1924-05-20

Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister) moved:: That the name of Mr. Euler be substituted for that of Mr. Mitchell on the select standing committee on Banking and Commerce.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 120, to amend the Prisons and Reformatories Act.
He said: Under the Prisons and Reformatories Act, when a girl of Protestant faith in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island is convicted for certain offences, the judge, instead of sending her to prison, may send her to the Maritime Home for Girls at Truro. The object of this bill is to apply
the same provisions to a new institution in New Brunswick called the Interprovincial Home for Women, which was established in Moncton last year.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

[Stage Direction]
On the Orders of the Day:
Hon. CHARLES MARCIL (Bonaventure):: I rise to make an explanation. I notice in the Ottawa Evening Journal of yesterday an article in the editorial column under the caption " The Liberal Revolt," which states that, though present in Ottawa, I did not vote and did not have a pair. If I was not present, it was because I understood that I was paired; for that reason I did not turn up for the vote. As to my views on the budget, they are contained in Hansard of April 15, the third day of the debate, when I gave the budget unqualified support.



PRIVILEGE-MR. FOURNIER

Mr. C. A. FOURNIER (Bellechasse):: I rise to a question of personal privilege. The same thing that applies to the hon. member for Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil) applies to me. As the article in the Ottawa Journal of yesterday is very short. I will read it:
The Liberal Revolt
The revolt in the Liberal party against the budget is much more formidable than press reports would indicate. Here is the record of the vote on Friday morning last:
Marler, of Montreal, against the budget.
McCrea, of Sherbrooke, absent (though in Ottawa) without a pair.
Euler, of Waterloo, against the budget.
Raymond, of Brantford, against the budget.
Hon. Walter Mitchell, resigned from Commons because of opposition to budget.
Sir Lomer Gouin, absent from House, without a pair.
Hon. Jacques Bureau, Minister of Customs, absent from House (though in Ottawa) without a pair.
Hon. Charles Marcil, Bonaventure, absent from House (though in Ottawa) without a pair.
Mr. Fournier, of Bellechasse, absent from House (though in Otta-wa) without a pair.
Thursday morning I had an urgent call to go out of town. I made arrangements to leave Friday morning at 6.55, and I kept my engagement. Had it not been for some of my hon. friends, particularly the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland), I would have had ample time to vote and my vote would have been recorded as in favour of the budget.



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS


[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) -moved that the House
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[Stage Direction]
go into committee to consider Bill No. 26, respecting the construction of a Canadian National railway line between Kingsclear and the St. Croix river, in the province of New Brunswick.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee Mr. Gordon in the chair.

[Stage Direction]
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Mr. HANSON:: Will the minister be good enough to say if the preliminary survey of this line has been completed? _ He will recall that when the resolution in connection with this bill was first introduced, he stated that the preliminary survey had not been completed, and that was correct at the time. I presume that by this time it has been completed. I merely wanted to know.


Mr. GRAHAM:: No surveys have been
made except a reconnaissance of two alternative distances, rather than routes, one over the 41 miles, contingent upon our being able to secure the running rights, and the other over the shorter course to connect with the Canadian Pacific Railway. Before we go further I might call the attention of the committee to the fact that, as in the case of the other bills, an amendment has been made in section 6 at the instance of the ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton).


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 4-Mileage and cost are estimates only but not to be exceeded by more than 15 per cent.
George Perry Graham: I think it is understood
that we shall include in this and the other sections where necessary the amendments that have been made in the bills which have already passed.


The CHAIRMAN:: The amendments are all included in the reprinted bill.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 6-Issue of securities limited if running rights obtained.
Mr. MACLEAN (York):: In regard to
running rights, have any negotiations in that direction taken place?


George Perry Graham: It is not practicable to carry on negotiations for running rights until the company has been given the right to build. When that is done application can be made to the Board of Railway Commissioners for the purpose of obviating duplication.


William Findlay Maclean: The government
may exercise that right?


George Perry Graham: The Canadian National
Railways will exercise the right of appealing to the Board of Railway Commissioners. Personally I have no doubt that some arrangement will be arrived at.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 9-Statement to parliament annually.
George Perry Graham: I want to be absolutely
fair about this. In a similar section in the other bills I think the committee passed an amendment the other night. The ex-Minister of Finance moved then to add after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of", together with another slight amendment.


George Newcombe Gordon: The present section, with the amendments as passed in the other bills, reads:
The minister shall present to parliament during the first ten days of each session held prior to the date mentioned in section 1 of this act a statement showing in detail the nature and extent of the work done, etc.


Mr. LOGAN:: I suggest that we use the
word "within" rather than during. The latter word almost implies that this presentation is to be made every day. Personally I think the word "within" would be better.


George Newcombe Gordon: All the other bills have been amended in this way, and it would seem desirable to have the present bill in conformity with them.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Before this bill is passed, Mr. Chairman, I desire to read to the committee, so that it may appear in Hansard, a resolution passed by the Fredericton Board of Trade at a meeting held on May 14, 1924, in favour of this branch line. The resolution is rather long and enumerates a good many reasons in its support, and in view of its importance I feel I am in duty bound to read1 it. It reads:
Whereas, the Canadian Government Railway system is the important railway system serving the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, with a total mileage of about 2,769 miles,
And whereas, the whole of the province of Prince Edw'ard Island, the greater part of Nova Scotia, and about half of the province of New Brunswick are entirely dependent upon the Canadian National Railway system, both for the transportation of all goods imported, and all merchandises exported, as well as for passenger traffic,
And whereas a very large proportion of the exports of the Maritime provinces go to the New England, and other eastern states.
And whereas, a very large passenger traffic originates on the Canadian National Railway bound for the eastern states,

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And whereas, the Canadian National Railway system in the Maritime provinces has no direct connection with any American railroad, thus making it necessary for the government system to hand over its freight and passenger traffic for points in the eastern states, to a competitive railway,
And Whereas, this system either increases the freight to be paid on all exports, etc., thereby reducing the returns of the producers, or else reduces the earnings of the Canadian National Railways,
And whereas, there is now before the House of Commons, Ottawa, a bill providing for the building of a connecting link of railway betw'een the Canadian National Railway system in the Maritime provinces and the United States system of railways, from a point at or near Kingsclear, York County, N.B., on the St. John and Quebec Railway, to or near the town of Vancelboro in the State of Maine,
And whereas, this proposed construction is advocated by the directors of the Canadian National Railways as being of great importance in the development of traffic to and from the Maritime provinces and the United States, over the said Canadian National Railways, from a revenue standpoint,
And whereas, a similar policy was advocated by Mr. Gutelius, formerly general manager of the Canadian Government Railways:
Therefore be it resolved, by the Fredericton Board of Trade assembled this 14th day of May, 1924, that it is in the interest of' the patrons of the Canadian National Railways in the Maritime provinces, and in an economic way in the interest of all Canadian taxpayers, that a branch line of the Canadian National Railways be constructed from some suitable point on the Saint John River, to connect with the Maine Central Railway at a point at or near Vanceboro, Maine,
And further resolved, that copies of this resolution be forwarded to Mr. R. B. Hanson, Federal member of York-Sunbury; the Senators from New Brunswick, and the Minister of Railways, the Hon. George P. Graham.
W. J. Osborne,
President Fredericton Board of Trade. Fredericton, N.B., May 17th, 1924.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On the Title:
Sir HENRY DRAYTON:: I desire to point out somewhat more in detail what I have already said in connection with this railway. Briefly, the railway is not one which in my opinion can be justified as a matter of business; and I am referring to the subject now only in that respect. In the first place, I would point out that we already have a good many different connections on the Intercolonial with New England points. The next thing I point out is that since this matter first came up we know what the actual freight movements are. On May 5, after this bill had been considered in committee, the following information was given by the minister and will be found at page 1722 of Hansard. He was asked as to the volume of revenue freight traffic transferred to the Canadian Pacific for furtherance to United States points. His answer was:
The tonnage of such traffic handed to Canadian Pacific Railway during 1923 was 187,909 tons and tonnage received during same period front Canadian Pacific Railway was 8,419 tons making a total of 196,328 tons.
Then on the question of receipts he answered :
(a) Canadian National earnings on above traffic were $321,606.65. (b) The St. John & Quebec Railway earnings were $53,255.69 of which the Canadian National retain 60 per cent.
Then with regard to the amount of money which the National system would have earned had this connection been built the answer is:
The Canadian National would have received one hundred per cent of the tonnage shown in reply to Question 1 and additional revenue amounting to $246,917,33.
It will be observed in the first instance, Mr. Chairman, that, based upon actual business- because here we get a photograph of what the situation is-there will be a gross added revenue to the Canadian National of $246,001 odd. I would point out to the committee that another question was answered very shortly afterwards, and it will be found at page 1862 of Hansard. The question here deals with the operating ratios, which give us some slight index as to the amount of money the system would be able to hold out of the $246,000 odd to which I have referred, and it is shown that on the Atlantic region the operating ratio is 123.23; that is, for every $100 worth of revenue received on that part of the system the sum of $123 odd is required to earn it. This added traffic cannot change that ratio very much one way or the other, for those results would be smeared over the whole. Supposing we take this ratio at 120 instead of 123, the result is we would be out of pocket 20 per cent, and, further, we would be out of pocket the whole amount of the carrying charges of the investment. The matter is carried further by the information which my hon. friend gave me yesterday in connection with the operating ratios of this particular line. Hon. gentlemen will remember that we are proposing to build a branch line, from a line owned by the province of New Brunswick, 40 per cent of the receipts from which line have to be paid over to the province of New Brunswick, the Nationals retaining 60 per cent The answers and questions are to be found a page 2264 of Hansard, as follows:
Sir Henry Drayton:
1.	In discharge of the contract to pay 40 per cent of the gross traffic receipts earned on the St. John and Quebec Railways, how much money did the Canadian National system pay the province in respect of the operations of the year 1923?
2.	How much did the said sum so paid fall short of discharging the obligations of the province as the owner of the said railways?
3.	What sum did the 60 per cent retained by the Canadian National Railways amount to in the year 1923?

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4. By what amount did the said 60 per cent of receipts fail to meet the operating expenses on the St. John and Quebec Railways in the year 1923?
5.	What is the resultant operating ratio of the year's operations based upon the retention of but 60 per cent of the receipts?
Hon. Mr. Graham:
1.	$109,199.75.
2.	No information on this question.
3.	$163,799.64.
4.	$340,455.81.
5.	307.80 per cent.
I submit, Mr. Chairman, that this whole proposition is absolutely against the interest of the Canadian National Railways. It cannot be defended from a traffic standpoint. These are not my figures; they are the figures of the system. They ought to be an answer to any reasonable man on the question as to the necessity of building this branch. I really think that if my hon. friend is at all well advised he will withdraw the bill. I am quite confident that if parliament is foolish enough to enact this legislation the line will never be built.


Mr. CALDWELL:: Mr. Chairman, while
the information given by the hon. member for West York (Sir Henry Drayton) is correct, I think it should be supplemented by some further information. In the first place, the St. John and Quebec railway, when projected, was to have been built from St. John to Grand Falls to connect with the Transcontinental at that point. Unfortunately only the middle section has been built and it has never been connected with either end. For instance, the last ten miles from Westfield to St. John has never been built and we had to get running rights over the Canadian Pacific into St. John. Three or four years ago I went before our provincial government at the head of a delegation to urge the necessity of completing the northern end of the railway from Centreville to Grand Falls. The then premier informed us that if the Dominion government would build the connecting link, which is the subject of this bill, the province would build the northern end. He said: "Unless this outlet is built we do not feel that it would be prudent for the province to build the northern section and continue to gather freight for the Canadian Pacific." A railway from Centreville to Grand Falls is very badly needed. I venture this prediction, and I have made it repeatedly in this House, that if this connecting link is built, thereby enabling the province to build the northern section, it will be one of the best paying lines in Canada. We simply gather freight to turn over to the Canadian Pacific Railway at four or five different points where we might begin to make something on the haulage of it. We are at

present sustaining a deficit of close to half a million dollars a year on this line, about half of which -is the Dominion's and the other half that of the province. If this completion does not take place we shall continue to lose half a million dollars a year. There is no doubt that the minister will be able to get running rights over the Canadian Pacific from Harvey to Vanceboro. If that is done it will not cost over S800.000 to build the 14 miles from Kings-clear to Harvey, and according to the figures given by my hon. friend (Sir Henry Drayton) himself, our earnings would be increased in the neighbourhood of $200,000 per year. If by spending $800,000 we can increase our earnings by over $200,000, that would be a pretty good showing. If the northern end of this road were completed to Grand Falls it would be one of the best-paying roads in eastern Canada, because all the freight destined for New England states points originating on the whole government system in that country- and there are about 2,200 miles of government railways in the Maritime provinces and eastern Quebec-would be routed over the St. John Valley railway to this outlet, from one end or the other. At present, however, we are simply maintaining sidings, stations, station agents and a train service to gather freight to hand over to the Canadian Pacific at various points. I am sure that the hon. member for West York is candid in his criticism, but if he knew the situation as I know it I am confident that he would revise his remarks with regard to it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Apparently I
cannot get the interest of the minister, but I will try again. I will take another point: Is it necessary to build lines unless we save mileage? Is it necessary to build lines which largely amount to duplication? Again, is it necessary to build this railway through a territory which twenty-five years hence will probably contain the same number of people that it has to-day? When this matter was discussed before, it was admitted freely that no freight would originate in that territory, that the line would merely serve the purpose of getting freight out. If there is any dispute about that I would sincerely like to hear it. Who is rash enough to say on his responsibility as a member that any new traffic will result from the building of this line in the territory that it runs through? Well, no member is rash enough to make the assertion. Here then, is a place where we get no new traffic. The hon. member (Mr. Caldwell) says it looks to him as if an income of $249,000 would be a good return on the investment. He would be right if we held the money, but the figures brought down by the minister

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himself-they are not mine-in connection with the operation of the St. John Valley system, show that for every $100 of revenue we pay out in the cost of performing that service $307.80. No one who knows anything about this matter-and I challenge the minister to contradict me if I am wrong-will say on his responsibility as a member of the House that with the construction of this line the operating expense ratio can be cut down to anything like the ratio prevailing on the main line and the system generally-$123 for every $100 earned. Let us know what we are doing; let us understand what our action involves. "We are building a line which cannot pay. This is not a net receipt; it is a gross receipt, and the figures produced by the government show that it costs $307.80 to earn $100 on the St. John Valley line.
Let me go into the matter a little further. In the original discussion the question of traffic over the National Transcontinental as against the Intercolonial was discussed. Nova Scotia business or any other business passing fhrough or originating at Moncton may be routed, first, Intercolonial to St. John and then transferred to the Canadian Pacific. The distance from Moncton to St. John is 90 miles, the distance from St. John to Vance-boro, 91 miles. Hon. gentlemen will observe that Vanceboro is the common point in both schemes. Then again, the traffic may be routed by the Transcontinental to McGivney and thence south over the old Canada Eastern to Fredericton for transfer at Fredericton to the Canadian Pacific. In other words, as matters stand to-day it is open to the management of the Canadian National to route their Nova Scotia traffic, Moncton traffic and that of points further than Moncton, either by the Transcontinental through McGivney or by the Intercolonial through St. John. If the new line is built the mileages will be as follows: Moncton to McGivney, 95.7; McGivney to Fredericton, 34.6; Fredericton to Kingsclear, 16; Kingsclear to Vanceboro, 41; total, 187.3 miles as against 181 at present. In other words, this new gateway which is to be built through a barren territory, producing nothing, is to have a greater mileage than that now available.
Now, as to the north shore and northern New Brunswick business-and I want the minister to interrupt me if I am wrong; we ought to be able to arrive at a common point in respect to a business matter of this kind so that there will be no room either for recrimination or misunderstanding. He has his figures; he knows what his reports are and he will correct me if I am wrong. The north
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shore and northern New Brunswick business moves: Intercolonial to Newcastle and Canada Eastern to Fredericton. Potatoes and lumber from Carleton county-and I would like to say something about Carleton county that I know the hon. member representing it will like; It is, I think, probably the best farming county in New Brunswick, it produces a great many potatoes, and Centreville, I suppose, is just about the best point in that whole county-


Richard Burpee Hanson: What about York county?


Henry Lumley Drayton: We come to York county afterwards. The density of farm produce would be very fairly put, I think, at Centreville, and my hon. friend from Carleton will correct me if I am wrong-


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: You are only getting
into the thick of it there.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think Centreville is just about the centre. However that may be, it certainly is a very important point. Now their traffic moves on the St. John Valley line to Woodstock, and is there transferred to the Canadian Pacific; the distance there is 25 miles. Supposing, it did not move that way, it would go over the St. John Valley to Woodstock, pass through Woodstock to Kingsclear, 48 miles; you have the total of these two mileages there. But the present business from the north is transferred to the Canadian Pacific at Woodstock. Business now from King's county, which is another very good agricultural county, would run on the St. John Valley from Westfield to Kingsclear, 85 miles. That is what would have to be done if we were going to work it that way. If it went by way of Westfield to Kingsclear it would travel 10 miles on the Canadian Pacific tracks. Now the proposition means these additional mileages, these unnecessary mileages, as against these intervening points of transfer at present.
Here is another point I would put to my hon. friend, and he knows a good deal about railway operation:	Is this line to conduct a
passenger business? Everybody knows it must. My hon. friend I should think at once would say that if the Nationals build this line they are going to put a passenger business on it. Now I wonder if he has ever considered what that means. Everybody knows that the passenger business at this point is passenger business which has to do with the larger New England points. Boston and the like. He also knows that, so far as passenger business is concerned, St. John is the most important point in New Brunswick. Now, just see. how that works out. I have already shown
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the increased length of haul for freight; let us now take this passenger business, at the points where the passenger business would be heaviest. Se. John would certainly have to have its passenger service; that is the point where .my hon. friend's regular passenger trains on the Nationals are to be found. The passenger haul from Boston and New England points by the new route from Vanceboro, the common point again, would be 140 miles, and by the Canadian Pacific from Vanceboro, 90 miles. What chance is there for anything like a profitable return on a mileage over fifty per cent greater than the Canadian Pacific's movement? I venture to say that my hon. friend has not thought of it. and I think it might be a very good thing for him to think over even now. If the whole object in question is to control cars, instead of handing over traffic to the Canadian Pacific, running rights can easily be obtained on existing mileage, which is shorter than that proposed to be built.
Let us go back for a minute. When this matter was discussed before, the great cry was that the Canadian Pacific held up cars which the Nationals should get. Now, I ask my hon. friend, is there any dispute about that? Is it not true that when this matter was first discussed in this House, and when it was discussed in the committee, the great argument was control of the cars?


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: One of the arguments,
a minor one.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend says it was a minor argument. I do not know that he talked on it. Will the minister say it was a minor one.


George Perry Graham: My experience with the
shortage of cars last year in the Maritime provinces would convince me that it was an important question. My hon. friend from Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) gave one or two instances of its importance, from his own knowledge.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Certainly it was a very important question. The information of the House was that the Canadian Pacific were holding up Canadian National cars, and that was the great ground for the building of this line. Well, another question was answered a few days ago, with which my hon. friend is very familiar, and that question was as to how many cars of the National Railways at the end of each month of the current year the Canadian Pacific was holding, and how many cars belonging to the Canadian Pacific the Canadian National was holding, and it was found-the information is on Hansard, and any one can turn it up- (Sir Henry Drayton.]
that in every single month the Nationals had far more Canadian Pacific cars on their tracks than the Canadian Pacific had Nationals on its tracks.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: Would you claim this
would apply to the St. John and Quebec railway?


Henry Lumley Drayton: All I am talking about is the figures I am supplied with by the management itself.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: That is for the whole National system.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It is the whole system, of course. Railways do not keep separate accounts as to cars over this mileage here and that mileage there; it is the whole system. Of course, it transpired in the committee, and I want my hon. friend again to interrupt me if I am wrong, that there had never been application made by the Nationals to the Railway Board! to compel the return of cars. The whole question of the car business was an excuse, and not a reason; the facts were against it. But let us assume that it was a reason, and not an excuse; let us assume in violence to all the facts that the Canadian Nationals are being robbed of cars. Now, under existing arrangements to-day- and again I am going to ask my hon. friend to correct me if I am wrong-running rights may be obtained over existing connections which would give the Canadian National Railways absolute control of their cars, and would save the expenditure of this large sum of money, with all these resulting railway deficits. Are we interested in keeping down deficits? Do we really want to see something like a proper show given to the National system? Well, we are not going to do it, if in the face of figures produced by the government itself, we persist in throwing away money.
I go back to the alleged reason, and I say that without the expenditure of five cents the system could control its cars. Suppose we stop handing over any freight to the Canadian Pacific at all. Running rights without any new construction can be obtained from Fredericton to Vanceboro over the Canadian Pacific Railway. The minister knows that. He knows that the Board of Railway Commissioners has the power to order running rights.


George Perry Graham: Under certain conditions.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my hon.
friend suggest that under these conditions it cannot be done?

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George Perry Graham: They may grant running
rights to save duplication. If there is no duplication threatened I doubt whether they would do so.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not know
about that.


George Perry Graham: It was discussed thoroughly in the committee by counsel for the Canadian National. My hon. friend was there.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend has not got the point.


George Perry Graham: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: No, my hon.
friend has not. The argument advanced by Mr. Ruel as showing the necessity for a pool of some sort was, not that running rights could not be granted unless there was duplication, but that there ought to be a statutory right to operate. But here to-day without the construction of a line, we can get running rights, Fredericton to Fredericton Junction, that is twenty-two miles, and from Fredericton Junction to Harvey, a total of forty-three miles, as against Fredericton to Kingsclear seventeen miles, and Kingsclear to Harvey, a common point, nineteen miles, or a total of thirty-six miles.


An hon. MEMBER:: No, sixteen miles and fourteen miles respectively, a total of thirty miles.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I got my figures off the map. If they are wrong I want to be put right but I do not think they are much out. It would be a bit longer mileage but you would save an awful lot of money in connection with it, and you would save an operating deficit which is infinitely worse than the whole of the capital expenditure. Now, where does that leave the whole matter? It simply leaves it here:	That on the one hand for
the purpose of getting control of our cars we are to do something that is entirely unnecessary, for, as I have said, we can get these running rights. We are to build this considerable mileage through an absolutely barren bit of country. We are to 'build that in connection with a system the operating ratio of which is 307, so that we are spending, under the company's own figures, $307 for every $100 we get. If this would make such a difference in the St. John Valley system as to make the operating ratio more nearly comparable to the general operating ratio of the whole system there might be something to say for it, but that ratio would be far exceeded here and I am sure the minister knows it. The operating ratio shown for
the whole of that territory is $123 plus for every $100 brought in. That is what is meant here, and I should like the minister to show whether it can be done more cheaply.


George Perry Graham: My hon. friend has striven hard to get up a good brief against this railway. Two of his propositions for obviating the construction of this line involve in the first place running over the St. John railway, to which my hon. friend objects, and in the second place the Canadian Pacific. These suggestions do not materially help the Canadian National Railway to swell its income. My hon. friend says that if the Canadian National asked for running rights they would be granted. He adds, however, there would have to be some amendment to the act-the railway would have to have statutory power of operation before this was asked for.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I said that was Mr. Ruel's argument.


George Perry Graham: If that be true, and it was not denied in the committee, unless some agreement is arrived at there can be no running rights unless the Canadian National had operating rights over some other line. In a radway bill of its own the Canadian Pacific Railway Company insisted, as the Canadian National Railway insisted recently, that if a certain line was built by the latter, there should be a clause inserted in the act compelling the Canadian National to make a joint arrangement with the Canadian Pacific. Now, if the Board of Railway Commissioners had the right to order a joint arrangement why the necessity of putting such a provision in the act?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Running rights and joint arrangements are different.


George Perry Graham: They surely are, but they are a good deal alike. If the Canadian Pacific railway had been sure that it could get running rights it would not have asked for an amendment to be inserted in the statute.
All this talk about running rights
4 p.m. is a bit of a myth unless running rights can be agreed upon between the two roads. The St. John railway does not belong to the Canadian National line. They only operate it under an agreement and its operating ratio of course is high. The Quebec and St. John railway was constructed by the province of New Brunswick under an agreement that the old Intercolonial would operate it. The Intercolonial took 60 per cent of the receipts and the province of New Brunswick 40 per cent, the latter guaranteeing the bonds and paying the interest thereon.
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Henry Lumley Drayton: I do not want to delay my hon. friend, but I really have only one object and that is to see that unprofitable lines are not built. Would my hon. friend say that before he gives his guarantees he will get a certificate from the Board of Railway Commissioners that it is in the public interest?


George Perry Graham: I certainly will not undertake anything of the kind. That would be placing the Canadian National system under a disability that no other railway suffers from.


Henry Lumley Drayton: The Canadian
Pacific is in that position to-day.


George Perry Graham: Not at all. The Canadian Pacific cannot locate its line, the Board of Railway Commissioners do that, but the company is not compelled to say whether the line is going to pay or not.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Will my hon.
friend say that the board cannot stop any Canadian Pacific construction that involves duplication?


George Perry Graham: I admitted that some time ago, but my hon. friend said the line must not be built unless we get a certificate from an outside body that it was going to pay.


Henry Lumley Drayton: In the public interest that is all I say.


George Perry Graham: Parliament must depend
upon the men who run the Canadian National railway and if we are going to take the advice of any person it must be their advice. I did not draw the act that excepts the Canadian National in the Board of Railway Commissioners in the matter of location, that was put through the House before my time and I am not responsible for it. It may be right and it may be wrong, that is not the question. The question is should this line be built. I was proceeding to point out to my hon. friend that although theoretically he had made out a case for running rights, yet when it came [DOT]down to practice, it would be impossible to get running rights at all over the lines which he suggests could be used for that purpose.
Then my hon. friend referred to the ratio on the St. John Valley railway which I was describing when he interrupted me. The ratio is high, and the ratio is high in the whole Atlantic region,-and I want to speak of that in a moment-but let me point this out: My hon. friend himself admitted that the proposition would improve the ratio of operating expenses against revenue, but he said it would only improve it a little. Well, the Canadian National railways are made up of a conglomeration of systems, and it is by these little savings and reductions of ratio all over the entire

system that the management is going to be able to bring it to a point where it will pay approximately. It will take many years, I admit that, before it will be able to pay its carrying charges; but if we are going to reject all these little savings because some person objects to them then we will never get the operating ratio down to a place where it will balance the revenue.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend
said it would take a little time to meet the carrying charges. Until that time comes is he not making the worst of the operating ratio?


George Perry Graham: My hon. friend stated a
moment ago that the operating ratio was $123 throughout the Atlantic region, the ratio here and even if reduced in this case to $120 that reduction would not amount to anything. But if the ratio is reduced by anything, the reduction will amount to something.


Mr. MEIGHEN:: Not necessarily.


George Perry Graham: In arguing the point, my
hon. friend does not want me to get along this far. The ex-Minister of Finance (Sir Henry Drayton) was arguing at the time as regards ratio and nothing else. I am answering that and he admits that it will reduce the ratio of operating expense to income.


Arthur Meighen: You do not necessarily
gain by reducing the ratio. Your reduction of ratio may not compensate for the increase of overhead.


George Perry Graham: That is possible in a large matter, but it is not possible in a small one of this kind. I was answering my hon friends opposite. I want to be fair to what is known as the Atlantic region. The operating ratio there is 123; but if the traffic on the system which the Maritime provinces feed and from which they are fed were all credited to the Atlantic region, the ratio would be much better than 123. Therefore, in order to be fair, we would have to go beyond that. It is not fair to say-my hon. friend has not said this, but some others have said it-that the traffic which goes through eastern Quebec and the Maritime provinces costs $123 to earn $100, because that is not true. The traffic that comes from Halifax, St. John and Sydney to Montreal helps to make the central region have a better showing and so does the traffic that the Atlantic region takes to those places. That, if credited to the point where it originates, say Montreal, if the Atlantic region were extended to that point, would make a much better showing for the Atlantic region than exists to-day.

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Richard Burpee Hanson: Does the minister not
think that his argument is a justification for making representations to the management that they should extend the Atlantic region to Montreal?


George Perry Graham: It does not make a bit
of difference to the freight or anything of that kind. It makes a difference only as regards the comparisons and I have tried to clear up the injustice of the comparisons.


Mr. MacLAREN:: It makes a difference
to the ratio.


George Perry Graham: You cannot buy anything
with the ratio.


Henry Lumley Drayton: No, it is the
wrong way.


George Perry Graham: As to the cars, the hon.
member for Victoria and Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) put his finger on the weak spot in my hon. friend's argument. The Canadian National or the Canadian Pacific, might have a surplus of cars in its possession belonging to the other road in some parts of Canada and a deficit in other parts of Canada. When there is a great rush of cars to the West for the movement of the grain crop, it is almost impossible to prevent a dearth of cars in eastern Canada. The telegrams which I received a year ago from New Brunswick, the eastern part of Quebec and Nova Scotia complaining that they had no cars to move their products, were very embarrassing, because I could not find any way out of .the difficulty. I asked the management and they put two or three men across the line endeavouring to get cars back. The difficulty is that in eastern Canada more is exported in pulpwood and so on across the line; you think you are going to get the cars back, and under present circumstances even if a car is sent to the boundary, it is not sent to the Canadian National, but it engages on another line, not working for us. The car argument has not been demolished. It is admitted that the ratio of operation will be improved. The men who are paid to advise in this matter are very urgent that this line should be built, and I think the committee should adopt the report of the committee on Railways and Canals and give assent to the clauses of the bill.


Henry Lumley Drayton: My hon. friend
says one thing that I am surprised to hear. He says that there is an unfair method of accounting on the Canadian National.


George Perry Graham: I did not say that at all.
I said that on account of what is called the
Atlantic region, there is on that region much traffic which, if the region were extended to Montreal, would be credited to that region; but it being a smaller region, the traffic is not so credited. It depends upon where you divide the region what the result of the traffic on that region will be to a large extent. The Atlantic region, as we have it is not given full credit for everything that would- be credited to it if it were enlarged.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Why should the proper thing not be done then?


George Perry Graham: The question about the
ratio is immaterial.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think my hon. friend is really wrong in his premises. He is going back to a very old question in connection with railway accounting and figures. Different companies and also different railway managements look at the matter in different ways. For example, the ratio in some years has been very much better in the West than in the East, or rather the central territory, and merchants and shippers in the central territory used to insist that the reason they had a bad ratio was that a great deal of western traffic came through under a very low furtherance rate, entirely out of line with the rates which they had to pay. But it was generally looked upon as being satisfactory, provided that the same rule was observed by all. In that case there was nothing wrong in what was being done. If my hon. friend has satisfied himself, for example, that there is very much more freight originating in the Atlantic division for furtherance through the central division, than there is freight originating in -the central division for furtherance through the Atlantic division-if he knows that to be the case, there is a good deal in what he says. But until he knows that the Atlantic division is supporting the central division to a greater extent than the central division is supporting the Atlantic division, he cannot advance us further in connection with the question. Has my hon. friend been considering that?


George Perry Graham: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Perhaps, then,
he will give us the result in tonnage in each centre.


George Perry Graham: I could not do that; I have not the figures at my fingers' ends.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Perhaps my
hon. friend will bring them down.


George Perry Graham: I am not going to get into an argument with my hon. friend re-
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garding freight rates here and there; but speaking as a layman, I think the committee will agree with me that if the eastern region had the traffic that originates in the province of Quebec, say in Montreal, and all the credit of the traffic from eastern Atlantic ports down to Montreal no matter where the traffic originated, surely the ratio in the Atlantic region would be reduced, just as the assessor succeeded in reducing the ratio in the central region.


Murray MacLaren: If the Atlantic region
comprised an area which we consider it should-and I think from what the minister said, he also appreciates that there would be an advantage in extending the Atlantic region-I hope he will follow this up and exercise such influence as he has in giving this Atlantic division its proper area. When this branch line was before the committee a short time ago the minister said he would obtain the information explaining how the cars would be brought back to the Canadian National in more ample numbers than at present. Will he give us that explanation now? He has said something upon the point but so far as I am concerned it has not served as an explanation. The minister might explain how the extension of 41 miles to the boundary line to connect with the Maine Central will bring back the cars to the Canadian National in a more satisfactory way ;han would be possible if the line passed to Harvey. I should also take this opportunity to point out, as I did before the Railway committee, that the extension of this line as proposed does not go through McAdam; it goes within two miles of Mc-Adam. Therefore, it would be necessary to establish a new custom house, with officials, at St. Croix. This is an item of expense which, while it is not paid by the railways, has to be met by the country and it is an element in connection with the necessary expenses of the new line that must be taken into consideration.


George Perry Graham: If I understand rightly,
Harvey is the point at which it is proposed to join the Canadian Pacific Railway.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Harvey is the
common point.


Murray MacLaren: I understand it is
proposed to build from Kingsclear to Vance-boro.


George Perry Graham: What is the distance between these two points?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Forty-one miles.
[Mr. Graham.}


George Perry Graham: Let me try to explain
the point to the hon. member as clearly as possible. It is intended to ask for running rights and to build the shorter rather than the longer line. If they can obtain those rights, as the Canadian National Railways think they can, application will be made to the Board of Railway Commissioners for the purpose of avoiding duplication. And the Canadian National Railways, having the right to build the 41 miles, will probably decide to construct over the shorter distance of 14 miles instead. If that is done there will be no necessity for the customs house as my hon. friend thinks. This, of course, presumes that things will work out satisfactorily, as I believe they will. My hon. friend asks what I think is a fair and proper question:	By what process will the return to
the Canadian National of their own cars from the American side be improved? That return will be expedited in this way. At present the Canadian National Railways hand over their freight to the Canadian Pacific, and the cars are then in the possession of the Canadian Pacific Railway until, of course, they are returned. W'ith running rights, however, the Canadian National would run their own trains to the border to connect with the Maine Central-perhaps even running on the other side as well-and1 when the cars came back they would be handed over direct to the Canadian National Railways at the border and not to the Canadian Pacific to be handed over in turn to the Canadian National, as at present. In other words, the cars would not be diverted; they would come directly into the possession of the Canadian National Railways on their return.


Murray MacLaren: Does the minister think that a diversion would occur in that distance? Would there be a diversion between Vance-boro and Harvey?


George Perry Graham: I do not get the idea.
The Canadian National Railways would have their own transfer rights and all that sort of thing, and any rolling stock that came back they would receive directly.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: Knowing the situation
as I do, perhaps I might be able to explain it clearly to the hon. member.


Murray MacLaren: I just want to finish
this point. In the event of the 41 miles being built, which was the position taken originally when the matter was before the committee, how would the Canadian National Railways get their cars back any easier after they have connected with the Maine Central?

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The Canadian Pacific Railway does not come in then.


George Perry Graham: The Canadian National
cars would be got back more easily inasmuch as they would never see a Canadian Pacific track; they would come from the Maine Central right on to the Canadian National.


Murray MacLaren: Is the Canadian Pacific Railway a more direadful menace in this matter than is the Maine Central?


George Perry Graham: I think I understand my
hon. friend's point. Of course, we shall not be able to make the American, lines any more expeditious in the return of our cars, but undoubtedly the cars would be returned to the Canadian National more readily and more satisfactorily if they were handed over directly to the company instead of being returned through the medium of the Canadian Pacific Railway.


Murray MacLaren: My point is that in
the event of the building of the 41 miles there is no advantage from the standpoint of getting the cars back more quickly.


George Perry Graham: The hon. member does
not get the point.


Murray MacLaren: Does he not? I do
not get the minister's point of view.


George Perry Graham: That may be so, too.


Murray MacLaren: All I say is that the
building of this 41 miles does not ensure an easier or more satisfactory return of the cars than we have to-day, because the Maine Central comes in and we have no control over the American lines within American territory. The other point I want to make is this, that this would seem an opportune moment for the minister to give us some encouragement in regard to the extension of the Atlantic division.


George Perry Graham: I do not think that has
anything to do with the bill; it is something for the board of management to consider.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I want to say
just a word or two in order to make the record complete. In this matter of cars, it seems the Canadian Pacific Railway are bad robbers; they are making trouble. My hon. friend is not worried very much over the American line, but he is willing to spend over $2,000,000 to get rid of this Canadian Pacific Railway bugaboo. We have heard about the Canadian Pacific shortage of cars as a result of the harvest movement, and my
hon. friend from Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) has told us about that. So as to make the record complete I will give to the committee again the government's own figures-not my own- as to how the thing works out; they will show what a bad holder-up of Canadian National cars the Canadian Pacific is and vice versa. Let us take the figures for last year; hon. gentlemen will find them at page 1641 of Hansard. Last January, when the rush was not on in connection with the western grain crop, the Canadian Pacific Railway had 2,206 of the National cars and the Canadian National had 4,355 of the Canadian Pacific Railway cars. So that the Canadian National was not doing badly in the fight for cars; it was beating the Canadian Pacific then.
In February the National cars with the Canadian Pacific numbered 1,968; on the other hand, Canadian Pacific cars with the Canadian National, 3,479. In March of National cars with the Canadian Pacific there were 2,068; and the Nationals had of Canadian Pacific cars, 4,025. April, the Canadian Pacific have of National cars 2,399, while the Nationals have of Canadian Pacific cars, 4.110. May, the Canadian Pacific have 1,414 National cars, as against 4,495 Canadian Pacific cars held by the National. June, 1,964 National cars held by the Canadian Pacific, as against 3,413 Canadian Pacific cars held by the National. July, 1,748 National cars with the Canadian Pacific, 3,067 Canadian Pacific cars with the National. August. 1,525 National cars held by the Canadian Pacific, as against 3,981 Canadian Pacific cars held by the National. September, 1,691 National cars with the Canadian Pacific, and on the other hand 2,940 Canadian Pacific cars with the National. October, 2,050 as against 3,399; November, 2,757 as against 3,898; December, 2,526 as against 3,545. And we are to spend two million dollars odd so that the Nationals can get even a better showing I


George Perry Graham: It might not affect this
situation one car.


Henry Lumley Drayton: In fairness my hon. friend ought not to make that statement.


George Perry Graham: Surely.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does my hon.
friend really think that a fair statement to make?


George Perry Graham: Absolutely.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Here is the
scramble for cars, and one system with per-
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centages one hundred per cent more in many cases and occasionally worse than that, and yet my hon. friend says it is a fair thing to increase those percentages by the expenditure of two million dollars. He knows that the cars are right in those figures, and yet he says they have nothing to do with it.


George Perry Graham: I beg my hon. friend's
pardon. I do not know anything of the kind. All the cars are in those figures, but this statement might be absolutely true-which it is-and yet show a surplus of Canadian National cars held by the Canadian Pacific in this particular vicinity and not interfere with the figures at all because those cover the whole Dominion.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Surely if all the cars are included, these cars are in these figures?


George Perry Graham: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Of necessity, if the government is bringing down truthful information, the cars at this interchange point are in these figures. Why does my hon. friend say they are not?


George Perry Graham: I did not attempt to
deny it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I certainly understood my hon. friend to deny it.


George Perry Graham: Oh, no.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Mr. Chairman, I am not going to delay the committee any further. Mileages, returns, business-every proper consideration that can be thought of-show that this line ought not to be built.
Bill reported.
Mr. GRAHAM moved the third reading of the bill.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Mr. Speaker, I notice it has been stated that the opposition are guilty of obstructing these bills. I should like to know from the Minister of Railways and Canals himself what he thinks of the treatment accorded to him by the opposition when they have allowed him to put through in a short sitting twelve of these bills, when instead of obstructing the opposition waived their rights under the rules of the House. Does my hon. friend himself think that that is a fair criticism of our action? Let us try to remember one or two things. It is against the rules of the House to advance a bill more than one stage at a sitting unless by unanimous consent. I do not think my hon. friend would question that statement. Consent was given by the opposition to this procedure in connection with

each one of the twelve bills. Is that the attitude of obstruction? This bill can only go through to-day with the consent of the opposition, Mr. Speaker, as you well know. We have done everything to expedite the passage of these bills. The last day that they were before the House, in considerably less than two and a half hours the House put through guarantees in connection with them amounting to over ten million dollars when the plus per cent is taken into account. Mr. Speaker, we are not obstructing. We believe there ought to be a business reason for the construction of every one of these lines, and we have tried to get this considered by bringing forward business facts and consideration of railway operation. Surely that is not obstruction. I have a pretty good idea that the system itself is not going on with much of this construction. Indeed, if much of it ever is gone on with I suspect that the contracts will be advertised just about election time. But, Mr. Speaker, the opposition have not obstructed but have facilitated the passage of these bills, and I know my hon. friend will agree with me in this.
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals):	Mr. Speaker, I have
not found fault with my hon. friend (Sir Henry Drayton). We know that he has talked a good deal and has not always thrown much light on the subject, but he was within his rights. We are making fairly good progress, This poor bill has taken a lot of time both in committee and in the House, but it is finally emerging. I admit that the bill cannot go through more than one stage without consent, but the custom of the House is this: Unless there is something essential to intervene, when bills go through the first and the second reading they go to a committee and when they come back from the committee there is not much difficulty about their getting a third reading. The literal rule to which my hon. friend refers is not very often invoked in practice. The reason that we had so many stages in this case is found in the fact that although government bills need not go to the Railway committee, these bills went to the Railway cominittee and were thoroughly discussed. Ninety-nine per cent of the bills that go to a committee-private bills, for example-are not subsequently discussed in the House unless there is some particular reason for it. But I make no complaint of my hon. friend's discussion of these bills.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Does the minister not think we did pretty well the other night?

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George Perry Graham: Yes, though nearly all the bills were in respect to roads that had already been started. But they had to go through just the same, and I think we are making good progress. I do not offer any complaint as to my hon. friend's delaying the House; that is his business.


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railway and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 32, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Sunnybrae and Guys-borough, in the province of Nova Scotia.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Henry Lumley Drayton: I suppose my
hon. friend had the amendments that were agreed to inserted in the bill? I would not expect to see in it, of course, the one we moved as a matter of principle, but I refer to the insertion of the words 1 in the first ten days of " and the reference to the detailed statement.


George Perry Graham: Yes. Every amendment I think, was put in except the particular motion to which my hon. friend refers.


Henry Lumley Drayton: We have not yet got any light on the building of this line, that is, light of such a character as would convince us that at a time like the present this expenditure is justified. But after having discussed it both here and in the committee I recognize that it is idle to debate the question any further. I merely desire to say that we think the amendments already agreed to should be incorporated in the bill-and in this the minister concurs. I suggest also that it should be noted as moved, as was done before, that the amount should be included in the estimates, and that the motion be recorded as lost on division. Just put it on the scroll, Mr. Chairman.


Mr. MACDONALD (Pictou):: When the resolution in connection with this bill was before the committee, my hon. friend (Sir Henry Drayton) intimated that this was purely a political road and that it was being built for political purposes. My hon. friend must now admit that there was no ground for any such assertion; indeed, I Should think he would be prepared frankly to take that position, even though he might believe he had
reason to object on other grounds. But apparently my hon. friend is not disposed to take that course. I say this because the hon. gentleman was present in the Railway committee when his political friend, Colonel Cantley, showed conclusively the necessity for the construction of this road and declared that there could be no possible justification for the assertion that political matters were involved in it in any way. It seems to me that my hon. friend is not taking the proper attitude toward his political friend and associate, who has a knowledge of the local conditions. The situation in regard to this road is this: It has been approved of by every government since 1910-by the government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who provided for the construction of a portion of it in the estimates of 1911; by Hon. Mr. Cochrane, who is on record in Hansard in 1915 as approving of the road; by the board over which Mr. Hanna presided and of which Colonel Cantley was a member, which passed a resolution providing for the commencement of construction, the war, however, intervening. The new board presided over by Sir Henry Thornton again took up the matter and recommended to the government that in the programme of branch line construction which was necessary for the advancement of the interests of the railway and of the -country this road should be included. I venture to say that that record of commendation and approval cannot be duplicated in regard to any one of the othe; branch line proposals before the House We are in a peculiar position in Nova Scotia. Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia have only t'he Canadian National Railways to afford- them means of transport to and from the other provinces. The adjacent province of New Brunswick has the Canadian Pacific and the Canadian National, to both of which those interested in advancing that province can resort with proposals for the construction of lines for the development of the province; and so also in Quebec, Ontario and the various western provinces. But in the province of Nova Scotia, and particularly the eastern part of Nova Scotia, we have natural conditions that are not equalled in any other part of this country, and there is no other railway company to which we can go for initiating development except the Canadian National. There is no use talking about the incorporation of smaller companies and the running of independent roads; that is not possible to-day; they could not be financed. So the Canadian National is the only railway that can deal with this situation. This country has entrusted to Sir Henry Thornton and his board the
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task of deciding where railway development shall take place, and unless we are going to take their judgment, and more especially in regard to matters where it is supported and justified by the records of this House and the records of the railway department, we may ao well not ask for advice on transportation matters from anybody. In this particular .reality through which this road is to pass, we have a varied situation in regard to natural resources that is hard to duplicate anywhere in this country. Not only have we vast timber resources of both hard and soft wood, but mineral resources also have been proven to exist; we have iron, for instance, and the gold deposits of Guysborough county, from which large quantities of gold have been taken in the last twenty-five years. These gold deposits are not high-grade ore, but low-grade, and can only be treated by machinery which cannot be transported there at the present time on account of the utter lack of railway facilities. Then, in addition, we have inexhaustible fishery resources in eastern Nova Scotia, in reference to which Colonel Cantley explained to the committee that on account of the shortening of the distance, which would enable the fish to find a market in Montreal and the central portions of this country, one could hardly make a prediction so far as the development of future traffic was concerned which would be too rosy. So, that is the situation in regard to this road and I do submit that the proposition is one that is entitled to the sympathetic consideration and support of every member of the committee. I again reiterate. I am surprised and disappointed that my hon. friend the ex-Minister of Finance should take the position which he has done.


Henry Lumley Drayton: It is indeed a
matter of great pain to me that I should at any time disappoint my hon. friend. I had really thought after hearing him in the midst of his usual diatribes that I never could disappoint him; I thought he had me outside of the corral altogether, as somebody that he had no hope in and no hope for. It is therefore pleasing to know that I have disappointed him, because that evidences the fact that some of the things I have said in the past he does not quite agree with. But I am afraid I shall have to go on giving the hon. gentleman pain.
I had hoped, Mr. Chairman, that we could get rid of this bill without further discussion.
I wonder if I shall be able to answer the hon. gentleman without having the party press of the government say in the usual letter which they send out, as they did the 
other day, that I am obstructing; but I will take the chance of that, and direct a few remarks to the committee in answer to what has been said by the hon. gentleman. After all, there is some penalty paid by all of us when we make unnecessary remarks for Hansard for the purpose of local copy. Mr. Chairman, I am of the view that a responsibility rests upon this parliament-that may be all wrong but I am at least honest in that view-ir connection with all matters of capital ex penditure in connection with the railways We have not that responsibility in connection with the management. Our position always has been that the fullest, freest hand should be given the management in connection with all matters of management and operation, but that so far as new capital expenditures are concerned, parliament had to take the responsibility.
There is another thing which I also believe, and that is having regard to the deficits of the National system, the first thing we should do is to get those deficits down. Capital expenditures ought to be held within the narrowest possible limits. Now that may be a matter of treason in the minds of some gentlemen; I do not know; but that, at all events, is my view. There is a responsibility on parliament to do its best to see that capital expenditures are kept down. We all know that in connection with new lines-and I am not saying that no new lines should be built; we have already consented to an awful lot of them-it takes some time at least before such a line becomes profitable. Now Sir Henry Thornton was a witness in this case. I do not know whether my hon. friend heard it, or whether, if he heard it, he remembers it, but Sir Henry Thornton said that he thought it would be at least four years before this line could be self-sustaining; that is the view of Sir Henry Thornton himself. It is perfectly true also that while he believes there will be deficits on this line for four years to come, he thinks it ought to be built. That is a matter in connection with which every member of this House has a right to have his own opinion, whether it is wise to multiply lines that are not going to pay for four years, and multiply deficits at the same time. Every member of this House not only has the right, but the duty thrown on him to exercise his own judgment in connection with that matter, and therefore I venture to have a mind of my own. I offered, this afternoon, and I now repeat the offer, that so far as I am concerned, if the enactment which was recommended by the report of the royal commission in 1916 becomes the law-that none of these railways

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ought to be built unless the Board of Railway Commissioners certify that their construction is necessary in the public interest-I am quite content to leave it at that. After all, that is only doing what is being done in the United States to-day. Railway companies there cannot build under their charters unless the Interstate Commerce Commission or the other commission in charge certifies that the building of the line is a necessity in the public interest. I do not think it is a good thing to build lines that are not going to pay for some years, and notwithstanding the appeal of my hon. friend I am going to stay of that opinion. I do not know whether my hon. friend wants me to go back over the old recommendations or not, but I may say that they were not recommendations in favour of this line. Why, one of the things Colonel Cantley said was, that he was very disappointed at the grades which were going to be followed upon this line. His desire was to cut out the bad grades on the old line, and to get this construction to a point where sixty cars could be drawn by one engine. That is the scheme the late Mr. Cochrane considered, but that recommendation is not one which would justify the building of this line as now proposed.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word " during " in the first line the words " the first ten days of," and after the word " showing " in the third line the words " in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill, as amended, reported.
Mr. GRAHAM moved the third reading of the bill.
Henry Lumley Drayton: In order to suit my hon. friend's convenience I consent to the bill being read a third time now.


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on 5 p.m. Bill 63, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Lockeport Station and the town of Lockeport in the province of Nova Scotia.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Henry Lumley Drayton: Our position with respect to this bill is the same as in the case of the last bill, and we wish to adopt the same course of action.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
That the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word " during " in the first line the words " the first ten days of," and after the word " showing " in the third line, the words " in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill, as amended, reported.
Mr. SPEAKER:: When shall the bill be read a third time?


Henry Lumley Drayton: In order especially to assist my hon. friend I consent to the bill being read a third time now.
Bill read the third time and passed.



CHINA CLAY BRANCH EXTENSION

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 64, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line from the end of the China Clay branch to St. Remi d'Amherst, in the province of Quebec.
C.N-R.-Branch Lines
[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Henry Lumley Drayton: When this bill was in committee, I pointed out to the minister that there was a question of a land grant tied up with it. The land grant was one authorised by the Quebec government and it would be earned as soon as ten miles of railway of this particular line were built. The Canadian National Railways have already built eight of these ten miles, and notwithstanding the fact that that construction was by the Canadian National, the promoters of the private bill have made a claim for that land grant. They cannot get it until these two additional miles are built. For them to get this land grant would be an absolute scandal, a theft practically of public domain, because these people would not have built a single mile of the railway as it was being built at the public expense. Nevertheless, that claim was put forward and persevered in, by reason of some defect, I understand, in the legislation. When I brought the matter to the attention of the minister, he said that he would look into it very carefully and that Mr. Ruel had it up. How does the matter stand now? Do we get the land grant, or has the claim of the private company to this land been withdrawn?


George Perry Graham: I think whatever claim
there was has not been withdrawn, but I have the assurance of the Canadian National Railway Company that these two miles will not be constructed until the matter is settled that the company that did not earn the land grant shall not get it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: How will that
be secured? With what assurance will the National Railways be satisfied? There are only two things that can be done, and that is either to put something in this statute which will deal with the matter and prevent what really would be a firsbclass steal, as I see it, or have Quebec legislation getting rid of their present legislation. I do not see how any agreement with the Canadian National can very well discharge the Quebec legislation. Perhaps the minister will tell the House, so that it will appear as a matter of record, that if this line is built, any benefit arising out of its construction by way of land grant or otherwise from the province, will be taken by the Canadian National or the line will not be built.
IMr. Graham.]


George Perry Graham: To make the matter clear, it might be that the Quebec legislature would cancel that grant altogether. That being the case, there would be no benefit; but I can assure my hon. friends that this line will not be built until the Quebec legislature or some other authority makes it clear that the building of this line by the Canadian National will not enure to the benefit of a third party that may at the present time be technically entitled to it, but that in reality is not entitled to a cent.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Then the position is just the same as regards this bill.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of," and after the word "showing" in the third line the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported.
Hewitt Bostock: When shall the bill be
read a third time?


Henry Lumley Drayton: Do I understand that my hon. friend is requesting me to consent to waiving the rule? If he does so request, I have no objection to the bill being read a third time.


George Perry Graham: With all humility I request it.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Then I do not
object.


George Perry Graham: I move that the bill be
read the third time.


Hewitt Bostock: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.

C.N.R.-Branch Lines


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 34 respecting the construction of a Canadian National railway line to Cowichan Bay on Vancouver island.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On Section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by addding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of," and after the word "showing" in the third line the words " in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 35, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line to Mile 100 on Vancouver island.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of" and after the word "showing" in the third line the words "in detail."
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 44, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Hanna and Warden, in the province of Alberta.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities, and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
That the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived' on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word " during " in the first line the words " the first ten days of," and after the word " showing " in the third line, the words " in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 45, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line from Lovema westerly in the province of Alberta.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities, and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
C.N.R.-Branch Lines
[Stage Direction]
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
That the amunt so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM mcved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of," and after the word "showing" in the third line, the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and
passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 62, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line to Pine Falls in the province of Manitoba.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Henry Lumley Drayton: Is this an extension of what is known as the Victoria Beach line?


George Perry Graham: Yes.


Henry Lumley Drayton: Hon. members
are aware that we have no stenographic reporters in the Railway committee. It was there pointed out that this line would not serve any agricultural country, and as a term of getting the bill through the committee the railway management undertook that the line would not be built unless a proposed pulp mill was constructed, because the resultant traffic was the only reason for building the line. I think we should have that understanding clear.


George Perry Graham: My hon. friend has
rightly stated what was agreed to in committee. My understanding is that this line was originally projected on account of traffic that would be received by the construction and operation of the pulp mill referred to, but it was thought that the line could be started at another point and so serve some agricultural country. However, those representing

Mr. Ruel of the Canadian National assured the committee that if the proposed pulp mill were not constructed the line would not be built-under this bill at least.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line, the words "the first ten days of." and after the word "showing" in the third line, the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 49, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Dunblane and Mawer in the province of Saskatchewan (as amended, and recommending that the title be changed to "An Act respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Dunblane and Mawer or a point west thereof, in the province of Saskatchewan").
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee on the bill, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days

C.N.R. Branch Lines
of," and after the word "showing" in the third line, the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
On the schedule:
Mr. CARMICHAEL:: 1 understand that if the Eston-White Bear line is built as proposed there will be three dead ends of Canadian National Railway line in this district. There is at present a line running from Dunblane down to Beechy. The original intention was to connect up the two ends at Beechy and White Bear, but this past season our competitor, the Canadian Pacific Railway, has been permitted to come in midway between White Bear and Beechy, thus blocking the prospect of closing up those two dead ends. This proposed line is intended to run from Mawer up to Dunblane and leave another dead end from Mawer to Riverhurst, thus leaving three dead ends of Canadian National Railway line with no prospect of their being connected up. I am not sure that the people in the vicinity of these three branch lines are satisfied with that method of procedure. The original intention was to cross the river due north at Riverhurst and connect up with the line that runs by way of Beechy, having the through line from Alsask by way of Eston, White Bear and Riverhurst down to Moose Jaw. I do not know whether or not the action of the Canadian Pacific in building there last year has changed that plan, but if so I would like to know why such action has been permitted and what the reasons are for diverting all around as is proposed.


George Perry Graham: I was not in the committee, but the bill was amended in some respects after a full discussion in the committee. My hon. friend will notice that the committee recommended that the title be changed to "An Act respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Dunblane and Mawer or a point west thereof, in the province of Saskatchewan." I imagine that is to give the engineers some latitude as to where this line shall run. Of course I am-only speaking from the point of view of the amendments made by the committee and the discussion that took place there.


Archibald M. Carmichael: The provision for
starting from a point further west than Mawer does not obviate the necessity for leaving three dead ends. That is the point that is objectionable.


George Perry Graham: What would my hon. friend suggest?


Archibald M. Carmichael: I suggest that the
original plan should be carried out,- namely, that the line should run from Riverhurst across the river, connecting up at Beechy and connecting up the two ends between Beechy and White Bear.


George Perry Graham: I am afraid I cannot
undertake to do that at present. The view of the committee would seem to have been expressed in the amendments as presented.


Archibald M. Carmichael: I was assured that when these bills came before the Railway committee, members interested would have a chance to be present, but the committee met and the bills were put through before I had any knowledge of it.


George Perry Graham: That point is not well
taken. The meetings of the committee are always, in newspaper parlance, advertised in the Votes and Proceedings four or five days ahead, and I did not think it was necessary to notify each member of the committee individually, because the Votes and Proceedings are in his hand every morning.


Mr. LEWIS:: I was in the committee at
the time, and the chief engineer informed us that some years ago it was the original intention to do as suggested by the hon. member for Kindersley. There were practically under construction two lines, one from Dunblane to Beechy and one from Eston to White Bear, but at the time these lines were under construction the Canadian Pacific Railway construction was not under way. The chief engineer said that since the Canadian Pacific has practically dropped down ih between these two lines, and has a charter running right practically between White Bear and Beechy, if the Canadian Pacific line were completed the Canadian National would never attempt to connect these two points, but at a later date they might make application for running rights over the constructed Canadian Pacific line. As far as a poipt westward in the amendment is concerned, it was not in-;ended that the lines should go as far as Riverhurst, but to go as far in that direction as possible and still keep the present half of one per cent grade. I still feel that the people in the vicinity of this railway would much prefer that it should run to Riverhurst. and over the river to Beechy but the engineer informed us that it could not be done under a one per cent grade, and that with such a grade it would not be able to compete with the Canadian Pacific bringing coal from the west to Moose Jaw; that is the only point he raised. I have noticed, however, that there are many bills going through parliament at ,the present time providing for railways that

C.N.R. Branch Lines

have a one per cent grade, and it is an admitted fact that from the river to Mawer there is a rise of 300 feet, and also from the river up to Dunblane, where this line intends to go. If economies can be made by wiping out the three dead ends as suggested by the hon. member for Kindersley you would get a much nearer route from Alsask to points east. I believe that this route would save not only a good many miles of construction, but also certain duplication. But if it is impossible for the Canadian National to run the line parallel to the Canadian Pacific between Beechy and White Bear, I do not wish to stop this line from going through, although I would much prefer the other route. I believe the Canadian National engineers intended to look this matter over again to see if economies can be made by taking this alternate route, and if so, I understand they intend to do so.


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 54, respecting the construction of a Canadian National railway line from or near Radville, Bengough or Ritchie, in the province of Saskatchewan.
Motion agreed to, and the House went into committee, Mr. 'Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Henry Lumley Drayton: When this bill was in committee I objected, and I only now speak because we had not any report of what went on -in the committee, and I do not want to see a very grave error made in connection with the location of this railway. I pointed out that the construction from Radville would be extravagant, and would not serve the great mass of the people who very badly require a railway service in this territory. There was an amendment made to the bill in committee, adding to the description of the location "from or near Radville" the words "Bengough or Ritchie". If the line is built from Bengough, or indeed from Ritchie, and then runs south to a proper distance from the boundary line, about two townships, and then west, it will serve a large number of people in a very excellent farming territory who most grievously require the service at the present time. But on the other hand, if the construction is made from Radville the line must travel over a most difficult country, and will serve only a comparatively small pocket of people, and fail 
very much in doing the best that can be done with this construction of 115 miles. If the amendment made by the committee was carried out and the line constructed for 115 miles from Bengough, it would carry the construction to a point in the seventh range, completely serving the people who really require this service very, very much. I do not understand how the mistake was made of mentioning Radville in the first place instead of Bengough. I am quite sure the people of the whole district want the line built where it will do the most good. If the minister will accept the suggestion-I am not going to move it-it should be made clear now that this line will be built either from Bengough or Ritchie. That will give a good service to the people and save a great deal of money. The hon. member for Maple Creek has a most intimate knowledge of the whole of this country, and I am quite sure can corroborate what I say.


George Perry Graham: This is one of the most
contentious locations, I suppose, in the whole list. I was at the committee for a few minutes, and after I had left I heard the echoes of the discussion as to where this line should go. The committee, after hearing all the discussion, came to the conclusion that they would practically leave it in the hands of the engineers of the Canadian National to decide what was the best thing to do with this line. When the location of the line comes to the minister I shall probably hear all the discussion again. If I did not feel myself qualified to reach a decision after hearing this discussion I should hand the matter over to the Board of Railway Commissioners and let them say where the road should go.	*	,


Mr. McTAGGART:: I do not wish to take up time in a lengthy discussion of this bill. The matter was gone into very fully before the railway committee and I have not much to add at this time except to say this: I am familiar with the country as the hon. member (Sir Henry Drayton) has stated. The statement of the hon. gentleman in summing up the situation is substantially correct.
I am not a railway man but I give it as my opinion that if the railway is built from either Ritchie or Bengough it will serve more people and absorb much more tonnage than if built from Radville. I submit that if the management be not forced to build from Radville in a southerly and westerly direction but be given the opportunity, after making a thorough survey, to build from either Radville, or Ritchie, or Bengough it would be the most satisfactory solution of this ques-

C.N.R. Branch Lines
tion. I understand that the survey which was made of this line from Radville southwesterly was really nothing more than a reconnaissance survey; and as a matter of fact the engineers of the National system know little of the tremendous difficulties they will encounter in that south country. As we have just reached the hour for
6 p.m. taking recess I shall not take up more time except to say while I feel convinced the line should be built from Ritchie or Bengough I am perfectly willing to leave the decision in the hands of the engineers of the National Railways, provided this decision is the result of a thorough investigation.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that the section be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of" and after the word "showing" in the third line the words "in detail".
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 30, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line between Rousseau and Laurent, in the province of Quebec.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding the following:
That the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for
that purpose.
148i
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line, the words "the first ten days of" and after the word "showing" in the third line, the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee on Bill No. 46, respecting the construction of a Canadian National Railway line from Lloydminster in the province of Saskatchewan, north-westerly forty-five miles.
Motion agreed to and the House went into
committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that section 2 be amended by adding thereto the following words:
Provided that the amount so to be guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates and voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division. .
Section agreed to.
On section 3-Certificates of minister as to mileage of said line of railway.
Arthur John Lewis: Before we proceed further
with this bill, I might say that the hon. member who sits next to me saw that it was nearly six o'clock and he did not expect that this bill would be reached. He left at six o'clock, understanding that the House would rise at that time, and he wants to speak on this bill. It is hardly fair to go on in this way. I am not objecting, but I know that in the committee he asked me to send him a note if this bill was going on. I sent him a note, and when he saw that it was nearly six o'clock and there were two other bills ahead of this one, he went home.


George Perry Graham: Does he want to make
any changes?


Arthur John Lewis: I do not know. He wants
to make some remarks about the bill.
C.N.R. Branch Lines

Mr, GRAHAM: He can speak on the third reading and let us get it through committee.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section S-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word "during" in the first line the words "the first ten days of" and after the word "showing" in the third line the words "in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
Bill reported.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee to consider Bill No. 40, respecting the construction of a Canadian National railway line to Mile 41 of the Melfort branch near Nipawin in the province of Saskatchewan (As amended, and recommending that the title be changed to "An Act respecting the construction of a Canadian National railway line either to Mile 41 near Nipawin or in a northeasterly direction to a point in Township 48, Range 13, west of the Second Meridian, in the province of Saskatchewan.")
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
On section 1-Power to construct and complete line described in schedule.
Mr. KNOX:: I should like to point out
that- the bill, as reprinted, has a mistake in the number of the township that wras quoted-it should be 48-in the title and in the schedule.


George Newcombe Gordon: That will be amended. It is an error in printing.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Company may issue securities and Governor in Council may authorize guarantee thereof.
Sir HENRY DRAYTON moved that this section be amended by adding thereto the following wordts:
Provided that the amount so guaranteed shall first be included in the estimates voted by parliament for that purpose.
Amendment negatived on division.
Section agreed to.
On section 8-Statement to parliament annually.
Mr. GRAHAM moved that section 8 be amended by adding after the word " during "
[Mr. Graham.l
in the first line the words " the first ten days of," and after the word " showing " in the third line the words " in detail."
Amendment agreed to.
Section as amended agreed to.
On the schedule:
Andrew Knox: Those who were in the committee will remember that this matter was discussed at some length, and it was pointed out that it was not wise to go to Nipawin at the present time, because the Canadian Pacific have a charter through there too and they are already building on that line. Some ten or twelve miles of the. line that is specified in this bill would parallel, in fact duplicate the Canadian Pacific where they are building. I pointed out at that time that work was already going on there and that the people to the east were petitioning and sending delegates here to have this Ridgedale extension go in an easterly direction along the- Carrot: river. I think I convinced the committee that that was where it ought to go, but I found that I could not move in committee an amendment to change the substance of the bill; that that was a matter for the House to do. I wished to have the words " to Nipawin " deleted, but I was informed that that would have to come before the House. I understand it is the wish of the engineer to have this left in so that he may have a choice of routes, but the people who need the service cannot see the matter in that way. There is no request at all, I might say, by the people of Nipawin, to have the line continued to that point, because they are depending upon the Canadian Pacific who are already building in there. Here is a short extract from a letter which I read to the committee, from Mr. Raymond Courteau, of Zenon Park who has been writing to have the line run in an easterly direction. He says:
In further reference to the railway extension from Ridgedale, I beg to write and give a few more facts that we have learned lately. The Canadian Pacific railway has started work on its line to -Nipawin from Tisdale, and gangs are employed at both ends now, men from our settlement have left to work on the line.
That was dated the 9th May. In the Saskatoon Star of May 10, there is an article which states that:
Three hundred men, two hundred teams and three machine graders are already in operation on this stretch of line.
I . do not want to delay the House by reading this extract, but I would just like to point out that this article shows that the Canadian Pacific is intending to cross the

C.N.R. Branch Lines
river at Nipawin and to continue on and give service to people who are settled on the north side of the river. It has been announced that the Canadian National does not intend to cross the river there. This is the concluding portion of the article:
This would place the Canadian Pacific in a strategic position to head for Hudson bay the moment competition and the exigencies of traffic force it to open the northern route to Europe.
I cannot say just what the Canadian Pacific has in view, but this was brought to my attention at the time and I thought I should point it out. The object we have in view is to give the people on the Carrot river service. The people of Nipawin are not asking for this and the other people are. I have no brief for the Canadian Pacific, but I have a brief for the people on the Carrot river who require this service. If the minister will give us some assurance that the matter will be taken into consideration I shall be satisfied. There is no doubt that the opinion of the committee was as I have stated, apart from the question ot our power to make any alteration in the substance of the bill.


George Perry Graham: These bills are based on
resolutions and we cannot even in this committee amend them in such a way as to involve any question of expenditure. We can make amendments only in so far as we are assured that they will entail no increased cost. If we should change this bill in such a way as to increase the cost we should simply be obliged to drop the whole thing. I shall bring to the attention of the board my hon. friend's representations but that is all I can promise to do unless he wishes to drop the bill.


Andrew Knox: I have no wish to drop the bill.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I think that if the minister would confer with the chairman the thing could easily be straightened out, because there is merely a mistake in printing. 1 am familiar with the character of the district and I think that the hon. member (Mr. Knox) is right. There ivere some things of which the engineers were not quite sure. The intention at first was to run pretty close to Carrot river, which is a very fertile district; but when the matter came before the committee again it was suggested by the engineers that there was too much water in that vicinity and that they would have to swing further south. The bill is all right except that we have the line swinging westerly instead of easterly.


Mr. CAHILL:: The hon. member for Prince Albert wants to delete from the bill the word "Nipawin", but as I understand the matter, if that amendment is carried it will involve certain features that will destroy the bill. The engineer was not able to give an estimate of the cost of the line to township 48 and by leaving in the word "Nipawin" it makes it possible to construct to either point.


Mr. STEWART (Humboldt):: The contention is not well founded. We had an amendment similar to this proposed in the bill for the construction of the Kelvington line, in which case we not only altered the direction but changed the destination. Nevertheless that bill passed the House.


Andrew Knox: I merely wish to point out that we were informed in committee that such an amendment as is now proposed might be made in the House. I had been relying on that assurance-at least I so regarded it -and if the minister will promise to bring the matter to the attention of the officials I am prepared to let it go.


George Perry Graham: I shall do so to-morrow.


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

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM: (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved that the House go into committee of Supply.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the Chair.
Labour-Administration, Technical Education Act, $3,000.
Item agreed to.
At six o'clock the committee took recess. After Recess
The committee resumed at eight-thirty o'clock.
International Labour Conference, $15,000.
Mr. STEVENS:: I presume the minister is going to enlighten the committee on the proceedings of the International Labour Conference.


Hon. JAMES MURDOCK (Minister of Labour):: The expenditure under this head
arises out of section 13 of the Peace treaty. The 1924 conference will be held in Geneva, and if the minimum number of delegates from Canada is sent the amount will be more than sufficient to meet expenses. Canada is also a member of the governing body of the Inter-
Supply-Labour

national Labour Office, being one of the eight nations of chief industrial importance in the League of Nations, and the expense of sending representatives every three months to the meetings of the governing body, which are also held in Europe, usually at Geneva, is paid out of this vote.


Mr. LEADER:: What was the expenditure last year?


James Murdock: The expenditure last
year was only $6,644.47, by reason of the fact that there was only one item on the agenda for discussion at the conference, that item being workmen's compensation, in which the provinces alone are interested. Therefore, only one federal government delegate was sent from Canada, and the Commissioner General at Paris acted as our other representative.


Harry Leader: The Auditor General's report gives the expenditure at $12,645.83.


James Murdock: My hon. friend will recall that the Auditor General's report deals only with expenditures up to March 31, 1923. The expenditure for the last fiscal year is not yet before us.


Harry Leader: I notice in that report a living allowance of $15 a day is granted to delegates, and then there is this item:
David Carnegie, London, England, services, 20 days at $40 a day.
What is the explanation of this expenditure?


James Murdock: Where a representative of or an adviser for the Canadian Manufacturers' Association or a representative of Labour attends these conferences the living allowance is $15 a day. Where persons other than officials of the Dominion government are asked to represent the government they are paid $40 per day.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: Is Labour given
any opportunity of nominating the man who shall represent it?


James Murdock: Section 389 of the
Peace treaty provides that the representative of the employees shall be chosen from the organization chiefly representative of the work people, and it is claimed that the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada answers this description in respect to the work people of Canada; therefore under the previous government and under this government the congress has been deemed without question to be entitled to name the representative.	.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The represents."
tive is or has been named by the Trades and Labour Congress?


James Murdock: Yes.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Could the minister give
the committee some indication of what was done at past conferences and what it is expected will result from these conferences in the future?


James Murdock: As I stated a few
moments ago, the item on the agenda last year was workmen's compensation. So far as Canada is concerned, that is a matter in which the provinces are specially interested, the federal government having no authority to deal with it. The results from these conferences are slow at times in becoming manifest in the form of social justice for the workers of the world as contemplated by the Peace treaty. There have not been as many ratifications of conventions emanating from the International Labour Office as have been desired by the director and officers of the International Labour Conference, but very many nations have taken action to deal with some of .those conventions. These have been set out in detail from time to time in the Labour Gazette. The following brief summary may be of interest to my hon. friend: A considerable increase is noted during the past year in the number of ratifications by various countries of the draft conventions adopted by the International Labour Conference (League of Nations) at its annual meetings. The Secretary-General of the League of Nations has been advised of 93 ratifications of draft conventions by various countries. At the beginning of 1923 the total number of ratifications recorded was 62. In addition to the 93 ratifications recorded by the I.eague of Nations, 58 other ratifications have been authorized by the competent authority in different countries but have not yet been formally communicated. In 120 other cases ratification has also been recommended to the competent authority. Two hundred and seventy-eight legislative measures in all have been adopted, introduced, or prepared with a view to the application of conventions and recommendations of the International Labour Conference. The total number of measures taken to date looking to ratification and application of conventions and recommendations is 549.


Mr. ARTHURS:: Are the subjects to be
brought before the Labour Conference announced in advance of its meetings?


James Murdock: Yes, usually many
months in advance.


James Arthurs: That being so, what particular reason was there for sending delegates last year when the matter on the agenda was one over which this parliament has no jurisdiction?


James Murdock: Because Canada being a member of the League of Nations holds membership in the International Labour Confer-

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ence and on the governing body of that conference as one of the eight nations of chief industrial importance. Canada cannot delegate her authority to any or to all of the provinces. Therefore if the views of the provinces are to be heard at the conference it is necessary that they should be presented through a federal representative. That briefly, I think, is the reason that it appeared necessary for the federal government to be represented last year, for even although the matter to be considered was one within the exclusive jurisdiction of the provinces, it was of material concern to Canada as a whole. Mr. Chairman, I find I was in error in stating that workmen's compensation was the item on last year's agenda. I find the subject then discussed was "general principles for the organization of factory ' inspection."


Mr. SUTHERLAND:: The minister has
referred to work people. Whom would he define as work people?


James Murdock: They are understood to
be organizations of labour under section 389 of the Peace treaty.


Mr. SIMPSON:: What recommendations of
the International Labour Conference have been adopted by Canada?


James Murdock: No recommendations
have been adopted by Canada. There is a motion now on the order paper to deal with one that Canada has a right to deal with under the British North America Act, that is, the question of the employment of children at sea under the age of fourteen. Many of the matters w'hich are the subject of recommendations by the International Labour Conference are matters of provincial and not of federal jurisdiction, therefore this House has to wait until the provinces indicate their desires in respect to them. When those desires are communicated to us we are only too glad to give the necessary ratification for Canada and pass along the convention, thus ratified, to the conference.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: Yesterday I asked the
minister on another estimate about the matter of harvest excursions, and he said he had some correspondence he would bring down in regard to the request for excursions from New Brunswick.


James Murdock: I had that for my hon.
friend last night, but he was not here. The hon. member for Fort William and Rainy River (Mr. Manion) and the hon. member for Centre Winnipeg (Mr. Woodsworth) also asked for some information, and if the committee desires I will give that information
now. The hon. member for Fort William and Rainy River inquired as to a comparison between wage rates in Canada and those in other countries. The Labour Gazette of November, 1923, contains an article, found on pages 1306 and 1307, concluding with a table which gives the figures that I think my hon. friend desires. If agreeable to the committee we could have it printed in Hansard, and I will just mention two or three of the rates showing the comparison.


Mr. MANION:: I suggest that the minister take more than two or three. Take one branch of each of eight or nine lines of work.


James Murdock: The occupations are
divided into the following:	Building trades,
unskilled labour, engineering trades, furniture trades, printing and bookbinding trades, and then a comparison of all occupations. We will take the case of a mason. The index number, weighted, of comparative real wages, March-August, 1923, at London, is given as 100. The rate at Amsterdam will be 107; Berlin, 61; Brussels, 70; Christiania, 86; Madrid, 50; New York, 274; Ottawa, 217; Paris, 71; Prague, 63; Stockholm, 95; Vienna, 57; Warsaw, 79.


Robert James Manion: If I understood the minister correctly, he said that was the index figure of real wages?


James Murdock: I will read a paragraph to show how this index figure is prepared:
The figures were used, first of all, to ascertain for each occupation, the quantities of bread, meat, flour and so on, which could be purchased with the wages of 48 hours' work. It was found, for example, that the Berlin bricklayer's wage for 48 hours would purchase 390 lbs. of bread, or 123 lbs. of flour, or 10 lbs. of butter, or 227 eggs, and so on. The corresponding quantities purchasable with the wages of the London bricklayer were then taken as a basis and called 100.


Robert James Manion: The reason I mentioned
the index number is because the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Speakman) followed my request with a request for the figures as to the cost of living. This combines the two; it combines wages with the cost of living, showing the real wages of the labourer or worker in the respective countries. That is exactly what I wanted.


Mr. FORKE:: I do not think that is very clear. You have the index number for Prague, 63, and for New York, 274. Does that ratio bear a proper relation to the purchasing power of money in the respective countries? That is the information that the hon. member for Fort William and Rainy River wanted. I claim that it does not, by a long way.


Robert James Manion: I Claim that it does, according to the figures given by the Minister of
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Labour. I did not ask for it that way. What I asked the minister to give us-and what he has given is still better-was the wages in money. The member for Red Deer supplemented that, to check me up, I presume, by asking for the real wages, that is, their purchasing power. The minister has explained that the figure he gives is based upon the amount of food which can be purchased, rent, and so on, by 48 hours of work in each of these countries. No better judgment could be arrived at with respect to the real wages of a country, I should think, than that which is based upon the purchasing power of money, and that is exactly what we wish.


Robert Forke: But we have not exactly what it purchases.


Robert James Manion: The index figures are all based on the same lire of work. It is not a question of money at all; it is food, rent and so on.


Robert Forke: I know that,.but reading over those figures without having them tabulated before you, you cannot form any definite judgment of what the purchasing power of that money is. If my hon. friend can tell, I cannot.


Robert James Manion: They furnish it for us, we do not have to furnish it.


Robert Forke: Let us have it.


James Murdock: This is prepared by the British Ministry of Labour.


Henry Herbert Stevens: If that is so it is bound to be correct.


James Murdock: I suppose my hon. friend means that it is more correct than it would be if furnished by the Canadian Ministry of Labour.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The point raised by the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Forke) is very important and it ought to be made perfectly clear. As I understand these figures, they do not represent money at all; they reduce the value of the wages and the cost of living to an index number. The figure 100 in London indicates the wage in London of a mason; Ihe mason in Prague gets 63/100 of what the London mason gets, and the mason in Ottawa gets 217/100 of the wages of the London mason. Now, that comprehends purchasing power, cost of living and everything, so that we can clearly understand the relative value of these figures.


James Murdock: My personal opinion is that the matter is so involved that one can get almost any argument he wants out of it.


Robert James Manion: I do not agree with that at all. The minister stated that these figures had been made up by the Ministry of Labour in London, and we have no reason to discredit their ability to make up such figures. It is not a very difficult thing to do; any good accountant could do it. There may be a very minute variation from exactness, but generally speaking I should say that the figures are almost absolutely correct at the date given. I agree with the suggestion of the minister that he put the whole statement upon Hansard I do not wish to bring in any of the budget debate at the present moment, but I would point out in passing how well this illustrates the difficulty of producing in this country in comparison with other countries. It was for that reason I wanted the official figures put on Hansard. I think that any fair-minded man looking at them will realize the difficulties, of producing in this country, whether on the farm or in the factory, as compared with other countries.


James Murdock: I am not at all disposed to disagree with my hon. friend, but when he is considering that point I hope he will remember that the mason's wages I quoted for New York, 274, as compared with 217 in Canada, also provides food for thought in connection with the exodus of our skilled workmen from this country. Perhaps there is the lodestone that has helped to some extent to deplete Canada of its artisans.


Robert James Manion: That, and lack of work
in this country, due to the fact that we are not producing as we should be in Canada.


Robert Forke: If the minister can tell me
that the Canadian with his wages cannot purchase as much as the New York mason with his wages, I will admit that that may be the lodestone, but it is quite possible that the Canadian can purchase as much in Canada with his 217 as the New York man can purchase with his 274. I know my hon. friend from Rainy River has not very much patience with what I am saying, but I am not entirely convinced by the argument that has been put up. An hon. member whom I do not see in his seat at present, accused me the other night of a lack of penetration; he said it was difficult to penetrate my cranium, so I would- be glad if the minister would put the official figures on Hansard so that I may have time to study them. Being in communication with the Old Country I know the conditions there, and I am not convinced that there is that much difference between living in the Old Country and living

Supply-Labour
in New York as the wages would indicate. There is more behind it than appears on the surface.


James Murdock: I will take the first
class in the engineering trades, for instance. The figures for a fitter are as follows:
London	 100
Amsterdam	 108
Berlin	 57
Brussels	 73
Christiania	 104
Madrid	 83
New York	 162
Ottawa	 106
Paris	 58
Prague	 54
Stockholm	 79
Vienna	 62
Warsaw	 61


Robert James Manion: How is it that that higher figure in Canada than in New York does not keep our people at home?


James Murdock: This is only one special class. I wanted to read it because I knew the hon. gentleman would be glad to hear that a fitter receives higher wages in Ottawa than in New York.


Robert Forke: The minister quoted 54 for
Madrid or Prague. How does the man live at Prague or Madrid?


George Perry Graham: He does not have any
of what the hon. member for Portage la Prairie calls entertainments.


Robert James Manion: The index figure for China would probably be about 2.


James Murdock: I will give the figures
for unskilled labour:
London	 100
Amsterdam	 Ill
Berlin	 71
Brussels	 78
Christiania	 136
Madrid	 63
New York	 150
Ottawa	 173
Paris	 64
Prague	 65
Stockholm	 95
Warsaw	*	 62
My hon. friend will note that Ottawa is again higher than New York.


Robert James Manion: Would the minister put that whole statement on Hansard?


James Murdock: Yes. with the permission of the House I will put on Hansard this article and table appearing on pages 1306 and 1307 of the Labour Gazette for November, 1923.
A Comparison of Real Wages in London and certain cities throughout the World. March-August, 1923 In the July issue of the British Ministry of Labour Gazette, there appeared an article giving the results of an inquiry into the purchasing power of wages for
certain trades in terms of food in a number of the chief cities in various countries in March, 1923. In succeeding issues corresponding figures for the months April to August have been summarized.
The Minister of Labour secured figures as to the rates of wages for certain classes of labour and as to the retail prices of certain staple foods for March, 1923. from the governmental office, state or municipal, iri each case, responsible for their collection, or from the published reports of such bodies. The method of computation was set forth as follows:
"The figures were used, first of all, to ascertain for each occupation, the quantities of bread, meat, flour, and so on, which could be purchased with the wages of 48 hours' work. It was found for example, that the Berlin bricklayer's wage for 48 hours would pm chase lbs. of Dread, or 123 lbs. of flourt 16 lbs. of butter, or 227 eggs, and so on. The corresponding quantities purchasable with the wages of the London bricklayer Were then taken as a basis and called 100, and a sene* of index numbers was computed, which showed, in respect of each article of food, taken separately, the relative purchasing power in London and in the foreign capitals under comparison, of the earnings of 48 hours in each occupation. In the case of the Berlin bricklayer i ^fervid to above, the numbers were found to be 88 for bread. 31 for flour, 26 for butter, 43 for eggs, as against 1* ft in each case for London."
Th * index* number of real wag -s. or nf the purchasing power of money wages, so calculated were then averaged, two tables being constructed and published the first being a table of simple arithmetical averages, in which no allowance was mad1, for the relative importance of each article of food, using the proportion* in working class family consumption in the United Kingdom. It is the latt.ir table which is kept up to date month to month. No allowance was maJ'\ howevc.i, for the number of [DOT] workmen in each trade in calculating the average. The significance of Vue figures thus obtained was interpreted as follows:
"It may be well perhaps to state with some emphasis that the index numbers shown afford no absolutely safe basis for conclusions as tc differences in the general level of real wages even in the selected cities. For this purpose it would be necessary 1.c secure wages data for a much larger number of occupations, including those :n which women ere largely employed. Still less can the figures be accepted as accurately reflecting differences in national real wage levels.	The most that can be
claimed for them is that they afford a rough indication of the differences that existed on or about 1st March, 1923, between the real-wage levels of the selected categories of typical urban male labour in t he various capitals."
It is also pointed oirt; in the article that for an accurate measurement of purchasing power of wages in the various countries, figures as to items other than food would be required, especially figures as to rent and clothing. Owing to the scarcity of houses in some cities and the restrictions imposed by law on rentals in some countries, the great:st divergence is known to exist in the rents. For instance, in Germany reports indicate that rent is a negligible quantity in working class expenditure, while is New York owing to high rentals, this item is very important in family expenditure. A comparison made from figures including rent, as well as food, would therefore, show the purchasing power of wages in Berlin somewhat higher than a comparison using food prices alone, and for New York, for instance, the reverse.
The accompanying table is the summary of the figures resulting from the investigation published in the July issue of the British Labour Gazette with the figures for all occupations for each month, April to August added. The changes in the figures from month to month are due to the changes in retail prices of foods as well as in the rates of wages.
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INDEX NUMBERS (WEIGHTED) OF COMPARATIVE REAL WAGES, MARCH-AUGUST, 1923

[Stage Direction]
(London=100)
Occupation	London	Amsterdam	Berlin	Brussels	Christiania	Madrid	New York	Ottawa	Paris	Prague	Stockholm	Vienna	Warsaw
March 1, 1923													
Building Trades:-													
Skilled:													
Mason	100	107	61	70	86	50	274	217	71	63	95	57	79Bricklayer	100	10?	61	70	86	50	274	217	71	63	95	57	79Carpenter	100	107	61	76	82	56	247	179	71	63	95	60	Joiner	100	107	53	73	82	63	179	76	95	Plumber	100	116	54	64	80	52	242	200	70	86	Painter (General)	100	122	57	65	91	55	260	175	75	68	112	65	83Unskilled:	Labourer (General)	100	118	77	67	108	50	161	88	67	112	61	84
Engineering Trades.

													
Skilled:													
Fitter	100	108	57	73	104	83	362	196	58	54	79	62	61Ironmoulder (Hand)	.*	100	96	58	78	106	78	215	197	59	61	81	62Patternmaker	100	101	53	95	97	78	197	210	54	74	57Turner	100	108	57	79	104	77	152	196	58	57	79	67	61Unskilled:	Labourer	100	111	71	78	136	63	150	173	64	65	95	62Furniture Trades:-	Skilled:	Cabinetmaker	100	94	63	64	83	57	114	78	70	80	46	Printing and Bookbinding Trades:-	Skilled:	Compositor (Book and Job), Hand	100	85	45	57	79	55	242	167	63	77	42	108" " Machine	100	88	45	58	73	78	155	9i	78	141100	85	60	79	55	153	77	108Bookbinder	100	92	45	51	92	45	184	175	63	82	75	37	ii7All Occupations	100	103	57	70	92	61	217	180	68	69	87	55	85March 1, 1923	All Occupations:-	April 1, 1923	100	102	57	70	93	209	174	6S	85	101May 1, 1923	100	99	65	86	58	182	67	83	43	98June 1, 1923	100	100	64	87	62	182	87	67	84	47	96July 1, 1923	100	99	62	90	62	186	88	65	86	50	76August 1, 1923	100	100	57	94	66	183	86	77	88	97
Donald Sutherland: In view of the statement the minister has made that you can draw any deductions you wish from these figures, will he vouch for their reliability?


James Murdock: I advised the committee
that they were compiled by the British Ministry of Labour, and I presume that they are as nearly accurate as index figures can be.


Mr. SPEAKMAN:: There is just one question I would like to ask. I think I understand the method of preparing index figures lMr. Murdock.]
fairly well. Taking 100 in London, as the purchasing value of 48 hours' work, that is used as a basis of comparison with other countries. I notice the minister referred purely to foods, and I was wondering whether the purchasing power of the wages included all lines of necessaries, boots, shoes, textiles, and so on. I wondered if those figures he quoted applied in the same ratio to the full cost of living.


James Murdock: I think the article itself, which will appear in full on Hansard, will clear up that point.

Supply-Labour


Alfred Speakman: I do not care what
argument can be drawn from the figures; I simply wanted the facts as to what the figures included.


James Murdock: My hon. friend from
Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) made some inquiries yesterday as to harvest excursions being run from the Maritime provinces, and I intimated that the Lhbour department had found some diffidence on the part of the governments in the Maritime provinces in respect to having harvest excursions run from those parts during the harvest season, to take farm labour out to the Canadian west. Last year we again had this matter before us, and on June 21, I wrote the following letter to the Prime Minister of New Brunswick, a copy of which was also sent to the Prime Minister of Nova Scotia, and the Prime Minister of Prince Edward Island:
Ottawa, June 21, 1923.
The Honourable Peter J. Veniot,
Prime Minister of New Brunswick,
Fredericton, N.B.
Dear Mr. Premier,
Crop reports from western Canada indicate at the present time the probability of an even larger yield of grain than the splendid results of last year's harvest, and it will be necessary within a very few weeks to give consideration to the matter of directing harvest workers from other parts of Canada to the prairie provinces for the harvest period. The need of the prairie province farmers for outside help will be for not less than thirty thousand and may even run to a considerably larger number.
As you are aware, it has been the practice of the railways to run excursions from the Maritime provinces, Quebec, and Ontario as far west as Sudbury, at very cheap rates for the purpose of assisting in the harvesting of the western crop. During the past three years very cheap rates have also been provided from the Pacific coast in order that all the available help in Canada might be pooled for the purpose of ensuring that the crop would be fully harvested.
The policy of running these excursions from certain sections of the Maritime provinces has not always met with the unanimous approval of all the interests affected, and there have on occasions been somewhat strong protests voiced against this policy. These protests, I think, have been based mainly on the ground that the excursions resulted in taking labour from the Maritime provinces to an extent which unduly depleted the provincial labour market.
As we shall in the very near future have to discuss with the railroads the subject of making adequate arrangements for providing the Prairie Provinces with labour sufficient to handle this year's crop, I should like to be advised as to your views with respect to the subject of the railways running excursions from your province, and I shall greatly appreciate your favour if you will write or wire me promptly stating the position of your government in this matter.
I feel sure that in determining your attitude upon this matter you will not fail to take into consideration the fact that the western crop is one of the fundamental and most valuable of our national assets and that the measure of our success or failure in the harvesting and handling of same reflects itself upon the general prosperity of Canada.
For your information I may say that I am forwarding an identical letter to the premiers of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.
Yours very truly,
James Murdock,
Minister of Labour.
To which Premier Veniot replied under date of July 5.
My dear Minister,
I am in receipt of yours of the 21st of June re the policy of excursions from certain sections of the Maritime provinces to the West, in order to help in the saving of the harvest and I note that you would like to be advised as to my views with respect to this matter.
In reply I beg to say that I have discussed the matter with my colleagues in the Executive Council and we are of the opinion that while it is necessary that labour should be procured to help save the harvest in the West, we do not think that it is fair to have an excursion with rates fixed the way they have been in the past, when the people of our province were induced to go west at a very low rate of travel, but in order to return home, had to pay more than for the trip to the West. We feel that if the same rate going would be given for the return trip, that less of our people would be liable to remain permanently in the West, as in many cases we have discovered that some had difficulty in raising sufficient funds to return home, notwithstanding that they desired to do so. Otherwise I see no objection.
This letter is signed by the Premier of New Brunswick. On July 10, I replied to the premier indicating that we would do what we could to ensure the same rate of return, and intimating to him that outside of that objection we understood that he was not opposed to the running of excursions from New Brunswick. Last year they were run from no further east than from Moncton to the West.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: You had no excursions from Nova Scotia points?


James Murdock: No.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: I am pleased to have
this information from the minister. I am somewhat surprised however that Mr. Veniot did not take the view that these excursions would be a very great injury to our farmers in New Brunswick. I am glad, however, to have this information, and to know that the Minister of Labour is not entirely to blame for these excursions. However, I should like to impress this on him and I trust he will not forget it-that the Premier of New. Brunswick did not speak for the farmers of that province. There is no question about that, because our farmers in New Brunswick resent these excursions and have done so for years. We have never been able to get any satisfaction from anybody in regard to this matter; the correspondence read to-night is the first intimation that I have ever had that
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anybody was ever consulted in New Brunswick. I should like to impress upon the minister just as strongly as I can the fact that it is very unfair to our farmers who hire their men by the summer for this special inducement to be held out to take the men to the West when they are so badly needed at home at that time of the year.
There was another point brought out by the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) and it was this: These men come back in winter and we are not in such a situation as they are in Ontario: We have plenty of work for them in winter; our men are not at a loss for work at any time in New Brunswick; in fact, our lumbermen are anxious to have them before we are through with the harvest. We have no idle men in New Brunswick. There is plenty of work for them all the year around, and there is no necessity for taking them away when we can provide them with work and certainly need all the men we have.
In New Brunswick we are up against another situation for which, of course, we cannot blame our own government, only in so far as it is a fact that conditions are not as good in our own country as in Maine. I live in what is known as the potato belt, which includes part of New Brunswick and part of the state of Maine which territory is separated by an imaginary boundary line. The Maine farmer is able to purchase his fertilizer anywhere from $8 to $10 a ton cheaper than we can in New Brunswick. That will be overcome by putting fertilizers on the free list this year however. But due to the fact that the Maine farmer can get 50 cents per hundred pounds more for his potatoes than we can-because we have to pay a fine of that amount in order to get into his market-he has been able to pay higher wages than the New Brunswick farmers can afford to pay. There is another drain on our help in addition to the inducement held out to our men to go west. These are serious handicaps, and the wages question is a serious problem for us because we cannot afford to pay the wages that the Maine farmer can although we are compelled to do so. I have had to pay $6 and $7 a day to young fellows to dig potatoes, but a man will go to extreme lengths to save a perishable crop before the bad weather sets in. The circumstances I have outlined show the position of the potato growers in my section of New Brunswick.


James Murdock: The second line of criticism on which I would like to say a final word is more acutely conceived. I have known it argued somewhat paradoxically that the Unemployment Insurance Scheme has been too successful, that it has been a mere palliative, that it has dulled the symptoms of unemployment and so made it possible to avoid a cure.
Let me admit at once that unemployment benefit has been a palliative, but a very necessary one. It is not too much to say that the provision of benefit has saved this country from an upheaval, the consequences of which might easily have been disastrous. Even as it is great numbers have suffered and are suffering severe privation and hardship. But it is probable that the total burden of distress and suffering has been lighter than it was in past years when unemployment was less pronounced and of far shorter duration.
When it is contended therefore, that the unemployment 'insurance scheme has prevented a remedy for unemployment from being found, I think rather less than justice is done to a valuable specific for this terrible disease of modern industrial organization. I am not going to attempt any answer to the question whether there is a remedy-that is a question of political therapeutics on which there is room for much discussion and for more than one opinion. One thing, however, is certain. The immediate cause of our great and long-continued unemployment is the failure of foreign trade. Until that revives, there is little likelihood that the industrial population of this country, organized and distributed as it now is, can again be restored to full employment.


Donald Sutherland: The minister has
just given us some information in regard to the operation of the farmers' harvester exclusions. Now, last night I asked whether he had any influence in arranging for the rates which were given, and I believe he said, No. Yet, from the statement which he presented a few minutes ago he has been writing to the Premier of New Brunswick with a view to arranging this matter. I should assume from the minister's remarks that he has had something to do with these excursions. What I want to emphasize-and it is the very matter that the Premier of New Brunswick emphasizes-is the fact that it was the habit for a good many years to grant a very low rate to these people to go out to the West. When the work in the West was completed many of them had enough money to pay their fare back but had no means when they arrived here. The consequence is that by charging for return fare a rate almost double the fare to the West many of these people congregate in the large centres of Ontario and the local authorities have to maintain them during the winter. This is a very serious matter. We have had professional harvesters in this country who do nothing else but go out west during the harvest time to harvest. We have had them parading around Toronto and even coming down to Ottawa. Some men came from the Old Country to harvest the western crop last year and who apparently have done

nothing since the crop was harvested but reflect on the industrial conditions in this country. Because they have been very assiduous in scattering broadcast throughout the Old Country reports that there are thousands of men out of employment in Canada. We cannot get these men to do anything else but harvesting no matter what work you offer them, and I was glad to see the ringleader was sentenced to six months in gaol last week.


James Murdock: My hon. friend yesterday asked:
Does the minister exercise control over the rates?
My answer was "Not at all," and it may be possible I gave my hon. friend a wrong impression. As a matter of fact the Labour department does negotiate with the railways on two questions that affect the railway rates. One is the question of securing a continued rate for the removal of surplus unemployed labour from one province to another. Under the arrangement that we have had since I have been in the department, although it is made to run for a few months at a time usually and then is re-instituted as from the date of expiration, that rate is 2.70 cents per mile for the removal of surplus labour from one province to another, with a minimum of four dollars. In other words, the 2.70 cent rate would apply when the reduced rate ticket is four dollars or more. I realize fully that we are in a very favourable position to be criticized by the farmers of the Maritime provinces of Ontario as regards these harvest excursions, while on the other hand, our good friends from the western provinces want to get all the assistance that the Labour department can give them in times of stress to ensure a proper supply of labour to harvest the western grain crops. So, officers of the department do make certain representations to the passenger departments of the railways in regard to the rates both from the Pacific coast to the prairie provinces on certain occasions and from the Maritime provinces or Quebec or Ontario to the West. We do not exercise control. We only make representations for a rate that will meet the purpose desired, and offer encouragement to the young men to go to the West and help with the harvest. We do not want, of course, to deplete the farms of New Brunswick or Nova Scotia or Ontario or Quebec, but we are between two fires, 'as it were, and the department wants to be as helpful as possible in the matter.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: We shall have to make our fire a little hotter.

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Donald Sutherland: Does the minister
think it fair that after these men are taken out to the West, they should be charged to come back nearly double the railway rates that they were charged going West, and realizing that there is no work for them when they come here, to land them stranded in these old provinces where they will have to be maintained by the cities? Does the minister think it fair that they should be charged these exorbitant rates coming back?


Robert Forke: In the great majority of
cases there is no such happening as that pictured by my hon. friend (Mr. Sutherland). The average harvester last year was getting six dollans a day for harvesting and he did not need to work many days to earn enough to take him home. That sort of talk is absurd. I do not impute any absurdity to the hon. member's statement because I know he is talking candidly.


Donald Sutherland: How long does the
harvest last in the West or any other part?


Robert Forke: Six weeks, or probably two
months, sometimes longer. I have seen the harvest last for three months. I have paid as much as S350 to $400 to one man for harvesting and threshing. Two-thirds of the harvesters who come West come from Toronto, Montreal and other big cities. We do not get many men from the farms.


Donald Sutherland: Yes, you do.


Robert Forke: I cannot get them anyway. Two-thirds of these men would not be of any use to the farmers of Ontario. They come from the cities out West for the wages, and we have to board them for nine or ten days before they are of any use. We have to' feed them a little before they can do any work on the farms. All this story about not being able to get enough money to come back is just so much moonshine.


James Murdock: The ra^e in 1922 from
Moncton to Winnipeg was twenty dollars, while the return rate from Winnipeg to St. John or Moncton was twenty-five dollars. I think that is about a fair comparison with what the rate usually is. I should like to ask the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) what he would think we should do when we receive a telegram sent on July 17 when the harvest is just commencing, and reading as follows:
Meeting this morning confidential statement will be prepared for press Manitoba requires fifteen Saskatchewan thirty-three and Alberta thirteen thousand harvesters three thousand available locally each province first excursion for Manitoba to arrive August seventh Saskatchewan and Alberta August fifteenth wages
probably three fifty for stooking and four dollars tu, threshing. Meeting later of railroad officials to consider points your wire fourteenth result to be announced later.
In other words, pressure was being brought to bear upon the Labour department and the Director of the Employment Service to do something. We could not, under those circumstances, decline to do what might be possible to assist the West, even though, by so doing and without personal knowledge, we may have helped to deplete somewhat labour in the Maritime provinces or Ontario or Quebec.


Thomas Wakem Caldwell: I notice the minister
said that no excursions ran from Nova Scotia or Prince Edward Island. What was the tenor of the reply from the premier of those two provinces last year? Did they object and was that, why they did not run the excursions?


James Murdock: The Premier of Nova
Scotia on July 17 wrote this letter:
Referring to your letter to me of the 21st ult., asking for an expression of opinion as to the advisability of advertising railway excursions from the Maritime provinces for harvesters, I beg to advise that as far as I was able, I consulted with my colleagues and others, and it was the consensus of opinion that it would not be desirable to make any special efforts to attract harvesters from Nova Scotia. This opinion would cover your desire to be advised as to my views upon railways running excursions from Nova Scotia.
We got a similar reply from Prince Edward Island.
# Mr. CHURCH: Some of the larger municipalities have grievances about the way in which they have been treated as regards these harvester excursions and the way those known as British harvesters were used. In my opinion, the British harvesters did not get a fair deal from the Labour department. They were brought out here by railway and transportation companies. They went out West, did their work, and when they came back to the large city of Toronto seeking work and finding none they came down to interview the government, but they were all sent back to Toronto. The city of Toronto wishes to protest against this to-night. It is a dumping ground after the harvest is over, for a large portion of the unskilled harvest labour that comes from the West. Dear knows, _we have, unfortunately, owing to many industrial troubles in that city, enough men of our own out of work without being made the dumping ground for the whole of Canada. As regards some of the men that came down to interview the government, it was said by some ministers that the men did not want to go to

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work. To show that that is not the case, three of these men took jobs at snow cleaning at Mimico and three of them were killed there in the yards of the Canadian National Railways, where they were getting the mean wage of fifteen to twenty-five cents an hour shovelling snow. I protest against the way in which these British harvesters were used. I do not say that the government is altogether responsible for this because I think part of the fault belongs to the transportation companies; but I urge upon the government that if these men are brought out, they should not be brought out in September, October, November, December and January when there is practically no work, and people are out of employment. There should be a closed season for immigration in winter as in some of the larger municipalities we shall have to go back perhaps next winter to the dole system. The way these British harvesters were used was bad advertising for Canada in the Old Country. In connection with immigration agents, I do not say that the Minister of Labour is to blame for this particular case, because this may not come under his department, but in immigration matters and in bringing men to Canada there should be co-operation between the federal, provincial and municipal authorities on immigration matters in general. The cities and municipalities all have their own labour troubles to contend with and in winter, by reason of natural conditions arising in their own limits, they have enough unemployment to take care of without having men who are imported from outside dumped upon them and left to depend upon charity. Many of these men who are brought into this country from the Old Land and left to shift for themselves in our cities in winter have wives and children depending upon them, and some of them are men who have fought for the flag. This sort of thing gives this country a black eye and something should be done to remedy the situation. This matter may not come within the minister's department, but I would suggest that, this notwithstanding, he urge upon his colleagues to do something in the way of co-operation with the Old Country authorities, the transportation companies, the provincial governments and the municipalities, with a view of having some joint satisfactory arrangement arrived at to check this work up. The larger municipalities are^ protesting; as I say, they have men of their own to look after in the winter. The minister has made the statement that unemployment was not so bad; personally, I have never known it to be as bad as it was during

the last winter. Many of the industries are closed altogether and 50 per cent of them are running only 25 to 30 per cent of their time. The government, I submit, can exercise control, through the Railway Commission, over the transportation situation, and in my opinion the damage done to these men should be collected from these companies. These men have been brought out to this country under false pretences: they were told that there was plenty of work for them on the farms in the summer and that in the winter they could get jobs in the cities. The British Welcome League in Toronto had to be reformed to help these poor men, give them accommodation and house and feed them. I cannot over-emphasize the mistake that was made in bringing these people to Canada in the first instance; and if the government did not enter into any contract with them, then the least they should do is to find out who did, and bring the parties or companies to time. As a result of this misrepresentation these unfortunate men have been stranded in this country. I do not say that the Ministei of Labour is to blame; indeed, I believe he has done what he could himself to remedy things. I would suggest that during certain winter and semi-winter months there should be no immigration; there should be a sort of closed season for immigration. At all events, I think it is highly improper that men should be brought into this country in the depth of winter and then abandoned and left to shift for themselves with their families and ill fed children as a result of the misrepresentation of immigration agents and the greed of transportation companies. It was a bad advertisement for Canada in the Old Land the way our kith and kin, many of them returned soldiers, were used in this unfortunate British harvester episode.


Mr. HOCKEN:: The government of this
country brings out a number of harvesters who are an asset to the West while the harvest is on. They are brought for that purpose and they render a certain service. They are well paid, of course, but I presume that those who pay them believe that they are getting value.


An hon. MEMBER:: No, sir.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: An hon. gentleman says
they do not get value. Why do the farmers employ these men, then? They are the best help that can be got, and are brought three thousand miles to be of service on hon. gentlemen's land. What I object to is that while these men are brought out to be an asset to the West, the moment they become

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a liability they are dumped upon the cities of Winnipeg, Toronto, Hamilton and Montreal. I do not ask the farmers to keep them all the year, but I do say that the government that undertakes to bring men out in such large numbers for a specific purpose surely has some responsibility for their maintenance when their service has been rendered; at any rate, the government has a responsibility for providing for their return home. Why should the cities and towns have this liability imposed upon them such as they have had particularly in the past year and in previous years? It simply means that out of private charity hundreds and sometimes thousands of men have to be maintained throughout the winter period, and maintained by people who did not bring them out. and who could not possibly derive any benefit from them. The residents of the cities are under the necessity of maintaining these men if they do not wish to see them die on their doorsteps. I say that the government that brings them out ought to find means by which they can be employed, or at least fed, when their services are no longer required and they become a liability. If they are to be a liability on any one, it should be the government that brought them out and not the municipalities who should be responsible for them. Surely it is not beyond the genius of this government, which is made up of geniuses, to formulate some plan whereby this burden may be removed from the shoulders of innocent people, who cannot benefit in any way by the presence of the unemployed, and placed, if not on the shoulders of those who have benefited from their labour, at least upon the nation as a whole. Certainly, no individual section of the country should be made to bear the brunt of this condition. I think the Minister of Labour might signalize his term of office by creating a great reputation, if he would devise a plan by which these people could be properly taken care of and not left as a burden on people who have had no part in hringing them out. I suggest to the minister that he take the matter up in council and see if there is not wit enough there to do something to relieve the situation, and take care of these men when unemployment is unavoidable. In a country such as Canada, with its rigorous climate, there must be always a good deal of unemployment in the winter, and the municipalities and such centres as Hamilton, London, Guelph and these other places, all have their troubles and their burdens in the shape of unemployment every year. That burden comes naturally in the care for their own men who have been employed in these cities during the period
149i
*when outdoor work is possible. But there comes a time when for three or four or five months there is no outdoor work to be done: building operations cease, road work ceases and the many other forms of work that must be done in the open are closed down. I believe that every municipality is willing to take care of its natural liability in that regard, but I do think that any city or town has a perfect right to protest against being shouldered with the burden of caring for those who are not a part of its local liability. I hope the minister will think enough of my suggestion to take it up with the members of the government to see whether some plan cannot be worked out in co-operation with the provinces and perhaps with the municipalities. Certainly these people (must be taken care of and at the present time the burden is forced upon those who have no responsibility whatever in regard to them. The matter should not rest there, and I am satisfied that something could be done to solve the problem. These people are here as a result of national activities and they should be taken care of by the nation.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I did not make any money cutting wood except enough to buy my working clothes.
I went back to Sudbury and then to a place named Burwash east of Sudbury; stayed a month there, then I came back and paid fare to Winnipeg; arrived there about middle of September. I could not make anything. I worked for my board and lodging in a candy manufacturer's; worked for about three months.
I went to the immigration office and complained. They told me they could do nothing for me except a job on a farm for $5 a month. So I came out and asked to get on the relief in Winnipeg but could only get on two days. Then I went back to the immigration officers and they took me in; I stayed there probably about a month and a half.


Mr. SALES:: What season of the year was he offered the So a month job?


James Shaver Woodsworth: About Christmas
time.


Thomas Sales: Five dollars a month, and his board and lodgings?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I suppose so.
Then a job came in for a 1.000 hands wanted for the bush in B.C. 1 heard these were to be used as strike breakers, so I asked at the immigration office from one of the permanent staff and he said there was no such thing as a strike in B.C.
Then 23 of us who were on the immigration relief signed up for B.C. We came to Wardner, B.C. and found a whole crowd of strikers waiting for us. They told us that the men were all out on strike and asked us not to go to work. Twenty-one of us never went to work but another and I talked it over and thought as the immigration office paid our fare out that we should go to work and pay this amoimt back, which we did. We worked a month in the bush $2.50 with board.
I left there and came down to Cranbrook and stayed in Cranbrook a few days. Then I met Gilbert and we decided to go to Trail and try and get work and on our way we got in this trouble. I had no money for two days. We went into this house to try and get something to eat and as we had no money we took the rifle and sold it to get something to eat. $8 we got for it. We sold it. in Grand Forks. We got there by walking and freight.
We stayed in Nelson one night. Gilbert was a member of the G.W.V.A. so got a ticket from them for the night for a hotel.	,
The judge makes this comment:
I am leaving the writing of this letter to go into the court room to sentence two lads-one from Halifax, Eng., and one from Glasgow, Scotland, for theft. They were enticed out here by the shipping agents of the Canadian railway companies. They paid about $100 to these shipping agents who get their rake-off and the rest goes into the coffers of the raihvaj' companies. These poor dupes who are being enticed out to Canada on false and misleading promises are victims of railway corporation cupidity. These lads were eking out a precarious living in the bush of Ontario and the farms of the prairies until they had to take refuge with scores of others in the emigration sheds at Winnipeg. Then they were shipped out to take the place of strikers in the timber areas of East Kootenay; they were told by the emigration authorities (so they have stated to me) that there was no strike.
Reduced to starvation conditions these lads lifted a rifle from a shed to sell to get food. They must go to prison for this crime. I will impose a short sentence but they have pleaded "Guilty" and I cannot avoid sentencing them.

The railway companies and steamboat companies are agitating for more and more population. Not a thought as to the class so long as they can get the passage money. Not a thought as to the future of these penniless lads so long as their fares are paid and go into the "Receipts" column.
It seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that when one comes into close contact with these men and realizes the brave struggle that many of them have put up in order to try and gain a foothold in this country, many of them having done their piece of work when work was available and were afterwards driven from pillar to post, some of them not fitted for the kind of work for which they were brought over, we ought to consider very seriously our whole policy, and I for one think we should rigourously refrain from wholesale condemnation of men who come to a new country to find that there is not the machinery here for fitting them into what, to them, are novel conditions.


Mr. MILLAR:: I fancy this is rather a
storm in a teacup. One would think from the remarks made by the members from Toronto that the sacrifices are made entirely by the large cities. Let me say that many of our best settlers on the prairies and, I suppose, in other parts of the country as well, were young men that came out just in this way. In fact my mind now reverts to a young man who came out with no knowledge of driving a team in Canada-of course, horses are handled differently in the Old Country-and Canadians were amused at the way in which he would talk to his horses, which would go just where they pleased. I will not say in what part of this chamber that man sits now, but he sits here. I think I could go over the country and find hundreds and thousands of such men. At the present time the farmers in the prairie provinces are doing their share in looking after these immigrants. They regard such men in the right light, for they realize these newcomers are living under entirely different conditions to what they have been accustomed. Very often when given a team of horses they will let them run away. I remember a case last fall: A young man was given a team to help stook-thresh, as we call it; he let his horses stand alone a short distance from the engine; when he wanted to stop them he said "whoa" and they stopped, he called to them a second time with the same result, but the third time they did not stop, they went home of their own accord and smashed the wagon and rack. Such mishaps will occur again and again, but the farmers realize that these men are inexperienced and

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with training will become useful; therefore they are making a sacrifice to train them, paying them sometimes three or four dollars a day which is often more than they are worth, confident that they will eventually become good Canadian settlers. The Englishman likes to be free; he resents being herded in the fall of the year and being told where he should go. Nobody dumps him on Toronto or any other city; he simply goes there of his own accord. I would remind hon. members from Toronto that much of the money which those men are helping to make on the prairie farms finds its way eventually to Toronto. Much of .what we pay for our farm implements, our textiles, and our mortgage interest, finds its way to Toronto. And I think if you look at the Auditor General's report you will observe that last year the federal government paid out to Toronto for unemployment $178,000. So I think the people of Toronto have no reason to make very much complaint. Let each one do his share by these men who come from the Mother Country, from conditions that are not very favourable, to a new country where they will make good if they are given a chance. But, I assure hon. members, the farmers of the prairie provinces are doing their share in dealing with these newcomers. As I said before, they are paying them good wages and training them at the same time, knowing they will become useful later on and good Canadian citizens. I think far too much has been made of this matter. If we all do our share I do not think any one will be badly hurt, and we will have so many more good Canadians.


Donald Sutherland: Why do not the
prairie farmers employ these men during the winter months if they are doing so much to assist them?


John Millar: To my knowledge many
of these men were able to work during the winter months, at low wages it is true, but in very good homes where they would have a chance to learn how to handle horses and to farm. I know near my own 'home two immigrants were given such an opportunity by a farmer, but both refused. Later on last winter the farmer was himself doing chores on his two farms because he could not get help at what he considered a reasonable rate.


Donald Sutherland: In the Hansard report of my remarks yesterday just before the committee rose at six o'clock when referring to a man who was sentenced to gaol for six months in Toronto I find I stated that
the magistrate termed him a rebel. The newspaper report was that the man himself admitted he was a rebel, but, as I pointed out, it was the magistrate who said he was a rebel. In regard to what the hon. member for Centre Winnipeg has said, I wish to point out that I did not without good reason make the statement that I made. I heard this man in Toronto about two weeks ago make the most reckless statements that I ever heard and I could not help being surprised that he had been permitted to say what he did. He admitted that he was the leader of this farmers' movement. He was advising these unemployed men what to do in case they made a contract to go on a farm.


John Millar: Did the hon. member say the farmers' movement?


Donald Sutherland: They claimed they were farmers-harvesters' movement, I should have said.


An hon. MEMBER:: Immigrants' movement.


Donald Sutherland: The hon. gentleman does not need to sneer at the immigrants. No province in Canada has done so much to bring people out here and to see them comfortably established as Ontario has, and that is why I asked the minister last night how it was that these men were charged a great deal more for coming back from the West than they were charged to get out there. The excursion rate from Ontario is $15 going West and $25 coming back. Ontario has for many years had to do that work itself; there has not been that co-operation between the federal government and the province that there should have been and the result is that Ontario has provided all the machinery for bringing these people out here and seeing that they are satisfactorily located with employers who will give them a reasonable wage and good care. It is the natural desire of nine-tenths of those who come to this country to become owners of land and to build up homes for themselves, and they are obliged to go to Ontario and obtain the necessary experience, because diversified farming is carried on there to a greater extent, I believe, than in the newer districts of the West at any rate. Well, a few mouths after they become installed with the farmer in Ontario they read about these excursions to the West. They are able to get out there at a low rate and get big wages and the result is that in many instances they become dissatisfied. Although they have made a contract perhaps for eight months of the year, the Ontario farmer realizes that there is no use trying to keep a man who wants
Supply-Labour

to leave; it is better to pay him off and let him go. And when these men come back the farmers whom they left under these conditions at the beginning of the harvest season do not feel like taking them in for the winter, because if another opportunity presents itself they will leave again. The farmers of Ontario have been maligned by many of these men, and the.arrangement entered into b}' the Department of Labour through representations made to the railway companies are in no small measure responsible for this condition. If it is advisable to have excursion rates, then give the men the same rate back that they get going out. I am not saying anything about the West that my friends from that part of the country need take exception to; they know this is the case. They know that it is necessary for them at certain times of the year to have a great deal more labour than they require at other times, and so long as that is the case there will be this going backwards and forwards between Ontario and the West, and there will be many men accepting these excursion rates and going out to remain there, but it is unfair to Ontario that these inducements should be held out at the very time of year when the Ontario farmer needs help the most. As to this man who was sentenced in Toronto two weeks ago, I stood there and listened to the statements he was making to the men before him, and had I had the authority I would not have hesitated to have him deported within an hour. He is not the kind of man we want in this country; he belongs to that disturbing element which are doing their utmost to create friction between the labouring classes and their employees. Our country with its great undeveloped resources affords ample opportunity to every willing worker who can come here, and will afford that opportunity for many years. It is not necessary for anyone to go around the streets of our cities and towns complaining that he is unable to get employment. It is not the case; I know of many contracts that have been standing idle during the last two or three years for lack of people to do the work. This is the condition of affairs in Toronto, and along then comes the minister and makes arrangements with the railway companies regarding these excursions. I thought it was the Railway Board who had charge of the regulation of railway rates, but we find the minister inducing the help engaged by the farmers of Ontario for a term of months to leave those farmers at harvest time and go to the West. Then we have hundreds of thousands of dollars paid out in doles to carry these people through the winter and we find people sneering at the farmer fMr. Sutherland.!
and saying that he will not take these men in for a few months. Those who are out of employment in Ontario are largely those who have refused to accept work in Ontario or who have gone out to help our friends in the West as a result of the inducements which the minister has arranged or is to-day offering to them through the excursion rates on the railways.


James Murdock: My hon. friend flatters me if he suggests that I fixed the rate applicable to these harvesters' excursions. The Labour department found out from the passenger departments of the railways what the rates were to be, because the excursions are believed to be a benefit to all concerned, to the western farmers and to the men who possibly want to be moved.


Mr. CHURCH:: An independent investigation into this British harvester matter was held by Canon Vernon for the Church of England in the diocese of Toronto. These men were sent back to the city of Toronto by the government of Canada. I will tell my hon. friend from South Oxford that while there may be an occasional one or two of them a socialist or an agitator, the great body of these men are British bom, and anxious to work. Here is a picture that appeared in the Toronto Globe of a military funeral that was given to three British harvesters who met death while snow-shovelling for the National Railways in the Mimico freight yards. These three men, George Platt, Frederick Ward, and
S.	J. Harper, had been in every British war since the Crimean. They were all married men, and they leave families of two, three and four children. The transportation companies brought these harvesters to Canada, and there was misrepresentation. These men are not loafers. I have seen many of them myself, and they are the best possible type of immigrants we could get. These three good returned soldiers were killed while out working in a snow storm at Mimico, seven miles from Toronto, and here is what Rev. Canon Vernon said at their military funeral in the Church of the Ascension:
They knew the bitterness of criticism and misrepresentation and they have answered with their lives. Last Saturday they went forth to their work and laboured until the evening, and, in the Providence of God, that evening was the evening of their life on earth.
These men, killed on the railway tracks, were not given a pension by the Canadian National Railways, and their wives and small children were left destitute. The Standard Stock Exchange and other bodies got up a public subscription for them. These men, after seeking work in vain for days, were

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given work at Mimieo on the Canadian National Railways at fifteen and twenty cents an hour, and one night an engine, backing down on the track, killed the three of them. The National Railways have not provided any pension or made any other provision for their widows and families, and I hope the Minister of Labour will see that justice is done to them. There was an inquiry, after the funeral of these three men, into the whole question of who brought these immigrants here, the conditions under which they came to Canada, went out west and were returned to Toronto and other urban centres of population in Ontario, and the inquiry showed that the men were brought out here under misrepresentation, that the transportation companies were to blame. Here is the Toronto Globe, an organ of the government, criticising the government's policy in this regard. They say that the government should not have allowed these transportation companies to bring these men out here, these men who had served in every British war since the Crimean war, and whose wives and families are now left to be taken care of by charitable institutions in Toronto. I am glad to say that a large number of these harvesters who came out from the Old Country have got work in Toronto, because we are a British-born city, and we are not going to see men who have fought for the Empire left to be dealt with by charitable bodies. It is a disgrace to the whole country the way these British harvesters were used, and as the Rev. Canon Vernon says, somebody is responsible for bringing them out. I tell you that it was the biggest black eye that was ever given to British immigration. I do not wish to criticise the government so much, because I think the transportation companies put something over on them. We have the president of one of the transportation companies in this country talking of the need for immigration, and this is the way the transportation companies use the British immigrants when they are brought to Canada. The Canadian National Railways paid these men fifteen, eighteen or twenty cents an hour for shovelling snow. These men went out in the depth of winter and worked under intolerable conditions seven miles from the city of Toronto, and were killed during one of the severest storms. There have been several sermons preached from pulpits about them. I know the Minister of Labour sometimes takes the pulpit himself. I do not think he is to blame for this particular case, but I urge him to take this matter up and sermonize Sir Henry Thornton and see if he cannot do something to get pensions for the widows of these three British-born soldiers who were killed while working on the National railways. I think the government should hold an inquiry into the bringing out of these British harvesters. I wish to protest against the way they were used.


George Newcombe Gordon: Order. This vote is for the International Labour Conference, and the hon. member is out of order.


Thomas Langton Church: I appreciate what the vote is for, but the Minister of Labour has brought up this matter of the harvesters. I am glad I called the attention of the House to the mean way the British harvesters were used.


Murray MacLaren: Before I say something in reference tc this subject, Mr. Chairman, I want to be quite sure I am in order. I wish to say a little on the transportation of harvesters, which has been discussed under this vote. Is that in order?


George Newcombe Gordon: I do not think it is in order. There was an inquiry made of the minister, and then finally some addresses were given on the subject.


Murray MacLaren: I shall be very brief in the reference I have to make.


James Murdock: Yesterday afternoon my hon. friend from Carleton (Mr. Caldwell) asked for certain information in regard to harvest excursions from the Maritime, provinces which I did not have with me at the time, and I promised I would let him have the information at the earliest opportunity, and I therefore brought the matter up tonight.


George Newcombe Gordon: The question is not a question of immigration, but purely one of transportation of labour from one part of Canada to another


Murray MacLaren: That is the point I wish to confine myself to, Mr. Chairman. I quite understand that the minister has no jurisdiction over transportation rates for harvesters within the Dominion, but I wish to take this opportunity of protesting against the conditions existing, that is to say, against harvesters being induced to proceed from their homes to the prairie provinces at a reduced rate, and at their having to pay a higher rate to return home. I protest against any such arrangement as that What is the object of that special rate? Is the return rate larger in order that these men may be retained in one portion of the Dominion to the detriment of another portion, which loses them? That to some extent is the effect, whatever the object may be.


Robert Forke: I will answer that question.
Supply-Labour


Murray MacLaren: I want to address myself particularly to the minister. I want to enlist his sympathy in the matter. I wish to present the matter from another point of view than what the leader of the Progressive party would probably put forward. The railway companies-and in this case the National Railways especially-should bring back the men to their homes at the same rate at which they took them to the West. They are being sent there to meet the needs of the middle West, they are taken from their own provinces, and the least that could be done in fairness to the sections from which they come is to return them at the same rate. Is it fair to deplete certain portions of the Dominion in rnxier to meet the needs of the West, and to grant special railway rates to assist in that depletion? I submit it is not? Surely the members of the Progressive party are not in favour of granting special inducements that will be in the interest of one section of the country more than in that of another. If they are not, how can they reconcile that position with the fact that an additional charge is made for returning the harvesters to their homes. I would submit this to the consideration of the minister so that he may, if he thinks fit, pass on to the proper quarter any views that appeal to him, more especially the view that if harvesters are brought from the East to meet the needs of the prairie provinces there should be no increase in the rates but rather a reduction in order to facilitate the return of these men to their homes.


Mr. MORRISON:: There has been considerable criticism of the railways for taking harvesters west at a lower rate than is charged them to return. I submit that the railways are entirely responsible for that course. They take the men from congested districts of the countiy to the West where they will have an opportunity to make a new start. Before they do this they advertise that the return rate will be higher than the rate to the West, so that if the men take in the excursion they do so with a full understanding of what the return faTe will be. The hon. member for North Toronto (Mr. Church) has just stated that the British-born among the harvesters deserve better treatment than they receive. I wish to say that last year there were 12,000 harvesters and only about 800 of them were dissatisfied. I submit that was a very gratifying result- there was less than one in twelve that did not fit in with his new surroundings. About the time that some dissatisfied harvesters held up the Prince of Wales at Winnipeg, ten of them refused an offer of 15 a day in the dis-
trict where I live. They would not work under such conditions for $5 a day, and I know that at that time the crop was not half threshed up in Alberta. There is always a percentage of dissatisfied men who will not accept the treatment offered them and go to work. I cannot understand any strong, unmarried man being in want in the winter after having worked at the harvesting in the West. If any such person found himself stranded it was his own fault. Some of the married men, however, were deserving of some consideration. Three years ago the city of Regina maintained eight hundred men for the winter. Two years ago they advertised that they were not going to feed men, unless applicants were able to prove that their condition was not due to any fault of their own. As a consequence they had none to feed. As long as municipalities will assume the burden of feeding men without requiring them to prove that their condition is not due to any fault of their own they will continue to have applications from needy men for assistance.


John Millar: Although I have spoken
already I wish to state that something has been said about misrepresentations and about the too rosy stories that were circulated-


George Newcombe Gordon: I question if the hon.
member is in order. This is purely a question of the transfer of labour from one province to another in the interests of western Canada. I do not think the question of immigration comes in if the hon. member will permit me to suggest that.


James Arthurs: How much was spent on
this vote last year?


James Murdock: The sum of $6,644.47.


James Arthurs: Who were the parties
that represented Canada?


James Murdock: At the International
Labour Conference? Miss C. E. Carmichael, president of the National Council of W'omen and Philippe Roy, Agent General at Paris, were the two government representatives. Mr. G. H. Sherrard, of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, represented the employers, and Mr. Tom Moore, the workers.


Harry Leader: Will the minister tell us
what it cost to keep an automobile for Mr. Roy?


James Murdock: I am unable to answer
that and my hon. friend will agree the subject is not in my department.

Supply-Labour


Harry Leader: You mentioned his name
in your answer. I can tell my hon. friend it is $3,000 a year.


George Newcombe Gordon: That has no reference
to this item at all.


Mr. HUMPHREY:: Can the minister state what the policy of employment agencies is in regard to transferring labour from one province to another in case of a labour dispute? Is it the policy of the employment agency to supply labour to another province as a result of representations by an employer, who has had labour difficulties but nevertheless states that no such trouble exists.


James Murdock: It is most decidedly not
the policy of the employment offices of Canada under those conditions to assist in transferring labour from one province to another. If representations are made, as they were made during recent months in British Columbia when the I.W.W. had a lumbermen's strike, or if representations are made to the employment offices of the prairie provinces that labour is wanted, the instructions are that the superintendent of employment offices must state the exact conditions in effect at the point where labour is required leaving the workmen then to act in accordance with their own judgment. Possibly the information desired by the hon. member is covered by order in council 3111, section 5, sub-sections (a) and (b). It will be observed from these sections of the order in council that employment offices should maintain a strictly neutral attitude in industrial disputes. Reports in this connection should be made in triplicate on form E.O. 25-report of trade disputes- one copy being sent to the provincial clearing house, one to the interprovincial clearing house, and one copy retained on file in the office. When disputes are settled advice to that effect is also to be sent on this form. I repeat, that in so far as is possible a neutral attitude is maintained.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Joint industrial councils, $5,000.
James Murdock: This appropriation is
intended to meet charges arising out of work done for the formation of a system of joint industrial councils as between employers and workmen. The system is largely identical with that known in Great Britain as the Whitley councils, and it is thought likely to be helpful in meeting industrial situations arising out of industrial unrest. The appropriation is intended to cover expenditures for salaries, allowance and travelling expenses, temporary assistance and so forth.


James Arthurs: Is the minister of the
opinion that they are less helpful? Otherwise, why the reduction in the vote?


James Murdock: There have not been
any extensive expenditures under this item for the past two years, one important reason being that there is generally in effect throughout Canada a commendable spirit of compromise as between employer and employee. There seems to be a desire on the part of both, generally speaking, to co-operate. There are some exceptions to that. The appropriation is maintained, but it has not appeared advisable to make any extensive undertaking. We pay out of this appropriation certain expenses, for instance, salaries last year of $1,308 and allowance and travelling expenses of $3,039.75. The expenditures shown under allowance and travelling expenses covered the amounts paid to an officer of this department who is on part time, who works by the day, who has been a very valuable officer to the department, whom we found working on the same basis when I came to the department, and who has accomplished some very commendable results in the way of mediation and conciliation since that time. The largest amount of this appropriation has been paid to take care of the salary and expenses of that officer.


James Shaver Woodsworth: How many such
councils have been organised during the past year?


James Murdock: Not any. I said a
moment ago that during the past two years no expensive undertakings have been made in regard to the establishment of joint industrial councils.


James Shaver Woodsworth: If no councils have been organised, what is the man doing who is working on half time?


James Murdock: He is by mediation in
numerous cases bringing about settlements between employer and employee. For example, within the past six months, six applications for boards of investigation were made to the department, on each one of which a settlement was reached as a result of the efforts of this officer in the way of mediation. If we put that in comparative figures, I think we could readily show that if, in each case, boards had been formed, and had gone through the usual mode of procedure, and the three members of the board had been paid, with the expenses of witnesses and the delays that would occur, this would have cost very
Supply-Labour

muidh more than this particular item amounts to in paying this officer his allowance and travelling expenses for the last year.


James Shaver Woodsworth: That may be a
very laudable work, but I submit it is not the work of establishing industrial councils. Has the government given up the idea of the advisability of establishing councils?


James Murdock: Not at all. I hope that the time may come before many years, possibly before the next fiscal year, when we can say that the time has arrived when we can proceed in a more insistent way to bring about the formation of industrial councils. It has not appeared advisable to move very urgently in that direction during the past two years, according to the view of the department and the minister.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am informed that certain groups of civil servants are very anxious that councils should be formed in the branches of the Civil Service. Surely, it would seem as if there was a field in whicfc the government need have no great hesitation. This does not impinge in any way on private rights, private corporations. Is it the intention of the government to establish Whitley councils or industrial councils within the Civil Service?


James Murdock: I would hope that my
hon. friend would ask the Prime Minister for a declaration on that point. I think I could go so far as to say that the government would expect that government employees should have all reasonable and consistent opportunity of making known their aims and claims. To that extent the government has indicated its desire during the past few weeks in regard to the postal employees' revision of salaries.


James Shaver Woodsworth: But in this again
I think the Minister of Labour will hardily attempt to tell us that making known the claims of employees is anything like the establishments of Whitley councils as advocated a few years ago in England.


James Murdock: I agree that it is not by any means, and again I hope that someone will not criticise me for saying this. This is a question on which the Civil Service Commission would have something to say; I think a question upon which they would have the most to say. In other words, under the law, they have authority to determine certain questions as those questions affect the wage rate or conditions of employment of civil servants. There is nothing in the law wh oh would

specifically say to them: You shall give civil servants an opportunity for a voice and a vote in the determination of those questions.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Does the minister imply that the Civil Service is in opposition to the commission?


James Murdock: I imply nothing. I am not touching on that point. I say that it is a matter on which the Civil Service Commission would have a good deal to say.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Has the minister ever inquired of the Civil Service Commission whether they would be willing to have Whitley councils established?


James Murdock: I have not asked the Civil Service Commission if they would be willing to have established in the Civil Service Whitley councils or industrial councils.


James Arthurs: The minister has justified this appropriation by stating that he has a very efficient officer who works part time. He gave instances where this officer had prevented disputes, in fact I understand had prevented all the disputes that had occurred in the department this year. Am I correct?


James Murdock: No, far from correct. I said that in six applications which were made, the officer was able to effect a settlement without the necessity of forming a board, but twenty-two applications were made during the year.


James Arthurs: It would appear that this officer on part time was more efficient than the other wage investigators. Is that true?


James Murdock: His duties are somewhat different. Fair-wage officers have a different line of duties to perform under the Civil Service classification.


James Arthurs: Fair-wage investigators?


James Murdock: Yes, and of course this officer is a good wage investigator. He can do that class of work or other classes.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I do not suppose his
assistance was requested in the dispute between the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) and Dr. Torrance.


James Murdock: No.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is rather too bad he was not called in.


James Murdock: He might have been able to settle that.


Henry Herbert Stevens: There might have been a little justice done.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Supply-Labour
Combines Investigation Act, including $1,000 to the registrar, $20,000.
Robert Forke: Could the minister give us some information as to the working of this act? Have there been any prosecutions or any discoveries?


James Murdock: There have been no
prosecutions.


Robert Forke: Any investigations?


James Murdock: There have been a considerable number of investigations regarding some of which I will give the details. The following is a memorandum, I have on the subj ect:
Preliminary investigations initiated by registrar as a result of representations received:
1.	Boot and shoe manufacturers and jobbers interrogated regarding fixing of resale prices. Result: complaint found to be unjustified.
2.	Inquiry of canners as result of an inquiry as to why act was not functioning in connection with canners' combine. Result: information received from canners and enquirer requested to make formal application, which to date he has not done.
3.	Inquiry of dealers in wholesale plumbing supplies
in connection with inquiry received re refusal of dealers to supply inquirer. Result:	applicants decided not
to make formal application, as investigation resulted in wholesalers agreeing to furnish supplies.
There are a number of other lines in which investigations have been held. Does the hon. member want me to read them?


Robert Forke: I think the committee is
anxious to know how the act is working out.


James Murdock: My memorandum on
this question continues:
4.	Inquiry into conditions existing in the western provinces relating to the marketing of B.C. fruit and vegetable. Attention of department directed to the matter by the Minister of Trade and Commerce and the member for Centre Winnipeg, who enclosed clipping from Nelson "Daily Sun" containing letter signed by
O.	J. Wigen of Wynndel, B.C., complaining of alleged combine regarding merchandising of fruit. Mr. Wigen was invited to make application under act on March 20th but so far has failed to do so. In the meantime an investigation into the matter is being conducted by departmental officer at Vancouver.


James Arthurs: How many formal complaints have been made?


James Murdock: There have been no
formal complaints. No application has been made under section 5 of the act, which requires that six citizens shall take the necessary steps. We have asked that application be made on several occasions when complaints have been lodged, but in no instance has the application been forthcoming when it came to final action on the part of the persons concerned.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Have there been
any investigations of the banks?


James Murdock: No; we have not assumed that this was a part of the function of the Combines Investigation Act.


Robert Forke: I do not think that it is
a wise provision to require six citizens to make the application; it is quite difficult to get six persons to agree to do this. One complainant may be quite prepared to make application but it is not so easy to get five others who are willing to stand behind him in the complaint and share in the responsibility. In that respect I think there is a weakness in the act.


James Murdock: My hon. friend will
recall that originally framed the act required only one person to initiate the complaint. That provision was amended, I think with the general if not, indeed, the unanimous consent of both Houses, to require the joint action of six citizens, it being held that one disgrunted individual or a discharged employee might make the application on entirely insufficient grounds. Indeed, if it appeared proper I could cite an instance in which this very thing has occurred. During the past few months an employee who had been discharged alleged all sorts of things which on investigation were found to be unwarranted. It was decided when the act was passed that six citizens should initiate the complaint before any business might be interfered with, perhaps unfairly; and the department has tried, and the minister will try, to conform to that view. It is not a question whether I personally believe that some other action should be taken; but generally speaking I think that this plan should be followed, especially in view of the fact that both Houses have endorsed it. One hon. member brought to the attention of the department a case in which it was thought that a combine existed, and after some correspondence and investigation he called upon the departmental officers and discussed the matter. Later on, hearing nothing further and thinking that possibly an application would be filed, the department inquired as to the result, receiving this reply:
Your favour 11th instant is received and contents noted.
In reply I am pleased to say that the mere threat of an investigation has had the desired effect, for the present at least; if repentance, and atonement, does not continue I will be pleased to let you know.
That is an indication of what was done in one case, and I think that the correspondence would disclose a number of similar cases in which inquiry for certain information has had the desired effect.
Supply-La b our


Levi William Humphrey: Is it possible to give the date of the investigation into the fruit situation in British Columbia?


James Murdock: This investigation has taken place only in the past few weeks and is still proceeding.


Levi William Humphrey: What is the date of the clipping which has been referred to?


James Murdock: It is dated March 8, 1924 and is taken from the Nelson Daily News.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Will the minister read it?


James Murdock: It is as follows:



BAR WHOLESALE BROKER COMBINE WIGEN DEMANDS

[Stage Direction]
Urges Federal Enactment to Prevent Interlocking of Interests
Seeks to Arouse Public Opinion
Wynndel Co-operative Head Claims Growers Being Given Over to Combine
To the Editor of The Daily News.
Sir,-This is an appeal through your valuable and much circulated paper (and others in sympathy with the fruit growers, that will copy it) to bring before the public the fundamental cause for the deplorable economic condition prevailing in our industry. And to pray for assistance from other commercial units, public bodies, boards of trades, and our provincials and Dominion governments to help us out of the entanglement with the two commercial combinations operating in our four western provinces, and known as the broker-wholesale combination, controlling the distribution of our fruit and vegetable products.
The true commercial condition that we are subjected to is this: That before we can use these fruit and vegetable wholesalers as our distributors, we must engage their brokers as our brokers, so that they legally can sell our products to themselves. And if we refuse to concede to their conditions they will get these requirements some where else, when a quantity of our products will have to go to waste.
A much similar condition prevails with the wheat and cereal farmers on the prairies, as their products must pass through the Winnipeg Grain exchange, a legalized gambling institution, for want of something more economic at present.
Farmers Discriminated Against
You men of commercial brain, as well as you lawmakers for our provinces and our Dominion, must realize the deplorable state of affairs that such a condition creates, for in no other industry would the laws permit such a condition to prevail, and if they did, no other industry subjected to it could ever hope of surviving beyond its stage of infancy.
Had nature not endowed the agricultural class with such a tenacity of life, it would, as an industrial unit in the nation's organic life, have been extinguished long ago.
We now appeal in the name of the British Columbia fruit industry to all fair-minded citizens to assist us in bringing to the attention of the governments in each of the western provinces and at Ottawa, the immorality of permitting interlocking combination in restriction of legitimate merchandising of the farmer's products, such as prevail with the mutual brokers, operating for the so-called Nash houses and the Growers Sales Agency, operating for the so-called independent houses.
[Mr. Murdock.J
As long as these two combinations are legally permitted to operate there is no hope for the British Columbia fruit industry ever getting out of the path
of bankruptcy, organized or unorganized. And the much hoped for co-operative movement of last spring only serves to hand the growers over to this combination in an organized form.
No Need to Buy Out
Mr. Howe of the Associated Growers says that it will take two and a half million dollars of the grower's money to get out of this broker-wholesale combination. Whereas we maintain that an order in council with the stroke of the pen, or the passing of an act by our federal government, would accomplish the same by making it unlawful for any wholesale house to own, control, or have any interest in any brokerage concern handling commodities of the same class as the respective wholesalers.
As farmers and fruit growers, we wish no quarrel with any legitimate wholesale house. On the contrary, we wish to foster a closer and more friendly relation along economic lines.
The wholesalers would not be human if they did not use to their own advantage the inquity of the law permitting such an interlocking combination to operate amongst us.
When we consider that the farming class constitute the Old Dad of the nation, providing the victuals for its inner sustenance, it becomes inconceivable that its family should subject him to bankruptcy, knowing, as they must, that it finally is bound to reflect upon themselves, causing suffering, if not social collapse.
On behalf of the British Columbia fruit and vegetable industry,
O.	J. WlGEN.
Wynndel, B.C., March 6, 1924.
We have invited the gentleman to file an application with certain definitely alleged facts over the signature of six citizens. So far he has failed to do so. But regardless of his failure, we are undertaking as careful an inquiry as it is possible to make under the circumstances.
James Arthurs: The minister has given
the names of two or three parties who were complained against. He might as well give us all of them.


James Murdock: I do not think my
hon. friend would really want me to do that.


James Arthurs: Then why single out
one or two, such as the boot and shoe men and the plumbers?


James Murdock: I have just read a
newspaper article, but I did not give the names of any persons or indicate in what part of the country they were located. I think as much or more information than that has appeared in the press from time to time.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Would the minister inform the committee if the Combines Investigation Act would meet the case complained of, providing the necessary charge were properly filed?

Supply-Labour


James Murdock: Personally, I am of
opinion that a thorough investigation under the provisions of the act could be initiated if the charge were regularly laid; but it is a question whether the department should initiate such an investigation on the representations contained in this newspaper article. After we get further information from an officer of the department who is inquiring into the matter in Vancouver and elsewhere it may be considered that there is sufficient involved to warrant our asking council for the appointment of a commissioner to make an investigation.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Did the signer of that
letter refuse to file any formal complaint when invited to do so?


James Murdock: He has not definitely
refused, but he has not yet laid a formal complaint.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The reason I ask is that
the charge in the letter as published is of a very sweeping and a very damaging nature. I know nothing about it myself, whether it is even approximately correct or not. It does seem to me that an effort should be made, on the one hand, if the charge is well founded, to remedy the situation; on the other hand, if the charge is not well founded, to dispel from the public mind the idea that such a nefarious combination exists; and I think the minister should press for particulars of a definite character in connection with such a serious charge.


James Murdock: I agree with my hon.
friend entirely, and I would not have felt it proper to place before the House references to certain concerns but for the fact that the letter had been published in the press. I would not think it proper to subject a business man to the notoriety of having his business methods condemned broadcast unless the charge was well founded. I believe, with my hon. friend, that after such investigation as the department may make it should indicate in some measure what are its views on the facts alleged in this communication.


Levi William Humphrey: I am personally acquainted with the writer of the letter which the minister has just read. He is a thoroughly responsible and reliable man. For some time he has been head of a very flourishing co-operative association, and he is, I believe, in a position to give very valuable information regarding the conditions complained of. Although perhaps he may hesitate to file a declaration signed by six citizens, I think
that on the strength of the charges he has made it would be well for the department to institute an investigation under the act.


James Murdock: We wrote the gentleman on March 20, but he has not even favoured us with an acknowledgment. We proceeded to make inquiries concerning the statements contained in the published article and are continuing those inquiries. We proceeded to make other investigations on the basis of the statements made in the published article, and are continuing those investigations.


Levi William Humphrey: I take it that the department would eventually have some further progress to report, if investigations are still taking place.


James Murdock: I hope so.


George Newcombe Gordon: Mr. Graham moves that item 277 be amended by adding thereto the following words after the word "registrar":
-which amount may be paid notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the Civil Service Act or in the Combines Investigation Act.


James Murdock: That is necessary in accordance with a letter from the Auditor General dated March 13.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Will the minister read the letter?


James Murdock: It is as follows:
Dear Sir,
I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 12th instant respecting a proposed remuneration to Mr. Hereford, a permanent employee in the Labour department, for his services as registrar under the Combines Investigation Act.
Any remuneration that may be proposed for Mr. Hereford will need to be voted notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the Civil Service Act or in the act to provide for the Investigation of Combines, Monopolies, Trusts and Mergers.
Section 22 of the Civil Service Act prohibits payment to any permanent employee of the Civil Service additional to his salary unless specially voted by parliament and section 4, Subsection 2 of the Combines Act provides that in case the registrar holds office in conjunction with any other office in the public service he shall not be entitled to any additional remuneration.
The item in the estimates should, I think, provide as follows:
"Combines Investigation Act including $1,000 for the registrar, which amount may be paid notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the Civil Service Act or in the Combines Investigation Act."
Yours sincerely,
Geo. Gonthier,
Auditor General.


Henry Herbert Stevens: What other duties does
this gentleman perform, and what is his present salary in addition to the proposed $1,000?
Supply-Labour


James Murdock: For the past several
years he has been classified as an industrial engineer in the Department of Labour, and his salary for this fiscal year for that position is $3,615.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Are his duties as industrial engineer of a very important and onerous character? Do they occupy a large portion of his time?


James Murdock: Yes, he is busy all the time.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Some people can keep very busy doing nothing, but I will be charitable in this case and assume he has some duties. Could the minister tell us what they are?


James Murdock: He is a technical officer who can deal with many of the questions that come before the department. His services are valuable also on account of the fact that the Minister of Labour has charge of the Printing Bureau. His work as industrial engineer and his recommendations in connection with the installation of machinery and the activities of the Printing Bureau have been extremely valuable and have resulted in a considerable saving to the government.


Henry Herbert Stevens: How much of his time is now to be diverted from these highly important duties to the Combines Investigation Act?


James Murdock: That depends on the
number of cases that arise. The department has not been extremely busy with cases arising out of this act, but there is considerable correspondence requiring attention and involving work which on many occasions has to be done after hours. It was thought that it would be well if we could get a responsible officer of the department to carry out these extra duties, and that it would be proper to give him additional compensation for that work.


Henry Herbert Stevens: What was the total expenditure under this item last year?


James Murdock: Practically nothing-to
be exact, $82.24.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Would it not be possible to have this registrar's work done by some other official in the regular hours of employment without additional salary? The position is certainly a very modest one in spite of the rather distinguished title which he bears. "Registrar under the Combines Investigation Act" sounds imposing, I know, but the duties outlined by the minister do not seem to call for a very highly paid official. I am not

objecting to this form of paying the official, of adding $1,000 or of taking that amount out of this vote for the purpose. But in view of the situation disclc-sed during the past, year it does seem to me that one of the officers of the department could act as registrar without any additional salary. To add $1,000 to another salary of $3,600 for the purpose of administering an act that last year cost the country $82.24 seems to me to be carrying the thing a little too far.


Mr. WOODS  WORTH@: I should like to support that contention. This man has been relieved from certain duties that he had hitherto been performing, and I cannot see that there should be an additional salary. WTe are talking economy; why not begin along these lines?


James Murdock: Very often my hon.
friend talks for justice, and I am quite sure that when he comes to analyse this question he will view it in that light. This officer is doing just as much work in his regular position as he was doing before, but it was not considered advisable that we should go outside and appoint some other person to this particular position. We want to economize; we want to carry on with as little expense as possible, and that we are doing so is shown in the expenditure of only $82.24 out of $30,000 voted last year.


Henry Herbert Stevens: We want to prevent the minister from breaking his good record.


James Murdock: My hon. friend (Mr. Stevens) suggests that we may not have much to do during the next year. That may be so, but we must be in a position to deal promptly and effectively with any cases that arise or any complaints that are made under the act. I do not think that even my hon. friend from Centre Winnipeg or my hon. friend from Vancouver Centre would suggest that this is a situation that could be handled by any clerk in the department. It certainly deserves the attention of an employee possessed of more than ordinary capability and experience. That has been the thought at least, and I certainly hold that view. Now considering the actual weeks of investigation and research that have been entailed by these additional responsibilities thrown upon an officer classified by the Civil Service Commission as an industrial engineer, it does not seem to me unreasonable to ask that for the present fiscal year some additional compensation be given him. No additional compensation was paid from August last until March 31 of this year. The additional work and research was all undertaken free. I think it is only

Supply-Labour
reasonable to suppose that the registrar is better fitted to go ahead and determine what should be investigated during the present year by reason of this research work which he has already done, and I would hope that it will not be indicated here that we are not prepared to pay reasonably for extra responsibilities, service or duty required by a classified government employee.


Mr. COOTE:: I think if we are to have
a registrar under the Combines Act, the House might very well vote the $1,000 that the minister asks for, but I would suggest to him that he might give this registrar some work to do, so that he can earn this extra salary. He might very well have him investigate, for instance, whether we have not a bankers' combine in this country that limits the rate of interest to depositors to 3 per cent. I do not think that he would have very much difficulty in proving that that is the case.
I would also suggest that the minister might have the registrar investigate and see whether we have not a millers' combine in this country. In support of my contention that we have a millers' combine let me just bring to the attention of the committee, that in Australia it is possible to buy a barrel of flour with the proceeds from four bushels and five pounds of wheat, whereas in Canada it takes the proceeds from six bushels and twenty-seven pounds of wheat to buy a barrel of flour I cannot understand why there should be that great difference in the spread between wheai and flour in Australia as compared with Canada. Flour is the basis of bread, which is the staff of life for all the people in this country, and I do not think it is right, when we have a registrar under the Combines Act, that he should allow this apparent combine to continue without making some investigation. In Alberta I believe you can buy flour that .is made in the city of Calgary for the same pricr in any part of the province, so there would seem to be some combine among the millers when they are able to fix a price for the whole province in that way. They also fix the price in Montreal at the same level as in Toronto, and sometimes they fix the price in Great Britain lower than it costs right here in Ottawa. I would suggest to the minister that he might very well have the officer in his department make some investigation into the millers' combine in this country.


Donald Sutherland: I must express my
surprise that so little of this amount that was voted a year ago has been used by the minister or the officers of his department. I have a very vivid recollection of how the minister
went up and down this country from one end to the other, railing against the trusts, mergers and combines that had everybody by the throat. We voted $30,000 a year ago, and the minister states to-night that of that amount it has not been necessary to expend more than $82.24 in order to settle this whole difficulty, and that now the coast is clear. I put some questions on the order paper during the session, and the answer with regard to this settlement that had been made was that it was not in the public interest to make known what had been done by this minister who has settled these combines once for all at a cost of $82.24 to the public. There is something so absolutely absurd about the whole thing that I am not at all surprised the minister should smile. We had evidence taken before a committee of this House a year ago with regard to the charges that were being made by the sugar refineries in this country. Sugar could be shipped over a long distance cheaper than it could be shipped to a point nearer to the refinery, and it was absolutely impossible for any grocers to buy except under those conditions. I brought this matter before parliament a year ago, but nothing was done. The minister, with all this $30,000 at his disposal, has not seen fit to take any action in that matter.
.The hon. member for Macleod has just referred to a millers' combine in this country. I think the millers of this country are being discriminated against to-day in the discriminatory freight rates that are being charged against certain points. Only last week my attention was called to the rates for flour and wheat from certain points, which showed that there is some discrimination being shown, and the result is that we have mills idle in many parts of the country to-day simply because they cannot compete with mills in other districts that are receiving a preferential rate. But the minister thinks all we have to do is to vote this money without being given any more information than he has seen fit to give to the committee, and he is even asking for $1,000 additional to be paid to some officer in his department. Surely the minister does not want the country to believe that these mergers, trusts and combines that were throttling industry and robbing the people of this country have all faded away since his advent to office, without any action on his part. If they have, I think it is up to him to inform the committee just what he has done in that regard, instead of answering a question I put on the order paper as it has been answered. My question was this:
1.	What prosecutions, if any, have been held under federal legislation against trusts, mergers, and combines
Supply-Labour

in restraint of trade in Canada during each of the years 1922, 1923 and 1924?
2.	What penalties were imposed during those years for the offences committed by any or all of said trusts, mergers and combines in restraint of trade?
That was answered on. March 20, as follows:
1.	During the year 1922 and until August 25, 1923, when a registrar was appointed under the Combines Investigation Act, 1923 the only federal legislation in effect under which prosecutions could be held was the Criminal Code (Sections 496, 497, 498). No prosecutions were held under this Statute. Under the Combines Investigation Act, 1923 no prosecutions have taken place, though complaints informally laid have been investigated with results which have avoided the necessity of prosecution.
2.	Answered by above.
I put another question on the order paper, with reference to the Combines Investigation Act, as follows:
1.	What complaints were laid and by whom?
2.	Against what persons, companies or corporations were such complaints laid ?
The anwer was:
It is not in the interest of the public to g:ve the information requested.
Does the minister want the members of this House to understand that if there are combines of that kind, and there are, the people should not know anything about them? Is it only the minister himself and those in the department who are entitled to know where these combines are located, and what means have been adopted in order to put an end to them? I do not think there is much evidence so far as the people generally are concerned that the minister has been active in this respect because, in so far as I can see, the very combine referred to by the member for Macleod (Mr Coote) is in operation. To-day we have vacant mills in the central part of Ontario that cannot be disposed of by reason of the discrimination that is shown in regard to rates. We have the sugar combine to which I referred which compels the grocer to pay those excessive rates. That grocer cannot have sugar shipped to him without purchasing from the wholesale grocers at a point distant from his place of business. He cannot purchase by the carload lot and have it shipped to him direct; he must go to the wholesale grocer at a greater distance. These are some things that the people are aware of. The minister ought to be frank and let us know in what respect he has relieved the people from the pressure that 'has been exercised by these combines.


James Murdock: My hon. friend I am
sure knows what is largely, or most often, the cause of combines, I hope this government is going somewhat in the direction of removing the cause and that it will move further in that

direction. My judgment is that protection which has been improperly in effect in Canada has permitted some of the combines to grow, and exist and flourish; and if we can remove from Canadian business improper protection that only contemplates the protection of certain special favoured individuals we will remove combines that affect the welfare of producers and consumers largely from the realm of possibility. That is my opinion.
Now as regards my hon. friend's suggestion. I understood from the questions he placed on the order paper, and I understand now, that he would like me to give the name, and date and place of all the investigations, or inquiries, that have been made. Well, the two Houses of Parliament indicated that possibly that would not be the proper thing to do. The law itself contemplates that shall not be done unless real cause and necessity for it is shown. While those instructions are in effect I do not think it would be fair for me to say that we investigated Mr. Jones at such a place because it was alleged that he was conducting, or alleged to be conducting a combine in the plumbing trade, or Mr. Somebody else at another place because he was conducting, or alleged to be conducting, a combine in the boot and shoe industry. It would not be fair to do that and I think the discussion last year in both Houses indicated this view. I can assure my hon. friend that if he and the hon. member for Macleod (Mr Coote)-knowing all these facts as to the millers' combine that they have talked about-will touch the pen, and get sufficient other citizens of Canada to do the same, we will initiate an investigation under the Combines Investigation Act, and I personally will endeavour to see that we go to the full limit by investigation to secure all the facts possible; but until someone makes the application contemplated by the law I shall have to abide by the instructions of both Houses of Parliament as understood and not appear to harass business unduly, but act only as the result of securing complaint as the law requires over the signature of six citizens. Now, whether that is right or wrong it is the position that I contend the minister in charge of the department should take in view of the instructions of both Houses when this law was passed.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is rather difficult to allow to go unchallenged the little political byplay that the minister indulged in in the early part of his remarks He says that the government have gone in the right direction towards removing the cause of combines in this country by dealing with this iniquitous thing

Supply-Labour
known as protection. Will the minister say that the reduction of the duty on farm implements, for instance, is proof that there was a combine in restraint of trade-an unreasonable combine such as he referred to before his election to this House, and such as is contemplated in this act? Will he say such a combine existed up to the time this budget came down, and that the budget by the reduction of these duties dealt with that iniquitous combine?


James Murdock: I am not saying so.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am putting a logical interpretation upon the minister's argument. If the minister does not say that, if he cannot claim that, then his argument a moment ago is senseless, meaningless, and pointless.


James Murdock: Just a moment-


Henry Herbert Stevens: Will the minister recall for a moment those vociferous denunciations of that terrible cotton combine-


An hon. MEMBER:: Textiles.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, of the Canadian Cottons and Dominion Textiles, a combine that was grinding the very faces of the poor in the mud according to the minister's statements, in one of his numerous speeches before the election. He said the government has removed all these things because the other day he told the country that there is no combine in Canada. He said if you searched the country from the east to the west, from Halifax to Vancouver, there was no combine in Canada.


James Murdock: Neither the minister nor any officer of his department made any such statement. I want to challenge that now because my hon. friend and others have used that too often; you cannot get away with it. There are combines in Canada detrimental to the public interest and they should be dealt with.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The minister now comes forward and makes these statements. He is Minister of Labour, administering the Combines Investigation Act on which last year he spent $82.24, out of $30,000 that parliament gave him for the purpose, and he declares to-night that there are combines in Canada that ought to be dealt with. Well, why does he not deal with them? Has he not the power under the Combines Investigation Act? He spent an hour a little while ago-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It seemed to me that he spoke almost for an hour. However, previous to a few moments ago he indulged for about



REVISED

[Stage Direction]
an hour-I think I have got it straight now- in a long dissertation, assuring the committee that after careful inquiry no combine was found; that a certain individual wrote him a letter, and that he looked into it and challenged the individual who made the complaint. Now he turns to the hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Coote) and says "Put your finger to pen, and get six others to put their fingers to pen. and look out for what I will do." If the minister himself knows of combines why does he not himself put a finger to pen? Has he not sufficient power? Can the minister not get six of his friends to put their fingers to pen and make a charge against these combines that he knows to exist, that ought to be suppressed, that ought to be dealt with? The minister comes before parliament as a minister of the Crown and deliberately charges that he knows of combines that exist, that ought to be suppressed. Where are they? We have a right to know. That surely is not a secret sacred in the mind of my hon. friend. Has parliament no right to know where combines exist, where the minister knows that fact and how they ought, in the interest of public safety and having regard to public welfare, to be suppressed? Is parliament not entitled to know that? The minister has indulged in heroics in this chamber to-night. He indulged in heroics in a speech which, perhaps I have exaggerated a little. I admit that, but sometimes we have to exaggerate in order to stir the minister up, as I have succeeded in doing
James Murdock: I am going to repeat
it in a minute.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I would be surprised if
he did not repeat it in spite of his denunciations to-night.


James Murdock: I will give day and date and include some of my hon. friend's friends in it.


Henry Herbert Stevens: But if the minister is
going to make charges on the floor of this House and say in one breath that there are no combines, that they vanished simply because he got his act passed-that is one of the statements that he made to the public-


James Murdock: Not at all. I must tell the hon. gentleman that he is making a gross misstatement. I said no such thing. I shall be glad if the hon. gentleman will simply stick to the facts.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I have learned from experience that it is very difficult to put any interpretation upon the minister's remarks, because he invariably denies or twists his way out of them. Amy one who has read any



EDITION

[Stage Direction]
Supply-Labour
[Stage Direction]
of his speeches or who has followed, in the slightest measure, in the most casual way, his speeches, knows perfectly well that he has time and time again charged that there are combines in Canada. He charges that tonight, and yet, although he pleaded with the people to let him once get info office and what he would not do with those combines was not worth talking about, in spite of two and one-half years in office, he has not discovered any. In all his reports to-night of incident after incident he, with a good deal of heroics and self-complacency, boasted that these persons who had charged or indicated that combines existed had failed to make good their charges. Now he comes before parliament and what we are dealing with particularly is the voting to an official who is already getting $3,600, or $1,000 additional salary, for the purpose of administering an act the expenditure of which last year was $82.24. In my estimation, the official who administered this act last year, who has been receiving $3,600, if he is administering this act, is not performing the duties that he was performing previously. I think that is a fair deduction to make. He certainly is not down in the Printing Bureau shifting printing machinery around and reorganizing the Printing Bureau; he is not advising the minister on that work-what was it the minister said?-he is reading and studying the records of other investigations and so on in order to fit himself for this job. A little less of these heroics, a little more common sense, a little more of performance and fewer charges would be more becoming to the minister.
James Murdock: Prom which source? I said and I repeat that, in my judgment, there are in Canada combines which should be investigated. I am substantiated in that view to-night by two hon. gentlemen who named them in this House. I think there may be others. I said something about combines and monopolies in the textile trade a few years ago. I think that could have been proven and I think it could be proven yet. A committee of this House, if my hon. friend will recall, with a member of this government sitting as chairman, investigated certain textile and other industries and found a percentage of profit brought about directly as a result of protection, that was absurd and unfair to the people of Canada. In 1920, when an investigation into the textile trade was instituted by a questionnaire sent out to all concerns manufacturing textiles in Canada, what was the result? At once the textile branch of the Canadian Manufacturers'

Association came to their friends in Ottawa and appealed to them, the cabinet with which my hon. friend was connected, to relieve them from being required to fill out that questionnaire. With what result? On the 27th January, 1920, they got a draft recommendation to council prepared relieving them from filling out those questionnaires, and on the 28th January the cabinet with which the hon. member was connected were challenged as to their right to relieve the textile manufacturers from filling out this questionnaire. With what result? They told the textile manufacturers that they should comply with the order of the board and fill out the questionnaire. When the questionnaires were turned in, what was the result? Profits of two, three, yes, and more than three hundred per cent were shown on the business of some of these textile manufacturers that you have been hearing tales of woe about from my hon. friends across the aisle during the past two or three years. Those profits were shown over their own signatures in a sworn statement, and my hon. friend's friends took care to see that, even though that was khown, there would be no interference with the business that they were conducting; that no action would be taken to prevent a recurrence of that, because they just proceeded' to make moribund, to put out of business, a board which was supposed to investigate and to deal under the law with those things to which I have referred. If my hon. friend wants information and data, why does he not insist on an investigation? These facts are not too old and too cold, and the data is not too much out of date to be looked into thoroughly in order that it may be found out whether the protection of the textile manufacturers was not simply taking unfair and indecent profits from the people of Canada for several years. Yet listen to the tale of woe that we heard last year about some of these concerns being put out of business, and that we have heard even during the present year. The hon. member for Vancouver Centre should realize that there is a long story to this, and I am personally willing to go into the whole story. But again I say to my hon. friend that even though holding the opinion that there are still in Canada combines that should be investigated, I know that parliament indicated last year the view that investigations should be initiated by six citizens of the age of twenty-one years. The view was, as I understand it, that there was to be no undue investigation or possibly undue interference that might develop later as being unfair to

Supply-Labour
some concerns. We are trying to follow that policy or what we regard as the instructions of parliament. Personally, I think it should be changed. I think an investigation might be very properly instituted on the signed statement of one citizen of Canada.


Donald Sutherland: My hon. friend is
a member of the government and the government has control. I would ask him, what did he do in regard to Sir Charles Gordon whom he threatened to have gaoled when he was railing against trusts and mergers?


James Murdock: My hon. friend once
again is inaccurate; I have never in any speech in my life referred personally to Sir Charles Gordon. I d'o not think my hon. friend from Vancouver (Mr. Stevens) will think it improper for me to call his aiten-tion to his own statement last year:
Why there would be no difficulty at any time, anywhere, day or night, summer or winter, to get six citizens of Canada to complain against some institution. I do not say ignorant people, but uninformed people are very prone to complain of businesses or institutions wherever they may be. Six uninformed, irresponsible individuals may ask for an investigation. The registrar proceeds to investigate. He calls for all documents, contracts, books and so forth of the company. He can step into the office, examine into prices, obtain any information he demands. All that he asks for must be produced; the concern which is the subject of inquiry has no recourse but to give up everything that is demanded pertaining to the secrets of its business. I submit that one rival desiring to get information regarding another rival's business, perhaps more successful than his own, perhaps underselling him on the market, would find it the simplest thing in the world to get that information through such an institution as this.
It. is that and similar representations made by hon. members of this House that lead me to the belief that we should go very carefully, and know our ground thoroughly, before undertaking an investigation that might later prove altogether unwarranted,. That is the reason, and the only reason, why some of the institutions which I think should be further investigated have not been inquired into and will not be inquired into, so far as I am concerned, under existing instructions and conditions and with the law as I see it.


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend undoubtedly has in mind the Board of Commerce Commission of which he was a very proud member when he refers to this application of the textiles for relief from answering a certain questionnaire. The committee ought to observe; in justice to the government which the minister condemns so vigorously, that no such relief was given to the textiles;
150i
and the minister of course is taking a great deal of credit to himself for that. Now, this whole quarrel, if I might refer to the matter in that way, between my hon. friend, other members of the Board of Commerce, and the preceding government, regarding the Board of Commerce and the acts controlling it, is an old quarrel Which the minister very frequently resorts to when he wants to escape an awkward dilemma. He tells the House that he personally as a member of the Board of Commerce was convinced, and so convinced that he vigorously protested against the government of the day taking action, that certain combines existed during the year
1920,	which was the last year of the preceding government, which was defeated in
1921.	The minister personally knows all that; yet he has been in office two and a half years and has not given the slightest indication, either before the passing of this act or since, that it ever has been his intention to make any investigation. He said to the House to-night, however, that this government had1 discovered a way to cure the very source of these evils, the means being to reduce and remove the protection on these various industries. Well, I do not think that the House has noticed very many reductions in the duties on cottons and textiles; there has been absolutely no indication of such reductions. I am not asking the government to make any reductions, but I do ask both the government and the minister to be consistent in their arguments. The minister condemns his opponents because they did not remove the protection on these industries, under which these combines grew up; but although he has been over two and a half years in office he and his colleagues have made no attempt to apply that remedy. Why? Largely because they are convinced that there is absolutely nothing in the minister's argument; there is no other explanation for it. I venture to say that the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) will scarcely corroborate what the Minister of Labour has said to-night.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: I would not corroborate what the hon. gentleman is saying now.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Will he corroborate the statement of his colleague?


Ernest Lapointe: I am not going to corroborate the statement of the hon. member that there was no reduction on textiles. There was a reduction under the British preference.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, of 2i per cent.
Supply-Labour


James Murdock: Which we are told was enough to put half of them out of business.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Let me ask the minister,
has he fully dealt with t'he combines?


James Murdock: No, by no means.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Then we may expect
action from the minister in the future.


James Murdock: I hope you will get it.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Let me say in regard to
the quotation from my speech, which the minister has read to the committee, that I take exactly the same position now as I did *then, absolutely. I say that no investigation should rest upon the basis of a single complaint, as was originally intended in the act before it was amended in accordance with the present provision. I am satisfied that with the signed statement of six or more responsible citizens an investigation, under the act as amended, is warrantable.


James Murdock: And do you not think
that such is the plan which the department should follow?


Henry Herbert Stevens: In so far as the public is concerned, yes. But I do not think that the minister can shield himself behind that provision so far as he himself is concerned.


James Murdock: Is the minister's opinion worth more than that of any other citizen?


Henry Herbert Stevens: His opinion as the opinion of the Minister of Labour should be worth more than that of a private citizen, yes. The Minister of Labour has all the information to hand; he has all the facilities available to secure that information; and his opinion ought certainly to be worth more than that of a private citizen who has no such means of getting at the facts.


George Gibson Coote: 
Arthur John Lewis: Is the minister aware that
last year a special parliamentary committee on Agriculture investigated ocean freight rates, and on April 23, 1923, they brought in their fourth interim report, which reads as follows:
Your committee are of the opinion that upon the regular steamship lines trading from Canadian ports the price of transportation service is determined neither by the law of supply and demand nor on the basis of cost plus a reasonable profit, but that a combine exists among the various shipping companies, which combine is known as the North Atlantic and U. K. Conference Eastward -bound.
As this committee was composed of nineteen members of this House, their number should at least be sufficient to demonstrate to the minister that a combine does exist. Under the circumstances I wonder if the government intends to do anything.


James Murdock: That particular question would come under another act. As a matter of fact I think it is being investigated1 at the present time.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: By whom
is the investigation being carried on?


James Murdock: By persons who are qualified to investigate. I do not .think it would be advisable for me to say who are engaged in the work.


Mr. SPENCER:: What department of the
government has the work in charge?


James Murdock: That would be more
closely connected with the Department of Trade and Commerce.


Arthur John Lewis: It would be true to say that the government has this matter under consideration at all events?


James Murdock: I think it is absolutely
correct to say so.


Arthur John Lewis: And that an investigation is
taking place?


James Murdock: I understand so.


Edward Joseph Garland: How long
are these investigations to continue before the public may expect some action to be taken?

Supply-Labour


George Newcombe Gordon: The hon. member's
question is not in order under this particular vote, the minister having stated that the matter referred to is under the Department of Trade and Commerce.


Edward Joseph Garland: We are discussing combines.


George Newcombe Gordon: The hon. gentleman's
question was not directed to combines.


Edward Joseph Garland: I wonder
how long the minister will consider the nature of these combines before taking action against them. Complaints have been registered in the press and by members on this side and a number of investigations have been held, yet we find the cattle and other freight rates still rising.


Mr. ROBB:: Mr. Chairman, I might advise the committee that the discrimination existing against Canadian products by the North Atlantic Conference has been corrected in part. We are following up other cases of discrimination.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Probably this will answer
my hon. friend's question. Is the British Imperial Shipping Committee, presided over by Sir Halford Mackinder, which was recentlv in Canada, dealing with this discrimination?


James Alexander Robb: No; but as the result of our
representations they are looking into certain complaints.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is in connection with the North Atlantic shipping rates?


James Alexander Robb: Yes.


Mr. MILNE:: I understand that a committee investigated a shipping combine on the Great Lakes last season, and that the charges were substantiated. Is it the intention of the government to prosecute the offenders?


James Murdock: I cannot advise my hon. friend just what the government intend to do further in that matter.


Arthur John Lewis: Will the minister tell us
just how far-reaching the Combines Act is? Does it simply cover industries and not ocean freight rates?


Edward Joseph Garland: It does not reach anywhere.


James Murdock: No, it would not have
anything to do with freight rates.


Arthur John Lewis: With ocean freight rates?


James Murdock: No, it would have nothing to do with ocean freight rates. The interpretation clause of the Combines Act reads as follows:
The expression "combine" in this act shall be deemed to have reference to such combines immediately hereinafter defined as have operated or are likely to operate to the detriment of or against the interest of the public, whether consumers, producers or others; and^ limited as aforesaid, the expression as used in this act shall be deemed to include (1) mergers, trusts and monopolies so-called-	,
(3) any actual or tacit contract, agreement, arrangement, or combination which has or is designed to have the effect of (i) limiting facilities for transporting, producing, manufacturing, supplying, storing or dealing; or (ii) preventing, limiting or lessening manufacture or production; or (iii) fixing a common price or a resale price, or a common rental, or a common cost of storage or transportation.
It has not even been assumed! by the Labour department that the Combines Investigation Act would cover an investigation of ocean or lake steamship rates.


Mr. GARDINER:: A few minutes ago the minister stated that some of the textile companies were making enormous profits.


James Murdock: I know the hon. gentleman does not intend to misquote me. I said .that in 1920 the questionnaires filled out by the textile company indicated that they had made profits higher than 300 per cent.


Robert Gardiner: That is, you did not
refer to the same companies as to-day making enormous profits?


James Murdock: There is a very great difference between the profits the textile companies were making in 1919-20 and the profits they are making to-day. Many hon. members tell us that the textile companies to-day have been put out of business by the 2J British preference of last year.


Robert Milne: Does not the minister consider a combine on the Great Lakes as detrimental to the public interest as any combine that could be imagined?


James Murdock: I would say yes, probably a good deal more so.


Robert Milne: Why should not they be included in the Combines Act?


James Murdock: They have been held to come under the Trade and Commerce department. As a matter of fact, an investigation was held under the direction of that department and a report made.


Donald Sutherland: The minister has informed the committee that the protection enjoyed by those trusts, mergers and combines is responsible for the whole trouble we have here.


James Murdock: The minister did not say any such thing-certainly not in that way.
Supply-Labour


Donald Sutherland: The minister attributed the existence of trusts, mergers and combines to the protection which they are to-day enjoying.


James Murdock: Largely as the result of unfair protection.


Donald Sutherland: In the debate on the Address and in the debate on the budget the tariff was discussed, and now the Minister of Labour has interjected it into his estimates as well. It reminds me somewhat of certain gentlemen down in the Maritime provinces, who shortly after the Liberal government came into power in 1896 referred to the promises which they had made and to their unfulfilment in these words:
We promised them freedom from tariffs,
We promised them freedom from toil,
We promised to break up the robber combines for the tiller of the soil;
We have helped our friends wherever we could,
And we have made it rough for our foes,
But we have saddled the same old robber combines on our Lady of the Snows.
I think this very clearly shows how active the minister has been. He claims that while a member of the Board of Commerce he obtained an intimate knowledge of conditions prevailing at that time. It is rather remarkable that when put in a position of power and authority he has done absolutely nothing to check combines, mergers and trusts. Of the $30,000 that was voted a year ago he has spent only $82.24, and he comes back to-day and asks this House to vote him another $20,000 without giving us any assurance that anything is going to be done to these combines. "No," he said; "the remedy depends on reducing the tariff or removing it entirely." That is really the only remedy he has for ridding the country of the trusts, mergers and combines which have saddled themselves upon us during the last few years. It has been pointed out to him that he has referred to certain research work carried on by his department. Surely if his department has all this intimate knowledge as to these leeches which are sucking the lifeblood from Canadian industry, he is in a position to cure the evil. Surely it is not necessary for him to sit back in his seat and say: "Why, the requisite -application over the signatures of six citizens has not come to the department asking for such an investigation." That was not the intention of the act. With the officers of his department it is his duty to investigate, and the research work to which he has been referring ought alone to have placed at his disposal the necessary information-and he has told the committee that he has the inform-fMr. Murdock.]
ation-therefore I think he has been recreant in his duty as minister in not taking steps to put a stop to this condition of affairs. Conditions are not the best in this country, and if the condition exists that the minister acknowledges, then it is the duty of the government to see that the people are afforded relief from it.


Robert Milne: There is no doubt about
this matter of a combine ion the 'Great Lakes, and I think the minister should give us some assurance that something will be done. I am satisfied, and I think others are too, that this condition still exists on the Great Lakes Perhaps they are not quite as bold as they were before the investigation, but I suppose when the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Robb) comes before us with his estimates he will say that it was a matter for the attention of the Department of Labour. I think we should have some definite statement in this regard.


James Murdock: That combine on the
Great Lakes was regarded as sufficiently important to call for the appointment of -a special royal commission to investigate and report.


George Gibson Coote: Was that commission not appointed before we had the Combines Investigation Act?


James Murdock: Yes. I think the report of the commission was in before last August.


Henry Elvins Spencer: To what extent did the
government carry out the recommendations of the commission?


James Murdock: My bon. friend will
have to ask some other member of the government for that information. I suggest that he make inquiry of the Minister of Trade and Commerce when he comes on with his estimates. The matter was under his direction.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Progress reported.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. A. ROBB (Acting Minister of Finance) moved that the House go into Committee of Supply.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
James Alexander Robb: That a sum not exceeding $40,871,970.85 being one-sixth of the amount of each of the several items to be voted as set forth in the Main Estimates for the fiscal year ending 31st March, 1925, laid before the

Questions
House of Commons at the present session of Parliament, be granted to His Majesty, on account, for the fiscal year ending the 31st March, 1925.
Resolution reported, read the first and second time and concurred in.



WAYS AND MEANS

[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. A. ROBB (Acting Minister of Finance) moved that the House go into Committee of Ways and Means.
Motion agreed to and the House went into committee, Mr. Gordon in the chair.
James Alexander Robb: Resolved that towards making good the supply granted to His Majesty on account of certain expenses of the public service of the fiscal year ending 31st March, 1925, the sum of $40,871,970.85 be granted out of the consolidated revenue of Canada.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Resolution reported and concurred in. Mr. Robb thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 121 for granting to his Majesty certain sums of money for the public service for the fiscal year ending 31st- Mardh, 1925.
Motion 'agreed to and bill read the first and second time, considered in committee, reported, read the third time and passed.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King, the House adjourned at 11.55 p.m.
Wednesday, May 21, 1924