fielding: There is none.


Arthur John Lewis: At the same time I do feel that this is rather a weak argument to put forward in favour of a preference to Australia. Raisins have become a very essential food in the ordinary family budget, and by the time this tariff reaches the consumer it will certainly mean between four and five cents a pound extra. When we have a better product in close proximity, it seems to me a little too expensive to bring raisins all the way from Australia with a view to effecting a trade agreement which may or may not be consummated for years to come. I am glad though that the resolution is to be deferred by order in council until this agreement materializes.


Mr. LUCAS:: I understood the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) to give a list of tariffs- /imposed by other countries against the importation of raisins running all the way from 2} up to as high as 7 cents a pound. Is there any other country that gives Australia as good a market to-day as Canada in regard to a tariff duty on raisins?


James Alexander Robb: Not if we place ours upon the-free list.


Oliver Robert Gould: Would the Minister of
Finance inform the committee just what concessions the government is seeking in the Australian market which would be beneficial to Canada?


William Stevens Fielding: We offered to exchange our preferential tariff for their preferential tariff without qualifications. They claimed that that was not good enough for them. They would give us as good terms as they granted to any other country, but they would not give us the same treatment as they granted to Great Britain. It is on that point that the hitch has occurred. We have some reason to hope that the item suggested here will be an attraction to them and will remove some of the objections they have urged and result in a more acceptable arrangement.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Customs tariff-Raisins and dried currants per pound: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, 3 cents; General tariff, 3 cents.
William Stevens Fielding: I beg to move that
resolution No. 3 of the Customs Tariff Resolutions of 11th May, 1923, be amended to lead as follows:-
Resolved, that it is expedient to amend tariff item 99b of the Customs tariff, 1907, to read as follows:-
Tariff item 99b-Raisins and dried currants, per pound: British preferential tariff, % cent; Intermediate tariff, % cent; General tariff, % cent.
The Governor in Council may by order in council direct that there be substituted for tariff item 99b in schedule A of the Customs tariff, 1907, the enumeration of goods and the rates of duties of Customs set opposite said item in schedule A the following:-
Tariff item 99c-Raisins and dried currants, per pound: British preferental tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, 3 cents; General tariff, 3 cents.
2. From and after the publication of such order in council in the Canada Gazette tariff item 99b as it appears in said schedule at the time of the pass'ng of the act founded on this resolution shall be repealed and the provisions of tariff item 99c shall be substituted therefor.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Custome tariff-All sugar above number sixteen Dutch standard in colour, and all refined sugars of whatever kinds, grades or standards, not covered by tariff item No. 135, when not exceeding eighty-eight degrees of polarization, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 83 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.50; general tariff, $1.50;
when exceeding eighty-eight degrees but not exceeding eighty-nine degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff. 85 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.53; general tariff, $1.53.
when exceeding eighty-nine degrees but not exceeding ninety degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff. 87 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.55; general tariff, $1.55;
when exceeding ninety degrees but not exceeding ninety-one degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 89 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.58; general tariff, $1.58.
when exceeding ninety-one degrees but not exceeding ninety-two degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 91 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.62; general tariff, $1.62.
when exceeding ninety-two degrees but not exceeding ninety-three degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 93 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.65; general tariff, $1.65.
when exceeding ninety-three degrees but not exceeding ninety-four degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 95 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.68; general tariff, $1.68.
when exeeding ninety-four degrees but not exceeding ninety-five degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 97 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.70; general tariff, $1.70.
when exceeding ninety-five degrees but not exceeding ninety-six degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff. 99 cents; intermediate tariff, $1.74; general tariff, $1.74;
when exceeding ninety-six degrees but not exceeding ninety-seven degrees, per one hundred pounds; British preferential tariff, $1.01; intermediate tariff, $1,77; general tariff, $1.77;
when exceeding ninety-seven degrees, but not exceeding ninety-eight degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, $1.03; intermediate tariff, $1.80; general tariff, $1.80.
when exceeding ninety-eight degrees, but not exceeding ninety-nine degrees, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, $1.09; intermediate tariff, $1.89; general tariff, $1.89;
Provided that refined sugar shall be entitled to entry under the British preferential tariff upon evidence satisfactory to the Minister of Customs and Excise, that such refined sugar has been manufactured wholly from raw sugar produced in the British colonies and possessions, and not otherwise.
Provided further that sugar imported under this item shall not be subject to special duty when the home consumption value at the place of shipment direct to Canada is more than eight cents per pound.
William Stevens Fielding: Hon. members will note that there are two provisos at the end of this sugar item; the second of these I desire to amend. It has been the subject of consideration with the refining interests, with parties interested in the West Indies trade, and so on, and the conclusion we have adopted is to offer a substitute in -the following words, which will be found in the amended resolution of May 23:
Provided further that sugar imported under this item shall not be subject to special duty in excess of three-fourths of one cent per pound.
The full limitation in the Dumping Act is 15 per cent, which, on the present value of sugar, would be at the rate of li cents per pound. We have thought that is an extreme protection to give them. The figures in this item in detail are meant to correspond exactly with the old duty less a reduction of 50 cents. It is a difficult matter to work out, I think, correctly; so that as respects the general duty there is substantially no change in the relation from the raw material to the refiner. But this special dumping duty that was being applied fully to the amount of 15 per cent, or li cents, we propose to limit to 4 of a cent per pound, which- will practically give a duty of 7i instead of 15 cents. It is not all the sugar people want, but I suppose few of us get all we want in this wicked world. I think, however, it is a fair answer to their criticisms.


Arthur John Lewis: What system is in vogue for determining the degree of polarization in
sugar?


William Stevens Fielding: I could not tell my hon. friend exactly, but the customs officials have had long experience in the matter and I have no doubt their system is scientifically correct.


Arthur John Lewis: Does it have to be stamped on the container when it comes in?


William Stevens Fielding: It is frequently the case that the officials have to admit the sugar
3480	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
without, taking time to test it, in which case the custom is to collect the highest duty payable, and then after testing whatever is due to them is paid. I am assured that the testing is done scientifically, and that it is based on the long experience of the customs authorities.
Item as amended, agreed to.
Customs [DOT]tariff-Ma!t flour Containing less than fifty per cent in weight of malt; also extract of malt, fluid or not, Including grain molasses-all articles in this item upon valuation without British or foreign excise duties, under regulations by the Minister of Customs and excise per pound:	British preferential tariff,
2 cents and 35 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 2 cents and 35 per cent; General tariff, 2 cents and 35 per * cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It is the same rate, is it not?


William Stevens Fielding: This is an article used by the bakers. There is a slight reduction in favour of the importer.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My recollection is that it was 2 cents before.


William Stevens Fielding: The present rate is 3 cents from the United States; we make it 2.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Bisulphate of soda or nitre cake; British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
Henry Lumley Drayton: This is a new item, I think; where is that taken from?


William Stevens Fielding: It is a new item. These articles are used in refining nickel, practically all for export, but the manufacturer is not allowed drawback on the goods exported. Il it were a material used in the manufacture of the export, a drawback could be had, but it is simply an agent employed in the work, and the business is entirely for the purposes of export. This arrangement will, I think, meet the desire of the people.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The reason I ask the question is that under item 210 of the tariff bisulphate of soda is free. I have the item before me: "British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free."


William Stevens Fielding: Let that item stand. I have it marked down as otherwise.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It may be in connection with the nitre cake; I do not know about that.


William Stevens Fielding: We will let it stand for further consideration.
Item stands.

Customs tariff-Dehydrated sulphate of copper for agricultural or spraying purposes; British preferential tar'ff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Where is that taken from?


William Stevens Fielding: There is no separate classification for it. The present rate is in dispute; there is a difference of opinion in the department as to what it should be. However, for these spraying purposes we remove the doubt by making it free.


Oliver Robert Gould: I believe that bluestone is manufactured from this product.


William Stevens Fielding: It is a bluestone further pulverized, I am advised.


William Charles Good: May I ask whether there is any provision for dehydrated copper sulphate?


William Stevens Fielding: No; this is the only item we have on the subject.


William Charles Good: I suggest that the word "dehydrated" is wrong; it should be "powdered". Dehydrated copper sulphate is not used.


William Stevens Fielding: The Customs department supplied this as the correct wording.


William Charles Good: I think it is wrong.


William Stevens Fielding: 
Arthur Meighen: What is liquorice paste?


William Stevens Fielding: The item is divided; the raw material is made a little lower and the finished article remains the same.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The raw material is reduced from 15 to 10?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Liquorice in rolls and sticks, not sweetened:	British preferential tariff, 15 per cent;
Intermediate tariff, 20 per cent; General tariff, 22* per cent.
Arthur Meighen: Is there any change
there?


William Stevens Fielding: The rates remain the
same.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Customs tariff-Dry red lead, orange mineral, zinc white and white oxide of antimony. British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff 7$ per cent; General tariff, 10 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: I move to strike out that item. That will leave the matter as it now stands.


Oliver Robert Gould: What will be the rate when the item is struck out?


William Stevens Fielding: Part of it is 3, 5 and 5; part of it 15, 20 and 22 J, the rates remaining as at present.


Arthur Meighen: That is, the minister was raising it in the intermediate and general tariffs; now he is leaving it where we had it.


William Stevens Fielding: Part had been reduced and part raised, but there was some confusion on the subject and we thought the safest thing to do was to strike out the item and leave the duties as they are now.


Arthur Meighen: The minister is wrong there, is he not? So far as I can see, he was raising the intermediate and the general tariff on the entire class, from 5 to 7i on the one and from 5 to 10 on the other.


William Stevens Fielding: There is a decrease in the case of white oxide of antimony. However, as I say, there has been a little confusion and I think the safest thing is to let the duties stand as they are.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to, and item struck out.
Customs tariff-Crude ipetraleum not in its natural state .7900 specific gravity or heavier at 60 degrees temperature, when imported by oil refiners to be refined in their own factories, per gallon, British preferential tariff, §4o cent; Intermediate tariff fio cent; General tariff 64o cent.
Mr. KELLNER:: Is this an increase?


William Stevens Fielding: There was an item there of six-tenths of a cent per gallon, but there is another item of a similar character where the rate is half a cent, and we thought it the better way to drop the rate to half a cent rather than have it at six-tenths of a cent.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: What is the idea of changing it? Was it too cheap under, the old tariff?


William Stevens Fielding: It was a matter in dispute with the Customs department as to what was the process. At one time we fixed the rate at six-tenths. We found there was another item at half a cent and we thought it better to make it the same term.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Is that another item? The old item was:
Crude petroleum in its natural state .7900 specific gravity or heavier at 60 degrees temperature when imported by oil refineries to be refined in their own factories-
And the rate was: Free, free, free.


William Stevens Fielding: The item here is "Crude petroleum not in its natural state." It is an article which has made some advance .in manufacture.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend is quite right. This is "not in its natural state." To be quite sure on that, which was the former item? The one I read referred tf petroleum in its natural state.


William Stevens Fielding: 267a.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That was petroleum in its natural state.


William Stevens Fielding: The producers of this claim that it was produced in the natural state, and they thought they were entitled to admission at the rate of duty for that item. It was a matter of contention with the department for some time, and we concluded that this was the best way to deal with it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It really came under non-elassified, I suppose.


William Stevens Fielding: I think the explanation I gave a moment ago is the correct one. The producers claim it is in its natural state, and contended it should be admitted at the rate of duty for that item. There was a discussion, in fact, there had to be an appeal to the Privy Council on this subject, and the conclusion was that it ought to be treated as an article of somewhat advanced character not equal to refined petroleum, but not to be treated as petroleum in its natural state, and the duty is arranged to meet that condition.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Fire brick for use in the construction or repair of a furnace, kiln or other equipment of a manufacturing establishment: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 71 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.
James Dew Chaplin: I would like the minister to explain this item. I understood that this fire brick under the tariff was free. My information is that there is no such fire brie}' made in Canada.


William Stevens Fielding: At one stage the item in the tariff read, "Fire brick of a kind not made in Canada," but there arose much contention over that. The expression "not made in Canada" sometimes leads to great confusion. It was complained by some manufacturers thait they did make these things in Canada and therefore that the article should be subject

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
to duty. Consumers say the manufacturers make something like that, but it does not serve the purpose. Fire brick is made at several points in Canada. The chief
9	p.m. consumers, of course, will be the people engaged in furnace work, the metallic industries and so on. They have complained that the rate hitherto has been too high. There was a dispute over that and the Customs department gave a ruling which would have imposed a high duty. We have had quite a little difficulty in adjusting that, but we believe that we have now an adjustment. which is really satisfactory. I beg to move as follows:
That Resolution No. 3 of May 11, 1923, be amended by striking thereout tariff item 281, the enumeration of goods and the several rates of duties of Customs, set opposite said item, and to provide that the following items, enumerations and rates of duty be inserted : Tariff item 281-Fire brick containing not less than ninety per cent of silica; magnesite fibre brick or chrome fire brick; other fire brick valued at no less than one hundred dollars per one thousand; all fire brick in this item to be rectangular, the dimensions of each not to exceed one hundred and twenty-five cubic inches and for use exclusively in the construction or repair of a furnace, kiln or other equipment of a manufacturing establishment: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
We are separating the item to make free for the purpose of these industries the thing which is not made in Canada. Then we say:
Tariff item 281a-Fire brick, n.o.p. for use exclusively, in the construction or repair of a furnace, kiln or other equipment of a manufacturing establishment: British preferential tariff, 10 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 12$ per cent; General tariff, 15 per cent.
That is to say, on the thing which is clearly and distinctly not made in Canada we impose no duty, and on the other we make a compromise duty of 10, 124 and 15 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What item is my hon. friend reading from?


William Stevens Fielding: It is a new item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The matter was before me more than once, and my recollection is that claims were being made, just as the minister states, that firebrick was now being made in Canada, and, therefore, the duty ought to apply. While the users of firebrick claimed it was not a brick they could use at all. or else it was so far away they could not handle it, and that no action should be taken by the Department of Customs. I do not think any action was taken by that department. At any rate, no action was taken by the department under the late government. All firebrick came in free under that item. So that the effect is just as the hon. member for Lincoln (Mr. Chaplin) states, to make firebrick, which formerly took

a different classification in our tariffs, bear a duty of 5, 74 and 10 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: We had the same difficulty, just as the hon. member describes. In October last there was a decision by the Board of Customs which made it more diffi. cult. They tried to classify it, and caused considerable discontent. I hope what we are proposing now is reasonably satisfactory to all interests.


James Dew Chaplin: Why is it necessary to
put the duty on the odd shapes? They require rectangular shapes and other shapes in construction, and why is the duty put upon the odd shapes?


William Stevens Fielding: I am told the odd
shapes are manufactured in Canada. The item has been considered, an effort has been made to meet conflicting interests and I am hoping that it is going to be satisfactory.


Arthur Meighen: Is it ?ot a fact that no
duty at all was collected on firebrick prior to 1922?


William Stevens Fielding: I suppose the classification "made in Canada" kept them out.


Arthur Meighen: There was no duty of
any kind prior to 1922.


William Stevens Fielding: I presume jny hon.
friend is correct, but I cannot say offhand.


Richard Smeaton White: My recollection is that there was a duty collected on circular shapes, or any other shapes, other than rectangular shapes. Now the magnesite, silica and chrome bricks are free, provided they are rectangular in shape. But if that quality is not made in Canada I do not think it should make any difference whether they are rectangular or any other shape.


James Dew Chaplin: These odd shapes are required in the building of a furnace just as much as the rectangular shape. When you get to the top of a furnace you require the odd shapes.


Herbert Meredith Marler: The irregular shapes are
made in Canada. Previous to 1922 they had a duty of 224 per cent. That duty, under the first amendment of the tariff, was reduced from 224 to 10 per cent. It is now placed at 15 per cent. Firebrick may be divided into three classes: first, the magnesite brick, silica brick containing not less than 90 per cent silica and chrome brick. These are free. The second class of brick is a brick made out of ordinary fire clay of the regular sizes. Previous to the 1st November, 1922, those were free. By the ruling of the department on that date

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
they were made subject to a duty of 224 per cent. I am speaking of the general tariff at the present time. That duty, under the resolution of May 1923, was reduced to 10 per cent, at which figure it remains. The third class was these irregular shapes partly made of silica clay and partly made of other clay, and these are manufactured in Canada. Those are the shapes I had reference to first. They were always subject to a duty under the general tariff of 224 per cent. That duty under the amended resolution, is now reduced to 15 per cent. With reference to the uses to which these bricks are put; rectangular shapes are used very largely by the steel companies. The first class are also used very largely by the steel companies, and that class-that is the special brick of silica, chrome magnesite, not made in Canada-will be allowed in free. It is a distinct advantage to the steel companies. In reference to the first class, instead of the steel companies paying 224 per cent, which they paid under the ruling 1st November, 1922, the}' will now pay 10 per cent. That is the resolution as regards firebrick.


William Stevens Fielding: It is 15 per cent now.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Fifteen, I think.


Herbert Meredith Marler: No, 10 per cent under the second class brick.


William Stevens Fielding: Fifteen in this resolution.


Herbert Meredith Marler: I understood the minister to say 15.


William Stevens Fielding: It is 10, 124 and 15.


Richard Smeaton White: I think the hon. member
for St. Lawrenee-St. George (Mr. Marler) missed the point. It is quality that governs, as I understand it, whether the brick is rectangular in shape, or with a curved edge. So long as it is not made in Canada, I understand the minister wishes it brought in free, and I do not see why irregular shapes should not be brought in free as well as rectangular shapes, provided they are the same quality.


William Stevens Fielding: It is represented that
the irregular shapes are made in Canada, and that is why the distinction is made.


Arthur Meighen: That is on the principle
of a revenue tariff.


William Stevens Fielding: Oh yes, quite so.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Customs tariff-328, Spectacle and eyeglass frames and metal parts thereof: n.o.p. British preferential tariff, 15 per cent; intermediate tariff, 17J per cent; general tariff, 20 per cent.
William Thomas Lucas: What was the duty on those
articles before?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Just the same.
I think my hon. friend will agree with me there is no change at all, in so far as the general rate is concerned, except to add the letters n.o.p., and the reason the change is made is- to make room for 328A. Paragraph 328A I take it, is to help the manufacture of spectacle and eyeglass frames in Canada?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, they will all bring
some revenue.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-328A, metal parts, unfinished, for the manufacture of spectacle and eyeglass frames: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 5 per cent; general tariff, 5 per cent.
Arthur John Lewis: With regard to the metal
parts unfinished; does that simply mean that it is not quite put together? That is, that it is not polished or screwed or properly done, or does it simply mean in the rough?


William Stevens Fielding: Unfinished, not polished.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Brass and copper scrap: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Henry Lumley Drayton: Is there any
change in that


William Stevens Fielding: It is the same with this qualification:
But nothing shall be deemed brass or copper scrap except waste or refuse brass or copper fit only to be remanufactured in furnaces.
It is a definition-not a change.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Composition metal and plated metal, in bars, ingots, or cores, for the manufacture of watch cases jewellery, filled gold and silver seamless wire and for dentad purposes: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; Intermediate tariff, per cent [DOT] General tariff, 10 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: The words "for dental purposes" are inserted.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the reason for inserting the words "for dental purposes"?


William Stevens Fielding: Part of it was free, part at 224 per cent, 30 per cent and 35 per cent. This is done at the request of the Customs department to make it clear.


Arthur Meighen: Really this is exactly as before except that all, no matter for what purpose, came in under this rate before.
3484	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


William Stevens Fielding: For dental purposes did not come in. We put it in; it was not included before.


Arthur Meighen: What did it come under before?


William Stevens Fielding: Part of it was free and part was at other rates.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: What inspired the minister to put eye-glasses on the free list and to place a duty on dental instruments?


William Stevens Fielding: We have not put eyeglasses on the free list. My hon. friend is mistaken.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: The raw material for the manufacture of eye-glasses?


William Stevens Fielding: To encourage the home industry.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: I would submit that there is also a possibility of a home industry in this other item, manufactured articles used in the dental profession.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Iron or steel scrap, wrought, being waste or refuse, including punchings, cuttings or clippings of iron or steel plates or sheets having been in actual use; crop ends of tin plate bars, or of blooms, or of rails, the same not having been in actual use, per ton. But nothing shall be deemed scrap iron or scrap steel except waste or refuse iron or steel fit only to be remanufactured in rolling mills or furnaces; provided that articles of iron or steel, damaged in transit, if broken up under customs supervision and rendered unsaleable except as scrap, may be entered for duty as scrap: British preferential tariff, 25 cents; Intermediate tariff, 45 cents; General tariff, 50 cents.
William Stevens Fielding: The rate is cut in two; it is one-half the former rate.


Arthur Meighen: This is a raw material. It is on that principle that the reduction is made, is it not?


William Stevens Fielding: It is one of that class of stuff that might be described as raw material.


Arthur Meighen: And this, in effect, gives a wider margin of protection to the users of the material?


William Stevens Fielding: Possibly.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Rolled iron or steel hoop, band, scroll or strip, in the coil, number ten gauge and thinner, when imported by manufacturers for use in their own factories in the manufacture of cold rolled iron or steel: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
William Stevens Fielding: I want to insert a word. This should read:

384b. Rolled iron or steel hoop, band, scroll or strip, in the coil, number twelve gauge and thinner, when imported by manufacturers for use in their own factories in the manufacture of cold rolled iron or steel.
There is a change there in the number of the gauge. This is an item which is a finished product in the case of one factory and the raw material in another.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The old iten
was, I think, free too?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It was gauge number fourteen, but it is now gauge number twelve.


William Stevens Fielding: The gauge is changed; that is all.


James Dew Chaplin: Is it good policy to use a gauge? What particular gauge is meant when you use the word "gauge?" Would it not be much better to describe this in thousandths of an inch?


William Stevens Fielding: The gauge is described in the tariff.


James Dew Chaplin: What is the gauge used?


William Stevens Fielding: Gauge when applied to a metal sheet, plate or wire, means the thickness as determined by the Imperial standard gauge. That is defined in the Tariff Act.


James Dew Chaplin: There are several gauges, and a matter of that kind should be put in decimals. Then you would know where you were. There are three different kind of gauges.


William Stevens Fielding: This has been in the tariff for ages, and it has apparently worked out very well.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Rolled iron or steel, and cast steel in bars, bands, hoop, scroll, strip, sheet or plate of any size, thickness or width, and steel blanks for the manufacture of milling cutters, when of greater value than three and one-half cents per pound: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 12J per cent; General tariff, 12[ per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: The preferential rate was per cent. It is reduced to 5 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Are we getting any importations now under this item from Great Britain?


William Stevens Fielding: Largely from the United States, I am advised.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That is what 1 thought. The real movement is from Ihe

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
United States. Is there any representation or hope that we may get some movement from Great Britain in connection with this item?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, we were asked to consider it.


James Dew Chaplin: Is it the price of this article that controls the duty, or is it the shape or quality of the material?


William Stevens Fielding: Three and a half cents per pound.


James Dew Chaplin: It is the price then that controls the duty?


William Stevens Fielding: The wording is exactly the same as before.


James Dew Chaplin: Steel of the same size and the same gauge, but of a lower price, would not come under the same tariff item; is that the idea? In other words, the price has to [DOT] be three and a half cents per pound or more?


William Stevens Fielding: Steel of a greater value than three and a half cents per pound would come under this item; of a lesser value it would not.


James Dew Chaplin: The price controls the
duty.


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Typewriters and parts thereof: British preferential tariff, 17$ per cent; Intermediate tariff, 22$ per cent; General tariff 25 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: The words "and parts thereof" are included in this item. Otherwise it is the same as before.


William Charles Good: What quantity of homo
manufacture is there? Are any typewriters manufactured in Canada?


William Stevens Fielding: There are typewriters assembled, if not actually made in Canada.


Arthur John Lewis: Are we importing any typewriters from Great Britain at the present time?


William Stevens Fielding: Only a few from Great Britain.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: How many are we importing from the United States now?


William Stevens Fielding: We imported 12,345 last year.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: Would it not be cheaper for this country as a wThole to eliminate this tariff entirely and pay the Canadian manufacturers of these machines a sum of money about equal to what they are making at present in ihis industry?


William Stevens Fielding: Would you make it
generous?


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: I should think so; at the
present rate we could afford to.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Revenue no
object.	-


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. Marcil):: Carried.


Arthur Meighen: No. The item is not changed, but it did strike me as a proper one upon which the theory of my hon. friend (Mr. Kellner) might be discussed. I have heard him state it many times. Surely he will not now simply accept the bare rejection by the Minister of Finance of something he has agitated for years?


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: I was in hopes that I should be able to enlist the assistance of the right hon. gentleman.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman could not have entertained such hopes at all, for I have never given him any reason to do so; I have never encouraged any such hope. But he has had coadjutors of the theory in this House, and I should really like to see whether he cannot get co-operation on their part now.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: I thought that the leader of the Opposition recognized the value of my argument and that he would assist me with a good argument of his own.


Arthur Meighen: I do not see that there is any value at all in the hon. gentleman's argument, and I never did. Here is a case where the extent of a Canadian manufacturer is not yet great. WThile of course the typewriter is not a new machine, it is not as old as most machines, and the extent of the Canadian manufacture and the supply of the Canadian market are proportionately low. The importations are very heavy and the machines are brought in practically entirely from the United States of America. Now, if ever there was an instance where the hon. gentleman's doctrine should apply it is in the present case. Where are hon. gentlemen that they are not driving their theory home? Have they given up hope of the Minister of Finance?


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: I think I am safe in saying that the only typewriters turned out in Canada are only partly made here. On the other hand, we are importing a large number of typewriters every year, and I venture to say that the duty which the government puts upon the machines they actually use would more than cover the entire
3486	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
income of those plants now in operation in this country. What, therefore, is the sense of the people of Canada paying $25 more for each typewriter they use simply in order to keep up two or three very inferior industries which, in any case, it is not likely will ever amount to anything?


Arthur John Lewis: This would be a tariff for revenue, would it not?


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Printing presses, lithographic presses, and type making accessories therefor, also machines specially designed for ruling, folding, binding, embossing, creasing, or cutting paper or cardboard, sheet feeding machines, when for use exclusively by printers, bookbinders, and by manufacturers of articles made from paper or cardboard-including parts thereof composed wholly or in part of iron, steel, brass or wood; machinery and complete parts thereof for printing by photographic methods on plates for use on lithographic and offset presses: British preferential tariff, 5 ppr c^nt; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.
Henry Lumley Drayton: This is merely a change in the wording of the item?


William Stevens Fielding: No; it is rather a broad item, and is generous to the printing craft. We are including sheet feeding machines not made in Canada, and are fixing the rates at 5, 10 and 10 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Stumping machines and complete Paris thereof: British preferential tariff. 10 per cent; intermediate tariff, 15 per cent; general tariff, 15 per
cent.
Mr. GARDINER:: What were the previous rates on stumping machines?


William Stevens Fielding: The previous rates were IS, 25 and 27^ per cent.


Robert Gardiner: Is the minister reducing the tariff on stumping machines in view of the possibility of a general election in the near future?


William Stevens Fielding: Stumping machines are very necessary things at election time, and perhaps the item had reference to the present campaign in Ontario.


Arthur Meighen: It is impossible to keep track of these items until someone says "carried." What is the number of the old item which is now described as 448c, the item we are now discussing?


William Stevens Fielding: This is a new item that did not appear before under any special classification.


Arthur Meighen: How did the minister indicate the duties before?


William Stevens Fielding: The previous rates were 15, 25 and 27i per cent.


Arthur Meighen: Under what item?


William Stevens Fielding: Under item 453.


Arthur Meighen: These machines previously just came under the general machinery classification,-the n.o.p. class?


William Stevens Fielding: They came under item 453. Some of these machines are made in Canada and the makers are entitled to a drawback.


Arthur Meighen: Upon what do they get the drawback?


William Stevens Fielding: On the material used,- 40 per cent-the same as other agricultural implements.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Machinery, of a class or kind not made in Canada, and parts thereof, for the manufacture of fish meal, stock and poultry food and fertilizers, from fish and the waste thereof: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
Mr. CALDWELL:: Has the minister seriously considered the advisability of putting on the free list not only the machinery for the manufacture of fertilizers, but fertilizers themselves? The raw material comes in practically free now, with the exception of acid phosphate, and I would suggest including this material on the free list, as well as the machinery that is used in making fertilizers of various kinds. I think the minister must realize how the duty on fertilizers affects the price of this commodity to users in Canada. The raw materials come into Canada free and are manufactured into fertilizera which are sold to the farmers at from S8 to $15 more than the agriculturists in the United States pay. The finished product is often shipped back from the Canadian factory into the United States where it is sold in some cases at as much as $15 per ton less than is paid for it in Canada, notwithstanding that the raw materials, the ingredients, are imported into this country in the first place. This is due to the duty, and it works a great hardship on the people, especially on the potato growers, while it brings practically no revenue to the treasury.


William Stevens Fielding: Of course, one can put up an argument in favour of putting nearly everything on the free list. The duty on fertilizers has been substantially reduced.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: It has been 10 per cent since I can remember.
JUNE 5, 1923	34S7
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


William Stevens Fielding: My memory goes further bacl^ than my hon. friend's.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: No doubt.


William Stevens Fielding: If we are to have a duty at all 10 per cent is not very high.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: The argument I am offering is simply the platform promulgated by the Liberal party in 1919 when fertilizers were put on the free list in that proposed schedule. I wish I had Hansard of either 1920 or 1921 in which the Prime Minister strongly advocated that fertilizers be supplied the farmers free of duty in order to increase production. This was emphasized by him on more than one occasion in this House since I have been a member of it; but of course that was when he was in opposition. I had sincerely hoped that, in view of the evidence I have been able to submit to the government of the effect which the duty on fertilizers has on the farmers of my section of the country, and in view of the fact that veiy little if any revenue is derived under this item, something might be done to alleviate the conditions in this respect. I put those figures before the House last year, and I do not wish to repeat them to-night, but on the imports of fertilizers a very small amount of duty has been collected, due to the fact that when the American manufacturer establishes a plant in Canada he brings in his raw materials free and simply stirs them together. This duty does not even help to make Canadian millionaires. If it did I would not feel quite so bad about it. It simply helps to swell the profits of our American friends.


William Charles Good: I think the hon. member
for Victoria and Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) has made out a very good case and I should like to see the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding) take some action on it. He might cut the duty down to 5 per cent anyway.


William Stevens Fielding: Oh!


Henry Lumley Drayton: In connection
with the item last passed, the minister told us that a stumping machine being an agricultural implement the manufacturer would get a rebate of 40 per cent. I think my hon. friend is perfectly right, but there is no change made at all because agricultural implements not otherwise provided for come under item 44S and we do not need this section at all. The rate there is 10, 15 and 15 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: Drawbacks come under
448c.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That is 448c. It covers hay tedders, posthole diggers, snaths
and a whole lot of other things n.o.p. I should have thought that would certainly cover stumping machines. If it does not, my hon. friend is wrong when he says they are entitled to a rebate of 40 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: We make assurance
doubly sure.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not think
there is any doubt about it.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
469. Well-drilling machinery and apparatus, and parts thereof, of a class or kind not made in Canada, drawn or seamless iron or steel tubing over four inches in diameter, for drilling for water, natural gas and oil, and prospecting for minerals, not to include motive power: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
Henry Lumley Drayton: We had a free item to the same effect before. What is the addition?


William Stevens Fielding: The item has been broadened to include several things not included^ before.
502a. Staves of wood, n.o.p., not less than five-eighths of an inch in thickness, further manufactured than sawn or split but not further manufactured than listed: British preferential tariff, 10 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 121 per cent; General tariff, 15 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: That is semi-raw material and has been reduced.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I thought that
had been increased. Did not that take old item 502? I am not complaining about the rate.


William Stevens Fielding: No, 502 did not cover
this.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What item
covered this commodity before?


William Stevens Fielding: This item appeared before under 506, and the rates were 17i, 224 and 25 per cent. We reduce them to 10, 124 and 15 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Fabrics of cotton or other fibre including cord fabric weighing over eight ounces per square yard for use in the manufacture of pneumatic tires: British preferential tariff, 15 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 17£ per cent; General tariff, 20 per cent.
Arthur Meighen: What is the change here?


William Stevens Fielding: It should be 524b. The
item is as before but the wording is changed in respect to the weight.


Arthur Meighen: If the article weighs
differently from the previous stipulation what would be the tax?
3488	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


William Stevens Fielding: The rate is not changed, but I am advised that this is done at the request of the Customs department to remove any doubt as to the interpretation of the act.


Arthur Meighen: What the minister had
in mind, I fancy, was1 to cover a respectable area of paper and make as little change in the tariff as possible.


William Stevens Fielding: There might be some
reason in that. I hope my hon. friend will adhere to the view that the changes do not amount to anything.


Arthur Meighen: They amount indeed to
practically nothing. The minister made reference in that connection to the British preference, that because we contended they were trivial in themselves they therefore could have no serious effect. Well, they may be so trivial in themselves that they never reach the consumer so as ultimately to benefit or to hurt him, but at the same time they are just below the line which would make the tariff of any value to our producers, and therefore the result is serious. No one knows that better than the Minister of Finance.	,


William Stevens Fielding: I think we will have to
assume certain things as fundamental, namely, that all taxes and all reductions ultimately reach the consumer. They may not do it today but they get there in the end.
Mr. MEIGHEN, If the minister believed that he would have a very different tariff.


William Stevens Fielding: Well, wait and s-ee.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
581. Velvets, velveteens, silk velvets, plush and silk fabrics: British preferential tariff, 17£ per cent; Intermediate tariff, 30 per cent; General tariff, 35 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: I propose to amend this item by making the percentages 174 32J and 35 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the
reason for this? Is it to carry out a promise given under the French Treaty?


William Stevens Fielding: No, there are no promises given to anybody.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Apart from any understanding with France, what is the reason for the increase there?


William Stevens Fielding: Owing to many representations made to us as to inequalities in the tariff. The British preference remains the same; in the intermediate and general tariffs there is an increase and as there is an increase on velvets, velveteens and silk fabrics,
fMr. Meighen.]
my hon. friend will receive the change with joy, bceause he complained that we were reducing these items.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I was very glad to see something done toward getting this item up a little bit. I was wondering what on earth had moved my hon. friend.


William Stevens Fielding: I think I had occasion to say before to my hon. friend that if we reach the right destination, I am not quarrelling with him as to the way by which we travel.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Has any progress been made toward finding out exactly what it means in dollars and cents-the difference in rate compared with the French treaty, having regard to the limitation of width of 24 inches? Has that been ascertained as yet?


William Stevens Fielding: The intermediate rate is changed, and in that way it affects the rate in the French treaty.


Henry Lumley Drayton: But was there not a special rate given in the French treaty under that item? I think there was.


William Stevens Fielding: In part, yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What my hon. friend is now doing, Mr. Chairman, is something which, had it been done before he made the French treaty, would have enabled him to get something of real value to the countiy. The old rates were 174 274 and 30; those were the rates my hon. friend had before him when he was negotiating in France. He now makes the British preferential rate 35 per cent, and I think he said he was going to make the intermediate-


William Stevens Fielding: 324


Henry Lumley Drayton: And the general tariff 37.


William Stevens Fielding: 
William Stevens Fielding: The Customs returns do not classify this item separately, and I suppose for the present it can only be a matter of conjecture what the proper percentage is I could not tell the hon. gentleman definitely.


Henry Lumley Drayton: In the meantime the only thing wrong is that it is done too late.
Item agreed to;


William Stevens Fielding: 581a.


Arthur Meighen: May I ask when 581a was born? It is neither in the budget address nor in the supplementary budget that came down a week ago.


William Stevens Fielding: We are going to witness the birth of it now.


Arthur Meighen: How many budgets are we likely to have this year?


William Stevens Fielding: As many as may be
necessary to get things correct.


Arthur Meighen: That will be quite a number.


Henry Lumley Drayton: We cannot be here all year.


William Stevens Fielding: I beg to move that resolution No. 3 of the Customs tariff resolutions of 11th May, 1923, be amended by adding thereto the following provision:
Resolved, that tariff item 581a, the enumeration of goods and the several rates of duties of customs set opposite said item be struck out of said schedule A and that the following item, enumeration and rates of duty be inserted in said schedule A;-
Tariff item 581a-Silk cloth woven in ti.e gum, not boiled or bleached, measuring not less than twenty inches in width when imported for the purpose of being dyed and finished in Canada, under regulations prescribed by the Minister of Customs and Excise: British preferential tariff, 121 per cent; Intermix! ate tariff, 22f per cent; General tariff, 35 per cent.
That involves what I may call non-techm-cally the first process of manufacture, which is advanced at the next stage. It is to meet the conditions of the dyeing industry of the country.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I have not seen the resolution but if I understand the minister aright, I agree with him; the only thing wrong about it is that it is done too late.


William Stevens Fielding: Better late than never.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Customs tariff-Artificial silk yarns of filaments or artificial fibre silk yarns or filaments producer! from a form of cellulose obtained by chemical processes, not more advanced than singles, not coloured artificial silk tops and waste or artificial fibre silk tops
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
and waste produced from a form of cellulose obtained by chemical processes: British preferential tariff, 10 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 12^ per cent; General tariff, 15 per cent.	^
William Stevens Fielding: 
Arthur Meighen: 583aa applies, I understand, to artificial silk yarns and 583a to artificial silk tops. The latter will be to give a protection to those who convert the tops into yarn.


William Stevens Fielding: The first process of manufacture is always subject to a lower rate than the others.


Arthur Meighen: I thoroughly agree. I cannot help but turn my mind back to the principle that is being adhered to, a principle that I strongly and consistently support.


James Dew Chaplin: Is it the intention thaT
this duty shall become effective at once or after the yarn is made here?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, but there will be a drawback up to the 1st of July, 1924. In the meantime there will be drawbacks, but those who are obliged to get this from other sources will be able to do so.


James Dew Chaplin: In other words, until the
factory is here ready to make the goods?


William Stevens Fielding: Until sufficient time at
which it is expected the factory will be in operation, yes.	, -


Henry Lumley Drayton: I suppose that will cover everything in the whole list, will it not?


William Stevens Fielding: These two items of artificial silks.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What is really
being done is to divide the old item in two.


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: You make your tops, which is largely your manufacturers' raw material, 5, and 10 per cent, and then you increase the more advanced and perfected article, the really manufactured article, as shown.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


William Stevens Fielding: 12$, 17 and 20 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I suppose that
was done because the gentlemen concerned thought there was not enough protection in what my hon. friend had provided for them before.


William Stevens Fielding: There are quite a number of people, I believe, who think they have not enough protection. Possibly he was one of them.


Henry Lumley Drayton: But my hon.
friend would know definitely. If he does not want to tell me, I am perfectly content to take his refusal.
r^1
j wa


William Stevens Fielding: They all wanted more.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I will put it this way to my hon. friend: Did he have representations made by these gentlemen who want to get this new industry in Canada, a perfectly proper thing to do, that the rate which he gave on artificial silk yarns or filament of 10, 12| and IS per cent was not enough to enable thqm to carry on.


William Stevens Fielding: I think they did.


Henry Lumley Drayton: And as a result he made the change?


William Stevens Fielding: As a result of a consideration of the whole subject.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Quite so. Will they go on now with the further concession given?


William Stevens Fielding: We hope so. We cannot guarantee it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Of course, that is all that can be said. What I mean is that they have not the feeling that nothing can be done. They left full of hope that they may do something?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, I think they expect to do something.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Quite so. So
my hon. friend by giving a bit more protection hopes to secure this new industry. Now in connection with the manufacture of yarn, has my hon. friend considered the position of botany yarn in connection with these items and the drawbacks which apply to these items?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, the matter has been before us.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Will the botany yam be protected?


William Stevens Fielding: There is no change in
the duty.


Henry Lumley Drayton: At present there is practically no protection of botany yarn. I want my friend to tell me if I am wrong in what I now say: The botany yarn, which is the finer and better yam to-day has no protection because there is a rebate to the manufacturers that use botany yarn of I think 98 or 99 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: Ninety-nine per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: There is today a duty without the drawback on the Bradford yarn. There is no rebate there to the manufacturer. I think I am right in that. The botany yarns are, of course, yarns which are more expensive and make more finely finished hosiery than do the Bradford yarns, which make the rough stockings.


William Stevens Fielding: It was one of a number of cases in which protection was desired, but we were not able to see the wisdom of it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It'has a protection now, only it is taken away in connection with the rebate which is given.


William Stevens Fielding: It has been there for
some time. It is not a new item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Oh, no, it is not a new item at all, but the manufacture of botany yam in Canada is a comparatively new thing. I think my hon. friend will agree with me on that. In fact, I do not think botany yarns were produced in quantity in Canada since before the war. Since then we have had a large number of spindles put in, and there is to-day practically enough installed to spin all the botany yams that we are using. Now these botany yarns are spun from imported wool tops. They are the finer yarns, and combined with that yarn is an artificial silk top. Now the wool tops come in free. The artificial silk tops did come in free, but now they will not. The artificial silk top that is used in connection with the preparation of botany yams is really waste. It is broken up. It is not used for the purpose of binding at all. It is no good till incorporated with the good wool, and when incorporated it gives the gloss which the better kind of hosiery has. I want to point out to my hon. friend what he is doing with this legislation. I just want it to be known that we know what we are doing, that is all The value of the wool top, speaking generally-market quotations will change a little bit-is 81.30 a pound. The value
10	p.m. of the artificial silk top is 72 cents per pound. Now my friend will follow me: As the value of the yam is chiefly composed of wool, that is, these imported

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
yarns, instead of artificial silk, the result is that under the drawback item the imported yarn will get a drawback of 99 per cent of the 121 per cent duty that applies on these yarns from England, while the Canadian spinner has to pay duty on his artificial silk tops.
I just want to ask my friend if he thinks it is fair to leave that 99 per cent drawback there, -which as he points out is an old thing, in the face of an absolutely changed circumstance and condition, unless his protective policy is that it is only a new industry to be protected, and that the spinners of this botany yarn because they are here-because there cannot be anything inherently wrong in connection with botany yam-because they are here and because they have a large enough investment to supply the country should receive no protection, while the new industry does. There is no escape, as I see it, from the situation. If that 99 per cent drawback is maintained, I think the other manufacturer should have to get along without the 99 per cent rebate in view of what my hon. friend is now doing.
T Mr. CHAPLIN: I would like to inquire from the minister what the determining factor is in arriving at the 60 per cent drawback on artificial silk yarn. Why 60 per cent?


William Stevens Fielding: These are all matters of fair adjustment. I do not know that I can lay down any absolute principle to govern all matters of drawback. Thejr vary.
) Mr. CHAPLIN: During the process of establishment of this plant the manufacturers of this particular article will be paying 100 per cent duty and getting 60 per cent drawback. Consequently, they will be paying a duty of 40 per cent. In other words, if the duty is 10 cents they will be paying 4 cents.


William Stevens Fielding: I think we will have to take it as it is, Mr. Chairman.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I would like my friend to tell me on what ground he thinks that the spinners of botany yarn should be put in a position not nearly as favourable as . the position of their foreign competitor. Previously there was no trouble. It is true they got no protection whatever, because there was the 99 per cent drawback, but my hon. friend turns round, and, putting a duty on these artificial silk tops, places them at a direct disadvantage, in so far as their competitor is concerned.


William Stevens Fielding: My hon. friend argues that that is what it means. He may be right.
I cannot decide it off-hand.


Henry Lumley Drayton: If the minister has not had an opportunity of considering the effect of it, I would like him to hold the item till he can consider it.


William Stevens Fielding: I do not think it is worth while holding the item. If, in any of these items, as we go further, we find anything that requires a correction, I shall not be afraid to ask for the correction, but I do not think anything can be gained by holding the item over.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Can the minister suggest anything against what I have said? There is the drawback of 99 per cent. There is the fact that the man who imports these yarns and uses them in manufacturing gets the drawback. Every single pound of botany yarn brought in is for the purpose of manufacture. There is the further fact that my hon. friend, under- this arrangement which is being made for the purpose of helping one line of manufacture-and I am not quarrelling about that, it is perfectly right-in maintaining the drawback which is applicable to botany wool, is simply saying "To the extent of my new tariff on artificial silk, you, the Canadian producer of botany wool, shall be put at a direct disadvantage in your own country." If my hon. friend can show me any way in which that result does not follow, I will abandon the point immediately. But there is no question about it. Surely my hon. friend has not considered it.


William Stevens Fielding: If my hon. friend is exceedingly anxious for me to hold the item over, I will do so, although I am bound to tell him that at this stage the opportunity of reconsidering these things is not as good as it was a while ago. If he wants it held over, I am content.
Sir HENRY" DRAYTON: I do not want to hold my hon. friend here for any length of time. If he says that he cannot change anything, very well; but we might as well know what we are doing. We are saying that Bradford's cheaper wool, which makes the stockings of the school children and the workers, gets no drawback, so that while the spinner of Bradford wool here gets protection, the spinner of these botany yarns shall have no protection, and not only shall have no protection but shall be at a disadvantage because the 99 per cent rebate shall be continued. If my hon. friend will not do anything else, in order to keep botany yarns going-and I do not suppose he has anything against botany yarns as botany yarns,-will he not say that the rebates on botany yarns

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
shall be no greater than the 60 per cent drawback which he is now putting on artificial wools?


William Stevens Fielding: I prefer to let it stand rather than answer questions.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It might come up on the discussion of the drawback, because it really should come up there.


Oliver Robert Gould: I would like to interpose a remark at this stage. We have listened to these tariff discussions between members of the two old parties, and we have a right to assume, at least, that these members are authorities upon questions of the tariff. Now I have had the honour of being in this House for four sessions, and I have never yet heard any argument advanced by either of the old parties why any tariff should exist, and I have a right to ask, and I have asked, and I ask now again, what investigation has the present government made to find a justification, or to ascertain why a tariff should be 10, 12, 15, 20 per cent or any percentage whatever? I have argued, and I have made the statement time and again, and wish to repeat it now, that the only thing that is in evidence at the present time is that certain institutions come and ask for these things, and, in so far as investigations by the powers-that-be are concerned, I think the people of Canada have not yet been furnished with any evidence to prove a justification or a warrant for the government of the day granting this tariff. If the evidence were given to the people it might clear up a lot of misapprehension providing that evidence does exist; and until the investigation takes place I am sure the people will not be satisfied. There are two sides to the question, the people who receive the duty and the people who pay it; the people who pay have a right to know what justification there is for a change of this kind being made.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Whom does the hon. member regard as the people of Canada- the people of Assiniboia, or the people of Canada generally?


Oliver Robert Gould: I think the question is not worth answering.


Lewis Herbert Martell: That is the opinion of my hon. friend, and the answer comes from a worthy source, because he does not know Canada. He wants Assiniboia to be Canada.


Oliver Robert Gould: I do not wish to enter into a controversy with the hon. member concerning my knowledge of Canada or his knowledge of Canada, or my conception of

the people or his conception of the people, or my conception or his conception of what is right or wrong. I do not think the matter should be exactly judged by the hon. member. I speak absolutely from conviction, as an individual who possibly has paid quite as much in tariff taxes as the hon. member. I would not be afraid to wager that I have paid ten times as much as he has, and that is one of the reasons why I am ten times as sincere in my convictions as the hon. member.


Lewis Herbert Martell: The hon. member is speaking from his own peculiar narrow standpoint,	_
Item Jrgreed^to^j
Customs tariff-Artificial silk fabrics or artificial fibre silk fabrics produced from a form of cellulose obtained by chemical processes or of which artificial silk or artificial fibre silk is the component part of chief value n.o.p. British preferential tariff, 17$ per cent; Intermediate tariff, 27$ per cent; General tariff, 30 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: I propose to amend this item by making the tariffs as follows:
British preferential tariff, 17$ per cent; Intermediate tariff 32$ per cent; General tariff, 35 per cent.


Arthur Meighen: The minister would not expect any comment here, but I have been wondering, for several items back, what had become of that noble band of "facing-in-the-right-direction" tariff people, and "a half loaf better than no bread." They seem to have fallen into somnolence.
Item as amended agreed to.


Lewis Herbert Martell: This item is carried, the same as other things are carried by the chairman without members having an opportunity for discussion.
Customs tariff-Manufactures of artificial silk or of artificial fibre silk produced from a form of cellulose obtained by chemical processes or of which artificial silk or artificial fibre s'lk is the component part of chief value, n.o.p.: British preferential tariff, 30 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 35 -per cent; General tariff, 37$ per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Any further amendment in that item?


William Stevens Fielding: It is made to agree with the silk item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: There is no further amendment?


William Stevens Fielding: No.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend states that the advance of 5 per cent in both the intermediate and general tariffs was to put them in line. If that was all why has the minister to raise this one too? I fondly

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
suspect that the real reason was that the men in the business satisfied my hon. friend they could not get started unless they got that protection, I suspect that is the real situation, just as we found in connection with, the former item. Does my hon. friend not agree with me that that is the real reason?


William Stevens Fielding: Would that not be a
legitimate one?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Yes.


William Stevens Fielding: Then let us carry the
item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my non.
friend admit the reason?


William Stevens Fielding: No, I admit nothing.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not know
in which direction the minister is facing. I think it is in four directions all at once.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Coal, anthracite and lignite; anthracite and lignite coal dust; coke: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
William Stevens Fielding: The word "lignite" is
included. That is the only change.


Arthur Meighen: Was lignite not previously 50 cents?


William Stevens Fielding: That has a bearing on
the American tariff. The American tariff includes anthracite and other coal in one and these items are so arranged that, perhaps, there may be on this particular item, reciprocity. The American tariff is so arranged that, perhaps1, they could admit anthracite and lignite reciprocally. We have no anthracite to sell; but it is the desire of the coal mining industry in the West that these things be put together with the expectation that this might lead to the Americans reciprocating, because of the terms of the American tariff.


Arthur Meighen: Needless to say we do
not import any lignite from the United States.


William Stevens Fielding: No.


Arthur Meighen: I see the reason, but
we do not import any lignite from the United States and never will to the end of time.


William Stevens Fielding: No, but if we had any
reciprocity in this particular item, it would have to conform to the American tariff.


Arthur Meighen: What is the duty on
bituminous coal?


William Stevens Fielding: Fifty-three cents.


Arthur Meighen: Has the minister had
importunities from the minister without portfolio, the Acting Minister of National Defence (Mr. Macdonald) and the hon. member for Cumberland (Mr. Logan) for an increased duty on coal?


William Stevens Fielding: No, these hon. gentlemen with the characteristic modesty of the Blue-nose have not asked for any increase.


Arthur Meighen: Modesty was not so
characteristic during the campaign of 1921.


William Stevens Fielding: Did they ask for an increase?


Arthur Meighen: They ridiculed the duty
on coal we had been maintaining as nothing at all, and they wanted something worth while for Nova Scotia.


William Stevens Fielding: I never heard of that.


Arthur Meighen: The minister apparently
ne^er heard it and he has not heard it yet.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Nova Scotia has never
got anything from either party.


Arthur Meighen: It has been said that the sin of ingratitude is worse than the sin of witchcraft. Where is the hon. member for Hants (Mr. Martell)?


Lewis Herbert Martell: He is from Nova Scotia.


Arthur Meighen: I heard about the silence of the sixteen. Their silence is1 relative; they are silent largely compared with what they were. But this small duty on coal was ridiculed by those stalwarts of the faith. How is it that they now allow the minister to sleep at night and to keep the duty of 53 cents on coal.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: In the days when my right hon. friend was Prime Minister of this country and had to do with the management of the railways, they spent $12,000,000 for the purpose of purchasing coal, and $9,000,000 of that went to purchase American coal. That scene has been somewhat changed. In 1921, the coal miners of my county were going without work; their families were going without food, while my hon. friends, in their management of public affairs, were purchasing coal from the United States. Under this government, that situation has been reversed, and in our province to-day all our coal mines are working to the fullest possible extent of their capacity. We have reversed the situation. The public interests of this country, including the railways, are purchasing coal in this country, and our coal miners are enjoying better conditions than they have enjoyed for the last ten years.

3494	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Arthur Meighen: This is highly interesting and edifying. In the days that the hon. member speaks of when the large purchases were made, everyone was employed in Nova Scotia. They were selling their coal the world over.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Not at all.


Arthur Meighen: Yes, selling it the world over. They could scarcely get it out fast enough. My hon. friend is referring to later on. At that time there were some out of work, but there was very little unemployment. I venture to say that there is as much coal being purchased to-day outside of Canada as there was in 1921, and by the railways too. As a member of this government to boast of never interfering with the railways, and then to come to this House and proclaim that they have altered the purchase of coal by the railways, my hon. friend is very consistent.


Lewis Herbert Martell: What member of the government?


Arthur Meighen: The hon. minister without portfolio, the acting Minister of National Defence.


Lewis Herbert Martell: He is a pretty good fellow.


Arthur Meighen: In 1921 we did not interfere with the operation of railways; we allowed them to buy where they could buy the cheapest; but we said to the extent necessary to provide work in Nova Scotia, buy at the price you can buy from the United States, and we out of the treasury of Canada will make good :he difference, so that the railways might be free to make the best business bargain they could. They bought at the price they could buy in the United States, and we paid large sums out of the treasury of Canada in order to keep men employed in Nova Scotia. I venture to say that to-day the railways are following just the policy they did then, and that the government is not doing anything to help keep meu at work in Nova Scotia. I would be glad indeed if it is the fact that there is a greater coal production in Nova Scotia; but such is not due to any action of this government, nor is it a fulfilment of the pledge which the hon. member made to move for an increased duty on these articles in the House of Commons.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: As regards any pledges I made to my constituents, I am prepared to go to my constituents and to deal with them. My right hon. friend, with his usual method of drawing a herring across 
the trail, goes back to war conditions and talks about what his government did when they were working under a War Measures Act, as though that were the situation to which I was referring. I was referring to the situation of 1921.


Arthur Meighen: Part of the time the hon. member was.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I was referring to the situation of 1921. In that year, while contracts were made by Mr. Hanna, a gentleman who was appointed by my right hon. friend's friends to operate that railway, with our coal mining industry in Nova Scotia, they absolutely refused to take the quantities of coal for which they made contracts. In 1921-22, out of twelve million dollars worth of coal purchased for the government railways-I am not speaking about the Canadian Northern or the Grand Trunk-my right hon. friend's, friends purchased nine million dollars worth from the United States, while as I say in the county of Cumberland, and in my constituency, men were out of work and the women were without food. That was the situation then, whereas to-day under a policy which has been inaugurated by Sir Henry Thornton, all the coal that can possibly be mined in Nova Scotia is being sold to the Canadian Government railways of this country and to business enterprises at home and abroad. My right hon. friend assented to a contract which was made by Mr. Hanna in 1921, by which he undertook, for a period of three years, to purchase a million tons of coal' annually from a certain coal mine in the state of Ohio. Last year, before the Public Accounts Committee, when we asked for information in regard to that, Mr. Hanna declined to produce the contract. That was the situation. As a result of the public confidence that has been renewed in our province as a result of the carrying out of a proper policy by the men who are now dealing with the affairs of this country, as a result of the general renewed improvement of business throughout Canada, the mining industry of our province is in a better condition than it has been in ten years.


Arthur Meighen: I recognize the difference in the angle of discussion adopted by the minister when he rose this time. It is now Sir Henry Thornton who made the change; it was not this government.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: My right hon. friend, with his usual ingenuity is proceeding to quibble. I said that he had allowed Mr. Hanna to purchase coal in the United

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
States; he had never said that he should not do so whereas we asked that it should be purchased in Canada whenever possible.


Arthur Meighen: The first time the hon. member said that this government had changed it all. Yes, Mr. Hanna ran the railways under our government in practice just as well as in profession. I venture to make this statement, although I have not the figures before me, not having looked into them- because we shall have a discussion later- that as large a proportion of American coal is being purchased to-day as was purchased before.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: For what purpose?


Arthur Meighen: For the railways.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: The hon. member is quibbling again. I said the Canadian Government Railways; I was not speaking of the Canadian National Railways or the Grand Trunk,


Arthur Meighen: Who is quibbling now? What counts to the miner is how much is bought for the railways; he does not care whether the coal goes to the Intercolonial or to the Grand Trunk. The thing that counts is what coal is bought for the railways; that is what counts to the province of Nova Scotia. I venture to hazard the statement I have just made, without going into the figures, because we can get them-


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: All right.


Arthur Meighen: -that there is being bought to-day as large a proportion of coal from the United States as was ever purchased. I do not wonder that there are not as many coal miners now as there were before; as a matter of fact, there are not as many artisans now as there were previously, although these are the days of halo and glory and business prosperity as described by the member for Pictou while they are described by hon. members around him as well as in other parts of the House as the days of the greatest exodus the country has known since the time of Mackenzie.


Mr. NEILL:: Unfortunately I missed the earlier part of the debate, but perhaps the minister would not mind repeating, if I apologise, the explanation if he has already given it, as to why it is necessary to ask the House to put on the free list two-thirds of the coal produced in Canada and not the other third. Roughly speaking, coal comprises anthracite, lignite and bituminous coal. Anthracite has
223J
been on the free list for some years, and lignite apparently is now being made free. What line of reasoning does the government pursue by which it finds it advisable to put these two coals on the free list and abstain from making bituminous coal free also?


William Stevens Fielding: Does the hon. member think it should be on the free list?


Alan Webster Neill: Yes.


William Stevens Fielding: I am afraid I could not agree to that. We get a revenue out of the duty, not to mention other considerations.


Alan Webster Neill: I do not think that is a good answer; if it is, would not the same factors apply to anthracite and lignite? The condition in regard to revenue is the same, no matter what kind of coal is involved, so that the question is not primarily one of revenue at all. What differentiates between lignite and anthracite on the one hand and bituminous coal on the other? That is the point on which I should like to have information for the people in the West.


William Stevens Fielding: The differentiation, if I may use the word in this connection, began a great many years ago when the so-called National Policy was established in 1878-79. Bituminous coal was then made dutiable while anthracite was made free, and that has been the condition ever since. Sometimes the fact that a thing has been in existence is a good reason that it should be continued. At all events, that is the history of this matter, as my hon. friend no doubt knows.


Alan Webster Neill: That does not explain why we are putting lignite on the free list now.


William Stevens Fielding: I have explained that.


Alan Webster Neill: Possibly I was too * dense to grasp it. I still think that the same conditions that apply to two-thirds of the coat that is produced in Canada might well apply to the other third. Earlier in the resolutions we see power taken to the government to send a representative to Washington to negotiate reciprocity. That of course is a, pure gesture, because we know that the government has power to do that without any legislation. It has been done before quite recently, and it was done years ago without legislative authority. But there is a species of reciprocity now offered to Canada, and only one species, which is on the statutes of the United States. I find in the budget speech a suggestion that the President of the United States might enter into any reciprocal arrangement with Canada without going to congress which I very much doubt. But
3496	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
there is, under section 315, if I remember rightly, a very distinct pledge on the books of the United States to-day and which cannot be gainsaid, which provides for reciprocity in one particular. It is not at the whim of the president or of any one man; it is there as a matter of law, and provides that if Canada takes off this duty of 53 cents the United States will take off a similar duty on Canadian coal coming into that country. That is an absolute open offer to reciprocity of which there can be no doubt to-day. It is there as a matter of fact, and it would be a real earnest of our genuine desire to have a larger measure of reciprocity with the United States if we accepted and put into force this particular offer which is now available right at our hands. I may explain that like most hon. members I have a selfish motive in this matter, only I have the honesty to avow it, and that is that if this duty were removed it would materially assist the coal miners in British Columbia, because the market for our bituminous coal in British Columbia is in the United States and we are handicapped by this 53 cents per ton which largely benefits the province from which the Acting Minister of National Defence (Mr. Macdonald) comes. So that it is a question of British Columbia being penalized for the benefit of the beautiful province of Nova Scotia for which and for whose representatives I have the very highest regard. I do think, however, that they should also let British Columbia have a fighting chance.


Arthur Meighen: This is a very pertinent question, which I think the minister should answer. Reciprocity with the United States is really the goal of his ambition! Here is a chance to start. The United States has offered reciprocity in bituminous coal. Why does the minister not meet that government in this resepect?


William Stevens Fielding: Do you wish it?


Arthur Meighen: Not at all. The minister has never heard me talk reciprocity here, but he has heard himself do so. Now, here is a chance for him to put his principles into practice, and he is urged furthermore by the hon. member for Comox-Albemi (Mr. Neill). Why does he not start? Reciprocity, according to the minister, is a virtue in itself, and a real crime was committed because we did not secure all the reciprocity on earth in 1911. Well, here is the United States knocking at our door asking for reciprocity in coal. Why does the minister not meet them?


William Stevens Fielding: I am afraid the United States in selecting one particular item and 
offering us reciprocity in connection with it is not taking very sound ground. At all events that is the way it impresses me. I do not think that the United States should be allowed to pick out one particular item for reciprocity, and an item that does not suit us in Canada. The majority of the Canadian people have agreed that there shall be a duty on bituminous coal, and I understand that the hon. gentleman takes that view himself. We are therefore both agreed on that point. Why should we allow the United States, then, to select one item in particular and ask for reciprocity in respect of it? It may be clear to my hon. friend that there is justification for this course on the part of the United States, but it is not clear to us. It is simply a difference in point of view, I suppose.


Arthur Meighen: The minister's argument boiled down is this, that reciprocity is all right so long as you keep away from coal. He puts in his reciprocity proposal six or seven things and says, "Come to us on any of these and we will meet you, but for the life of you, don't mention coal, because while reciprocity is a splendid thing in other respects, it is bad so far as coal is concerned." Now, the House will get the measure of the minister's sincerity in the matter - of reciprocity. I do not wish to dispute his sincerity at all; that is to say, I do not question his sincerity in regard to wheat and wheat flour in which he wants reciprocity, nor his sincerity in not wishing to have reciprocity in coal. He is equally sincere in either case, but the House will get the measure of the value of reciprocity as such in the mind of the minister. All that he has given us on the merits of reciprocity as a principle now goes up into the air; it amounts to nothing at all. It is defeated by what he says right now in respect of coal. In a word, you must taka every single article on its merits, you must look to the future as well as to the present, and there is no special virtue in reciprocity with the United States merely because thev are a great nation immediately opposite us.


William Stevens Fielding: My hon. friend for his
purpose attributes something to me which I never said. He says that I am in favour of reciprocity in connection with everything but coal.


Arthur Meighen: I did not say that.


An hon. MEMBER:: Yes, you did.


William Stevens Fielding: I say I am in favour of
reciprocity with the United States broadly and generally. I do not suppose we would have

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
reciprocity in everything. I am prepared to consider a fair reciprocity treaty with the United States, and possibly it may include coal. Everything would depend upon taking the treaty as a whole, not letting Uncle Sam select some particular item and say he will give us reciprocity in that. That is the situation.


Arthur Meighen: As one interested in the
production of Canadian coal, I shall always remain utterly unperturbed by the minister's threats that we will ever have reciprocity in coal while he is Minister of Finance. Reciprocity in cattle, wheat, wheat flour, oats, barley, potatoes, onions, turnips, hay, fish-he specifies there about eight articles and he says to the United States, "As far as those are concerned I am an advocate of reciprocity; but as far as coal is concerned I am not." I say that the minister by his position to-night clearly exposes to the House that reciprocity in general with the United States has no particular argument in its favour at all-that you may be able to pick out an article where it will be of benefit to us, you may be able to pick out others where it will not be. In a word, much that he has said in the way of declamation and general statement of his devotion to the principle of reciprocity is entirely destroyed by his attitude with respect to coal. However, we will come to this article when we return to No. 2, and I am going to have something to say about it, particularly when I compare it with the minister's proposals in 1911.


William Stevens Fielding: The hon. gentleman says he is going to come back to these resolutions, but while he is dealing with them he might as well deal fairly with them. He selects a resolution mentioning cattle and several other things, but he ignores the general resolution before that declaring the willingness of this country to enter into a fair, general treaty of reciprocity with the United States. And he says, "Oh, you are only proposing reciprocity in these few things." What are these few things? In the first place-we may possibly have to repeat the discussion-there is a broad, general declaration of the willingness of the people of Canada to enter into a reciprocity agreement, not qualified by any limitations. How broad it is to be depends upon the terms of the agreement, and that is a matter which would necessarily go to Congress. But we have said, "There is something which we could do without waiting for Congress. The United States government has authorized the President to make reductions on certain things." Perhaps1 we could get the United States government to make these reductions
now or at an early date, and we select the things most important. I hesitate not to say that the most important item to-day to make -I will not say a reciprocity agreement, for it is not such a broad question, but if we wanted to make a temporary arrangement with the United States to-day I say there is nothing the people of the western provinces are more interested in than cattle, and that in eastern Canada there is no item we are more interested in than fish. We take a few items which we all want to send to the United States and we say, if the United States will meet us on these things we will make corresponding reductions, not waiting for Congress to act. Why these particular things, it may be asked. Well, because these are the particular things which above all others are troubling the people of Canada to-day. That is the position; not as stated by my hon. friend.


Arthur Meighen: I will tell the minister
why I referred to that. Just as the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill) said, the only clause in the minister's reciprocity proposal is clause 8C. The preceding clause is only a gesture. He does not need it. He would be just exactly in the same position if, it was not there at all.


William Stevens Fielding: Did they need the same thing in 1879?


Arthur Meighen: Not at all.


William Stevens Fielding: But they used it, and
for good reasons.


Arthur Meighen: Very well. It is a gesture and nothing more.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Why was it put in the National Policy?


Arthur Meighen: I presume for just the
same purpose as the minister uses it now: it was a dead letter then and it is a dead letter now.


An hon. MEMBER:: They were fakirs
then.	.


Arthur Meighen: Now, the minister says
we select those things that we need-


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: Will my hon. friend permit me a question?


Arthur Meighen: He never permitted me
one in my life.


Edward Mortimer Macdonald: I will be very glad to start all over again. Does my hon. friend say that the clause with regard to reciprocity which was part of the National
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Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Policy of Macdonald and Tilley was put in without any intention on the part of those great men to carry it into effect?


Arthur Meighen: I did not say that at
all. I say if it was worded as this is-I presume it was, my hon. friend says so-it was a gesture and nothing more and did not change anything in any degree whatever.


Lewis Herbert Martell: What was it put there
for?


Arthur Meighen: Neither does this. The United States says on a long list of articles- and these in 8C are only a few of them- they give the president power under certain conditions to reduce the duties. The minister selects about eight and says, "On these that suit us we will meet you;" and he asks for power from this parliament to do so, but he takes care to exclude other commodities, thereby confessing to this House and the country that his general declamations of devotion to reciprocity with the United States really amount to nothing. If it would be a good thing in these, why would it not be in coal?


William Stevens Fielding: If that is so, why not in everything?


Arthur Meighen: Because it is not. I do not believe in it at all. I do not think we get anywhere by any extensive reciprocity agreement with them. But when the minister says, "It is all right in these articles and all wrong in coal," he declares to the House that the principle he has been arguing for all these years is really nothing but air.


Hance James Logan: I should like to remove
from the minds of hon. members a misconception with reference to the duty on coal. We in the Maritime provinces are getting rather tired having people continually throwing at us that all we desire is this wonderful duty on coal. What is the duty on coal, Mr. Chairman?


Lewis Herbert Martell: A bagatelle.


An hon. MEMBER:: A Martell.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, Oh.


George Newcombe Gordon: Order.


Hance James Logan: When the duty was put on
coal some years ago it was made specific, and when it was fixed at 53 cents a ton, coal was worth about 82.25 a ton. To-day coal is worth over $5, and the duty instead of increasing, as it would have had it been ad valorem, remains the same. The result is that this wonderful duty we are supposed to be so anxious about in Nova

Scotia is to-day a 10 per cent duty. That is the protection that our Nova Scotia coal gets. That is, if the law were enforced as was intended by those who enacted it. But what are the facts?


Lewis Herbert Martell: It does not protect us
at all.


Hance James Logan: The importer buys his coal at the United States colliery as run of mine, and has it screened there so that it is divided into screened and slack coal. This is brought into Canada and he pays a duty of 53 cents a ton on the screened and 15 cents a ton on the slack coal, with the result, as I am credibly informed, that to-day this imported coal is paying an average duty of less than 35 cents a ton, or about 7i per cent ad valorem. Now, does my hon. friend from Comox-Alberni or any other gentleman on the other side of the House consider that a 7i per cent duty is a protective tariff? It is not even equivalent to a tariff for revenue. In fact it is not even half of a tariff for revenue, as we generally understand that phrase.
Let me call attention to one other thing. During the last three years of the right hon. gentleman's administration there was brought into this country from the United States over half a billion dollars' worth of coal, and the average loss in exchange during that time was about 8 per cent. Multiply $500,000,000 by 8 and you have a loss to this country of $40,000,000. It might as well have been thrown into the sea; yet no one seemed at that time to be very much alarmed or to be considering seriously the development of our own coal resources.
Personally I am fully convinced that there should be a duty on anthracite coal. If we are going to tax the poor man's coal, even at 7i per cent, why should we allow the rich man's coal to come into this country free? As a revenue producer nothing could be better than a tax upon anthracite coal. I consider therefore, that it should be advocated not only to encourage the buying of our own coal but to give us a substantial revenue. Our coal has been proved to be equal to anthracite so far as domestic needs are concerned. This has been proved beyond a doubt in the committees of this House within the last few weeks. I say we should collect a revenue on imported anthracite coal; for in doing so we collect it from the people who can afford to pay, those who are well off or comfortably off. But let us have the last of this talk of protection on Nova Scotia or New Brunswick coal when we are only collecting a duty of 7i per cent on American coal.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Alan Webster Neill: It is very evident that the coal producers of Nova Scotia must be in a very prosperous condition when we find the hon. members for Cumberland (Mr. Logan) and Hants (Mr. Martell) disparaging the duty as small and saying that 53 cents a ton is a mere bagatelle. I trust they will join with me in suggesting that it be taken off for the benefit of British Columbia. I assure these hon. gentlemen that British Columbia would receive that bounty with the deepest gratitude; they would not look a gift horse in the mouth and say, "This is only 53 cents." I say we would be only too glad to have it; we would regard 53 cents as a substantial assistance and would be pleased indeed to receive what these hon. gentlemen do not seem to appreciate very highly.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Will my hon. friend permit me a question? We have no coal in the county of Hants; there may be coal lying dormant there, but we have not any coal mines. The hon. member for Hants is as far as possible, theoretically at least, a tariff for revenue man only. I am not advocating a tariff for the protection of any industry, but we hear too much about this question of protection for the coal industry in Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia, prior to confederation, was able to run all her affairs with about 7i per cent duty. To-day the only thing you can point to that we have any protection on at all is coal, and it is very little protection we get on it. The hon. member for Cumberland may have coal in his constituency; if he has, he has as much right to protection as any other industry in Canada, and 50 cents on a ton of coal in Nova Scotia is not half as much protection as other industries are getting in this country which are making the people of Nova Scotia hewers of wood and drawers of water. My hon. friend (Mr. Neill) is very frank when he says he wants protection; I believe he would admit himself that he is a protectionist. Comox-Albemi has no coal, therefore he is not very much concerned about protection; if Comox-Alberni had coal he would be preaching protection. There is a small duty on coal in Nova Scotia. The people of that province are prepared to accept free trade in everything; we are prepared to take the duties off coal so long as you take them off everything else.


Alan Webster Neill: Mr. Chairman, the hon.
gentleman said he would like to ask me a question; would he mind stating it? If he does not wish to do so, I do not desire to take up the time of the committee but I
really must repudiate the suggestion that there is no coal in Comox-Albemi. I think it is a slander on the representation I have given to that district in the House in the last two years when I am told at the end of my days that there is no coal in Comax-Alberni 1


Oliver Robert Gould: I would like to add a word, not particularly about coal but in relation to the sentiments expressed on the question of reciprocity. When the Minister of Finance rose to reply to some suggestions that have been made, he stated that it was not right to single out one item. Well, so far as reciprocity is concerned one does not need to confine himself to one item, having regard to the present attitude of the American people.
I would recall the minister's attention to the fact that boots and shoes, which everybody in Canada must use, are allowed to enter the United States free of duty. When the minister was compiling the list here it might have occurred to him or to the government to have included boots and shoes, because that would have materially affected the carrying out of the principle of reciprocity concerning which the minister seems to be so anxious. Likewise, agricultural implements may enter the United States free of duty, and we might mention quite a number of other things in connection with which the American Congress has gone on record as making a standing offer of reciprocity. I contend that in good faith we might accept this half loaf or quarter loaf offered us at the present time by the United States government. If we are really desirous of promoting the spirit of reciprocity we have a splendid opportunity to do so now, in a measure at least. There are undoubtedly other items which could form the basis of a reciprocal agreement with the United States when the time comes, but I repeat that we might well take advantage of the opportunity now offered by the American government in the legislation at present on their statute book.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. member for
Assiniboia (Mr. Gould) has raised a very interesting point. He is quite right when he states that the American tariff imposes no duty on boots and shoes, and, I believe, no duty on agricultural implements. He says to the government, "Now, if you are in earnest, if you really mean what you say when you assert that bceause the American tariff is generally high we must therefore maintain ours, why do you not at least do what they do in boots and shoes and in implements?" His argument, based as it is on the pretensions of the government, is to my mind, irrefutable, and I would especially like to hear a reply

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
from the hon. member for Quebec East (Mr. Lapointe). Let us test his sincerity in this matter. His constituency is filled with boot and shoe factories. There is the American market open, a market of one hundred and ten million people, free to the manufacturers of boots and shoes in his constituency. If the government are only waiting for American reductions in order to have our own duties reduced, just think of the opening that is left them now in boots and shoes. I hope the hon. member for Assiniboia will press until he really exposes the actual mind of the Minister of Marine and Fisheries and many other hon. members around him.


Ernest Lapointe: My hon. friend is very kind to the industries of Quebec. Indeed our first aim is to get reciprocity in natural products. When it comes to manufactured articles, boots and shoes will be treated like the others.


Arthur Meighen: Treated exactly as the others.


Mr. BAXTER:: I do not want to delay passing the item but I was hoping for some explanation from my hon. friend from Hants, but I am afraid he has gone out of the Chamber. It is not so long since there was a very disastrous election in this country, and I happened to be travelling down in my hon. friend's province. I was handed a very neatly printed little pamphlet which told what my hon. friends were going to do in the matter of boots and shoes when they came into power, and my right hon. friend to my left (Mr. Meighen) was represented as being a sort of monster of injustice because every poor woman who bought boots and shoes for the family had to pay fifty cents, all because of the wicked Mr. Meighen, and if she had the merciful Mr. King as premier it would only be thirty cents. There was going to be a very sharp reduction in the cost. Last year I noticed the tariff gave some little advantage in respect of English boots and shoes. There are some imported, but very few, and they are not of the ordinary cheaper variety.
I do not fancy there has been any very great relief to the suffering housewives in Nova Scotia because of any experiments tried on the tariff last year, and I was regretting the absence of the hon. member for Hants from the House at this moment. I thought I might learn from his eloquent lips just how these women in the province of Nova Scotia are being consoled for the utter failure to implement the promise of cutting down the wickedness of Meighen at fifty cents to the mercy of King at thirty cents.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to. fMr. Meighen.]
Customs tariff-Hat sweats; hatters tips and sides when out to shape. The articles in this item when imported by hat and cap manufacturers for use exclusively in the manufacture of hats and caps in their own factories: British preferential tariff, free; Intermediate tariff, free; General tariff, free.
Henry Lumley Drayton: That is slightly extending the wording, I think.


William Stevens Fielding: The item is substantially the same except that hatters' bands are taken out.


Henry Lumley Drayton: They are
dropped?


William Stevens Fielding: Dropped from this item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Where are they
put?


William Stevens Fielding: They come under tariff item 575.


Henry Lumley Drayton: That is 25, 32i and 35 per cent.


Arthur Meighen: So the net effect of this is to put a duty on hat bands of 25, 32+ and 35 per cent.	.


William Stevens Fielding: It would be 27^ per
cent.


Arthur Meighen: That is the net effect of this change. This will be good news to those who talk about the "step in the right direction."


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Emery wheels; carborundum wheels and stones, n.o.p.; manufactures of emery or of carborundum: British preferential tariff, 17J per cent; Intermediate tariff, 22£ per cent; General tariff, 25 per cent.
Arthur Meighen: What is the change here?


William Stevens Fielding: N* change except that n.o.p. is inserted.	'


Arthur Meighen: Will the minister tell us the effect of that?


William Stevens Fielding: The next item will show. Air. MEIGHEN: That is item 670a.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Carborundum wheels or stones not further manufactured than moulded and burned: British preferential tariff, 10 per cent:	Intermediate
tariff, 12£ per cent; General tariff, 15 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: There is a reduction
there.


Arthur Meighen: What are carborundum
wheels?


William Stevens Fielding: They are partly manufactured stone brought in from the United States to be finished in Canada,

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Arthur Meighen: There is no reduction then on the finished article?


William Stevens Fielding: No.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Sticks or canee cut into suitable lengths for umbrella, parasol or sunshade or walking sticks, further manufactured than in tariff item 672 but not further finished than bent, when imported by manufacturers of umbrellas, parasols, sunshades or walking sticks for use exclusively in the manufacture of such articles in their own factories: British preferential tariff, 10 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 12J per cent; General tariff, 15 per cent.
Henry Lumley Drayton: Any change
there? Is the effect here to put on a new duty or to change the nomenclature?


William Stevens Fielding: Part of it is a reduction, and part of it is free. This is put in at the suggestion of the Customs department. They have had difficulty in administering the former item.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The former item was free altogether.


William Stevens Fielding: No. 174, 224 and 25 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The old item 672 read:
Bibs of brass, iron or steel, runners, rings, caps, notches, ferrules, mounts and sticks or canes in the rough, or not further manufactured1 than cut into lengths suitable for umbrella, parasol or sunshade or walking sticks when imported by manufacturers of umbrellas, etc.
It seems to me that the effect is-I have no doubt my friend finds the industry requires it-to take these sticks or canes off the free list-they were free before under all three tariffs-and to put on a tariff of 10, 124 and 15 per cent in its place.


William Stevens Fielding: No. I understand some of them were ruled free in the customs and some were dutiable. They were not all free.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I have just read the item.


William Stevens Fielding: I think you will find that the words are changed.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: It looks as if it turned on bending, It says "not further finished than bent."


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-(b) Usual coverings containing goods not machinery, subject to any ad valorem duty, when not included in the invoice value of the goods they contain;
(bb) Usual coverings containing machinery subject to any ad valorem duty, when not included in the invoice value of the goods they contain:	British
preferential tariff, 221 per cent; Intermediate tariff, 35 per cent; General tariff, 35 per cent.
Arthur Meighen: There is no change hers at all.


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, there is a reduction in the case of coverings for machinery coming from Great Britain. The coverings there are much heavier and of a more expensive character.


Arthur Meighen: That is paragraph (bb).


Herbert Meredith Marler: Is there any duty on coverings for hospital supplies? Does that come under this item?


Henry Lumley Drayton: In nearly all cases they are included in the cost of the goods, in the invoice.


William Stevens Fielding: If the goods are free there is no duty on the packages. If the goods are dutiable there would be a duty on the packages.


Herbert Meredith Marler: Under this item?


William Stevens Fielding: Under all items, yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not think there is a charge on any containers except when included in the purchase price. My hon. friend's own item says "when not included in the invoice value of the goods they contain."


William Stevens Fielding: The item is the same, I am advised, except that the word "machinery" was taken out.


Herbert Meredith Marler: The reason I asked that question was this: The question came up some years ago as regards X-ray plates used in hospitals in Montreal. I understood they were dutiable, and in addition the coverings were dutiable. I do not know whether it is convenient for the minister to give an answer now. If not let it pass.


William Stevens Fielding: I will be glad if the hon. member will let it stand and I will give it later.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to. *

[Stage Direction]
Customs tariff-4. Resolved, that schedule B to The Customs Tariff, 1907, as amended by chapter twenty-six of the statutes of 1914, by chapter forty-seven of the statutes of 1919, chapter nineteen of the statutes of 1922, and by order in council, be further amended by striking
3502	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
thereout tariff items 1029, 1030, the enumerations of goods, and the rates of drawback of customs duties set opposite to each of the said items, and to repeal Order in Council. P.C. 17/846, dated the twenty-first day of April, 1922, and to provide that the following items, enumerations and rates of drawback of customs duties be inserted in said schedule B:-
William Stevens Fielding: May I ask the committee to return to resolution No. 4?


George Newcombe Gordon: That is the one we are at.


William Stevens Fielding: As to the date at which it is to take effect. However, we will return to it and the committee can go on with the other. We will let it stand.
Customs tariff-Materials, subject to drawback when imported by manufacturers of hat sweats and hatters' tips and sides and used in the manufacture of such articles in their own factories: Portion duty-net including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 99 per cent.


Arthur John Lewis: It seems to me this drawback of 99 per cent is altogether too generous. I understand it costs the government 3 per cent to collect the tariff when only one transaction is made; the drawback as I understand it, involves two transactions, and the cost to the government would be 5 per cent. It seems to me that instead of giving an over generous drawback of 99 per cent the government should take at least four or five per cent on the transaction. I do not think any drawback should exceed 95 per cent.


William Stevens Fielding: The effect of giving a drawback of 99 per cent of course is to make it practically free. The argument is that it is easier for the customs to control it by way of a drawback than by making it free. You may have an article free for one purpose and dutiable for another, and if you make it free generally the privilege is abused. Experience has shown that, and it is better to make the article dutiable and grant your drawback for that part of the business in which you wish to make it free; that is the reason it is made 99 per cent.


Arthur John Lewis: Is not the transaction a loss to the government financially?
, Mr. FIELDING: It virtually makes the article free.


Arthur John Lewis: It is a loss to the government just the same.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Materials: subject to drawback when used in the manufacture of articles enumerated in tariff item 236: Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 50 per cent.
Item agreed to.

Customs tariff-Sugar not above number sixteen Dutch standard in colour, sugar drainings or pump-ings drained in transit, melado or concentrated melado, tank bottoms, sugar concrete and molasses testing over fifty-six degrees and not exceeding ninety-six degrees of polarization, subject to drawback when used exclusively in the manufacture of syrups and molasses enumerated in tariff item 140, not to include syrup and molasses produced in the process of refining sugar. Provided, however, that such drawback shall not be paid unless the claims as presented by a manufacturer at any one time aggregate twenty -five dollars: Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 30 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: I move that item 1031 be struck out and that the following be substituted :
Artificial silk yam, filaments, threads or twists enumerated in tariff items 583AA and 583B when imported by manufacturers to be further manufactured in their own factories before the 1st day of July, 1924, 60 per cent.
That item will be designated 583aa.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Had it not better be numbered with the drawback numbers, instead of being put in with the tariff numbers? Usually my hon. friend will find all his drawbacks in schedule B. Really the proper place to put that in would be as No. 1011a, because then it would be in proper contradistinction to what happens in connection with this unfortunate botany yam. It is a drawback provision, and the drawback provision as to botany yam is No. 1011.


William Stevens Fielding: Before the resolution is finally disposed of we will consider that suggestion.
Item stands.
Customs tariff-Oil subject to drawback when used in the manufacture of manila rope, not exceeding one and one-half inches in circumference, when used exclusively in the fisheries: Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 99 per cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Is that new?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, it is a new item. It is in the production of an item that is free that this oil is used.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Glass tubing, subject to drawback when used for the manufacture of glassware and other scientific apparatus for laboratory work in public hospitals. Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 99 per cent.
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Barilla or soda ash, subject to drawback, when used in the manufacture of sal soda. Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 99 per cent.
Item agreed to.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Customs tariff-Machinery, and parts thereof, and dies valued at more than $500 each, of a class or kind not made in Canada, subject to drawback when used in manufacturing or producing goods of a class or kind not manufactured or produced in Canada prior to the twelfth day of May, 1923: Portion of duty- not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback 60 per cent.
Henry Lumley Drayton: What is the
underlying idea in connection with this item? We get 60 per cent there as against 99 per cent in the others.


William Stevens Fielding: It is intended in this
case to encourage the introduction of machinery not made in Canada, but machinery to be used in the creation of industries not hitherto in existence in Canada. It may be argued we should make it free, but we have in mind some of the industries which are contemplating coming in now which will have the benefit of what , some people think is quite a protection, and there is no reason why we should give them protection on both. For that reason we think they should be content with a partial drawback.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
/ Customs tariff-Materials, including all parts not 'finished, subject to drawback when used in the manufacture of goods enumerated in tariff item 448c: Portion of duty-not including special duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 40 per cent.
William Stevens Fielding: That is giving the drawback on materials used in the stumping machines previously referred to.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-Copper in blocks, ingots, pigs or bars; subject to drawback when used in the manufacture of rods for use only in the manufacture of trolley, telegraph and telephone wires, electric wires and electric cables:	Portion of duty-not including special
duty or dumping duty-payable as drawback, 99 per cent.
Henry Lumley Drayton: That is new also, is it not?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes, that practically
makes the item free.


Henry Lumley Drayton: What was the situation before? Had we that at all before?


William Stevens Fielding: There is one factory- I am not sure that there is more than one- making these goods, which did not get them free because they were not made in their own factory. They were not wire manufacturers, and consequently they were not able to avail themselves of the freedom. We now propose to give them an opportunity of getting a drawback no matter whether these articles are made in their own factory or not.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend's recollection will be much fresher than mine;
but as regards the copper situation in Canada, at one time one of the things that came very strongly before me in the tariff inquiry was that in view of the protection we had on the raw material, it would have paid a manufacturer to take his plant to Buffalo for the purpose of selling in Ontario, because the duty on his raw material and his other expenses ran up to about 12 per cent as against a protection of 10 per cent, so that he was 2 per cent worse off than if we had free trade. Is the idea of this drawback to get away from that situation?


William Stevens Fielding: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: If it be to get away from that situation, why is it so much confined to these particular articles?


William Stevens Fielding: The item is the same as it was before, except that the qualification about using these bars in their own factory in the making of wire is removed. Anybody can now import copper bars for that purpose. Under the new copper policy, we hope, however, they will buy them in Canada.
SirJHENRY DRAYTON: This is not intended then to assist the main situation at all?


William Stevens Fielding: It will change the situation in this respect, that the man who could not formerly import copper rods and bars free unless he made the wire in his own factory, can do so now. That limitation is now removed.


Mr. WALLACE:: While we are dealing with drawbacks, is there any drawback on material entering into the manufacture of oleomargarine?


William Stevens Fielding: I am told that there is a drawback under an order in council which will expire some time this year.


John Alexander Wallace: What is the amount of the drawback?


William Stevens Fielding: The actual duties paid.


Arthur Meighen: The minister says that it will expire.


William Stevens Fielding: I am so advised. It is an order in council for a limited period.


Arthur Meighen: Yes, but the minister can have another one passed.


William Stevens Fielding: Certainly.


Arthur Meighen: It is the intention to keep the material free while the finished product is free?
3504	COMMONS
Waps and Means-Customs Tariff


William Stevens Fielding: That whole question is open until to-morrow?


Arthur Meighen: To-morrow it may close and it may not.


Mr. SPENCER:: What is the amount of the drawback for this last year-the whole thing?


William Stevens Fielding: I could not give that to my hon. friend now. If he is desirous of getting it, I will give him at a later date the amount paid.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-5. Resolved, that any enactment founded on the foregoing resolutions shall be deemed to have come into force on the twelfth day of May, one thousand nine hundred and twenty-three, and to have applied to all goods mentioned in the foregoing resolutions imported or taken out of warehouse for consumption on and after that day and to have applied to goods previously imported for which no entry for consumption was made before that day.
Henry Lumley Drayton: In this connection I think my hon. friend said-at least his statement would have that effect-that notwithstanding the fact that the general resolution would come into effect, he was taking power to see that resolution in regard to artificial silk did not become effective until the company could do business.


William Stevens Fielding: Have we not effected that by the drawback?


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not think so.


William Stevens Fielding: I will take a note of that and think the matter over.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It is a very serious matter.


William Stevens Fielding: Two resolutions touching reciprocity stood over earlier in the evening. If hon. members so desire, we will go on with them now.


Arthur Meighen: It is pretty late to start reciprocity to-night. I should like the minister, when we come to the discussion, to have the information as to what list of articles, as regards the United States, the president has power to make reductions on, upon the conditions specified in their law; that is to say, upon what articles besides those enumerated in clause 8c.


William Stevens Fielding: I shall be glad to look into that.


Arthur Meighen: And under what conditions?


William Stevens Fielding: As contained in the
American tariff?


Arthur Meighen: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
4.	Resolved, that schedule B to The Customs Tariff, 1907, as amended by chapter twenty-six of the statutes of 1914, by chapter forty-seven of the statutes of 1919, chapter nineteen of the statutes of 1922, end by order in council, be further amended by striking thereout tariff items 1029, 1030, the enumerations of goods and the rates of drawback of customs duties set opposite to each of the said items, and to repeal Order in Council, P.C. 17/846, dated the twenty-first day of April, 1922, and to provide that the following items, enumerations and rates of drawback of customs duties be inserted in said schedule B:-
Mr, FIELDING: I desire to move that this resolution be amended by adding after the word "councils" in the sixth line the following words "P.C. 19-656 dated 25th May, 1920, and." That is an order in council that was omitted.
Amendment agreed to.
Arthur Meighen: What is the minister's idea in having a statute repeal an order in council? All he has to do is to repeal that himself in council. It seems to me to be cluttering up our statutes. Nobody in looking over the statutes can tell what on earth the effect is.


William Stevens Fielding: The Customs department regards this as very important. It does not lumber up our statutes much because when you are repealing a certain bill, it is not much to add a certain order in council.


Arthur Meighen: I know that.


William Stevens Fielding: It is the practice, and the Customs department agree that it is necessary.


Arthur Meighen: I do not think it is the practice. It was not the practice before, although it may be now. It is true that it does not take any longer to read; but the difficulty is that afterwards when this becomes a permanent statute in our annual production, anyone who examines this statute will not know what the effect of the statute is. He will have to send down to Ottawa in order to get a copy of the order in council. It makes it very difficult to interpret.


William Stevens Fielding: If the order in council
is repealed it does not matter.


Arthur Meighen: Yes, but he does not
know what is accomplished by this statute.
I think it would be much better that orders in council passed by council should be repealed by council and not by statute.


William Stevens Fielding: I understand that the
experience of the Customs department has been otherwise, but I am willing to look into

Questions
the suggestion of the hon. gentleman. I move that the committee rise and report progress.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Progress reported.

[Stage Direction]
Right Hon: W. L. MACKENZIE KING
(Prime Minister) moved the second reading of and concurrence in an amendment made by the Senate to Bill No. 54 to provide for the investigation of combines, monopolies, trusts and mergers.
He said:	There is a slight amendment
offered by the Senate to the bill. It simply adds that the statement which must be submitted when the six applicants make application for an investigation shall be in the form of a solemn or statutory declaration. The amendment is acceptable to the government.
Arthur Meighen: Is that the only amendment ?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes.
Motion agreed to; amendment read the second time and concurred in.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King the House adjourned at 11.25 p.m.
Wednesday, June 6, 1923