1926-06-25

THE DUNCAN REPORT

[Stage Direction]
Mr. DUGAiLD DONAGHY (North Vancouver) :	With the consent of the House I
should like to move that the Duncan report be laid on the table of the House.
Mr. SPEAKER:: According to the rules
of the House, two days' notice must be given.


Mr. DONAGHY:: Is it not in order to
make the motion with the unanimous consent of the House?


Hewitt Bostock: Bourinot says:
The documents laid before parliajment are presented either by message or by command of His Excellency the Governor General, or in answer to an address or order of the House, in pursuance of an act of parliament.
In such cases two days' notice is required.


Hon. H. H. STEVENS (Vancouver Centre):: Speaking for myself and with the authority of my ri^ht hon. leader, we would have no

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell
objection at all to the unanimous consent being given, but with one proviso-that is that the report, evidence and exhibits complete, should be laid on the table.


Dugald Donaghy: That is the way I have drawn my motion.


Hewitt Bostock: The motion is:
'Moved by Mr. Doneghy, seconded by Mr. Jenkins:
That the interim report of Walter Duncan, dated December 10, 1925, and the report of Walter Duncan dated February 8, 1926, mentioned in the proceedings before the special committee investigating the Department of Customs and Excise, together with transcript of evidence referred to in the report of February 8, 1926, and all exhibits mentioned in said evidence, and alii enclosures accompanying said report or referred to therein, be laid on the table of the House.
I have stated that two days' notice should be given, but if the motion is made by unanimous consent the motion may be put.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Hon. GEORGE H. BOIVIN (Minister of Customs (and Excise):	I hope I may have
the unanimous consent of the House to lay the documents on the table during the course of the afternoon, as soon as I can get them.
Mr. MEIGHEN:: I understood the motion was to lay them on the table now.


Mr. BOTVIN:: Just as .soon as I can get
them. I was unaware that this motion was to be made.


Arthur Meighen: I do not know how the motion to lay them on the table can be passed, unless they are laid on the table at once.


Georges Henri Boivin: They will be laid on the
table in the next ten minutes.



CUSTOMS INQUIRY


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Thursday, June 24, consideration of the motion of Mr. Mercier (St. Henri) for concurrence in the report of the special committee appointed to investigate the Department of Customs and Excise, the proposed amendment thereto of Hon. Mr. Stevens, and the proposed amendment to the amendment of Mr. Woodsworth.
Mr. M. N. CAMPBELL (Mackenzie):: Mr. Speaker, we as members of parliament are now being called upon to adjudicate on what, I think I am safe in saying, is one of the greatest moral and political scandals that ever besmirched the fair name of Canada. The details of the doings of high officials are so disgustingly immoral that the committee 14011-318
through a sense of public decency refuse to allow them to be incorporated in the evidence at all.


Dugald Donaghy: May I make a remark and ask a question here?


An hon. MEMBER:: Keep quiet for once.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Dugald Donaghy: I take it I have the hon. member's consent.


Hewitt Bostock: You may proceed, if you have the consent of the hon. member.


Dugald Donaghy: When the report mentioned in the motion just agreed to is laid on the table it will be found that nothing is excluded from it, and everything is printed in the proceedings of the committee.


Mr. HOCKEN:: Will the Duncan report appear in full in those proceedings?


Dugald Donaghy: It will, and it appears in full in the report of proceedings which is now in the hands of hon. members.


Mr. CAHAN:: And the evidence?


An hon. MEMBER:: Produce the evidence.


Milton Neil Campbell: We will have to defer our decision on that to some future occasion. The facts as far as I am aware are as I have stated. I do not propose to go into all the details of the case because they have been pretty well laid before the House by previous speakers. It suffices to say that the chief offender in all these disclosures would appear to be a former Minister of Customs, the Hon. Jacques Bureau. It would also appear that when the condition of affairs within the Customs department became revealed to the country, the government rewarded the Hon. Mr. Bureau for his services in debauching the department by appointing him to a senatorial position and placed in charge of the department a young and active minister in an effort to clean up that department.
I am not one of those who will readily condemn the present Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin). I have a good deal of sympathy for him. He inherited much of the present situation from the former chief of that department. The whole Customs department was debauched previously and perhaps it was too much to expect that the new Minister of Customs could set things right almost immediately. Therefore I say that I am prepared to be quite tolerant in my judgment of him. I shall be frank in saying that if there were no sins levelled at the government be-



IT.VISKD EDITION

[Stage Direction]
5016	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell
yond that of the charge against the present Minister of Customs, I would be prepared to say to the minister, "Go and sin no more," and to vote confidence in this government.
But the facts would prove that there is a good deal of responsibility on all, or nearly all, the colleagues of the minister besides the responsibility that is placed upon himself. I am not prepared to make him the sacrificial goat for all' the inherited sins of the party or the iniquities of that particular department. One of the things that I would hold against the minister-indeed I look upon it almost as his cardinal sin-is the fact that he would rise in his place in this House as a minister of the crown to defend the forme' Minister of Customs. If I was rather surprised at his action a few days ago, I was amazed when the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) did the same thing yesterday. I think the least we might have expected was that these two hon. members should have dissociated themselves from the former Minister of Customs and been prepared to admit that a mistake was made in appointing him to the upper chamber.
Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: May I say to
my hon. friend: if he will read my remarks in Hansard, as he may have heard them yesterday if he was listening, I made no defence of the former Minister of Customs whatever. I made an explanation with respect to the circumstances attendant upon his appointment and I asked that the former Minister of Customs be allowed to make his defence before a judicially constituted tribunal. I made no defence of him myself.


Milton Neil Campbell: I have no desire to enter into an argument with the Prime Minister about this because his remarks are a matter of public record and anyone can read them in Hansard. The principal responsibility which I would place upon the government is that of putting the former Minister of Customs in the upper chamber when, according to all the evidence, conditions in that department, the debauchery of that department by that minister, were a matter within the knowledge of most of those ministers.


Mr. DENIS (Joliette):: Would my hon.
friend allow me a question?


Milton Neil Campbell: I would prefer that
my hon. friend should wait until I have finished.
On February 2 when the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) brought this matter to the attention of the House, he levelled a direct charge against the government. I am going to read the remarks of

the hon. member for Vancouver Centre as found on page 681 of Hansard. This is what he said:
What I am accusing the government of is this: that for a year the Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Customs, the ex-Minister of Customs, the Acting Minister of Customs, the Minister of Marine, the present minister,-no, I will stop with the others-they knew that this condition existed. The Minister of Customs learned it when he entered office. The Solicitor General entered the government with a knowledge of these things.
Mr. Lapointe: I deny that entirely.
Further on the Minister of Justice continued :
Mr. Lapointe: If what my hon. friend says is true, and I do not think it is true, I deny entirely the knowledge of any such thing and I throw the charge back into his teeth.
The Solicitor General interjects:
Mr. Cannon: If my. hon. friend will allow me, following my leader, I do the same.
Further on the Minister of Justice again states:
Mr. Lapodnte: Even that I deny. Anything my hon. friend has said as to my knowledge I deny entirely.
Further on the Minister of National Defence as reported on page 713 makes the following statement:
Mr. Macdonald (Antigonish-Guysborough):	As a
member of the government I want to say that T have not heard of the hon. gentleman's story.
On referring to the report of this committee, I find in the sworn testimony of Mr. Sparks he refers to a letter dated June 23, 1924, addressed to the Prime Minister and although it is rather long perhaps it is important enough for me to weary the House by reading it. It reads:
Dear Sir,-Confirming the writer's conversation with your secretary, Mr. McGregor, we would respectfully ask the opportunity for a delegation representing this association to lay before the government certain matters in connection with the wholesale smuggling of various classes of goods into Canada.
We think it would be desirable, should you grant this request, that the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Customs and the Minister of Justice might be present, as the matters which we wish to lay before you affect these three departments.
We believe the Minister of Finance wrould be interested in the statement of our opinion that the loss of revenue will exceed $10,000,000 per annum.
As the prevention of smuggling comes under the Customs department, certain very important facts which we propose to put before the government in reference to the ineffectual methods now adopted by the Customs department will be of interest.
We shall also call attention to the fact that conditions in the ports, particularly in Montreal, are such that smugglers are practically immune from punishment.
The whole question of smuggling has become a national problem. It is seriously affecting business, and, as pointed out, causing a tremendous loss of revenue. This association for more than a year has studied this problem, and we would like to lay before your government a comprehensive statement covering the matter.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell
We would respectfully suggest that, if you are able to fix a date, it should be at least a week or ten days forward, as representatives from various parts of the country will require to be notified of the date set.
Trusting you will see your way clear to meet this delegation, and awaiting your early reply, we remain, Yours respectfully,
Canadian Association of Garment Manufacturers, per (Signed) R. P. Sparks,
President.
This is addressed to the Prime Minister under date of June 23, 1924. In the sworn evidence Mr. Sparks states that the deputation appeared before the government on the 6th August, 1924. When asked what ministers were present he answered as follows:
Right Hon. Mackenzie King, Hon. Jacques Bureau, Hon. Mr. Lapointe, Hon. Mr. Macdonald, Hon. Mr. Graham and Hon. Mr. King.
Yet, Sir, we find a number of these ministers denying absolutely on February 2 last that they had any knowledge of these conditions. To my mind that is amazing.
I am not going into many details but in my opinion the government had one opportunity to vindicate itself before the country, and I took occasion to point that out to the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) privately. I even quoted an analogous instance in which the Scott government in Saskatchewan some years ago took action to clean up a corrupt state of affairs which was brought to their attention. A great deal of corruption had prevailed among members of their own party and among the civil servants, and the Saskatchewan government took steps to have the whole matter investigated. Did that government evade the issue? Did their members in the legislature stand up to a man and defend the malefactors? Not at all; the Premier said, "We want the fairest and fullest investigation, and we want everything that is wrong exposed."


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: By a royal commission.


Milton Neil Campbell: It does not make much difference what means they took. They got all the facts and punished every man who was found guilty. Among those who were punished were three members of the party supporting the government and they served terms in jail for their crime. The result was that the Scott government was vindicated before the people of Saskatchewan, and when the next election came around they were returned by a larger majority than before. I as a supporter of that government felt proud to be of the same party. Now I say that this government lost an opportunity of vindicating itself by not going on record as being prepared to face the situation fearlessly 140-11-3181
and courageously. As I have told the Prime Minister, had he taken that course, I would have been prepared to vote confidence in his government and would have been glad to see them still in the treasury benches. If the government -had faced the situation as they ought to have done I would have felt that the ends of justice were being satisfied.
Now we are considering to-day an incomplete report; I say incomplete because it is a well known fact that the members of the Conservative party on the committee wanted to add an appendix to have certain recommendations embodied in the report, but the majority of the committee declined to accept that proposal. It is equally true that the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy), representing the Progressive group on the committee, desired to have certain recommendations added to the report. His representations were also refused by the majority of the committee. For that reason I say that the report we have received in this House is incomplete.
The hon. member for Vancouver Centre, in order to represent more properly the point of view of the whole committee, moved what I consider a very moderate amendment. If I were to find fault with the amendment I would say it erred on the side of moderation; and I think it expresses, if not in words at least in substance, just what the member for Peace River, the representative of the Progressive group on the committee, wanted to add as an appendix to the report. We in this section of the House have confidence in the hon. member for Peace River. We realize that having sat on the committee and heard all the evidence he is in a better position -than any other member in this group to understand the situation, and so far as I am concerned this amendment, meeting as it does in substance, as nearly as we could get it, the actual recommendations of the hon. member for Peace River, our representative on that committee, I feel I can do nothing but support the amendment.


Mr. FORKE:: So far as the hon. member
for Peace River is concerned, I agree with every word the hon. gentleman has said.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Robert Forke: But I want the hon. member who has the floor to speak for himself and not for the Progressive group.


Milton Neil Campbell: I may frankly state
that the hon. member for Brandon (Mr. Forke) has never been able to speak for the Progressives and is not able to speak for them to-day.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell


Robert Forke: Will the hon. member allow me another word?


Milton Neil Campbell: I speak with no authority for the Progressive group, but I say that this group has confidence in the hon. member for Peace River. Will the hon. member for Brandon deny that?


Robert Forke: No.


Milton Neil Campbell: Will he say that we
have no confidence in the hon. member for Peace River?


Robert Forke: I told you we have.


Milton Neil Campbell: Then why rise to deny the statement I have made?


Robert Forke: I simply wanted to say that
we did not want the hon. member to speak for the Progressive group; let him speak for himself.


Milton Neil Campbell: So far as that goes I
can speak for the Progressive group. Now I come to a consideration of the subamendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth). I am sorry indeed that the hon. member is not in his seat, because I want to make some personal references and I hesitate to do so when he is not here.


An hon. MEMBER:: He is here.


Milton Neil Campbell: I hope he will come
in before I am through.


An hon. MEMBER:: He is behind the curtain.


Mr. WILSON (Vaudreuil):: I am not
Woodsworth.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Milton Neil Campbell: Now there is only one useful purpose which can be served by the subamendment so far as I can see, and that is to whitewash the whole filthy proceedings and to prevent the members of this House from having an opportunity to vote on the original amendment, which in my opinion is the crux of the whole debate. If the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre or those whom he represents want to evade the real issue why do they not stand up and vote directly against the original amendment? That, in my estimation, is the manly thing to do.
There are some things I find difficult to understand in regard to the action of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. Just what does he want to do by this subamendment? Does he 'Object to the recommendations of the committee that a number

of civil servants who have come under a cloud in this affair should be dismissed? Does he Object to that? Not at all. He does not object to that, because he adds another name to the recommendation for dismissal. He is satisfied that a number of civil servants should be dismissed from their positions; he is content to have them thrown to the wolves for their part in the corruption; but when it comes to members of parliament on both sides of the House what does he say? He proposes to delete from the amendment every single word in condemnation or censure of the actions of the government and proceeds to whitewash the whole thing. But that is not in accordance with what the hon. gentleman said in his speech. I could quite understand the motive of the hon. gentleman in moving this subamendment if he were prepared to vindicate the government, to wash them and leave them white as the driven snow. I could quite understand his action if he were prepared to do that. ' But the statements in his speech prove otherwise. At page 4922 of Hansard I find the following:
Again we have brought 'before us the conduct of the former minister, Mr. Jacques Bureau, and let me say, as far as I am concerned, that the worst thing the .present government has done in connection with the whole matter was to put that gentleman in the Senate.
I quite agree with the hon. member in that regard. And by the way, I am glad to see that he is here now. I am sorry to have discussed him while he was absent, but I will repeat some of what I said for his benefit.
I cannot let this opportunity pass without protesting against the unequal justice that prevails in connection with our laws. Petty thieves, even young boys, are sometimes given months or years in gaol.
He goes on:
What is the penalty for debauching a governmenta senatorship!
Then referring to some other members of parliament, he said:
But I think most of the members here would agree with me .that action such as Mr. Robichaud took in writing a letter asking for leniency on the ground that a certain man who was convicted was useful to the party is absolutely inexcusable, and in the interest of establishing what I believe to be a .higher standard of political morality in this country I think we are bound to say so.
Again I heartily agree with the hon. member. Then he makes some other references to Mr. Boivin, Mr. Duff and Mr. Boys. The original amendment does not condemn the government or these members in nearly as strong language as the hon. member does in his speech, and yet in the same breath he moves an amendment to the original amendment, the purpose of which is to delete every

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell
bit of that condemnatory or censuring language from the original amendment. Could anything foe more inconsistent?


An hon. MEMBER:: Nothing.


Milton Neil Campbell: No hon. member in this House has talked humanitarianism more than the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth); no one has protested more vehemently in this House and out of it against social injustice than the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre; no one that I know of in the Dominion of Canada has protested so vigorously as has the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre against discrimination in the enforcement of our laws- and again I say I honour him for it. But what does he propose to do in this amendment? He concurs in the dismissal of all those civil servants who have been guilty of minor crimes, but he applies the Whitewash brush to all the officials higher up who were guilty of the major crimes.


Mr. TV OODSWORTH:: Does the hon. member characterize the statements which he has just read from my speech as whitewash?


Milton Neil Campbell: Not at all, Mr. Speaker.
I was pointing out the inconsistency of the hon. gentleman in condemning these men in his speech and yet moving to delete from the main amendment every single word of censure on the same men.


James Shaver Woodsworth: May I ask the
hon. gentleman-and I do so because I know him very intimately-if he would mind discussing the points that I was trying to urge in that speech.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am speaking with the hon. member's permission.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: There was the twofold consideration: on the one hand that it was impossible to conduct a judicial inquiry in a body of this character, and on the other hand that in discussing this case'-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


An hon. MEMBER:: It is another speech.


James Shaver Woodsworth: -we could not
very well disregard other factors.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Milton Neil Campbell: Mr. Speaker, I was just coming to that when the hon. gentleman interrupted. I quite agree with him as to
the necessity for a judicial inquiry, and I may remind him that the right hon. leader of the opposition intimated to him that he was quite prepared to have that incorporated in the main amendment, but the hon. gentleman sat quietly in his seat and refused, by silence at least, to consent to that, thereby leaving his sincerity open to question. There is just one thing I will give him credit for-he was quite frank in saying that he justified his amendment on the ground of political expediency. No one, Sir, in the Dominion of Canada has condemned the old party system more severely than the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. With most of what he has said from time to time on that subject I agree, because to a large extent I belong to the same school of thought, and that is one thing that makes it particularly painful for me to disagree with him at this time; but to-day he is prepared to whitewash one of the worst scandals in the whole history of Canada on the ground of political expediency.


James Shaver Woodsworth: If my hon. friend will permit me? I know he wants to be perfectly fair. I think he will admit that that phrase is his, not mine. I did not say I was justifying my amendment on the ground of political expediency.


Milton Neil Campbell: Perhaps I misunderstood the hon. gentleman. Let me quote his
remarks at page 4921 of Hansard:
So let us be frank and say that in a case of this character it is exteranely difficult for the most honest and honourable man-and I take it that despite some cheap sneers hurled across the floor the large majority of this House are honest and honourable men-I say it is very difficult in such a case for us not to be biased by partisan considerations.
I do not wish to quote further, for it seems to me it is quite obvious from that passage- and I appreciate his point-that he is justifying his action on the ground of political expediency, and the necessity, as he said, of keeping this government in power.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I think the hon. gentleman will have to read a great deal more of my speech before he will find those words.


Milton Neil Campbell: Well, Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman delivered a rather lengthy speech two days ago and I do not want to read it all. It is of public record, and anyone can convince himself of the fairness of my characterization by reading the speech. But I wonder what some of those poor, distressed working people, for whom he has been pleading so earnestly and so tearfully, in this House for the last five years, will think when he justifies the dismissal from their position of
.5020	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Campbell
civil servants because of the mud thrown up by someone bigger falling on them, and at the same time applies the whitewash brush to the real criminals higher up.


Mr. DUNNING:: Will my hon. friend
permit me a question? Does he describe the Minister of Customs as one of the "real criminals higher up"? Is that what he means? Let the House understand what is intended by "-the real criminals higher up."


Milton Neil Campbell: I think I made myself
quite plain at the outset. I have no intention of being drawn into any further argument with the Minister of Railways.


Charles Avery Dunning: Will he justify-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.
-Mr. DUNNING:	Is he man enough to
justify the term?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order. Sit down.


Charles Avery Dunning: I ask him as a man,
will he-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Speaker, the hon.
gentleman-


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: Will the right hon. leader of the opposition-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Charles Avery Dunning: I have the floor.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order. Sit down.


Hewitt Bostock: Order. The Chair will
deal with any point of order. No hon. member can interrupt the hon. gentleman who has the floor without the latter's permission.


Charles Avery Dunning: I had the hon. gentleman's permission, Mr. Speaker. I asked him to justify the application of the term, "criminal" to -the Minister of Customs.


Milton Neil Campbell: The hon. Minister of
Railways must be possessed of some supernatural power if he is able to read into my remarks some direct reference to the Minister of Customs. I find that on this side of the House we are not alone in our opinion on some of these things. I find the hon. member for North Vancouver made a very direct reference to one of them when, speaking from the Liberal benches and pleading for that application of the rule and for a vote of confidence in the government, he said:
Nobody with any sense of public honour would attempt to justify the expressions used by Mr. Robichaud in that letter and I am not going to attempt to justify
fMr. Campbell.]	,i i jj !f$|
them. My self-respect will not permit it. The sting, I say, is in that letter and it is contained in these words in the letter which Robichaud wrote to Mr. Bureau, not to Mr. Boivin:
Mr. Aziz is of the highest help for us during this campaign, and we cannot do without his services.
And so on. It appears 'to me that When we have remarks of that- kind from the Liberal benches, there is at least some justification -for strong language from other parts of the House.


Mr. McLEAN (Melfort):: Mr. Speaker,
will the hon. gentleman kindly tell us who are the "criminals higher up"?


An hon. MEMBER:: Go and read the
evidence.


Milton Neil Campbell: The hon. member knows as much about the evidence as I do.
-Several hon. members have referred to this House as a jury. In a sense that may be true, but if I were to go into details I would describe the situation a little differently; I would place the government in the position of defendant, the official opposition in the position of plaintiff, and I would place the jury seats in this corner of the House. After all, we have to face the facts and there they are; there can be no question about that, and even in a larger sense I am not so sure that it is not so. Our party system is based on the principle of competition. We have two major parties competing for the spoils of office; we have a party in power fighting to retain office and a party out of power fighting to get into office. The group in this corner of the House was brought into being through a desire on the part of hundreds of thousands of the electors of Canada for something which would modify that situation, something which would make a definite change there. They believe a system could be worked out on the co-operative principle; they believe a system could be worked out whereby all the parties in the House could co-operate in forming a government and giving to this country the best brain and brawn of all parties. That, I say, was the ideal in the minds of hundreds of thousands of electors, the evidence of which we find in this corner of the House. This group is not looking for power; we never expected to be in power and probably never will be. _ But I say that in this position we should at any rate be able to judge without partisan consideration, and that is what the people of Canada from the Atlantic to the Pacific are going to expect of us at this time.
I object to the expression, "voting with the Conservatives" or "voting with the Liberals." That is the way the press have dubbed it, but I think we have tried to vote on the

Customs Inquiry-Mr. White (Mount Royal)
issues at stake regardless of where the chips fall, and in this case I think we should do the same. I think the voting public of Canada are not going to deal very harshly with the government; I think' the people understand the party system of government and they will expect the government to hold on to office and probably try to whitewash themselves if they can, while they will expect the official opposition to try to get on the treasury benches.


Mr. CANNON:: Will my hon. friend allow me a question? The hon. gentleman says that we would attempt to whitewash ourselves. Can he say that I am guilty of anything more than he is? I would like him to state that like a man.


Milton Neil Campbell: I am not a minister of
the crown; I am only a private member, but as a private member I have certain responsibilities, and I am prepared to face them. If there is anything wrong that I have done I am quite prepared to admit it, if my hon. friend can prove to me that I have been wrong.
Now I want to point out again that the voting public of Canada will not after all sxpect very much else from the Conservatives jr the Liberals than a struggle for the spoils of office. Perhaps I am not fair in saying that, but I think generally speaking the voting public will look at it in that way. But J._ voting public will expect something different from the group in this corner of the House. Unless the third party stands for something different from the two old parties; unless that party stands clearly for something different, I do not see much justification for the necessity of putting the people of Canada to all the expense of organizing and maintaining this party, because it does mean a good deal of expense to our electors. When this matter is brought before the final court of appeal, the people of Canada, the credit or discredit, whichever it may be, will fall on the members in this corner of the House.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Has not that system existed for a great many years, to turn one group out and put another group in? Might it noit be worked out in a different way?


Milton Neil Campbell: I do not quite see the
hon. gentleman's point. I was pointing out that very fact.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Quite so-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am quite sure
the hon. gentleman is willing to allow a question. We have been discussing the question of affairs of political organization which he undertook to bring forward in his address to-day. I was just going to ask him-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: -with his permission, whether the practice in matters of this kind had not been from time immemorial to simply turn one group out and put the other in, and whether or not a third party might not devise another means of treating such a question as this and insist upon it being considered on its merits.


Milton Neil Campbell: That is precisely what
I was trying to point out; I thought the hon. gentleman understood me. The responsibility is on the third party, and the country has a right to expect something a little different at this time from those who do not agree that the old party system is entirely the proper one.


Jean-Joseph Denis: Might I ask a
question?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Jean-Joseph Denis: When I was speaking the other day the hon. member asked me several questions which I was pleased to answer. I am sure he will now allow me to put a question, and will give me an answer. The hon. member has brought out the point, or has tried to make out that the Prime Minister-


An hon. MEMBER:: Put your question.


Jean-Joseph Denis: If you want me
to put the question, let me put it, otherwise I will sit down. The hon. member charges the Prime Minister with defending the Hon. Jacques Bureau. Might I be permitted to read an extract from his speech-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Jean-Joseph Denis: -and ask my hon. friend if that is a defence?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Hewitt Bostock: This is out of order.


Mr. R. S. WHITE (Mount Royal):: Mr. Speaker, I cannot hope to entertain the House for long, but I trust I may be permitted to make a few observations. I do not intend to enter into the whole question, but having some knowledge of the Customs department, having been connected with it for twenty-one years in the city of Montreal, I think I speak with some authority.
The first observation I would make is that the action of the hon. member for Vancouver
5022	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. White (Mount Royal)
Centre (Mr. Stevens) in moving for the appointment of this committee has been justified by results. There can be no question, and there is no doubt throughout this country, but that a public service has been rendered by the hon. member who was instrumental in securing the appointment of that committee. Sometimes we hear mention made of the cost of the investigation. I venture to say, without knowledge but with strong presumption, that the cost of the investigation has already been recovered to the treasury by additional revenue through the lessening of smuggling.
I would like to address the House for a moment on some of the recommendations of the committee. One of the recommendations urges a reduction in the number of ports. I tell hon. gentlemen of this House, and I speak with some experience, that that is impossible. All that the government can do is to refrain from opening more ports. Let any hon. member who has a port in his constituency ask himself if he is going to urge that that port be closed up. If he did, and1 the port was closed, he would at least lose political strength, as well as probably inconveniencing the commercial community it served. If we were starting all over again, we might follow t'he procedure of the United States and have only frontier ports; that is all they have, and I think it is a wise and proper system.
Secondly, it is recommended that there be a uniform appraisal of goods for duty purposes, ad valorem. That is a very old story. The ideal system is the specific duty; but with the ad valorem system it is entirely different. I can recall very well that a quarter of a century ago the Board of Trade of Montreal passed a resolution in favour of the appointment of a Dominion board of appraisers who were to go from port to port and see that there was a uniform appraisal of goods for duty purposes. I would say to the Minister of Customs that he should think very carefully over that question of the appointment of a board of appraisers for the Dominion. It would at least help the commercial community of Canada, and possibly help to swell the revenue.
One other word and I am dona In my opinion the report of the committee, unanimous though it was, was unfair to at least two people, and possibly to more. I refer to the present collector of the port of Montreal, Mr. Weldon, and his surveyor Mr. McLaughlin. The minister was good enough to put on record in Hansard a letter that he received from Mr. McLaughlin protesting his innocence. Sir, I believe in his innocence, but I believe equally in tihe innocence of the col-

lector, Mr. Weldon, and I want to express here publicly my confidence in the integrity of both these gentlemen. Mr. McLaughlin has had forty years' service, and there is no one in the whole of Canada with a more profound knowledge of -customs than Mr. Henry McLaughlin. Mr. Weldon is a comparative newcomer, but he has made a reputation for himself, and I say that it is unfair to besmirch a reputation that has been acquired during forty years of more or less public service in the city of Montreal. When, after the session, the Minister of Customs comes Calmly and quietly to determine what course he is going to take in carrying out the recommendations of the committee, I would ask him-not to have mercy, 'because mercy implies guilt-but to see that justice is done to Mr. Weldon and to Mr. McLaughlin, and I will include also Mr. Wilson, 'chief preventive officer, whom I know well, who has for many years performed faithful service, whose character cannot be disparaged and whose experience is an asset to the department.


Mr. T. W. BIRD (Nelson):: Mr. Speaker,
before I commence my remarks upon the subject before the House I want to bring to the attention of the House a matter which I attempted to bring up by way of privilege yesterday. It is in connection with a letter that I have received, casting certain aspersions upon myself, and I want to say that I am not reading this letter in order to make any capital out of it, but simply in order that I might, if possible, make the ears of the perpetrator tingle, because I think they richly deserve it.
It is written on House of Commons note-paper, and posted in the House of Commons post office. I shall not read it all, because it is too infinitely childish to impose upon the House, but the first sentence, which is the offensive one, reads:
If you continue to allow yourself-
I want to remind the House that I have a certain sense of humour:
-to be bought. and sold much longer, the hope for your entry into heaven, is small.
I do not take any exception to the doubts cast on my right to enter Elysium, because I have often had great doubts about it myself, but this is an attack upon one's reputation under the cover of anonymity, and I want to submit, Mr. Speaker, that the gentleman who wrote this, and forgot to sign his name is, to use mild language, a contemptible and despicable cotvard, and if he has a fibre of manhood in his composition he will give me an early opportunity to say so to his face.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird
With respect to the subject matter under debate, I rise with a good deal of diffidence. I listened to the appeal made by the right hon. leader of the opposition especially towards the close of his speech, and such an appeal is difficult for all serious-thinking persons to lightly withstand, and all the more so, so far as I am concerned, because I have the highest respect for the opinions of that right hon. gentleman. During the five years I have been in this House I have 3 p.m. developed an admiration for the abilities and the personality of the right hon. leader of the opposition which I am afraid on some occasions I have only imperfectly been able to conceal. It is with much regret that I have to differ from him and from his conclusions.
I want to keep out of my address all expressions of a provocative kind, if I can help it, but listening to this debate I have been reminded of a speech, I think from Cicero, which says, "How hard it is to be virtuous, and how difficult it is even to pretend to be virtuous." As I have thought of the government I have thought with Cicero, how hard it is for politicians to be virtuous. As I have thought of the strictures of our friends to my right I have thought with Cicero, how hard it is for politicians even to pretend to be virtuous.
I intend to vote for the subamendment, not because I want to camouflage my underlying intention at all. The right hon. leader of the opposition said it was a bridge over which timid Progressives might pass into an attitude of support toward the government.


Arthur Meighen: My hon. friend has unintentionally misstated what I said. I did not use the word "Progressive"; I said timid members.


Thomas William Bird: I did not think there was any other kind of members in the House thinking of crossing a bridge. I think the right hon. gentleman is a little unfair to the member from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth). Perhaps he was partly justified in his statement because the member for Winnipeg North Centre possibly made somewhat of an irrelevant attack upon the right hon. member, but I want to refer more particularly to the remarks of the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell). I was somewhat surprised to hear him interlard his speech so much with the word "whitewash", and especially with regard to my hon. friend for Winnipeg North Centre. I think that kind of charge is extremely double edged. The hon. member should be very particular how he treats the motives of other people. Of course there is
an obvious retort to that, and one that I tvould be disinclined to make use of, but the people of the country might be asking what orand of wash is he going to use when he is called upon to support our friends to my right.


Milton Neil Campbell: I was not questioning
the motive of my hon. friend at all, I was dealing with the effect of the amendment.


Thomas William Bird: Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird
those things which have been laid at the door of the members of the government.


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, yes, you are.


Thomas William Bird: Here is another hon. member
who takes the simple view of morals, one of these minds of pristine simplicity that looks out upon a great complex world and sees nothing but black and white, no fine gradations at all, no shading, but simply glaring black and white. I am sorry I am not in that enviable position of the right hon. member. But I want to say that I am not condoning this action on the floor of this House and I will not condone it on the platforms of my constituency. What are these charges that are laid at the door of the government which are inexcusable and admittedly damning? In tlhe first place we have a minister of the crown in one of the highest positions of the land demeaning himself to use his high position for purposes which no right-thinking man could possibly palliate, and the irony of the situation is this, that the hon. member is now hanging on the horns of the altar in the sanctuary beyond, where public opinion cannot touch him, where the avengers of blood cry out in vain. I do not mind much about the avengers of blood, but I do about public opinion. It is an ironical thing that nere we have a member of our community Who has debased his high office, who has brought shame upon the government of this country, and yet to-day he is in a place which is immune from public opinion. I do not think that position can be condoned1 or palliated for one moment.
As to my hon. friend the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin) I would agree with many of the expressions of opinion that have been given that the fafflts and the mistakes of my hon. friend were of such a character as not to be an adequate foundation of a motion for general censure upon the government, I want to say that I am second to none in my admiration of his great ability. I believe in my heart that he is a man of soundness of character. What did he do? He showed a regrettable disposition to fall into the rut that his predecessor travelled in, that his predecessor had travelled in and that his predecessor had travelled in. In public life we need1 to treat the reputations and characters of other hon. members tenderly, considerately and carefully. But there is such a motto as "noblesse oblige" and "To whom much is given, of him shall much be required."
I am optimistic enough to believe that the hon. gentleman has realized the full import of the mistake he made in not fully meeting
IMr. Bird.]
the demands of an arising public opinion in this country. The obligation rests upon every hon. member not supinely to follow in the traditional ruts of laxity that have prevailed in our parliamentary system, but to rise up and if possible to strike out new courses of probity, to set new standards of rectitude in our public life. His alacrity in rising under the sting of the whip of public opinion is somewhat praiseworthy. There was no disposition to dally and hedge, but rather an earnestness to start out afresh. I am optimistic in saying so but I believe what I am saying. I believe the hon. gentleman has long ago made up his mind that in regard to the administration of public departments, not only of his own, but of others, new standards are long overdue.
What about the government? What about the Prime Minister and his attitude towards these matters? What about -his attitude towards his delinquent minister? It is a very difficult thing, on the evidence that we have, to characterize just what his attitude was. According to his speech, which I am prepared to accept as I would the speech Of any other hon. gentleman, the conclusion we come to is this: that he was more or less conscious of an undesirable state of things in that department which was presided over by a man whom we all knew, one of his own friends, a man of long standing in this -House, and that his disposition was not to stay proceedings in the process of cleaning up, but rather if possible to let down his colleague as lightly as possible.
We are not living in the old patrician days of Rome when stoic doctrines ruled the minds of senators and sometimes of people, when a Roman patrician would order his son to death because in some thoughtless and rash way he had tampered with the peace of society. We have wandered a long way from those days of stoic sternness when they were willing to sacrifice their own flesh and blood for the sake of principle. I am afraid we are living in very -Christian days when we are all willing enough to forgive ourselves-and to exact the last pound of flesh from the other man. But is that Christian? I know it would be a good thing if we had some of the iron of the old stoic morality in our blood; but we do not want to go back to stoic days when that unnatural condition prevailed that a man would sacrifice his friend in cold blood. We have too far advanced into the -Christian era to want to do that. There is a higher standard set for men and women of to-day; that is, that in respect of things connected with one's personal conduct there shall be stoical stem-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird
ness and in regard to the conduct of all others there shall be Christian consideration. If I am going to be condemned for any expressions of leniency as to the conduct of any hon. member, I am prepared to be condemned; but if I pass from public life with a stain on my own conscience that in any respect I have fallen short of my personal duty here, that is the thing that will follow me to my grave and not the other.
I said that I was not going to condone this kind' of conduct. What does this arise out of? It may have arisen out of the humanity of these men. It may have arisen out of the fact that they are very much like ourselves; that is there was a readiness to respond to the solicitude of a fellow member; that there was a tendency to hide, to shield and to protect a friend. There may have been that; but added to it was this effete, exploded idea of cabinet solidarity that we as a Progressive party came here to protest against, an idea of solidarity which encourages a weak member of the cabinet, that man who is morally weak to say: I will take the plunge because I am a member of a clique with a traditional esprit de corps; nothing serious can happen to me; they will all defend me, stand by me to the last extremity. Can hon. members see the mischief of it? Look at the influence upon the other members of the cabinet who are compelled, almost by the rules of the game, to condone, to glaze over, to veneer absolute corruption in the administration of individual members of the government.
I want to say a little about the defence that has been made. There are always two sides to a question. First of all, I want to give certain weight to points that have been made on the other side, but certainly not the weight that I have heard given to them by some members on the other side. In the first place it is maintained that the system was effete, out of date; that it was brought face to face with new circumstances of an overwhelming character and that in an attempt to meet them it went to pieces. That is one of the. points in the defence, but I do not attach much weight to that from my standpoint as a Progressive member. What business have governmental systems to become effete? What are ministers bound to do but to keep them in condition? I cannot attach any great weight to that, but it applies equally to one government as to another. Through all these years the people have been led to think that by voting one way or the other they would eventually get a perfect system of government administration. What have we after all these years? We have a system that we are almost ashamed to describe lest it should get abroad and we should become a laughing stock to other countries.
Another argument which has been made- and this is a more serious question for discussion-is that the attitude of members in general has been such as to make it difficult for ministers to carry out their duties with rectitude. That is contained in the amendment. There is a sort of moral haziness existing in the rank and file. After all the black and white distinctions do not prevail amongst private members so much as private members imagine they do. There is a kind of blurring, a kind of uncertainty, about the moral standards that ought to apply to individual members, with the result that individual members go hat in hand to ministers of departments and ask those ministers to do things which they have no right to do.
The cabinet after all very much reflects the House and the House reflects public opinion back home. The public have been listening to this debate for the last two or three days and I am afraid they have been listening to it with an air of mere curiosity. But they are as much concerned in it as the members sitting on the floor of this House. Every man, every woman in the gallery this afternoon, everybody back home is concerned about tua They too have elementary conceptions of what is right in the life of a public man, and they too have made upon us demands which should never be made by the people upon their' representatives if they wanted to keep their representatives clean and straight.
I come now to the most serious argument of all and that is that the other group are just as bad. That is not an argument at all. It is good English common sense that two blacks do not make a white and the people of Canada will so decide. It is not the morality of this or that party that I am concerned about this afternoon; it is the fundamental .rottenness that has grown up from the very system that underlies them. You know the parable of the unclean spirit that went out of a man, wandered through dry places seeking rest and finding none, came back to his house and found it empty, swept and garnished, then went away and brought back seven other devils worse than himself and entered in and the last state of the man was worse than the first.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird


Thomas William Bird: Hon. gentlemen opposite are applauding me, thinking I am getting one in on my friends to the right. That is not at all the point I am making, because hon. members will observe that it was the same devil-the same devil reinforced. The same devil, not another devil, went out and brought in seven other devils worse than himself.


Mr. BURY:: Does the hon. gentleman not
recognize that the seven devils came into the so-called purged party?


Thomas William Bird: No, I do not.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: That is what it is.


Thomas William Bird: I am not so highfalutin as
to think I came into paradise when I became a member of the Progressive party. At the beginning of this session our sympathizing friends came to us and said: "You are between the devil and the deep sea." I replied, "No, that is not right. We are between two devils, two deep seas." In saying this, I am not casting any reflections upon the personnel of the parties at all-I never have.


An hon. MEMBER:: Yes you have.


Thomas William Bird: My hon. friend apparently
has the elementary ethics of the stone age. He has not yet risen to that plane of intelligence where mankind can draw a more or less fine distinction between one course and another. My hon. friend from Mackenzie gave the House some idea, according to his own light, why the Progressive party came into existence. I am sorry to say I think the hon. member has not grasped the reason why we came into existence, or the spirit in which we began this session. My hon. friend talks of co-operation. All that he knows about co-operation is to try to reap its benefits without accepting its responsibilities. There has been a lot of talk about expediency, and about the morality of expediency. What about the expediency of morality? What about the spirit of Pecksniff, which says: Let us be moral, let us contemplate the universe. You cannot be moral by saying so. You cannot be moral for political purposes. It has been said that some people's morality is in the piece, and has not yet been made up into a garment. We do not want piecemeal morality. We want a morality that goes down to the very depths of a man's personality and affects his outlook on life, not now while the government is in danger but all the time.
In dealing with the attitude of my hon. friend from Mackenzie, let me state what my conception is of why the Progressive party

came into existence, and of the ideal that it has been trying to maintain ever since; and I guarantee that nine out of every ten Progressives will accept my conception. I go back to the last election. Up to then I myself had an inveterate repugnance to cooperating with any party in this House, and I think most of my colleagues had. I think it was the results of the election that caused a change in our ultra-idealism. Back home I fought a straight fight with a Conservative -so-called. Now it might foe thought that therefore I was supported by the Liberals, but I tell the House that for two elections now I have fought my constituency and snapped my fingers at both Liberals and Conservatives. At the last election I was urged, not only by Liberals but by some of my own friends, to approach the Liberals, to be a little more agreeable to them. But without hesitation I refused tp do so, and my course has been justified by what is happening now.


Mr. MULLINS:: Was T. A. Burrows
responsible for the hon. gentleman's candidature in Nelson? He is the outstanding Liberal there?


Thomas William Bird: The hon. gentleman is trying
to make a joke.


Henry Alfred Mullins: No, I am asking a question.


Thomas William Bird: Mr. T. A. Burrows had no
more to do with my nomination than the hon. gentleman for Marquette (Mr. Mullins) had. Mr. Burrows may have supported me, but I
have never acknowledged any support I may have got from him.


An hon. MEMBER:: Very ungrateful.


Thomas William Bird: I am not ungrateful at all;
but I tell the hon. gentleman that if I had acknowledged such support and governed my course accordingly, he would have been the first to cry me down for it, he would have said, "Here is a man with strings on him." I do not say it boastfully, because I think every Conservative in my riding would agree in my declaration-I have no strings on me whatever, except my own Progressive organization, which is an organization of farmers and business men in my riding. And I want to say now ithat that is the attitude I am going to maintain.
When we found the position was such that though few in numbers we had yet the balance of power, we were astonished at our own importance. It is something difficult for ordinary human nature to withstand, to think that twenty-five of us held the balance of

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird.
power. Personally I was never very much carried away with the idea, and I have since learned that I was right. It is not a desirable position to be in. But what happened? My executive met after the election to discuss the situation. Members of that executive wanted me to enter into an agreement with one or other of the parties. This was repugnant to my notions at that time and I refused pointblank. I hope the House will pardon me for giving this history, because I think it illustrates the experience of many of us. I consulted several prominent individuals in western Canada and in eastern Canada, concerning the course that it was desirable for me to take, and for the party to take. I came down here and met fellow-members of my party, and ultimately I could see that it meant co-operation with one or other of the old parties or else a course of futility, that is, another election and perhaps still another election. So at the beginning of the session I undertook with my colleagues to support the Liberal party. Why?


An hon. MEMBER:: Old ties.


Thomas William Bird: Not at all. It is on record
that in the last election I criticized the Liberal party throughout my riding just as I did the party to my right, and on the same basis-out of my firmly established belief that the system that we have at the present moment can be productive of no good for the democracy of this country.


Mr. LUCAS:: Would the hon. member
have continued supporting that party if they had failed to live up to their promise respecting the Hudson Bay railway?


Thomas William Bird: The hon. gentleman has asked me a very pertinent question. I certainly would not have supported them if they had failed to live up to their agreement.


William Thomas Lucas: May I ask another question? Would you put in that class a member from another province who would not support the government because of their failure to give Alberta its natural resources?


Thomas William Bird: I am not attributing any
blame to the hon. gentleman, and he knows it. He knows that I have as much respect for him as I have for any other member, and I have no reflection to make upon the course that either he or any other member has taken. I want to say this, in regard to the natural resources of Alberta as in the case of any other item of the agreement of cooperation which we had with this government: I would certainly have used my influence to turn the government out if they
had ever considered going back upon their promises. I take the same attitude in regard to rural credits, the same attitude in regard to the Hudson Bay railway, the same attitude in regard to the amendments to the Grain Act, in spite of the fact that I have had communications from many people expressing doubt with respect to some of these questions. Hon. gentlemen ought to give those who entertain a different opinion the same credit for sincerity of purpose which I am prepared to accord to them. We decided as a group to support a government that we had denounced during the elections, a government that we had no more confidence in then than we have now. How is that procedure to be characterized? Was that acting from highfalutin motives? I think it was acting straightly and unabashedly from motives of political expediency; and we did it with our eyes open.


An hon. MEMBER:: That is right.


Thomas William Bird: It is right; and it was just
tou h and go that we did not make the same arrangement with our friends to the right.


An hon. MEMBER:: You are lucky, though that you did not.


Mr. LENNOX:: You would have lost your four thousand dollars.


Thomas William Bird: No, we would not have lost
it because hon. gentlemen on the floor of this House promised us they would not go to the country for two years. Two years ago our group acted from motives of expediency, and no individual more so than the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell), because expediency is stamped all over the epidermis of that gentleman. Yes, we acted from motives of expediency, and I am here to-day to defend expediency, an expediency that is open and aboveboard. We Progressives came down here to represent ourselves. We are not interested in the garbage cans of the old political parties; we are not going to waste our time nosing round their records-we are only too glad to forget that. I think I have never in all my political history laid a finger on the reputation of any old party individual although I might have done so. What is to be gained by it? It just deflects us from the ends that we have set before ourselves; and those aims are designed as exactly as we can frame them, to represent the rights and the opinions of the people who sent us here. Yes, I say it was expediency; and this is not an opportune time to reproach any of us with trifling with moral issues. Some hon. gentlemen are like one of Steele's characters, one of those ladies of exceedingly high style

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bird
and dubious morality who adorned the society of the eighteenth century, and of whom that author said, "They are outrageously virtuous." It seems to me, although I hope I am mistaken, that there has been a lot of outrageous virtue expressed in this debate, irrelevant virtue. We are all driven by necessity or expediency, and the only question is whether that expediency is of a right kind. Is it actuated by personal motives or by motives of the highest public utility? I claim that my expediency in choosing the Liberals against the Conservatives at the beginning of this session had no personal animus at all. I considered it-and I am fallible-as expediency in relation to what I deemed t-o be the good of the public of Canada.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Thomas William Bird: If the hon. gentleman will look me in the eye and repeat that remark I will answer him


Mr. GOTT:: I said oh, oh.


Thomas William Bird: That is about all the hon. gentleman ever says. I wonder if the hon. member for South Essex ever thinks of the crudity of his conduct in this House. He sits there-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Eccles James Gott: 
Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker, the minister owes it to the House to state more specifically what he means. If he means that any coercion has been exercised from this side of the House in respect of any bill before the other chamber I give it an explicit and firm denial.


Charles Avery Dunning: I will advance the
reasons for my language. Is it not well known to every member of the House that by parliamentary devices, under the rules, it is possible to adjourn consideration of a particular matter; and is it not well known to eveiy member of the House that the Conservative majority in the other chamber has adjourned consideration of a particular matter for a very considerable time?


Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker-


Charles Avery Dunning: I am willing to be inter: upted on a point of order, but not otherwise.	.


Arthur Meighen: I am speaking to a point of order. It is inconceivable that any member of this House should deem it his right to refer to the conduct of the upper house or of any committee of the upper house, especially when tihat house is sitting. It is still more inconceivable that a member of the government should do so and should be allowed to proceed.


Charles Avery Dunning: I referred not to the
upper house as such, not to any Committee of the upper house as such, but to the Conservative majority in that upper house, a Conservative majority which no more than one year ago was asked by my right hon. friend to co-operate more fully with the party in this House.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker, I take the first point of order and ask for a decision.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Arthur Meighen: I do not think we are going to be overawed by noise.


Hewitt Bostock: Under rule 19:
No member shall apeak disrespectfully of His Majesty, nor of any of the Royal Family; nor of the governor or person administering the government of Canada; nor use offensive words against either House, or against any member thereof; nor speak beside the question in debate. No member may reflect upon any vote of the House, except for the purpose of moving that suoh vote be rescinded.
I call the hon. gentleman's attention to those words:
-nor use offensive words against either House, or against any member thereof; nor speak beside the question in debate.
Bourinot, at page 357, states that it is the well known practice that no reference shall be made in this House to what takes place in the other House. I take it that the point of order is well taken. If one refers to the debates of the other House or characterizes the actions of any member or group of members of that House, he is infringing the rule.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Speaker, I shall, of course, be happy to obey your ruling. I may be permitted however to ask this question-


Arthur Meighen: The only obedience to t'he rule is to withdraw the remarks objected to.


Hewitt Bostock: There were no offensive words used, but the references of the hon. gentleman to the debates or action that was taken in the Senate were against the rule, and I have ruled them out of order.


Lucien Cannon: If I may be allowed, Mr. Speaker, for the future guidance of the members, is it not a fact that the rule should be interpreted as follows:	That members
should not refer to anything which has taken place or is taking place in another place, the Senate, during that session, so that we shall not interfere with the proceedings in the other House. But surely we can make a reference to what has taken place there in a former session.


Hewitt Bostock: I gathered from the remarks made by the hon. Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) that he was referring to the action of the Senate or a group of senators during the present session. It is better to live up to the rule I have just cited.


Charles Avery Dunning: I shall do my utmost to do so, Mr. Speaker. I think, however, it is within the rules for me to ask if it is right and in accordance with the independence of this parliament for action in another place to have a bearing upon the votes of hon. members of this House as to the innocence or guilt of the Minister of Customs. Surely that is in order, Sir, and I may add to it the well known fact that Conservative senators and Conservative members of the House of Commons meet in caucus together to concert tbeir plans.


Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker, I rise
to a question of privilege. I cannot express my amazement at the conduct of the min-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning
ister. I want to give the most explicit denial to any concerting of plans whatever, near or remote, of any character or of any kind. The hon. member's remarks are unworthy of a member of this House.


Charles Avery Dunning: I am content to let the facts speak for themselves.


Arthur Meighen: Hear, hear.


Charles Avery Dunning: They are sufficiently
known to members of this House, regardless of what my right hon. friend may say.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: I wanted to make a few remarks, Mr. Speaker, with reference to the address of my hon. friend from Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell). I am sorry he is not in his seat. I advised him that I intended to make some reference to his remarks, and I must therefore proceed in his absence. I understood the hon. gentleman to say that if this government and this parliament followed the practice of the Scott government in Saskatchewan, when certain of its ministers and others were thrown under suspicion, he would support such action and support the government in so doing. Now I want, if I can, to get my hon. friend's support for the amendment to the amendment upon the basis of his own professions, because the action taken in that case-both myself and the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) have reason to be very familiar with it, because we were there at the time-that action was what? Investigation by a parliamentary committee, a committee of the legislature, and upon that committee reporting its findings, there was a decision made by the government and the House to appoint royal commissions to investigate further those matters which the committees themselves were unable to go into. If my hon. friend from Mackenzie is honest and sincere, and I believe he is, in saying that he supported the action of the Scott government at that time because of that procedure, how then can he justify a vote against the amendment to the amendment moved by my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth)? I can put on Hansard, if it is necessary, the proof of my statements from the journals of the Saskatchewan assembly.
Here is the report in the Saskatchewan journals concerning the personnel of the three royal commissions that were appointed:
The first for the purpose of inquiry into all contracts and other works under the control of the highways commission, to consist of ex-Chief Justice Wet-more and Messrs. Mason and Smith.

The second for the purpose of inquiry onto the charges of bribery against certain members of the assembly, to consist of Messrs. Justices Brown and El wood, and
The third for the purpose of inquiry into the charges concerning the erection of certain public buildings, to consist of Sir Frederick Haultain, Chief Justice of Saskatchewan. and Messrs. Justices Newlands and Lamont.
I would point out further that a former leader of the opposition was asked by the Saskatchewan government to take the chairmanship of the committee of inquiry into its own actions.
With regard to the matter mentioned by my hon. friend from Mackenzie in connection with which he characterized the Minister of Customs as a criminal, and refused, when asked by myself, to withdraw the word in relation to the act of the Minister of Customs, what was that act? After all the arguments that we have heard in this House during the last two days, what was that act? __ Was it not in fact the withholding of a warrant of commitment to gaol at the request of a member of the House? My hon. friend from Mackenzie condemns the Minister of Customs, and used the word "criminal" in relation to that action, when he well knows that within the last two months he has requested action of that same Minister of Customs that would have exactly the same effect-the withholding of a warrant of commitment to gaol.


William Richard Motherwell: That is putting them over the plate.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend wrote, as he had a perfect right to do, to the Minister of Customs-this file has been supplied to me by the Minister of Customs as an evidence of what has been pointed out right along, that this is a common and usual practice in the department-and he asked for what? The leader of the opposition was very careful to say when the Solicitor General (Mr. Cannon) attempted to introduce argument of this kind: Oh, you cannot go outside of the evidence which came before the committee. There is a good reason for that, and my right hon. friend well knows it. In this particular case a constituent of my hon. friend from Mackenzie gets into trouble for making home brew, and if there is any offence that I know of that is worse than smuggling, it is the making and selling of that vile stuff known as home brew. A fine was imposed, with imprisonment as an alternative to payment-imprisonment, of course, if the fine was not paid. My hon. friend from Mackenzie writes to the minister, as he has a perfect right to do, to point out to the Minister of Customs or the Minister of Justice that this man cannot pay the fine,

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning
and he thought he ought not to be sent to gaol, but ought to be given till the fall to pay his fine. There is only one way for the Minister of Customs to accede to that request, and that is to withhold the warrant of commitment. My non. friend shakes his head.


Arthur Meighen: Certainly; all the difference in the world.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Charles Avery Dunning: My right hon. friend
has made his speech. Let me make mine. I have the floor.


Arthur Meighen: The hon gentleman is
very brave.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Charles Avery Dunning: If my right hon. friend
desires to ask a question, all right, but if he wishes to rise to make a statement, no.


Arthur Meighen: I only wish to inform
the hon. member-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Charles Avery Dunning: Does the right hon.
member desire to put a question?


Arthur Meighen: I rose to ask a question,
but I do not propose to be treated discourteously by the hon. member again.


Charles Avery Dunning: I had no intention of
treating my right hon. friend discourteously, and I should think he should be the last man in this House to complain of discourteous treatment. I hold in my hand a letter which proves, if anything can be made to prove, the practice of the department in this regard. This letter is written by a man who has been spoken of in the highest terms by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre, Mr. Taylor, Assistant Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise and relates to a case that was evidently dealt with as a matter of course. This is a memorandum addressed to the chief of the customs and excise preventive service as *a result of the representations made by my hon. friend from Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell) and reads:
It appears desirable that warrant of commitment be [DOT]not executed against him at the present time in view of the fact that he is a farmer and the seeding season is at hand.
An hon MEMBER: He would be a great help in an election!


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order, order.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend appears
to have some doubts as to the bona fides of this matter. I shall be very pleased to read the letter of the hon. member for 14011-319
Mackenzie, and in reading it I want to repeat now what I said a few moments ago that he was perfectly within his rights in writing it, and that the action taken as a result of the letter was a perfectly proper one. It had the result of carrying out my hon. friend's request, the withholding of the warrant of commitment against a man found guilty of an act similar to the act for which my hon. friend from Mackenzie condemns the Minister of Customs in terms such as "criminal."


Milton Neil Campbell: I did not use the word
"criminal" as applied to the Minister of Customs at all, and I think the Minister of Railways should retract that statement.


Charles Avery Dunning: I endeavoured to give
my hon. friend an opportunity to take back the word "criminal."


An hon. MEMBER:: He took it back.


Charles Avery Dunning: He did not take it back. If he takes it back now, I shall be happy to accept the retraction.


Milton Neil Campbell: I will say quite frankly
that the use of the word "criminal" was too strong. I should have used the word "offender." The minister had no right to make the statement he did make, because I made no direct reference to the Minister of Customs.


Charles Avery Dunning: The hon. member takes
it back, and that is quite sufficient for my purpose. This letter is addressed to the Minister of Justice, dated April 11, 1926, written by the hon. member for Mackenzie, and reads:
I understand that some time ago Mr. John J. Cher-nankoff of Peily, Sask.-
This is not the only peculiar name in the Dominion of Canada. There are others which sound strange to English ears, but they may be very decent people, whether their names are Chernankoff or Aziz.


Mr. RYCKMAN:: Did my hon. friend
say that letter was addressed to the Minister of Justice?


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: And not the Minister
of Customs.


Charles Avery Dunning: I can deal with that
feature later. The letter was addressed to the Minister of Justice, and because it related to a customs offence, it was, as the file later reveals transferred to the Minister of Customs to deal with, because it involves the matter of withholding a warrant of commitment. I should have said it was trans-



REYISKI) EDITION

[Stage Direction]
5032	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning
ferred to the deputy minister. It did not even go to the Minister of Customs, and this is a practice that has occurred in dozens if not hundreds of similar cases throughout the country. I will read the letter:
I understand that some time ago Mr. John J. Cher-nankoff of Pelly, iSask., was fined $200 the charge being the making of home brew. I may say -that Mr. Cher-nankoff has paid $50 on this account and is not at the present time able to meet the balance.
As the seeding season is approaching it would be a very serious matter for his family if this man were obliged to go to jail and I believe it would serve the ends of justice if you could extend the time of payment of the balance of this amount sufficiently to enable him to meet it, as it is impossible for him to raise this money a-t the present time. I am given to understand by people who know this man- thoroughly that he has never made this stuff for sale.
How often have I had that plea presented to me. The letter continues:
Under the regulations, had he known so, he could have notified the Minister of Customs that he was making home brew for has own use, in which case he would not have been guilty of an offence against the law.
I do not know where my hon. friend gets his law for that. But that is what he says.
Some hon. MEMBERS:: That is right.


Charles Avery Dunning: The letter continues:
I think -this might well be taken into consideration when his case is dealt with.
Then there is an acknowledgment sent to Mr. M. N. Campbell by the Minister of Justice. Mr. Campbell's letter is written on the paper of the House of Commons. Surely it is quite clear that my hon. friend does not deny writing the letter. I do not question for a moment his right to write the letter.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I think it is onlj fair to the hon. member for Mackenzie to point out that he is not putting that request on the basis of any service rendered to him in the constituency.


Charles Avery Dunning: No, Mr. Speaker, but
are we to say that because one man is foolish enough to put in a letter the statement that this is a political friend, as the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Robichaud) did, that he is to be condemned and that the ministry is to be condemned for it and on the other hand a member who is clever enough to know that it is not the proper thing to put in a letter and who simply leaves the minister to read between the lines is to get off scot free? None of us can be so incredulous. I do not want to labour the point, but hon. members will understand that men who have served as ministers of the crown at least will realize that while it is decidedly improper to urge

political consideration regarding matters relating to one's constituents, is there a man in this House who will say that a letter from a friend, political or personal, with regard to a particular matter does not receive consideration outside of the borders of its literal contents, and to some extent in deference to the relationship which exists personally or politically between the writer of the letter and the recipient of it? That is common sense.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Does the minister infer that
the hon. member for Mackenzie had that motive or intention when he wrote that letter? The minister is reading it between the lines and wanting the House to read it between the lines.


Charles Avery Dunning: I was merely replying to a question addressed to me in that regard.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: And the minister's reply
implied that.


Charles Avery Dunning: I am not drawing any inference with respect to that letter; I am making a statement which is within the knowledge of every hon. gentleman facing me. When letters are written it is not necessary to state, in the terms stated by Eon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Robichaud), that this man is a supporter and so on, to get consideration from a personal or political friend. Let us take the case of the hon. member for Simcoe (Mr. Boys). There was no political friend-Aip, but the evidence indicates that there was considerable personal friendship, which I have no doubt exists still and which is no discredit to my hon. friend. He writes a letter. It would have been foolish for him to put into that letter:	Please do so-and-so because this
man will help me politically. It would not have been good sense for my hon. friend to do that. But my hon. friend did urge every consideration he was capable of urging; he did take the fullest advantage, proper advantage possibly, of his friendship for the Minister of Customs, and certainly the man concerned-Daivey Waisberg was it not?- received generous treatment. What a Godsend it is that the hon. member is not a Liberal member. If he had been, how the welkin would have rung from the other side with reference to the correspondence and his action!
To pursue the matter of the member for Mackenzie a little further, the Minister of Justice transmitted the letter to the chief of the Remission branch and he in turn transmitted it to the Department of Customs because it was a matter with which the Depart-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning
merit of Customs had to deal, the withholding of a warrant of commitment for more months of time in order to enable Jolhn J. Chemankoff to pay the fine. According to my understanding of the file he had to go to gaol for seven months if he did not pay the fine. The hon. member for Mackenzie, very properly I have no doubt, from (his knowledge of the man and his case urged that the minister should extend the time. There was one way of doing it and that was to withhold the warrant of commitment until the fall. If the man atr that time did not pay the fine, he would go to gaol. May I point out that that was exactly the thing which the Minister of Customs requested to know from his deputy on that famous day when he first came into the office, namely, whether he had power to withhold a warrant of commitment? This is a letter-


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Read the whole file.


Charles Avery Dunning: I will read the whole file, although it will take time to put it on Hansard. I want again to emphasize that I am not condemning the hon. member for Mackenzie with regard to this matter, but this Shows the practice and the injustice of my hon. friend's attitude this afternoon towards the Minister of Customs.


Mr. MARCIL:: Did the man go to gaol or is he still at large?
(Mr. DUNNING:	He is still out.


Milton Neil Campbell: I again rise to a question of privilege. I want to point out to the Minister of Railways-it seems impossible to make him understand it-that I dealt very tolerantly with the Minister of Customs.


An hon. MEMBER:: That is not a question of privilege.


Milton Neil Campbell: If the charges against the Minister of Customs were the only sins of which the government were guilty I would be quite prepared to vote confidence in the government.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend indicated very plainly that he was prepared to vote for a resolution which would have t'he effect of driving the Minister of Customs out of public life. That is how tolerantly he dealt with him.
This is the letter of transmission from the chief of the Remission branch to the deputy HOll-3191
minister of the Department of Customs and Excise under date of April 17, 1926:
Dear Sir:
In further reference to the case of John Chemankoff,
I herewith return your file No. 130028, which you were kind enough to forward to this department for consideration. I thank you for your courtesy herein.
I now forward you copy of a letter from Mr. M. N. Campbell to the Hon. the Minister of Justice, and would draw your attention particularly to the second paragraph of the same. As Mir. Campbell is asking that the time for payment of the balance of the fine imposed be granted the defendant, and as this is a matter rather for your department than this-
For Customs, rather than for Justice.
-I submit iit to you for such consideration and action as you think advisable in the premises.
Then Mr. Taylor, a man of whom the hon. member for Vancouver Centre spoke so highly, writes this letter in reply. I am saying: nothing against Mr. Taylor; I am merely pointing out that this business of keeping: men out of gaol after they have been sentenced is in various ways a fairly common practice in this department or letters of this kind could not have been written. This is a letter written by Mr. Taylor,	Assistant
Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise, to Mr. M. F. Gallagher, chief of Remission branch, Department of Justice under date of April 22, 1926:
Sir,-Replying to your letter of April 17, (File 18052),
I am enclosing herewith copy of a letter addressed to the chief preventive officer, from which you will observe that the department has agreed to extend the due date for payment of the balance of this man's fine until October 10, proximo.
I venture to say that the Minister of Customs never saw that; that it was handled as a routine matter in the department. What does this letter contain? This is a letter addressed 'by Mr. Taylor to Mr. Wilson, chief of the Customs and Excise preventive service. Ottawa, under date of April 22, 1926: Sir:
Re. P.S. Excise Seizure No. 6548,
John Chemankoff, PeJdy, Sask.
The department is advised that the above offender has paid fifty dollars on account and is unable at the present time to pay the balance. It appears desirable that warrant of commitment be not executed against [DOT]him at the present time in view of the fact that he is a farmer and that the seeding season is at hand.
In the circumstances I would state that, provided the justices of the peace are willing, the department will raise no objection to the balance of the fine and costs being allowed to stand until October 10, proximo. If not promptly paid by that date the department should be advised.
But even on October 10 apparently he would not go to gaol until the department was advised. The discretion would still continue.
5034	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning


William Lyon Mackenzie King: By whom is that signed?


Charles Avery Dunning: By Mr. George W. Taylor, Assistant Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise, and it is apparently in conformity with the general practice of the department. All of this correspondence took place while the committee was sitting, while the Moses Aziz case and all those other cases to which reference has been made, were before the committee. The final letter on the file is from Mr. M. F. Gallagher chief of Remission branch of the Department of Justice, to Mr. Campbell:
Dear Sir:
With further reference to your letter of the 9th instant >to the Honourable the Minister of Justice with iregard to John J. Chemankoff, recently convicted for :a breach of the Inland Revenue Act, I beg to advise you that this case was at the time referred to the Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise who now informs me that instructions have been issued to extend the due date for payment of the balance of the fine imposed in this case until the 10th o*f October proximo.
And the man will not go to gaol until the 10th October.
I would call attention to the fact that I am asking for the support of the hon. member for Mackenzie on the basis of his own professions in the matter of the Scott government to which I referred this afternoon before the hon. member came back to his seat. The additional point I am now endeavouring to make is this: the language used by Mr. Gallagher, the chief of the Remission branch of the Department of Justice, in the letter signed by Mr. Gallagher which I have just read, was exactly the language contained in the letter on file in the Aziz case from the same Mr. Gallagher-exactly the same. There are other cases I could quote in which members of this House asked for consideration and wound up with the request not that this case be given consideration because the man was a political friend, but saying very properly at the end, "I make no recommendation as to what shall be done." Enclosed with a letter of that kind is a letter from one pleading on behalf of the individual concerned and winding up with the statement " This man is a political supporter of yours." The member making the recommendation did nothing wrong. I am not saying there was anything wrong at all; he made no recommendation in the case, he merely transmitted a letter to the government and said- not only for self-protection but because he did not know enough of the facts-"I make no recommendation in this case." That is the proper kind of a letter to write to a department or a minister when a member is 
transmitting information of that kind. But you see, Mr. Speaker, how difficult it is for any man who represents the people to deal with matters of this kind, particularly if he happens to be a Liberal, without subjecting himself to all kinds of accusations. Oh! I can imagine what would have been said by hon. gentlemen opposite in connection with the Daivey Waisberg case if the hon. member for North Simcoe (Mr. Boys) had only been a Liberal. We have no doubt at all what they would have said then.
What are we asked to do after all in this matter? This House is asked not only to condemn and drive out of public life the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin)-


An hon. MEMBER:: Hear, hear.


Charles Avery Dunning: Somebody says "hear,
hear"-"As ye judge so may ye be judged."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Charles Avery Dunning: Among the jury are
men who should, for very conscience's sake, hesitate to cast a vote condemning as a political outcast the Minister of Customs for the offence with which he has been charged, the offence in question, stated at its worst, being that of being too lenient, as was within his discretion, with respect to a man whc should have been and now is in gaol. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) made, I think, a very strong point when he asked if this House should displace this government because one of its ministers exercised too great leniency and put in its place a government the head of which would be the man who sent that telegram to Winnipeg which was quoted by my hon. friend and which had for its effect the approval of putting men in jail illegally. The gentleman in question stated his own doubts of the legality of the proceedings but said:	Put them in jail and deport them as
quickly as you can, and if there is anything wrong about the proceedings we will consider ratification later. I submit, Sir, that from the point of view of the public good the minister who is even rightfully accused of being too lenient is not so great a danger politically in Canada as the man who would sign such a message implying such an awful invasion of the liberties of the subject in this Dominion. And then we are asked, Sir, to vote out this government and to put in another government from across the way, remembering as we all must remember, that the reason why smuggling is profitable is because there is a customs tariff which is high enough to enable those breaking it to make money, and to be able to afford the taking

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Dunning
of the risk involved. We are asked to put in a government a cardinal point of whose policy would be the increasing of the premium on smuggling.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend surely
understands that the reason smugglers make money is because there is a customs tariff, and by smuggling they are enabled to put that tariff into their own pockets. That is why smuggling exists, and everyone knows that if you increase the premium it will constitute an ever-increasing attraction for the law breakers, who are inclined to enter that business. And so we are asked to turn out this government and put in another one which will say through its policies to all the smugglers in the country: We will increase the profits of your business. That is the position exactly.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Would the same argument apply equally to the excise duty and the sales tax?


Charles Avery Dunning: Of course there is a difference.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Charles Avery Dunning: I was speaking of smuggling, which means the bringing in of goods from a foreign country without the payment of a customs duty. Will my hon. friend argue for a moment that increasing a customs duty will not increase the premium to the smuggler if he is successful in getting his goods in?


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend did not quite catch my question. I am speaking quite seriously. I say smuggling is an evasion of the customs law. Now I ask will the same argument apply to the evasion of the excise duty and the sales tax which is involved in our report just as much as smuggling is?


Charles Avery Dunning: That is one of the
reasons why we reduced some of the excise taxes. We decided to reduce the premium on law breaking.


Mr. BELL (Hamilton):: We want to get an honest government.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend says he wants to get an honest government. I have always said that honesty was not the peculiar prerogative of any political party, least of %11 the political party which has within its _inks-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Charles Avery Dunning: Yes, hon. gentlemen
would like to drown my voice. I was going on to say this-least of all the political party which has in its ranks at this moment men who, while their country was engaged in war, grafted out of the public purse.


Mr. CLARK:: What did you do in the war?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Stand up.


John Arthur Clark: All right, I will stand up. What did any one of you do?


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Speaker,-


Hewitt Bostock: Order. Let me pour a little oil on the troubled waters. I must remind hon. members that this is a debate.


Arthur Meighen: It was.


Charles Avery Dunning: It is very strange, Mr. Speaker, that my right hon. friend the leader of the opposition can on all occasions stand up and pour his vitriol over this House while we sit and listen, but when anyone on this side stands up and hands him back some of his own medicine there is an uproar from our friends opposite.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: You plume yourself overmuch.


Charles Avery Dunning: My hon. friend from Burrard asked what I did in the war.


An hon. MEMBER:: Or any one of you.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: I would refer my hon. friend to his leader; I do not discuss those matters.


An hon. MEMBER:: Then why did you bring it in?


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Speaker, I have done. I started by arraigning this court which is trying this matter. This whole proceeding, Sir, is an indication of the unfitness of this body to act as a court in the trial of an individual who is a member of it. That is why in the evolution-


Mr. SUTHERLAND (South Oxford):: Speak for yourself.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Lucien Cannon: Get some Australian butter.


Hewitt Bostock: Order.


Charles Avery Dunning: That is why, Mr. Speaker, many years ago parliament tried, or purported to try, many offences which do not now come
503G

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
before parliament-there are many instances- because it was found better to transfer such cases to a judicial tribunal, which I submit this body never can be with respect to a matter of this kind. When I say so I am saying no more against my hon. friend from South Oxford than against myself. I say that he and I, in connection with a matter of this kind, are influenced not only by the facts of the case but by political considerations. Yes, all of us are so influenced. Perhaps I should except some hon. members in the far corner who describe themselves as jurymen in this case. I will not pursue that suggestion for it would lead to endless debate. But J do urge, Sir, that it is possible as a result of the amendment moved by my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre to take this matter out of the atmosphere of political partisanship with which we are all surrounded, and to have it examined in the cold, independent atmosphere of a judicial tribunal.


Milton Neil Campbell: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a question of privilege. I think it is unnecessary for me to apologize to this House or to my constituents for my action in connection with the case related by the Minister of Railways, The very fact that the Minister of Justice acceded to my request proves I was right.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order. The Minister of Justice did not accede to my hon. friend's request. The Minister of Customs, or the Department of Customs, did exactly as in the Aziz case.


An hon. MEMBER:: That is not correct. Mr. CAMPBELL: Mr. Speaker-


Hewitt Bostock: Order. Let the hon. gentleman state his question of privilege. He is not allowed to make another speech.
^r' CAMPBELL: I think I have a right to explain my purpose.
An hon. MiEMBER: No.


An hon. MEMBER:: Sit down.
_ Mr. SPEAKER: Order. He has that right if a question of iprivillege is involved, but I do not see any. The hon. gentleman is answering the hon. Minister of Railways.


Milton Neil Campbell: In this particular case, Sir, I might say-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Hewitt Bostock: Order. I do not consider the fact of an hon. member writing a letter asking what the hon. gentleman is said to have asked constitutes a question of privilege. It happens every day. I do it myself. IMr. Dunning.]


Mr. HENRI BOURASSA (Labelle):: Mr. Speaker, I should like, if possible, to introduce into this debate, in as few words as I can make use of, the so-called judicial spirit which we are supposed to have in order to pass judgment in this case. Not being a lawyer, and therefore having no chance of becoming a judge one of these days, perhaps I can afford to make use, now, of some of that legal spirit in discussing this matter. It seems to me that some of the numerous lawyers who have been pleading for the adoption either of the amendment or of the report have not contributed much, in the last few days, to convince us that this parliament has really been transformed into a court of justice. I entirely agree with the closing words of the Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning): it has been made quite clear that this House is not in a mood to pass cool and impartial judgment upon the matters referred to it by the Customs committee.
May I suggest something more, Mr. Speaker? By the very nature of things, it was unreasonable to expect that this matter could be dealt with, not only in this House but likewise in the committee to which it was referred, without any political considerations. I have followed this debate pretty closely- as much as I could stand of it,-I have read a good deal of the evidence brought before the committee. It seems to me that we should, first, make a division of matters. First, we should consider tne matters that are strictly before the House as a result of the report of the committee, and thereupon consider the three motions that we have to deal with-the motion to concur in the report of the committee, the amendment of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr Stevens) and the subamendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth) .
Then, there is something else. I do not want to be offensive; but there is what I would call influence brought to bear upon this debate and upon all questions of this nature by public opinion outside that has become very nervous every time some question of liquor smuggling arises. That public opinion is not always exactly judicial; and when expressed by speeches and votes in this House: it very often comes near to what I would call hypocrisy, if the term were parliamentary. I learn from members on all sides of the House that it has become almost impossible to deal with liquor control or smuggling without raising such prejudices as tend to warp one's judgment. Thirdly, we have to consider the broad political issue; and here, I join hands with

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre in his statement, that this whole matter demonstrates once more the absurdity of a system under which, first of all, committees of this House-composed of members designated by political parties whose main object is either to keep or to attain power- cannot divest themselves of those considerations, and secondly, that when the matter is brought before the House there is no choice other than to vote for either this motion or that motion, and thereby bring about a change of government. This situation should be brought home to the thinking men, both in and out of parliament, as frequently as possible, to show the imperative necessity of modifying the habits of our parliament in this respect. It stands in contrast with the wisdom of this same parliament in connection with matters of electoral contests, for example, when it divested itself of the power of passing judgment upon these matters, in order to leave them to impartial tribunals.
The question at issue in this debate should have been brought before a judicial commission at the start; the whole inquiry should have been conducted by such a commission. For my part, I say quite frankly and openly that I do not feel prepared to pass judgment, in an impartial manner, upon the matters referred to in this report. I will not take advantage of the compliment paid to a few members at this end of the House by the .Minister of Railways; I will not say that I feel more virtuous or more disinterested than any Conservative or Liberal member; I only say that there is not here the same consideration of party which may animate the Conservatives or the Liberals. But I cannot dissociate this question from the political consequences which will follow the vote. In justice to my constituents, in justice to the people who believe in me in my own province, and even outside of that province, I cannot consider this sole issue of whether or not the Minister of Customs was right in the Aziz case or any other case. I cannot dissociate these "great" issues, now before the parliament and the people of Canada, from those "minor" considerations which the right hon. leader of the opposition says are not worth mention in this House-matters of war and peace, matters of foreign relations, questions up6n which the decision taken by the House to-day may mean, in five or ten years, the loss of 50,000 lives. Of course, that is a trifling matter for the right hon. leader of the opposition. It is "time-killing" to think of the future of our country; it is "time-killing" to talk about the foreign affairs
of this country, or to talk of great constitutional principles. But if you can find one little fault in this man-if he is a Liberal and you are a Conservative-if you can catch this minister at fault and in so catching him gain power, here is a great constitutional issue 1
I do not blame hon. gentlemen opposite for doing a few of these things. But is this what the great Conservative party has come to? It may be that it will give them power,
I do not mind; whether they are in power and the Liberals in opposition is not mv main concern. Likewise, the fact of one Liberal minister or two or three Liberal or Conservative members having committed errors of judgment in order to serve some political ends, would not appear to me as sufficient to bring about a political crisis and make a change of government without considering what the effect would be on the whole legislation of the country, on all the principles of government and administration. On this point I entirely agree with the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre: it is absurd for this House to pretend to transform itself into a tribunal of adjudication, when every time judgment has to be passed that judgment will be influenced by political or party considerations, rather than by considerations of justice. The time will surely come when it will be possible to vote for or against a certain action taken by one minister, or for or against certain pieces of legislation, without being forced to say: "This means a c.hange of government." Even in the great Mother of Parliaments, of which we hear so often from members who like to quote British precedents when they suit their views and purposes, where the principle of ministerial responsibility is the basis of the system, they have been forced by circumstances to come to the conclusion that many questions which here, with our old views and narrow spirit, we consider questions of confidence, are not such questions at all. Ministers are censured, government motions are defeated, but the government is not called upon to go out of office. The result is that they can deal in a much broader and more effective manner with the many problems confronting the government than we in Canada can do, because of that old inherited habit of fifty years ago which says that upon every question which may crop up, or almost every one, we must vote the government down or keep them in office.
With regard to the various questions mentioned or raised in the report, I shall not dwell upon them at length. I do not think we are

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
in a position to pass judgment upon the various matters brought before the committee. We are not in a position to say that the findings of that committee, with regard either to individuals or to administrative methods, are necessarily just and right. In the report itself, what do I read: "The matters referred to have not been completely reviewed" and "to a degree, therefore, this report is incomplete and suggestive rather than final." So it is upon an incomplete report from a committee, tlhe members of which declare that they hlave not been able to review the whole question, that we are called' upon- to pass judgment; to put out of public life this man or that man ; to blame or excuse this one or that one, to endorse either the recommendations made by the committee or the suggestions contained in the amendments also before us. We must decide all this in half a week, after a hurried debate in which I failed to see on either side the disposition or the will to remedy the real evils that have been disclosed before that committee. The one single dominating thought is:	Which party will carry the
vote?
Let us be true to ourselves. For my part, I am not capable of voting upon this matter without coming back to the position in which I found myself, five or six times, during this session.


Mir. MANION:: Are not the recommendations of the committee designed to remedy conditions?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I will deal with that.
Rather than throw down this government and bring into power the other party, whose policy I do not approve, and approve still less after the six months session we have had than I did at the beginning-I am bound to give my vote dominated by that thought, which has nothing to do with the administration of the Customs department, and has nothing to do with the moral guilt or innocence of the Minister of Customs or any of' the other officers named in that report. This is absurd; and, for that reason, I am entirely in agreement with the first part of the subamendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, that this inquiry should be turned over to a judicial commission, which would cover the whole ground and come back with a report. Then, at last, of course, we would have to take some action; but it would be action preceded and directed by the findings of an impartial body, safer and much better preserved from political interference than the committee was. In this respect, again, let us be frank.

I heard a large part of the very able speech delivered by the hon. member for Vancouver North (Mr. Donaghy). It was, I think, the most complete analysis of the report; but he used one sentence which made me shrug my shoulders. He said, in effect:	If we
had delved into the years gone by we could have opposed to the findings with respect to the administration of the last four years, some acts of maladministration on the part of the opposition, dating back ten or twelve years, and in that way we could have put the opposite party in an equally bad position. I say boldly that the committee did wrong in not doing that. Either of two things: Either that committee was a political body working for the benefit of one party or the other, or it was a judicial body looking for real reforms in the administration of the Customs department. If it was a political body, the Liberal members on that committee were foolish to leave the matter entirely in the hands of their opponents. If it was a judicial body, and if they wanted to gain the confidence of the people of Canada in their findings, they had to show up every misdemeanour of all governments for the last ten years; and that would have made things equal as between the two parties. From the highest point of view, the government had no right to allow the members of the opposition to make of this inquiry a political propaganda duel.


Mr. NICHOLSON:: They could not help
themselves. The government members could not produce any other evidence.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I think they could have.


George Brecken Nicholson: Why didn't they do it?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I think they were foolish in that respect; they were very weak. The whole documentary evidence was prepared by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre in conjunction-perhaps I should not say that, for I do not know their relations-with that so-called Commercial Protective Association of Montreal. It was not the business of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre to dig up everything that could go out against his own party; just, as the right hon. leader of the opposition said yesterday, it was not for the Conservative members of that committee to call upon the Hon. Jacques Bureau to come and give evidence.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I think the hon. member desires to be fair. If he will permit me, the original request was for a committee to survey recent years; I think I named, originally, the last four or five years. Then another motion was suggested by the minister, which

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
was accepted by my right hon. leader and everyone on this side, that the committee should go back with their inquiries as far as they liked. So it was open to the committee.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Precisely, but they confined their inquiries to the last five years, and did not go beyond that.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Is the hon. member aware of the fact that inquiries into matters dating beyond the last two, three, four and five years were invited by the members of that committee?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: That proves again that the Conservative members on the committee did not find their match in the Liberal members of the committee. The Liberals were far too anxious to prove that they were not acting from political motives.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Or they were asleep.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Perhaps; I do not know what the cause was; I am simply stating the fact as it is. But, after all, this is only what I would call the least important point. The more important point is this, and I ask every hon. member to ponder on what I am going to say now. Being given those facts, you will not get a consensus of the moral opinion of this country at the back of the vote that will be given to-night one way or the other. Why? Because the force of circumstances has turned this matter into a political bone of contention; and if there is an election upon this question, the Conservatives will go around the country to demonstrate that the Liberals are rotten, that they have brought the Department of Customs to such a state of corruption that they cannot be trusted with office; and the Liberals will reply with equally true things, which, however, they will have to take from the past records of the Conservative governments,-and they will find plenty of them. The result will be that you will have a mud-slinging election of the first order, or of the last order, with one-half-


Leslie Gordon Bell: Will the hon.
gentleman specify those things which he says they will find plenty of?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Yes, I would take the whole war administration. I would take all those facts upon which Sir Andrew MacPhail has reported in his very interesting book dealing, for instance, with the manner in which the unionist government organized that comedy-I cannot use the word, because the results were so abominable-that orgy of peculation and exploitation of patriotism for the basest objects, and which cost the lives of so many Canadians.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Will the hon.
member point to that "plenty of things" in the evidence that was taken before the Customs committee, and not simply in any book.by Sir Andrew MacPhail?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: The hon. gentleman,
who has a very keen mind, and who is a very intelligent and courteous member of this House, must remember that I have just stated that one of the faults of the Liberal members of the committee was precisely to have put themselves in the position where the whole evidence that was given in that committee conncerned a Liberal administration; they made little or no effort to pierce to the bottom of things and show what had been done under past Conservative administrations.


Leslie Gordon Bell: That does not
answer my question.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Yes, it does. I say that if the Conservative party, as they evidently wish to do, are going to carry on a mud-slinging campaign against their opponents, using the findings and evidence of this committee, their opponents, having let themselves be put in this position, will refer back to some other scandals; and you
5 p.m. will have the people of Canada listening for months to that kind of accusations, right and left, and having to choose between the two, and they will say, as they very often have to do now: Let us try to find out which is the less crooked of the two. That is a great danger to the moral and political stability of the country, and to a large extent it is unjust to both parties.


Robert James Manion: The hon. gentleman has just made a general statement about the bad administration of the government during the war. Would he mind telling us, for the information of the House, of any charges that have been made against the government that was handling the affairs of this country during the war?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: You have only to read the pages in which Sir Andrew MacPhail describes, for instance, the organization of Valcartier camp, the thirst of the late Minister of Militia to send as many men as possible to the other side without proper equipment, without proper weapons, so that the Canadian soldiers threw their guns into the ditches rather than make use of them, because they were more dangerous to themselves than to the enemy. Guns were forced upon the department by the minister of the previous
5040	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
Liberal government, Sir Frederick Borden, then by Sir Sam Hughes, who were both hand in hand-I mean in a very friendly sense-with Sir Charles Ross; and this entailed a cost of millions of dollars to the government of Canada and resulted in the loss of the lives of hundreds of Canadian soldiers. It was improper to use these guns in that warfare, but they had been forced upon the soldiers.


Robert James Manion: Is the hon. member not aware that Sir Andrew MacPhail was an AJD.M.S.-I saw him there myself-and would not know anything about the cases of the soldiers dying in the front lines?


An hon. MEMBER:: You were a Liberal then.


Robert James Manion: That has nothing to do with it.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: The Ross rifle was so well known to everybody connected with the militia that my hon. friend would surely not ask me to bring evidence to substantiate my statement. He has only to interview the officers and soldiers who were engaged in the war and he will ascertain the truth. The unanimous finding was to the effect that the government were obliged to destroy every one of those discarded guns because they were unfit to use. Those guns were put into the service to please the friends of the former Minister of Militia.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Will my hon. friend inform this House what on earth the charges against the Ross rifle have to do with the charges now levelled against the Department of Customs for corruption in office?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I would not have brought up the matter at all, if it were not for the question put by the hon. member. I was making the point that the first error had been committed by confiding this issue to the findings of a committee which was bound to become a political body; secondly, that since it was found to become a political body, the Liberal members of that committee and the ministers at their back made a great mistake in permitting the inquiry to be confined to these issues which tell against their friends. I made my point there, because, as I said, the moment the Conservative candidates begin exploiting the findings of that committee for their electoral purposes, they are sure to have the candidates of the other party reply by making counter charges against the other side.
I gave that as an example.


Leslie Gordon Bell: The Ross rifle as an example?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Yes, among other things. I have given that merely as an illustration of the false principle upon which this whole matter has been based.
Now I come to the other position, demonstrating what I would call the absurdity of the parliamentary situation. I have demonstrated the absurdity of the suggestion that we are acting as a judicial body. The manner in which the "gentlemen of the jury" in this House have deliberated for the last few days is sufficient to show that we are not in a judicial frame of mind, and not in a position to render a judicial decision upon this issue from any point of view. Let there be no Pharisees among us. My hon. friend from Hamilton (Mr. Bell), who asked me a question, feels just as I do in regard to this matter -not perhaps as a lawyer, not perhaps as a Conservative member, but as an honest and clever gentleman.
Let us consider now the absurdity of the parliamentary situation. My hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre spoke of the quandary in which he found himself in reference to casting his vote, and he explained the situation in a manner which, I may say, corresponds with nine-tenths of my own feelings-except that he made the matter worse for me by bringing in a subamendment. I must tell the House frankly that neither the subamendment, nor the amendment, nor the main motion to accept the report, accords with my views. Nevertheless, I have no other opening and I propose to give my support to the subamendment merely because it provides for a reference of this matter to a judicial commission and for no other reason.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The report itself contains
a recommendation unanimously arrived at that there should be an extra departmental investigation, leaving it to the government to determine what form that should take.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I will explain my position on that point. I am accepting the subamendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) solely on account of that recommendation which it makes. I may say that I approve also of the second paragraph of the subamendment, because it is a declaration of opinion, which practically is the same as one of the paragraphs in the report, 'though couched in somewhat different words. It reads:
2. That the following be added to clause 6:	Your
committee deplores the common practice, as revealed by the evidence, of members of parliament and others appealing to the minister to relax the reguJations of the department for personal advantage or political expediency.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
But I cannot approve of the other portion of the subamendment of the hon. member. That is to say, I agree that it is wrong, "for personal advantage or political expediency'' to intervene with the minister, or for the minister to intervene with the ends of justice; but I have no hesitation in saying that it would be still more wrong to prevent the minister from exercising his judgment and taking his responsibility upon the application of the law, and it would be equally wrong for members of parliament to be remiss in their duties, if they did not call to the minister's attention such cases as deserve clemency, indulgence and the application of mere human intelligence. This brings us back to what I stated at the beginning of my rambling remarks. We have come to the point that every time smuggling and liquor is mentioned we seem to have lost all sense of propriety and proportion. I hope I will not scandalize anybody, when I state what is in the minds of a large number of the members of this House, and that is, that there are many worse things than smuggling and drinking which are treated with much greater leniency by governments, parliaments and tribunals. We are reversing the basis of morality and the sense of justice. Not content with the amount of crime and weakness which our poor human nature contains and evidences every day, and against which laws divine and human are incapable of accomplishing perfection in a day, we have been going on in Canada as in the United States, much more so than in Europe, creating crime and enacting penal laws for matters which have never been and will never be considered as crimes by any right thinking individual or by any community which has preserved the proper sense of things.
Therefore, apart from the reasons which I have just given-that the report is incomplete, that the House is not in a mood, in a position and in itself constituted to pass upon that report-I cannot agree to concurrence in the suggestions of tlhiat report, because, in my opinion, they tend towards increasing the evil rather than remedying it. The Minister of Railways and some other hon. gentlemen have touched upon one aspect of the question when they spoke of customs dues; but I am afraid they were more concerned with trying to impress free traders of the west with the importance of voting with the government. No doubt, customs dues are to a large extent the main cause of smuggling.


Malcolm McLean: The only cause.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I would not say it is
the only cause.


Malcolm McLean: Why smuggle if there is no duty?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: If you have an excise
duty which applies to goods sold in our country and not to goods sent into another country, you have again a question of smuggling from Canada into the United States bringing back, for instance, narcotics. If we were not so much concerned with the liquor question and a little more concerned with narcotics, we would be doing more service to the young people of whom the 'hon. member for Vegreville (Mr. Boutillier) spoke with so much fervor yesterday. That is one point on which the effort of the police force should be directed.
But as regards liquor, as long as you preserve the present excise and customs duties, you are inviting smuggling to such a degree that no parliament, no government, no laws and no regulations can prevent it. I take the very argument that was made yesterday by the leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen) with regard to the great matter of state, much more important to call for the thoughtful reflection and great enunciation of principles of a great statesman than the mere matter of a few thousand Canadians being killed or not in the next war. I refer to the selling of those 16,000 gallons of alcohol. He said that it would have been better to sell them for one cent a gallon to the Quebeci Liquor Commission as potable or possibly potable alcohol in order to get the $10 a gallon in revenue. I ask any sensible business mam in this House: If you take an article of merchandise which you value at one cent a gallon and you make it worth artificially $10 a gallon because you impose an excise duty upon it, are you not inviting the ingenuity, the activity and all that can- be done to produce that article at what it is worth, namely, one cent a gallon, and sell it at an enormous profit if you avoid paying the $10 of excise duty?
One recommendation of the committee which is worth considering is to impose the excise duty at the distillery, whatever the destination of the liquor may be. In that respect, if we were in a position to enter into the merits of the case, I would say boldly to the government:	Lower the excise and Customs
duties against all alcoholic beverages. Apply the attention of your officials to the introduction of the right kind of beverages. So far as that is concerned, you will find a great
5042	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
help in the working of the Quebec Liquor Commission, because, however faulty it may be in some respects, it has at least this advantage that it looks after the quality of the products that are imported into this country. But if you desire to maintain the customs duties as you have them at present against all articles of luxury, to maintain the excise duties or even to put them higher, as you have them in the case of alcoholic beverages, to prevent all smuggling of liquor into Canada and then to look after the smuggling of liquor into the United States because of the return smuggling, you might just as well make up your minds that you will have to devote all the revenues of the Customs and Excise department and' perhaps the whole income tax, before you prevent one-half of the smuggling that is going on.
I heard the leader of the opposition read a letter from another gentleman who has been very closely connected with this matter. I refer to Mr. Sparks. By way of parenthesis, the right hon. gentleman opened his speech yesterday by saying that this was to be a great historic debate. I have been tempted at times to think it is rather an hysteric debate. But supposing it goes down in history, the funny thing is that you will have two monuments that will stand in the annals of Canada, one to Moses Aziz and the other to Mr. Sparks. I think the Conservative party, the moment they get into power, should devote their first contribution to the fine arts of Canada by having a beautiful monument erected to Mr. Sparks with Moses Aziz, for instance, in the position of one of those little devils who play in the corners of medieval cathedrals; because no doubt they will owe their advent to power largely to the efforts of Mr. Sparks, and also to the martyrdom of Moses Aziz.
I come back to that great pillar of virtue, of economic reform, who has received so much attention from both sides of the House. I feel at ease in speaking of him in this great historic debate because, my knowledge of history being very limited, I have never before heard of Mr. Sparks in any capacity whatever. But if he wrote this letter to the leader of the opposition, and if the leader of the opposition expects to become Prime Minister and to accomplish what Mr. Sparks told him could be done by adding a few words to the law and a few policemen, namely, the suppression of 90 per cent of the liquor smuggling in Canada and out of Canada with its return smuggling, I say that Mr. Sparks does not know the first elements of human nature and economic conditions.
fMr. Bourassa.]


Henry Herbert Stevens: As Mr. Sparks of course
cannot speak for himself, would the hon. member permit me to say that in all Mr. Sparks' activities he never once touched the smuggling of liquor. He and his association dealt with matters within their own knowledge and range of activities, namely, the smuggling of merchandise other than liquor. I say that merely in justice to him.
Mr. BOURAiSSA:	But you cannot disconnect the two things.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I am merely making a
statement of fact in fairness to Mr. Sparks.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I was not trying to be
unfair to Mr. Sparks; I was referring to him merely as interpreted by his first lieutenant, the leader of the opposition, or if you prefer it, as interpreted by his counsel before the cool, judging tribunal that we are. I think the leader of the opposition, who is a great lawyer, is quite capable of interpreting Mr. Sparks or anybody else or even of twisting anything in connection with the case.
But supposing this refers only to other merchandise than liquor. There are two points I want to make. First it is all very well to look after the contraband of smugglers as against legitimate trade, but I would like to know what has been done in the last thirty years against false declarations made by so-called legitimate traders in the customs house?
I will give a brief example of my incidental knowledge of the matter. One day, I was coming back from Europe where I had left some luggage behind me. The luggage came two months later, with what the French call "slow speed". I went to the Customs house of Montreal, then under the very able jurisdiction of the hon. member for Mount Royal (Mr. White). Of course, I did not see at first the member for Mount Royal, or the superintendent, or the chief inspector; but one of the officials presented me with a certain form. I looked at it and I said "That will not do, it does not correspond to my case. I cannot swear to that",

because we have to swear to everything at the custom house. Well, they handed me another form and I said "That will not do either; it does not meet my case at all". The official replied "Those are the only two forms we have." Then I said "I am not going to make a false oath; I am not going to commit perjury". So I went to the chief and it was then I made the charming acquaintance of Mr. White. After I had explained my case he looked at me-he is not here at the moment so that I can speak

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
with more freedom-in his quizzical fashion over his eye-glasses; apparently in that way he sees more clearly; and with a smile of irony, he said: "You are the first man I have seen in fifteen years who hesitates at committing perjury." He added "Between ourselves, this is the greatest manufacture of perjury there is in Canada." That impressed me at the time and the impression has remained. I am, in some respects, very old-fashioned. I believe that perjury is a much worse offence than smuggling or taking liquor. I do not know, perhaps my morality is not up to that of Vegreville, but I consider that when you accustom young boys of fifteen and sixteen years of age to go to the customs house and make false declarations for the benefit of their employers in order to have false entries made and thus pay less duties- and that is the practice of a large number of so-called legitimate houses of commerce-it disquiets me much more than the question of whether Moses Aziz should stay out of gaol for three or four months-much more.
In the second place, you cannot, in our days, disconnect the smuggling of various articles of merchandise which enter into competition with the goods of the regular trading houses, from liquor smuggling. That has been already explained to the committee, and the committee reports on that fact. The committee points out that with the adoption of the Volstead Act, with the development of the means of communication between the two countries, there is such an export of liquor from Canada into the United States that it pays to engage in a return trade in other commodities. The man who goes into the United States from Canada with an automobile loaded with liquor tries to bring back some things that will give him as much profit on the return trip as on the outgoing trip. He will bring back narcotics, he will bring back silks, he will bring back jewellery; he will bring back articles that will take up limited space and yield great profit. What was done on a very small scale, when the trade communications between the United States and Canada consisted practically of a few trunk lines of railway, is now multiplied, I do not know how many times, as a result of the building of highways and the use of automobiles. And I repeat: you cannot put a stop to the smuggling evil, taking it as it is, without any exaggeration, you cannot put a stop to it to the extent of 90 per cent, or 50 per cent, or 25 per cent, or even 10 pgr cent, unless you treble, and increase even to a far greater extent, the expenditure of
your Department of Customs and Excise. Therefore I say: Why not diminish the incentive to smuggling? Why not endeavour to alleviate the causes which make it pay to smuggle? I am not referring especially to the customs duty, I have reference also to the excise duty. That is one of the points, it seems to me, upon which the committee has not deliberated at all. I have not read anything in the report that would indicate that tihe committee has paid any attention to it. Of course the traders of Canada are rather disposed to include the entire country and its social and economic interests within the four corners of their special sphere. Mr. Sparks, or Mr. So-and-So, will come here and tell you that unless you correct this or that, it will mean the end of the world, because as matters stand their individual profits are lessened. I do not blame them for entertaining that view but we have to take a broader outlook and consider what can be done to diminish in reasonable degree, all over, the evils of smuggling. We should start first of all from the point of view that it is far better to diminish inducements to smuggling than to increase the punishment for engaging in it. In the second place I say it is wrong-although that is not the view of traders generally-to make penal laws of sucih a character that you will put administrators or other high officials in the position of not being able to consider every case on its merits and exercising some degree of leniency. I repeat, you cannot enforce penal legislation unless you have the honest opinion of the people at your back. You will never make them believe that it is right to punish with a heavy fine and imprisonment acts that are and have always been considered by the public and individual conscience as minor offences, whereas offenders against real moral laws escape more lightly. If we want to correct evils of this sort we must begin by putting on a proper basis our standards of public morality and of penal legislation.
There is something in this report which I regard as very dangerous. It suggests that there should be an increase in the inducement to detectives and officials to arrest smugglers by increasing their share of the proceeds from fines and seizures. In the second place, it is proposed to give them the power to arrest anybody without a warrant; and, here I cannot agree with my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth), the third section of whose amendment would deprive the minister of the power to exercise any leniency. If you enact this into legislation you must be prepared to multiply the
5044	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
number of gaols in this country in order to accommodate the number of people that will have committed merely technical offences, and the gaol wardens will have no time to think of the real criminals. Then the hon. member for Vegreville, ten years from now, will see whether public morality has been improved.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Did not the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin) the other day suggest that if he were relieved of this right of discretion it would solve a great many of his problems and leave him free for general administrative work?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: The hon. member is
perfectly right and it shows how absurd the position is. May I slightly correct my hon. friend. The minister said it would relieve him of much of his troubles and give him more time for administrative work. But you would have to find somebody else to do that. If you did not, you would create a state of tyranny in this country that would simply be intolerable or you will give a further premium to smuggling, to hypocrisy, and to evasions of the law. It will be one or the other; it cannot be otherwise. You will get more and more people thinking: How is it? There have been denunciations of this man and that man because he brought a few bottles of whiskey from Montreal to Ottawa to distribute to his friends. A minister has been denounced because he prevented a man from going to gaol after he had been fined, or rather he took action to delay his going to gaol.


Leslie Gordon Bell: To prevent.


An hon. MEMBER:: To delay.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Suppose it had been the other way,-as is done eveiy day in every province, including the province of the hon. gentleman, where sentences are suspended or are not enforced. I must admit that I have not the legal mind. But to say that it would be right for the Minister of Justice to let a man go out of gaol the day after he went in, but that it is a crime for the Minister of Customs to prevent that same man going into gaol that day, is something that, while to the very delicate consciences of lawyers it may appear very big, yet to the less cultivated consciences of commonsense people, seems a very fine distinction without any substantial difference. The moment you do something to relieve a man from paying the penalty for a wrongful act, whether it is done on Monday or Wednesday, or whether it is effected through the action of this hon. gentleman or 
that other hon. gentleman, it comes to the same thing. You have thousands of Canadian citizens who realize that there are some people who go to gaol and there are some who do not.
There is more than that involved. Our whole economic system in the last twenty years has put a premium on theft-theft organized by some of the leading men of this country, bank directors, railway promoters, men who have been rewarded by senatorships, men who have received decorations from the king-not that the king knew anything about them, but because they had paid enough money to a decoration agent to be entitled to those decorations in the name of the king- those men have been crowned as captains of industry, they have been acclaimed as makers of Canada, while they were making their fortunes by extorting capital out of the gullible people of this country, by levying tribute upon the consumers and the travellers of this country because of the conspiracy of parliament and of governments. This evil calls for much more denunciation than the petty action of a small smuggler, or the neglect of a minister to see that a petty smuggler goes to jail. Let us take our lesson now, Sir, from the subdued indignation in the sub stratum of society against the power of the ruling classes, against kings, aristocrats or plutocrats, based upon the accumulated injustice and hypocrisy that have built up the socialism of Europe and its extreme form, the Bolshevism of Russia.
Let us make no mistake, let us not narrow our minds, let us not increase the incentive to legal misdemeanours, let us not show a scandalized conscience in regard to minor acts of neglect on the part of responsible administrators of departments and conspiracy with real criminals, let us look at the question from a broad paint of view. Every one of these problems is connected with some other similar problem, and until we have a sense of the whole fabric of social justice and economic order I say that, for a third reason, we are disqualified to settle this problem in the manner that is suggested to us. At least I feel that I am. Perhaps I know a little too much and not enough to feel positive in regard to this matter. I envy the position of those who, because they possess an intimate knowledge about certain matters connected with the merchandise they sell, or because they hold at the tips of their fingers all texts of law, imagine they are in a position to settle all these things. No. That is where lawyer and business men lose their sense of humanity,

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
their sense of the social order. You cannot settle everything from the dollar point of view, nor from the legal point of view.
Now, Sir, that is the situation as I view it. Perhaps it is because I have not read every word of the evidence adduced 'before the committee.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Hear, hear.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I have endeavoured to
keep my mind free and broad, instead of overfeeding it at the risk of losing the proper sense of things and getting an indigestion of small matters that would entirely disturb the balance of my mind.


Leslie Gordon Bell: You mean, of
facts.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: No. I recognize my
own limitations. I admit that I am one of the least instructed and enlightened members of this House.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Hear, hear.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No, no.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: But perhaps also there
are in this House members who do not know everything, perhaps there are a few men, even on the side of the great Conservative party, who have not mastered all those great problems of social order as they connect with economics, with fiscal laws, with the application of the customs laws, with the balance between various kinds of taxation-all those things have to be considered. Therefore I say we are not in a position to pass judgment. My inclination, if I could find support in this House, would be to throw out the three motions. I would throw out the motion moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, (Mr. Woodsworth), although I agree with nine-tenths of it, because it is connected with concurrence in the report. I would throw out the motion of the hon1. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) because it is on its face a small and narrow political manoeuvre that will defeat the object he has in view. I want to be fair, I credit him with the idea, when he started, to arrive at the truth, I believe that he wanted to do justice to legitimate trade; but I am afraid that by the force of circumstances-I would probably have done the same if I had been in his place and a member of a party-there grew a tendency to forget more and1 more the interests of legitimate trade and to think more and more of the illegitimate thirst of the Tory party to get into power. Of course, that is quite legitimate from his point of view, just as it is legitimate for the other gentlemen of
the jury, sitting on this side of the judge, to differ from him in that respect and to think that they ought to defeat his political object.
I tell him frankly, and it is just as sincere as everything I have just said, in itself the fate of this party or that party is absolutely indifferent to me, as a party.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Oh.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Yes, absolutely. But being given the conditions in which we are at present, being given the mentality that has been shown by the Conservative opposition during these six months, not to speak of the past, I would give ten times as many bad votes as I might give to-night to prevent them from coming into power. But of these three motions I take the one which comes nearest to my point of view. The amendment suggested by the member for Winnipeg North Centre has as its necessary consequence that no legislative action will be taken hastily upon the findings of the committee. It means, if carried, that the report of the committee will be inoperative-not to prevent the department from adopting this or that measure for diminishing the evil of smuggling-but that no radical measure or so-called remedy will be adopted. In other words, the general conclusions of the report will not be acted upon until after the evidence is complete and we have a report, not "incomplete" but final, a report given by a body in which, even though they are judges, there may be some trace of political spirit, there are very few in.Canada among the men of all races who have not some political tinge-but a body of men who, by their position and by the very power that will be given to them, will be in a position to deal with this matter in a much more impartial way than either the hon. member for St. Henri (Mr. Mercier), the hon. member for West Hamilton (Mr. Bell), or the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. They may have done the best they could, but still there are a few things which should commend themselves to the delicate conscience of some members of the Progressive party, who seem disposed to vote with the Tory party in order to avenge virtue and make all vice impossible. When it came out before that committee that the distilleries, those infamous dens of vice which the hon. member for Vegreville (Mr. Boutillier) painted in such dark colours yesterday, when it came out that these agencies of vice were helping the Tory party as well as the Liberal party, the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy) wanted to have the accounts opened in order to find the proportion of funds which went to the party of virginity and to the party of vice. But we are
5046	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bourassa
not in a position to know which cost the more, to get the favours of the Tory virgin or the caresses of the Liberal-well, I will not qualify it. The remainder of the committee, Liberals and Conservatives, the virtuous and the vicious, the avengers of moral right and justice as well as the depredators of public conscience, all joined together so that the people would not know how much more it cost to purchase the Conservative party than to purchase the Liberal party. Therefore, how can members of the Progressive party, whom I credit with a sincere desire to protect the morals of this country, justify a vote for this party more than the other? How can they justify themselves, any of them, in voting against the only possible suggestion so far made to keep the findings of this committee from the devil of political partisanship? This is just as bad for the morality of the country as the alcohol described by the hon. member for Vegreville, upon which a large number of the members of both sides do not show such horror when they are not making speeches; a number of hon. members even show in their speeches that they are not altogether convinced that whiskey is in itself vicious and illegal, even when it is drunk in contravention of the temperance laws of the virtuous province of Ontario.
One more point and I am finished. Another reason for which I think this inquiry should be pursued in every part of the country by a judicial tribunal instead of being passed upon by the House at this stage was pointed out by the Prime Minister. It brought shouts of protest from the other side when the Prime Minister said it was not sufficient to inquire into the province of Quebec. Let us have a real understanding; I have never stood for the protection of any crook in Quebec or elsewhere; I have perhaps denounced more malefactors of my own blood and race than any other public man in Canada, and I have taken them as they came, from both parties. But, on the other hand, using the same argument I made a few moments ago, if you want to have the public opinion of the people of Canada back of this attempt at reform, it must not be suspected that this inquiry was started or conducted-and I will not exaggerate anything-with as one of its objects, the idea of lowering the chances of the Liberal party in the province of Quebec, or if that did not succeed, enabling Tory candidates elsewhere to denounce Quebec as a den of thieves, of smugglers and of immoral public men protecting vices and violations of law. I know that is not in the mind of the hon. member for West Hamilton; I know it 
is not in the mind of the right hon. leader of the opposition; but they know also that there are around them men prepared to do that sort of thing just as, if the situation were reversed, there would be camp followers of the Liberal party prepared to do the same thing.
The moment the inquiry was coming to the end of its investigation of Montreal affairs, one of the Tory papers of Montreal, I do not remember whether it was the Gazette or the Star, published a communication from Ottawa saying that the committee would soon end its inquiry because it had found sufficient evidence to demonstrate the system.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Might I ask a
question? Would the hon. gentleman for one moment be prepared to suggest that it was on the responsibility of any member of this committee that that paper should publish any such statement?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: No, not at all; I have
just stated the contrary, and I have not corrected myself. I do not think it has ever entered the mind of any hon. member of the Conservative party whom I know; but circumstances are such that, if we adopt this report, the lower camp followers of both parties will be put by this House in a position to use that argument and counter-argument; and that should be avoided. Whether it means retaining this party in power or putting that party in power, the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) knows that I always speak my mind, and I say that it is my earnest desire to prevent, if I can, a question of this nature being used to stir up racial prejudice and hatred.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I certainly have the same earnest desire.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: I know my hon. friend has the same desire. There is no man in the province of Quebec, perhaps, who suffers more than the hon. member, at times, from the fact that he does not always find the same sympathy, from a purely social and individual point of view, amongst French Canadians as he would otherwise find if it were not for these base processes which have been resorted to time and again by both parties. If you create a political crisis of this issue without having completed your evidence, without having probed Toronto, Vancouver and any other town east or west in the same manner as has been done in the case of Montreal, without having brought before the bar of that committee all the miscreants, to whatever race or province they belong and whatever their political affiliations, you can-

Private Bills
not avoid it. I will not do it; the hon. member for West Hamilton will not do it in Ontario; the leader of the opposition will not do it as the head of his party, but it is bound to come. I have heard it said three hundred times at least since this committee first started: Yes, they are going to find out all about vice in Montreal, but they will not touch holy Toronto. I have heard that said in Montreal by honest people. There are a few things that have been said, and that are still being said, which justify some people in believing that there is some truth in that- not in the sense that the hon. member has rightly protested against, but truth in the sense that there are members of his party who are prepared to do that kind of thing. Already you see in various organs of opinion tentative suggestions to prepare the way for an anti-Quebec campaign, unless, of course, Quebec makes up its mind to help the Tory party, and then, of course, Quebec will be blessed just as it was blessed when it helped to throw down the Liberal party in 1911. I am not ashamed of having taken my share in that, but I admit that I felt ashamed afterwards of some of the men who made that fight with me. I have finished on that, but I repeat what I said the other day on war and peace issues, that it is far better now to face all the aspects of a position like this than to wait till the devils of racial discord are unleashed.
I sum up the whole thing. In the name of social justice and economic order, and for the sake of the proper administration of public affairs, the question whether this man or that has been indiscreet or not is a very small issue. The real issue is, since parliament has decided to get to the bottom of this, let us go to the bottom and let us come back next session, either under a Conservative or a Liberal administration; and in cool blood and after due reflection, let us pass such legislation and adopt such regulations as will command the confidence of the public conscience of the people of Canada at large, and not simply of one party or the other.
At six o'clock the House took recess.
After Recess
The House resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILLS

Mr. WILLIAM DUFF (Lunenburg) moved:: That owing to the late .period of the session all the private bills received from the Senate and not yet referred .to a select standing committee be read a first and a second time and referred to the select standing committee on Miscellaneous Private Bills.
He said: There are certain bills yet to be referred to the select standing committee on Miscellaneous Private Bills.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
first and second readings
Bill No. 206 (from the Senate), for the relief of Ethel Clementina Cnaig-WiHiams.- Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 207 (from the Senate), for Ithe relief of Frederick George Jones.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 208 (from the Senate), for the relief of Ida Lula Dupuis Murchison-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 209 (from the Senate), for the relief of Gladys Andrea Boyle.-Mr. Lennox.
Bill N.o. 210 (from the Senate), for the relief of Edward Barker- Mr. Ross (Kingston).
Bill No. 211 (from the Senate), for the relief of Joan Henderson.-Mr. Ladner.
Bill No. 212 (from the Senate), for the relief of Vina Kennedy (otherwise known as Vina Dorothy Kennedy).-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 213 (from the Senate), for the relief of Sadie Joy Downey.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 214 (from the Senate), for the relief of Aimee Glenholme Young.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 215 (from the Senate), for the relief of Alberta Lutz.-Mr. Mewburn.
Bill No. 216 (from the Senate), for t'he relief of George Frederick Adams.-Mr. Anderson (Toronto).
Bill No. 217 (from the Senate), for the relief of Edward Saville.-Mr. Anderson (Toronto).
Bill No. 218 (from the Senate), for the relief of Leslie Ellis Noble.-Mr. MeClen-aghan.
Bill No. 219 (from the Senate), for the relief of Cecil Chester Richardson.-Mr. Arthurs.
Bill No. 220 (from the Senate), for the relief of Manford York.

Mr. Harris.
Bill No. 221 (from the Senate), for the relief of Robert Fisher.-Mr. Jacobs.
Bill No. 222 (from the Senate), for the relief of James Alfred McCabe.-Mr. Chupch.
Bill No. 223 (from the Senate), for the relief of Dorothy Terry.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 224 (from t'he Senate), for ithe relief of Lillie May Brown	Nichols.-Mr. McCilenaghan.
Bill No. 225 (from the Senate), for the relief of Hazen Pearl Clarke Pearcy.-Mr. Geary.
[Stage Direction]
Red Lake Railway Company
[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 226 (from the Senate), for the relief of Edith Swartz.-Mr. Hocken.
Bill No. 227 (from the Senate), for the relief of James Gibb Erskine.-Mr. MeGlen-aighan.
Bill No. 228 (from the Senate), for the relief of Erneslt Johnson.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 229 (from the Senate), for the relief of May Elizabeth Chambers.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 230 (from the Senate), for the relief of Maxime Demers.-Mr. Garland (Carleton).
Bill No. 231 (from the Senate), for the relief of James Ediward Bamaby.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 232 (from the Senate), for the relief of Joseph Azarie Handfield.-Mr. Mc-Phee.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 194, for the relief of Gwendolen MoLachlin.-Mr. McClenaghan.
Bill No. 195, for the relief of Jessie Evis.- Mr. Arthurs.
Bill No. 196, for the relief of Max Gertler. -Mr. Garland (Carleton).
Bill No 197, for the relief of Florence May Hicks.-Mr. Anderson (Toronto).
Bill No. 198, for the relief of Ruth May Harrington.-Mr. Edwards (South Waterloo).
Bill No. 199, for the relief of Edith Maude Bull.-Mr. Kaiser.
Bill No. 200, for the relief of Joseph Bernard Hoodless.-Mr. Garland (Carleton).
Bill No. 201, for the relief of Amelia Chester.-Mr. McClenaghan.
CONSIDERED IN COMMITTEiE- THIRD READING
Bill No. 174, to incorporate The Detroit and Windsor Subway Company.-Sir	Henry
Drayton.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. STEWART McCLENAGHAN (Ottawa) moved the second reading of and concurrence in amendments made by the Senate to Bill No. 113, respecting The Bronson Company.
Motion agreed to; amendments read the second time and concurred in.

[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from June 22, consideration in committee of Bill No. 95, to incorporate the Red Lake and Northwestern Railway Company.-Mr. Heenan-Mr. Duff in the chair.

On section 1-Incorporation.
Mr. HEAPS:: I wish to make one or two remarks arising out of some statements made by me when we last had this bill under consideration. I stated on a previous occasion that Manitoba was guaranteeing bonds to the extent of $25,000 a mile for a railway to go into this area. That statement seems to have been challenged by some hon. gentleman. Therefore I have tried to confirm this statement and I find it is correct. I have been unable, as I said.before, to obtain an actual copy of the bill; but looking up the files of the Manitoba Free Press in the Parliamentary Library I find that the day before the Manitoba legislature prorogued a bill to that effect was passed. This House would be creating a very bad precedent if it were at the present time to give its consent to the construction of another railway into the same area when one of the provinces of the Dominion has already agreed in some way, shape or form that I am unable to state to-night, to guarantee $25,000 per mile for the construction of a railway into that same area.


Mr. CAHILL:: What does the hon. member mean by a guarantee of $25,000 per mile?


Abraham Albert Heaps: I believe a company was to be incorporated in Manitoba to build as far as the Manitoba boundary. If we look at a map of the Red Lake district we shall find that for the purpose of being able to get to a large centre of population for its supplies, the nearest point is the city of Winnipeg. On account of that fact I believe a company was to be incorporated to build a railway and Manitoba agreed to guarantee bonds to the extent of $25,000 per mile as far as the Manitoba boundary. That bill was passed during the last session of the Manitoba legislature which closed about the end of April.
This is something more than a mere branch line that we are asked to sanction the construction of to-night. I think we were told the last time the bill was under consideration that the charter was for a line to be built a distance of from 350 to 400 miles. A line 350 miles in length is more than a mere branch line. This bill has had very little consideration in committee. Another reason that was given for the construction of the line was the fact that there were 3,500 prospectors in the particular area that the railway was going to traverse. If this government is going to give charters for the construction of railways in every place in Canada where prospectors go in, we shall be doing nothing but issuing charters in all parts of the Dominion. I would prefer to wait in regard to this charter until

Red Lake Railway Company
another year, until we see what happens regarding the proposed connection with the Red Lake area from the city of Winnipeg.
Another reason why I think there is good ground for objection to this particular bill is that if we grant this charter, this railway will be given the right to traverse the same line and area as the Canadian National Railways traverse in northern Manitoba. It was stated here the other day that the Premier of Ontario had given his consent or voiced no opposition to this particular measure. I wonder why the promoters of this bill have not consulted Manitoba, which is vitally interested in the development of the northern part of Manitoba.
Manitoba is vitally interested in the completion of the Hudson Bay railway; yet this charter is to be given for a railway to go into The Pas and in the direction of the Hudson bay itself. In other words, although there are members in different parts of this House who doubt the feasibility of completing the railway to the Hudson bay because they think it will be a white elephant, yet there are others who come along at this juncture and want to build another railway into the same area. In other words in an area where some hon. members think it is impossible for one railway to pay, we are asked to grant another charter with the result that two lines may be built in the same area where it is contended that one line cannot pay. We should1 not be in too great a hurry to grant charters, because every time we grant a charter for a railway into a particular area we give the stamp of approval of parliament for the construction of that railway. I do not think it is a wise policy for this House to give the stamp of approval on railways until .we have far more information before us than we have at the present time.
I object to this charter being granted for the additional reason that Manitoba has not as yet had an opportunity of saying whether it is in favour of this railway or not, and until such time as I know what the opinion of the Manitoba government is I feel bound to voice my opposition to this measure. Those who are interested in the passage of this bill through this House would' be doing no hardship to the promoters of this company if they had to withdraw it at the present juncture and bring it before the House again at the next session of parliament. Very little would be lost because those who feel bound to voice opposition to this bill would perhaps be in some way convinced as to its feasibility. In the second place it would give Manitoba an opportunity of determining whether or not it should oppose the bill.
Another reason is the fact that it would enable us to see whether the company which is about to be incorporated in Manitoba will go ahead with its project, and whether Manitoba will be liable for the $25,000 per mile guarantee in accordance with the bill which was passed at the last session of the provincial legislature.
I feel I would have to voice my opposition this evening even to the extent of talking this bill out.


Mr. HEENAN:: I have already spoken on this bill a couple of times, and I had it in mind to say just what the hon. member for ' North Winnipeg (Mr. Heaps) has said for me, but I hesitated to say it. I think anyone who has followed his remarks will now be of the same opinion that I am, namely, that this i3 a fight between the interests of Manitoba, which is desirous of building into Ontario, and the people of Ontario who desire to develop Ontario's own natural resources. That has always been the situation regarding the northern part of Ontario. Every time that we have endeavoured to develop northern Ontario we have obstruction from Manitoba, guardedly or unguardedly. The hon. member, contrary to some of his friends on the other side, has not argued in favor of public ownership in this regard, although he is a public ownership man, but he has argued that a private concern which has gone to the government of Manitoba and induced them to give a guarantee of $25,000 a mile for the building of a railway should receive consideration ahead of a concern in Ontario which desires to build a railroad into the Ontario mining area without any government guarantee. I think we have now a sufficiently strong case to show that no hon. gentleman opposite who has any regard for the province of Ontario and its development should vote against this measure. There is no question in my mind, any more than there is in the minds of the people of the part of Ontario affected that interests in Manitoba desire to tap the mineral wealth of Ontario and direct it into Manitoba channels.


Abraham Albert Heaps: If that is the case will the hon. gentleman explain why the same interests are seeking to build a railway which will tap the natural resources of Ontario?


Peter Heenan: The "same interests" are not asking to tap the natural resources of Manitoba.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I beg to contradict the hon. gentleman. Authority is asked for in the hill to go to The Pas in the province of Manitoba.

Red Lake Railway Company
Mr. HEENAlN The object ie to build into the Red lake area first. In order to carry out that purpose they have to go through another province than Ontario. In view of that fact they have to get a charter from this government.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Why did they not go to the government of Ontario?


Peter Heenan: You had better put that question to the promoters of the bill. I cannot conceive that the rules of this House will permit the bon. member to talk out this bill, although he threatens he will do that. Surely the fate of the bill ought to be settled on its merits. If the rules of the House permit a bill to be talked out, without its being discussed on its merits, then those rules should be altered. When the measure was being considered in the Railway committee all kinds of obstacles were raised to its passage. First of all it was said that the opinion of the government of Ontario should be obtained with respect to it. This argument was urged by Ontario members and I have no complaint to make of that. Those hon. gentlemen wanted to know what the policy of the Ontario government was in connection with the bill. That information has been vouchsafed. Then a desire was expressed to know what the policy of the Dominion government and Sir Henry Thornton was in the same connection. That information has been given also. Finally the measure was remitted to the House, and now that we are in committee on it, instead of considering each clause of the bill on its merits there is discussion once more as to the principle embodied in the bill. Surely we ought to consider on its merits a bill which was passed by the Railway committee on a vote, I think, of nineteen to nine and been given a second reading by this House.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I cannot let some statements made by the hon. member pass without contradiction. He says that Manitoba interests are opposing this bill. Such statements are entirely out of place.


Peter Heenan: I did not say that.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I wrote down the statement made by the hon. member and he said it was "obstruction coming from Manitoba interests." I am not obstructing the bill on behalf of any Manitoba interest; I am acting entirely in the interests of the province of Manitoba as a whole. It may be true that I am opposing some interests in the province of Ontario, but I really do not know at this hour

what interests are behind the bill. For all I know those interests may be interests of Backus and if that is the case I would oppose the bill a thousand times more strongly than I intend to do at the present time. So far as I know there is no obstruction from any interests of the province of Manitoba. Certainly I have received no instructions from anybody in that province to oppose the measure, but I do know this: a bill was passed at the last session of the Manitoba legislature giving a guarantee of S25,000 a mile towards constructing a railway to the provincial boundary; and unless there is some representation from the government of Manitoba agreeing to this bill I think I am perfectly justified in opposing it. What does the bill contemplate? It distinctly states that it is for the construction of a line to a point at or near Red Lake, a distance of about 100 miles, then in a generally northerly and westerly direction to a point on the Hudson bay division of the Canadian National Railway at or east of The Pas in the province of Manitoba. Now, if I am to take the correct inference from the statements of the hon. member, the only reason this clause was put into the bill was in order to obtain a Dominion charter. I think the statements of the hon. gentleman afford sufficient reason for the House to reject this bill. In other words, there is absolutely no intention on the part of this company of building into the province of Manitoba; there is no intention to build into the district of The Pas, and the granting of this charter would prevent the development of that district by others at some future time. Certainly no bill should be passed containing provisions which are not likely to be carried out. If the promoters have no intention of going to the province of Manitoba as the hon. member states, such a provision is merely camouflage.


Peter Heenan: I did not say anything of the sort.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I did not say my hon. friend spoke of it as camouflage; that is my own statement. But he did say that the provision was put in for the purpose of getting a Dominion charter.
Now if the promoters are going to confine their operations purely to Ontario, why did they not go to the Ontario government and get a provincial charter? Then there would not have been any necessity for introducing the present bill in this House. The bill has been before the Railway committee on two occasions. The first time it was thrown out, I do not know for what reason. When it

Red Lake Railway Company
came back to the committee a second time it was passed and now comes before this House. We have as yet received no information as to who is behind the bill or who is going to finance the contemplated work; we have no information except what is contained in the clauses of the bill. I felt impelled to rise in order to contradict the statements of the hon. member, which statements, in my opinion, contain sufficient reason why this bill should be rejected.


Mr. EVANS:: I rise again to oppose this bill, not because of any personal or private interest but simply on general principles. I believe with the advocate of the measure that it should be accepted or rejected on its merits. I intend to speak briefly on those merits once more, but I would have thought that those who have this project in hand would have seen fit to withdraw the bill, seeing that it has been considered so many times by the Railway committee and by the House and has failed of acceptance. I am rather glad that this discussion has taken place because I believe it will result in the establishment of a railway policy for the Dominion which ought to be a guide for us in future applications for railway charters. The people of Canada have loaded themselves with a railway burden; they have plenty of trouble to ponder over for another generation or two owing to the indiscriminate granting of charters of this kind in the past throughout th' ~	The people of
this country are already sufficiently burdened with a debt of considerably over $2,000,000,000 through our railway system, and this has been brought about simply by small beginnings such as this charter represents.
Regarding railway service, this country is obligated to do two things. In the first place, we have been repeatedly told by financiers, stockholders of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and many others Who favour private ownership, that a 10 per cent dividend must be paid on the capital stock of that company to maintain the financial credit and integrity of Canada. If the present railway rates are not sufficient to do this, they must be raised, as they were in war time and since by the modification of certain statuory protection which the west enjoyed under the Crowsnest pass agreement. One thing is certain, we have been paying a handsome dividend to the privately owned Canadian Pacific Railway, while the government system has involved us in a deficit year after year, running all the way from $30,000,000 to $60,000,-
000.	We have been trying to make a great
transportation system out of these scattered branches of our Canadian National Railways. All these branches were indiscriminately chartered by past governments. The other obligation is to provide a service which, because of vested interests created by such indiscriminate railway construction, causes an overhead expense which cannot be met out of earnings, yet on the other system we are, through the people's industry, creating big dividends for private shareholders. This, I might say, is one of my chief objections to granting a charter for a railway which begins nowhere and ends nowhere, and is bound to be a burden to the country later on, when we shall have to take it over and perhaps purchase the charter from those who are now seeking it. The dividend on the privately owned system and the deficit on the government owned system is a super tax on the. earnings of the people. Both are the result of past mistakes, which this Red Lake project seems to repeat. I believe, Mr, Chairman, that had there been one complete system of government railways the railway year of 1925 would have shown a surplus instead of a deficit. That is, the people in primary production and through our export trade have paid for railway service over $60,000,000 more than was necessary had there been a complete system of government ownership of railways. This added to the saving which the elimination of duplication of service would have effected would have greatly lightened our burden of taxation to the extent, I believe, of about one-third of what is required for administration purposes this year, or about $120,000,000.
I have said that this parliament will have to formulate a railway policy. In confirmation of this let me quote a paragraph from a report of a royal commission on which Sir Henry Drayton and Mr. Acworth sat some few years ago. Regarding the ownership and control of our railway systems they advised:
That henceforth there shall ibe in Canada only two railway systems, the one consisting of the Canadian Pacific under its present management and control, and the other made up of the (present government railways, the Grand Trunk system, including the Grand Trunk Pacific, and the Canadian Northern.
That the promoters of this wildcat scheme -for it is nothing more-for the exploitation of the people for private gain persistently push this project is evidence of the profits they expect to make when the charter is obtained. When this bill was before the , House the last time the Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning), I think, told us that the Premier of Ontario had no objections to it, and that the Canadian National Railway

Red Lake Railway Company
board was not even interested. But this is the people's business, and it is parliament that should decide whether or not this charter shall be granted, not the Minister of Railways or the board of the Canadian National Railways. I would ask hon. members to consider this bill very seriously and not grant a charter which will aggravate our railway problem, "or we are bound to be faced with heavier Jeficits if we indiscriminately grant charters >f this kind.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Clause 1, Mr. Chairman,
which is now under discussion, gives the names of the gentlemen seeking incorporation as John H. Cassidy, Charles OB. Hibbard, and Frederick R. Brown, all of the city of Montreal, and D'Arcy 'Scott, of the city of Ottawa, '"together with such other persons as may become shareholders of the company." I am wondering who is behind this scheme. I have become a little more suspicious since being informed a few moments ago that there is no intention of building this railway into the province of Manitoba, but merely from a point somewhere in the township of Wabigoon to a point touching Red lake somewhere in Ontario. If such is the case I think we should have a little more information than is contained in clause 1, and I would like to know if those promoting this bill can give us that further information.


William Duff: Shall clause 1 carry?


Abraham Albert Heaps: Could I have the information I am asking for?


Peter Heenan: I cannot give any information other than what was given by the lawyer, Mr. D'Arcy Scott, when he was before the Private Bills committee; he gave the names of the bankers who were -behind it. My hon. friend said a while ago that if he thought Mr. Backus was behind it he would oppose the bill. I want to point out that Mr. Backus now has authority ito build a railway through the province of Ontario, and this proposed railway will be in competition therewith. I did not say, as the hon. member suggests, that it was not intended to build into Manitoba;
I-said it was necessary to go into two provinces before coming to this House -for a charter. The committee wan given full information as to the people behind the bill by the lawyer who had it in charge and by the promoter himself. I have nothing more to say; I am not going to talk my own bill out. If there are any questions, I will -be glad to answer them.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Thei only information the hon. member can give is that Mr. Backus is not behind the bill, together with the additional statement that the committee was told of the bankers who were behind the bill, but that is not sufficient information. I think we should be given more than -the name of the lawyer who appeared before the committee and the names of three individuals of whom w'e know nothing. I see the lawyer's name mentioned here as one of the promoters of the bill; I believe it is quite usual in an application for a charter to have the name of the lawyer appear, but there is nothing to show that this charter if granted will not subsequently be disposed of to the highest bidder, and there is nothing in this bill to compel the company to actually construct one mile of a railway.
If it were only intended to construct this railway in Ontario that would be a very good reason for the bill being withdrawn and the required power obtained from the Ontario legislature. There would be very little time lost, because I -understand that the Ontario legislature meets early in- the year and continues in session for several months. Under this charter a period of twelve months is given in which construction must be commenced, and if that is not done the charter automatically lapses. But let me point out to the committee that the twelve months really amounts to two sessions of this House; after granting the -charter we will not know definitely whether or not anything has been done until after next session and the probabilities are that the charter would not be allowed to lapse but that this House would be requested to extend that tame. It is stated in one of the clauses that the sum of $100,000 must be spent by this company during the twelve months, but it does not mean that that amount must be spent in actual construction. That money can be easily spent in lawyers' and promoters' fees and in other matters of that kind; than the company can come back to the House and say they have spent the required amount of money and ask for an extension of the charter. That would establish a very bad precedent and I think we should demand something more than that.
In addition, no good reason has been presented as yet why a charter should be granted to cover the Manitoba area. A good case could be made out for a railway to enter the aRed lake area and possibly I would not oppose the bill, but when power is requested to go for a distance of 400 miles when 150 miles would be ample, I feel bound to offer my op-

Red Lake Railway Company
position, not merely because I am in favour of the principles of public ownership but because I feel that the promoters are asking for far greater power than they actually require. Unfortunately the promoters of this bill cannot give us the information we asked for, and I think that information is very germane to the whole bill. We have no assurance in any way that those behind the bill will proceed with the construction of the road, and I think under the circumstances we should not allow the bill to proceed at all until they first go to the Ontario legislature and have the measure passed there.
I wish, Mr Speaker, the letter from the Premier of Ontario to the committee in which he stated that he had no objection to this bill had been read to the House. I have not seen that letter nor have I heard it read here. It is rather strange that although the Ontario legislature began its session about the time this House met those responsible for this bill did not see their way clear to go to the Ontario house and secure the rights they are asking for here. It is one of the unfortunate things in our legislative structure that two bodies should have the power to grant charters for the construction of railways; that is another reason in addition to those enumerated by the hon. member for Rosetown (Mr. Evans) why we are in such difficulties at present. Here on the one hand we have all the provinces with authority to grant railway charters and give guarantees, and on the other hand we have the Dominion parliament granting exactly the same privileges. It has been stated that the only intention of the promoters is to tap the Red Lake mining area, and to give the prospectors there railway facilities. I think this is a purely provincial matter and should not have been brought before this House. From the statements submitted here it appears that the reason this charter has been asked for in this parliament is to overcome probably some legal technicalities, and if that is so I think it a very good reason why parliament should not grant a charter of this description. When the bill comes before the House we are informed by the hon. gentleman in charge of it that this is oiily put into the bill in order to overcome tertain technicalities, in order that the House itself might provide this company with a charter to construct the road, which is to be purely within the province of Ontario. If it is going to be entirely within the province of Ontario, the promoters of this railway had a perfect right to go before the Ontario legislature at its last session and secure a charter from that legislature, and then it would not
have been necessary for them to come to this House at all. W'e have had this bill before the House three times now, and several hours of valuable time have been taken up discussing it; it has been twice before the committee, and there does not seem to be much chance of it passing to-night.


Mr McGIBBON:: You are deliberately
obstructing it.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I may be in a sense, but-that does not mean to say that I am not within my rights. One of the reasons why I am obstructing this bill-I am perfectly frank to admit it-is that the House has not the information to enable it to pass intelligently upon it.


Peter Heenan: Is the hon. member a
member of the Railway committee?


Abraham Albert Heaps: Yes.
Mr. HEENA'N: Then if he had attended the meetings of that committee he would have got all the information he desires.


Mr. McGIBBON:: He does not want it.


Abraham Albert Heaps: It has been stated that I did not attend the Railway committee meetings. Another hon. gentleman has stated that I did not want the information. Unfortunately, Mr. Chairman, I cannot be in two places at the same time. I am a member of the committee on National Railways and Shipping, and also a member of the Railway committee, and if I could have managed to have cut myself in two and have one-half of me attend the Railway committee and the other half the committee on Railways and Shipping, I might have been able to attend both committees at one and the same time. The Chairman of the committee on National Railways is here, and he can tell you that I did not miss one of the meetings of that committee. It so happened that the Railway committee, when this bill came before it, was holding its meetings at the same time as the other committee, and consequently I found it impossible to attend the meetings which my hon. friend from Kenora says I should have attended. I want to assure him as well as other hon. gentlemen that I have not refused to attend a single meeting of any committee this session which I have found it possible to attend, but some mornings there have been meetings of three committees of which I was a member meeting at one and the same time, and I thought it better, as a member, to understand thoroughly the workings of one committee-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan


Peter McGibbon: My hon. friend is deliberately obstructing this bill after he admits that he does not know anything about it. How .much longer is he going to continue to talk of something he knows nothing about?


Abraham Albert Heaps: Three minutes. I did not say I did not know anything of what I was talking about.
Mr. ClHAPLIN (Lincoln):	It is about
true.


Peter McGibbon: You admitted it.


Abraham Albert Heaps: What I said was that the House did not have sufficient information before it.


Peter McGibbon: Speak for yourself. You are not the House.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I have the floor, and I am expressing my opinion. You can express yours when I am through.


Peter Heenan: I think you could save five minutes of the time of the House, Mr. Chairman, if you would call it nine o'clock.


Peter McGibbon: We will get even with the hon. gentleman on some other occasion.


Abraham Albert Heaps: That is a threat.
Progress reported.



CUSTOMS INQUIRY


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Mercier (St. Henri) for concurrence in the report of the special committee appointed to investigate the Department of Customs and Excise, the proposed amendment thereto of Hon. Mr. Stevens, and the proposed amendment to the amendment of Mr. Woodsworth.
Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Mr. Speaker, in entering upon a
discussion of the .resolution, the amendment and the sub-amendment now before this House I feel a deeper sense of personal resiponsibiiity than 'I have felt on almost any other occasion in my life, which has been one of varied experiences and of grave responsibilities.
I represent, Sir, in this House a constituency in the province of Quebec, and it has been suggested that a vote againkt the subamendment and a vote for the amendment may be deemed to be a reflection upon the honour and reputation of that great province.
That, Sir, I specifically deny. I
9 p.m. have had intimate acquaintance with the leading men of that province during the past forty years. I
	,
have had the esteem of a number of my fellow-citizens in that province, and I have given to a greater number my esteem and personal affection, and therefore, although I am an English-speaking citizen of that province, and although I think there are a few in that province of its English-speaking cit-tizens who are better acquainted than 1 am with its language, its history, its literature and its traditions, I feel a sense of jealousy for its good name and reputation, and for that good name and reputation I am prepared. to stand at all times and on all occasions.
I also have, as I stated in an address which I delivered to this House on February 5th of the present session, a personal esteem not only for many of the members representing that province in this House, but for the members of the ministry who represent that province, and I think I can say, after a pretty careful reading of the evidence, that I do not find in that evidence any fact reflecting upon the personal honour of those members of whom I spoke on February 5th-the hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb), the hon. Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe), the hon. Minister of Marine and Fisheries	(Mr. Cardin), the hon. Solicitor General (Mr. Cannon); nor do I suggest that the facts reflect severely upon the personal honour of the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin), at the present time. In regard to the Minister of Customs, I felt all through this debate, having read the evidence, a measure of personal sympathy, in view of the facts which he had Stated to the House: that he had just entered upon his duties as a member of the government at the time that the Robichaud letter, so-called, had been received1 from the hon. member for Gloucester; that he had but a day or two in this city; that he -was pressed with the business of his new department; that numerous letters had been placed before him, and that it could not be expected that he could give that time and attention to the reading of letters that he might have done in less busy times and calmer moments. Although there were numerous discrepancies between the statement he made in that respect, as pointed out by the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen), and the evidence which he had- given personally before the Customs committee, and some discrepancies between his later statement and the statement he gave to the House when the motion for the appointment of that committee was made, yet after many years' experience in the courts, having been myself called1 upon to give evidence on many occasions, I am pre-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan
pared to ibelieve that the most intelligent witness in the witness box .may at times be unintentionally guilty of inconsistencies and verbal contradictions in his evidence. But what impressed me most, and what finally decided my opinion, was the statement of the hon. minister himself to this House in the debate on June 22. The member for Vancouver North (Mr. Donaghy), who sat on the committee and who is a political friend and associate of the hon. Minister of Customs, said in reference to the Robichaud letter:
The sting in the whole thing is contained in the letter which Mr. Robichaud wrote. We cannot hold anybody responsible for writing a letter like that other than the man who wrote it. Nobody with any sense of public honour would attempt to justify the expressions used by Mr. Robichaud in that letter and I am not going to attempt to justify them. My self-respect will not .permit it. The sting, I say, is in that letter and it is contained in these words in the letter which Robichaud wrote to Mr. Bureau, not to Mr. Boivin:
Mr. Aziz is of the highest help for us during this campaign, and we cannot do without his services.
That is the sting. I could well believe that if I had been in the position of the hon. Minister of Customs, with all the cares and distractions upon my mind which he had at the time, I might justify, on account of the conditions prevailing at the time, the instructions given through an officer of his department in the Aziz case. But the hon. Minister of Customs, in making his statement on June 22 to this House, said:
But I say now that if I had seen the request-
There had been discrepancies in his statement previously as to whether he had seen the letter and as to whether seeing the letter meant that he knew its contents:
But I say now that if I had seen the request and been cognizant of all the other circumstances my conduct would have been the same; I will say further that if this request had come to me from a Conservative member of parliament, my conduct and my reply would have been absolutely the same.
I do not say, I would regret to say, that the incidents of that case reflect severely upon the personal honour of the Minister of Customs, but the spirit which he showed in that vaunting statement to this House, sitting in judgment on this case, shows that at the present time, at least, he is not actuated by that spirit which should actuate a minister in his high position in the administration of the acts, matters and things that come from day to day before the Minister of Customs. I think the attitude he should have taken, in view of the facts that are before him now, and I think the attitude he should take now in view of that statement, is to withdraw from the ministry, to send in his resignation, to relieve,
so far as he can, the members of the government and the Prime Minister from the responsibility for approving the statement which he now makes-that even if he had been fully cognizant of the facts he would have acted in the same way as he did act under the circumstances. I have not lost my personal respect for the Minister of Customs. I know he is a younger man than myself, of great talents in many respects, talents which might be used to assist in the administration of the government of this country, talents which might be used in the public service, in other relationships and other spheres. But I do hope that a temporary absence from the ministry of this country will somewhat reform his spirit, will give him time for reflection, and that the time may come when he will withdraw those words and be in a position to resume again his high place in a position of public trust in this country.
The position in which the House finds itself to-night is this:	A committee appointed by
this House has heard the evidence and has made its report, a report which' has met with the express approval of the Prime Minister, a report which the Prime Minister says he and his government and his party are prepared to endorse by .their votes to-night. Paragraph 10 of the report so approved and so submitted contains this statement:
6. The evidence submitted to the committee leads to the general conclusion tihat for a long time the Department of Customs and Excise 'had been slowly degenerating in efficiency and that the process was greatly accelerated in the last few years. Aiptparentfly the Hon. Jacques Bureau, then Minister of Customs, failed to 'appreciate and properly discharge the responsibilities of his office and as a result there was a lack of efficient, continuous and vigorous control of subordinates by the headquarters staff at Ottawa.
Dealing with the administration of that department, the report also finds that in cases where a report was required from subordinate officers to comply and to conform with the well understood wishes of the minister, although in contravention of the facts then on the files of the department, subordinates were induced to make reports in order to sustain or to vindicate the action of the minister. That shows a thorough demoralization of that department at headquarters. On the other hand, with regard to the administration of that department in the matter of excise it is stated that orders in council had been passed, beginning on April 17, 1924, under which in the opinion of the committee unmatured spirits unfit for human consumption were freed for public consumption to the injury of the public health. Further this
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan

is what the committee find in the administration of that department at the customs ports of the country:
10. The committee find that it is the common (practice of the department to grant clearances to vessels wholly or partly laden with liquor for the United States, or allegedly bound for a foreign port, ibut admittedly sailing to "nun rows", and that false landing certificates have been produced to obtain cancellation of bonds given for foreign export of cargoes so cleared..
In the evidence adduced before that committee and as showing that the reflections, suoh as they are, contained in the evidence and in the report, bear upon otlher provinces, bear with terrific force upon my native province of Nova Scotia, we have the evidence adduced that vessels laden with thousands of cases of liquor would leave the port of Halifax for ports in South America, in the United States or in the West Indies, in many cases voyages requiring weeks and months for their completion, and would return within twenty-four hours to the port of Halifax with landing certificates to release their bonds, landing certificates which never could have been obtained from Lima, Peru, from Nassau in the Bahamas or from any other port to which they sailed; and that officials and officers of the Customs department knew that in accepting those certificates they were giving facilities for forgery, fraud and perjury and admitting those fraudulent, false and perjured certificates as reliable documents on which and receiving which the Customs department could relieve the parties of the bonds which they had given to the department for the faithful export and landing of those liquors at the port at which they were alleged to be destined.
Those facts must have been known to every official of that department; they were current, in the press of the country. I know during the past summer when I was engaged before the courts in Halifax and in some proceedings there it was a gibe on the streets, a gibe of which you heard in the recesses of the courts of the city, that fraud, forgery and perjury were being committed with the knowledge of the customs officials of that great port. Although I regret to say it, and although I believe the general reputation of my native province is equal to that of Ontario or of Quebec, if there is any reflection upon a province in this report and in the facts adduced before the committee and found to be true in the report, it reflects as greatly upon my native .province of Nova Scotia, where public morality as a whole is as high as in any other province of Canada.

Why did the facts which were alleged come from the city of Montreal? Montreal is not the province of Quebec. Montreal is a great commercial city, it is true; but the high public morality, the virtue of private living and life which characterize that great province, may not. be so well exemplified in some of the worst quarters of the great city Of Montreal. But because we have wrong-doing in some of the purlieus of Montreal I defy any intelligent man to say that the bringing of those facts to light from the purlieus of that city casts a reflection upon me or my fellow citizens of Montreal.
In addition, the report of 'the committee which has been approved by the Prime Minister and by the government, as I said, asks for further investigation into the facts, and I as a citizen of Quebec wish to know what are the facts with regard to Windsor, Vancouver and other ports of entry in the western provinces. The committee, headed by one of the most intelligent young men representing my city in this House, reported as follows:
12. . . . With reference to the distilleries, the committee has not had time to investigate them all. The committee recommends that a thorough audit and examination be made of the records and accounts of all the distilleries.
14. The committee recommends that the conduct of the officers at the port of Windsor, Ontario, and other important ports, should be further investigated and that the services of such of them as are found guilty of evasion of duty should 'be dispensed with.
The committee knew well that having been engaged for some five months in this inquiry they 'had not completed all the evidence available, and they urgently demanded, so far as they could, that this House and the government should insist upon further inquiry and investigation being made. But the government has the full duty and1 responsibility with regard1 to that investigation. The government has the authority, without any further legislation or direction from this House, to appoint a royal or other commission under the Inquiries Act to make full, careful and complete inquiry into all these transactions at other ports.
Now in regard to the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) the House is asked to approve of the following:
The evidence further discloses that ministerial action has been influenced by the improper pressure of political associates and friends of the minister, or acting minister, administering the department, resulting in the suspension and in some instances the abandonment of prosecutions against those charged with violation of the statutes, and in the loss of revenue to the country. Moreover, successful appeals have been' made to

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan
the minister and acting minister administering the department to improperly interfere with the course of justice 'between the conviction of the offenders and the execution of judgment thereon.
With regard to that I wish to say that the argument that under previous administrations there has been wrongdoing, where corrupt acts have been committed by members of the ministry or employees of the department, is not convincing to me. Under the conditions which prevail in Canada to-day-and I will leave the province of Quebec-under the conditions which prevail in my native province of Nova Scotia the rum traffic, unhindered, is ruining homes and ruining lives, and steps should be taken to enforce the law in that province. As to the appeals which have been made under previous administrations, all I have to say is, that although the evidence adduced by the hon. Solicitor General (Mr. Cannon) is not convincing to me until I have read and analysed it, previous wrongdoing does not justify the action of this House in refusing to condemn similar practices today. If we are coming to the stage that the public honour of this country is not to be maintained, that the moral spirit of this country is not to be maintained, because in times past there has been wrongdoing by Conservative administrations which justifies wrongdoing by a Liberal administration today, then I say I am prepared to abandon every other political relation I 'have in life and join' some independent party in this country who will see that the law is properly administered, irrespective of what 'has been done in the past either by Conservatives or Liberals.
The amendment further declares that:
The Prime Minister and the government had knowledge for some considerable time of the rapid degeneration of the Department of Customs and Excise, and their failure to take prompt and effective remedial action is wholly indefensible.
I think it has been shown by the letters produced by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) himself that his government were very fully informed, as I will show in a few minutes, of the material facts of the case. Then the amendment declares:
The conduct of the present minister of the department, the Hon. George H. Boivio	is utterly unjustifiable.
His action was unjustifiable if he had been thoroughly informed of the facts; and now that he, before the high court of parliament, has declared that his action would have been the same if he had known the facts in all their ramifications and all their bearing, I have no hesitation in saying his conduct was not justified. And yet when I say that I make this reservation; I do not believe that
is a finding, as hon. gentlemen opposite have said, to the utter dishonour of the Minister of Customs. I hope and believe that when he has had time to reflect upon his admissions before this House he will regret such admissions and regret the spirit which prompted them as much as I, standing in my place in this House to-night, sincerely regret them.
Next the amendment declares:
Your committee deplores the practice, as revealed by the evidence, of certain men influential in public life to direct appeals to the minister to relax and depart from the proper administration of his department for reasons of political expediency.
Your committee is of the opinion that this practice is detrimental to the best interests of the country and prejudicial to the administration of the department.
Now, the sub-amendment, which Your Honour has declared to be in order, in the main asks that clause 6 in the amendment be deleted and in lieu thereof the following inserted as an addition:
Your ccxmmi'ttee deplores the common ipractice, as revealed by the evidence, of members of parliament and others appealing to the minister to relax the regulations of the department for personal advantage or (political exped iency.
I entirely agree with that statement, but why, by inserting that, should we remove all reflection upon ministers of the crown who give effect to such appeals, and without whose definite action such appeals would be entirely in vain? Why is it that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth), who proposed that subamendment,, wishes to remove that reflection upon the government of the country, and every reflection upon a minister of the crown who had given effect to sordid, personal appeals of that character? Therefore my position is this: that with respect to the contents of the subamendment proposed1 I would be prepared to vote m favour of those in the main, but they can and should only be given effect to as an addition to and not as a substitution for the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens). And if the government wish to give full effect to the opinion of this House I believe they will now agree and Will solicit the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre to withdraw the subamendment os a substitution for the amendment and add it to the amendment in order to give it full and complete effect. In so far as the subamendment proposes that a royal commission should be appointed in order to continue the investigations, that is a matter entirely within the discretion of the government; it has full power and authority to appoint such a commission.
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan

But, Mr. Speaker, although the Prime Minister has declared his approval and the approval, I understand, of his government, of the general recommendations and the statements contained in the report of the committee that:
The evidence submitted to the committee leads to the general conclusion tihat for a long time the Department of Customs and Excise had been slowly degenerating in efficiency and that the process was greatly accelerated an the last few yeaxs.
Nevertheless he suggested, and in fact quite frankly stated, that it is not within the competence of this House, as a political and partisan body, to judge of that report and to render a verdict upon it. No man in this House or in this country is more fully informed than the Prime Minister of the great agitations which were carried on from decade to decade in order to achieve responsible selfgovernment in the provinces of Canada; no man is foetteT informed than he of the principles which underlie responsible self-government in this country. And we are sitting in judgment to-day because there is no other court in this country, and no other court can be constituted without an almost complete abrogation of the constitution, which can be empowered to take the place of this House in judging of that report and finding a verdict upon it. In September last the Prime Minister appealed to whom? To the general electorate of this country for their support by returning to this House of Commons, if it was possible to be obtained, a majority supporting him and the party which he has led for so many years, and with which he has been identified for almost the whole of his later life-the party of which, I might say he has been a distinguished member, and in which he has rendered to this country many eminent services. The parliament assembled here today is the result of the recent verdict of the people, and the government, the members who form the administration, are responsible to this parliament and must justify their acts before it. Parliament is vested with the right of legislation, of enactment by statute, for the government of the country. Parliament enacts the law under which the administration is carried on, but the Prime Minister and his colleagues are responsible to this House, and to this House alone, when it is in session, for the efficient and faithful administration of those laws. In the earlier weeks of the session I sat in this House and heard such discussions as would lead1 members to believe that the making of our laws is of paramount importance, of more importance than their administration ; but I submit that the administration of the laws after parliament has enacted them

is a duty and responsibility of this government, and that those laws will be utterly ineffective and inoperative unless that administration is duly and faithfully performed.
Now, this theory and practice of the constitution is endorsed, in part, by the right hon. Prime Minister in his recent address. He says:
According to our theory of government, the Minister of Customs is responsible for the administration of the affairs of that department.
But the Prime Minister failed to state that he himself and his colleagues in the ministry are responsible to this House and to this country for the efficient administration of each and every department of government. That responsibility and that duty cannot be denied by the Prime Minister and those associated with him. Now, did the Prime Minister have knowledge of the conditions existing in this country, conditions which were known generally throughout the length and breadth of Canada? Not knowledge, I suggest, of every specific detail, but did he have knowledge of existing conditions sufficient to put him and his colleagues upon inquiry and upon investigation? If he had such general knowledge and notice, I say he is responsible to this House for not ordering such an effective inquiry as would have brought the details more directly to his notice. The Prime Minister admits that after the negotiation of the agreement between this government and the government of the United States in 1923-
-the attention of the government was drawn for the first time to the growth of the smuggling evil as it affected commercial interests in this country.
That was in 1923, nearly three years ago. Yet I say to-night-and I do not think my statement can be denied-the Prime Minister cannot point to one single fact in evidence in this case which discloses that the government took effective measures to render administration of the customs more effective. A delegation representing a number of the large manufacturing and commercial interests of the country informed the Prime Minister and his colleagues of the existence of these great evils in the Customs administration.


Robert James Manion: What date was that?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: After 1923, the minister says. What attitude did the government take? Let me read the Prime Minister's own statement of the government's attitude. Referring to this delegation that came to meet the members of the government, he says:
Did the government say: No, we have our own preventive service, our own Customs department, our own officers. We ourselves will look after the suppression of smuggling and the -protection of the revenue laws.

Customs Inquiry

Mr. Cahan
I submit that is what this government are elected to do, that is what they must do to carry out their oath of office, in order faithfully to perform the responsibilities and duties which rest upon them. That is what they must do if they are to maintain a good account with the parliament and with the House of Commons of this country. And what does the Prime Minister say? The Prime Minister says the government did not take that position, and I say that in not taking that position the government were recreant in their solemn trust and duty.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I think my
hon. friend is drawing an entirely wrong inference from those words.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I do not want to do an injustice to my hon. friend, but I am going to elaborate my argument and I think he will see that I am not straining his words unduly. If I do so I regret it very much, but I am going on. The government entirely abnegated their responsibilities and duties; the government under the direction of the Prime Minister took the indefensible position of placing upon those very men who formed the delegation the duty and responsibility of what? First of making suggestions which would most effectively deal with the situation. The delegation asked among other things for more effective legislation and the government, feeling no particularly urgent responsibility, asked the delegation to draw up the measures which in their judgment it was essential to have enacted. And then further he says:
The government met that request by asking the Commercial Protective Association to draft such legislation as its officers thought would be most effective.
Then the Prime Minister says to this House:
Now I ask, could the government -possibly have taken a more effective way of dealing with the -problem than by requesting those most concerned to draw up the legislation themselves?


Edmond Baird Ryckman: Let George do it.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Yes, let George do it. What were the existing conditions at that time? The Prime Minister has quite fully and frankly informed us; he says:
The country was face to face with a condition in relation to smuggling of such a magniture as few could comprehend.
But the Prime Minister leaves us to understand that he fully comprehended it. He had all the agencies of government at his command and yet failed by one single administrative act, one single effort, to administer the existing laws pending further legislation which would tend to mitigate these evils;
he left it to a private association of business men to draw up and submit the additional legislation. More than that, he left it to this private association to supplant the Department of Customs in the administration of the law at the outports. Was not this a complete or almost complete abnegation by the Prime Minister and the government of the duties and responsibilities of the high offices which they respectively hold?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Does my hon. friend wish the House to infer that in his view the government should have declined to co-operate with the protective association?
M-r. CAHAN: No, certainly not. I am going to deal with that in a moment. But when before in the history of this country did a government abnegate their duties and responsibilities; when did they ever fulfil the high trusts of their office by placing the administration of a department of government in the hands of a private association of business men? Again in the letter of February 4, 1925, which the Prime Minister read, Mr. Sparks informed the government that:
iSmuggiling and undervaluation for duty purposes were causing an immense loss of revenue and seriously interfering with the business of legitimate traders and manufacturers.
Yet no active administrative efforts were made to protect the treasury by checking these evils. And the Prime Minister adds:
Assuredly the protective association brought to the attention of the government the evils of smuggling as they have described .them.
But it was not only additional legislation which was urged by this delegation who approached the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister quotes a letter from Mr. Sparks dated February 26, 1924, as follows:
Might I take the opportunity of stating that after four months of investigation by a staff of trained criminal investigators-
Referring to investigators employed by the merchants and manufacturers association.
-we are convinced that at least half of the smuggling now going on oouild ibe prevented within a month by an energetic policy on behalf of the department.
But in the record of evidence taken by tlhaifc committee I submit there was not one single effective administrative measure taken by the government in the course of these three years to mitigate these evils and to protect the commerce of this country. Again on April 8, 1925, Mr. Sparks wrote to the Prime Minister as follows:
Smuggling on this continent has become a huge industry. . . . After months of investigation by trained investigators we have no hesitation in saying that this traffic constitutes a national problem of the very first importance.
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Cahan

Then the Prime Minister himself says:
I regarded tlhis as probably the greatest prohlem which the country has before it at the present time.
Again let me state that on July 13, 1925, almost a year ago, the president of the Toronto Board of Trade wrote the Prime Minister urging upon him and his government that in the reorganization of the preventive service the dominant note, to quote his words, should be the strict enforcement of the law in the interests of the lawful commerce of the Dominion and an increased national revenue which, in turn would be reflected in an improvement in economic conditions generally. Yet still not a single direct effort was made by the Prime Minister and his colleagues to secure a more effective administration of the law, although at that time they had secured from this House an amendment to the law with more stringent provisions, and a vote of this House supplying all the necessary funds to carry that law into effect. The returns brought down recently in the public accounts show that they so neglected their duty that they did not even make use of the appropriation which this parliament had placed at their disposal for the efficient administration of the law passed in 1925, "But," the Prime Minister says, "We gave the association government detectives; we paid for those detectives and told them to use those detectives and let them report to you"-to Mr. Sparks. Yet in this House, if I understood the Prime Minister correctly-and I am prepared to withdraw the statement if he denies it-he spoke of disloyalty to him and to his government on the part of one of the officials loaned to Mr. Sparks, and who was instructed to report to Mr. Sparks.


Henry Herbert Stevens: And by the way, who
were paid by Mr. Sparks and his association.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Were they? And so the
Prime Minister and his colleagues disregarded their responsiblities as members of the government of Canada, and proved, I repeat, recreant to the trust which was imposed on them, and left the administration of the custom laws of this country in the hands and under the control and direction of a private mercantile association. Then to this body of private gentlemen who, at the government's request, were in fact usurping the functions of the government of the country, the Prime Minister describes his attitude as follows:
What attitude did I take towards him?

He is referring to Mr. Duncan, who was then in the employ and under the direction of this private association of merchants:
What attitude did I take towards him? What attitude did the Minister of Finance take? We said to him: Thfis business which you are on is a serious one foir the country. We give you full latitude to do anything and everything you want to do or think ought to be done.
What was that but the re-establishment ir>
this country of an irresponsible body to whom some of the chief functions of administration in this country had been assigned and entrusted by the Prime Minister of the country? And so I say that the government of this country by a responsible cabinet, under 3 responsible prime minister, ceased to function in Canada, and the system of responsible government, the system of parliamentary institutions, which are the only hope and stay of Canada, were degraded, step by step, until they have reached the contemptible position in which some members of this House would by their speeches place them to-day.
What are we told to-day? We are told that although this ministry is responsible to this House and to this House alone, although there is no other body in this country, judicial or otherwise, to which they can submit themselves and still maintain responsible government in this country-we are told by them, now that parliament has so degenerated, that we are unfit and incapable of judging of the merits of a report submitted after six months of investigation by members of a committee on which the government controlled the majority. We are told that we are unfit to consider and decide upon that report. When, I would like to know, was there ever a precedent in the history of any province of Canada since responsible self-government was granted, when was there ever a precedent in the history of the proceedings of this parliament, when the only prospect held out to the country was, on the one hand, government by a private committee of mercantile men, or on the other, authority being vested in some judicial committee or commission appointed by the government themselves to judge of their own conduct, because parliament is unfit to so judge, as parliament has done ever since we have had responsible government?
The Prime Minister appealed to this country, and a minority of this House were returned pledged to support him. He has appealed to this House now, and this House alone can decide. There is no other tribunal judicial or otherwise, that has or possibly

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Kennedy (Peace River)
could have jurisdiction to decide in this matter. Upon this House, and upon this House alone, rests the responsibility, and the sole responsibility, and no matter what may be our individual capacities we are derelict in our duty, we forswear our oaths of office and our pledges to the country, we are recreant to that duty which is placed upon us by our institutions, if we decline to-night so to decide.


Mr. D. M. KENNEDY (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to take up the time of the House at any great length. I merely wish to state what my position will be when the time comes to vote on the amendment to the amendment, and on the amendment.
I have listened with a great deal of care to most of the debate. My position has changed somewhat since I moved the amendment in the committee. The majority of the committee was unable to agree to it. The Conservative members of that committee moved a certain amendment, and I also
10 p.m. moved an amendment representing my views at that time. After listening to the debate I not only think that my position in the committee was justified, but I feel that when the opportunity presents itself I must vote for the amendment that has been moved in this House.
In section 6 of the report, which has been referred to quite often in the debate, I find the following-and to this, of course, every member of the committee agreed:
The evidence submitted to the committee leads to the general conclusion that for a long time the Department of Customs and Excise had been slowly degenerating in efficiency and that the process was greatly accelerated in the last few years. Apparently the Hon. Jacques Bureau, then Minister of Customs, failed to appreciate and properly discharge the responsibilities of his office and as a result there was a lack of efficient, continuous and vigorous control of subordinates by the headquarters staff at Ottawa.
In addition, Mr. Speaker, I moved that Mr. Farrow, the Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise, should be discharged. The majority of the committee recommended that h'e should be retired. My reason for objecting to that was simply this: We had recommended that a number of the officials in the Department of Customs should be discharged, and I could not see any difference between the position of some of these officials whose names are mentioned in the report and that of the deputy minister under whom the department had so rapidly degenerated during the last few years. I am very much opposed to the distinction that is drawn between
individuals who practically are all guilty of the same kind of conduct and the same inefficiency in performing their duties, simply because one happens to draw $2,000 a year and the other $10,000.
That very position leads me still further. I find that while the position of a minister in the government is somewhat different, I have to vote for as near the same kind of censure of him as I am constrained to vote for with regard to Mr. Farrow. Certainly if the deputy minister was guilty he should be held responsible, in a large measure at least, for the degeneration in efficiency of the department. This is much more true of the ex-Minister of Customs, Hon. Jacques Bureau. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that the government itself has to accept responsibility for the degeneration in efficiency of that department. This, of course, I regard as a very serious matter for the government, and it is the chief reason why I feel that I must vote for the amendment after the subamendment is disposed of. The Department of Customs is practically as important a branch of government as the Canadian National Railways, if you like to call them a branch of the government. The total revenues of the Canadian National Railways amount to a little over two hundred million dollars annually. Under the Customs department, taking the various branches together, we obtained a revenue in 1924 of nearly three hundred million dollars. Does anybody believe that we would be justified in voting confidence in the government if it could be said that under the management placed and left at the head of the railways there had been or was a rapid degeneration in efficiency during the last few years? That is the thing that appeals to me as being so serious in connection with this matter. The whole evidence bears on this question and justifies that conclusion.
We have been told that the government is bad, that it has made some very bad mistakes, and that it is true of previous governments that we have had. That may be. We have not the privilege of dealing with the previous government to-day, but we have the responsibility of dealing with the present government. We have been told what will happen if the hon. members who form the official opposition come into office. Well, I wonder if we are going to be able to keep them out of office. They very nearly succeeded in defeating the government during the last week or two, and I do not want, Mr. Speaker, to establish a precedent here that any government can expect the confidence of this House even if it has allowed the chief revenue collecting department of the government to degenerate rapidly
5062	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Macdonald (Antigonish)
in efficiency. It seems to me-and that is the reason I differ with most of my colleagues here-that the government that allows that to happen must face something more than a severe tongue-lashing in the House of Commons, and the only weapon we still have, and the only weapon that governments fear, is a vote of want of confidence.
I would trust that if the amendment to the amendment does not carry, it can be moved as an addition to the amendment. As it stands at the present time I find that it will be necessary to vote against the amendment to the amendment and support the amendment, not *that I disagree with the amendment to the amendment so far as its form is concerned, but because of its position and relation to the amendment. Not that I altogether agree with the terms of the amendment, but I do agree with it in so far as it is a vote against the government, and having regard to the evidence and to what has happened in the department during the last few years, I can conscientiously cast my vote only in that way.
Mr. JEAN -FRAN COIS POULIOT (Temis-couata):	My speech, Mr. Speaker, will be
very short. I am sorry my hon. friend from West Calgary (Mr. Bennett) is not in his seat, because he would have been very glad to hear the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy), making the same speech as Collins would! have made.


Hon. E. M. MACDONALD (Minister of National Defence):: Before the motion is
put I rise to speak more of a matter of privilege than otherwise. My hon. friend from Kent, N.B, (Mr. Doucet), in his address the other night, referred to me as being one of those who participated in the stopping of prosecutions for smuggling. I want to mention a circumstance that occurred in June 1925. A portion of the permanent force were in Glace Bay, Cape Breton. They had an officer's mess there. These officers had some liquor. This liquor was seized, I do not know by what authority, Whether federal or provincial. Everybody who knows anything about the life of officers, on active service or otherwise, knows that the mea is an institution which has been maintained by them from time immemorial. When the liquor was seized one of the officers happened to be going to Montreal, and came on to Ottawa. He reported the matter to the department and stated-and the officers of the department sustained the point-that under the king's regulations the mess supplies were immune from seizure by civil authority. I simply transmitted to the department the position

these gentlemen took in regard to this officers' mess. I never inquired what the decision of the department was, and I never knew what it was. Further than that, I had nothing whatever to do at any time with regard to this question of the smuggling of liquor or smuggling of any kind. I merely wish to say that if the innuendo which was contained in my [DOT]hon. friend's reference to me was of the same character as was made to some of my colleagues, then there have been a great many innuendoes in this discussion that are without foundation.
Mr. MALCOLM MicLEAN (Melfort):	I
do not intend to take up much time of this honourable House, but I wish to make some remarks before the vote is taken. If I might be permitted to digress a little bit, I would like to tell hon. members a story. I am reminded of two boys who were working in a law office. They met one day and one said to the other, "Johnny what do they pay you at the office?" Johnny said, "Four dollars a week, what do they pay you"? The other boy said, "$1,000 a week". Johnny says, "Aw go on, you're talking." The boy said to him, "No, I am not, they pay me $3 a week in money and $997 in advice." I feel something like that boy. As a new member of this House I am bewildered by the flow of legal lore and the advice that has been given particularly during the past few days, but generally through the session,. The legal advice and information that have been given us are enough to bewilder an ordinary, plain person trying to solve problems coming before this House on the basis of experience and common sense and by assiduously studying them. So to-night, as I look over the debate of the past few days and the issue at stake herein, I find that I must endeavour to differentiate between the material that has been displayed and the legal verbiage that has been thrown around it.
Time after time in this House I have heard clever lawyers such as the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) argue the case as if they were prosecutors in a court-house prosecuting some law breaker. I appreciate much the excellence of the wisdom and learning given to us by the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George and the plane on which he spoke. But habits of the court room are hard to break, and apparently the intention on his part and on that of many hon. members opposite was not to make the matter plain and clear to us, but to ensure that a verdict would be given against the defendant.

Custom* inquiry-Mr. McLean (Meljort)
When first these charges were made in this House some months ago, I was surprised that the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) should in his laudable desire to suppress smuggling in this country, go all the way to Montreal, Rock Island, to Beebe and these other places of which many of us had never heard before and tell us about the lamentable conditions existing in the customs administration there. I would have thought that the hon. member for Vancouver Centre, coming from the city of Vancouver, a city which through the press and other methods of spreading information has been notorious for smuggling, booze running and dope peddling for many years back, would have first started to clean up near his home where we are told that charity begins. I would have thought, I say, that there where it was easier for him to get information he would have endeavoured to start the cleaning up process.
I found, however, that there was something else to it than that. I found that in addition to the smuggling of liquor out of Canada and other commercial goods into Canada, there was the smuggling of something worse, something that in my opinion the Canadian people will feel less like forgiving even than the smuggling of liquor out or the smuggling of other commercial goods in. I refer to the smuggling of secret information, secret reports, confidential reports, prepared by trusted employees of this government for the benefit of the public and the administration generally in enforcing the observation of the law and in bringing evildoers to justice. These reports, according to all the information that has been given us in connection with this matter during the past few days, were smuggled from their rightful place in the possession of the government into the hands of the chief political attacker of the government at this time. While I am not excusing the smuggling of liquor or other goods into the country and other goods out of the country, these are material things, the value of which can be reckoned accurately in dollars and cents. But when parts of the civil service of Canada, the secret agents of the government who are paid to get information on which the laws can be upheld, are debauched to the stage where they are willing to allow their information to be smuggled to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre or any other hon. member, that is a sad state of affairs and the people of this country are not going to think lightly of it.
Information given out during the course of this debate has shown that all the disclosures in the Customs Inquiry committee on smug-14011-321
gling in two months and a half, prepared for and paid for by the government and handed to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre, was that based on the famous Duncan report. Is there anything so infamous in the history of the department as that this information which was prepared an'd paid for by the government should be handed over for political purposes and that the service should be debauched in this way? Yet, hon. gentlemen qpposite smirk and smirk as they sit in their places and think lightly of it, while they talk of some youngster who brought in some celery, bread and other things.
I notice another hon. gentleman of the legal profession making notes, and I know he will get after me in good style; but I am satisfied that to-night I have in mind the outlook of the people of Canada rather than the heated and biased outlook that it is almost impossible to keep away from after 'six months of political warfare in Ottawa, where intrigue runs strong, where lobbying has been developed to the fine art at which it stands, where efforts have been made such as we had an inkling of in the debate-yes, desperate efforts made to swing members this way or that but generally I think to swing them away from the thing their constituents in many cases want.
This attack on the government through the Customs investigation and now through this report is not a new thing at all. All during this session and the session of last year hon. gentlemen opposite have been making these attacks on the government. The government have been accused of almost everything under the sun. If they were not accused of anything that was bad, it was because their opponents apparently overlooked it. At the start of the session they were accused of paralyzing industry, bringing the country tu the brink of ruin.
Mr, SPENCE (Parkdale):	That is right.


Malcolm McLean: The hon. member says that is right. Yet he has helped to hold the House here for six months and has not suggested anything to assist in remedying that state of affairs. All through this session attacks have been made on the government. First hon. gentlemen opposite tried economic attacks. This House was well fitted to deal with that, because of the fact that the House had gathered in members from 245 seats throughout the country who knew the exact conditions in their constituencies and were thus able to compare them with those of last

5064	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. McLean (Meljort)
year, the year before and six months ago. So the economic attacks on the government failed.
They brought political attacks on the government and again for the same reason members who had gathered from all parts of the Dominion were able to judge of their value and they failed. They accused them of being a government held in office by bribery, barter and many other terms that might not be parliamentary so that I will not repeat them. These political attacks were made on the government time after time and they failed. So they decided on another form of attack and, true to Tory traditions, they decided to bring it on moral and uplift grounds. This - is not a ne\v thing at all, but it is something that would almost make the angels w'eep to hear of a Tory opposition in the city of Ottawa in the year 1926 attacking the government of the day on high moral grounds. This is a form of attack that they have made on different Liberal governments at various times throughout the Dominion and people have reached the stage where they very easily discount such methods. But when they brought this new moral attack on the government they coupled with it an extremely strong barrage of legal argument, and in this I will admit the remainder of the House is at a disadvantage over members of the opposition. They have now spent days and weeks at different times during this session giving us legal arguments. If we could turn these arguments into good cash value we certainly would be enriched. But we cannot do that, because there is no value in them. If you weigh them dispassionately you will agree that there is no market for these legal opinions that we have been getting. This is an old method, Mr. Speaker, to break down co-operation between the various groups that have combined to carry on the government of the country. When they cannot be broken down directly on the economic or political isues involved, it is a first class plan to use moral and "uplift" arguments. If we cast our eyes back a few' years to the Motherland where co-operation has been employed between different political parties, we find the same plan tried; we find that an issue such as we are debating to-night has been interjected in order to try and cause disruption. I remember the government of Mr. Asquith, I think it was, being defeated in 1895. A number of groups were working together, and the government was defeated after a very heated debate, on the cordite question. The Tory politicians made the welkin ring 
with their predictions of the danger to which the empire was exposed because there were not sufficient supplies of cordite on hand. Well, the government w'ere defeated, they went out of office, and their opponents took their place, and within a few weeks it was shown that no addition had been made to the cordite supplies of the country although it was proclaimed by the Tories that there was a calamitous shortage. However, the Tories achieved their purpose. They got into power and the country got ten years of Tory misrule, including the Boer war, as a result of that famous debate on the cordite question.
Throughout this session hon. gentlemen opposite have been taunting the government with being in a minority and of having to make promises that were not in the interests of the country in order to secure support. Moreover the Progressives have been condemned likewise in the worst possible manner for co-operating with the government. Yet to-night we find hon. gentlemen opposite applauding some of the former allies of the government who have announced that they are going to support this amendment. I say this is all part of the game. From the political point of view it may be a very fine-game but it will not be endorsed by the people of this country who have to pay the bills and who have sent members down here in order that they should co-operate in the carrying on of the administration of public affairs; it is a mighty poor game from the standpoint of the interests of the country.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: What game are you playing?


Malcolm McLean: My desire is that we should not waste time -but that we should put through legislation that will be of benefit to the people of Canada now and for many years to come. That is the only game I am playing. It is the only game that I have ever played politically, and I have no desire to play any other.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Are you
quite sure of that?


Malcolm McLean: Yes, quite sure. But let me say this: the courteous thing for any hon. member when asking a question is to rise and not remain in his seat.
We have had some memorable speeches on the legal aspect of this question. I am not going to enumerate them, but I have something to say to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. That hon. gentleman is not a lawyer but he gave a long address and no doubt,
JUNE 25, 1926	506-c.
Customs Inquiry-Mr. McLean (Melfort)
from his own point of view a very effective one. I noticed, though, that he did not touch on the smuggling conditions in his own city which, as I said before, are notorious from one coast to the other. -Smuggling conditions there are worse than they are anywhere else on the continent, not excluding even Montreal, and yet nothing was said about them by the hon. member.
The hon. member for West Hamilton (Mr. Bell) in a very learned speech, also strove to impress upon us the viciousness of the administration of the Department of Customs. When the hon. gentleman was speaking, however, my mind went back to a period early in February when he told us about the hundreds of people in his community, in his own fair city, going out on the hillside in the depths of a Canadian winter and gathering grass to carry home as the only fuel they could get to keep them from freezing. That was a terrible state of affairs in a city where such an enormous quantity of beef, as stated by the hon. member for East Algoma (Mr. Nicholson), is consumed. The hon. member for West Hamilton made a speech such as we might expect from a high class criminal lawyer. But some of it, I am afraid, resembled the product of a member of another profession in which I understand he is engaged, namely, that of playwright. In view of these two roles in which the (hon. member has distinguished himself, and bearing in mind also the picture he painted of the dismal conditions in Hamilton, we may be pardoned if we do not take his arguments too seriously on the present occasion.
The right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen) has a highly trained legal mind. He applied his well known critical faculty, his great dialectical power, to attacking the government. I have often thought, while admiring the skill displayed by , the right hon. gentleman in building up his case, that that case is often laid on poor foundation. He reminds me of a critic who wishes to examine a picture, and who, instead of standing back from the painting and trying to view it in its proper perspective and proportions as the artist intended, goes right up to the picture, pulls out a thread from the canvas with a pair of pincers, examines that thread under a high-powered microscope and tears it completely to pieces. I have no complaint to make of that; it is the usual style of the right hon. gentleman, but it is regrettable that instead of taking a broad view of national conditions he limits himself to a very narrow and very sectional view. Therefore I am sure that his fine legal argument, spun out in great detail as it was, will not HOll-3211
affect public sentiment to the extent desired by my right hon. friend.
As regards smuggling and other crimes of a similar nature in this country I desire nothing more than to see the law thoroughly enforced; I desire nothing better than that there should be a thorough investigation into the administration of the Customs department, or any other department that may come under fire, at this or at any other time. It seems to me that it would be far better to have a judicial investigation, such as contemplated by the subamendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) into such matters than to throw the issue into a partisan assembly such as this. It is true we have power to try this and other matters except where they have not been handed over to the jurisdiction of the courts. In the last couple of weeks we had a striking reminder of this House, in an electoral case, having divested itself of its power and conferred it upon the properly constituted courts of the country. In the present instance, I think the same procedure should be followed. It is true that the House of Commons has a right to judge the government of the day on its merits. But when men are accused of law-breaking as distinct from unwise or inexpedient administration or leadership, surely the proper way to determine their innocence or guilt is by judicial procedure. Here we have charges made and the accusers are also the grand jury and the petty jury. Such a condition of affairs in any other transaction would be considered most unreasonable, and I know hon_ members will agree with me, even though they may be prevented from expressing their-views, that this is a most unreasonable course to take.
There is another consideration that I think should be kept in mind when discussing the relative merits of an investigation by a judicial body or by a partisan committee of the House. To-night we are putting ourselves in the position of sitting in judgment while only part of the evidence is in our -hands. The city of Montreal, Rock Island, Beebe and a few other isolated points have been investigated fairly thoroughly, but the rest of the Dominion from coast to coast has not yet been investigated. I am not criticizing the committee on this account, but I do say we should not sit in final judgment on this case, even if it be conceded that it is legal for us so to do, until all the evidence is before us. For that reason, if for no other, I think a judicial investigation should be proceeded with.
5066	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. McLean (Meljort)
The fundamental causes of smuggling have been already touched on. Undoubtedly when you make it profitable you will find a certain class of men ready to take the risks incident to smuggling. During the Napoleonic wars and for a few years afterwards smuggling was one of the greatest troubles of the British authorities, and men took desperate chances of fine and imprisonment .because of the big profits which attended successful smuggling operations. Not until the duties were reduced, and in many cases abolished, did the illicit traffic die out. Once the incentive to smuggling is removed, smuggling ceases. I have not heard during this investigation of anyone having been found guilty of smuggling farm machinery, coal oil, binder twine or similar commodities into this country of late years, simply because the duty is so low it is not worth the risk. Usually only high-priced commodities of small .bulk are handled by smugglers.
To-night, Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask hon. members to keep in mind that the things which loom so large before us at this time and seem so important to us in the heat and mist of partisan debate will in a few years shrink to their right proportions and appear of Little account. 1 am satisfied1 that then we will have forgotten who Moses Aziz was. His name will not be so much remembered as the name of the man mentioned by the Solicitor General when speaking yesterday. But one thing we will remember, whether the result of this debate was good or evil for the country as a whole. By that time, however it will be too late to change our decision.
During the debate I heard it charged that the Customs department deteriorated very rapidly in the last few years. I hold in my hand volume 52, part I of the public accounts for 1916, and I find that even at that time there was rapid deterioration going on in the Customs service. For instance, instructions were given at some ports, particularly at Morrisiburg, to allow certain articles to be entered free of duty, and those articles were brought in in car lots. I am not going to read the evidence, but it is at least interesting as showing that the deterioration of the Customs service has been going on for a long time.
The people of Canada to-night are more interested, Mr. Speaker, in seeing that the Customs department and every other department of government is improved and strengthened, and that the administration is conducted in such a way that it will enure to the prosperity and peace of the country, rather than in the case of Moses Aziz or any 
other smuggler on whose behalf members of parliament have been asking for clemency. Such requests are being made day after day of the authorities in Ottawa, Toronto and every other capital city in the Dominion, and many of them are granted. The people of Canada are not so much interested in clemency being granted or withheld, neither are they so much interested in the legal arguments advanced to-night; but they are interested in the result of this vote. To-night we are making our choice for the people of Canada, who are not able to come here to make it themselves, as to whether the government that has carried on during the past five years, the government that they know has helped greatly to bring back prosperity to Canada and to restore that condition of political and economic satisfaction that we have had in the past few years, shall be sustained.


Ambrose Upton Gledstanes Bury: Mr. Speaker, I should not intervene at this late hour of the debate, but for the fact that on this question I think members generally on both sides of the House should voice their feelings. It is not a question, in essence, of any party issue. It is a question that transcends all party considerations and has to do, as the right hon. leader of the opposition said in his speech yesterday, with the honour of the country. May I say that in listening to the different speeches that were delivered in defence of the action of the Minister of Customs and in defence of the action, or rather the inaction, of the government, I think no one who afterwards reads the pages of Hansard will fail to come to the conclusion that the defence advanced by the ministers, even those most prominent and most interested, utterly failed to accomplish what it was proposed to accomplish. The pleas which were made were ad misericor-diam appeals, based on the inexperience of the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin) so far as the charges relate to him, and upon the fact that he had only recently come into his office and was not familiar with the duties and powers belonging to it. Such a plea was put forward on behalf of a gentleman who, as has already been pointed out. had a distinguished legal career and a long practice not merely in civil law, because had that been the case we might have found some reason to explain and extenuate his conduct. But this is the conduct, the course of action of a lawyer not only brilliant and learned in his legal acquirements and in the practice of his profession but a lawyer whose practice has been in criminal law, who has been a prosecutor for the crown. The speech of the hon.

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bury
minister himself was a poor attempt to justify and explain his conduct; the speech of the Prime Minister, (Mr. Mackenzie King) his leader, was almost equally poor and weak and irrelevant; the speech of the Solicitor General might be placed in the same category for absolute inefficiency, and finally the speech of the Minister of Railways, who was supposed to take this House by storm and be the saviour of his party and of the country, was perhaps the poorest speech delivered by a member of the government that I have heard in the months I have been in this House.
Not merely was there an utter absence of genuine defence or argument but in point of fact there was gross misrepresentation by nearly all the gentlemen whose names I have mentioned, both of the facts and of the law. That statement is easy to make but perhaps not so easy in tihe time at my disposal to exemplify, but the misrepresentations in connection with the law were perfectly obvious. The Minister of Customs informed the House yesterday evening that it lay virtually with 'the Minister of Customs to issue his warrant of commitment before a man, found guilty by a magistrate or by two justices of tihe 'peace, should be taken to prison and confined there. That, of course, is utter rubbish. The warrant is not that of the Minister of Customs 'but one issued by the magistrate or justices who try the man. The Criminal Code of this country which, as the Solicitor General very well knew and as the Minister of Railways should have known, regulates procedure in these matters, directs the justices or the magistrate who tried the case, immediately after the conviction of the offender, to fill in the form of conviction according to the code and to issue a warrant according to the nature of the sentence.
Now let me pass on to some of the charges made in this case. I say-and I think the House will agree with me-that the charges have been absolutely proved. The charges which were laid by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) on February 2, have been proved practically to the hilt, as will be seen by the reports and findings of the special committee. Not only that, but we have the admission of one of the members of that committee, the hon. member for Vancouver North (Mr. Don-aghy), in his long speech delivered the other day, that if the hon. member for Vancouver Centre had not taken the action he did these facts would never have been elicited, and the condition of the Department of Customs would never have been brought to light. It
follows, therefore, that all the attempts-and they have been many and strenuous and eloquent and vociferous-which have been made to throw discredit on the action of the hon. member, and the attempts to discredit the motives and results of his action are absolutely answered not out of the mouths of members on this side of the House but out of the mouth of the member appointed by the government on that committee.
I wish to say also that in his defence of the government the Prime Minister was very eloquent and very diffuse in laying before the House what the government had done, by reason of which they should be exonerated from these charges and sent back to resume their duties with a clean sheet. If you analyze the speech of the Prime Minister, the speech of the Solicitor General, even the speech of the hon. member for Vancouver North, and the speeches of most of the members who spoke on behalf of the government, you will find that the only defence is that the government placed adequate legislation on the statute books. The Prime Minister took us over one statute after another which was placed on the statute books by this government, directed to meet the needs of the Department of Customs. I submit to this House that the trouble is not with the legislation; the trouble is with the administration, and there was a very significant and very eloquent silence on the part of all government supporters who were so strenuous in their defence of the administration on the one vital matter of how the government administered their own statutes. It would be far better for this country if it had about one-half of the present statutes, and they were administered properly. There is no use trying to cure an evil of this kind by putting statutes on the statute book, to be filed away on the shelves of parliament or of our law societies or in legal offices or even on the shelves of ministers of the government. What this country wants is that the legislation that now exists on the statute books of this country shall be carried out fearlessly, without partiality, with a stern and determined hand, that the ill-doer shall be caught and punished to the last letter of the law, and when that is done the stigma that rests upon the fair name of this country -and that it does so rest, is shown by the facts that have been divulged as a result of this inquiry-will be lifted from that name.
Another thing to which I would like to call the attention of the House is this. The pleas that have been made here have been most absurd. The hon. member who preceded me, the hon. member for Melfort (Mr. McLean)
506S

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Bury
urged upon the House that there had been continuous efforts by the opposition to swing votes. That was the weight of one of the first charges he made against us, that we had been busy trying to swing votes. Oh, I should like to have the secret history of the last four months of this parliament! I should like to have told here all that went on behind closed doors in ministers' offices and in private members' offices throughout this building. I should like to know who did the trying to swing votes. I venture to say here and now that from the beginning of this session till this very day the government have been trying to swing votes to keep in office, and its tenure of office has been the most precarious tenure of office that any government has ever had. I am not going to take up the time of the House any longer. I see that the hour is late and 1 am not desirous of delaying the vote which the House 'is anxious to take.


Mr. EDWARDS (South Waterloo):: I was paired with tlhe hon. member for North Waterloo (Mr. Euler). Had I voted, I would have voted against the subamendment.


Mr. FONTAINE:: I was paired with the
hon. member for Ottawa (Mr. Chabot). Had I voted I would have voted for the subamendment.


Mr. CROSS:: I was paired with the hon.
member for West Calgary (Mr. Bennett). Had I voted, I would have voted for the subamendment.


Mr. W. R. FANSHER (Last Mountain):: I beg to move in amendment to the amendment, seconded by the hon. member for Macleod (iMr. Coote):
That the words "and that the committee for such purposes be revived" as they appear at the end of the amendment be struck out and the following substituted therefor:-
Your committee deplores the common practice, as revealed by the evidence, of members of parliament and others appealing to the minister ito relax the regulations of the department for personal advantage or
political expediency.
And also to add thereto the following to paragraph four:	.
Since ithe inquiry indicates that the smuggling evils are so extensive and itheir ramifications so far-reaching that only a portion of the illegal practices have been brought to light, your committee recommends the appointment of a judicial commission with full powers -to continue and complete investigating the administration of the Department of Customs and Excise and to prosecute all offenders.
And also to strike out all the words after the word "department" in the third line of .paragraph eight.
And also in clause thirteen to add the name of R. R. Farrow'. Deputy Minister of Customs and Excise, to the l.ist of those who are recommended that their services be dispensed with,
And that the committee for such purposes be revived.


Hewitt Bostock: Before putting the amendment to the amendment, I may say that I have some doubts as to its regularity. All the
allegations or declarations contained in this subamendment have just been voted upon by the House, and Bourinot at page 318 states:
If the amendment is rejected, it is regular to move another provided, of course, it is different in purport from that already negatived.
Of course if the new amendment had been different in purport it would have been proper to be moved.


Arthur Meighen: The opinion, Mr. Speaker, you have tentatively expressed must arise from a failure to appreciate the amendment and its entire effect. The main clause of the subamendment just defeated was to strike out all of the amendment itself; the subamendment struck out all the words after the word "instructions" and substituted a number of paragraphs instead. The effect of this amendment is not to strike out anything except the very last few words:
And that the committee for such purpose be revived.
Otherwise the first amendment moved by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) stands, of course making it very substantially different from the amendment just defeated. The last few words are struck out and then all that is in this amendment is inserted including those last few words, those last few words, therefore, coming in their proper place in the end. The difference in a word is this that the subamendment just defeated eliminated the primary amendment of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. This amendment takes the amendment of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre and adds to it the amendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.


Lucien Cannon: The leader of the opposition is apparently more familiar with the amendment just proposed than I am. The question has been raised by Your Honour as to whether or not the subamendment is in order. It is a rather difficult question to decide. The members have not had the amendment in their hands; we do not know the exact contents or terms of it, and I think it would be fair to every hon member that we should adjourn so that we may know exactly what the hon. gentleman proposes. Nobody knows except the leader of the opposition.


Sir HENRY DRAYTON:: Mr. Speaker-


Mr.   GANNON@: If my hon. friend will
allow me a moment. In conclusion I would move the adjournment of the debate in order that we might know exactly what is before the House.
Customs Inquiry-Division


Hewitt Bostock: The hon. gentleman has
already spoken. He is speaking for the second time.


Lucien Cannon: If the Speaker will allow
me, I spoke on the subamendment which has been defeated, but we have before the House a new amendment and I am speaking on it.


Hewitt Bostock: I understand the hon.
the Solicitor General had spoken on the point of order, had taken his seat, and then rose again to move the adjournment of the debate.


Lucien Cannon: Technically, Your Honour, I did speak twice, but I just got up the second time to add to my remarks that we should adjourn the debate.


Hewitt Bostock: I am not convinced by that argument. I take the amendment which has just been defeated by the House; I read the various allegations of that subamendment and those of the present subamendment, and I find they are identical. The allegations are the same, and I must be governed by common sense and by precedents. Bourinot says:
But an amendment once negatived by the House cannot be (proposed a second time.
All the allegations are so much alike that the French translation which I gave I read from the subamendment which has just been defeated.


Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker, will you permit me one minute?


Hewitt Bostock: I shall have to abide by the rules in such a circumstance as this. Otherwise the Speaker might perhaps risk his head. Seriously, if no objection is taken to the motion made by the hon. member, I will put it.


Arthur Meighen: Certainly the hon. mem-bre cannot make a motion to adjourn the debate. He has already spoken.


Lucien Cannon: I had no doubt the right
hon. member would make the objection. He is right.


Henry Lumley Drayton: I was going to rise merely for the purpose of pointing out to the House that there is nothing new in the present amendment. The present amendment hon. gentlemen have had in their hands ever since it was moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth). The wording is familiar to everybody. Of course the difference is very vital but it is nothing new at all. The difference is very vital as it makes this amendment entirely different from the one we have already dealt with. While it carries into effect the different suggestions made by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre as to further action, at the same time it is a motion censuring the government. The censure stands; the whole of the first amendment stands, and the different matters urged by the hon. gentleman which have already been discussed are merely added to it.


Mr. GUTHRIE:: I think if Your Honour will look at it in this way it will not take long to decide it. The subamendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre was largely in substitution of the amendment moved originally. The subamendment now proposed is in addition, not in substitution.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


Hewitt Bostock: Even if I should declare the subamendment out of order, any member may rise and move another amendment provided that it is drafted according to the rule. So that nobody is deprived of his right. I say, therefore, that in my humble judgment, the subamendment is out of order because it is an exact repetition of the subamendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.


Arthur Meighen: I rise to appeal from your ruling.


Hewitt Bostock: Mr. Fansher having moved the subamendment which by the Speaker was declared out of order because in his judgment it was a repetition of the subamendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth), the Right Hon. Mr. Meighen appeals from that decision. Is it the pleasure of the House that the ruling of the Speaker be sustained?


Joseph-Éloi Fontaine: I was paired with the
hon. member for Ottawa (Mr. Chabot). Had I voted I would have voted that the ruling be sustained.


Alexander McKay Edwards: I was paired with the hon. member for North Waterloo (Mr. Euler). Had I voted I would have voted that the ruling of the Chair be not
sustained.


Hewitt Bostock: I shall now put the
amendment which I had overruled. Shall I
read it again?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Dispense.


Hewitt Bostock: The question is on the
amendment to the amendment.


William Richard Motherwell: Mr. Speaker, before we have
any more amendments, or subamendments, or any more votes recorded I desire to make

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
a few observations. True it is that the subamendment of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodisworth) has been defeated, but the battle is never won or lost until the last gun is fired1. My mind goes back with some vividness to the night of February 2 last when the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) made his famous charges against the government. Ever since then, however, hon. gentlemen opposite have kept rigidly away from the allegation with respect to the former Minister of Customs and Excise having taken away to his home at Three Rivers nine targe boxes of public documents and there destroyed them. At no time throughout the entire investigation has any attempt been made to ascertain whether such an allegation had any semblance of the truth. And yet throughout his speech the hon. member for Vancouver Centre repeated the allegation and asserted that if such a thing were true there was danger of more evidence of a damaging nature being destroyed. The House will recall that the question before us at the time was whether there should be an adjournment. The government was asking for an adjournment of six weeks in order to carry out the reconstruction of the cabinet. The hon. member for Vancouver Centre took the ground that in view of all these documents having been taken away from the files and destroyed, there was a possibility that other documents might be taken away and destroyed in the same ruthless manner if we were given an adjournment. That was the keynote of his statement; I remember it quite well. However, the hon. member for Vancouver Centre did not make his charges applicable to the government on, that occasion. He was good enough to absolve the Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) from any complicity in this terrible crime, and he also absolved the Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart, Edmonton) and I remember quite well, too, that he was good enough to absolve myself from any complicity. I think I told my good friend on that occasion that I did not want any absolution at his hands.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is right.


William Richard Motherwell: I think the chief
charge contained in the amendment has been that this government has -been too slow in instituting reforms in connection with smuggling throughout Canada. Well, Mr. Speaker, if we have been Slow in this matter, all other governments have been slower still, because no other government since confederation ever took such prompt action to put down.' smuggling, and no government ever achieved the success that has attended our efforts.

Let us see what there is in this charge against the Minister of Customs. A few days after the general election last October we went into council and decided to carry on until parliament met and then ask whether we would be sustained in this House, with the result that on some fourteen or fifteen occasions we have been sustained by our supporters and our allies. Two or three days following the election of October 29, 1925 after we decided to carry on, the Minister of Customs consulted the Minister of Finance with regard to the best steps to take to combat this smuggling difficulty. At that time our desks were covered with accumulations of correspondence and papers which we had not been able to attend to during the campaign, but by November 15, the Minister of Customs had got in touch with Mr. Duncan, an ex-Scotland Yard detective whom the Minister of Finance had loaned him for the purpose of investigating conditions in Montreal and elsewhere. At the time Mr. Duncan had other investigatory work on hand, but by December 1 he was in Montreal prosecuting the inquiry that we felt was necessary before we took further action to combat the smuggling evil. No reasonable man can claim that the Minister of Customs could have acted more expeditiously.
In the meantime the member for Vancouver Centre seemed to know exactly what was taking place in the department. On the very day that Mr. Duncan got into harness at Montreal the member for Vancouver Centre, or some of his friends, sent a despatch to the Montreal Star intimating that he intended to take action in the matter-but he was just two weeks behind the Minister of Customs. It is significant that on February 2 the hon. member made allegations and charges against this government respecting the very conditions that are outlined in the report made by Mr. Duncan on the instructions of the Minister of Customs.
We all know the legal axiom that whoever seeks justice must come before the court with clean hands. Let us inquire how the hon. member for Vancouver Centre stands in that respect. First he puts himself in the dual position of investigator and prosecutor. Then when the committee was being formed he allowed himself to be put in the position of judge and juror. AVas there any impropriety there? AATat is the usual custom when one member makes a charge against another? If he is offered the opportunity of going on the committee, very often he declines for good and substantial reasons obvious to all. But the hon. member has no delicacies of that nature; he wants to be prosecutor; he wants to be judge and jury and now. if we

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
allow him, he would like to be hangman as well. There are no niceties to deter the hon. member from cleaning up this mess and incidentally destroying the government.
There is another triviality; the hon. member gave no notice the night he made his statement. You will remember that the substance of his remarks was on the order paper in the form of a resolution; he took it off in the middle of the night and then, when other assassins were abroad, he launched it in the form of a charge against this government, taking the Minister of Customs entirely unawares and giving him no opportunity for preparation. But I suppose that is only a trivial oversight on the part of my hon. friend; if he were out to kill, why give notice? However, we will pass that up.
Then another thing is the method which he followed in getting his information. Where did it come from? Mr. Duncan in his evidence says it is his opinion that the information came from Mr. Sparks. I did not look it up, but an hon. gentleman informs me that Mr. Sparks swore that the information did not come from him. When the Minister of Customs intimated that he knew where my hon. friend got the information in the Duncan report, my hon. friend denied that. Then the Minister of Customs said:
Wild my 'hon. friends make the same denial concerning Mr. Sparks?
Then note the hon. member's answer:
No. Mr. Speaker, so far as the Merchants' Protective Assoteiartio-n is concerned it is, as the hon. minister knows, an association of business men which has met the government on several occasions. I have mert the Merchants' Proiteetive Association, as I have met Mr. Sparks, both last year and this year. But I want to say to the hon. minister that the information which I used to-day is certainly not exclusively or indeed in large measure that of Mr. Sparks.
He admits inferentially, however, that some of that information came from Mr. Sparks, although he does not say how much. I have not the pleasure of Mr. Sparks' acquaintance; I may meet him some time but just now I must form my opinion from what he has done not only in this regard but in other respects. Mr. Sparks swore that he did not give the information to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre, while the hon. member admits in his speech that he received some of the information from Mr. Sparks. These two gentlemen cannot both be telling the truth, and I leave it to them to settle who is wrong. One thing which we do know, however, is that the hon. member had the substance of the Duncan report before the Minister of Customs ever saw it. That was information dug up at the instance of the minister, and the hon. member used it as a foundation for his charges. He
used it 'to destroy the future political prospects of the minister, and to destroy the government as well. Well, I suppose the question of ethics does not enter very much into warfare, but I think we might examine into what this means. If I know anything at all the information upon which the hon. member based his charges was stolen by somebody from somebody, and the hon. member used stolen goods; that is the way he started to clean up things, but we will see how it finishes.
What was the government going to do with this information when they got it? Judging from the attitude we have taken in the matter of royal commissions, as outlined in the amendment just defeated, we were going to take the course usually followed in matters of this kind. First we were going to have a parliamentary committee to look into these charges, something in the nature of a preliminary hearing before a magistrate. Then, if the allegations were reasonably substantiated, the matter would be submitted to a royal commission which would go into it in a judicial way and get at the real facts. But apparently the hon. member was desirous of precipitating a political issue; hon. members opposite did not want an investigation by a royal commission, because they have voted down a subamendment to that effect.
I remember some experiences I had which the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell) mentioned this afternoon. He took the ground that if this government would only follow the example set by the Scott government of Saskatchewan in 1916, when they cleaned up the rascality found to exist in some departments there, as a supporter of that government he would be delighted to support this government as well. That is exactly the course that we started out to pursue. What was the result of the investigations at Regina? First of all, we had three committees appointed, and these three committees established the fact that great wrongs had been committed, that thefts had been committed by part of the staff. While we were hunting around for the personnel of three royal commissions to continue these investigations, there was a great deal of excitement among the ranks of the opposition, just as there is here to-day. They thought that we were going to leave the matter in the hands of a committee of the House and, as they said, whitewash ourselves. It took us some time to find enough judges available to constitute these three commissions, and what kind of judges did we appoint? Did we appoint judges who would Whitewash us? No. Did we appoint judges that we hoped would be


Arthur Meighen: You would not need the X-ray there.


William Richard Motherwell: I want to point out that we not only started this investigation as soon as the Minister of Customs had taken office, but away back in 1924 we went out of our way to such an extent that the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George said that we have abdicated all the functions of government in working in co-operation with the Commercial Protective Association, which had asked us to endeavour to clean up this smuggling business. We asked them what they wanted, and they said they wanted remedial legislation. We were busy in the midst of a session at the time, if I remember rightly, and we logically and properly answered: You draft the legislation, and if it is reasonable we will put it through. We also increased by a considerable amount the vote for the preventive service, so that the staff might be enlarged. When has there been in the history of Canada since confederation such an attempt to better matters, and yet we are going to be censured for what we did by the men who never did anything but help corrupt the situation and make it worse. If we are going to have a fight, we might as well have it on that as anything else. The one who does most to clean things up is going to be censured. But there is a higher court than this, Mr. Speaker, to appeal to, and that is the country, and we are not afraid to go there.


Arthur Meighen: That is the only place you can go.


William Richard Motherwell: They will not be able to get away with their libellous statements concerning the Minister of Customs
507')

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
when we go to the country; they will not be able to get away with traducing remarks about Hon. Jacques Bureau taking his files away. Let us examine that file charge.


Mr. SPENCE (Parkdale):: What's the use of bothering? It won't do any good.


William Richard Motherwell: Let us examine it, because the ashes of those burned files-they said they were burnt-are rising up in judgment against hon. gentlemen opposite and proving them to be wrong. What about the letter from the liquor commission? That proves it was submitted to the liquor commission. It was said to be burned and destroyed, but I say it is rising up in judgment against hon. gentlemen opposite now. My right hon. friend the leader of the opposition said: Well, if that letter was there, it should not have been there. It was a public document. But he did not tell the House that it was addressed to Three Rivers and never was forwarded to Ottawa. That might very easily happen. For many years when I was in Regina my home was in Abernethy, and sometimes I would have twenty or thirty letters there awaiting my arrival. It was very easy for these letters not to be forwarded to Regina. They might very easily be filed away by someone who did not know their purport, and so with Mr. Bureau. I wonder if the hon. member for Vancouver Centre really believed what he said. He should know that Mr. Bureau, like any other minister, had the right to take away his private files. Was he not a minister himself for three or four weeks in 1921? He must have known that he had the right, and I know he exercised the right of taking away some of these files because there was a file of the Department of Trade and Commerce put on the table during the debate on the contract of Sir William Petersen. The file was supposed to be on the table there. It was noticed by the right hon. leader of the opposition. There was a letter in that file marked "confidential". The Prime Minister indicated that it should not be tabled, and the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) knew he had a right to that letter and took it off the file before our eyes; so that he knew Mr. Bureau had the right to take away his private files. The keystone of his charges was that boxes of letters were taken to Three Rivers and destroyed. He repeated the charge and opposed an adjournment for fear we would cover up our alleged nefarious conduct by the destruction of more files. Do hon. gentlemen think he can get away with that before a royal commission,
or before the electors-making charges that the minister has stolen property and also trying to ruin the reputation of an honourable man, the present Minister of Customs, whose shoestrings he is not fit to unloose? I do not quote poetry often, but here is a passage from Othello which I will read.
Wlho steals my punse steals trash.
And if we remain in Ottawa much longer, he who steals my purse will certainly steal trash. It reads:
The good name, in man and woman, dear my lord,
Is the immediate jewel of their souls.
Who steals my .punse, steals trash; '.tis something, nothing;
'T was mine, 't is his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name,
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed.
The only difference is that he attempts to filch the good name of the hon. Minister of Customs, but that does enrich him, which makes the offence a thousand times worse. However, it does not seem to affect him, he is as hard as a nail, with a hide on him like a rhinoceros. I remember the night he made those charges. He did it well. He thought he was going to shake the members on this side of the House out of their chairs that night, and he came pretty nearly doing it, but those of us who know the hon. gentleman, the fearless fighter he has been in former sessions, can see the violent contrast between his conduct in former sessions and during this session. Ever since that night he has taken very little part in proceedings, but no doubt he did his work in the committee. As soon as he got through that night, as soon as he saw the hon. Minister of Customs was ready for him-which was not due to preparedness, because he did not know what was coming; it was rather due to his resourcefulness-he was able to meet him. I was reminded of the retreat from Mons; as soon as the enemy had dug in it was only a matter of time till he would be beaten. I want to draw a parallel in the present case. My hon. friend's march upon the Marne was stopped that night.
I forgot to tell the House the result of the investigation of the Regina commission. Some men were put in gaol and one sent to the penitentiary. Was the government ruined? We went to the country the next year, and in a House of sixty members seven Tories came back. Give us a chance to show the heinousness of the hon. member's charges. Let us have a royal commission, such as we had in Regina. Well, there may be more than

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
seven Tories come back to this House, but they will have a very much smaller number than they have at the present time. If the hon. Minister of Customs and other young men on this side of the House, who are growing into prominence both inside and outside the government, have an opportunity to display their talents for one year, we will see what will happen. This government would be in power for an indefinite length of time and they may be in any event. What does the investigation show? It shows that it is very incomplete. It says that more inquiries' will be necessary. Yet think of it, wanting to render a decision, with the evidence only partly in! What would you think. Mr. Speaker, of a judge, hearing evidence on one side only, solemnly rendering a decision. The committee investigating this matter admit that the investigation was only partial and that subsequent investigation will be necessary to get at the real situation. Yet they want to render a verdict based on a partial exposure of the facts. It is just as reasonable as a judge on the bench giving a decision without hearing all the facts. Why does the opposition want that? Because they know that a complete exposure of the facts would put them in the wrong and put us in the right, so that there would be no hope for them at the next election. That is the reason they want a snap verdict.
I wish I could impress my Progressive friends with these facts. There are not many of them in the House at the moment. I know they are really desirous of doing the right thing. I ask them if it is right for members to base actions on party feelings. We are "ready, aye ready", for further investigation. Why is it not granted? Did we not make the best possible use of every particle of our time since the Minister of Customs came into the government and before that? How are we going to clean up all the mess which was left after the Tory government had been in power for ten years? This customs matter, is part of it. The charges against my colleague completely 'broke down. The Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) demonstrated that this afternoon. What is the charge? It is that this government is subject to censure, although any one member of this government has done more to improve matters than all the whole caboodle opposite. But I do not mind what the Tories do, I expect it. It is part of the game. What would they do if they followed their feelings? If one-tenth of those members who wanted to break away from the party on the motion for censure against the Minister 
of Customs acted as they really felt, we would not have been two behind but about twenty ahead. I know' how many men would have censured the Minister of Customs if he had been outside of politics and if they really desired to express their honest opinion. How many of them will get up alongside of him and size up to him in character and ability? I do not think there would be very many applicants. Lots of hon. members on the other side have character and ability, but there among them is no man of greater ability and promise than the Minister of Customs. They just want to get over here. It is a long time since the 29th October last to wait to get over here. They were just within the promised land as they thought, but they were denied entrance. They think they are just about in now. but they are not here yet.
This question involves many things. If the government and their allies are defeated, it means that we shall get a dissolution or somebody on the other side will be called upon. There is no doubt who will be called upon; it will be the leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen). The Montreal Star and the Gazette sometimes have had another guess, but they have always been guessing wrong, anid I do not think their guess has done the leader of the opposition any harm. When these party papers begin sniping their own leaders, they are not up to much. That applies to both sides; we have the same thing to contend with, so that that makes me sympathise with my right hon. friend.


Arthur Meighen: The hon. gentleman particularizes as to ours. Will he be good enough to particularize as to the Liberal papers to which he refers?


William Richard Motherwell: There is only one -the Toronto Globe. Is that the answer my right hon. friend wants?


Arthur Meighen: I think the answer is a little incomplete, but I will accept it.


William Richard Motherwell: That is the only one I am aware of. The Speaker permitted the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre to discuss the alternative to supporting the government, to this government continuing in power with the assistance and1 co-operation of its allies in order to cany the programme of the session to Consummation. Some of it is in the Senate; some of it is still in this House. What is going to become of the Hudson Bay railway if my right hon. friend has charge of affairs? We have been working on that project in the west for forty years. Is the fact that this government has exercised

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
itiself in endeavouring to suppress smuggling more rapidly than any other government in the history of Canada, justification for jeopardizing the building of the Hudson Bay railway? The rank and file 'of t'he Tory party in eastern Canada, when the Hudson Bay railway question was before the House opposed it, not openly, not by getting up and moving against it, but speaking against it, deriding it and sneering at it. The Journal of this 'City spoke about the Hudson bay area as the country of icebergs, seals, walruses and so on.
The leader of the opposition when he was in the west pledged himself to the building of the Hudson Bay railway providing it would not cost more than $3,000,000. That pledge would be carried out if he gets into power to-morrow and the Hudson Bay railway would stop somewhere in the vicinity of where he stopped it before, namely at Kettle rapids, the second crossing of the Nelson river. I wonder bow supporters of the Hudson Bay railway axe going to justify before their electors defeating this government for having done more to suppress the smuggling evil and by their action jeopardizing the Hudson Bay railway. The leader of the opposition is going to have some trouble in defending that in Portage la Prairie if I know anything. I look forward with some interest to the contest in Portage la Prairie; I hope it will not be a three-cornered one. How much further will his supporters allow him to go than to spend the $3,000,000? Not one foot farther.
What about the grain bill that is hanging up in the Senate waiting for somebody to come that they do not want to come? Nobody on either side wants Mr. Boyd to come to Ottawa; they do not need him; but they are waiting for him to come. What will happen to that bill, commonly called the Campbell bill? When that bill was in the agricultural committee, every Liberal, every Progressive, every anti-Tory in the committee voted for it. It really should be called the Turgeon bill that should have been put through last year instead of now. Twelve Conservatives voted against it in the agricultural committee. It is now in the Senate; how much mercy is it going to receive from the party that is always behind the big interests-the Tory party? We shall see what the farmers have to say about that when they ask:	Why did you jeopardize these things?
What are you getting in lieu of this? Were the government and their allies not doing well enough for all parts of Canada, but particularly for the west and the Maritimes?
One of the things we have done for the Maritimes is to clean up tuberculosis in the
cattle. There is only one province in the Dominion that is free from tuberculosis as regards its cattle and that is Prince Edward Island. There is a standing offer to the Premier of Nova Scotia to do the same thing for that province just as soon as they are ready. That has not been done in any other province. We have in the estimates a provision, an old part of the Agricultural Act vote devoted to paying the balance of the instalments on two buildings in the Maritime provinces, one at Truro and one at Fredericton. That is something that has not been done for any other province.
What about the tariff, which means a great deal to us, if my right hon. friend comes over here? The tariff is of practically no use to western Canada. We recognize that we have to have a tariff; we are willing to have a reasonable tariff on what we have to buy; but we feel that the Maritimes and the prairie west that are really injured by a protective tariff should be dealt with fairly in order to compensate them for their loss under that tariff. The Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) has to have revenue to carry on the government and this is one way in which something like $130,000,000 or $140,000,000 is secured. But it must be an equalized tariff, one that will bear as equally as possible on all classes of the people; and those who are not helped by it should have some compensation in lieu thereof. That has been our tariff policy. What has been the policy of hon. gentlemen opposite? Protection for the central provinces that have benefited most and let the rest of the country go hang. If the members from the Maritimes and the prairie provinces deliberately put their neck into this noose again they will do it with their eyes wide open. I wonder if my good friend the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins) intends to run again. If he does not it is not because he is afraid to run; he is not afraid of anything. How is he going to explain his attitude toward these questions? That is what is interesting me?
We are going to have a very interesting election whether we are on the inside or the outside track. It is not always the horse on the inside track that wins the race; its the best horse that wins as a rule. The government has dealt with the tariff .in a manner most satisfactory to the country as a whole. There never has been such a satisfactory adjustment of the tariff since 1897 as there was this session. There has been an adjustment downwards of the income tax, restoration of the penny postage to the figure it was in 1897, a thing that was hailed with delight all over Canada. Are we to be punished for
507S

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Motherwell
these things? Is there to be restoration of a high protective tariff with all that it means? I am not saying these things because of unkindness to hon. gentlemen opposite, but I am not going to shake hands with them until I have to.
What about the question of old age pensions? Some people in this country are so well situated now by way of pension that they are oblivious to the interests of others who are getting old. How much legislation is the country going to get from my hon. friends in that respect? Will they revive the bill which passed this House? Well, we will see.
We have had a debate on the Locarno pact with all it implies. At the beginning of the session we were twitted with not having ratified it although there is a lot at stake in that compact and the questions associated with it. I think it is the only question ever debated in this House upon which the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Meighen) did not speak a word. It is not from shyness that he did not speak.


Robert James Manion: There is no such pact.


William Richard Motherwell: I do not care what you call it; it is very hard to keep track of all these things. There is the question of accepting the obligation involved under it.


Robert James Manion: Not until Germany is admitted to the league.


William Richard Motherwell: What did the right hon. leader of the opposition do when he was asked by the Prime Minister to indicate his position? I have read his speech in Toronto and the loop-the-loop speech he made in Hamilton. WTe used to think that whatever else might be said of the right hon. gentleman he was never open to the accusation of cowardice. Whether that may be, on that occasion he hoisted both the white flag and the yellow flag; he crawled in under the underpinning of the barn, through a hole in the wall, and pulled the hole with him.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


William Richard Motherwell: You cannot laugh
that down. Who was the author of the WarTime Elections Act? What about the disfranchising of. thousands of men who came to Canada in good faith and after showing themselves to be good citizens expected to get their certificates of naturalization? The right hon. leader of the opposition is credited with having disfranchised many worthy citizens at one stroke of the pen. He is also being blamed to some extent for the partial enfranchisement of women; the enfranchisement

of those women he thought would vote right. Never was such a crime committed even in Mexico in connection with the matter of enfranchisement. What about the traffic in soldiers' votes. The allotment of those votes to the proper constituencies where they would get the best results? 'What, a glorious, delightful way of securing control of the government.


An hon. MEMBER:: Such a thing was
never done.


William Richard Motherwell: Those who know
most about the matter do not deny it.


Arthur Meighen: I did not think the hon. gentleman expected a denial. I thought he knew he was talking nonsense just to fill in time.


William Richard Motherwell: My right hon. friend takes good care not to make a denial. Hon. gentlemen opposite want to come over here and clean up smuggling more rapidly, a practice that is encouraged by a higher tariff, as stated by the Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) this afternoon.*


Henry Alfred Mullins: I should like to ask my
hon. friend a question. I happened to be out of the chamber when he made a reference to me a moment ago. Does not the policy of this government with respect to the live stock industry merit severe censure?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Hewitt Bostock: I think we are getting
away from the question. I would ask the Minister of Agriculture to adhere to the subject before the House.


William Richard Motherwell: You have been so
indulgent in the past, Mr. Speaker, that I have no hesitation in accepting your hint not to wander too far from the question. May I not answer the question of the hon. member for Marquette?


Hewitt Bostock: Yes, providing it is to
the point.


William Richard Motherwell: My hon. friend
suggests that the government has been guilty of neglect with respect to the live stock industry.


Henry Alfred Mullins: Pure neglect.


William Richard Motherwell: The hon. gentleman was not here last year except as a witness and the evidence he gave before the Petersen committee was favourable to the government with regard to the live stock industry. He was against the chilled meat industry in competition with Argentina. He showed that

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
the only hope of the live stock industry of this country was to get our cattle into the markets of Great Britain on the hoof. We have not failed I might state in our duty to that, industry. We were the ones to strike the last blow which opened up the British market, closed for thirty years to our stockers. That trade is developing now by leaps and bounds, but when we strove to get lower ocean rates what help did we get from hon. gentlemen opposite? None at all. I would point out-not to defend the hon. Minister of Customs-that in the Waisberg case the Conservative whip, the member for-what is his constituency again?


An hon. MEMBER:: Lunenburg.


William Richard Motherwell: The member for
North Simeoe (Mr. Boys). Waisberg, a professional smuggler, a confirmed briber, a corrupter of the morals of that district, got into trouble with the Customs department. And who came to his rescue? The Conservative whip. He importuned the then Minister of Customs, Mr. Bureau, who turned him down. Twice the Conservative whip came down to Ottawa, he tells us in his professional capacity-how he could separate it from his capacity as a member of parliament I do not know-and finally Mr. Bureau remitted the gaol penalty but charged Waisberg double duty. Surely this House cannot hope to get any remedy for the smuggling difficulty in that direction.
The Prime Minister recited what took place between ourselves and the Commercial Protective Association. We even went to the extent of inviting them to draft amendments to strengthen the Customs law. In this work we did not get too much support from hon. members opposite outside the leader of the opposition. We passed the necessary supply to provide a new preventive service, but we had not time during the interim to use it all. The country was in the throes of a general election, and I think under the circumstances we have effected great reforms in the direction desired by the people of this Dominion.


Mr. McQUARRIE:: What kind of throes are you in now?


William Richard Motherwell: I do not know what the hon. gentleman means. As has been said more than once, the people of Canada are watching the results of the movements in this House, and of every member who is responsible for precipitating another general election they will ask:	Why did you do it;
what was the question involved? How much 14011-322
more rapidly could any set of men go in the direction of reforming the Customs service than we did? What more honourable man can you find in the public service than the present Minister of Customs? I am ready for the contest at any time, but I do not want the country to be precipitated into another general election without due deliberation, I do not think it is wise to make a leap in the dark. Therefore I would exhort every hon. gentleman who intends to come back here to weigh well the results of his vote to-night.


Mr. STEWART (Leeds):: In what constituency does the hon. minister propose to ' run?


An hon. MEMBER:: In yours.


Mr. E. J. YOUNG (Weyfbum):: Mr. Speaker, since the Customs committee has presented its report practically every speaker on the opposite side of the chamber has prefaced his remarks by complimenting the committee on its work. I am sorry that I cannot concur in that opinion. I do not consider the committee is entitled to any thanks from this House or from the country, for the reason that it did not investigate the charges that it was appointed to investigate. Not very many minutes ago the hon. member for East Edmonton (Mr. Bury) stated that the charges made by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) were proved right up to the hilt.


An hon. MEMBER:: Hear, hear.


Edward James Young: Some hon. member says "Hear, hear." Well, let us examine the hilt, and I think we will probably find that it extends all the way down to the point. What were the charges that the hon. member for Vancouver Centre made? I well remember on February 2 at about midnight, "at the witching hour when hell itself breathes forth contagion to the world"-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Edward James Young: I remember the hon. member got up and hurled his charges across the floor. First he said:
I wish to say right now that already nine filing cabinets filled with records containing damaging evidence have been removed from the custody and the care of that institution known as the government, taken away down to the home of an ex-minister and there destroyed.
Did the committee investigate that charge?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Yes.

5080	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)


Edward James Young: I have never
heard of it. Did they find that charge true? It is not so stated in the report. They ignored that charge entirely. Then he said:
In the second place I will not disclose the source of my information because I know, and I will prove it to the House before I am through, that innocent business men would not dare to walk the streets of Montreal if it were known that they disclosed certain information. Yes, and the ministers know this, the government know it.
That, I think, Mr. Speaker, is perhaps the most serious charge of all. It means that in the city of Montreal a gang of thugs would actually put out of the way any reputable business man who dared reveal anything that he knew about their machinations. Was that charge investigated by the committee? I never heard of it. Is there anything about it in the evidence taken? I have not seen it. Is it mentioned in the report? I have not seen it there. They did not investigate that charge.


An hon. MEMBER:: Time.,


Edward James Young: Oh, there is
lots of time. This is his third charge:
We voted $350,000 for special preventive work. What did the government do with it? It was used largely for political henchmen during the election.
That is a very serious charge; it means that the government asked parliament last session for $350,000 to prevent smuggling and used that money as a campaign fund during the last election.


An hon. MEMBER:: Where was it used?


Edward James Young: The Minister
of Customs told you in his reply ; it was left in the treasury of the country. Did the hon. gentleman substantiate that charge?


An hon. MEMBER:: Certainly.


Edward James Young: He did not.
Did the committee investigate that charge? No. they ignored it as they ignored all the other serious charges. Let us see what the next charge was.


An hon. MEMBER:: Time.


Edward James Young: The hon. gentleman is fond of calling time, but when he is speaking he pleads that he is a young member of the House and asks that we reserve our questions and interruptions until he is finished. This is the next charge:
In the presence of a deputy and another witness, this individual, asking to be appointed to certain positions, offered to superior officers a bribe of $100 a week, not a casual little bribe that ended with the first offering, but a steady salary addition of $100 a week. This was before he was chief preventive officer.
TMr. E. J. Young.]
Now, follow me, all members of the government. This was reported to the minister of the crown, and subsequent to the report of that offer of a bribe, the same minister of the crown promoted him to the position of chief preventive officer of the district of Quebec. Bisaillon offered a bribe for promotion, but "No," this government says, "keep your money to yourself; do not waste your money in thart way; we will give you the position without any bribe."
Was that charge investigated?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, and sworn to in the
committee, and demonstrated by both the deputy minister and Mr. Sparks.


Edward James Young: And stated in
the report?


Henry Herbert Stevens: No; it is in the evidence


Edward James Young: Is it in the report?


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend would not expect all the evidence to be inserted in the report.


Edward James Young: We expect the
report to at least state what charges were proved. Let us see what was the next charge:
I purpose to show that this man Bisaillon, the chief customs preventive officer, raised to that position after the government had knowledge of his rascality and his criminality, received moneys of the crown, some $69,000, discovered in several cases, 'including $14,000 referred to in this examination which I shall read in a moment; that he received moneys of the crown to the extent of tens of thousands of dollars, deposited them to his own account, and this examination will disclose that he never remitted those moneys to the account of the Receiver General.
That is a very serious charge, and was it investigated?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Yes, and proved to the
hilt.


Edward James Young: If it was proved to the hilt why have they asked the attorney general of Quebec to try and prove it?


Henry Herbert Stevens: If my hon. friend will
allow me I will tell him. The attorney general of Quebec is the only officer who can properly deal with the matter, and it was referred to him by the committee for the necessary action.


Edward James Young: I see. Here is
the recommendation of the committee:
The committee recommends that the evidence of J. A*. E. Bisaillon given before this committee with reference to his bank account for the amount of $69,000 be transmitted to the attorney-general for Quebec, for the purpose of comparison with the evidence given by him on the same point at preliminary inquiry at Quebec, P.Q., in the case of Rex vs. Symons et al, and for such action by the said attorney-general as the evidence may warrant;

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
Was that charge proved? Here they ask that the evidence be sent to the attorney general of Quebec for his examination, to see whether it is correct.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Permit me to interrupt.
As a layman I asked that the charge of perjury against Bisaillon be included in this report. The lawyers on the committee, colleagues of my hon. friend as well as of myself, advised me, and the committee so decided, that it was not proper to mention a charge of perjury in a reference of this kind, and this is the action recommended by the lawyers of the committee. I am told it is quite in order.


Edward James Young: I am not a
lawyer and do not understand these fine points. I am a plain, blunt man, and I suppose this report is published for the guidance of ordinary mortals. One would gather that the committee are not quite sure of this man's guilt. What is the next charge? I might explain this a little bit first. When the hon. gentleman made his speech he referred to this gang of smugglers and thugs in Montreal, who would go so far as to commit murder. One of their number was a negro named Bud Harris, who was defrauded by his companions of S3,000, his share of the spoils of the smuggling operations. This man threatened to squeal on his comrades because of this fraud, and the hon. gentleman says:
If you will turn back the files of the Montreal papers you will find where the body of a coloured man was found wired up with wire and weighted with weights *in the Back river. I think from the description I give of this case hon. members will Tecall it. That was the body of Bud Harris, the coloured member of this gang. That was what he got for intimating he would squeal on the smuggling gang in Montreal. Mr. Speaker, do you wonder that I emphasize this: that with the knowledge o*f these things, with the knowledge of the character of this man Bisaillon, with t-he knowledge of these activities of Giroux and others, this government preserved them in their office since last February with positive knowledge before them, and with equal knowledge of their rascality, put this man Bisaillon in the premier office of the customs service-
It is a serious thing to charge that the government knew these men to be not only smugglers and gangsters but also murderers, and with that knowledge promoted this man Bisaillon. Was that charge investigated by the committee; was it proven? I do not see it in the report.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is a statement of fact.


Edward James Young: Then the hon.
gentleman should be able to prove it. These are the charges the committee was appointed to investigate, and they were ignored entirely.
14011-322J
Let us consider the next charge, which has to do with the 16,000 gallons of alcohol sold for less than its value:
That may be an example of the exemplary honesty of these people. It may be that, but lit looks to me, knowing a whole Jot more about the incident, that it was simply a case of covering their tracks. But what was this alcohol sold for? This sixty-nine [per oent overproof alcohol was sold few thirty-six cents a gallon.
And a little later:
A previous seizure properly treated was sold for $14 a gallon.
The charge was that the government had sold 16.000 gallons of alcohol which had been seized from the barge Tremblay to their friends for 36 cents a gallon when they should have sold it for S14 or $15 a gallon, thereby defrauding this country of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Was this charge investigated?


Henry Herbert Stevens: Absolutely, and proved to the hilt.


Edward James Young: My hon. friend's leader took up the matter in the House yesterday, I think, and said that this alcohol was offered to the Quebec Liquor Commission, who refused to buy it because it was unfit for human consumption. The Minister of Customs also pointed out that this alcohol was offered to the Quebec Liquor Commission, and that they refused to buy it because it was unfit for human consumption; they said they could only buy at a very low price, and the minister sold it for the best price he could get, 36 cents a gallon, or 4 cents more than it would cost to reproduce it. The leader of the opposition then said that the government should have sold the alcohol to the commission if they got only one cent a gallon for it because, he argued, that when the Quebec Liquor Commission put that liquor out as potable liquor they would pay an excise tax of $10 a gallon on it, and the government would thereby have gained by it, he said, $160,000. When he made that statement I could not help wondering whether he really believed it himself, or whether he was trying to impose upon the credulity of the House.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It is perfectly correct.


Edward James Young: Let us examine that statement for a minute. The Quebec Liquor Commission each year buy so much alcohol, and no more. I do not know what the amount is, but they buy as much as they can sell. Let us suppose it is 100,000 gallons.


Henry Herbert Stevens: It has been over 300,000 gallons for the last three years.
5082	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
Mr. YOUNG (Weyburn) Very well, but 100,000 gallons will do for the sake of illustration. The excise tax on that at $10 a gallon would amount to $1,000,000. Now it does not make one particle of difference to the revenue of this country whether the Quebec Liquor Commission buy that from the Customs department or from some distillery. If they had bought that 16,000 gallons from the Customs department, they would not have bought it from some other quarter, and the tax of $160,000 paid into the treasury would have been the same. Yet the hon. leader of the opposition gets up and says that we lost $160,000 on that transaction.
I do not think the government are altogether blameless for the situation that is here tonight. I think they might have acted a little differently in the matter on the night of the 2nd of February when the hon. member for Vancouver Centre was hurling his charges across the floor. I think the government should have got up then and told him in good plain English what they thought of him, even if they had to transgress the rules of the House. I would have done it. This committee, I say, did not investigate the charges. The charges are there, and they were not investigated. Why was the investigation confined to certain places and certain times? Well, everybody knows that the committee was composed of four Liberals, four Conservatives, and one Progressive. Everybody knows that the Liberals were suspicious of the Conservatives, that the Conservatives were suspicious of the Liberals, and that the Progressives did not trust either of them very much. The general attitude of the committee was that each side was trying to put something over the other. I reasoned when I saw the investigation had been confined to particular places and times desired by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre himself that it would be a very simple matter for the Conservative members of the committee to persist in asking questions and keeping the inquiry centred on any places they liked. The Liberal members of the committee could not object to that, because to do so would put them in the position of appearing to block the inquiry, so they had to allow those who were taking the initiative to centre the investigation pretty much where they liked.
The hon. member for West Hamilton (Mr. Bell), who was a member of the committee, let a little more light on it this afternoon when he said that perhaps the Liberal members of he committee were asleep, implying that the Conservative members of the comfMr. Stevens.]
mittee were a little sharper than the Liberals and put something over them. That is the statement of a member of the committee, that the Conservatives acted in such a way as to put something over on the Liberals, and that is the evidence and that is the report on which we are asked to condemn the Minister of Customs, on the evidence of a committee a member of which says: Possibly the other side were asleep and we slipped something over on them. Is that justice?
Next we are told that the case is to be tried before this jury. This House is the court, and the members are the jury. The members of this House have not even read the evidence, which comprises some 3,000 pages, and a good many members have not even read the report. How then are we to judge this case. Can we be impartial judges? The jury itself is not in the court room. They have not read the evidence, they have not studied the report, and they have not been here during this debate. How then are the members of this House in a position to judge whether the Minister of Customs should be condemned?


Robert James Manion: They might have read the evidence.


Edward James Young: They might
have, but I say they did not. There are 3,000 pages of it, and members have not studied that carefully enough to render a judgment. Even in a court a judge, after hearing all the evidence and taking notes, always listens very carefully to the summing up of the lawyers.
Now what is the offence of the Minister of Customs? Of what crime has he been guilty? It is this, that he showed a little clemency to a fellow man. Here is a man found guilty of having a little liquor in his possession. He was tried and sentenced to a fine of $150, and to three months imprisonment. He paid his fine, and then the minister, at the request of a friend, delayed the sending of that man to jail.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Why did he
do it?


Edward James Young: Why have such things been done right along in hundreds of
cases?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Was not the request for clemency based purely on political grounds, and granted on these grounds?


Edward James Young: Did not the
member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) explain to the House the other
v	JUNE 25, 1926	5083
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
night that he had that day received a telegram very similar and had acted upon it? I can advance you a dozen reasons why you should do a certain thing, but does it follow that if you do it you have acted because of any particular one of those reasons, or any of them at all?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Yes.


Edward James Young: Not at all. I am advancing you reasons why you should vote for the Minister of Customs, but are you going to do it?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I am not complying with your request at all.


Edward James Young: It is a common practice for members of the House to request a minister to exercise clemency, and it is a common practice for the minister to exercise it. I will not ask the hon. gentleman if he has ever asked for it, but I say the time may come when he will do it, and be very glad to do it. We have a system of laws, and we have policemen to enforce the Jaws, but the policeman does not try an offender. He fakes him where he can be tried. We have a court to try offenders, and the offender can hire a lawyer to defend him, and if the case goes against him, and he has enough money, he can hire another lawyer to get him off. Is there any place where that man can find mercy? If there is not, it will 'be a sorry day for us. There must always be some place where the human element can come in, and where cold justice will not be the only con-sideratiioni. A long time ago it used to be the practice, when a general came back from the battlefield victorious, to honour him, but if he losft his army he was destroyed. That is considered barbarous to-day, and we do not do it any more. But here is another fight that is conducted along a line 4.000 miles in extent, and the general has 5,000 men under him, and because his forces were worsted at one or two outposts, you ask that the general himself be destroyed. It is the custom, I am told, among ship owners to discharge a captain who has lost his ship, but did you ever hear of them discharging a captain because for a single hour he had to run before the breeze? Never. Hon. gentlemen are great admirers of the tall chimneys and want them in all our cities. Do they not know that the tall chimneys sway in the wind. What would a tall chimney be if it were absolutely rigid and would not sway in the wind? It would snap and be worthless.


Robert James Manion: What would it be worth
if it did nothing else but sway?


Edward James Young: The Minister of Customs is not the kind that does nothing else but sway. Take this from Bobby Burns: My son, these maxims make a rule And lump them aye tigither The rigid righteous is a fool The rigid wise anither.
The cleanest corn that e'er was dight	'
May have some piles o' caff in	:
So ne'er a fellow creature slight	.
For random fits o' daffin.
My hon. friend was speaking about Shakespeare a minute ago. Shakespeare wrote The Merchant of Venice.


Robert James Manion: Bobby Bums was a better authority on whiskey.


Edward James Young: He is not the
only authority. An inconspicuous college professor found a single grammatical error in The Merchant of Venice and denounced Shakespeare in the market place as no fit man to be writing literature. There is in the Customs department to-day the most capable, energetic and upright minister that has been there for many a long day, and because you find one grammatical error in his conduct you would condemn him. You know there are different kinds of men in the world. There is a big man, big-hearted, big-minded, who grasps big things in a big way, who can safely handle big affairs, and then there is the small strict man who never would go one hair's breadth out of the path of rectitude, and to-day we may choose. Will you have George Boivin, the big man, or the strict man who acts according to his formula? France had a strict man once who would not deviate one iota from the right path. It was the bloodthirsty Robespierre, the man that had no heart, no soul, nothing but the letter of the law and cold steel. That would not be the man to put in charge of any big affair or large department. How will the people of the country look at our action in this matter? We are told that the eyes of all Canada are centered on us. I think the hon. member said the other night that in all future generations they would be looking on us, when the walls of this building were crumbling into ruins and our names would stand out and it would be known how we voted. The picture is a little overdrawn. But how will they look at us?
O wad some power the giftie gie us,
To see oursel's as i there see us!
Well, let us consider how others will see us. Here is a man, Moses Aziz, an ignorant Syrian, raised in a foreign country. Our ethics are not the same as their ethics, perhaps not in the habit of thinking liquor is an evil. He is found with liquor under the flooring of his
5084	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
cellar. He is convicted and sentenced to prison, and because he was not sent there promptly the Minister of Customs is to be condemned.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: How many times has Moses Aziz been fined?


Edward James Young: The records
show once. That is one side of the picture, and here is the other side. We have a great building containing 600 rooms with 245 members. Rooms were searched but not for papers, and I know there was great indignation when our papers were ruffled. Papers were not the only things that were found, and we rose in our might, and we denounced the person who dared enter our rooms and demanded his head. A little of the same stuff, that Moses Aziz had in his cellar was discovered there. How will our vote look to the people when they read about it? And we are going to condemn the Minister of Customs? We would cut a sorry figure before the county. Let me tell the House a true story. One hon. member in this House voted twice to condemn the Hon. George Boivin. That hon. member was going into a friendly country with a supply of whiskey in his possession, and when, the customs officer came and was about to seize it-it was one bottle and not very big at that-the man said to him, "You dare not seize it until we get to the American border." But before they got to the American border he had drunk the whole thing.


Robert James Manion: Nothing against that in
the United States law.


Edward James Young: The law says
you shall not take whiskey into the United States, and it does not specify whether it is in a bottle or a leather bag.


Robert James Manion: Why did they not seize
the passenger?


Edward James Young: The evidence
\was destroyed.


Robert James Manion: He was the container.


Edward James Young: I ask hon.
members, can that man conscientiously condemn the Minister of Customs for leaving Moses Aziz out of gaol for a few days longer if he himself had-what shalj I say?-Aziz had whiskey in his cellar, and the other man had it under his belt. What is the difference? Would we not cut a sorry figure here, insisting on our privileges and rights as members of parliament, exercising the rights the law has given us, abusing that power, smuggling liquor from Hull into the building, and

because the police dare not come into the building and trouble us we think we are immune-and now we condemn the poor ignorant Syrian who had some in his cellar.


Robert James Manion: You should limit this to
your own experience and not bring us all into it.


Edward James Young: They did not
find anything in my room. Let us ask ourselves, are we justified in condemning the Minister of Customs for doing what he did. when we know that every day in our lives we do worse? I say candidly that I am going to vote in favour of George Boivin on this subamendment, the amendment, 'the main motion and on every subsequent amendment there is proposed.


Robert James Manion: We are not surprised at
that.


Edward James Young: The Minister of Customs, as I am sure all will admit, is one of the ablest, most promising and highest type of men we have in this House or in this country to-day, and Canada can ill afford to do without his services. If the Hon. Mr. Boivin goes out in disgrace from this House his public career will be ruined. The Liberal party has said: We will go down with him because it is better for this country that the Liberal party should go into the wilderness-


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: For forty
years.


Edward James Young: If my hon.
friends opposite have the framing of the election laws and the counting of the votes, it will be for forty years. It is better for us, for Canada, that we go into the wilderness for a season and come back again bringing Boivin with us than that his services should be lost to the country. That is the reason we are going down together-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Edward James Young: -or else we are going to stay where we are. The hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy) said in his address: The Customs department is more important than the National railways. Mismanagement would not be tolerated on the part of the National railways or any other railway or any bank or any large institution in this country. They do not send men to gaol when they are found committing small offences; their idea is to keep them out of gaol if they can. The crime of the Minister

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Young (Weyburn)
of Customs is that he kept one man out of gaol, when my hon. friends opposite think he should be in gaol. Do they think it improves the position of this country to put a man in gaol ?


Robert James Manion: It would stop bootlegginc for a while.


Edward James Young: We have tried
it in Saskatchewan; we have tried it here and in the east but it has failed.


Robert James Manion: He will be prevented from bootlegging while he is in gaol.


Edward James Young: Would you stop anything from coming into this building if you put us in the tower? When the railways or the banks find anyone guilty of misdemeanours they make them disgorge if they can.


An hon. MEMBER:: Quote some more
poetry.


Edward James Young: I will:
I know not whether laws be right or whether laws be wrong,
All we know who 'lie in jail is that the wall is strong,
And that each day is like a year, a year whose days are long.
This too I know that every law that man has made for man
Since first man took his brother's life and the sad world began,
But straws the wheat and saves the chaff, with a most evil fan.
The cause of your trouble is the unjust laws that you have made. Why do men smuggle? Because you have denied man the inborn right to buy his stuff where he can buy it best. I had a friend one time who always said that if he started to break the law he would break it by smuggling because there, he said, ''I am not injuring my fellow man and I am simply taking back in an illegal way what nobody had any right to take away from me."


Edmond Baird Ryckman: Where is he now?


Edward James Young: He is where my
hon. friends opposite will never be. He is standing where they will never stand, standing where a man stands who thinks his own thought and is a free man. You pass a law and you say to the people of this country: You shall not buy goods where you can buy them best; you shall not spend your wages where you can spend them to the best advantage; you must buy from individuals named by us. Those individuals, the favourites of the government come and say to the government: The people are not buying our goods; they are buying goods from the United States; they are
smuggling them in. Pass a more drastic law; put them in gaol; put heavier fines on them. These are the things that make men smugglers. Your committee that was appointed to investigate those charges bring in recommendations to stop smuggling and ignores completely the cause of the smuggling.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Does the
hon. gentleman know that all this has to be printed?


Edward James Young: The hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre has no kick coming about the number of pages of Hansard used by anyone on this side. A man that will talk for hours about amendments to the Grain Act after the matter has been all threshed out in committee, after the question has been practically settled, and fill I do not know how many pages of Hansard, has no kick coming about speeches by hon. members on this side. I might incidentally remark that he was not very well posted on the question he was discussing. Here is a speech which occupies twenty-six pages, delivered at about this hour in the morning by an hon. gentleman opposite and about one-half the space is filled with charges. Those charges were flung at the government on the eve of the Prince Albert election in the hope that the government would become frightened and resign, or that it would influence the result in that constituency before the charges could be replied to. But the hon. member who made those charges did not know the calibre of the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin); he made a complete answer to every one of them.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Edward James Young: Hon. gentlemen may laugh, but in the early part of this session I sat here for a whole month and heard them wasting time. The hon. member for Vancouver Centre opposed the six weeks' adjournment asked for by the government for fear they would take advantage of it to destroy letters of a damaging character, as he said they had done before, a charge which he failed to prove. Therefore he should now apologize to the government for the insinuation.


Hon. J. C. ELLIOTT (Minister of Labour):: There is no doubt that the work of the Customs inquiry committee is not completed, and it must be continued by some other body; that seems to be agreed by everybody. Now what is the difference between' the members of the committee on this question? First of all the majority agree that certain recommendations should be made to the House. I
Customs Inquiry-Mr. Elliott

think it will be agreed there has been a fair and honest endeavour to present to the House a report that would have a beneficial effect upon the customs laws of Canada and that would, to a large extent, meet the requirements of the situation.
Now I am bound to pay a tribute to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) for the industry and attention which he has devoted to the work of the Customs committee, and I would pay a similar tribute to all the -other members of that committee. A careful perusal of the speech made by the hon. member on February 2 against my hon. friend and colleague the Minister of Customs must lead to the conclusion that he was referring to the hon. minister's predecessor and to others; in fact, it is tantamount to an exoneration of the present minister. I ask what is the outstanding -charge that the hon. member -now makes against the Hon. George Boivin? I challenge the hon. member to make any serious denial of my statement that there is any other real charge against the hon. minister at the present time except that he failed to have Moses Aziz sent to gaol shortly after conviction.


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend has challenged me. If he will be good enough to simply read the amendment which is now before the House he will find that it contains in precise language the charge which is made against the hon. minister. He will find there a complete answer to his question.


John Campbell Elliott: That is not what I was
asking. I a-m in th-e judgment of every hon. member when I say that the only real charge against the Minister of Customs at the present time is that he did not send Moses Aziz to gaol as soon as my hon. friend thinks he should -have sent hi-m.


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend asks me
what the charge is. The charge is set forth in the amendment, and if he desires to be fair he will read it now. I will recite it in my own language if he desires.


John Campbell Elliott: No, my hon. friend knows the question perfectly well, and he knows the answer.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Certainly I do, I have it here.


John Campbell Elliott: And the answer is just as I have stated, that the only real, substantial charge against the Hon. George Boivin at the present time is the Aziz charge.


Henry Herbert Stevens: My hon. friend I know
desires to be fair. The answer is simply this, and I will give it in the official language of the amendment that is now before the House:
The evidence further discloses that ministerial action has been influenced 'by improper-


John Campbell Elliott: Mr. Speaker. I asked my
hon. f-riend if h-e could state any other charge against the Hon. George Boivin. Without reading over two or three pages he ought to know in his own mind and be able to state to this House what that other charge is.


An hon. MEMBER:: Take your medicine.


John Campbell Elliott: I will let you have yours.
He ought to be able to state to this House-*
M-r. STEVENS: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a question of privilege and to a point of order, both. As to the point of order, the hon. minister -challenged .me to state what the charges were against the hon. Minister of Customs other than the -one regarding Moses Aziz. In response to his challenge I rise to give him -precisely what those -charges are, and I submit, Mr. Speaker, that in all fairness I am entitled t.o present those charges to the House.


John Campbell Elliott: I submit, Mr. Speaker,
that the exhibition my hon. friend is now giving is the best proof to every hon. member that unless he studies pages of charges-


Henry Herbert Stevens: No, just one paragraph.


John Campbell Elliott: -he cannot think of any other substantial charge against the h-on. Minister of Customs than- the Aziz charge. That-leads up to the point I want to make. A perusal of my hon. friend's speech of February 2 fails to disclose the slightest suggestion -of the Moses Aziz charge. I again challenge him to point out where in th-alt speech from ohe end to the other there is one word or syllable referring to the Aziz case. His charges now are those which he discovered by -aidci'dent; he -does not raly upon any of the other charges he made alt thait time. This-charge was discovered through a letter sent by the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Robichaud) to the H-on. Mr. Boivin during the- stress of an election. I ask hon. members of this House if that, is not a fair statement of the kernel of the present charges.
Mr. STEVENS': Absolutely no.


John Campbell Elliott: I say absolutely yes, and
the whole tenor of the remarks of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre and the right

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Elliott
hon. leader of the opposition has been to show that the minister did not speak of the Moses Aziz case in exactly the same words on two different occasions. He told the story at one time and varied it slightly from the story he told at another time, and that is the offence for which this man is to be put out of the public life of this country.	.
My hon. friend knows these charges well, and I am sure he will agree with me that the charge he is making against the minister at present is the Aziz charge, and nothing else.


Henry Herbert Stevens: That is positively wrong.


John Campbell Elliott: And how much of the hon. member's time in the discussion of these matters was devoted to the discussion of anything but the Aziz charge?
Mr. (STEVENS:	If my hon. friend will
permit me to say so, I never discussed the Aziz charge at all; he will not find it in my speech.


John Campbell Elliott: Part of my hon. friend's
argument was that the Aziz charge would be dealt with by the hon. member for West Hamilton (Mr. Bell). I want to ask hon. members of the House what charge has been made against the Minister of Customs other than the Aziz charge?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


John Campbell Elliott: It is all very well for my
hon. friends to laugh; it is fine to laugh when someone else is being charged.


Robert James Manion: What about the Dominion
Distilleries charge?


John Campbell Elliott: My hon. friend from Fort W illiam is very adroit in drawing a red herring across the trial, but he Should know by this time that he cannot do so with me; I am not talking of the Dominion Distilleries. This is a serious discussion; this is an important investigation, and I do not think it comes with good grace from any hon. gentleman sitting in the front benches of the opposition, with the experience of the hon. member for Fort William, to interpolate anything about Dominion Distilleries when we are discussing the Moses Aziz charge. His inquiry is as far away from the discussion as Peru is from Jerusalem.


Robert James Manion: My hon. friend was asking
what other charges were against the minister.


John Campbell Elliott: My hon. friend knows he
is not meeting the question fairly. The point I want to make is this. I stand in the judgment particularly of the independent gentlemen in this House as to whether the charge against the Minister of Customs is not as I have stated. If that is the charge against him is it not a fact that practically everything else has been abandoned, that practically no evidence has been submitted except in connection with a charge which did not form a part of my hon. friend's speech on February 2 at all?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Time.


John Campbell Elliott: I hear some of my hon. friends shouting "time". That is the last thing they want; that is the thing Moses Aziz did not want, and he was by no means the only one. Now I ask hon. members seriously if they think it is fairly meeting the charges made by my hon. friend on February 2 for him to now try and say "I have substantiated these charges by finding a peg for some other charge upon which I may hang my hat." Every hon. gentleman in this House probably had to come through an election campaign, and as a matter of fact some of us had to go through two of them.


Robert James Manion: And you were lucky, too.


John Campbell Elliott: We were fortunate. You heard the explanation given by the Minister of Custohis with regard to what happened at the time. He found that letter on his desk when he came in to look over the correspondence, and to answer what it was possible to answer. Will any hon. gentleman who has been through an election suggest for a moment that a man with an election campaign on his hands will go through a file of 100 or 150 letters and manage to get any idea of their contents? You all know the stress of an election, and you know very well that careful consideration cannot be given to matters of this kind at such a time. I ask gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, is there any hon. gentleman who will seriously say if he had been in the place of the Minister of Customs at that time he would not have done exactly as the Minister of Customs has done? There is not the slightest doubt about it.
I have endeavoured to call to the attention of my hon. friend from Vancouver Centre the fact that if making out the charges contained in his speech on the 2nd of February were essential to 'his succeeding, then he has utterly failed for the charge against the minister has been a different charge altogether. That is a point that I think has been largely overlooked in the course of this discussion.
There is a great deal of difficulty for a minister in carrying out the duties of a de-
508S
Customs Inquiry-Division

partment where there is any ministerial responsibility involved. Every hon. minister who has presided over a department knows that, and I believe that when my hon. friends on the other side of the House consider seriously the situation the minister was in, there is not one of them but who in his heart of hearts will say other than that he in all probability under similar circumstances would have done exactly the same as the minister did.


Mr. BEAUBIEN:: Mr. Speaker, as the
hour is getting late and this is one of the most important debates of this session, I beg leave to move the adjournment of the debate.


Hewitt Bostock: Mr. Beaubien moves,
seconded by Mr. King (Huron) that the debate be now adjourned. Shall the motion carry?
Mr. BOA'S:	On a question of privilege,
Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a statement with reference to the vote. We met last night and had a definite and distinct understanding-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Hewitt Bostock: The hon. gentleman cannot speak now that the question is put. The hon. gentleman is always very courteous, and he should be treated courteously. If he wishes to rise immediately after the vote is taken, I will give him the floor.


Mr. BOYS:: Last night the whips of the
three parties in this House decided that we would to-night vote upon this question. It seems to me the arrangement thus made by the whips should be respected by the various parties in this House, and I desire to state that when the motion to adjourn was made it was certainly contrary to the understanding reached by the whips.


Mr. OASGRAIN:: I may be permitted to
say a few words on the same subject. It is true we met and had a certain agreement that we would try to finish the debate this evening, but at that time there were only two motions before the House, one by the hon. member for Vancouver Centre and the other by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre. We Voted on one of those. motions. As the House is well aware, this motion was defeated and immediately afterwards a new motion was added to the main motion, absolutely and entirely different from the other; it was not expected at all. There was a ruling by Your Honour which was not sustained, so that a new feature was introduced in this debate. We are in the same position as we were last night.


Mr. THEODULE RHEAUME (Jacques Cartier) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, previous to voting on the amendment which is before the House, I deem it my duty to say a few
words so as to explain the vote which I shall be called upon to give presently. The amendment before the House is evidently one presented in bad faith. It has been given a virgin robe, but this virgin robe fits it just about like a green suit would fit the member for Frontenac-Addington (Mr. Edwards), on the 12th of July, the national day of Orangemen.
I say, Sir, that this amendment is in bad faith; first, because the censure does not include a member who is quite as guilty-if it is a question of guilt which is being considered by the House-and that gentleman is not included for the simple reason that he is not sitting on the government side. But why do they wish to censure the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin)? Because, Sir, he complied with requests which are of daily occurrence. Is not a member often merely an interceder with those in power? We are likened to saints and called upon almost daily to intercede. And, because a member accedes to the request of an unfortunate elector, a mountain is made of it. Looking upon the shocked expressions on the faces of gentlemen opposite when the name of Moses Aziz was mentioned, I asked myself:	Is there no
mirror on thait side of the House1
I see the member for West York (Sir Henry Drayton) smiling; he the Parisian par excellence. What, Sir, they are shocked with the Moses Aziz affair! I say, search among yourselves! How many Moses are there within your ranks? Most astonishing, everyone was shocked, they blushed like scandalized young virgins. No Sir, those who had charge of affairs during the war have no right to be shocked over the Moses Aziz incident 1 The members who sold those old jades, not to be forgotten, have no right to protest. The member who swapped an old horse for two ducks and then sold it to the government for $150 cannot very well blush when confronted with the Moses Aziz incident! The Tory member who got $175 from the government for an old mare that had gone through the South African campaign and died the day following the sale, has no right to be perturbed over the Moses Aziz incident! No Sir, I say that the members of the opposition are wearing masks for the occasion. You have disguised yourselves under a false cloak. You are recognizable. Drop that cloak, your past demands it:	Drop it, the veil is too
thin.
Censure the minister of Customs; why? Because he did what all the ministers have done since confederation, and what precedents applicable to similar cases allowed him to do. There is moreover another reason for

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Rheaume
which I cannot register nry vote in favour of this amendment. I have no mandate from the electors of the county of Jacques-Cartier to put into power the right hon. leader of the opposition. In the course of the last electoral campaign he did not think it worth while to come into one single county of the province of Quebec in order to propound his policy. Oh! you may answer, the policy of the opposition found supporters in Quebec. Yes, there came to the historical county of Jacques-Cartier, that I have the honour to represent, a party leader who bid desperately to win over my constituency. This gentleman proclaimed in Jacques-Cartier and throughout the province a doubtful independence which at first dazzled the people, but could not convince them. What a cunning duplicity! The Hon. Mr. Patenaude hastened to repudiate the Right Hon. Mr. Meighen. He was as far remote from Mr. Meighen as he was from Mr. King. Nevertheless, his blows were concentrated on the latter. At about the same time the leader of the opposition boasted at Charlottetown that he would carry 35 seats in Quebec, when not one candidate of the opposition could be nominated without first having received the silvery blessing of the Hon. Mr. Patenaude.
There must have existed a pact, if not, there were hidden and powerful interests which were backing my opponent, helping him to form a group in this House, capable of directing a certain policy which you all know.


Mr. FAFARD (Translation):: Will the hon. member allow me a question?


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: With
pleasure.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: Did the hon. Mr. Patenaude come forward as the Messiah?


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: As the
Saviour also. Only he saved no one, he not even saved himself. However, Sir, what is most astonishing: a few months after the famous defeat of the Saviour, the Messiah, who was to replace the leader of the opposition; after his famous defeat, I say, what a drama did the country witness? At a large popular meeting held at the Forum where by din of trumpets and advertisements posted everywhere, they had succeeded in rounding up a good crowd, we there witnessed the leader of the opposition, who had been publicly repudiated seven or eight months previous by Mr. Patenaude, shower compliments upon compliments on the latter.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: Mr. Speaker, I do not want to interrupt the hon member, but I wish to draw his attention to the fact

that at the last meeting held in Montreal, the hon. leader of the opposition presented flowers to the Hon. Mr. Patenaude, while he made no mention of Mr. Monty.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I congratulate the hon. member for so closely following our meetings at Montreal. That is really what happened to the great scandal of many good Conservatives who had carried on loyally with Mr. Monty the struggle during more than four years in favour of Mr. Meighen. How ungrateful is politics, the roses are often for the eleventh hour toiler! Those who performed the noble task of the sower are not there to reap.
A funny coincidence: a few days after the meeting at the Forum, the Hon. Mr. Patenaude, in a solemn interview given to the press, publicly gave the "Lamourette " kiss to the Hon. Mr. Meighen.
No, Sir, I have no mandate to vote in favour of the amendment, because I am aware that this amendment was moved to obliterate all the benefits of the Liberal administration and in particular the Robb budget, one of the best budgets that has ever been brought down in this House, a budget which, at the time, was applauded even by our opponents. All were unanimous to acknowledge that after the financial crisis the effects of which are still felt, the hon. Minister of Finance had found the means of balancing the country's finances. Deficits have disappeared and have made way to surpluses. Our opponents came to the following conclusion: If we allow the government to take advantage of their good work, we are lost; and it is then, Sir, that they thought out the Clever idea of bringing Charges and thus blind the people by throwing mud without mercy, without thought whether they attacked irreproachable men, whether they blemished the reputation of honest public men and which often, in the public opinion, it is impossible to rehabilitate even after a whole honourable life.
These are the circumstances which have
prompted the opposition to bring its charges. But this is not all. One of the reasons which prevents me from voting for the amendment of the opposition is that the liberal party had adopted a policy of .moderation wishing to give fair play to all parts of the country, an equitable tariff policy which allowed .the manufacturers to exist and also protected the consumer from being bled alive by exorbitant prices.
The government were carrying out a policy of autonomy which pleased all who loved freedom, a definite autonomous policy, not

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Rheaume
one which takes refuge in silence in presence of questions put to them, an open, frank policy capable of being appreciated by all free .men in this country. The other day wdien the question was put by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) to the leader of the opposition as to where he stood on that question, the House witnessed the sad performance of a party leader to whom I recognize great talents, who squats in his seat and declines to enlighten the House on this question of autonomy so dear to all Canadian hearts.


Mr. MERCIER (Laurier-Outremont) (Translation):: I should like to put a question to the hon. member for Jacques-Cartier. Would he tell us about the conduct of Mr. Patenaude towards Mr. Meighen at the meeting which took place at the Forum? The hon. member for Jacques-Cartier knows that Mr. Patenaude came forward against him and he is fully aware that Mr. Patenaude repudiated Mr. Meighen


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: Mr
Speaker, I enjoy questions.


Joseph-Alexandre Mercier: What do you think of the
conduct of the Hon. Mr. Patenaude towards Mr. Meighen after having repudiated him in the last Quebec campaign?


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I shall
frankly give [DOT] you my opinion in regard to the conduct of Mr. Patenaude and Mr. Meighen. It is also that, I think of the whole province of Quebec, of the whole country: it is that these two gentlemen were, during the 1925 campaign and since, two mournful humbugs.
For the last fifty or sixty years we have had elections every fourth or fifth year, with the exception of when the Tory party prolonged its own existence.


Mr. DOUCET (Translation):: With the Liberal party's consent.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: Pardon, if the hon. member for Kent (Mr. Doucet) has a question to ask me, I shall be delighted to answer it.
A MEMBER (Translation): He has not even the politeness to rise.


Alexandre Joseph Doucet: Politeness
is not lacking in me.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: The discussion has been gracious up to now and I trust I may continue in this manner. I am aware that the hon. member for Kent is
to-night or rather this morning as it is five minutes to four, under the influence of a delirious emotion. He had an inextinguishable thirst for power and this morning, the day after the St. John the Baptist holiday, he still has a thirst, one which is not yet quenched. However, we do not know what the future has in stock for us. The hon. member for Kent is in an exceptional situation. Much will be forgiven him, because he has much loved, even scandals.
I note that there are in this House gallant fighters. The hon. member for Laurier and Outremont (Mr. Mercier) whispers in my ear this advice: Let us fight and win out. It is surely what the Liberal party intends to do. There is still life left in the heart beats of the government. It was struck at this evening, one might say in a treacherous way. This attack reminds me somewhat of the way the old city of Champlain was attacked by General Wolfe. I acknowledge the bravery of the English general's troops who have left an everlasting name in history. It was at an hour like this one, an officer appears and attempts to pass by the " Anse-au-Foulon," the sentry cries out: Who goes there? France! answers the officer, thus he prepared the way for the English army to reach the plains of Abraham where was to be decided the battle which gave to England what was the finest jewel of the crown of France. The battle abounded in feats of heroism, but the historians agree that this incident was not worthy of the courage of Wolfe and his grenadiers. Well, to-night when I witnessed the attack directed by the opposition, the whole of this drama recurred to my memory and I thought: Why do they not come out openly, why do they seek a winding path to escalade the Ottawa fortress. Gentlemen, it is for you to decide, if there might not have been more glory for the opposition to triumph on the merits of its own principles, its own definite programme than to triumph by a subterfuge as the one which they have adopted here under the form of a hypocrite amendment which is at present before the House.
Mr. Speaker, during this famous campaign, of which I have just spoken, what words of despondency have we not heard! Every candidate of the opposition wore a crepe on his hat and shed crocodile tears. " We were on the verge of bankruptcy, it was the ruin of the country if Mackenzie King continued to carry on the affairs of the country and yet. at the end of seven months, the Minister of Finance found it possible to bring down a budget which balanced our finances and re-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Iiheaume
lieved the ratepayers of a large share of the burden which had been imposed upon them by the Tory government.
As I see the hon. member for Winnipeg South (Mr. Rogers) entering the House, I avail myself of the circumstance, to repeat that the Patenaude movement in tihe province of Quebec was concocted at the Windsor Hotel, in Montreal, anid that the hon. member for Winnipeg South was not a stranger to the birth of this child. He was himself sponsor at the christening.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: May I ask
the hon. member the reason why he did not give the child his father's name?


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: He did
not tell us, he gave no reason. The search for paternity is always allowed in the province of Quebec according to the French law. and it is exactly in virtue of this old French law which has remained on our statutes that we sought the Patenaude paternity, and found it. The people themselves found it.
On many an occasion in the course of our splendid meetings at Jacques-Cartier, I put various questions: "Mr. Patenaude, why at such a date, about five o'clock in the afternoon, were you at the Windsor Hotel, in Montreal, with the hon. member for Winnipeg South (Mr. Rogers) ? What took you there?" There was no answer. And as we, on this side of the House never bring forward anything without proof to back it, I call as witnesses the hon. member for St. James (Mr. Rinfret) who came to lend me a helping hand, I call to witness the member for St. Henri (Mr. Mereier) as well as the member for St. Denis (Mr. Denis) and many others. The hon. member for Maisonneuve (Mr. Robitaille) whom I notice is smiling with the smile that draws to him the majority of the lady voters; and our Holy Father (Saint-Pere) of Hochelaga, can all bear testimony to such statements. In order that you may understand how the Patenaude movement was looked upon with suspicion in the province of Quebec. I may say that at two o'clock in the morning, in the riding of St. Henri, there were still eight hundred people listening to the Liberal members and it was our Saint-Pere of Hochelaga who pronounced the benediction.
We had other questions that we put to the new Saviour.
How did it happen. Sir, that an Imperialist newspaper found it possible to carry on the Hon. Mr. Patenaude's campaign? We asked ourselves this question. I put it to my constituents of Jacques-Cartier.


Hewitt Bostock: I would
ask the hon. member to keep within the bounds of the amendment. I listened without too much distraction to the speech of the hon. member for Jacques-Cartier and, up to the present, I have not been able very well to see the relationship of his remarks with the purport itself of the amendment.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I am
just coming to it, Sir, I am now linking up the two. I was saying, Sir, that I had no mandate and that my constituents had given me no mandate to vote in favour of this amendment, I must first give the circumstances which led to my mandate. It seems to me that a certain latitude should be given to members of this House, and especially when it is four o'clock in the morning. I promise, Sir, that I shall establish the connection between my arguments and the purport of the amendment, should I appear to stray somewhat from the subject, I shall return to it by doing a little winding but not too long a one. I had the honour to study under our Speaker at the old University of Montreal. I learned from him constitutional law, and, Mr. Speaker, I also learned to bow to your decisions.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: All is well.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: This reminds me of an incident, but I fear I would not be in order in telling it. A good parish priest, in the course of an election in which the hon. Speaker of this House had an interest, told his parishioners: " Here in the pulpit, one has no right to carry on politics, however, vote for the best (le mieux)," and the hon. Speaker of the House was a candidate at that election.
Now, Sir, I return to the purport of my speech, to the puzzle which has been put to the electors of the province of Quebec.
When an imperialistic newspaper asked the people to vote in favour of Mr. Patenaude, the so-called independent candidate, it was a mystery to everybody, and, one evening, at a large meeting in Lachine-and I well interpreted the thoughts of all my constituents- I said: "You, my opponent, who are a handsome fellow, do take off the mask which disfigures you." WTe knew what we were talking about. In fact, he was well masked and he laid down his .mask when he gave the "La-mourette" kiss to the hon. leader of the opposition, a few days after the meeting at the Forum. Well, Mr. Speaker, I, who obtained the votes of more than 20,000 electors of the county of Jacques-Cartier, am not allowed to frustrate their will and sub-

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Rheaume
stitute to the Liberal policy, one that they have never approved. I will vote against the amendment.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: Mr. Speaker, I see no reason why the hon. member tries to justify his conduct in this House this evening. because if the one who carried on the contest against him happened to be here, he would exactly follow the same procedure.


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I entirely
agree with the remark of the hon. member.
The attitude taken by the Hon. Mr. Pate-naude, who will perhaps be taken in the future cabinet-if a new cabinet there must be,-is a challenge to public opinion of the province of Quebec. I wish to state that this is a lurid comedy and that the comedy will be repeated before the parliament of the nation.


Mr. LACOMBE (Translation):: Shame 1
shame!


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: Yes, you
are quite right to cry out shame! Young member of the county of Two Mountains, for whom success awaited not riper years; you are quite right. Beholding so much deceit, hearing my opponent in the county of Jaeques-Cartier proclaim that he was as far remote from the leader of the opposition as from Mr. King, nevertheless, putting all blame on one and not mentioning the other, I recalled a biblical passage where Rebecca, wife of Isaac-


Alexandre Joseph Doucet: Mr. Speaker, I wish to raise a point of order. Would the hon. member tell us what connection exists between the wife of Isaac or the wife of Jacob and the amendment at present before this House?


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I am delighted to be able to give an immediate answer. These are the words of the great patriarch Isaac to his son Jacob who, disguised, was asking him for his blessing: "This is truly the voice of Jacob, but it is the hands of Esau." And this is the comparison: it is that there was in Mr. Patenaude as well as in Rebecca who had laid this stratagem as much deceit as there is in the amendment which is submitted to us. Is the hon. member for Kent satisfied? I mi^ht add to complete my thought that at the large meeting held in St. Laurent the people who were listening on the radio repeated not without reason: it is truly the voice of Jacob but it is the hands of Esau.
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Terrebonne (Mr. Prevost), notwithstanding a serious illness has found it possible to be loyal
to his duty of member in coming here to protest with us against the deceitful policy, which is wrapped up in the amendment. The hon. leader of the opposition, whom I had the honour to hear at the Forum-I was in the last row-


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: There was
no one in the last row!


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: I was entirely alone. I heard his speech and his language was excellent. I understand him perfectly well. I congratulate him on his effort to acquire the French language, and should he wish to persevere in studying that language I know he will be able to come into our province to give us better reasons than those he gave us for having abstained from visiting us before the general elections.
I frankly admit, Sir, that when the hon. member for Vancouver Centre delivered his speech and spoke to us about people having been hung, murderers and robbers, the little hair I have on my head stood on end. We shivered, Sir, on hearing these charges. I thought: What, destroy public documents! There is not a member of the House who could be elected if he approved of such scandal. To charge the minister of having destroyed files, I say that it is the most formidable charge which can be levied against a public man who holds cabinet rank! Where would be our trust in public men, Sir, if ministers to hide their evil deeds, were to destroy the public files? For I acknowledge to the opposition the right to criticize. It is not without reason that the country pays to the leader of the opposition a salary of $14,000, it is that he may criticize justly. And, to his honour, I must acknowledge that he well earns his money, and if it depended on me I would wish him heartily to remain for a long time the leader of the opposition, in order that he might continue to criticize as he does with such ability the deeds of the government.
However, the hon. member for Vancouver Centre has gone beyond the limit, he failed to substantiate his charge and it seems to me he owes the minister, not only on his account, but for the sake of his family, he owes him at least an apology or a public statement. If these charges had been made on the steps of the Chateau Laurier or anywhere else outside of this House, an action for damages would have been instituted by the minister so charged. I state that this is not courageous, that it is not generous to make such a charge when no proof is forthcoming; at least when we are aware that a false accusation has been laid, an
5094	COMMONS
Customs Inquiry-Mr, Mercier (Laurier-Outre mont)
apology should be made. This is the opinion not only of the House but that of the public in regard to this matter. . And they wish to make us believe that this member is in good faith when he moves such an amendment? For the amendment is truly his creation.
Mr. Speaker, when such charges are brought against a public man, the country has a right to expect an apology. I bear a great esteem for the hon. member for Vancouver Centre and I state that before this debate closes on this question-


An hon. MEMBER:: Oh, ohl


Joseph-Théodule Rhéaume: Is this the crowing of the rooster? The debate on the amendment-I am in order, Sir, I am speaking on the amendment the whole time-the debate on the amendment will perhaps last until to-morrow. Perhaps it may end before. We have munitions to carry on. I see here gallant warriors, sharpshooters, if you will have it so, and who will, when I am through, empty their belts. However, I would request at this early hour when dawn approaches and invites one to prayers, I would ask the hon. member for Vancouver Centre to place his hand on his conscience and think:	Do I not
owe an apology to the hon. minister whom I have vilified and against whom I have not substantiated my charges? I appeal to his heart and reason, and I feel convinced that before this session is over we shall have this apology. I think it is in the interest of the hon. member, humanity is the same all over, it has horror of injustice.
Now, Sir, I see that a number of members around me seem keen to take part in the debate. I have but one word to add. If the discussions in our public meetings were less bitter and especially in our parliaments, the public interest would be better served and the country would reap the benefit. I state that our public men have everything to lose in throwing mud at one another. I make such a statement on behalf of the good name of our country, because to-day, through the means of telegraph, these charges made in the nation's parliament do not remain there, they reach every part of the country, the United States, the old continent, and when we ask these people to send us their sons to help us in tilling the land of Canada, they answer: "But we are not going to emigrate to your country, the public funds can no further be trusted, public documents are no more in safety in your country, they are in the hands of political robbers." That is the effect produced in foreign lands by these non-substan-

tiated charges and 1 protest in the name of justice, honesty and in the interest of my country against these charges laid with a political aim and not substantiated nor retracted.
I shall close these few remarks, Sir, and I thank you for your kind attention. On the day of the celebration of the French Canadian national holiday, I conceived the idea of going together with a few friends to make a pilgrimage to the Notre-Dame cemetery. On entering we were faced with a magnificent mausoleum. Cut in the stone there was but one inscription, but one name Laurier. Surmounting it, there were nine women of bronze representing the nine provinces of the Dominion. The faces of all these women have different countenances but in each of these countenances, one can discover a common impression of sadness. They weep over tlhe one who has left us, the one who held the respect of all his fellow-citizens from the Atlantic to the Pacific. They weep over the man who gave more than fifty years of his life to his country; they weep over the one who gave fifteen years of prosperity and national grandeur to Canada which he loved so much. Union at death's door is an admirable thing. Indeed, union at death's door is a magnificent spectacle, but union in national life is still more beautiful. Canadians, hailing from Scotland, you that have preserved in your character something of the granite of its mountains; sons of the Emerald island; you that have left the shores of the proud Albion, and have preserved the motto of Trafalgar and are proud of it; you that have come from the sunny shores of old France, finally, you Canadians who have gathered from everywhere, let us put our shoulder to the wheel and let us work in the interest of the country; let us cease our fraticidal struggles, let us unite in brotherhood and justice.


Joseph-Alexandre Mercier: Mr. Speaker, at this late hour of the morning it is with great diffidence that I rise to speak on the subamendment, but I have the utmost confidence in the Minister of Customs (Mr. Boivin). I am possibly the oldest friend he has in this House. I knew him when he was a young boy studying law, I know his honesty of purpose, I know the love that he has for his country and the great admiration that the province of Quebec has for him. The motto of my province is, "I remember". The province of Quebec will remember what this investigation has done and that this investigation did not go outside of that province; in fact it hardly went outside the city of

Customs Inquiry-Mr. Mackenzie King
Montreal. We in the city of Montreal and in the province of Quebec have the greatest admiration for the Minister of Customs, and we regret the action taken by this House tonight in defeating the first subamendment. I say to hon. gentlemen that the province of Quebec has remembered, remembers now and will continue to remember what was done to one of its most illustrious sons.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker, the amendment to the amendment before the House at the moment you stated a few moments ago to be identical in its phraseology and in its terms with the amendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth). Under the circumstances I see no reason why the amendment should not be accepted. In making that statement I wish, however, to make it perfectly clear that in accepting the amendment the government and hon. members of the House reserve their right to reject the amendment as amended or to amend the amendmerft as amended, as the rules of the House may permit. In these circumstances I think we will advance proceedings by a stage if it is understood that we on this side are prepared to accept the amendment moved by the hon. member for Last Mountain (Mr. Fansher) because it is in the same terms as the amendment moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, for which we have already voted.
Amendment (Mr. Fansher) agreed to.


Mr. C. G. POWER (Quebec South):: On the amendment to which has now been added the subamendment I have certain remarks to make which, at this late hour, it may be impossible to proceed with. I would therefore move that the debate be now adjourned.


Hewitt Bostock: Before this motion is put I should have said that the question now before the House is the amendment as amended.



ADJOURNMENT

[Stage Direction]
Mr. MACKENZIE KING moved the adjournment of the House.
Arthur Meighen: Mr. Speaker, I desire to
ask the government if the report which is current to-night that an order in council has been passed appointing certain civil service commissioners is true, and also if it is true that just recently another has been passed appointing a senator; and also if the Prime Minister intends to make any statement as to the attitude of the government following three defeats to-night.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker,
if my right hon. friend will retract the last statement he has just made, I will answer his former questions.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 5.17 a.m. (Saturday).
Monday, June 28, 1926