1925-02-16

OCEAN SHIPPING RATES


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: I have two motions that
were moved and passed the other evening, but which have been sinced expunged from the Votes and Proceedings. I beg to move:
That 800 copies in English and 200 copies in French, of the report of W. T. R. Preston in respect to the North Atlantic steamship combine, laid on the table of the House on the ninth instant, be printed forthwith for distribution to Senators and Members; and that rule 74 be suspended in relation thereto.


Mr. STEVENS:: Does this report, as tabled, contain all of the report of Mr. Preston, or is there a supplementary report or recommendations not included in the one that was tabled?
186	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Garland (Carleton)


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My impression is that this is the report in full. I will ask the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Low) when he comes in, and if I am incorrect, I will inform the hon. member.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

William Lyon Mackenzie King: That 425 copies in the English language and 75 copies in the French language of the report of the Royal Grain Inquiry Commission, laid on the table of the House on Monday, the ninth of February, 1925, be printed forthwith for distribution to Senators and Members; and that rule 74 be suspended in relation thereto.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

William Lyon Mackenzie King: That on Wednesday, the 18th of February instant, and every subsequent Wednesday until the end of the session, the House shall meet at three o'clock in the afternoon.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Report of the Work of the Department of Soldiers Civil Re-establishment for the year ended December 31, 1924.-Hon. Mr. Beland.
Report of the Board of Pension Commissioners for Canada for the year ended March 31, 1924.-Hon. Mr. Beland.
Auditor General's Report for the year ended March 31, 1924.-Hon. Mr. Robb.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. WILLIAM IRVINE (East Calgary) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 5, to amend the Dominion Elections Act.
He said: The purport of this ibill is to repeal sections 10 and 11 of the Dominion Elections Act. Section 10 deals with companies and associations which are prohibited from contribution to funds for election purposes. Section 11 deals with persons nonresident who are prohibited from taking part in election campaigns.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Friday, February 13, consideration of the motion of Sir Eugene Fiset for an Address to His Excellency the 
Governor General in reply to His Speech at the opening of the session.
Mr. W. F. GARLAND (Carleton):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to address the House, I must first congratulate the mover of the Address on his speech and also on his being restored to health. The declared policy of the government since it took office has been one of economy and retrenchment, but the policy that has been carried out has fallen far short of that. In each year since the present government took office, the national debt has increased. Members on this side of the House have often been told that they should offer some concrete suggestions that would put an end to some of these deficits that we are being confronted with from time to time. We have in power to-day a government that is preaching economy, but not practising it. In the first place we have a large number of civil servants, and at every session of parliament we are told that the number is being reduced. The number is being reduced in this way, that the underpaid civil servants are being let go and heads of departments and others who are drawing the larger salaries, are in nearly every case being retained. In some cases departments are being depleted, perhaps two stenographers doing the work, but the heads being still kept on.
Last session a Superannuation Act was passed in regard to the civil service, and some changes could be made to it during this session-for instance, that a civil servant who has been restored to health should lose his superannuation. This, I think, would be a very appropriate session in which to introduce legislation of that character. We also have government officials from time to time travelling around the country doing work for the government, going short distances, such as from here to Toronto, and, instead of sitting in first class passenger cars, being accommodated with chairs in parlour cars. This may not seem very much, but when you add all these small items together the grand total represents a large sum of money which could be saved to the country. Certainly, in my opinion, these civil servants should be required to travel in ordinary first class cars just as other people do.
Another item of unnecessary expenditure which the government should look into, and which comes nearer home, is the money spent in the use of motor cars that go driving around for ministerial purposes at the expense of the public treasury. This is an ideal opportunity for some economy. It is true that there are ministers of the crown who run their own cars, supplying their own gasoline, but no

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
doubt this particular item could afford some means of retrenchment. As I say, these various items may not appear to amount to much but in the aggregate they certainly account for a large sum. I might mention one other matter in connection with which I think there has been bad management. The headquarters of the Public Works department in this city were formerly on Queen street. The government bought a property on York street and remodelled it, and that new building houses the employees of the department a half mile away from the centre of things. This entails a gi-eat deal of inconvenience especially when any of the employees are needed in a hurry. This is one respect in which the government showed poor judgment. If they had wanted to do something to relieve unemployment conditions, instead of buying the new property which is so remote from the centre of activities, they could have made use of the property which they already had on Wellington street. That building could have been remodelled. Economy would have been effected and also employment given to those in the city who need work. The Canadian people are not looking for doles; they are anxious to secure employment; and it does seem to me that the government should take advantage of every opportunity that presents itself to provide such employment.
Now the government are handing out to the people statistics in regard to the cost of living; these figures they have placed on Hansard. I am sure the Canadian housewife will be glad to receive the information which is contained in these statistics; it will no doubt enable her to manage her affairs more economically, especially when these statistics have been supplied by experienced housekeepers. But, Mr. Speaker, 'this is not the sort of thing that the people are looking for from any government, irrespective of the party in power; the people want a government which will take advantage, as I have suggested, of available opportunities for providing employment. Once let the people secure work and they will look after the cost of living themselves. The Canadian to-day is bringing up his family, in nearly every case, ultimately to supply the country to the south of us with labour. We heard a good deal in this House last year about stability; that word was used considerably. I think that it is in the interests of this country to raise its tariff on a par with that of the United States. It seems to me that if anybody in Canada desires cucumbers, strawberries and things of that kind out of season, he ought to be prepared to pay a proper duty on them.
Something has been said- about immigration, which to my mind is a wide subject. No one is more pleased than I am to see immigrants coming into this country, but the important proviso, I .think, should be, that every immigrant contemplating coming to Canada should be given clearly to understand that this is no land of milk and honey but a place in which he must take off his coat and settle down to work if he expects to be successful. The government in its endeavours to bring immigrants into Canada should see to it that those who come in will remain on the land a reasonable time. People come into this country and after about a month's stay on the land they flock to the cities to well the ranks of the unemployed. I would go so far as to suggest that before any man left his native land to come to Canada he ought to be told that unless he remained two years, say, on the land in this country he would be deported.
I know that the agents in the countries from which the immigrants come are only too ready to help themselves. Not long ago I saw in a newspaper a skit which is not without its significance: A good Canadian housewife had sprinkled crumbs on the doorstep to feed the sparrows and a sparrow came along with a dollar bill. By this time in the countries overseas I suppose people will have gained the impression that it is just as easy as this for anyone to pick up money here.
I do not intend to take up the time of the House further. I have spoken very briefly, because I believe that we ought to get down to practical business. Every small leak which is stopped is so much gained, and in the long run all the small economies which are practised will represent an appreciable saving. The shorter our speeches are, therefore, the sooner we shall be able to get down to business and the more time we shall save.


Mr. DONALD SUTHERLAND (South Oxford) :: The debate on the motion now before the House has covered a pretty wide range of subjects. This, no doubt, is due to the fact that the Address contains so little matter on which the attention of the members can be concentrated. I have listened with a good deal of interest to the speeches that have been delivered so far, particularly that of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King). I have also listened to arguments advanced and have perused a good many of the statistics which have been placed on Hansard by the Prime Minister with the object of convincing the people of Canada that conditions here are not so very bad and, in fact, are much better than they are in the
1S8

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
country to the south of us. Statistics, however, will not satisfy the man on the street who is out of work and is without the means of providing for his family; he requires more than statistics and things of that kind to convince him that conditions here are satisfactory.
It is not a pleasant thing to * have to refer to these conditions. When we survey this vast domain which is ours we can come to no other conclusion than that Providence has been very kind to us. We have inherited a great estate; we are charged with the responsibility of the administration of that estate; and so far as Providence is concerned the last few years have been, on the whole, bountiful ones indeed. In the province of Ontario, notwithstanding that last year the spring was late and backward and things did not look very favourable for some time, nature, on the whole, asserted its capacity for recovery, with the result that we had' a very bountiful harvest. The same was true also of many other provinces. I notice that the Speech from the Throne did not contain any reference to something that was a feature in the Speech from the Throne when the government came into office. On that occasion -1922-the second paragraph contained the following:
Our Dominion has not escaped the world-wide economic disturbance and industrial depression but has suffered less from it than other countries. Keen observers of the business barometer feel that the worst is about over and that at an early date we may look for a substantial revival of activity.
That was the condition which prevailed at that time. To-day I observe that the second paragraph of the Speech from the Throne is as follows:
The problem of the cost of living is the most important that my ministers have in mind at the present time, and every effort is being made to improve conditions with respect thereto. It is apparent that even the most rigid economy in public expenditures will not suffice to solve this pressing problem.
Mr. Speaker, I think under those circumstances it would be advisable for the government to at least make some attempt at economy. If a business man felt that he was going behind, he would take immediate steps by economy and reorganization to place his business on a sound basis. But what is our condition? During the last three yearn our debt has increased by $178,000,000, the direct increase representing $128,000,000, and the indirect $50,000,000. This is surely a very unsatisfactory condition of affairs, and should cause alarm on the part of the Government and the people, and surely it demands drastic action and economy on the part of the government.

But the worst feature to my mind is the fact that during these years we have lost 600,000 of the best of our people, young people, who have been forced to leave their native land. They have gone to a foreign country to secure that employment which is denied to them at home. This is an appalling state of affairs and calls for plain speaking on the part of the representatives of the people in this House. If I say some things this afternoon that may not be pleasant to hon. gentlemen opposite, I can assure them that I shall do so from no personal feelings against them, but purely from a sense of the duty which I owe my constituents 'and1 my country. I shall endeavour to discharge that duty regardless of the consequence.
In August last the Prime Minister and several of his colleagues visited the county of Oxford. Such visits the people always appreciate very much, whether they agree with the government or not, and I am sure that the Prime Minister and those who accompanied him could not help but feel that the people of Oxford appreciated the importance of the visit. During this debate the Prime Minister referred to some statements which were made by the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen) who on the same day happened to be addressing a similar meeting in the city of Stratford. This meeting was arranged some time in advance of the meeting in the county of Oxford. I thought at the time that in two adjacent counties it might have been possible to have had an interval of at least a day or two between the visits of these two distinguished gentlemen. I attended the meeting addressed by my leader, and to my amazement the Prime Minister last week in this House endeavoured to convey to members of this House an entirely different impression of what was stated by the right hon. leader of the opposition in the city of Stratford. He stated quite distinctly that he had1 a list of manufacturing industries in this country which had closed their doors since the present government took office. He did not place the number at two thousand, as the Prime Minister stated, but at one thousand, and this figure appeared in every napei which had a reporter at the meeting. But the leader of the opposition did not take exception to the doubling of his figures, because, he said: Although I had stated rhat one thousand Canadian factories had closed their doors since the government came into power, yet I am prepared to accept your figuie of two thousand. And he produced Dun's report to show that two thousand was nearer correct.

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
On that occasion the Prime Minister also referred to what was being done by his government to reduce the cost of living, and he offered some excuse for the controversy which had arisen between himself and Mr. Bradshaw, the general manager of the Massey-Harris Company, with regard to the Prime Minister's statement respecting improved conditions in the agricultural implement industry as a result of the tariff reductions of last session. He claimed that he intended to say that the improvement was due to the policy of the government, not to the reductions in the tariff. But according to the report of his speech in the Woodstock Sentinel-Review-the only daily paper in the county of Oxford which had a reporter present and which gave practically a verbatim report of the speech-the Prime Minister, after offering his explanation of the controversy between himself and Mr. Bradshaw, said:
The point we are concerned with is that the present government took the sales tax off the implements of production, and the previous government had put it on.
" And the previous government had put it on." Surely the Prime Minister knew better than that. Was it fair to the people of Oxford to leave the impression, on their minds that his government had removed a sales tax of 6 per cent on agricultural implements which the previous government had imposed? What are the facts? When his government came into office there was a 3 per cent sales tax on agricultural implements. They increased it the first session to per cent, and next session to 6 per cent. So as a matter of fact he reduced the tax on agricultural implements by just as much as he had increased it. In fact it was found that a sales tax of 6 per cent was altogether too high The people did not complain very much of a 3 per cent tax, but they complained and complained bitterly, when it was doubled.
He went on to quote statistics-and he did the same thing in this House; it is on Hansard -to prove that the cost of agricultural implements had been reduced as a result of the reductions in the tariff of a year ago. I thought the Prime Minister had made a mistake, and when he said that, I asked him if the reduction included the decrease in the sales tax. He endeavoured to create the impression that the sales tax had nothing to do with it; that it was the tariff reductions that had brought about the result he mentioned. You will find that in Hansard of a week ago to-day; that is the impression the Prime Minister conveyed to this House. I pointed out that the result had been brought about by a decrease in the tax that had been imposed
very largely by his own government, and he had to admit-that the removal of the sales tax was included in the reduction to which he referred.
If you will look at Hansard of Friday last you will notice that the member for London (Mr. White) gave statistics with regard to the price of agricultural implements when this government came into office in December, 1921 and in December 1924; and in every instance the prices of the implements mentioned by the Prime Minister are higher to-day than they were when ithe present government took office, with one exception. That is the result of the tinkering with the tariff which has been going on; that is the result of the announcements made by the government that they were going to do something along this line. It seems hardly necessary, but I am going to repeat what the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) said, following the assertion of the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart) that he hoped last year's budget had sounded the death knell of protection.


Mr. ROBB:: Will my hon. friend allow me before he leaves that: Do I understand that he advocates a duty on agricultural implements?


Donald Sutherland: I am referring to
statements made by the Prime Minister and by others. The impression has been conveyed to the people of this country that as a result of the reductions in the tariff made by the present government the cost of agricultural implements has been reduced. I have pointed out that the reduction has not been as much, even in the last year, as was the amount involved in the removal of the sales tax and that the prices are higher than on 1st January, 1922. The boasted reductions by the Massey-Harris people and the International Harvester people did not amount to as much as the reduction in the sales tax-a tax one-half of which was put on by the present government.
Now, what are conditions at present? In the principal town in the south riding of Oxford, we have machine companies manufacturing tools, screws, bolts, and parts of machinery and implements. Articles of this kind are to-day being supplied the manufacturers of agricultural implements by manufacturing industries in the United States, and many of our workmen who formerly obtained' employment in our own factories have had to go south of the line to get employment in a foreign country, in many cases working with firms who are supplying

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
this country with materials which formerly were manufactured here. This is the policy that is being advocated by the present government-not that of protecting our industries, not that of affording employment in Canada for our own people, but that of having our people employed in a foreign country in order that goods may be sent here to compete with the labour of those who remain at home.
In the constituency of North York a few months ago the Prime Minister intimated that there was to be a "pause" in the activities of the government in ringing the death knell of protection, as was intimated in this House, but that a halt had been called for present, for the purpose, of enabling him to try to find the direction in which they were drifting. They have halted their policy. But the Minister of Agriculture, to whom I was going to refer when the Acting Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) interrupted me, stated in this House on the seventh of May last:
We are beginning to do slowly what we had endeavoured to do rapidly on three historic occasions, and failed-in 1878 and in 1891, unrestricted reciprocity, and in 1911 reciprocity in natural products.
They are now to do slowly-by degrees- what they had before attempted to do, rapidly and they are endeavouring to blind the people as to what their objective is. Is it any wonder that the people are asking themselves where we are drifting? We are a people to-day without any definite national objective in trade, in defence or in outlook. We are simply, drifting, wondering how long this state of affairs is going to continue. The government are admittedly trying to blind the people, trying to fool the people as to their objective. The Minister of Agriculture is frank at times and I am prepared to accept his explanation as to what their objective is. It is evidently designed! with a view to pleasing many of those who are seated on this side of the House to my left, because I believe that the definition given of my hon. friends to my left, the Progressives, by the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) was correct, namely, that they were simply the "pale shadow of the government." We have evidence of that in the debate which has taken place in this House. On Thursday night, to our amazement, we found that some time after six o'clock the debate on the Address had terminated, the motion had been put and carried and the whole thing was apparently over. On having the irregular proceedings corrected we were reprimanded by the leader of the party to my left (Mr. Forke), who stated that a sigh of re-

lief, or words to that effect, would go up over the country when it was realized that this debate had terminated. Since that time you have not heard a word from a supporter of the government or from my friends to my left. They are dumb as oysters, and they seem to be hoping and praying that the Address will be adopted without the people knowing what is going on in this country.
When the budget was brought down in 1923 by the Minister of Finance, Right Hon. Mr. Fielding-whose absence from this House we all deplore, a man who stands high in the estimation of the people, a naan whom to know was to love-he Stated:
The congress of the United States in the exercise of its undoubted right, has established what is commonly called the Fordney-McCumber tariff, which is largely a high tariff, and which we realize operates to the disadvantage of Canada. Any desire that we may have towards modification of our own tariff is naturally held in check by the high tariff of the United States.
This was Mr. Fielding's statement in the House in 1923. On the same occasion the Prime Minister said, a few days later, referring to the need of stability and confidence on the part of the people:
That is all we are aiming at. We do not intend to sacrifice in any particular the needs of any class of our citizens or -the needs of industry.
And a little further on:
So long as on the part of the United States, the tariff w'all remains what it is against us, and in Europe the unsettled condition continues to be what it is, and so long, may I add, as Canada remains the only country that has reduced its tariff since the Great War, while other countries continue to put up their tariffs, for that period-
Mark the words:
-for that period of time at least we shall give to those who are interested in investing their capital and establishing industries in this country, and who are seeking to restore business to a higher level of development, assurance that there will not be unstability where stability ought to prevail.
What a reassuring message to the investor, to the people of this country-for that period of time at least we shall give you that assurance, but after that, look out! That was the policy enunciated in 1923 by the Minister of Finance and by the Prime Minister, and observe what happened in the following year. Reduction in the tariff. Industries such as we have in Oxford which have been supplying many of the parts used by the manufacturers of agricultural implements of this country are falling off and many of these parts are now being manufactured in the United States. We have lost many of our workmen, is it any wonder our people are losing courage and wondering what the end is to be? I would like to point out that when the Prime

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
Minister was in the county of Oxford this condition of affairs was very much in evidence then as it is now. Scores of our workmen hacf left this country and gone to the United States, to Detroit and others of the border cities, and were working there. Along with the Prime Minister on that occasion we had the Minister of Labour (Mr. Murdock) and in his address I find that he is reported to have made use of the following language, of course he knew what the conditions were:
The question might be asked, why are there so many unemployed in Canada?
Then he went on to explain why it was that so many were out of employment. Then the report goes on:
" Let the unemployed realize that we expect them to get out and hustle as the rest of the citizens have to do," said the Hon. Mr. Murdock to the accompaniment of loud handclapping.
And again:
" I am holding to-day the proudest position of my life, and I want to coine back to give you an address on why I am a Liberal."
I have not noticed, Mr. Speaker, any disposition on the part of the hon. member for North Oxford (Mr. Sinclair) to have the Minister of Labour come up to his constituency and deliver that address on why he is a Liberal. The Minister of Labour sits in this House and hears the criticism of his department, and he does not attempt to defend it, but he likes to get up whenever someone else is speaking and interject a speech in an irregular way. He has violated the rules of the House on numerous occasions in that way, and that is about as far as the Minister of Labour gets towards any explanation which might reasonably be expected from him in regard to this and other matters. I should be very much interested to hear the Minister of Labour or anybody else tell us why he should be a Liberal under present conditions.


Mr. MURDOCK:: Would my hon. friend-


Donald Sutherland: I hope my hon.
friend will not take advantage of the opportunity to deliver that address just now. After I get through he will have abundant opportunity to do so.
There were a good many other things referred to by the Prime Minister, which I shall not take up at present. I have mentioned the question I put to the Prime Minister, and probably I had better give the exact language used. I asked him:
Do the reductions which the Prime Minister has placed upon Hansard include reduction in the sales tax or are they attributable entirely to the reductions in the tariff?
Mr. Mackenzie King:	In a word, they are due
to the reductions in taxation which this government made last session.
Mr. Sutherland:	And put on the session before.
Mr. Mackenzie King:	My hon. friend is wrong
there.
Mr. Sutherland:	Very largely put on the session
before.
Mr. -Mackenzie King:	No. I may say that the
reduction in the sales tax had an effect, and certainly the reduction in the duties had an effect.
I am not going to deal with this matter any further. The financial policy for this country can be discussed later when the budget comes down, but I thought it advisable to make this reference in view of the remarks made by the Prime Minister when addressing the House a week ago.
Some of you may recall that- at the 1924 session the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe), who, I am sorry, is not in his seat at present, delivered an address in this House on the budget along lines that you would scarcely expect from a Minister of Justice. You might have expected such an address from someone who was apologizing for the policy the government was pursuing. The Minister of Justice in that address tried to show that the policy of the Liberal party was not a protective policy, and he endeavoured to prove his point by quoting from a speech made by Sir Wilfrid Laurier to the effect tihat protection was not the policy of the Liberal party. After having done that, the Minister of Justice whom one would naturally expect to hold the scales of justice even, was very unfair, I think, in referring to one of his former compatriots from the province of Quebec. He did not mention his name, but it was quite evident to whom he was referring. The Minister of Justice said that this gentleman, Hon. J. I. Tarte had been practically read out of the government and the Liberal party because he had differed with his leader in 1902 on the tariff. He said:
My right hon. leader of that time was absent attending a conference, I think it was the Imperial Conference in London, and a member of his cabinet- a very able man in every way, but who had on tariff matters the same views as the present right hon. leader of the opposition-during Sir Wilfrid Laurier's absence had preached the principles of high protection in the province of Quebec, and I think in the rest of the country. The first thing that was done by Sir Wilfrid Laurier on his return was to ask for the resignation of that member of his cabinet.
Surely this would indicate to the world that according to the Minister of Justice the policy of the Liberal party is a policy towards free trade and not a policy -of protection. What other inference can be drawn from such language? I thought at the time that it was remarkable he did no-t go a little further and state what the views of the hon. gentleman

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
referred to were, and what he himself had to say about it, so I asked the question:
Before my hon. friend leaves that subject, would he mind placing on record the statement made by the minister, who he says was read out of his party, regarding an understanding the Liberal party had with the manufacturers prior to the election of 1896. Make the story complete while you are at it.
I thought it was only fair to the memory of this man, who is now dead, that his statement on the matter should be placed fairly on Hansard and so I asked that question. The reply of the minister was as follows:
I do not know anything about it. My hon. friend seems to have a fountain of knowledge regarding matters that I am not familiar with at all. This is the first I ever heard of such a thing and I cannot give him the information asked for.
This was the statement made by the Minister of Justice in this House last session, on the 15th of May last. Previous to that he had just stated:
If you will take the trouble, as I did, to go to the library and read the electioneering pamphlets issued by the Conservative party in all the elections which followed 1896 you will see what hon. gentlemen opposite thought of the tariff of Sir Wilfrid Laurier.
The Minister of Justice admits that he went to the library and went through all the literature issued by the Conservative party for goodness knows how many years back, and he is going to see that this is published, particularly in the province of Quebec; and yet he had never heard anything about the matter to which I referred. Well, I am going to read from Hansard the official record of this House, to show what actually took place, and give you the statement that was made by the member of the government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier referred to by the Minister of Justice. I think it is only fair to the memory of the late Hon. Mr. Tarte the minister e-ferred to that this matter should be placed fairly before the people. My attention was drawn to it by reason of the fact that Hon. Mr. Tarte on that occasion replied to the speech of the member for South Oxford of that time, Sir Richard Cartwright, who, I may say, represented that constituency for some sixteen or seventeen years. Sir Richard Cartwright had delivered a lengthy address on the budget and was followed by Hon. J. I. Tarte, a member of the same party. Mr. Tarte made reference to the many empty benches on the government sidie when he spoke. Why were those Liberals not in their places to hear this ex-minister give an explanation regarding his resignation from the government and also as to what he believed should be the fiscal policy of Canada. I will only quote part of Mr. Tarte's address which was a very able one, indeed, and one weill

worthy of being studied by even the Minister of Justice, I cannot understand how the minister, while he was in the library hunting for Tory literature, missed this noteworthy deliverance on the part of Mr. Tarte. On April 20, 1903, Mr. Tarte is reported by Hansard to have spoken as follows:
There is one thing that sunprises me. This Liberal side of the House is rather empty to-night. I would like to see it full. But what surprises me is that there are so many members of parliament on this side who have told me that they share my views, who have written me and told me repeatedly that they share my views, and who have not been able to impress their views on the government. I say it openly, I say it from the bottom of my heart, that I fully expected that the Liberal party, with which I have been connected during the last ten years, would carry out the policy it was understood in 1896 they would carry out. I am weighing my words. 1 know what arrangement, what understanding took place between some public men. I know what took place. I do not divulge any secrets. I know what we did in the election of 1896 in Montreal. I see within the radius of my eye public men, who, at our request, came to the city of Montreal, went to the manufacturers, with the knowledge of the leaders of the party, and told them not only would the tariff not be disturbed, but it would be changed in the right direction when the proper time came. There was no secret about that. I shall not give names. There are men who hear me-I am sorry there are not more on those benches-who know that I am perfectly right. I am out of office because I could not stay in office under the present circumstances. I have had only but pleasant relations with most of my colleagues and have for the most of them the greatest respect. But I could not possibly stay in office when I knew that the policy we are following now is not the right policy- when I knew what understanding took place formerly. The tariff has worked as well as it could because we have been passing through years of prosperity. But after all we have not developed so marvellously. My hon. friend, the Minister of Finance, and my hon. friends from the Maritime provinces should take a lesson from the past. Before Confederation they were most of them free traders.
A little further on Hon. Mr. Tarte says:
I am in a peculiar position. As I have said, my relations with most of my colleagues have been of a most agreeable character. I have confidence in the integrity, in the honour of most of them. I have worked harmoniously with the great bulk of the Liberal party. I have done what I could for them in days when they were not as strong as they are to-day. I remember very well the days when the Liberal party was scattered to the winds after the Mercier episode in Quebec. My friends, the Liberals in that province were not as strong then as they are now. They found allies in the Conservative party, and 'let me say to some of them that they have never been loyal to those allies. Let me reproach them on the floor of this parliament for their lack of loyalty and sincerity towards some of us. They know that I am speaking by the book. I for one have been stabbed in the back on more than one occasion, but I forgot all that. A public man must forget and forgive, when he has the true interest of his country at heart. I remained in the government knowing that behind me there were men who were stabbing me in the back. My former colleagues know it just as well as I know it myself. I remained in office for loyalty sake to my leader and to those of my colleagues with whom I was working for the

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
best interest of the country. On the question of the tariff, I could not compromise any longer. It may be said that I am not a good party man, and I stand ready to accept that reproach. If I am asked to give up opinions in which I firmly believe in order to remain in office I cannot do it. There are things on which a public man cannot compromise; on which he cannot give up his views. The question of the tariff; the question of transportation, on which I have spoken in the House so often, are two questions on which I hold strong views that I could not possibly give up. I felt that I was no longer in sympathy with several of my colleagues and I went out of offce. I have no ill-will towards them.
Surely, in fairness to this man who for many years occupied a prominent position in the public life of Canada, the Minister of Justice might well have put his views on record without endeavouring to condemn his
4 p. m. attitude, and to make it appear as though Mr. Tarte had1 changed his views on the matter of protection.
During the past few days we have had an intimation from the government of possible action in regard to what is known as the Preston report dealing with shipping rates on the north Atlantic. That question was also referred to in the Speech from the Throne, and I may as well read from the Speech itself the paragraph in question;
With regard to ocean freight rates, action is being taken to overcome the restraints on export trade due to the exactions of the powerful steamship combine known as the North Atlantic Steamship Conference. Your approval will be asked of a measure aimed at affording the government of Canada a control of ocean rates.
The same matter was referred to by the Prime Minister in his speech here a week ago. Apparently he wished to convey the impression that legislation to carry out something further than what has so far been announced in the Address would be brought down. One reference was to the following effect:
We hope so far as our effort in this regard is concerned, that the Canadian government will not have to battle alone, but that it may look to the governments of all other self-governing Dominions and to the government of the Mother Country herself to co-operate with us in fighting this great combination that exists on the Atlantic, to the detriment not only of Canadian trade, but to the trade of Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, and all parts of the British Empire.
Then further on he stated:
As I have said, parliament will be presented shortly with the report dealing with this whole question of Atlantic trade, and the House will also be informed in due course more exactly and in particular of the steps the government is about to take in an effort to cope with the exactions of this powerful combine. The government's action in this regard is only part of a constructive programme which has for its objective the development and increasing of the wealth of this country.
Further on:
And we believe that the legislation which we are going to introduce during the present session if it receives the support of this parliament, will materially assist us to further the diversified industries of this country.
There is evidently in the mind of the Prime Minister a doubt whether his proposition, whatever it is, will receive the approval of this House. I am not going to attempt to discuss the report which was tabled several days ago and which to-dav was ordered to be printed. I am not in a position to know what the report contains; but I feel called upon to make some reference to it and to the commissioner who was delegated to make this report, by reason of the fact that a year ago in this House I took exception as strongly as I could to the appointment of the man known as W. T. R. Preston as a commissioner to make this or any other report on behalf of this parliament. Following this up, not receiving a satisfactory answer from- or even the attention of-the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Low) who had charge of the estimates under consideration, I moved that the amount contained in the estimates for this purpose should be struck out. In view of this action taken by me a year ago, I feel called upon to-day to say something further with regard to this commissioner and his unsavory record. If there i3 a combine in connection with ocean rates and it can be broken up, I am willing to lend my assistance to the utmost to bring about a solution of the difficulty. But I question very much whether this is not another effort on the part of the government to divert the attention of the people of this country from other matters relating to the government, and I do not believe the government expect by the method proposed to bring about the results which have been referred to by the Prime Minister when he says that he hopes that the other Dominions and the Old Land will join with us in putting an end to this combine.
Whom have they appointed to report on this question? A man who has been known in this country for twenty-five or thirty years as one of the barnacles on the ship of state, nothing more or less. When I entered public life in Canada, my attention was drawn very clearly and emphatically to the operations of this man, not only in western Ontario, but throughout that whole province. I endeavoured to point this out to the Minister of Trade and Commerce when he was asking the House to pass the vote referred to in his estimates, and he even intimated that he did not pay any attention to what I was placing before parliament. He was determined that

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
7.	That there are good reasons to believe that there are many specific and well authenticated cases where agents of Mr. McNish concealed at their homes some of those strangers, who there paid large sums of money to electors to induce them to vote for him.
8.	That Mr. McNish will forthwith deliver to the Speaker of the legislative assembly his resignation as a member thereof for the said electoral district.
Donald McNish.
Witness: A. B. Aylesworth.
This is Sir Allen Aylesworth, at present a member of the Senate and who subsequently to this affair was Minister of Justice. If there is any hon. member in this House or any person in the country who doubts the accuracy of this document or of any statement that I have made with regard to this question, I can guarantee that the matter can be cleared up in the upper house, where the then counsel for Mr. McNish will have an opportunity of stating his views on the whole question and either affirming or denying the accuracy of this confession.
This admission naturally caused a great deal of comment in the province. Although the government had been in office for many years and had at the outset a fairly good reputation, many of the most outstanding Liberals in the province openly condemned their party leaders and the Prestonian methods adopted to hold office. I am referring to one in particular, the late Hon. S. H. Plake, whose statement as follows was reported in the press and was never denied so far as I know:
If I were in office Preston's head as well as all others who took part in these disgraceful acts would fall just as quickly as I could write down their names on paper.
Hon. S. H. Blake was never considered to be an impulsive man; he was of a judicial mind, learned in the law, of high personal character and a distinguished member of one of the oldest and best known Liberal families in the Dominion. I also had an encounter with this machine in its operations in South Oxford. I was elected as representative of that constituency in the Ontario legislature in 1902 by nearly 200 majority; and if I do say it myself, I do not think a cleaner or fairer election was ever conducted anywhere. The fact that the government only had a majority of one after the election was possibly responsible for their attempt to open the constituency. South Oxford having at all times in the past been a Liberal constituency, I presume the government thought if they could void my election they would have little trouble in electing one of their own supporters. With the machine in charge they made the attempt. During the election trial I had as my counsel Hon. S. H. Blake, and I am about to read part of a letter which I re-
IMr. Sutherland.!
ceived from him some years afterwards during the election of 1905. In that year I wrote him asking if he wrould deliver an address in South	Oxford.	He wTote back that
it would be a pleasure for him to do so by reason of the fact that it was just fifty years years since his uncle, Dr. Connor, ran in that constituency; but he regretted that it was out of his power to do so. I may say that although I received this letter twenty years ago, it has never been published, but I feel in view of the serious condition of the country to-day it is advisable that I should place on record another expression of opinion from this great Canadian. I shall not read the whole letter because it contains personal references which I am a little too modest to place on Hansard. In part, he wrote as follows:
Possibly no breath that issued from the machine was so rank and poisonous as that which then escaped. As a lawyer it struck me as an attempt to strike a fatal blow to that which is of vital moment to every citizen-the administration of justice. Day after day Mr. J. B. Jackson, K.C., presented members of his brigade paid to swear you out of your seat, and day after day the news of the effort by these means to thwart justice was published from one end of our country to the other. It was proved out of Mr. Jackson's own mouth that he offered $650 to one man to procure the evidence to unseat you. It was proved that he went down to Toronto to take advice as to carrying out this portion of the plot. It was proved that after such advice he paid a portion of the money and made himself liable for the balance. For these amounts he drew upon the Toronto branch of the machine. The trial began on October 14, and, although it was adjourned and not finished until December 3, no voice of remonstrance was heard, but the government with all these flagrant misdeeds in every public newspaper stood ready to accept of the results hoped to be won by the poisoning of the springs of justice. Nothing ever drove home to me so forcibly the vileness of the methods approved and adopted by the government to keep them in power as the revelations from clay to day presented on this trial. As I understand the matter, the great issue before the bar of public opinion to-day is-Shall the province sanction these and the like methods of carrying on a government oi shall it stamp its abhorrence of such unrighteousness by the punishment which must be a great element in clearing the atmosphere of the vileness which so thickly pervades it
And so on. There you have the opinion of the Hon. S. H. Blake of this gang of outlaws who were carrying on in the province of Ontario in the manner indicated by the confession signed by Donald McNish and his solicitor, Mr. Aylesworth, a witness. It is one of this gang whose report has been tabled in this House, and to which the attention of -the people not only of Canada but of Great Britain and the other dominions is being directed, towards remedying an alleged combine of ocean rates on the high seas. Are those the kind of commissioners the government have to rely upon to-day?

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
Let me give the House one other quotation on the same subject. I have here an editorial from the Toronto Globe of November, 9, 1903. After referring to the situation in Ontario, it proceeds:
The present distress has not come by accident or chance, or as the result of a change of government policy, and not at all because of any growth of power or prestige in the opposition. It has come through the cooling enthusiasm and the slackening effort of not a few Liberals. And the secret of it all is in the discredited election methods sometimes resorted to and the activity of political parasites who make party service a means of private gain. Because of electoral corruption here and the prominence of party heelers there, Ontario Liberalism has lost something of its old-time self-respect, and its note of confident and public-spirited enthusiasm has lost something of strength and resonance.
Then, further on:
There is but one thing open to the Liberals of Ontario, and mat thing is their first and most pressing duty. The barnacles on the ship must be treated with an iron hand. The interests of the Liberal party are superior to those of any individual, and the interest* of the province are supreme over all. Half measures will not avail. Neither the Liberal party nor the province owes to any man any position or reward not earned by honest and efficient public service.
What do hon. members think of that statement from the Toronto Globe, the official newspaper of the Liberal party, respecting this gang of outlaws who had been operating in Ontario?


Mr. ARTHURS:: Who was their chief?


Donald Sutherland: The Address-Mr. Sutherland
anyone who suggests, or who would propose, that there should be indiscriminate emigration to that province. Whatever is done must be done carefully, and any who are sent out must be well selected emigrants. But don't run away with the idea that only well-to-do people, or those with money, are going to emigrate. If you are going to keep up the populations in the old parts of the province you must be satisfied with sober, energetic and industrious emigrants. I know all you people are terribly afraid of the foreign element-
I notice that he is emphasizing the need of getting "the foreign element" in, not the British immigrant.
Upon that point I don't agree with you and have no hesitation in saying that a gocd class of foreigners scattered about the old parts of Ontario will do very much more towards preserving a proper agricultural population than those from England for instance. Politically speaking I believe the introduction of a hundred families or so into some of those close ridings with the connections which could be had and maintained here would easily preserve for us many doubtful seats in that province.
Sgd. W. T. R. Preston.
I shall not read the rest of the communication. Only a year ago I put the whole of it on Hansard for the benefit of the Minister of Trade and Commerce. This Mr. Preston entertained the idea of placing one hundred or so of these families in close constituencies. What a list of workers he could have selected from the people who were sent out to Canada by the North Atlantic Trading Company! I say that any man who would pen such a document to government officials in this or any other country is not a fit man to be in the public service of Canada and to be drawing money from the public treasury.


An hon. MEMBER:: Who was that communication signed by?


Donald Sutherland: It was signed by
W. T. R. Preston. It is his signature which is attached to the document which I quoted.


James Arthurs: Is he still a government
official?


Donald Sutherland: He is still in the
pay of this country but at the time this letter was written he was Superintendent of Immigration overseas. There was a general election in this country in 1911 and the Laurier government was defeated at the polls. One of the first acts of the incoming government was to perform the operation that Mr. S. H. Blake would have liked to perform many years before. Mr. Preston was decapitated politically and his head along with the heads of several other persons of like calibre went into the basket. Nothing further, or at any rate not very much, was heard of him until the wartime elections in 1917 when he again bobbed up as the representative overseas of the Liberal party in Canada in connection with

taking the soldiers' vote. He was placed in charge of that work for the Liberal party, because the opposition were given the appointment of one-half of the election officials, and with such a representative as Mr. Preston it may be taken for granted that he did his work for them well. I hold1 in my hand a circular which was distributed amongst the soldiers. This was sent to me by a man who was serving at the front at the time. The circular in question is signed by "W. T. R. Preston (On behalf of the Liberal candidates"). The circular is headed:
To the Canadian overseas forces.
Vote for Sir Wilfrid Laurier and conscription.
There are a number of appeals in the circular and one of them is:
Do not be deceived by misrepresentations.
Opposite to this appeal the soldier who sent me the circular wrote "I won't." An arrangement was made to have cablegrams sent from the Liberal candidates in Canada to the soldiers from their respective constituencies through Mr. Preston. I have here a copy of one such cablegram which was also sent to me by a soldier from my constituency serving at the front. It is addressed to the depot at Shoreham and was addressed as follows:
Your vote solicited. Supporting military bill.
These are the methods that were pursued by this mian who had charge of the voting overseas on behalf of the Liberal party. Was it surprising therefore that he drew up a lot of false charges which were pre-5 pun. sented to the House -a few years ago by the present Secretary of State (Mr. Copp) who spoke for several hours in their support. However, the charges received but little consideration even by Liberal members, and they have hardly been mentioned from that day ,to this. Has the present government taken any steps to investigate any of these charges which were preferred by Mr. Preston? Not one. Nor dare they do so. They had no confidence in the charges, they had no confidence in the man who preferred them; and yet we are asked to place faith in this man, acting as the agent for this country, when he alleges there is a combine among the steamship companies on the north Atlantic. I do not know whether there is any truth in the allegation that these companies have been acting as the Presiton report apparently indicates, because I have not seen the report itself; it is not yet printed. Why was this report not printed and placed in the hands of hon. members before this discussion was introduced by the Prime Minister? The subject dealt with is the most important fea-

The Address-Mr. Sutherland
ture contained in. the address. Is that the reason why the government is so insistent and so anxious that this debate be closed? Is that one of the reasons why hon. gentlemen on my leflt allow such insinuations to be scattered broadcast by the man of whom I have spoken? Yet, notwithstanding the importance of this subject the leader of the Progressive party says there will be a sigh of relief among the people when the debate is ended. I am sure there will be a sigh of relief from the Canadian people when they learn that no more characters of the Preston type are appointed to office in this country.
There are many other features in connection with this matter that I might refer to. I believe, if the Hansards containing complaints and debates with respect to W. T. R. Preston were placed one on top of the other they would make a pile ten feet high. In view of the voluminous character of the charges and debates you will readily understand it is hardly possible to do more than touch upon these matters in a general way.
Something was said by the Prime Minister and those who are associated with him about a general election. I believe that a government that has so absolutely failed to take means to meet the conditions which exist in this country ought to go to the people and not attempt to longer carry on. When the government admits, as it does admit in the Speech from the Throne, that it is unable to do anything, that we must stand still, wait and see what is going to happen-


An hon. MEMBER:: No, they said there
must be a pause.


Donald Sutherland: What the Prime
Minister said was virtually this:	"We have
paused for the present but look out; you will see what will happen in the future if we get an opportunity." Sir, the leader of the government in the presence of the leader of the Liberal party of the province of Ontario, on several occasions lately made it plain that there is room in the Liberal party for all those whatever that may be, who are opposed to Conservatism, or the Conservative party. His declaration to all intents and purposes was this:	"It does not matter whether they are
red or whether they are yellow, they are welcome if they will come into the Liberal party with us." This is what the government desires and it is just as well therefore to talk plainly and let the people of this country know what is happening. It is well known that the present government is in power by reason of the support of a conglomeration of all the discordant elements that we had in Canada at the last election. It was not by
reason of any particular policy which they advocated, because they had many policies. People did not pay any more attention to them than did the government of the day to the matter to which the Minister of Justice referred a year ago in connection with Mr. Tarte. They went out before the people of this province and other provinces at that time and they told them: "Notwithstanding the fact that we are advocating a reduction in the tariff, practically free trade, you do not need to fear. Why, we would not think of doing anything of that kind." I have Sir Wilfrid Laurier's own statement, delivered at a meeting in Toronto long afterwards in 1906, where he pointed out that they had made few reductions in the tariff and that the manufacturers of Toronto could sleep soundly because they had faith in the government on the tariff. This government comes into power, and the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart), ^ the minister from Prince Edward Island without portfolio (Mr. Sinclair) and the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) state: "We are endeavouring to do, by slow degrees, what we attempted to do quickly on two or three historic occasions," and they ask the people of this country to have faith, to have courage; they ask the unemployed to get out and hustle, as the Minister of Labour (Mr. Murdock) told them at Woodstock, as the government had to do. These are the methods that the government are taking to establish confidence when confidence is so necessary in order to overcome our difficulties. Our difficulties are great indeed, but with such tremendous resources as we possess, if we tackle them as a united force, with a common purpose, there is no reason why they cannot be quickly overcome. But we must quit this threatening attitude if people of means are going to put their money into industries in this country. They are not going to do so if it is to be jeopardized and placed at the mercy of a country to the south of us with the highest tariff in the world. Our farmers, our manufacturers, are handicapped; everyone in this country is handicapped, and we need a sane and stable policy to meet conditions as they exist. Personally, I would favour free trade if we could have free trade throughout the world. I believe that Canada could stand on her own feet under such circumstances, but we must face conditions as they are. We are living alongside of a neighbour which takes every advantage to make it difficult for us to trade with them. The people of that country are quite within their rights in doing this; but if you give them to understand that our policy is one for our own people-Canada for the Can-
The Address-Mr. Hocken

adians-that when they adopt a policy of that kind, that we shall similarly retaliate, you will find that conditions will improve very materially in Canada.


Mr. H. C. HOCKEN (West Toronto):: Mr. Speaker, I did not hear any merry quips or light persiflage from my hon. friends on the other side while the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) was describing the activities of W. T. R. Preston. I take it that the members of the government and of the party on the opposite side are thoroughly ashamed of themselves in having in their employ a man of his type. If they are not, they ought to be, and if he comes under the control of the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Low), I would suggest that that minister give his attention to the villainous record of W. T. R. Preston and get rid of him just as quickly as possible. I have known this gentleman for many years and he has always been of the same kind. He is not fit to be in the employ of any public body, and the hon. member for South Oxford this afternoon has proved that to a demonstration. But the fact is that from the time Mr. Preston was dismissed from the employ of the government of this country-because of the change that took place-he haunted his friends of the Liberal party everywhere, and as soon as this government came into power,- within a week or two after the change of gov ernment,-W. T. R. Preston was again on the payroll. What hold he has upon the members of the government I do not know, but I cannot conceive of any man with a record such as he has being able to put a pistol at the head of any minister unless he held some minister in fear of exposure. I believe the Liberal party is afraid of what W. T. R. Preston could say about it, and that is why he is on the payroll of the Dominion government to-day. I do not understand how one who had been through the West Elgin election, the North Atlantic Trading Company and all the rest of those manipulations, could have the face even to ask for an appointment by his political friends. But I fancy that the hon. member for South Oxford has said enough, and it will not foe necessary for me to discuss any further the activities of this gentleman.
With the exception of the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. Evans), the whole party to my left appears to be perfectly satisfied with the present policy of the government to stop any further reductions in the tariff.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, no.
[Mr. Sutherland.)


Horatio Clarence Hocken: No protest has been made and apparently no protest is going to be made.


An hon. MEMBER:: What did the leader
say?


Mr. MEIGHEN:: He did not say much.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Their leader made no
protest of any account, and he seems to have put something in the nature of a gag into the mouths of those who are following him. They have not said anything. During former sessions, almost every member of that party was on his feet, yelling for free trade and lower duties.


Arthur Meighen: They have seen some of the consequences.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: But now the Prime Minister can say: "We are going to stop now; we have gone so far and we are not going to make any further reductions," and no objection comes from my left. Let me give to the House the idea that the hon. member for Saskatoon has about these reductions. It may be that the other members of the Progressive party think they are quite satisfactory. He says:
But the one thing which is at the root of the whole evil is to remain as it is for the present.
He protests against that.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: Hear, hear.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: The hon. member for
Bow River is satisfied too. He does not want any further reductions.
No, even the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart) is not to mention the "death knell of protection" this year, and the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) states in his speeches that the government has gone far enough; the government is upholding the hana of the protected interests while ominous sounds of separation are heard from both the east and the middle west of this Dominion.
He speaks of it in this way:
In spite of the much vaunted cut in the tariff last year-
We have to concede to the hon. member for Saskatoon the virtue of sincerity. He at least has made his position clear to this House, to the country and to his constituents. He is not going to renege upon his free-trade views, no matter how much the rest of the party with which he is connected desires to do so, and I think he is to be given credit for that.


Arthur Meighen: Who made the deal?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Whoever made the deal,
it certainly was not the hon. member for

The Address-Mr. Hocken
Saskatoon, but amongst the Progressives there are 'better dealers than that hon. member. There are some members who have a greater resiliency; they can bend a little more than he can; indeed, we have seen them in this House bend from one side to the other. Whoever made the deal oi arranged this matter, I do not know. Of course, they would not tell me, although if they had told me I would* not give them away. But certainly it appears as though someone made a deal on behalf of this party with the government of the day. When the Prime Minister 'Mr. Mackenzie King) went west he made an appeal to them to come in: "You know, we are just like brothers and we think the same on this question. Come on in anti let us all be one happy family ". I do not know but that, if there had not been a " ginger " group or something of that kind, the marriage would not have taken place. And' even had that been the case it would not have made very much difference in the votes that are cast in the House.
The Prime Minister tells us that the year 1924 has been a period of substantial progress. My, my! I wonder where he got that idea? He could not have got it fiom the manufacturers or from the farmers. People are not prosperous in the west, are they? No, there is no prosperity in the west; there is none among the manufacturers; and there is none among business men or merchants. Then where is this " substantial prosperity " of which the Prime Minister speaks? We find it in some statistics; that is the only place wherein we can find any prosperity in this Dominion. I am quite satisfied that the statement in the Speech from the Throne announcing this prosperity will be a surprise not only to business men but to the public generally. So far as 1 can judge, it rests upon one fact; we are told' that the exports exceeded the imports and the inference is that we are prosperous. Well, I have heard that kind of talk ever since 1878 but I have never, nor has any other man found any prosperity in mere statistics; nobody can tell from statistics of this kind whether he is doing well or ill. The prosperity of a man is something that is not to be demonstrated by way of figures from the statistical department of the government. People know whether there is any money in their pockets or any food* in their stomachs, and the prosperity that does not manifest itself in these ways does not exist. It will not satisfy the public, therefore, merely to tell them that they are prosperous.
If times were good it would not be necessary for the Prime Minister to talk so much about the balance of trade; and as to the
balance of trade the fine figures which he presents and which he thinks prove his case merely show, in my judgment, a depletion of the natural resources of the country for the benefit of the workmen on the other side of the line. The favourable oalance of trad'e is made up by exporting our raw materials to be turned into the finished product in the United States. If you take away these raw materials from the exports, then the Prime Minister will find the balance on the wrong side, undoubtedly.
My opinion, whatever the opinion of others may be, is that it is not good for a country to export its natural resources in the unfinished state, but rather to manufacture them and send' out the finished article. This is more important in view of the fact that there are certain finished products which we can sell to the full limit of our capacity to produce them. For example, if we manufactured our pulpwood into paper, instead of shipping it out as cordwood or pulp, we could sell every ton that could be produced in all the mills of the country, and* there would be as many more mills operating at full capacity. Is it worth while to have half a dozen more mills in this country? My hon. friends talk about exotic industries. Is the paper industry in this Dominion exotic? Should it not be built up and strengthened? Is it not indigenous to the country? Then why continue a policy that is injurious to that industry instead of adopting a policy that will increase the output of our natural resources? The Prime Minister says that we shall make the country prosperous by developing the natural resources; ana* then he maintains a policy that prevents us from doing that by sending the natural resources out of Canada in the raw state. The export of these resources in the unfinished state has this disastrous effect, namely, that we follow it up by sending out the manhood and womanhood of the country. We export our pulpwood and then export the paper-making mechanics who go to the United States and* turn that, pulpwood into paper. I do not know how any country can stand that kind of exportation which is one that we cannot boast of; lather, it is to be deplored. You could make the balance of trade enormously greater if you could put a money value on our population; if you could say that we exported to build up the United* States so many men at so many thousand dollars each. If you did that you could increase the balance of trade by millions. But, of course, it is difficult to determine how much a man is worth to a country. The value of some men is very great while the value of others is less con-

The Address-Mr. Hocken
siderable. And unfoitunately tie men. who are of greatest value sometimes get the least encouragement. If a man is poor he is a failure, and if he is rich he is a menace, and we ought to kill him. But some of the men who create the big industries are a thousand! times more valuable than those who want to take everything from them which they have acquired during a lifetime of earnest and successful effort and application of a genius for organization. If this country was prosperous in 1924 I want to know why it is that sj many people had to go across the line to get work. According to our statistics 148,000 immigrants came into ihe country while 181,973 persons went out. In other words, more people went out than came in, and the type of man who went out was the very best we have or can have in this country because he was native born. In my opinion the native bom Canadian is of greater value than any other citizen, because he knows the country.
Mr. McMASTER. Oh, oh.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Why the hilarity of my
hon. friend? Now this is what we find, Mr. Speaker. The Registrar General of Ontario reports that he is signing 150 birth certificates every day for the admittance of Ontario-bom people into the United States. About 100 are signed in duplicate, being required for those , who intend to remain there. He reports also that more than half of these are married men. This means that if only half are married men the total daily exodus from Ontario is nearly three hundred. This is not guess work; the figures are given from the certificates signed by the Registrar General of Ontario. Now, this province has roughly one-third of the population of the Dominion; therefore if similar conditions prevail in the other provinces, we are sending out of this country at least 500 native born Canadians every day. How long can we stand this drain? Is it not the duty of government to be apprised of the seriousness of the situation and to take adequate measures to stop this exodus? I do not know of anything that is worse than this daily loss of our native born population.
And it is followed up, Mr. Speaker, by the closing of our factories in almost every part of the Dominion. If you want to find out the state of trade in this city, ask the merchants on Sparks street if times are good; go to any of our manufacturers and ask them if they are getting business. One of the largest of our mercantile firms in Toronto, the third in size, which had been in existence for seventy-five years, and which was able to ride the storm of 1878 and the storm of 1891, was not able to get over 1924; the firm of W. A. Murray & Co.
[Mr. Hocken.J
has disappeared. A similar disaster happened in Hamilton, where one of the oldest firms-a sort of co-operative firm, too, a firm in which most of the older employees held considerable quantities of stock-was driven out of business; the Sanford Company that had the Oak Hall stores throughout Canada, suspended business last year. Is that proof of prosperity? Can the "favourable balance of trade" satisfy these people whose capital has disappeared? Can it satisfy the thousands of employees of these firms who have now to look for work elsewhere? It is perfectly futile to quote statistics to them. If you want any further evidence of depression, read the advertisements in the papers of forced sales- "must go out of business"-in practically every city of the Dominion. Why, Sir, it has become a matter of first-page news value for the newspapers if a factory is working full time. I noticed the other day one of our city newspapers gave its largest heading to an account of a factory in Hamilton that is actually working full time. Astonishing! With wheat at S2 a bushel, too. I do not know whether any factory in Toronto is working full time, but if so, there are mighty few of them. But of course that does not matter; Toronto gets along some way or other. But we have reached a sad estate of affairs when the general condition of industry is half-time or failure altogether and1 when it is a matter of first-page news that a factory is working full time.
And of course that reacts on employment. My right hon. friend the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) gave the House some statistics to prove that unemployment is not as bad as it was. Well, let him go over to the corner of Wellington and Bank streets and he will see two or three hundred men standing around envying those who are at work at the dirty job of tearing down those buildings and loading the debris into wagons. Those poor fellows have nothing better to do than to stand around the better part of the day envying their working brothers; and some of those onlookers are skilled mechanics. You have this condition of affairs almost within earshot; but you can get it much more obtrusively in some other places. I have a statement from Montreal, given on the authority of the Emergency Unemployment Relief Committee of that city, and I am sure that my hon. friends opposite will not desire to digest more than this short paragraph:
Reports from forty local trade unions show that of a membership of 48,605 , 9,324 are unemployed, 22,463 are working part time only, and 4,348 have left the city.

The Address-Mr. Hocken
And my right hon. friend offers statistics to those people I The Montreal Star is a little more humane and considerate-it gives them a meal; while others are opening soup kitchens which will provide the unemployed with something more satisfying than a table of statistics. To my mind the Prime Minister who, after surveying the unemployment in this country, offers the poor fellows nothing buit statistics, is not showing that appreciation of the seriousness of the situation which we have a right to expect from a man in his position. The condition is worse than it was last year, for if he is able to show by some index number- which is not a very satisfying diet for hungry men-that there are a few less unemployed now than last year, it must be taken into account that during the spring, summer and fall season of 1923 work was plentiful over practically all this part of the Dominion, and those who were working during that time were able to save enough to tide them over the winter of 1923-24; but last summer unemployment was extensive all over Ontario-I think all over the provinces to the east as well -and those who ordinarily would have worked through that period and saved enough to carry them through the winter had to start this winter with their financial resources entirely exhausted. Indeed they were in a much worse position, calling for much larger expenditures upon relief than we have had to meet at any time in the past. I can take you back, if you like, to 1878, but our population was small then, and while our unemployment may have been proportionately as great, it was not nearly as serious a thing to deal with as the problem we have to-day. Yet the government has nothing to give the unemployed when they come down here asking for relief; they are told we cannot do anything-"Go back to your province or to your municipality."


Arthur Meighen: The British North
America Act.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Yes, the British North
America Act covers a multitude of sins, but it cannot cover the failure of the government to consider humanely the needs of the working people of this country. The Prime Minister should, I think, have shown at least some desire to contribute, proportionately, if you like-proportionately is right-with the provinces and with the municipalities in the relief of unemployment. It is all right for him to say, "As soon as possible we will start some work," but in the meantime these people are starving and the municipalities have to spend hundreds of thousands of
dollars to give them bread, to give them charity. If they have to be fed this government is as much responsible as the municipalities or the provinces. I am with the Prime Minister when he refuses to pay doles. I hope the day will never come in this country when doles will have to be paid. But there come emergencies when men are hungry, when children are unclad and there is distress in the home, and that is the condition today. There is no principle of government that should not be set aside to meet that kind of emergency. But the government did not do that; the deputation that came the other day were sent away empty handed, without a word of comfort or of hope for the future.


Arthur Meighen: Except the British North America Act.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Well, the British North
America Act does not satisfy the cravings of the stomach.
I am going to quote the Globe, Mr. Speaker. I do not know whether the Globe has the weight with the government of the day that it used to have, but it has been a great newspaper and is a good newspaper yet. This paper carried on Saturday the story of a man who had been trying to help another fellow to get work. He says this:
Having the price of a paper, we didn't have to go to the office to scramble for a peep at the advertisement page. Instead, seeing two ads that sounded likely, I hailed a passing taxi and told the driver to get us to the first address in double-quick time. I wish you could have seen that place when we got there. A rugby scrimmage would have had nothing on the pushing, fighting mob that was trying to beat its way into the factory. The second place had been just a3 popular, too, for we got there just in time to see a notice posted to the effect that the position had been filled.
A "pushing, fighting mob" for one job! And he says further:
But there are three more months of winter to be got through. Is there nothing before him but that soul-grinding hunt for work which doesn't exist, and that miserable begging of the social agencies for the bare necessaries of life?
And that man is offered the British North America Act! The Montreal Star is feeding these poor people and is to be highly commended for doing so. In Winnipeg they are feeding 2,000 people a day, according to my information, and in the House of Industry at Toronto they are spending $20,000 a month to feed people and to give relief. One little mission in the downtown section fed three hundred men the other day. There were a hundred others waiting for a meal who could not get into the place, and some kind-hearted citizen took them to a restaurant and fed

The Address-Mr. Hocken
them. Montreal, Winnipeg, Toronto-the same story; distress of the worst kind. And this government is doing nothing. I submit that the policy of the government is responsible for this condition of affairs.
Not only is the House of Industry in my city full, as are the missions where the men lie all night to get out of the cold, but the police stations are filled with people who have no other place to go to seek shelter-the down-and-outers. What is the use of talking to these people about lowering the cost of living? What is the use of talking about the cost of living to people who have not any money, who have not the price of a bowl of soup? Besides, nothing that this government has done has reduced the cost of living; it is just as high as it ever was and it will not go down-it cannot go down-until some reduction in taxation takes place. I wonder if my hon. friends to my left are aware of the taxes that are paid? I have just made a little list of the different heads under which they come. The taxes paid in every industry make the cost of the products of those industries higher than they otherwise would be. If a man is running a factory of any kind he must at least break even, or quit. Of course he can carry on for a while, as thousands of our industries have been doing for the last year and a half. Upon their reserves; but we have got to the point where the reserves are pretty well exhausted, they are not going to last very much longer. A man in business now has to pay to the federal government, the income tax, the sales tax, the stamp tax, the receipt tax; to the municipal government, income tax, business tax, real property tasx, and local improvement tax; and to the provincial government, the workmen's compensation tax. By the time he pays these nine taxes and has added them to the cost of what he has to produce, you can easily see why prices are higher than they otherwise would be. While we are paying taxes at this rate our neighbours across the line are paying about half as much; and then we expect that the Canadian industry can compete with the American industry, apart altogether from mass production and the other advantages in the size of the market that they have over there. If it is the policy of this government, and if my hon. friends to my left think it would be a good thing, to wipe Canadian industry off the map, then they should continue this policy, but if they realize that no country can be great, no country can be prosperous in the best sense of the word that has not industry as well as agriculture, then they will do something to stop the flow of manhood

to the other side and to stop this impossible competition that our manufacturers have to meet.


Mr. FANSHER:: Put on more taxes, I
suppose.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Well, if they put on just
one or two more taxes there will be an end of all industry in this country. If my hon. friend knows of any additional tax I would like to hear of it, because I would like to know in what other way we can be taxed. With the 5 per cent sales tax and all the other taxes, it is pretty hard to live.
Among the industries that are ruined by the present policy is the woollen industry. I read in the Pembroke Standard the story of the shutting down of the Pembroke Woollen Mills. It says:
The story must not be mixed with politics-
I do not see how you can keep it out.
-for the tragedy is not being told with that intent. The proprietors of the Pembroke Woollen Mills are Liberals, and the late owner was a gentleman who had done his share for party success, so it is not a partisan cry but the bald fact with regard to the textile industry in Canada; it is not being strangled to death, but bludgeoned to death.
That does not come from some wicked Tory o-r from some pampered manufacturer. It comes from the Pembroke Standard, which I presume is a Liberal paper, from the care it exercises to square itself with the party before it commences to speak.


Mr. GRAHAM:: My hon. friend does not
know the community.


Arthur Meighen: Does the minister say
it is not?


George Perry Graham: I have said what I have
said.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: It may be like the Brock-ville Recorder-Times or the Stratford Beacon-Herald, which are both neutral papers.


Arthur Meighen: I think the hon. member
for Brace could likely afford some information. The editor came from his county.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: The Jefferson Glass
Works, in our own city, which employed 475 men, and had a payroll of $10,000 a week, has had to close down by reason of the unfair competition it has to meet. The Canadian Products of Windsor, a plant put in at close to $7,000,000, employing 2,000 people and spending $72,000 a week in wages, has had to close down, and the product that was formerly turned out by their factory is now being made at Battle Creek, Michigan. Of course, nobody is to blame, my hon, friends opposite say.

The Address*-Mr. Hocken


Mr. BALDWIN:: Does t)he hon. member
know that a quarter of a million dollars is now being put into a glass factory right within sight of this House? Does he also know that the Financial Times of Friday last, the 13th, said that the Dominion Textile Company is working ninety per cent full time and is very prosperous? Now that sterling is almost at par it makes it very much better.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: That is just what I said, Mr. Speaker.


Willis Keith Baldwin: Oh, no.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I have said that it is a
matter of first-class news importance that any factory Should be working full time. My hon. friend says the Dominion Textile Company is not working full time, and although it is not working full time, he gets up to make a point of the prosperity of this institution that has not got enough business to give its employees full-time work.


Willis Keith Baldwin: Is not ninety per cent a
large average?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: It is a pretty good average, but my hon. friend will find, if he goes into the textile business, that that is one of the very few factories that are working full time. Let him go to the knitting mills of this country and find out if they are working full time.


Willis Keith Baldwin: Let me give my hon.
friend the words of a large manufacturer just one week ago. He told me that the woollen business was first-class, and his business is not sixty miles from where we are.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I invite my hon. friend
to reply to my remarks. He will have ample opportunity unless he, like my hon. friends to my left, has a handkerchief stuck in his mouth to prevent him speaking any more. He will have a chance later on to speak in this debate.
There is one other subject that causes me some concern. I attended a luncheon during September of last year, where I heard Sir Henry Thornton make a speech, and I was greatly impressed with one remark that he made. He said; "I think the government of Canada should find the biggest and most capable man there is in 'this country and put him in charge of immigration." Nothing, he said, " is required in this country so much as immigration." Well, what have we got? We have no Minister of Immigration in charge of this important work, according to Sir Henry Thornton, and I am sure the Minister of Railways (Mr. Graham) will agree that Sir Henry Thornton is one of the greatest authorities we have in this country on colonization,
transportation and so on; yet we have no [DOT]man at all as head of the Immigration department, looking after the immigration interests of this country. My hon. friend (Mr. Robb) who is the titular head of that department is also Acting Minister of Finance. I would like the House to consider whether a man who has to perform the arduous duties of Minister of Finance, without having the twenty years of experience that the titular minister of that department possesses, has not got enough to do looking after that department alone? Has he any time to attend to immigration? I wonder if my hon. friend the Acting Minister of Finance ever goes into the Immigration department? I would' not expect him to, Mr. Speaker. Well then, the work is left entirely in the hands of officials without any directing head, and without any government policy so far as I can discover. And when you get into the department what do you find? Why, they let a man go who had experience, who had capacity, who showed himself efficient in the performance of his duties. He was shifted out into the Canadian National Railways Colonization Department, and a man brought in in his place who had been a trade commissioner in South Africa, a man absolutely without experience in immigration.


James Alexander Robb: I infer that my hon. friend is
trying to create the impression that Dr. Black, the former Deputy Minister of Immigration, was crowded out. Let me say now that Dr. Black voluntarily resigned as Deputy Minister of Immigration, and acting for the government I asked him if he would accept an increase of salary and stay on. He said, "No, I am offered more than the government will allow you to pay, Mr. Robb." And I have Dr. Black's letter expressing regret that he had left the government service.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I am very glad to hear
that from the Minister of Immigration, and I give him full credit. I express my appreciation of that treatment of a man of Mr. Black's capacity. But, surely, after he had gone there were men in the department who had had experience, who had had knowledge of all that had gone forward, and who would have been more acceptable to follow him. I do not know anything personally about the present Deputy Minister of Immigration, I have never met him; but surely experience is required in the deputy head of any department of the government, and why a man should be brought from South Africa to act as deputy minister over an important department of that kind it is difficult for me to understand.

The Address-Mr. Hocken


Mr. MARTELL:: My hon. friend has referred to the fact that there was no minister in charge of immigration, and to the present Deputy Minister of Immigration. I think it is a great thing in favour of this government that we have a man of sufficient ability to look after two departments under the leadership of the Prime Minister. What is the fault with Mr. Egan, the present Deputy Minister of Immigration? Will my hon. friend come out in the open and tell us his reason?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I am giving the only reason I have.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Very likely.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: Mr. Speaker, will the hon. gentleman accept my word?


Lewis Herbert Martell: Certainly; I respect the hon. member.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I say it is a mistake to
take a man without experience and put him in the most responsible position in a department of that kind.	I do not think you can get
away from it.	It is a position that requires
experience.


James Alexander Robb: There might seem to be some colour to the impression my hon. friend would give, to one who does not know the conditions as I know them. The reason why a man was brought from the Department of Trade and Commerce and made Deputy Minister of the Department of Immigration was that I discovered there was so much jealously in the department among the higher heads that some of them were not speaking to each other.


Lewis Herbert Martell: We get lots of that.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: We are not getting
immigration. My hon. friend the Acting Minister of Finance evidently had not sufficient courage to exercise his own judgment and say: Here is the man for the job.


James Alexander Robb: That is exactly what I did
do.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I do not see it that way. I agree with Sir Henry Thornton that there is nothing so important in this country at the present time as a well-devised and energetically pursued immigration policy. If we could get fifty per cent more of the right type of .people into Canada than we have at the present time it would solve every problem that is facing our country to-day.


Mr. KYTE:: Would it not open more soup kitchens?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I do not think so. If we had fifty per cent more population our National railways would not be rolling up

deficits but would be yielding a surplus, and that surplus could be applied to the reduction of freight rates.


Lewis Herbert Martell: Keep clear of the National railways.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: If we had fifty per cent
more population there would be that much larger number in Canada, spread over the country, to help to bear the burden of taxation and in consequence that burden could be lessened.


Arthur Meighen: We would have to get
jobs for them.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: My right hon. leader says we would have to get jobs for them, but I take the view that every .family suitably settled in the country represents that much more work. There might be difficulty in-the newcomers getting adjusted, but almost every immigrant who comes to a new country experiences more or less difficulty. The adjustment would take place and the immigrants would settle down in a short time and become excellent citizens.
At six o'clock the House took recess.
After Recess
The House resumed at eight o'clock.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: The Address-Mr. Hocken
acquainted with the people in every part of the Dominion. What could be of more educative value to a group of children from Saskatchewan, say, who were bom and brought up there up to the time that they had earned such a scholarship? Those children would see the provinces of Ontario and Quebec and would learn something of the manner of life and the methods of livelihood of the people in the places they visited; and they could go to the Atlantic coast, staying such length of time as was found possible, under proper direction of teachers or instructors, or men who had been specially selected for their ability to make the greatest use of such an opportunity. Such an undertaking would not begin to show results in a year but I venture to say that in ten or fifteen years' time, after seven or eight hundred children had travelled up and down the country every year, the admirably useful effects would be apparent to every observer in the country. It will be argued that this parliament has nothing to do with education, and I admit that at bottom this is a matter of education. At the same time, it seems to me to be something more than education in the ordinary sense of the word, and I submit the proposal to hon. members for their consideration. If the government really desire to do something to bring about greater unity of sentiment throughout Canada I think they should carefully examine this suggestion. The cost, no doubt, would be considerable, but in my judgment it would be justified by results.


Mr. EULER:: Would you not obtain more immediate and practical results if you sent delegations of grown-up, intelligent men?


Miss MACPHAIL:: And women.


William Daum Euler: And women, too.


George Perry Graham: They will follow.
Mr. HOCKEN; I do not know how the hon. member (Mr. Euler) would make the selection. It is to be presumed that to some extent at least men in business have an opportunity of travelling from one province to another.


William Daum Euler: Many have not.


George Perry Graham: Would it not be cheaper
and more practical if the members of parliament themselves would travel on their passes and see their own country first?


Horatio Clarence Hocken: I presume that was one
of the purposes of the passes, and I may inform the minister (Mr. Graham) that I have personally made use of mine, as I know he has done also. The minister has opportunities now of travelling under comfortable conditions.


George Perry Graham: Beautiful.


Horatio Clarence Hocken: If he would give us private cars we would all travel too. I agree that the members of parliament should, and to a considerable extent they do, make use of their passes to enlarge their knowledge of the country. However, notwithstanding what hon. gentlemen have said, I still think that the plan I have suggested is the best that could be submitted. We have to begin a thing of this kind with the rising generation, who are susceptible and who will learn things in their youth which they are not likely to forget. They would be anxious to go back, having once visited places of interest, and it would inspire them with a patriotic feeling towards the rest of the country. I am sure that the experience of such a trip would prove of great value not only to them but to their fellow students. I leave the suggestion with the members of the government for consideration.
There is one other matter which I intended putting on the order paper in the form of a resolution, but I thought it would be better to bring it before the government on the present occasion. Two yea"s ago I addressed the House on the question of encouraging the magazine industry of this country. No one can tell to what extent the exodus from Canada is brought about by the reading of United States literature. In my judgment it is due very largely to such reading. Our young men and young women have no other magazines to read, with the result that the United States is presented to them in every magazine they read as the land of promise, this is pounded into them issue after issue, and' eventually, if they move at all, instead of moving to another part of Canada they go across the border. My hon. friend the Minister of Railways (Mr. Graham) will know from his experience in journalism that the only way you can get a man to absorb an idea is to iterate it over and over again. That is exactly what is done by these United States magazines. That that country is a good place to live in, is a place where success is to be achieved, is repeated over and over again to our young men and' young women, and while, as I say, it is impossible to determine its exact effect, I do net think any reasonable man would deny that it must have a very great influence upon the minds of our young people. There is the other fact, that we allow a great deal of magazine literature to come in here that should never be published at all. As a matter of fact, the United States is considering measures for the purification of its magazine and periodical literature. Well, at least we should* not admit that kind of

The Address-Mr. Stansell
stuff. Then there is the other fact, that many of these magazines are 60 per cent advertising matter. If ihat advertising came in separately it would pay a duty of 15 cents a pound; mixed with stories and articles on various subjects it enters free. This works an injury to every Canadian manufacturer who is advertising, and it works an injury to the publishing business of this country. I submit that in view of all the evils which I have pointed out- the bad effect upon our young people, the unfairness to the magazine publishing industry and the manufacturing industry of this country, the government ought to do something. When I spoke on this question before the Minister of Finance (Mr. Fielding), wno unhappily is not able to be with us now, expressed approval of the proposal I then made, and I thought that was a pretty sure guarantee of something being done along the lines 1 had suggested. But nothing has been done. So I venture again to bring the matter to the attention of the government, and again to suggest that it would be good', sound public policy for the preservation of Canadian ideals in our young people to do the decent thing by an industry that has no protection, that is even met with taxes on its raw material, and that cannot survive unless it gets a chance to live through appropriate action by the government. I have witnessed scores of magazines started in Canada, but they have all failed. The very best brains of Canada were employed' upon them. Some of the men who were involved in those failures are now in the United States engaged in the magazine industry. The editor of the Ladies Home Journal, the highest class magazine they have over there, was trained on MacLean's magazine in Toronto. We have the editorial ability, we have the writing ability, we have the artistic ability, but we cannot possibly compete with the flood of pernicious magazine literature thas is sent in here from the United States. I should not say pernicious literature, because much of it is very good and would always come in. I do not care how high priced a book or magazine may be, if it has value in it people will buy it. And those people could afford to pay any reasonable tax that might be put on American magazines in order to make possible the continuance of the industry in this country. I therefore leave these two matters, both of which have an important bearing on the question of national unity, to the favourable consideration of the government.


Mr. J. L. STANSELL (East Elgin):: Mr. Speaker, before entering upon the subject of the Speech from the Throne, I should like to 14i
endorse the final suggestion of the then, member who has just taken his seat. It must be apparent to every true Canadian that the flood of magazine literature from the country to our south is not in the best interests of Canada. We have only to look at the number of magazines and the quality of some of them on our news stands to realize that their perusal month after month is not likely to develop the best class of young Canadian manhood and womanhood. I am not a newspaper man, and therefore do not propose to offer a remedy, but I do say that something ought to be done to encourage Canadian authors and publishers. In addition to the evils that may be traced to the reading of many American magazines, there is also an' economic menace from the volume of advertising in such magazines attracting Canadian business that should be legitimately supplied by our own manufacturers.
The debates on the Speech from the Throne have for the first time in my recollection been carried on largely by one party in the House. Is it not worth while to ask ourselves if the people will not be curious to know just why the debate has become so one-sided? In this connection it may not be out of place to inquire the purpose of this debate. We must remember that very few of our electors have any opportunity to visit here, and the only way in which they can ascertain whether we have any grasp of the national situation today, and what remedies -we have to offer for anything that needs treatment, is by the printed word that goes out from this place. Many have spoken of the debate as a waste of time. This opinion is, I think, mistaken. Properly conducted, it is not a waste of time. It is true some speeches mi^ht very well be shortened, the ideas enunciated might be very well crowded into fewer words, but after all I believe the view of the electorate is that the debate on the Address in reply to the Speech from the Throne serves a useful purpose. The Speech placed in the mouth of His Excellency usually deals with national affairs and outlines what legislation will be introduced in an endeavour to improve the condition of the body politic. It is just like any other motion that comes before the House and is debated: the opposition exercise the undoubted privilege and right of criticising and bringing before the public what they think the true situation is and what, in their judgment, is the proper course to pursue. As the result of this the public form an intelligent opinion of what their representatives have in the way of a grasp of the situation and what the different parties have in the way of solution for any existing evils. H we rob parlia-

The Address-Mr. Stansell
ment of tMs we have done a great deal to rob the public of their share in the work of this House. We are their elected representatives and I feel sure that we are not doing our whole duty if we do not come here with some intelligent idea of what conditions are, of what conditions are that are wrong, and of what the solution should be.
That there is a desire at this particular time to shorten the debate, to limit discussion, there is no doubt. The silence of nearly all those on the government side is eloquent testimony to their desire, at least. What is still more strange is the corresponding silence of the party to my left. They have not always observed this anxiety for economy of time. This seems to be the first time they have completely bowed to the will of the government in this respect. I have been asked time after time by some who are interested and who voted to send the third party to parliament, just what my opinion was of the independence of that group. I have replied. I thought in all fairness, that with some notable exceptions many of those elected to that group were trying, as far as possible, to take an independent attitude on public questions. But I cannot see, Mr, Speaker, how I can give that same answer after this. It is strange to me, and I think the public will regard it as equally strange, that when the government evince a desire to shorten this discussion or to have practically no debate at all on the Speech, the Progressive party are so suddenly obedient to their will. As I have said, there must be a reason, and we will inquire for the reason.
A great deal has been said during the past year about pessimism in connection with public affairs. We of this party have been accused of being pessimists. I wish to say right here, and I believe I am speaking for every member of our party, that we have no reason for being pessimistic in regard to the future of Canada. But we do have a right to be pessimistic, to be doubtful of the means adopted by the present government working toward that end. And accordingly we have the right to suggest what we think is the proper course. If there has been such a thing exhibited as pessimism within the past year I want to say that the present government have given most glaring examples. As an illustration of pessimism I do not know of anything so striking as this empty, spineless document I hold in my hand, the Speech put into the mouth of His Excellency. I propose to prove that. Most of us remember what the Speech of last year was. You will recall that it started very much as this one does.

It asserted first that Canada was attaining prosperity and making great progress. It referred also to the cost of living and the efforts the government was putting forth to reduce it. It also announced with a flourish of trumpets that as a result of governmental policies, for the first time since 1912 or 1913 they were going to balance the budget. Not only that, but they would announce a surplus and a substantial reduction of debt; and, further, that the time had come when in the attempt to lower the cost of living a reduction in taxation should be given. Why, let me ask you, have they not continued the good work? Why are all such references absent from the present Speech? This fact is an eloquent if silent testimony to the failure of some of the policies put into effect during the past year. Does anyone mean to tell me th-at if the government were confidently looking forward to a substantial surplus this year; if the policy of reduced taxation was so sound that there would be a balancing of the budget and a still further reduction of duty-if this were the case, would the fact not have been mentioned in the Speech? I think it would, but we know very well that such has not been the case. Instead of that what do we have? The Speech starts out just as it did before. The anxiety to relieve the cost of living is just the same as it had been and has been ever since the time before the present Prime Minister took office. This has been a live subject. The government attempted to deal with it last year by a reduction of the tariff; now we are told they are going to try an entirely different tack.	No
longer must we contemplate the cost of living and its remedy in reduced taxation.
In effect, by not continuing the discussion of the Speech, they tell us to turn our eyes from the present condition of affairs and not even consider the remedies that were applied last year and the failure of those remedies. They ask us to turn our eyes eastward toward the broad Atlantic and see the rising sun of Petersen, Preston and Company. That is now the important thing. But why not continue the policies of last year? The answer must be found in the fact that there was no surplus last year, with corresponding reduction of debt-and I have it on the authority of a supporter of the government in a speech made in this House that not only was there no surplus last year, not only was there no reduction of debt, but there was actually a deficit of $42,000,000. That must be the real truth of the situation; otherwise, had these policies been sound, had the budget statement of last year been correct, why have they not continued the good work, so nobly begun?

The Address-Mr. Stansell
We have had several speeches dealing with different aspects of the tariff and with the reductions made last session. An estimate was made at that time that the changes would result in a lessening of our revenue by about $24,000,000. If the estimates being made today are correct, they resulted in a falling off of at least twice that much in the revenues of this country.
Now, let us see for a moment: what is the real purpose of the tariff? Briefly, a tariff serves three purposes. One of those purposes is a source of revenue, and those who have occupied the treasury benches know that it is a substantial source of revenue. The second purpose is that it incidentally affords protection to those industries which are common to Canada. The third is that it provides a basis for bargaining in our trade relations with other countries. These three purposes are very useful ones and they should be continually borne in mind. It is true that the changes made last year were not very large. So far as they applied to agricultural implements they may not have affected the industry so very materially, because to offset what was done in the way of tariff reduction, free raw materials were given. In this particular instance the harm was most apparent. Many of the firms manufacturing the raw material formerly supplied to the makers of agricultural implements have either been put out of business or their operations have been seriously curtailed. Some I know of are operating at the present time out of capital at a loss, and operating only three days a week; so that indirectly the result of last year's tariff tinkering was unemployment, emigration, a deficit, a loss to the country of much needed revenue. To balance that, what have we in the way of material advantages? We had the figures given, and no one has disputed their accuracy, that to the farmer, the man most concerned, the man whom it was supposed to benefit, the prices of agricultural implements have not been reduced by one farthing by a reduction of the customs tariff -not even quite enough to make up for the loss of the sales tax. The net result to-day after three years work in the direction of reducing the cost of living, and in the direction of making cheaper the implements of production, is that the farmer, the one who was supposed to be benefited, is paying the same or more for his implements than when this government assumed power. The net result has been a loss of revenue, unemployment, emigration of our best class of labourers, and no one has got any benefit. In the face of this, is it any wonder that debate on this subject is not wanted? I am not at all surprised that the government do not care to have any debate on this subject, and that they are in a hurry to begin consideration of the control of ocean freight rates. I do not blame the government so much for their silence for this reason: it shows that with all their faults, they are just a little bit ashamed of their efforts and are troubled with remorse. What excuse, however, is there to offer for the action of the Progressive party, whose leader arises in his place and in effect says that now he has made his pronouncement everyone else must keep silent, there must be no more debate on this question by them. I must commend the leader of that party in a sense for his stand. He did perfectly right because the whole country knows that he and his party were a party to the mess that has been made.
We are told in the Speech from the Throne that the high cost of living is not going to be cured by further reductions in the tariff; it is going to be cured, and you will find the reference in the Speech, by consideration of transportation costs and immigration. The government, evidently proud of the success they have made in controlling transportation on the Great Lakes, have now ventured out into a larger field and are going to control, single-handed, ocean freights.
With regard to immigration, in the opinion of some people as well as the government the solution of Canada's difficulties lies in immigration. Let us inquire how far during the past three years immigration has operated to cure any of the ills from which we suffer. Of what use is millions spent on immigration while for every raw immigrant we bring into this country two native-born Canadians go out? Of what use is millions spent upon immigration if we cannot find jobs for the men we have? What have we as Canadians to offer to the intending immigrant? We have to say to them that we have a tremendous debt of about two and a half billion dollars; that in spite of our wonderful resources, in spite of all we say about Canada, we cannot make revenue and expenditure meet and are going further in debt every day. This is the bait we are to hold out to the intending immigrant to attract him here to help us pay our debts. Is it not an alluring prospect? That is the scheme that has been brought forward after three years by this government as a cure for the high cost of living-immigration. We do need immigration, but first of all, we need sound policies. First of all, we want to so economize that we shall be able to live within our revenue; we must show some signs of reducing our public debt; and when that is done all that will be necessary for Canada

The Address-Mr. Stansell
to do will be to keep out the undesirables, and the rest will be clamouring at the door for admittance. Imagine a government sending out agents and spending millions of dollars on immigration when the only thing we can say to the intending immigrant is: Come and help us pay our debts. You mght. just as well go to the man who is burdened with debt and unable to balance the family budget and say: All you need is an increase in the family. The first thing we want to do is to develop a sound policy, to practise economy, and have a real business administration of the affairs of this country, and until that is done the money spent on immigration is so much money thrown away.
The other solution offered by the government is the control of ocean freight rates. This is to be done by subsidizing a small line of about ten ships to the tune of a million dollars a year. In my judgment the real reason for this new scheme is to distract attention from the real condition of affairs in this country, from the fact that we are not balancing our budget, that we are not paying our way, but are going deeper and deeper into debt. It is to take our minds from that disagreeable subject that we are asked to consider the control of ocean freights. Some years ago, about the time Sir Wilfrid Laurier assumed power, an arrangement was made with a company known as Petersen, Tate and Company, by which a subsidy was given to a fleet of ships that was to give a quicker service between this country and the old land, and reasonable rates for passengers and immigrants. It is well to remember that this Petersen, of the Petersen, Tate Company, is the same Petersen that the arrangement is to be made with now, but then they were only being paid about half a million dollars; things were cheaper in those days. What was the result of that arrangement? In the first place I want this House and the country to remember that Petersen, Tate and Company failed entirely to live up to their contract, and although they had deposited a considerable sum of money with the Canadian government by way of guarantee, after they had failed to live up to their contract a most generous Liberal government gave them back their deposit. That was the result of the first attempt to control freight rates with the assistance of the Petersen, Tate Company.
Now let us look at the other scheme. Who was the man largely responsible for arranging this deal? We have been told this afternoon that it was W. T. R. Preston. As you have already heard, a number of years ago in my county a man going under the name of W. T. R. Preston was given control of affairs 
for the Liberal party, and he attempted to control the elections in West Elgin by bogus ballot boxes and manipulation. Although West Elgin was traditionally Liberal and had always previously elected a Liberal, when the investigation following this particular election was over a Conservative was elected for that constituency and it has never chosen a Liberal since. You have heard much this afternoon from the hon. member for South Oxford (Mr. Sutherland) about the activities of this gentleman who has undertaken this great work in the interest of the Dominion. Much more could be added but the facts have been so well placed before the House that I will not enlarge upon them. Many members who are older in public life than I am are thoroughly conversant with the activities of this particular friend of the present government. The result of his exertions in West Elgin was not only to earn a most disagreeable name for himself but to bring disaster to the Liberal party. Has anyone any idea that the efforts of this man in connection with ocean freights, in combination with the Petersen firm that failed once before, are going to be productive of any greater success than he was able to achieve in West Elgin? Is it any wonder that we of this party view with considerable misgiving the prospects of success under such circumstances? Upon the strength of the report issued by this man a scheme has undoubtedly been arranged in connection with which a million dollars of the taxpayers money is to be paid. This is all being done upon the recommendation of a man whose activities in connection with Canadian public life have been such as were described here to-day. If there is a combine in connection with ocean freight rates, if we are paying excessive transportation charges at the present time, we are just as anxious to reduce these rates as anyone can be; but we have to remember that Canada already owns a merchant marine very much larger than the flee we are about to subsidize, and it is operating at a loss of about $2,000,000 each year, which loss the taxpayers of this country have to make up. I would ask, if freight rates are too high why is the Canadian merchant marine operating at a loss? The Canadian taxpayer already has had to dip down in his pocket to the tune of $2,000,000 to make good the losses of a fleet of sixty or more ships which the government own. Now we have a suggestion that to our merchant marine be added another fleet of ten ships upon which the Canadian taxpayer must pay out another million dollars. It is said we are going to control ocean freight rates. Was ever

The Address-Mr. Stansell
any idea more fantastic than that? If the solution put forward a year ago for a cure of the high cost of living was such a failure- and that it was a failure is admitted by this empty document placed in our hands to-day- then what can be looked forward to in the way of success from an effort along this line to control ocean freight rates?
It is not sufficient to criticise. If we are not satisfied with existing conditions we are expected to point out something that would effect improvement. Let me indicate what, in my humble judgment, I believe would be the proper course for Canada to take to-day. In doing this I want to address myself particularly to hon. gentlemen to my left because, like myself, they are interested from the farmer's standpoint. My hon. friends have now been in public life for three years or a little more. No doubt their intentions are just as good as the intentions of any of us who have been elected to this House. I believe my hon. friends are perfectly sincere in what they are trying to do, but they have as yet offered no national solution, if I may use the term, for Canada's difficulties. I have waited patiently during the past three years for some suggestion to come -from the west in the nature of a national solution, but in vain. What have we heard? We have heard when crops were poor that there should be a reduction of the tariff. When prices were low we were told the same remedy was required. When crops have been better and prices have been high we are still told what is required is a reduction in the tariff. Last year, as the result of their support of the government, and I believe on the part of very many against their better judgment we were given a sample of the reduction in the tariff with the results which I have outlined. The financial year which has closed was so unsatisfactory that the government avoided all reference to it in the Speech from the Throne. Indeed, no one appears to have derived any benefit from the government's policy. Surely our western friends can offer something better in the way of a solution of existing difficulties than merely to ask for a reduction in the customs tariff.
We might ask ourselves why a customs tariff is needed? I believe the answer is clear. No matter what our personal opinion may be, no matter what attractive arguments in favour of free trade can be presented, we are faced with the disagreeable fact that our immediate neighbour for over three thousand miles believes in a policy directly the opposite; and it is surely apparent 9 p.m. to any one who has any business instinct at all that it is absolutely impossible for us to work in the direction of free trade while our neighbour enforces high protection. A splendid illustration was given by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) the other night when he cited an illustration under which one side of Sparks street was given full liberty to trade, whereas the other side was strictly limited to its own immediate territory. That is the situation exactly. There is no possibility of an industry of any kind flourishing in Canada if it is entirely shut out of the American market, and forced to divide its own market with the country to the south. Such a thing is absolutely impossible and absolutely unjust; I give many of my western friends credit for good business judgment in recognizing that it is impossible to succeed in the face of such conditions, that it is impossible to adopt any such policy as they advocate when our neighbours are not in harmony with us. If trade with the United iStates is desirable there is no one thing that will so quickly bring about an improvement as putting up the barriers on our side to the extent they themselves have done. Let us do all we can to cultivate trade with nations that show a desire to trade with us, let us continue the Imperial preference, but surely in our own great interest it is far better to pursue a policy that will build up Canadian industries rather than the industries of the United States.
In my judgment there should be an immediate revision of the tariff, with the object of protecting Canadian industry from the unfair competition of our American neighbours. I should like very much to have some of our western friends who are satisfied with what has been done in the way of tariff reduction with respect to agricultural implements to spend a short time with the hon. member for Brantford (Mr. Raymond). They could then see for themselves what conditions are in that enterprising city, and just how little cause they have to be satisfied with their handiwork in the matter of customs reduction. They might also go to the fruit growing district where men, who had faith in Canada and invested their money in the country, were forced to allow acres of strawberries to rot for lack of a market, because the Canadian people in many of our large cities had bought the fruit from the United States, in many cases not as good, for twenty-five and thirty cents per box. Surely it would be good business to provide adequate protection for these men who are bearing their fair share of taxation, who have faith in Canada and have invested their money in the country. That is only one illustration but it is an important one. These foreign fruits come on

The Address-Mr. Stans ell
our market somewhat earlier and at a higher price, and those who are able to purchase them contribute very little, if anything, to the revenues of the country. By the time Canadian-grown fruit is ready, the market is pretty well satisfied, and I know of cases where four or five acres of strawberries rotted on the ground because they would not pay for the effort or labour of picking them. Surely it should be a Canadian policy to give, as far as possible, the benefit of our market to our own people. If there are those who are so wealthy that they can afford to buy this early fruit at a higher price, let them pay a reasonable amount into the revenues of the country. I would suggest that a duty of 20 per cent would not be out of the way for the protection of the small fruit growers of this country and that it would not work an injustice to anyone. Those who did not have sufficient money to buy the high priced fruit would be able to buy the Canadian fruit and those who wished to buy the high priced fruit would contribute something to the revenues of Canada.
Let us have a practical and immediate revision of the tariff with the object in view of preserving, for the Canadian people against the competition of the Americans, the Canadian market for Canadian industry, Canadian labour and Canadian production. This could be done by a board properly representative of all classes and could be made equally fair to all, no matter in what industry they were engaged. The main object should be the protection as far as possible by customs regulations of the Canadian market for the Canadian people as against the competition to the south. AVhen that is done, the respect in which we are held by the Americans will substantially increase, and I believe that we could obtain better trade relations than we have hitherto obtained from them if we used the means in our hands as a weapon in this way.
AA e are told, of course, by one of the nunisters that Canada is coming through. Perhaps he should have said: Coming through great tribulation in the matter of government. In the judgment of those Americans who see thousands of our citizens going over the line to find employment and homes in that country, Canada is certainly coming through. But if Canada is to get out of the woods and make the progress that she should, we must have, in addition to a sound trade policy, the most rigid economy, economy pressed to such an extent that it almost hurts. We have heard a great deal about economy in the last three years; but so far as I am able to judge, all the exhibition which

the present government have given of their understanding of economy, is the combination of letters that spells the word. We have not had real, stringent economy. We should have economy to such an extent that we shall have a balanced budget. When we are able to meet our obligations and to show a reduction of the national debt, then and not until then we shall be able to appeal to the right class of immigration and we shall be on the sound road to substantial progress.
There is a rumour that the anxiety on the part of two parties in this House for a short debate is that there is a prospect of an early election, and they wish to hurry through the work of the House in order to appeal to the people at an early diate. I do not know how true this may be; but if this be the case, there never was a time in the history of this country when the electors were more anxious for a reduction of taxation, for a sound administration at Ottawa, for unity, for economy and for progress than they are at the present time. If that is the desire, I am sure the people of this country will welcome the opportunity, and personally I would say:	Do
not tremble on the brink; come on in, the water is fine.


Hon. J. B. M. BAXTER (St. John City and Counties of St. John and Albert):: Mr. Speaker, I shall not, I hope, add very much to the length of the debate to-night, but there are a few observations that I think ought to be made upon a matter of the suggested importance of the Speech from the Throne. There is a tradition, perhaps not much more than a tradition, that a Speech from the Throne is supposed to reveal the policy of a government when a government possesses a policy that is capable of revelation. I have searched the Speech from the Throne, which is at least moderately brief this year in comparison with previous efforts, and I fail to discover anything more than an effort at patchwork. I think, in the judgment of the people of Canada to-day, what is insistently required is a real, comprehensive policy that will fit Canada from one end to the other, and that most confessedly we have not such in the few scrappy sentences which are uttered for the purpose rather, perhaps, of distracting than of focussing public attention.
I do not want to take up much time and I do not think the people of Canada require much time to be taken up in disposing of the obvious misstatements in this Speech from the Throne. I doubt if there is such a wonderful difference between the state of the Maritime provinces to-night and that of the rest of Canada that the language of the open-

The Address-Mr. Baxter
iag sentences of the Speech can possibly be true of the rest of Canada and yet be false with regard to the Maritime provinces. Certainly in those provinces the economic situation has most decidedly not improved since the last session of this parliament. It has as distinctly retrograded. Just as certainly the cost of living has increased in the Maritime provinces; it has not decreased since the last session of this parliament. IVhy use these futile words that can deceive no one? The basic industries of the Maritime provinces are in no better and in a decidedly and visibly worse condition to-day than they were a year ago or at any time since this government took office, and I am not going to blame this government entirely for that condition. What I shall blame them for is that they have not yet created and I doubt if they ever will create a comprehensive, all-Canadian policy that will enable us to grapple with the difficult conditions that exist throughout Canada at the present time. You certainly cannot do it by reciting that the economic situation has improved nor by telling the people who know better that the cost of living has decreased.
I go further in this Speech and I find a statement with reference to our old friend, the Crowsnest pass. I am not going to take time to-night to belabour the governmen: for its variegated policy with regard to Crowsnest pass rates. I found myself only upon one sentence where they say that this matter will, in some measure, necessarily depend upon the decision of the Supreme court in the appeal. I would like all the silent members of the government-and that embraces every member of that body except the Prime Minister, so far as this debate is concerned-who have yet an opportunity of speaking, to point to a decision of the Supreme or any other court in Canada that brought the Crowsnest pass agreement into effect. Why go to the court to "everse the decision? The Crowsnest pass agreement was made by this legislative body of Canada, and if the government of the day were a virile government it would grapple with the question by legislation and not by the artful dodge of sending it from commission to court to deal with. I think I can safely suggest a policy to the government, but I am satisfied that there is so much division in their councils that they will never steal a policy or adopt one coming froim this or any other angle of the House. Wake up and give us a policy I I think it was last year that my hon. friend the Minister of Labour (Mr. Murdock) introduced a bill for the protection of the government; I commented on it as a bill
for the safety of children at sea, and the object of the bill was very patent to us all. This year they want to go to sea in a Britannia ruling the waves spirit, without a navy and for the purpose of fixing ocean rates; and the next thing they know they will be helplessly at sea again in the Supreme court with regard to constitutional questions. Let them give us a real policy. Do not let them bother with the ocean. Do not let them emulate King Canute sitting in his chair at the margin of the shore surrounded by his courtiers and ordering the waves to roll backward. That sort of thing is not worth while. Rather, let the government try to do something useful; let them give us a real policy that will be protective of Canada, a policy that will ensure the men who raise grain in the west that if they use Canadian channels of transportation instead of channels partly Canadian and partly American they will secure a rate as low as, or lower than, they can obtain by the hybrid route. Give us an all-Canadian route, and if you have $10,000,000 or other millions to squander on the Petersen system spend it on internal modes of communication, and route the grain by Canadian rail and Canadian water to Canadian ports instead of through foreign ports That is something which my friends of the government can control, but that policy would be national and therefore it is not required at the present stand.
I have spoken in this House on many occasions, and I shall speak again and again, on behalf of the Maritime provinces and their rights. We do not come here as suppliants nor as would-be tyrants; we simply ask for a fair and square deal in those provinces and we do not propose to be shut out of confederation and such benefits as may reasonably come to us from the existence thereof. I do not think that we are interested in a subsidy to ocean steamships, but we are interested in making the conditions within Canada such, that every pound of freight that Canada has for export will use Canadian rails and both grade systems, as well as Canadian lake systems, employing Canadian boats and making use of Canadian ports. WTe believe that a policy could be devised by w-hich those who enjoy the benefit of the British preference would have it withdrawn from them unless they utilized British shipping and Canadian ports. The government has had the power ever since coming into office, simply by means of an order in council, to bring that policy into effect; but all we have had has been a mere temporizing 10 per cent measure, with the results of which the ministry claim they are satisfied, so far
The Address-Mr. Baxter

as they go. Why are they afraid to take a further step? If the 10 per cent is successful why do they not go the whole distance? They need not be afraid of votes against them from this group.


James Alexander Robb: Were not the hon. gentleman and his party opposed to the building of an elevator at Halifax for the purpose of shipping grain through that port?
Mr. MoMASTER:	That is the wrong
port.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: My party and the people of Halifax were opposed to the spectacle of ministers of the crown and their supporters rushing into that constituency on the eve of an election and pretending to discover the necessity for elevator requirements to which they had been oblivious from the day that Nova Scotia gave them sixteen solid and silent supporters. They woke up when they saw they were in peril of having the sixteen reduced to fifteen. And Halifax promptly turned the trick and gave them one less as a hint to the others to rouse themselves and stand up for their rights. We did not oppose elevator capacity in the Maritime provinces, but what we said on the platform in Halifax, and what I say to-night, is that down to that time there had not been the slightest effort to use the limited elevator capacity that had existed in that city. Down to that moment the government had been trucking and trading with two or three of their political supporters about different sites, as to which one it would be most advantageous to negotiate for. That is the sort of thing we were faced with. Will the government grapple with this question as a whole? I do not want to discuss Halifax or St. John from the standpoint of mere partisanship, but I do want to speak of their rights as part of the whole of Canada. The government talks about transportation. It has another sentence in the Speech about a freer movement of commodities through an equalization of railway freight rates as between provinces and localities, and something about lower carrying charges upon shipments by water. What does it mean? Not a minister of the crown has explained it. Are they suddenly dumb, or are they waiting to 3ee what it can be made to mean according to some peculiar side currents and drifts of opinion that may be moving in the House? I will tell them what I wanted to see in the Speech with regard to railway transportation:	I wanted
them to come out and declare that the day of falsehood had ended in this country. Does the government realize our position in the Maritime provinces? Does it realize that

when we complained in this House of the shipment of automobiles through New London we were first put off with explanations, and that explanations were then sent to the newspapers from the head of the government railways to the effect that they were doing everything in their power to carry out the bargain with the people of Canada, that every pound of freight should be routed by Canadian rails through Canadian ports, and that the Canadian National railways were doing everything to implement the declaration of Sir Wilfrid Laurier? More than that, the St. John Telegraph sent two emissaries across Canada and they found shippers who declared that not only had they not routed their goods through American ports, but that they had never been asked by a representative of the Canadian National Railways to route them through Canadian ports. And yet we were deluded and deceived, for the people of Canada were told by the head of the National railways that every possible effort was being made to route traffic through Canadian ports, and that it was the shippers who had refused to do so. Those shippers who have come out in the open and made those statements are either right or wrong. If the government is doing anything else but sit on the fence, it will ascertain whether its servant or whether these shippers are making false statements. We had been led to believe by the very people in charge of the National railways that there was a deep-rooted hostility in the western part of Canada to the use of the ports of the eastern provinces, and now our investigators find that the trouble is somewhere else. Transportation policy! Why do hon. gentlemen opposite from Nova Scotia keep quiet throughout this debate when they have not a jot or tittle of assurance of improvement of the conditions to which I have referred, and which must be as well known to them as to me. Why is it that not a minister connected with transportation or any other service of the government railways explains the policy of the government and how they propose to implement it? Has the Speech from the Throne become a barren congeries of words with no meaning and no result?
When a gentleman sat opposite as Minister of Railways w'ho had, I believe, the confidence and good feeling of every member of the House-and in saying that I mean no disparagement at all of his honourable successor-in I think the first remarks I addressed to this House on the railway question I suggested that what was necessary was the cutting down of the enormous waste because of virtual

The Address-Mr. Baxter
railway duplication, that nothing else could save us except an accord between the railways -co-operation instead of competition. Has any step been taken in regard to that as a national policy or to put it in operation? Are we doing anything else to-day except foolishly bucking one national railway against the other national railway? For that is exactly what is occurring to-day. Not an attempt is made to cut out duplication of services. I do not want to be misunderstood. I do not want to see anything like the Board of Railway Commissioners imposing their will upon the two railways; I do not want to see this government pass legislation to impose what it may think to be the will of the people upon the railways. All I ask is that the heads of the two railways shall be invited-as business men trying to solve a common question would invite each other-to sit in a conference and discuss the means by which a combination of the respective systems may be operated more profitably and with less expense. Not merely millions but tens of millions of dollars can be saved to this country by such a course. And that money, whether it is paid as freight rates to the Canadian Pacific or to the Canadian National, is coming just the same out of the pocket of the Canadian taxpayer. But what is the answer we get from the Canadian National Railways? A blast and blare of radio from the Moncton station; great speeches, wonderful noises and rumblings all over the continent; "Hello; good fellow" to every man in the service of the road; amusement for the passengers; but never a sign of co-operation, nothing but coming to this parliament for money and more money and more money still to make good deficits, and never a thought that by a few hours reasonable consultation with the other great system millions of dollars of unnecessary expense might be eliminated.


George Perry Graham: Now my hon. friend has
made this statement two or three times, will he allow me a word?


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Certainly.


George Perry Graham: The very thing he says
should be done has been done on more than one occasion.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Where and when ?


George Perry Graham: At least twice during the past year I have personally called to the attention of the railway heads the discussions which took place in the House, I have discussed it with both presidents, and I have also called to their attention the discussion which took place in the committee; further, I have but recently written each of them asking if it is not possible for them to get together and endeavour to economize in the present state of affairs by cutting out duplication of trains without unduly discommoding the public.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: I am glad to find, Mr. Speaker, that the seed I scattered did not all fall on barren ground-


George Perry Graham: The seed came after the
crop.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: -because I enunciated that policy, if you may call it such, long before the hon. minister acted upon it. But I am not anxious for the credit.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: , No, I am not anxious for the credit, laugh as much as hon. members like. They may treat the business of Canada as a jest if they will, but I will not. What I am looking for is results, and I have asked the hon. minister to-night where and when.
I want him to point to me a single train service eliminated, a single bit of waste set aside. I want something more than letters written.


George Perry Graham: I do not want to interrupt my hon. friend unduly. A moment ago he did not want it settled by this parliament, nor did he want a bludgeon wielded by the railway commission; he wanted the heads of the two railways to be asked to get together in a friendly conference. If he wants us to go a step further, it will be beyond where he suggests we ought to go.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: I am suggesting a step
further, and there will be no bludgeoning in the step further. I would suggest that with all the suavity of manner and the real ability which my hon. friend possesses and with his long experience, if he were earnestly trying to do something in this matter he would sit in that conference with those men and get them started with a pretty definite object in view, and I do not think he would let go until he had accomplished it.


Lewis Herbert Martell: What did you do up to 1921? You took over t'he railways.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Mr. Speaker, my acquaintance with Holy Writ is perhaps a little dim and I have never been able to quite determine whether it was the angel or the ass that spoke.


Lewis Herbert Martell: The ass has just spoken.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Now, Mr. Speaker, I find
a sort of aversion in the Speech from the Throne to any discussion of the tariff question. In fact there seems to me to be rather a con-
The Address-Mr. Baxter

fession that the little tariff tinkering that was not going to hurt anybody very much but yet was hoped to benefit somebody a very great deal, has not been productive of any useful result, and now the government has discovered that the whole crux of the question lies in transportation.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


John Babington Macaulay Baxter: Hon. gentlemen to my
left laugh because they like to be deluded in this way, and they have shown appreciation of their delusion by a great many votes in support of the government, which I have no doubt, will be implemented by many more in the future. I do not think, however, that we have anything really constructive unless we have some dealing with the tariff along broad lines. I do not pose as a high tariff man, nor do I come from a province that has any interest in what you might call a high tariff. In fact, there might be some preference in New Brunswick for a very low tariff. In Nova Scotia, as hon. members well know, the feeling in many sections would be very much the other way, and the maintenance of a tariff is vital to the development of some industries. You go into Quebec and you find the necessity for a tariff again. That is repeated in Ontario, and is immediately denied in the west. When you reach the Pacific coast you find a recurrence of the belief in the tariff. Is it impossible for this government to bring people together on the tariff question? Is it not worth while for sections of the country-take my own for instance-which may have no interest that calls for a high tariff, to be fair enough to say: There are other parts of the country besides ours where the tariff is a vital necessity. We will put up with a reasonable tariff, surrounded by proper safeguards, if we get the business of those other portions of Canada passing through our territory? In other words, give us our compensation by the solving of our transportation problem. Do that, and give to those parts of Canada, which require it, to the industries of Canada which require it, a real, vital protection and not a mere half-baked thing that is no good, a thing which perhaps may be said not to injure the consumer and certainly does not help the producer. Give us something with vitality in it. The west can afford ito bear a reasonable amount of tariff burden if the government of the country is strong enough and has vision enough to solve the internal transportation problem of Canada, so that when they reach the seaboard the Canadian wheat grower and the Canadian manufacturer will be on the same footing as those who have 
the advantage of the use of American ports. But have we a suggestion of anything of this character in the Speech from the Throne? Have we a suggestion of anything positive, of anything concrete? Is there a policy at all? Can a man read that Speech and deduce from it any real basis upon which it is proposed to administer the affairs of the Dominion of Canada during the next twelve months? I cannot find it and I do not think anybody else can. What confirms me in that view is that except for the perfunctory- well, I will not say that; but except for the part in the debate which necessarily fell to the Prime Minister by virtue of his office, there has been practically no support of the Speech by hon. gentlemen opposite, and the Prime Minister has been at least a party to the silence of his followers upon all the questions dealt with in it.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Shall the motion carry?


Arthur Meighen: On division.
Motion (Sir Eugene Fiset) agreed to, on division.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King, seconded by Mr. Graham, it was ordered that the Address be engrossed and transmitted to His Excellency the Governor General by such members of the House as are of the Honourable the Privy Council.


James Alexander Robb: That this House will on Tuesday next resolve itself into a committee to consider of a supply to be granted to His Majesty.


Arthur Meighen: Where does this come
in on the order paper?


Hewitt Bostock: As soon as the Address
in repiy to the Speech from the Throne is adopted, these motions are in order.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

['Stands as a notice of\nmotion.\nMotion stands.']
James Alexander Robb: That this House will on Tuesday next resolve itself into a committee to consider of the ways and means for raising the supply to be granted to His Majesty.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
A message from His Excellency the Governor General transmitting estimates for the year ending March 31, 1926, was presented by Hon. J. A. Robb (Acting Minister of Fi-

Questions
nance), read by Mr. Speaker to the House, and referred to the committee of Supply.

[Stage Direction]
A message from His Excellency the Governor General transmitting supplementary estimates for the year ending March 31, 1926, was presented by Hon. J. A. Robb (Acting Minister of Finance), read by Mr. Speaker to the House, and referred to the committee of Supply.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. GEORGE P. GRAHAM (Minister of Railways and Canals):	Mr. Speaker, with the
consent, of the House I would move, seconded by Mr. Robb:
That rule 10 of the House of Commons relating to the appointment of the select standing committees of the House be amended by adding to the select standing committees of the House for the present session a select standing committee on Railways and Shipping owned, operated and controlled by the government, to which will be referred the estimates of the Canadian National railways and the Canadian merchant marine for the present session for consideration and for report to the House: provided, however, that nothing in this resolution shall be construed to curtail in any way the full right of discussion in committee of Supply; and that the said committee consist of Messieurs Cannon, Drummond, Drayton, Euler Graham, Harris, Jelliff, Jones, Kyte, Mackinnon, Milne, Rinfret, Robi-chaud, Stewart (Humbolt) and Stork.
These are the same as last year, except that Mr. Cannon is put in the place of the late Mr. Gauvreau.
Hewitt Bostock: According to Rule 40
this requires unanimous consent.


George Perry Graham: I would have to give
notice if I did not get the consent of the House, but I asked for that before I moved the resolution.


Hewitt Bostock: Is it the pleasure of the House that the hon. member shall have unanimous consent?


Arthur Meighen: No, Mr. Speaker.


George Perry Graham: Stands as a notice of
motion.
Motion stands.



QUESTIONS

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

Mr. CARMICHAEL:: 1.	What was the yearly emolument received by the postmasters at Coleville, Kerrobert and Kindersley in the province of Saskatchewan, for their services as postmaster during the latest year for which data is available?
2.	Does post office bos rent accrue to the postmaster or to the department?


Hon. Mr. MURPHY:: 1. For year 1923-24.
Coleville post office.. ..	$ 720 58
Kerrobert post office.. ..	5,472 90
Kindersley post office.. ..	3,822 55
2.	In government-owned and rented post
office buildings where the postmaster and staff are civil servants, all revenues from post office boxes accrue to the government.
In government-owned and rented buildings where the postmaster is paid from revenue, and where he, in turn, engages and pays his own staff, 50 per cent of the post office box revenue has always been assigned to the postmaster as one of the items which make up his salary.
At the three above-mentioned post offices the postmasters are paid out of revenue and they supply their own buildings and equipment, including post office boxes, and, in accordance with the rule that has always prevailed, the postmasters in question retain the revenue from these boxes.


GRAND RIVER BRIDGE
Mr. SENN:: 1.	What was the total cost of construction of the grand river bridge at York, Ontario?
2.	What has been the cost of maintaining said bridge during each year since construction?


Hon. Mr. KING (Kootenay):: 1.	$26,327.95.
2.	1892-93, $147.00, 1893-94, $340.00; 1894-95,
$300.00; 1896-97. $62.12; 1897-98, $32.50; 18991900, $798.00; 1901-02, $993.97; 1902-03, $16.00; 1903-04.	$198.34;	1904-5,	81,210.55;	1905-06,$3,114.35; 1907-08, $1,619.56; 1909-10, $1,82352; 1910-11,	$25.00;	1911-12,	$124.85;	1912-13,$524.49; 1913-14, $875.00; 1914-15, $1,024.24; 1915-16,	$623.29;	1916-17,	$186.66;	1917-18,$370.52;	1918-19,	$456.25;	1919-20,	$634.67;
1920-21, $1,042.38; 1921-22, $5,083.12; 1922-23, $121.25; 1924-25, $28.00.


REJECTED IMMIGRANTS
Mr. ROSS (Kingston):: 1.	How many immigrants have teen refused admission to Canada during the fiscal year ended March 31, 1924?
2.	From what countries did these people make
application ?


Hon. Mr. ROBB:: 1.	11,303.
2.
Arabia	 2
Armenia	 5
Austria	 2
Belgium	 3
China	 48
Cuba	 3
Czecho-Slovakia	 5
East India	 5
Egypt	 2
Questions

2.-Concluded
Esthonia	 5
Finland	 21
France	 7
Germany	 17
Great Britain and Ireland:-
England	 121
Ireland	 17
Scotland	 45
Wales	 4
Greece	 12
Holland	 13
Hungary	 2
Italy	 443
Japan	 3
Jugo-Slavia	 4
Latvia	
Malta	 10
Mexico	 2
Newfoundland	 79
Poland	 9
Portugal	 3
Roumania	 7
Russia	 13
Scandinavia:-
Denmark	 4
Norway	 23
Sweden	 11
Spain	 10
Switzerland	 3
Syria	
Ukraine	
United States of America.. .	10,311
West Indies	 18
Other Countries (not given).______8
11,303


PACIFIC CABLE BOARD EMPLOYEES
Mr. NEILL:: 1.	During the calender year 1924 how many telegraphists or clerks were appointed on the staff of the Pacific Cable Board ?
2.	How many of these at th: time of their appointment were domiciled in:-(a) Great Britain; (b) Canada; (c) Australia; (d) New Zealand; (e) Other portions of the British Empire?


Hon. Mr. MURPHY:: 1.	Twenty-three operators, seven clerks.
2.	(a) Two operators, clerks, nil; (b) Two operators, two clerks; (e) Sixteen operators, two clerks; (d) Three operators, one clerk; (e) Operators, nil, two clerks, Fiji.


STEAMSHIP REGINA
Mr. DOUCET:: 1.	What was the time and date of the arrival of the Steamship Regina at Halifax, about the latter part of the month of November, 1924?
2.	How was the mail transferred to Montreal?
3.	By what tram?
4.	When did it reach Montreal?
5.	Is it a fact that two carloads of mail matter were mislaid in transit?


Hon. Mr. MURPHY:: 1.	Steamer Regina docked at Halifax at 8.45 a.m., on the 29th November, 1924.
2.	By Canadian National railway trains.
3.	Canadian National Railway fast freight train 475 to Monk, P.Q., and thence, on account of protest of the Pu=t Office Department, by Canadian National Railway special train to Montreal.
4.	At 4.30 a.m., December 2nd, 1924.
5.	No, but the time taken for conveyance of the mails to Montreal was longer than usual due to the use of a freight train pan. of the way.


MATANE HARBOUR IMPROVEMENTS
Mr. DOUCET:: 1.	What amount was voted for habour improvements at Matane, Quebec, in 1923-24, 1924-25?
2.	What firms received contracts for dredging and wharf building at this place and the amount of contract in each case
3.	Was the tender system used?
4.	What damage, if any, was caused by ice and sea to wharves and breakwaters at Matane in the fall of 1924 and winter of 1924-25?
5.	Who is inspector of wharf building at this place? How was he appointed and when, and is he competent in the discharge of his duties?
6.	Who is inspector of channel dredging at this place, how was he appointed and when, and .is ho competent in the discharge of his duties?
7.	Is it the intention of the government to rebuild any wharf or breakwater damaged by ice, etc., at this place ?


Hon. Mr. KING (Kootenay):: 1.	1923-24, $100,000; 1924-25, $75,000.
2.	(a) Dredging: A contract was entered into with Horace Dussault and Company to dredge 290,000 c. yds. p.m. at 37 cents, amounting approximately to $107,300; when 32,135 c. yds. were removed the contract was closed and a contract awarded to The St. John Dry Dock & Shipbuilding Company Limited for the remainder of the work, viz.: 257,865 c. yds. p.m. at 37 cents amounting approximately to $95,410; (b) Wharf building: Messrs J. R. & J. E. Boulanger: Extension to eastern breakwater at unit prices, amounting approximately to $38,178; construction of wharf to connect present wharf and western breakwater at unit prices, amounting approximately to $30,972.80.
3.	Yes.
4.	The structures under construction by Messrs. Boulanger & Boulanger were damaged first on December 9th, 1924, and again on January 20th, 1925.
5.	(a) Joseph R. Pelletier; (b) By Civil Service Commission, July 11, 1924; (c) Yes.
6.	(a) Henri Joncas; (b) By Department of Public Works; (c) July 26, 1923; (d) Yes.
7.	Matter being investigated.

Unopposed Motions for Papers


YUKON GOLD COMMISSIONER
Mr. BLACK (Yukon):: 1.	What amount as salary, and what amount as living allowance, is paid annually to the Gold Commissioner of Yukon Territory?
2.	What amounts are so being paid to the Acting Gold Commissioner of Yukon Territory?
3.	Was an increase madp within the past three years in the amount paid annually to the Gold Commissioner of Yukon?
4.	If so, by what amount annually was such payment so increased ?
5.	Was such increased payment made retroactive, and if so, how many years back did it extend?
6.	At what date was such increase put into effect, and what total sum was at that date paid pursuant
to such increase ?
7.	How many persons are at this date being paid as Gold Commissioner, and Acting Gold Commissioner of Yukon?


Hon. Mr. MURPHY (For Mr. Stewart):: 1.	The duties of Commissioner of the Yukon have been added to the Gold Commissioner who is paid annual salary of $5,000, with annual living allowance of $3,000. Before consolidation former commissioner had salary of $6,000, living allowance $6,000, and free house. Gold Commissioner had salary of $5,000, living allowance $1,500.
2.	Answered by No. 7.
3.	Answered by No. 1.
4.	Answered by No. 1.
5.	Yes, to April 1, 1919.
6.	February 7th, 1923, $5,750.
7.	Gold Commisioner, G. P. Mackenzie summoned to Ottawa to assist in framing policy for administration in North West Territories along lines which will protect natives and conserve wild life. He is organizing and will command Arctic expeditions and will be paid the same salary $5,000 per annum and living allowance $3,000 per annum as he received as Gold Commissioner.
Mr. Percy B. Reid, Division Commissioner of Immigration has been borrowed from Department of Immigration and Colonization to act as Gold Commissioner at Dawson. His salary is $4,500 per annum and he is being paid in addition a living allowance of $8.50 per day.


HOME BANK DEPOSITORS
Mr. HODGINS:: Is it the intention of the government to take any steps towards reimbursing the depositors in the Home Bank, at this session of parliament?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I will have a statement to give the House on the orders of the day to-morrow with reference to the Home Bank.


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
Mr. HUDSON:: 1.	What treaties and conventions are in existence and operative affecting Canada: (a) between Great Britain and the United States; and (b) between Canada and the United States?
2.	How many trade commissioners, trade agents or consular agents has the United States in Canada?
3.	How many trade commissioners, trade agents and consular agents has Canada in the United States?
4.	What was the value of the Canadian imports from and exports to the United States for each of the last five years.


GENEVA PROTOCOL-INTERNATIONAL DISPUTES
Mr. MORIN moved:: For a copy of ail correspondence, letters, telegrams and other documents exchanged between the government of Canada and that of Great Britain, concerning the Geneva protocol, for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker, this correspondence is going on at the present time between the British government and the government of Canada with respect to the Geneva protocol, and I think it would be inadvisable to bring down any of it until the whole of it can be brought down. At a later stage of the session, before the subject is debated in the House, I will see that such correspondence is brought down as can be.


Hewitt Bostock: Stand?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Dropped.
Motion dropped.


SINGAPORE MILITARY BASE
Mr. PREVOST moved:: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams and other documents exchanged between the government of Canada and that of Great Britain or other self governing dominion in connection with a military base .at Singapore.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I think that had better stand.
Motion stands.


UNOPPOSED MOTIONS FOR PAPERS ROCKPORT-ALEXANDRIA BAY FERRY
Mr. STEWART (Leeds):: For a copy of all correspondence, resolutions, petitions, regulations, reports and other documents on file, relating to the application of one Hutchinson for a license to operate a ferry between Rockport Ontario, and Alexandria Bay, New York.
Home Bank Depositors

PUBLIC SERVICE EMPLOYEES Mr. ARTHURS (for Mr. Sutherland):
For a return .showing number of employees in the several departments in the public service for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1924, designated in accordance with the new classification schedules, and showing salary paid in each case.


ADVERTISEMENT-&quot;CANADA IS COMING THROUGH&quot;
James Arthurs: For a return showing a list of all newspapers given publication of the advertisement "Canada is Coming Through" and the amount of money paid or to be paid to each.


IMPERIAL CONFERENCE
Louis-Simon-René Morin: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams and other documents exchanged between the government of Canada, and the government of Great Britain or the government of any of the self governing dominions concerning the calling of an Imperial conference at London in the early part of the year 1925.
On motion of Mr. Mackenzie King, the House adjourned at 9.53 pm.
Tuesday, February 17, 1925