1928-01-31

CONTROL OF WATER POWERS

Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I promised
my hon. friend the leader of the opposition at the close of yesterday's sitting that I would table this afternoon a copy of the order in council passed on the 18th of January, in Which the whole question of the division of legislative control over proprietary interests in water powers, as between the Dominion and provincial governments, has been referred to the supreme court for hearing and consideration. I now lay a copy of the order in council on the table.



DOMINION-PROVINCIAL CONFERENCE

William Lyon Mackenzie King: I also mentioned to my hon. friend that I would table to-day the official precis of the Dominion-provincial conference. In tabling the document I would move, seconded by Mr. Lapointe:
That fifteen hundred copies in English and five hundred copies in French of the official precis of the Dominion-provincial conference held at Ottawa in November, 1927, be printed forthwith, and that standing order 64 be suspended in relation thereto.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
[Stage Direction]
Report of the Canadian delegates to the eighth assembly of the League of Nations, September 25, 1927.-Mr. Mackenzie King.

Hon. J. H. KING (Kootenay, Minister of Health):: I beg to advise the house that no
regulations have been made under the Public Works Health Act since the last session of parliament; also that no regulations have been made under the Proprietary and Patent Medicines Act during the same period.



CANADIAN NATIONAL RAILWAYS


[Stage Direction]
Hon. CHARLES A. DUNNING moved for leave to introduce Bill Nc p to confirm

. Si. John and Quebec Railway
a certain agreement made between the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways Company.
Some hon. MEMBERS:: Explain.


Mr. DUNNING:: This bill is for the purpose of confirming an agreement entered into between the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Canadian National Railways with respect to the construction of a branch line authorized by parliament some sessions ago, which authorization, I believe, was extended at the last session, from Rosedale to Bullpound, in the province of Alberta.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



PATENT ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 7, to amend the Patent Act.
He said:	The purpose of this bill is to
bring the Patent Act into conformity with the terms of the international conference for the protection of industrial property, as revised at the eighth conference of 1925. I may add that the changes are of a minor character. There is an amendment to section 40, concerning the granting of licenses for the use of an invention when the necessary and reasonable requirements have not been complied with, and this involves the addition of the following words:
Or that the patentee has failed adequately to manufacture the patented invention in Canada.
There is also a change made in section 49 which relates to any foreign ship or vessel entering the country temporarily. The words " air craft or land vehicle " are added to that clause.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 8, to amend the Trade Mark and Design Act.
Mr. GUTHRIE:: Explain.


Mr. RINFRET:: In like manner this bill
is for the purpose of bringing the Trade Mark and Design Act into conformity with the decisions of the same meeting at the Hague in 1925. The changes are also of a minor character. There are added to section 11 of
the act two new paragraphs giving reasons for which a minister may refuse to register a trade mark in certain cases.
After the expiration of the current term of a trade mark, namely, twenty-five years, this bill proposes to give an extra period of three months within which the owner of the trade mark may renew the application and similar provision is made with regard to rights in an industrial design. Special fees are provided in case of such renewal.
In the case of a trade mark which has been filed in another country and which it is desired to file in this country the period is extended from four months to six months. All these are in conformity with decisions reached at the Hague.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



SAINT JOHN AND QUEBEC RAILWAY

[Stage Direction]
Hon. CHARLES A. DUNNING (Minister of Railways and Canals) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 9, to authorize an extension of time for the completion of the Saint John and Quebec Railway between Centre-ville and the county of Carleton, and Andover, in the county of Victoria, N.B.
Hugh Guthrie: Is this only an extension?


Charles Avery Dunning: The Saint John and
Quebec railway is owned by the province of New Brunswick and the provincial government has requested an extension of time in connection with the completion of the line. 'This bill is designed to grant such extension.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first " time.



EXPERIMENTAL FARMS STATIONS ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 10, to amend the Experimental Farms Stations Act.
Mr. TOLMIE:: Explain.


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: When the original
Experimental Farms Stations Act was passed some forty years ago, certain acreage limitations were imposed upon them, that is in regard to the Central Experimental Farm at Ottawa and the farms at Nappan, Indian Head, Brandon and Agassiz. The purpose of this bill is to remove the limitation from those five farms, thus putting them on a parity with the remaining eighteen which have no such limitation.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.
Tariff Advisory Board



SEEDS ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 11, to amend the Seeds Act.
Simon Fraser Tolmie: Explain.


William Richard Motherwell: This act has not
been before the house for several years and this bill proposes a number of amendments, fifteen in all, with a view to brushing up the act to meet present day requirements.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



DAIRY INDUSTRY ACT AMENDMENT

[Stage Direction]
Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Minister of Agriculture) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 12, to amend the Dairy Industry Act.
Simon Fraser Tolmie: Explain.


William Richard Motherwell: This bill provides
for the reinforcing of butter and cheese boxes for export in order to avoid the many breakages that occur without this reinforcement
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



CUSTOMS INQUIRY COMMISSION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the das':
Mr. D. M. KENNEDY (Peace River):: Will the government lay on the table of the house the evidence which was taken by the Royal Commission on Customs and Excise and on which the report was based?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I do not know whether my hon. friend desires to have the evidence placed upon the table in order to have it printed. It is a voluminous mass of material, but there is no objection to laying it on the table for the information of the house.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: All the evidence?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yes.



HOME BANK DEPOSITORS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. PETER McGIBBON (Muskoka-Ontario):: I would like to ask the Minister
of Finance if it is the intention of the government to vote any further sums of money in aid of the Home Bank depositors in order to remove the unfairness that at present exists?


Hon. J. A. ROBB (Minister of Finance):: I hope, as soon as the debate on the address

in reply to the speech from the throne is concluded, to table the estimates for the ensuing year, and my hon. friend will have to judge for himself whether there is anything for them or not.



TARIFF ADVISORY BOARD-EVIDENCE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the daj':
Mr. IT. B. ADSHEAD (East Calgary):	I
should like to ask the Minister of Finance, in view of the fact that he was not able last year to fulfil his promise to the members in connection with copies of evidence taken before the tariff advisory board, whether he will lay on the table, for examination only, copies of any evidence which may be required by members of this house.
James Alexander Robb: There is certain evidence in the department. If there is sufficient room in the chamber after the evidence of the customs inquiry has been tabled, I will consider whether we shall table this or not.


Mr. ADSHEAD:: If any member desires
to examine the evidence in connection with any one case, in view of the fact that the promise made last year in connection with furnishing such evidence was not fulfilled, will that evidence be placed on the table for the purpose of examination?


James Alexander Robb: That is a very reasonable
request. I see no objection to it.



GOVERNOR GENERAL'S SPEECH


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Monday, January 30, consideration of the motion of Mr. Ilsley for an address to His Excellency the Governor General in reply to his speech at the opening of the session.
William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Speaker, in addressing the house yesterday with respect to the speech from the throne, my hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) divided his remarks under three main heads. He referred first to matters of domestic concern, next, to those matters which have to do with imperial affairs, and finally to questions that have an international bearing. I was endeavouring to follow him in the order in which he had proceeded and had to a considerable extent concluded what I had to say with reference to the first division, which, by the way, constituted the longest portion of his utterances.
With respect to matters that are more or less ef domestic concern, there were a few

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
points to which my -hon. friend referred and to which I had not had time to reply when six o'clock came. As to these I shall endeavour in as few words as possible to give him the information which I think he wished to have, and also to address to him a question or two in reference to the significance of his own remarks.
My hon. friend mentioned that we on this side of the house had laid a good deal of stress on the importance of taking parliament as much as possible into our confidence, and wherever it could be so arranged, giving to parliament in the first instance information on matters of national concern, and certainly not making binding commitments without first obtaining the assent of this chamber and where advisable of parliament as a whole. I entirely agree with my hon. friend that such is the desirable course to pursue, and I assure him that such is the wish of the administration; and not only is it the wish, but it has been, and will continue to be, the practice, of the administration in so far as it can possibly be maintained. But I am sure my hon. friend will realize that during the parliamentary recess, when many months elapse between one session and another, situations will arise in which the government is certain to find it necessary to act immediately, and to come to parliament later on with a reasonable explanation of why the matter in question had not been held over for final decision until the members were assembled.
One of the matters to which my hon. friend referred was the announcement by the hon. Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Dunning) that it had been decided that Fort Churchill should be the ocean terminus of the Hudson Bay railway, and I think my hon. friend made the statement that the Minister of Railways and Canals had not only failed to take parliament into his confidence in making that announcement, but had failed even to take his own colleagues into his confidence. I should like to set my hon. friend's mind at rest at once in regard to the latter statement.
I recall the circumstances very well. Mr. Palmer was engaged first of all to make the study which he did with regard to the Hudson Bay bemuse of his acknowledged reputation as an estuarial engineer of pre-eminence, of greater pre-eminence, I assume, than any other engineer engaged in like pursuits, and when he was retained it was assumed that the government was asking for his expert advice not for academic purposes, merely, but rather to be guided in its decision by the best advice that was obtainable. When Mr. PalmeT
made his investigation it was with a view' to giving the government the benefit of his expert opinion, to enable it to decide in the interests of the country which was the most desirable port at which to have the ocean terminus of the Hudson Bay railway. While Mr. Palmer was making his investigation, the question naturally came up as to whether the announcement of the decision which would be made by him should be deferred until parliament assembled, or whether an immediate announcement should be made. The situation was canvassed to some extent between members of the government and the Minister of Railways and Canals before the minister went to the west with Mr. Palmer. It was felt that if Mr. Palmer was in a position to give his decision immediately, there was every reason why that opinion should be made known also to the country with as little delay as possible. Let me just ask my hon. friend what his -criticism would have been if, having Mr. Palmer's opinion, we had withheld it. If, having had in our possession the opinion of an expert engineer who was to determine which was the better port, we had held back any announcement of his decision for several months, we would have been justly criticized on the ground that it was for reasons which affected the interests of friends of the government or something of the kind, and I think we would have been entitled to that criticism if we had taken that attitude. It was precisely because we wished to avoid any possible criticism, and also because we believed that in other respects it was in the national interest to give the country the information at the earliest opportunity, that it was decided before his report was made that the government should -take prompt action with respect to announcing the decision of its expert.
May I -add this? Far from failing to take his colleagues into his confidence in the matter, I recall very distinctly receiving from my colleague the Minister of Railways and Canals a telegram at the time the report had been finally made saying that the report was now in readiness and asking if I would ascertain from other members of the government their views in the matter, and give him the decision of council with respect to the publication of the report. That I did in a telegram that I sent to him, and on which he acted. But that was not until after council had been informed.
I think my hon. friend the leader of the opposition was unfair in another particular. He -took a dispatch in the press which made certain adverse references to the circumstance that other developments had taken place over a
44	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
period of years which had now proved to be unwise, and he attributed what was in this newspaper' comment to my hon. friend, though the article itself commences with the words, "Mr. Dunning refused to make any comment on the matter whatever." I submit that my hon. friend could not have read that article as carefully as he should have done, for if he did. I do not believe he would have made the particular comment upon the action of the minister which, possibly, in a little haste, he did. So much for the Hudson Bay terminus and the motives that actuated the government in reference thereto.
My hon. friend spoke next of the transfer of the natural resources to Alberta, and rather regretted that there had been a considerable delay in making the transfer. May I say to my hon. friend that I join with him in the regret that these resources have not been transferred more speedily, though may I hasten to add this statement, that having had the advantage which the members of the government had of meeting in conference last November the premiers of the different provinces and their colleagues and of considering with them the question of the transfer of the natural resources to the western provinces, I feel that it is possibly fortunate for the province of Alberta, as well as for the other western provinces, that a decision has been deferred until the present time, and that the necessary legislation 'has not been passed up to the present moment.' Let me illustrate what I wish to convey.
One advantage of the conference was that premiers and ministers from the different provinces were in a position to give to the federal government an expression of opinion as to how in existing circumstances the action of the government would be viewed by their respective provinces-the action, for instance, of government with respect to subsidies to the maritime provinces under the Duncan report. We were pleased to find that without exception the premiers of the provinces of Quebec, Ontario, and of the western provinces, the premiers of all the provinces, were at one with the federal administration in having adopted the course which we did adopt in voting the grants which were made last session to the maritime provinces, and in saying that so far as their provinces were concerned they were only too happy that the maritimes should continue to be treated in like manner until at least the accounting which is asked for by the Duncan report had been completed. There was an evidence that the prairie provinces and British Columbia, as well as the central provinces, felt that in certain economic particulars the mari-
time provinces had been handicapped of recent years, and they were pleased that, as a factor contributing to the unity of our Dominion, the administration had taken the course it did in accordance with the recommendations of the Duncan report. Similarly in regard to the western provinces, we found, on the part of our friends from the maritimes, the premiers from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, and also on the part of the premiers of Quebec and Ontario, a distinct willingness to have the federal government, in the matter of dealing with the prairie provinces, take what may be described as a generous attitude in so far as that was consistent with financial considerations of which the federal government has to take account. They seemed to feel that the government might well consider what, in arranging for the transfer of their resources to the prairie provinces, has been one of the main difficulties up to the present time, namely, the advisability of continuing, along with the return of the lands, the subsidies which up to the present time, had been paid in lieu of the lands. The moment that attitude on the part of the other provinces became apparent to the administration, we found we were in a position to negotiate with the prairie provinces on a basis much more satisfactory than had existed before we had received that general expression of view on the part of the other provinces of Canada. After all, while these are federal matters, they do also affect all the provinces in the Dominion. As a consequence of the discussion which took place at the conference, the government has reopened the subject of negotiations with the Premier of Alberta in regard to the return of the natural resources to that province, and I am authorized by the Premier of Alberta to inform this house that so far as he1 is concerned, these negotiations are proceeding in a manner that is satisfactory to him at the present time. I hope that that assurance, which means that the matter is being satisfactorily dealt with as wrell, so far as the federal administration is concerned, will quiet any alarm or misgivings which hon. members opposite may have, concerning the progress of negotiations regarding the transfer of the natural resources to Alberta.
Then I come to British Columbia, and there again the expression of views of the other provinces was helpful to the administration. British Columbia made strong representations why some of the lands in the railway belt and the Peace River block should be returned to the province. I confess that the government had anticipated the wish of the British

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
Columbia government in that matter by having an inquiry made. The late John Oliver, as hon. members know, repeatedly brought to the attention of the federal government what he claimed were the legal rights of the province of British Columbia in that matter. In the spring of last year, if I recollect aright, the government appointed Mr. Justice Martin as a royal commissioner to investigate the question of the legal claims of British Columbia in respect of these lands. Mr. Justice Martin has submitted to the government an interim report, in which 'he states that, while he does not think there are legal claims, he is of the opinion that there are strong claims in natural justice-claims in equity, so to speak, on the part of that province for the return of these lands. Mr. Justice Martin's final report is not yet in the hands of the government, but as soon as it is received it will be laid on the table of the 'house and no doubt hon. members will be guided in the matter of subsequent legislation by the findings which the commissioner may make. So much for the question of the natural resources.


Mr. HEAPS:: What will be the policy
of the government in regard to the natural resources of Manitoba?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The same
policy in the matter of natural resources covers all the provinces of the west. The federal government believes that the natural resources of the western provinces should be returned to them, but there are questions in relation to the transfer which require to be carefully considered. I should not like in any way to see created a situation which would be embarrassing to either the federal or provincial governments where our action is intended to be one which will have the effect of removing embarrassment, and therefore we may be proceeding with a little more caution than we would otherwise.
In regard to the Duncan report, I am glad to see that hon. gentlemen opposite so cordially accept it in its findings, and speak so highly of the service which has been rendered by the commissioners in the making of their report. Let me remind them-and I do it in case by any chance they should repeat a criticism of the administration in adopting a similar method at another time-that when the government decided to have the question of the maritime claims referred to a commission we were told by some hon. gentlemen opposite-indeed the line of criticism of the opposition and particularly of members of the opposition who came from the maritime provinces was-that this was no sort of way to deal with the question, and that it was only a means of evading the responsibility of the government in respect thereto. It has turned out to be the opposite. The government at the present time has implemented a very considerable part of the report and we intend to continue to carry out its recommendations.
On the subject of scientific research, I think my hon. friend is at one with the government in its desire to see in this country the work of industrial and scientific reseach furthered as largely as may be possible, and in a manner which will lead to co-operation between the federal and provincial governments. There again may I say that the Dominion-provincial conference was extremely helpful'to the governments of the provinces as well as to the federal government. The subject was very fully discussed. The premiers of some of the provinces indicated the line on which they thought the provinces would be able most effectively to develop scientific research, and there was general agreement that, so far as the federal government was concerned, the establishment of laboratories here for the purpose of conducting certain lines of research would be the most important contribution which the Dominion could make. I will leave to my colleague, the Minister of Trade and Commerce to inform the house at a later stage just what the intentions of the government are in that particular
My hon. friend has referred to the commission appointed to inquire into the fisheries of the maritime provinces in particular, and also of the province of Quebec, and has expressed the hope that its report will be tabled, so that hon. members may have it in the course of the present session. I will go one step further, and say that I hope that not only will the report be tabled, but that it may be tabled in time to permit this blouse, if thought desirable, to carry out in the form of legislation any of its recommendations, if legislation is called for.
Another matter to which my hon. friend referred was the announcement in the speech from the throne that the Department of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment and the Department of Health would be amalgamated in a new department under the title of National Health and Soldiers Welfare.
The leader of the opposition expressed surprise that the speech from the throne did not contain any further mention of the promise made last session of a committee to inquire into the question of pensions. Well, may I tell my hon. friend that if we had attempted to put into the speech from the throne all
46	[DOT] COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
that we intended or promised to do it would have been a much longer document than it is, and he might perhaps have criticized us on that score. But I hope he will not think that anything which has been left out of the speech from the throne in the nature of a promise made in a previous session is being overlooked. The government intends at the very earliest date to ask the house to appoint a special committee to consider legislation which will be brought down by the Minister of Health and Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment (Mr. King) and to recommend what may be advisable by way of amendment to existing legislation. The hope of the administration is that the committee will go very fully into the whole question of pensions in its bearing on the well-being and welfare of returned men.
The remaining part of the address of my hon. friend in relation to the speech from the throne which concerned domestic affairs had to do with the question of trade. I confess that listening to him yesterday and also reading with considerable interest the addresses which he has made since he became leader of his party, I have yet to learn exactly what he has in his mind as to the policy he thinks should be adopted by the government with respect to trade matters. I hope during the course of the session he will enlighten us, and, if his party has a policy with respect to trade, that he will give us some opportunity first of all of knowing what it is and, if it differs from our own, of debating the merits of it. Up to the present time he has told us that what this country needs more than anything else is the development of its natural resources, the expansion of its commerce, and the development of trade within the empire. Well, all these are matters of common agreement. Of course we want to develop, our natural resources, of course we want to trade with the different parts of the empire, and we want moreover to trade as widely as we can with all the countries of the world. If there is anything more than that in what my hon. friend has been telling the country is desirable in the way of policy, I hope he will enlighten us upon it.
I should like to ask him first of all, when he speaks of the development of our natural resources, whether in his experience of business affairs he has not found that capital is as necessary as labour in order to develop any branch of industry, particularly the great primary and manufacturing industries of the country. What the dominion needs at the present time is as much capital as possible brought in for the purpose of sound invest-

ment-not merely immigration for the purpose of supplying labour, but also the introduction of more capital. We want that capital from all quarters of the globe, and-may I say to my hon. friend?-the more we can get from the British Isles the happier we in this dominion will be. We cannot have too much British capital or British labour to develop our natural resources, so long as we are in a position properly to assimilate the population that comes to our shores; but simply to bring people into Canada without having the capital wherewith to put them to work in the development of our great primary industries is, I think, a questionable proceeding.


Mr. BENNETT:: There are thirteen hundred and eighty-five million dollars of savings in this country not being used in industry or development. That is the answer.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Does my hon. friend wish us to infer that he does not want any more capital to come in?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No. People are fearful
of using their capital. They are tying it up in the banks at three per cent instead of using it to develop industries.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I would say
to my hon. friend that the large sums now in the banks is just another evidence of the great prosperity of this country. The more that is advertised to the world the more it will help to bring into this country the kind of settlers we want. I w'ould ask my hon. friend, as the leader of the party opposite, if, when he speaks on a subsequent occasion, he will be a little more explicit as to just exactly what he wants to see done in the way of trade development, and how that wider development is to be brought about. He has spoken a great deal about trade within the empire. I should like to ask him this question-not to reply to it immediately, but I hope during the session:	Does
he want free trade within the British Empire? Does he want an increase in the British preference; and if so, on what particular commodities? Does he wish us to trade only within the British Empire, to build up a sort of exclusive economic unit within the British Empire; or is he prepared to have the producers and manufacturers of this country buy and sell in as wide markets as it is possible for them to find? Before my hon. friend pretends to the country that he has a policy on trade matters T think he ought

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
to make clear first of all in his own mind what that policy is, and then give to us the benefit of a clear expression of his views.
Speaking of trade within the empire, I have a few figures here that may help my hon. friend to reach a decision on this matter of benefit to his party and himself. Let us take the figures with respect to trade with the United Kingdom and other parts of the British Empire. What are they? In 1896 we imported from the United Kingdom commodities to the value of $33,000,000; in 1926 our imports amounted, not to $33,000,000, but to $163,000,000. From other parts of the British Empire we imported $2,000,000 in 1896; that had grown to $44,000,000 in 1926. In other words, our total import trade with the British Empire had grown from $35,000,000 in 1896 to $207,000,000 in 1926. Our exports to the United Kingdom in 1896 totalled $62,000,000; in 1926 that total had reached the large figure of $513,000,000. To other parts of the British Empire we exported in 1896 $4,000,000, and in 1926 $85,000,000. In other words, our total exports to the British Empire increased from $66,000,000 in 1896 to $598,000,000 in 1926.
While that is an enormous growth of trade within the British Empire and one of which we are all proud, may I draw my hon. friend's attention to this fact: that while in 1896 the empire took 60 per cent of our exports, in 1926 it took only 45 per cent, although there had been that great expansion from $66,000,000 to $598,000,000 in the total exports from this Dominion to the various parts of the empire. That, it seems to me, means that if this Dominion is to find markets for its produce and products, whether they be the raw materials that my hon. friend speaks of so much, or the goods that are manufactured from them, those markets must be found in all parts of the world. The United Kingdom or the British Empire as a whole cannot begin to take from us all the commodities we have to sell. Are we to wait until my hon. friend has brought about this economic union which he speaks of in a theoretical way in order that we may trade within the empire to the exclusion of other parts of the world?


Richard Bedford Bennett: He did not say that.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I may be
wrong in interpreting what my hon. friend has in mind, but I think the house will agree with me that he has been sailing pretty close to the idea of a sort of economic unit of trade within the British Empire.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But he did not say it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am glad to have got that much from my hon. friend, that he has never said that we are to seek to make an economic unit of the British Empire in the matter of trade. However, may I make our position clear: What we want first of all is trade, and we would prefer to have that trade in largest measure within the empire. Wherever, therefore, there is opportunity for trade we shall take advantage of it, first of all among ourselves at home and next, other things being equal, with other parts of the empire, in preference to trading beyond. But when we have gone as far as we can in developing trade among ourselves and within the empire, then, if it is to the economic interests of the citizens of the Dominion to find other markets, we shall endeavour as far as we can to obtain such markets, and the best markets possible, in all parts of the world.
Let me call my hon. friend's attention to what appeals to me as an important consideration in this matter. What do we mean by raw material? The grain that is grown in the field is raw material: it is raw material from which flour is subsequently manufactured. Are we to understand that Canada is not to export her wheat at all but only to manufacture it into flour, shipping out the finished product alone? Flour itself is in turn a raw material, used in the making of bread. Are we therefore to cease exporting our flour and to export only bread? And so we might pursue the query? Take newsprint, for example: newsprint comes from pulp and pulp, as my hon. friend knows, is a product of the trees of the forest. But newsprint is a raw material; it is used for a variety of purposes. It beoomes therefore a question whether we shall stop exporting newsprint, if the argument that is advanced is to be regarded as sound. If that is to be the case, let me remind hon. members that we have reached in Canada to-day the point where we have not only the greatest record which this country has ever achieved in the export of wheat and newsprint, but that our record in respect of the export of these two commodities is also the greatest of any country in the world. It seems to me further, we should keep in mind, if we are to have a proper appreciation of matters of this sort, the significance of conservation-something which my hon. friend apparently disregards altogether. Because wheat is grown and exported one year it does not follow that the soil has been exhausted and is incapable of
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repeating the same reproductive process year in and year out. If proper regard is had for the rotation of crops, and for other considerations of which agriculturists 'have a wide knowledge, there is no reason why the fecundity of nature should not continue from year to year with increasing advantage to the nation. Similarly with regard to our forests. My hon. friend in some of his utterances seems occasionally to be under the delusion that we are necessarily depleting the country of its forests when we export such large quantities of newsprint. There again he should consider the importance of conservation properly carried on as a means of restoring and renewing our forests. If my hon. friend will give due consideration to this aspect I am sure that many doubts he may have in the matter will be removed.
I pass now to the next subject which the bon. leader of the opposition touched upon, namely, immigration. Here again I find the same difficulty in appreciating what precisely he has in mind. If he will scan the remarks he made in the house yesterday, as reported, he will see that what he suggested was the introduction of some immense scheme in relation to immigration. Apparently he seemed to think that the country was dissatisfied with the restrictive measures at present in force and that what was most needed was some large policy that would involve a considerable expenditure. If that is what he contemplates, I wish he would tell us just what the scheme is. That is what we are entitled to know. What does be want to initiate? What does he want to do with the money which he wishes parliament to vote for immigration? Does he want it spent in bringing into the country people to work in the factories? If so, let him tell us. Does he want to bring in people indiscriminately, without any of the restrictions that exist at the present time? If that is what he has in mind, should he not so inform the House? But do not let him criticize the government's immigration policy simply on the score of its not being satisfactory because it is not large enough to satisfy some ambition which he himself has not seen fit to disclose to the country.
As to the government's immigration policy, let me say this-and if this is not going far enough I wish my hon. friend would suggest how much further we ought to go-our policy is to bring into the country just as many people, of proper physique and general qualifications, as the country is capable of assimilating with satisfaction to itself as well as to those who are brought in. We do not wish to bring into Canada races that are not assimil-
* Mr. Mackenzie King. 1
able. We do not wish to bring in peoples from countries that have populations which, as experience has shown, do not make good citizens or settlers in our dominion. On the other hand, wherever men and women of strong, healthy physique and of proper character can be found, the doors of the country are open to receive them, under such restrictions only as this parliament places, or authorizes the government to place, upon their entrance into Canada. Parliament in its wisdom has thought well to make a distinction between different classes coming into Canada. We have felt that as a British dominion we should welcome, in larger measure than from any other country, immigrants from the British Isles. It is the desire and the wish of the administration to encourage as largely as we can immigration from England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. We want to build up this part of the British Empire with people of British stock. But if the British Isles are not prepared to send their people, if the people of the British Isles do not wish to emigrate' to this country, despite the inducements we offer, then we feel called upon, in the endeavour to increase the population of this dominion by immigration, to introduce strange stocks from other countries as well. The policy, then, is to accept as the best stocks, next to the people of the British Isles, those who come from the northern races of Europe, not because we have any particular criticism to make of the individuals who come from the southern climes of Europe, but because experience has shown that the northern stocks are best adapted to this northern half of North America. The effort of the department is to encourage immigration of people from Norway, Sweden, Denmark and other northern countries, next after those of the British Isles.
There are certain parts of Europe from which it has been thought advisable not to seek to bring in immigrants to any large extent, and parliament has decided that they shall be permitted to come in only subject to special permission on the part of the minister or of the department. My hon. friend said yesterday, with respect to permits, that all sorts of rumours were afloat regarding the department. He intimated that there was suspicion and a feeling that people were being kept out who should be allowed to come in, and that there was need for investigation. I am very glad that he made reference to this matter, because I think that wherever there is suspicion abroad the sooner we know about it the better; the sooner the whole matter is investigated the better it will be for everyone concerned.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
Let me say to the house that the officials of the department have an extremely difficult task to perform. In the matter of administration they are restricted by the obligations which parliament imposes upon them; and, on the other hand, they have to stand all the abuse that may be directed against them for not meeting the wishes of persons who, from [DOT] one motive or another, hold a view different from that which parliament has decided should prevail. I remember being much impressed in this house on one occasion with a remark made by the Right Hon. Mr. Fielding, to the effect that not only every member of the government 'but, as well, every member of parliament owed a special duty to the civil service to uphold public servants who endeavoured to discharge their duties honourably and honestly. The government of the country is carried on by a large body of civil servants who act under instructions and in accordance with the policies laid down by parliament. They are not free agents; if they did as they pleased they would be violating the obligations of their positions. They are put in positions and are expected to administer the law in accordance with the provisions of the statute. The Deputy Minister of the Department of Immigration, Mr. Egan, has sought, I believe, to administer the affairs of his department honestly. He is fearless and courageous, and all that I have seen of him makes me believe that he is possessed of the qualities which it is desirable to have in officers of the public service. If Mr. Egan is restricting immigrants from coming into this country in consequence of any regulation, all I have to say is it is for parliament to decide whether that regulation should continue or not. So long as the regulation is there, and the officer seeks only to uphold the regulation, no member of parliament is entitled to criticize him adversely. If there is any criticism to be made let it be directed against the government that keeps the officer in his present .position. Let me say to my hon. friend that the government will be only too happy to have all the affairs of the Department of Immigration discussed and investigated by a committee of this house during the present session. It is suggested that that committee should be the committee on agriculture and colonization. I think that possibly, in view of its membership, it is the best committee to investigate matters relating to the Department of Immigration. I know that the minister at the head of the department was quick to volunteer the statement that he would welcome the fullest investigation into the affairs of the department, by the members of the committee. That investigation can easily be arranged, and will be arranged during the course of the present session.
My hon. friend stated that there was sus- [DOT] picion as to the permits that were being issued, as to how they were being issued and the like. May I say that if it is found that permits are being issued in an illegal manner no time will be lost on the part of the administration in seeing that that procedure is brought to an end very summarily. I wish to say, because it is within my own certain knowledge, that members on both sides are coming to the Minister of Immigration from day to day and pleading for the right to have permits granted to certain people in their own constituencies. That is known to every hon. member, and I say that if hon. gentlemen do not wish the permit system to continue by all means let it be discontinued. But if the permit system is regarded by parliament as wise, I would urge hon. members to support the minister and the department in their efforts to carry out that system properly.
I am not so sure that the views expressed by my hon. friend in regard to the extent of immigration to Canada give a fair idea of what is being done. My hon. friend expressed the view that we were doing nothing at all, and that immigration was being brought almost to a standstill. The hon. gentleman knows better than that. Not only is that the case, but his own words disclose that he knows directly the opposite, because elsewhere in his address he said that there were not half of those that came in 1913. My hon. friend chose 1913 because it was the peak year, so to speak, of the immigration movement to Canada. Let me point out that 1913 was before the war. At that time Europe was in a state of panic, and many people were trying to get away from the continent as fast as they could. In 1913 transportation costs across the Atlantic were low. These were factors which contributed to a heavy immigration movement at that time. Moreover, for a number of years previous to 1913 there had been considerable immigration from Europe to Canada, and as every hon. member knows no immigration propaganda is as effective and as helpful as that which comes from immigrants who have come to this country and are living here happily and contented. They are glad then to induce their friends to come and settle in the new land where they themselves have encountered success. I need not point out the unfairness in making a comparison between 1913 and to-day. Take the population of Europe to-day. Why that continent has been largely depopulated of those progressive spirits who



The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
are ready to move from one part of the world to another when opportunity offers. There is no country in Europe, and that is true particularly of the British Isles, which has not suffered a tremendous loss of manhood in consequence of the war. How then is it possible to get the same volume of immigration that took place in 1913 and preceding years. In 1913-I speak only from memory at the moment-my impression is that you could go from ports in the British Isles to Montreal for something like $25 or less. To-day the fare is $80 or more. That is a very different situation to-day when we want to get immigrants. Notwithstanding the handicap to which I have alluded the immigration to Canada for the first nine months of the last fiscal year amounted to 128,928 persons, an increase over the corresponding period of 1926 of 14,893, or 13 per cent. Of the total of 128,928 the immigration of British, United States, French, Belgian, Swiss, Scandinavian, Dutch or German origin amounted to 92,955. In the nine months under review-here I want to direct the attention of the house to a statement by my hon. friend that Canadians were leaving the west to go into the United States-33,722 Canadians returned to live in Canada from the United States where they had gone with the declared intention of residing there permanently.


Peter McGibbon: Is the Prime Minister
aware that in the last five years more Canadians crossed to the United States than the number of immigrants who, from all sources, came to this country?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am not, but I would say this to my hon. friend. I would rather in the interests of immigration give to the country the statement I have just made than the one he has made to the house.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: "Whisper of death."


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It is insinuated sometimes that the government is not doing as much as it should towards encouraging immigration from the British Isles as compared with Europe. What are the facts? I will ask hon. members to listen for a moment while I communicate the details of the relative expenditure on bringing immigrants to Canada from the British Isles as compared with bringing them from Europe, and ask if they think the insinuation or implication is correct that we are doing more for immigration from Europe than we are for immigration from the British Isles. The expenditures on the continent of Europe totalled $63,000 in 1925-26, and $57,000 in 1926-27. The per capita cost of continental immigrants 
was approximately $1.50 in 1926 and less than 80 cents in 1927. In the British Isles during 1925-26 we spent in advertising, literature, exhibitions and general office expenses, $427,000, and on passage assistance during the same period, $317,000, a total of $744,000, or an average of approximately $20 for every British immigrant secured. In 1926-27 the expenditure was $881,000, or an average of something over $17 per capita. For the continental immigrant there is no passage assistance; he pays a minimum ocean rate of $112.50 or stays at home. A Britisher who pays his own way pays a minimum ocean rate of $84.50, while if he belongs to the classes receiving assisted passages, his ocean passage costs him but two pounds and his children under seventeen years of age travel free.
That is the position as between the continent and Britain and I submit that those figures are unanswerable as to the effort on the part of the government to encourage migration from Great Britain. WThen my hon. friend speaks about other parts of the empire receiving British immigrants, what are the figures? In the calendar year 1927 Canada received 47,607, Australia 27,571 immigrants. During the same period there was a total of 60,967 passages assisted in England, of which Canada received 29,287, Australia 26,021, New Zealand 5,368 and South Africa 293. Therefore our proportion of immigrants from the British Isles who received assisted passages was the largest of any of the dominions. One would think, from much that one reads in the press, that Australia and other countries were getting away ahead of us in British immigrants. My hon. friend, I think, will discover when the committee on agriculture and colonization considers this question, that what is really at the back of all this criticism of the Department of Immigration is the fact that while this parliament is prepared to vote money to assist immigrants to come to Canada who will take up agriculture as an occupation or become domestic servants, parliament is not prepared to vote money for persons who will engage in other occupations and callings.
Those who are interested in bringing into this country people regardless of the occupation into which they will go are continually finding fault with the administration because our assisted passages are limited to those two classes and because equal amounts are not given to people who wish to enter Canada to engage in other occupations. I ask hon. gentlemen opposite who are members of the legal and medical professions how long thev

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
would tolerate a contribution by the state to bring in by assisted passages lawyers and doctors in large numbers from the British Isles to Canada. The man who is a mechanic working at his trade, the skilled engineer, the miner, men in the building trades and the like feel in exactly the same way with respect to what they have devoted of their time and energy in acquiring skill in their particular trades.


Mr. CAHAN:: In respect of those other
than agriculturists who are coming in, is it not a fact that they are prevented from coming in from other countries than Great Britain unless they go into agriculture or become domestic servants?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I think my
hon. friend is mistaken there in the broad inference that one would take from his remarks. May I .put the matter in this way? As regards the British Isles anyone can come to this country who can qualify as being physically fit; there is no restriction of any kind. As regards Europe there is an occupational test; a man has to follow a particular occupation in order to be permitted to enter Canada as an immigrant. May I add this further? As regards the British Isles, if the immigrant belongs to the agriculturist class or is a domestic servant his or her passage is assisted, paid for the most part by the state. In connection with Britain there is further a contribution by this parliament which is j oined in by the parliament of Great Britain towards the settlement of families from the British Isles in this country. That does not exist with respect to the continent.
There are some European countries from which certain classes, as I indicated a moment ago, can come only under special permission. But parliament has decided that, and the Department of Immigration is surely not to be blamed for carrying out regulations which parliament has made. If hon. gentlemen feel that we should not exclude any class from Europe, all they have to do is to amend the law to that effect. But I submit that they will not do so because what in the matter of immigrants is of greatest importance to this Dominion looking to the future is quality rather than quantity.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I am asking purely for information and not from any partisan motives. Is it possible under the regulations for a citizen of France, no matter how wealthy he may be, who is engaged in any occupation 56103-41	,
except that of agriculture or domestic service, to enter Canada at the present time for the purpose of settling?


Mr. FORKE:: I might answer for the
Prime Minister. As a matter of actual practice, immigrants from all countries of northern Europe are coming in under practically the same provisions as immigrants from Great Britain provided that they pass the health qualifications.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: If they get special permits
from the minister.


Robert Forke: No.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: A relative of mine who
happened to be a French citizen came into Canada to stay for six months, and although
a person of wealth and distinction I was asked to give a bond for return.


Robert Forke: If the hon. member will give me the name of that person I will make inquiry and I will guarantee that the case is not exactly as he states.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: My statement will stand.


Robert Forke: I will take the name.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: Does the Prime Minister not think the farmer has the same right to object to competition as the doctor or the lawyer?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I have no doubt he has the same right to object but he does not do so. The farmer is anxious to get as much as he can in the way of agricultural assistance land I ithink he takes a much broader view on these questions than some others.


Richard Bedford Bennett: May I direct my right
hon. friend's attention to the fact that it is not the statute that prohibits but the regulations made by order in council under the statute and this parliament has not had an opportunity of dealing with the matter, but rather orders in council prepared by the government have been made to conform to particular eases that are desired to be met.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am quite
prepared to agree with my hon. friend that the statute gives the government authority to make regulations. Those regulations are laid on the table of the house; they are known to all hon. members. If those regulations are not satisfactory, let us have a debate on the matter and amend and change them. The point that I am making at the moment is that as long as those regulations exist it is unfair to officials of the department who are doing their utmost to serve their

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
country faithfully and well, to criticise them on the score that they are endeavouring to restrict and prevent people from coming into Canada. My hon. friend said that he had a telegram from some friend of his in Europe complaining about instructions with respect to medical examination.


Richard Bedford Bennett: From London.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That serves to illustrate just how far criticism may go in completely misrepresenting the intention and purpose of the administration in respect of some of the so-called regulations. For years the medical examination of immigrants to Canada took place on this side of the ocean. I think hon. members will all agree that we do not want in this country classes who are defective, delinquent and dependent, but that we want classes that will come up to a certain qualification. The examination took place at Grosse lie, with what result? The result was that many of those who had left their homes in the old country were turned back when they reached the shores of Canada. What was the criticism made? The criticism was that the government by making its examinations on this side was deterring immigration; that every man who was sent back became a centre of discontent in the country to which he returned. It was urged that instead of having these examinations made at the time of landing and consequent painful returns of immigrants to the old country, the examination should be made in the old country itself. Then at great expense, because it is a great expense, the government appointed medical examiners in Europe and the British Isles, placing them not one in every village but at a considerable number of points. Now we are criticized because of alleged extravagance by the government in paying for these physicians on the other side, and then our hon. friend comes and tells us that we are criticized because we make the immigrants on the other side undergo this examination.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No; it is the character of the examination.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: This also is a matter which I would wish this committee to discuss, and I think it will be shown that every one of the so-called restrictions has been made primarily if not entirely in the interests of the immigrant. As I say, I believe it will serve a useful purpose in every direction to have the entire question of immigration as thoroughly ventilated as possible.
WTith respect to the empire settlement scheme, and in particular to the possible criticism that we are not doing as much as we fMr. Mackenzie Kin i.l
should, may I quote a paragraph from an interview given at Vancouver by the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, Mr. Amery, in regard to this government's part in cooperating with the British government in empire settlement? As every hon. member knows, no one has more at heart than Mr. Amery, the -Secretary of State for the Dominions, the success of the empire settlement scheme. Here is what Mr. Amery said in one of his first interviews:
I do not think there is any feeling in Great Britain that the Canadian government is not doing its part to stimulate immigration, and I do not think there has been any apathy on the part of the Canadian government in the old land in this respect. The fact is there have been economic factors at work which have retarded the flow of emigration to this country.
There is a statement which I hope hon. members will take as authoritative having regard to the source which I have mentioned.
I regret that I have found it necessary to dwell at such length on these matters of immediate domestic concern. I shall endeavour speedily to conclude by referring to the two other main subjects which my hon. friend brought up in his address. I refer to imperial and international questions.
First of all, may I allude to the remarks of my hon. friend on the alleged commitments of our country at the League of Nations. He said, if I followed him aright, that parliament ought to know a great deal more about what is going on at the League of Nations and what we are being committed to than it does; that there has been recently an economic commission on which Canada has been represented, and that the implications of its findings are matters of concern to all of us, and he said that these commissions should not exist without a fuller knowledge on the part of members of this house as to what they are doing. He also intimated, in particular, that there was an order in council or a despatch sent some time ago which set out the policy of the government in regard to arbitration; or rather, it was the other way round- that the policy of the government in regard to arbitration in international affairs was a matter on which he desired to have more concrete information, and which he thought- my hon. friend shakes his head. Did I not understand him aright?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I referred to the observations with respect to Senator Dandurand's speech, and I said that in my judgment that speech did not warrant the implications founded upon it. My right hon. friend will find what I said in Hansard.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Probably there is very little difference between my hon. friend and myself on this point. The government's policy with respect to arbitration was set out in a despatch tabled two years ago. What I wish to say *with respect to the League of Nations and the part that this country is assuming in relation thereto is this:	As hon. members of the house know,
the reports of the representatives of this country at the League of Nations, the reports of delegates who have been appointed to the league, are tabled every session, and in addition to that, there is distributed to all members of parliament the proceedings of the League of Nations which contain, I understand, all that transpires there that is of moment. These documents give as complete information to members of the house as it is possible to get from any source.
In regard to the economic commission to which my hon. friend has just referred, may I say to him at once and to the house that that was not a commission on which ministers of the crown were represented. It committed the government or the country to nothing. It was a commission of experts on economic questions, meeting under the auspices of the League of Nations to discuss means of more effectively bringing about greater stability in economic matters throughout the world-a body of experts who met in Geneva and discussed these matters there, and prepared a report. That report will be presented to parliament. The report of our members on the economic commission will be presented to parliament, I hope, to-morrow. It would have been ready for presentation to-day, but it is being translated. I desired to present both the French and English copies at the same time.
I now come to that part of my hon. friend's address which touches upon the much discussed subject of status. May I say to the leader of the opposition at once that so far as we on this side of the. house are concerned, our view in regard to Canada's position within the British Empire is none other than that which was laid down at the Imperial conference of 1926, in that part of the report of the conference which relates to the status of Great Britain and the dominions and which is set forth in black and white in the published proceedings of that body. May I say this further to him, that in that particular, namely, in our view as to Canada's position, we do not differ one whit from the view of the government of Great Britain, the government of New Zealand, the government of South
Africa, the government of Newfoundland, and the government of the Irish Free State. All the governments of the self-governing dominions, and the government of the mother country have expressed their view as to the present constitutional position of the dominions and the mother country, and that position is the position which we at all events, as the Liberal party in this country and, in another capacity, as the government of this country, take with respect to Canada's status at the present time. May I read from the proceedings of the imperial conference the exact statement of Canada's position as we conceive it to be in relation to other parts of the British Empire? The report of the conference reads:
There is, however, one most important element in it-the British Empire-which, from a strictly constitutional point of view, has now', as regards all vital matters, reached its full development-we refer to the group of selfgoverning communities composed of Great Britain and the dominions. Their position and mutual relation may be readily defined. They are autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no wray subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the crown, and freely associated as members of the British commonwealth of nations.
That position has not only been emphasized, as my hon. friend has said, by my colleague the hon. Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) and myself and other members of the government, but it has been stressed in this country by every visitor we have had in this Dominion in the past year who has had anything to do with the imperial conference. The Prime Minister of Australia, when he passed through Canada, said that this was the position so far as Australia was concerned in regard to its relations to the other parts of the empire.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Australia can amend its
own constitution.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am going
to have a word with my hon. friend on that point in a moment. Then the Premier of New Zealand took the same position as respects both New Zealand and Canada. We have just had a visit from the President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State, who has taken exactly the same position, and we have had within the last week a visit from the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs who has repeated at different points in this country the same position. We had during the summer a visit from the Prime Minister of Great Britain, not to

Trie. Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
mention His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, each of whom took exactly the same position with regard to our status.
My hon. friend has just interjected that Australia has the power to amend its own constitution. What I wish he would tell the house is whether, if he is in any way dissatisfied with the present arrangement, he is prepared to join with us in having amended the present procedure in regard to the amending of our constitution.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The responsibility rests
at the moment with my right hon. friend.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend says that the responsibility rests with us at the moment. Under the circumstances, and since he hesitates to give expression to his own view, let me give to the House what I conceive to be the views and desires of my hon. friend with regard to the amending of our constitution. I think that possibly my hon. friend and those of us who sit on this side of the house are not very far apart on this matter. At all events we were not very far apart before he became the leader of his party, and I cannot believe he has changed since, although no doubt he has received warnings from those who sit about him as to how far he should go in these matters. I have in my hand a copy of a very admirable address which my hon. friend delivered before the board of trade of his native city, Calgary, on June 5, 1927, before he had become the leader of his party. May I just read to the house the account which appears in his own paper, the Albertan, of the address which he delivered there?


Richard Bedford Bennett: To those who live in
Alberta that is a joke.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Then my
hon. friend takes exception to the statement that the Albertan is his paper?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Rather.	[DOT]


William Lyon Mackenzie King: But he will
not take exception to the accuracy of the report?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have not seen it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Perhaps he
will tell me if the report is incorrect. This report reads:
Mr. Bennett began by mentioning that Canada will probably advance as much both constitutionally and otherwise in the next ten or fifteen years as she did in the past fifty or sixty years. In 1865 Canada was a dependency of Great Britain and was treated as a colony by that country. The members of the British house in the debate on the British North Ame-

rica Act revealed themselves as devoid of vision as to what the confederation would mean. Since then the relations of Canada with foreign powers in respect to trade, the making of treaties and the like involved the assertion of nationhood.
These are good words.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Then he
continued:
But Canada cannot properly be called a nation to-day even though there have been great changes since confederation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He continues:
Canadian laws are still subject to disallowance by Westminster theoretically, and there is on the statute books of Great Britain a law which says that in certain cases British law has precedence over Canadian law.
That was something along the line of what he said yesterday.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The reporters did not
understand the legal side of it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I read further:
In one matter there has been no progress. We are still without the power to amend our own constitution.
This is what my hon. friend said:
If Canada is to be a nation she must have this power.
Now does my hon. friend want Canada to be a nation? We should like to know whether my hon. friend wishes this country to be a nation or not.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I will answer it. Nationhood technically used in international law involves, as I said yesterday, complete independence. I am not prepared for the complete independence of Canada.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend is putting his own construction on the word "nationhood." May I say to him that the reason that I welcome the equality of status as between the different dominions of the empire and Great Britain is that I believe it is the only basis on which the British Empire can continue and endure, and for that reason and not from any desire of independence in the sense to which my hon. friend refers, I am a strong supporter of the present position of the British Empire as laid down at the Imperial conference of 1926. The quotation continues:
If Canada is to be a nation she must have this power. In its ultimate analysis the constitution of Canada is a statute passed by Great Britain. The British parliament is supreme except in cases where it has delegated its power,

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
but there is no indication in the British North America Act that that power has been parted with. There are indications that the Canadian people are beginning to wish to have this power.
That is the end of the quotation. Then the report in the paper proceeds:
Mr. Bennett referred to the fact that other dominions have the power to change the constitution, namely, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the Irish Free State.
Then a quotation again:
It seems to me that young men must be prepared to calmly consider what machinery shall be set up by it to amend our own constitution.


Ernest Lapointe: These are fine words.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The quotation continues:
This to me is the biggest problem.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I agree I said that.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The report in the paper continues:
He referred to the report of the imperial conference and said that Canada has not equality of status within the so-called commonwealth of nations, and that to refer to Canada as a nation is a misnomer-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Exactly.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: -
[DOT]-while the present constitutional arrangements exist.
Mr. Bennett also referred to the selection of a Canadian flag which he said was another problem which would demand attention before many years and was wrapped up with the problem of obtaining the power to change our own constitution.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear. So it is.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend must leave the house to judge from this just what his real desire with respect to nationhood is.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I did suggest-and that is a very casual report in the newspaper-that it was highly desirable that the young men of this country should think in terms of the possible amendment of our constitution, and with respect to the flag-it was the time of the controversy in South Africa when the people were tied up with that problem-I said it was time the people of this country were thinking of it. I do not withdraw a single word of what I said.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Yesterday in the course of my hon. friend's remarks, he used the word " implication " and spoke of what was implied. It is desirable that the house should know just what his point of view is with respect to the position of Canada
within the empire and what deduction is to be drawn from his own utterances in this regard.
I will not take up the time of the house by citing statements of other parties as to Canada's position, but I would like to put on record one statement made by Mr. Amery, Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, who is here in our country, with respect to what, in his opinion, was laid down at the conference. Speaking as a British minister he said:
The conference had laid down in the first place the complete equality of British nations-* that none was subordinated to another. "Canada is no more subordinate to Britain than Britain is to Canada" he declared. "That principle is laid down for the whole empire with absolute unanimity."
With that statement we on this side of the house are in entire accord and complete agreement.
Yesterday my hon. friend's remarks were directed in large part to the Colonial Laws Validity Act, and he argued that because there is on the statute books of Great Britain a law known as the Colonial Laws Validity Act, under which statutes repugnant to the laws of Great Britain when passed by this parliament become of no force and effect, we are not, shall I say, a nation-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not of equal status.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Not of equal
status with the mother country. May I say to my hon. friend that if he is speaking of purely legal technicalities-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not technicalitiesofficial interpretation.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Legal interpretation-then perhaps he can find some support for what he says, but may I remind him that every recognized authority on constitutional law and constitutional history has taken the view that the constitution is something larger and broader and higher and deeper than a mere matter of law. The constitution is not made of statutes alone, but of customs and practices and traditions, as he well knows, and of principles and practices which have been long in use, all of which played their part in determining the constitutional position and status of a country.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I desire to make myself
perfectly clear to my right hon. friend. I say the customs and practices have nothing whatever to do with judicial interpretations. The courts take no notice of anything else but statutes, as appears in the Nadan case, and therefore in the Nadan case they interpreted the statutes- -

The Andress-Mr. Mackenzie King


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I do not wish to go into the legal side of this matter with my hon. friend. I prefer to leave that to the legal members of the house. But I want to say that there would be some force in his contention if the factor to which he has drawn our attention had not been the very factor of which full notice had been taken and to which particular consideration had been given at the conference. What was the precise endeavour of the conference with regard to describing the status of the dominion? It was, first of all, to discover whether there was agreement between all parts of the British Empire as to the nature of the relations existing between the different self-governing parts to each other; and if so, what the basic principle of the relationship was. There was no difficulty in discovering that. It was agreed by all that it had been a matter of evolution. It was not some new thing of the moment, brought for the first time into being. It was the opinion of all that the point reached in the constitutional evolution of the dominions themselves and their relation to the governments of Great Britain and of one another was such that the only accurate description of the relationship existing between them was one of equality of status. Once that principle had been laid down, then the conference proceeded to see whether in any particular there was a survival of the old order which had passed away. It was recognized that there had been a change. I submit that the greatest of all the transformations that had taken place in respect to the British Empire had been the transformation from the conception of the empire as an imperial unit to be highly developed in the form of a federation to this acknowledged conception of the empire as a community of free nations, owing a common allegiance to the same crown, having similar constitutions, cooperating with one another in accordance with certain well understood principles, but in no state of subordination one to the other.
Having laid down the position, the conference had then, as I have said, to see whether there were survivals of the old order, whether there were anachronisms, whether there remained anomalies. As was to be expected, one, two, three or four anomalies presented themselves. One was the case my hon. friend has mentioned. If you have equality of status, if that is the position between the dominions and the mother country, how can you reconcile that equality of status with the power which the Colonial Laws Validity Act apparently gives to the imperial parliament?
(Mr. Bermett.]
That is what is troubling my hon. friend. It was noticed at once at the conference that that was an anomaly; at once it was stressed that the statute could not continue to be operative under the condition which has now come to be recognized, and immediately the conference undertook to provide ways and means of removing that anomaly. Instead of seeking to remove it instantly during the sessions of a conference which had been called only for a few weeks, and which was then nearing its close, recognizing that there were legal obligations and difficulties involved, it was decided that a committee of experts from different parts of the empire would meet with a view of considering how that particular anomaly might be removed before the time of or at a subsequent conference.
The whole position in that regard has been set out in the proceedings of the conference. Let me, in order to confirm what I have said, read from the text of the report of the conference. After setting forth the statement of equality of status in the terms in which I have read it, the report has the following:
Equality of status, so far as Britain and the dominions are concerned, is thus the root principle governing our inter-imperial relations. But the principles of equality and similarity, appropriate to status, do not universally extend to function.
I do not need to continue on that part.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: It is puzzling to me to know what "function" means.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend and I will have to talk about that some evening. I think we can work it out together. Here is .the point:
Existing administrative, legislative, and judicial forms-
My hon. friend has referred to the judiciary; there is a reference to judicial forms.
-are admittedly not wholly in accord with the position as described in section 2 of this report.
The conference recognized that there were some features not in accord with the principle.
This is inevitable, since most of these forms date back to a time well antecedent to the present stage of constitutional development. Our first task then was to examine these forms with special reference to any cases where the want of adaptation of practice to principle caused, or might be thought to cause, inconvenience in the conduct of inter-imperial relations.
Going on from that stage in the procedure, under the head of Operation of Dominion Legislation, the report continues as follows:

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Our attention was also called to various points in connection with the operation of dominion legislation which, it was suggested, required clarification.
And what was one of those points?
(d) The operation of legislation passed by the parliament at Westminster in relation to the dominions. In this connection special attention was called to such statutes as the Colonial Laws Validity Act.
The very point that my hon. friend has drawn our attention to. Now what does the report continue to say with regard to that?
We gave these matters the best consideration possible in the limited time at our disposal, but came to the conclusion that the issues involved were so complex that there would be grave danger in attempting any immediate pronouncement other than a statement of certain principles which, in our opinion, underlie the whole question of the operation of dominion legislation.
What is said further on this point?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Is not that an ideal to be attained rather than a realization at the present time?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend is quite correct in saying, it is an ideal to be attained, and I hope he will join me in the endeavour to bring about its attainment.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: There is no pretence of our having attained it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: There is no pretence; this statement sets the situation forth in black and white. This citation, .1 think, answers what my hon. friend says about "pretence". Referring to certain matters that may have to be considered in the interim the report says:
On this point we propose that it should be placed on record that apart from provisions embodied in constitutions or in specific statutes expressly providing for reservation, it is recognized that it is the right of the government of each dominion to advise the crown in all matters relating to its own affairs. Consequently, it would not be in accordance with constitutional practice for advice to be tendered to His Majesty by His Majesty's government in Great Britain on any matter pertaining to the affairs of a dominion against the views of the government of that dominion.
Now, Mr. Speaker, when the British government itself declares that with respect to any statute which affects this dominion it will not undertake to advise His Majesty, but will have His Majesty advised by the government of this dominion, whether it be with respect to the Colonial Laws Validity Act or any other statute, I submit that we need have no fear about the full establishment of the principle of equality of status as between governments. Then the report goes on to say that:
Steps should be taken by Great Britain and the dominions to set up a committee with terms of reference on the following lines:-
And one reference is:
(iii) The principles embodied in or underlying the Colonial Laws Validity Act, 1865, and the extent to which any provisions of that act ought to be repealed amended or modified in the light of the existing relations between the various members of the British Commonwealth of Nations as described in this report.
May I suggest to my hon. friend that perhaps he would be well advised to give to this particular question the same degree of thought that his predecessor in the high office which he now holds as leader of the Conservative party has given to it. I think he will find if he reads what Sir Robert Borden has written on the question of status that Sir Robert takes as to the evolution in the constitutional development of the Dominion very much the view which is now being expressed. May I cite one paragraph from Sir Robert's treatise on Canadian Constitutional Studies which relates to the question of Canadian status. Probably we will hear my hon. friend quoting it one day on a Conservative platform as a part of his policy:
As no formal attempt was made to define the constitutional relations between the British and Canadian governments, those relations were free to develop by the same slow and sure steps which had built up the system of government now obtaining in the United Kingdom. Unfettered by a written constitution in the ordinary acceptation of the term, that system has been moidded and is controlled by custom and convention to a remarkable extent. In the words of Lord Bryce, "the always changing constitution becomes interpenetrated by custom." Anson puts it in much the same way: "If in our constitution we find that law and custom diverge, we must note first what is the law, and then how it has been overgrown by custom."
"The conventions are superimposed upon the law, and modify political relations without in the least affecting legal ones." In an interesting contribution to the history and study of relations between the nations of the British commonwealth, Mr. H. Duncan Hall points out the vast scope of changes that may be effected through new conventions of the constitution.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Since then we have had the Nadan decision.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend, with all his legal acumen, might well, instead of seeking to emphasize a small technical point upon which he dwells at such length, offer the house some advice as to how best, for the benefit of all concerned to remove this last anachronism, this trifling anomaly, this irritating remnant.
And now may I conclude by referring to the one other matter in the speech from the throne which my hon. friend discussed at some length,
,	.	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
namely, the decision on the part of the administration to have ministers plenipotentiary exchanged between France and Canada and between Japan and Canada. May I here preface what I have to say by reading the paragraph which appears in the speech from the throne. I would ask hon. members to follow the sequence of statements as they are there set forth. The paragraph in the speech from the throne reads:
As contemplated by the conclusions of the imperial conference of 1926, provision was made on July 1 for direct communication between . His Majesty's government in Canada and His Majesty's other governments of the British Empire. The further implementing of these conclusions which aim at more effective consultation through personal contact by the appointment to Canada of a representative of His Majesty's government in Great Britain is being discussed between the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs in Great Britain, who is at present in Canada, and members of my government. By agreement between the governments of France and Canada and the governments of Japan and Canada it is proposed that each of these countries shall be represented in the other by a minister plenipotentiary.
Let me now take the proceedings of the Imperial conference as they relate to the question of representation between Great Britain and Canada and indicate to the house what was there agreed upon among the representatives. At page 22 of the report, under the heading, System of Communication and Consultation, there appears the following:
Sessions of the imperial conference at which the Prime Ministers of Great Britain and of the dominions are all able to be present cannot, from the nature of things, take place very frequently. The system of communication and consultation between conferences becomes therefore of special importance. We reviewed the position now reached in this respect, with special reference to the desirability of arranging that closer personal touch should be established between Great Britain and the dominions, and the dominions inter se. Such contact alone can convey an impression of the atmosphere in which official correspondence is conducted. Development in this respect seems particularly necessary in relation to matters of major importance in foreign affairs, where expedition is often essential and urgent decision necessary. A special aspect of the question of consultation which we considered was that concerning the representation of Great Britain in the dominions. By reason of his constitutional position, as explained in section 4	(b) of this report, the Governor
General is no longer the representative of His Majesty's government in Great Britain. There is no one therefore in the dominion capitals in a position to represent with authority the views of His Majesty's government in Great Britain.
That is all I need quote in the present connection. What I wish to direct the attention of the house to is this: The Imperial confer-

enice, composed of those members of the several governments within the empire who have to do for the most part with communications passing between different parts of the empire, were agreed that the time had come when there should be not only direct communication as between government and government but also greater opportunity provided by way of personal contact and personal consultation, as a supplement to the written words of a despatch exchanged between governments. Perhaps I might state it thus wise: As nations, in their relations one with another, have found it advisable as the years have passed, to develop a diplomatic service whereby communications may be exchanged not merely in the form of written despatches from one government to another but having the advantages of personal contacts as well, so within the British Empire, with the business of the empire growing as it is, and with the increasing need for cooperation, extending as it has extended since the war, a useful purpose will be served if, in addition to written despatches, there are resident in the various capitals within the empire personal representatives from other parts of the British commonwealth of nations. It was recognized that it was for each dominion and for the British government to decide individually how best it should be represented in the other self-governing communities. Canada has been represented in London for many yearn by a High Commissioner. The High Commissioner in London holds the highest position in the gift of this government in its diplomatic relations with the world outside Canada. As between the other governments of the British Empire and Canada on the one hand, and as between foreign countries and Canada on the other, there is of necessity a considerable difference income particulars in the matter of representation. lit seems to me that there must be drawn a distinct line between representation as between units within the empire and the representation of a dominion in foreign countries. I believe that so long as there is a British Empire the contacts within the empire will be to each dominion more important, more numerous, in every particular more essential, than will be the relation between that dominion and any foreign country; and for that reason I shall always feel that, so far as this country is concerned, the highest post in a representative capacity that may be given beyond the 'Confines of Canada will be the post occupied by the official, whoever he may be, representing this Dominion in London. Whether he be called' a High Commissioner, or by whatever other title he may be designated,

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
he should be regarded as the head of -that representative service which has to deal with the affairs of Canada abroad.
I do not know where my hon. friend got the idea, but he spoke about the possibility of appointing a minister to London. I want to assure him that so far as we on this side of the house are concerned, so far as the government is concerned, we have never thought of anything of the kind.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That was the word used in many press articles.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I agree that the press may have used the word, and I think my hon. friend was right in directing attention to the fact that "-minister" would not be an accurate designation of Canada's representative in London. It would -not be accurate, first of all, for the reasons which my hon. friend gave; and moreover it would be certain to be confused with "minister of the crown". The last thing I should wish to see, carrying out the doctrines of responsible government, would be a minister of the crown from Canada residing in London and there without opportunities of consultation with his colleagues, committing the administration of this country to whatever he might wish to say or do. There is another factor of importance, and that is the difference which must always obtain within the empire in the relation of one who represents merely a government and not the crown and one who represents not merely the government of his country but also the sovereign or recognized -head of the country from which he comes. May I make this a little clearer by way of illustration. Within the empire, the crown is represented in Great Britain by the King and in this Dominion by His Excellency the Governor General. The government of Great Britain, as distinct from the cr-own, has in Canada no representative at the present time. Such however is not the present position of the United States in Canada, which by its minister is represented both as respects the president and the government. Among other subjects discussed by Mr. Amery when passing through Ottawa was this very question of a representative to be appointed from Great Britain -to this dominion. The Secretary of State for the Dominions made it clear that it was -the intention of the British government to appoint a representative who would reside at Ottawa. What his designation will be, or who will be chosen, is a matter for the British government to decide. Mr. Amery naturally wished to have an opportunity of conferring with his colleagues in England before announcing any decision on either of these particulars, and he is returning with certain
views after having carefully considered the situation durin-g his visit to this country. Whoever is sent by Britain to represent the British government will receive a very cordial and warm welcome to this Dominion. I believe that the effect of personal representation of the British government at 'Ottawa will go very far to make closer and more effective the consultation which is so desirable if there is to be effective cooperation between the British government and our government; that it will make that consultation -much more effective than it has been hitherto. Having said this,
I now say to my hon. friend: If personal conference and contact is desirable as between governments of the British Empire, why is it not equally desirable with respect to the governments of the British Empire in their relations to the governments of other countries? The British government -has thought it advisable to -have a representative of His Majesty and- His Majesty's government in all parts of the world. That has proven to be in the interests of Great Britain. Why should it be less in the interests of His Majesty's government i-n Canada to have its representatives in other parts of the world? True, there is no necessity for having a number of representatives; we must gauge -the situation in each case as vve feel the necessity of so doing.
I submit, however, that in Europe conditions have vastly changed from what they were when Canada was first given representation there. It was in 1888 that Sir John A. Macdonald appointed a high commissioner or commissioner general to Paris. For forty years Canada has been represented in Paris by a commissioner general. In the intervening period there have been cataclysmic changes. In the recent past no less than four empires have disappeared, no less than twelve or thirteen new republics have come into being. The whole complexion of the map of Europe has altered. A league of nations has come into existence. This Dominion of Canada is a nation in the League of Nations, as it is a nation in the community of British nations. Not only is .Canada represented in the assembly of the League of Nations but it has a representative on the council of the league. I say therefore that conditions, so far as Europe is concerned, are entirely different from what they were at the time the commissioner general to Paris was appointed. I think it will be conceded by all who have been in Paris and have met Hon. Mr. Roy, the Commissioner General, that he has established there a position very different from the one which it was expected a commissioner general would hold, and that his position is

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
in reality much more nearly that of a minister. By that I mean, a minister has the right, as representing his government, of immediate approach to the ministers of the government to which he is accredited. He has the authority to speak in the name of his government. Mr. Roy has time and again been accorded that right as a matter of courtesy by the French government and by the British Ambassador in Paris. It has, however, been as a matter of courtesy that the right has been conceded. Now we have come to the time where we feel that if there is to be equality of status and co-operation between the different self-governing communities of the British Empire there should also be an increased measure of responsibility on the part of each with respect to its own affairs. We feel that Canada's interests, which have grown so largely in the course of the years, will be safeguarded more effectively, that the business interests of this country in relation to France and the government of Canada in her relations to the government of France will all be in a better position, if our representative in Paris is given a standing similar to that which a number of other countries, many of them much smaller than Canada, enjoy in France at the present time, and, I might add, the British government correspondingly relieved of a measure of embarrassment and expense. We have thought it advisable therefore to take this step.
Now I turn to the orient, and let me first point out the change which has taken place in the situation there. I believe it is true that our trade with the orient to-day is greater than was the trade of Canada with the United Kingdom at the time the government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier came into office. When that event took place Canada's trade with the United Kingdom stood at a certain figure. That figure is exceeded to-day, so I am informed, by the total trade of Canada with the orient. Now volume of trade is indicative of a variety of increasingly important interests, and while I think it is wholly desirable, as my hon. friend (Mr. Bennett) said, that we should have trade commissioners, and an increasing number, scattered in different parts of the world, no trade commissioner as such, it must be remembered, has any right to approach the ministers of the government of the country in which he holds office, nor does he speak with any authority on behalf of the government by whom he may be employed. He is not a representative of that government, he is the agent of a government department. I may say that our government has received from trade commissioners in different parts of the

world repeated appeals that their status should be improved, that they should be given something of a diplomatic status; that Canada was suffering because they had not the status which would enable them on behalf of the dominion, to have those relations with the governments of the countries in which they were stationed which they felt was desirable in the interest of Canada.
We have appointed one representative to the United States. We intend to appoint a minister to France, who will be the sole representative on the continent of Europe, and one to Tokyo who will be the sole representative on the continent of Asia. To appoint but one representative in Europe, one in Asia, in addition to one in America, each of whom will 'have the standing of ministers and be in a position to meet the diplomats and members of governments of other countries on an equal footing, is surely not in the present stage of our international relations proceeding with undue haste. And may I say to my hon. friend that the purpose we have in view in this matter is not at all that of emphasizing our status. That is not our view. We do not need to emphasize our status; our status is conceded and we are no longer worrying about it. But what we do maintain is this, that if there is to be equality of status there must be something also in the way of responsibility with respect to our own affairs, foreign as well as domestic, in whatever pertains to the relations between this dominion and other countries of the world. What we wish is to assume the responsibility which we as a nation, having to deal in increasing measure with foreign affairs, feel we should assume in the position to which Canada has attained at the present time. This I submit, is essential to effective cooperation with other parts of the empire.
May I say one further word in regard to our representation in the orient? Here I touch on a very large subject, and I hope the house will receive what I have to say as coming from a profound conviction of what I sincerely and deeply believe is of importance in the relations of this country with the orient. I was sorry to see at the party convention which my hon. friend attended that among other resolutions which were passed was a resolution declaring for oriental exclusion. I do not wish to question the motives of anyone in connection with the introduction or passing of that resolution.
I believe one can read it, as an hon. member from my hon. friend's own party has done, as not really meaning what it appears to say.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie King
May I make this perfectly clear, that as regards desiring a white Canada and a white British Columbia, as regards desiring to maintain the standards of our labour in British Columbia, I will yield place to no one in the belief that we must not permit competition of the oriental races with our own people in that province? I think the numbers that have come into this country from the orient are excessive already and there is abundant reason why every possible measure compatible with good relations and good will between the different nations of the world should be adopted in order that we may prevent what I believe would be a very serious consequence were, for example, labourers from the orient to be permitted to come to this country in any numbers. But what I do say is this, that in dealing with foreign countries, a country with a population as large as that of Canada, a country as important as this country is, cannot afford to fail to take cognizance of the susceptibilities of the nations with which they are doing business and with which they wish to deal not only this year but for years to come. Hon. members know very well that there is no term more offensive to the Japanese people than the word "exclusion". I feel that in this parliament on these matters of foreign affairs my hon. friend opposite and myself ought to be able to unite in taking a question of this kind completely out of the realm of party politics. Let us agree that we do not want oriental labour coming into this country in competition with our own. But let us realize this, that if we are going to remain, as I hope and pray we always shall remain, a part of the British Empire, we owe a certain obligation to be true not only to ourselves but to other parts of the British Empire in our relations with and attitude towards other countries of the world.
During the time I was privileged to- be present at the meetings of the Imperial conference I learned a good deal about the difficulties which were confronting Great Britain in some of her foreign relations. Indeed, if not the main purpose of the conference, it always seemed. to me to be the most important result of the conference that those who came from other parts of the empire were afforded an opportunity of coming to appreciate the magnitude of some of the problems with which Great Britain herself had to deal and the importance of certain considerations with respect thereto. I believe that within the last year or two there has been no problem which Britain has had to face that in the seriousness of its aspect has been comparable with that of the unrest
which has developed in China, and which in the last session of this parliament led to discussions as to whether or not there was to be war in the orient and whether or not this country was to participate in it. Along with that unrest in China, stimulated as there is every reason to believe it has been from some other parts of the world, there has been great unrest in India. If to the unrest in India and the unrest in China you give the Japanese nation cause to feel indignation and resentment at the British Empire, I do not know what the consequences are going to be. I wish to say to my hon. friends opposite that when the government was face to face with the situation created by that resolution, and was forced to ask itself how, in the faoe of it, it was to deal with this oriental problem, then, and for the first time, we took the position that we could not stand for restriction of immigration by a policy of exclusion in those terms, but that we would do our utmost by diplomatic endeavour with a friendly nation to see that the numbers of Japanese coming into this country were reduced to the lowest possible point in a manner which at the same time would help to preserve the friendly relations between that country and ourselves and between that country and the British Empire.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Perhaps my right hon.
friend will explain what he said a moment ago that there were too many of them now.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I meant exactly what I said. I would say so to-morrow in Japan. I think there are too many Japanese of the labouring classes in British Columbia at the present time. I have always made that clear. My hon. friend turned to the Speaker yesterday and complimented His Honour uipon his visit to Japan and the result of his diplomatic mission some twenty years ago. Does my hon. friend think we would have succeeded even at that time in getting the reduced numbers we succeeded in getting if the whole matter had been left to despatches or to the roundabout process of dealing through the Foreign Office in Great Britain with the Foreign Office in Japan? It was because we were able to send from Canada one of our own citizens, one of our own ministers, and have him deal at first hand with the Japanese government that at that particular time we w-ere able to make the arrangement we did. There was one remark which my hon. friend made yesterday that I did not like. I hope I was wrong in what I gathered as to the meaning of his reference to the diplomatic skill of this

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country. I contend that the diplomatic skill of Canada with respect to Canadian affairs is of just as high an order as the diplomatic skill of Great Britain or that of any other part of the British Empire.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I made no reference to the diplomatic skill of Canada.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am glad to hear my hon. friend say that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Where a gentleman has been able to remain in power from 1921 to 1926, as my right hon. friend has, I have a high regard for his diplomatic skill.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I can tell my hon. friend he will come to have a still higher regard if he just continues where he is for another half a dozen years.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It will not be that long.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: May I conclude, Mr. Speaker, by saying that it has been solely from a desire of meeting the responsibilities of Canada as one of the sister dominions of the British Empire, to play our part with respect to Canadian affairs as we believe we should play it in foreign relations as well as in domestic relations with a full consciousness of our responsibilities, that we have been led to take the step we have taken with regard to representation in Europe and in Asia and of which we hope this house will approve. In other words, our desire in these particulars as respects our country in its relation to other parts of the British Empire is expressed by the three words: equality, cooperation and responsibility. We believe in the' equality of the British nations within the empire; we wish to co-operate in a friendly and helpful way with all parts of the empire, and we wish in cooperating to assume to the full the responsibilities which as a nation within the British Empire we believe are ours in imperial and international affairs.


Mr. ROBERT GARDINER (Acadia):: Mr. Speaker, before addressing myself to some of the important problems with which we in Canada are confronted, I should like to be permitted to extend my congratulations to the hon. member for Hants-Kings (Mr. Ilsley) who moved the address in reply to the speech from the throne. I can assure him that I enjoyed his address very much and I hope he will be long with us in this house to give us the benefit of his opinions. I had also the pleasure this morning of reading the translation of the speech of the hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Beaubien) who seconded the

address in reply to the speech from the throne. I enjoyed very much the reading of it, and I regret that I do not sufficiently understand the French language to have been able to follow him when he was speaking.
I wish also to thank the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) for his kindly reference to me yesterday. I am quite sure it was a mistake on his part during the proceedings on Thursday in this house when he forgot to make the reference, which forgetfulness he deplored. I accept his explanation and I appreciate his reference.
It will not be possible for me, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that the forty minute rule is now in effect, to give to this house a detailed consideration of some of the more important questions with which I should like to deal, but so far as this group is concerned, no doubt different speakers will take up specific questions and give them a more detailed survey than it is possible for me to do in the time at my disposal this afternoon. I shall therefore lose no further time, and turn my attention to one or two of the more important matters.
The speech from the throne this year is not a document such as it was last year. It is not very specific. It is, in my judgment, merely a recital of circumstances or things which have already taken place. It gives to the House no intimation of the legislative program of the government for this session. In that respect the speech from the throne is very deficient. It is regrettable that the members of the house will have no intimation until such time as the actual legislation is brought down of what the legislative program which we shall have to consider later on will be. Comparing the speech from the throne this year with that of last year, a tremendous difference is to be noted. Last year the government did give the house a very good forecast of the legislation it intended to bring down, so that the members were apprised beforehand of what they might expect and were therefore in a position to study the different subjects that were coming up. But the speech this year is very deficient in that regard, and under no circumstances would we be justified in using extravagant language in praising it.
Since the house prorogued last year I have had the privilege of addressing many meetings of electors in my own constituency, and of telling those people that for once in the history of this country we had a government in power that carried out its promises at least on one occasion, and that was this government during the last session. We all remember the session

The Address-Mr. Gardiner
of 1926 when a certain program was before this house containing important pieces of legislation. For certain reasons which we all understand it was impossible to carry out that program at that time, but I had the pleasure of telling the people of my constituency that when the same government came into power again last year, they were in a position to carry out and did carry out their previous program, and we appreciate that very much indeed.
The speech from the throne states that we have evidences of great prosperity. It is quite true that we have exidences of greater prosperity than has prevailed for several years past. But is this prosperity general, or does it apply to certain sections of Canada and only to certain classes? I think we should find, if we were to review the situation very closely, that certain classes in Canada are probably fairly prosperous, but that on the other hand many other classes in Canada can by no stretch of the imagination be called prosperous. As a matter of fact if you go into our large cities to-day I think you will still find bread lines, notwithstanding all these evidences of prosperity that are spoken of, and because of that fact I feel that the speech from the throne is not as explicit in that respect as it should be. I think we all realize that certain sections of the country are not enjoying the same measure of prosperity as are other sections. There may be economic reasons why some sections of this country are not enjoying the same measure of prosperity as others are, but without going into those reasons there is no doubt at all that such sections do exist in Canada.
Dealing with the question of unemployment, which also is related to the question of prosperity, my hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) in his address to the house yesterday afternoon cited the fact that we had imported during the last fiscal year $80,000 000 more of goods than we did the previous year, and he attempted to show to the house that if we had not imported this extra volume of goods we would probably have had no unemployment problem in Canada. I think my hon. friend is sufficient of a business man and has had a wide enough experience to know that all business is an exchange of goods and services, whether it be between individuals or nations; consequently if Canada is to export her surplus products-and in some lines of production we have a surplus in great abundance -it is necessary for us also to import. In that connection I should like to point out that there is some information which is
lacking at present and which would be of great value to the members of this house if it could be secured. We recognize, of course, that we are borrowing large sums of money from the different countries of the world for development purposes, railroad construction and the like, for loans for settlers and so forth, and that all our governments, federal, provincial and municipal, are borrowing large sums of money abroad. Now the only way in which we can pay back the principal and keep up the interest payments on these borrowings is by exporting our goods and selling them in the markets of the world. But we have no record at the present time of just what our annual obligations under this heading are, and I would suggest to the Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) that for the better information of the house and of the country generally, steps should be taken to secure that information as rapidly as possible so that we may have an intelligent idea of what our real balance of trade is at the present time. We do not know whether or not the balance of trade which is indicated as being in our favour is a real balance of trade, because we may owe in principal and interest more than the balance that is indicated in our favour. Under these circumstances, therefore, we are discussing this very important question more or less in the dark-merely stabbing at it instead of dealing with it in the light of full knowledge. I would again urge the Minister of Finance to take steps to make this information available to the house.
A great deal has been said, not only in this house but throughout the country, as to the necessity for securing capital to develop our natural resources and to build up industry. I should like to place this viewpoint before the house for its consideration. First of all, let us determine what capital is. Money is not capital. Money in its proper form is merely a medium of exchange, a medium whereby services or goods of one class are exchanged for services or goods of another. Money, therefore, being a medium of exchange, is not and can never be capital in the proper sense of the word. Real capital consists of lands for building purposes, the buildings erected upon these lands for manufacturing or productive purposes, the machinery of production and the raw material necessary for the product. That is the real capital. Whenever any person advocates the importation of large amounts of capital he must at the same time advocate the importation of large volumes of goods. Capital does not come into this country in the form of money. It comes first of all by way of credits.



G4 COMMONS

[Stage Direction]
The Address-Mr. Gardiner
After the credits are distributed, as they are intended to be distributed, there must follow the importation of goods either from the country of the origin of this credit or from some other country; consequently when we ask for the importation of capital or the increase of capital from outside sources we are asking for the importation of goods, and those who are of a protective frame of mind naturally would object to that. The two terms are not synonymous, and they can never agree in any shape or form.
The situation appears to me to be this: We have in this country undoubtedly a surplus of labour at the present time. Probably that surplus is not so great to-day as it has been in years gone by, but nevertheless we have a surplus of labour. We have the raw material from the natural resources to which that labour can be applied, and in most cases we have the necessary machinery of production. I wish to ask this question in all sincerity of all members of the house; is there any reason why we Canadians cannot create our own capital in our own way to suit our own needs? I maintain that it is quite possible for us, if we so desire and if we organize properly, to produce our own capital without importing it, and without at the same time having to pay interest for the use of it. This is a matter of very great importance. It is a big question, I admit, but no effort, so far as I am aware, has been made along those lines for the creation of our own capital. I am not at all satisfied that it is a good policy for the Canadian people to advocate the importation of large volumes of capital which eventually will have to be repaid and at the same time pay dividends upon it. I believe that, in the interests of the people of Canada, the working classes and all classes, it is very essential that we create the most of our own capital, to be used for our own services, in order that we may create a larger measure of happiness amongst all classes of Canadian people.
I should like to refer for a few moments to the conditions in western Canada. It has been said that we in western Canada have harvested the seaond largest crop in the history of the three prairie provinces. While that is true so far as the number of bushels is concerned, on the other hand we regret to say that the quality of that crop this year s in many respects very low, and consequently (he monetary return to the farmers of western Canada will not be as large as we had anticipated prior to the harvesting season.
Charles Avery Dunning: It is only of value for export.


Robert Gardiner: That is quite true.
Under those circumstances we do not expect to have the same measure of prosperity, measured by our purchasing power, as we had anticipated. We have had great losses from natural causes. During this year we have had more damage from hail in western Canada-at least in Saskatchewan and Alberta- than we have ever seen before. That has hit some sections and some farmers very hard, almost to the extent of putting them out of business. We also have had considerable damage from frost. That, of course, is a natural cause which you cannot overcome except by securing early ripening kinds of grain. Probably the greatest problem we have before us to-day is the question of rust. I want to pay a compliment to the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) for his desire and his effort to try to secure ways and means to combat this menace to our welfare in the west. I should like also to point out to the government in this regard that, so far as the investigation of this particular matter is concerned, we require the services of the best trained minds that we can secure. It is so important a question that we cannot afford to be penny-wise in regard to it, and it is necessary to pay higher salaries than we are paying to-day in order to obtain .the services of the right class of men to assist us in this great problem. I would suggest to the government and to this house that it would be far better to pay those salaries in the hope of securing some remedy than that the western country should be subjected to the tremendous loss it now has to bear.


William Richard Motherwell: Hear, hear.


Robert Gardiner: 

The Address-Mr. Gardiner
In the prairie provinces we are still confronted with railway problems. We appreciate the legislation that wTas passed by this house last session for 'branch line construction in connection with the Canadian National Railways. We appreciate also that the Canadian Pacific Railway is doing its duty to the best of its ability in providing branch lines. But there are still many districts unprovided with the necessary transportation, and until it is provided it will be impossible for them to produce to their utmost, and consequently Canada will suffer just to that extent. May we hope that another branch line program for the Canadian National Railway system will be in evidence this session, and that the Canadian Pacific Railway will also take similar action in regard to its system?
I now come to one of the important questions that has been discussed in this debate. I refer to the Hudson Bay railway. For years western Canada has felt that great injustice had been done to it because of the failure to complete this railway. Last year the Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) intimated to the house that before any further expenditures would be made on a terminus an independent investigator would be sent into the territory to determine whether Port Nelson was feasible or whether another port should be selected. I wish to thank the minister for his kindness in sending me a copy of Mr. Palmer's report, which I have perused with a good deal of interest. From the data furnished by Mr. Palmer it is evident to me that a great mistake was made when Port-Nelson was selected as the terminus of the Hudson Bay railway. I also had the privilege of discussing this question with a friend of mine who was in that territory for three years with a survey party taking soundings at Fort Churchill and in the waters adjacent to Port Nelson. He informed me that in the judgment of those engaged in that survey Port-Nelson was not a very good place to provide shipping facilities, and that in fact Churchill was superior in every way. I trust, however, that no mistake will be made in selecting Fort Churchill as the terminus. I do not know just to what extent the government has committed this house and the country to expenditures at that point. I can quite understand their desire to ensure the completion of this work at the earliest possible moment; on the other hand, I think the government in matters of this description should be very careful not to take into their own hands that power which in the final analysis is vested in the House of Commons.


Charles Avery Dunning: If my hon. friend will
permit, is he suggesting that that was done in this matter?


Robert Gardiner: I am referring , now
more particularly to expenditures. I said I did not know just exactly how far the government had gone. If no expenditures of any great importance have been made, then I think probably the attitude of the government is quite correct; but outside of the question of the terminus to be selected, if those expenditures have been sufficiently large, then probably there is some reason for complaint.


Charles Avery Dunning: 
Robert Gardiner: I must remind my hon. friends that I am subject to a time limit.


Charles Avery Dunning: I would request that the hon. -gentleman be given consideration for this interruption.


Robert Gardiner: I am glad to accept the minister's explanation, and in the light of the evidence produced by Mr. Palmer I can congratulate him on the action he has taken in the matter.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Robert Gardiner: When the house rose at six o'clock I was about to deal with the question of immigration. I was very glad indeed to hear the statement of the Prime Minister this afternoon, to the effect that if the house deemed it desirable the whole question of immigration would be sent to one of the committees for -investigation. "I believe that would be the best way to deal with the situation, because we need to have an immigration policy suitable to the conditions which prevail to-day. We must remember that the conditions which obtained in 1900, and for some years thereafter, were altogether different from what they are to-day, and the new conditions demand the adoption of new immigration methods. From 1900 onward a large amount of railway construction was done in Canada,.

The Address-Mr. Gardiner
and an extensive area of crown lands was available for settlement. Under those conditions it was possible to absorb large numbers of immigrants annually. But to-day there is not the same amount of railway construction, which provides employment for new settlers, nor have we the same extent of crown lands from which to make grants to new settlers. In my judgment a land settlement policy is essential. Not only do we need such a policy but we must take care that no greater number of immigrants are to be admitted to Canada than the country is in a position at the time to absorb. I appreciate very much the suggestion the Prime Minister made in this regard. At present there is a partial land settlement scheme in operation in conjunction with the imperial government, but I understand that this will take care of only some three thousand families, and I should not be at all surprised to hear that the specified number of families have already been settled under that policy. We must review the whole situation and see if it is not possible to adopt a more effective policy with respect to immigrants than the one which is now being followed. I have had several interviews with men who claim to be in touch with the situation, and I have been informed by these men that many immigrants are coming from Great Britain under the assisted passage scheme, but instead of going on the land they are crowding into the cities. It is an easy matter for them to do so at points contiguous to large centres of population. The result is that under that particular policy we are getting immigrants who come to Canada at the reduced rate and then go to swell the population of our cities, which is certainly not in the best interests of Canada. I approve very heartily of a strict medical examination of immigrants, but complaints have come from different sources as to the severity of this examination in Great Britain. I have also received complaints with respect to the medical examination on the continent, but it is claimed that the examination there is not so severe as it is in the old country. If so, British immigrants to Canada are in a measure discriminated against. I do not know whether or not the statement is correct.


Mr. KING (Kootenay):: There have not
been any examinations made on the continent as yet, and very few have been made in the old country up to thfe present.


Robert Gardiner: I accept the explanation. I am merely bringing these matters to the attention of the government so that they may take cognizance of them.
I wish now to deal for a few moments, if I may, with the case of the returned soldiers, whose situation is becoming more pressing each day. I should like to see this matter also referred to a committee for investigation. There are many veterans who require a medical examination but have not the needed funds to pay for medical attention; they are unable to follow any employment and consequently are almost destitute. It may be quite true that the Minister of Health has not at present the power to take care of this particular class of men, but some remedial legislation is necessary in their interests and that legislation is long overdue. These men have served their country faithfully and their health is now impaired. Whether that condition is or is not due to war service, in my opinion, makes no difference. I believe it is the duty of the country to see that these men who have served Canada so faithfully should be given such medical care as it is within the province of this parliament to grant. I appeal strongly to the house on behalf of this particular class of men, because I know many of them are in poor health and have not the means to secure that medical care which they should receive.
My time has pretty well elapsed, consequently I shall not be able to deal with many other matters which I desire to discuss. For instance, there is the question of grants to highways. We had in this country a policy by which there was a grant of $20,000,000, I believe, to assist the provinces in building highways. I maintain that the federal government has a duty to perform in regard to interprovincial highways and I trust that before the session is over this matter of assistance to the provinces to build particularly interprovincial highways will be given serious consideration by the house.
Then there is the question of technical education. We had a grant from this parliament for the assistance of technical education in the provinces. Some of the provinces have built suitable institutions for the purpose, but when the grant is withdrawn or has expired they will not be in a position financially to carry on this good work. Technical education is very important to all classes in Canada in that it makes our workmen and our people generally more efficient in their life work.
There is also the important question of the rate for Alberta coal. I will not attempt to-night to go into that, because time forbids, but I trust some of our members from Alberta will have an opportunity of dealing very extensively with that particular matter.
As regards the question of the St. Lawrence development, we are partial to that develop-
The Address

Mr. Gardiner

ment, yet we believe that much more information should be secured before that work is proceeded with. We are sympathetic in regard to the matter and that is about as far as we can go at present.
I have not the time to deal with the question of the tariff advisory board and its reports, except to remind the Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) that at all times members of this house should be in a position to secure reports of the evidence given, before that board. If the question is one of funds, I trust that before parliament prorogues such funds will be made available.
I have not the time also to deal with the question of the redemption of the national debt and its being put on a sound financial basis. Up to the present we have merely taken the surpluses that accrue each year for the reduction of that debt, and in my judgment that is not good business procedure. Certain items should be included annually in the estimates until the national debt is much reduced.
I have just half a minute at my disposal and I am going to fake it in order to enter a protest here. We have listened with a good deal of interest to the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) and also the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) in their addresses to this house. I was particularly interested in the Prime Minister's address this afternoon, more especially on constitutional questions. The Prime Minister spoke for something like three hours and twenty minutes, and while we all appreciate the value of his address, at the same time it seems somewhat incongruous in a democratic organization such as this. The last redistribution took place on a population basis; that is to say, each constituency had about the same number .of inhabitants in it, the quota being something like 36,000 souls. That means that each member of this house is responsible for the representation of a similar number of electors, but under the rule of last session a discrimination has crept in. At that particular time I did not appreciate the importance of the change in the rule limiting most of the members of this house to forty minute speeches, but if this rule is continued, an undemocratic situation will be created, and at this time I merely appeal to the house to re-consider that rule.


Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, in most of what the
last speaker (Mr. Gardiner) has said I heartily concur. To-night, however, I should like to emphasize particularly certain matters in which the Labour group whom I represent

are interested. The speech from the throne as an indication of the government's program is distinctly disappointing; indeed it would almost seem as if the speech were becoming simply a convenient peg on which to hang a very elaborate ceremonial. I should like, however, to compliment the government on one or two matters which have been introduced, and I wish to refer first of all to the proposed appointment of a minister to Japan. It seems to me that action recognises not only the wider responsibilities which are facing us in Canada, but at the same time the importance of a situation which prevails on the Pacific coast. I refer also to the announcement that the government intend to give substantial assistance to industrial and scientific research. That it seems to me is a distinct step in advance.
The speech makes reference to the prosperity of the country. The hon. member for Hants-Kings (Mr. Usley), in his very graceful speech, admitted that the prosperity was not as evenly distributed as it might have been, and he went on to say that he referred particularly to the territorial distribution. I would agree with him with regard to that matter. Certainly the central provinces are enjoying a larger measure of prosperity than either the east or the west, but I wish to refer particularly to the distribution as between classes. According to the latest statistics which are available in the Canada Year Book of 1926, the capital invested in manufactures amounts to 13,538,813,460, the net value of the products to $1,256,643,901, and the wages to 8420.269,496. The percentage of wages to the value added by the manufacture is 33.4 per cent. When the labourer receives only one-third of the added value which his labour produces, I do not much wonder that the other classes who receive the remaining two-thirds rejoice in the great prosperity. What does that one-third amount to in the case of the individual wage-earner? The average yearly wage is only $972, or roughly, $81 a month, or only $20 a week. I ask: How can a man live and maintain a decent standard of living on that amount, and how can the country generally be prosperous if the purchasing power of the mass of the workers is so low as that? I do not mean to say that this has anything to do with politics. It is ridiculous that either the leader of the government or the leader of the opposition should suggest that. This is but an indication of the great economic laws that are at work. Recently we have had from the census bureau of the United States Department of Commerce a report covering a survey which has been made of all the branches of manufacturing in the United
JANUARY 31, 192S	B9
The Address-Mr. Woodsworth
States. The report points out that industry is being centralized at an appalling pace; that the number of workers employed is decreasing, while the output and the manufacturers' profits are advancing with giant strides. Let me quote one 'brief paragraph from this report.
The outstanding features of the report were the increase in production, the decrease in employment of wage-earners and the increase in horse power.
If we want to know what low wages mean to the countryside I do not know that we can do very much better than take the statement that was made the other day by the member for Hull county in the provincial house at Quebec. He is reported to have said:
The labourers of Hull received only twenty-five cents an hour or $2.50 a day for a ten-hour day, and often lost working time during the year, and most of them had eight, ten or twelve children at home, and very often more. How could he keep them on $400 a year, which was all he had when he had paid his own board and contributed even lightly to the church and good works.
Yesterday when the Prime Minister was speaking about the growing employment in the country, he quoted the Premier of Ontario as refusing to acknowledge that there was unemployment in Ontario. May I say that in my judgment the Prime Minister was hardly fair because he has in his possession a letter recently received from Premier Bracken of my own province of Manitoba, in which that province points out the very serious state of unemployment, and asks the federal government to assist in giving relief. In a memorandum presented on December 14th by the committee on unemployment, of the provincial house of Manitoba, these statements are made:
In 1927, during the first seven days of December, 708 men registered for work at the employment office, as compared with 466 during the same period last year. There is also an increase in the number applying to the social welfare commission of Winnipeg for unemployment relief, the total number registered for relief to December 7, 1927, being 108 families as compared with less than half that number last year. Employment office officials estimate that there are 1,000 men available for immediate employment if work was available, and that this number is being added to daily through the fact that many men are coming to Winnipeg hoping to find employment in the Flin Flon development work.
Again:
The control of the immigration stream is in federal hands, and it would seem reasonable to demand that at least a share of the cost of relief made necessary by unemployment caused by immigration should be paid by the Dominion government.
We are told that there is a "substantial increase in the number of British immigrants." I should like to read quite a typical paragraph with regard to the British immigrant:
With neither employment nor money and only a few threadbare clothes to keep out the biting blasts and sub-zero temperatures, Stanley Hornsby, a young lad giving his address as "the old country", appeared in St. Boniface police court this morning charged with vagrancy, and pleaded with the magistrate to send him to jail.
That was on December 15th, the day after the provincial committee had reported on the question of unemployment, and it indicates how serious a matter unemployment is in the lives of our citizens.
On the other hand, the speech from the throne calls attention to the prosperity of certain classes. It mentions " increased railway receipts ", In that connection I note that a few months ago there appeared the following item in our daily papers:
The directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway to-day decided to issue an offer to shareholders of record August 19th, on the basis of one share to eight of their respective holdings, $32,500,000 of ordinary capital stock at $150 per share.
And I read the following comment from one of our labour papers:
The only explanation which will fit all the facts is that the Canadian Pacific Railway increases its capitalization by one-eighth to enable themselves to divide up the accumulated surplus profits and to prevent the surplus profits "piling" up in future years as an accusation of extortion and an argument for reduced transportation rates-and in the meantime the Dominion railway commission putters with little details such as railway crossings.
Lest that should be thought to be merely an extreme statement by a radical labour paper, perhaps I might quote from a letter that I received from a very good Liberal friend of mine, a Winnipeg lawyer, with regard to this very practice. He says:
There should be no cutting of melons in public utility corporations, and every such utility should be compelled to sell new stock on the open market for the best price that it will bring and the financiers of the utility therefore receive the full benefit of a sale of new stock.
I wonder why the government cannot put on the statute books legislation which will carry out the idea behind that quotation.
The speech tells us that there is to be the establishment of "more favourable trade relations between Canada and certain foreign countries." I hope the government will take the very earliest opportunity of informing the house why it broke off relations with Russia. There are no charges of improper activities on the part of the Soviet representatives in Canada. In a statement to the press the

The Address-Mr. Woodsworth
Prime Minister explicitly repudiated any such thing. Let me. quote a comment from the Manchester Guardian on the action of the British government in severing relations with Russia:
Can British trade benefit? Quite the contrary. Will Europe in general be. the more tranquil for this widening of the chasm between Great Britain and Russia? Obviously not.
Again:
It is questionable whether we or Russia suffered more from the wars of intervention after the armistice. If we are now to attempt in the economic field what we could not achieve by force of arms, the consequences are likely to be equally costly to ourselves, to Russia, and to the peace of Europe.
Why, I ask, should the Liberal government in Canada be tied to the apron strings of the Conservative party of Great Britain?
I see the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Dunning) in his seat. I should like to offer him a suggestion with regard to the Hudson Bay railway and incidentally may I say that I think he is to be commended on his promptness in securing competent authority to make investigations with regard to the terminal of that railway. Amongst our most highly respected [DOT] immigrants in western. Canada are the Icelandic people, who came to this country over fifty years ago. Some of us perhaps fail to remember that their claim to be the real discoverers of America when Leif Ericson crossed the Atlantic is really fairly well substantiated. Two years from now the Icelandic people propose to celebrate the one-thousandth anniversary of parliamentary institutions along modern lines in Iceland. Large numbers of them are then returning to participate in those celebrations. I would like to suggest to the minister that, if. for nothing more than a matter of publicity, he should offer to send a party of these people to Iceland on one of the merchant marine vessels via Fort Churchill. As they say in the press, Ihat would certainly put Fort Churchill on the map.
We are informed that the government is "continuing negotiations with the prairie provinces for the return of their natural resources.'' I cannot say that that is exactly news. In fact, I am afraid if the negotiations go on for any great length of time longer there will be nothing left to return. Seriously, it seems to me that we are in danger of giving away our great natural resources of the north country, and I hope that at a convenient opportunity the government will tell the house just why it is that the Whitney syndicate is to be allowed to pay no royalties for a period of twenty years. I notice that
{Mr. Woodsworth.]
the Canadian Mining Reporter, speaking with regard to this matter, publishes the following:
The thing is wrong in principle. It is not because the Flin Flon deal is being made with foreign interests. It would stink just as badly if purely Canadian financial interests were being handed such a gift on a platter. What we object to is the giving away of our Canadian heritage by our government to anybody.
Here we really enter upon the wider question of the control of the natural resources. In that same northern district we have the White Mud falls. In my judgment the control of the powers of the White Mud falls is just about as important a question as that which was brought up last year in regard to the Georgian bay canal scheme. Why are these powers so recklessly alienated? I came across an article the other day in the Nation's Business for October, headed "Why our factories cross the border.'' The writer is Mr. Floyd S. Chambers, editor of the Financial Post, Toronto. He referred to the 1,400 American branch factories located in Canada and went on to speak of the United States having three billion one hundred thousand dollars invested in Canada, representing a mortgage of twelve per cent on the total national wealth of the country. If already twelve per cent of our national wealth is mortgaged to the United States, I submit it may not be so very long before we realize the evil consequences of the get-rich-quick policy that has characterized some of our business men of to-day.
At the last annual meeting of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association, Mr. Cyril T. Young, in an address on Canada's Resources, exhibited a large map of Canada decorated with the union jack. He exclaimed dramatically "Long may the union jack flutter and wave," and of course there was applause. That sounds well, but I would call attention to the very rapid acquisition of our resources b>
Americans. Pulpwood, mining, oil, water-powers are passing under foreign control. Some day, if the house will permit it, I should like to exhibit in this chamber a spot map on which the American controlled industries would be marked with the stars and stripes. If that were done in respect to all of the country there would hardly be room to place the union jack, much less a Canadian flag, if we had one. Do not let us deceive ourselves by saying that because we live north of the forty-ninth parallel we control things here. Economic control and economic considerations are more important than political control or geographical considerations. Last summer I spent a month in a mining town in the mountains. When I was having supper

The Address-Mr. Woodsworth
one evening in a miner's house a whistle blew. I think it was three blasts that signalled across the valley, and the miner remarked: "That means no work to-morrow." He had no option. And who was it who told him he should not work to-morrow? The company, of course-an American company with the stock owned in Pennsylvania and the board of directors sitting in the city of Philadelphia. My hon. friends around about me from Alberta are very anxious that we should adopt a policy of buying and consuming Canadian coal.


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


James Shaver Woodsworth: And I say to my
hon. friend from Bow River (Mr. Garland) who says "hear, hear," let us examine the matter closely. When I do so I find it impossible to get up any great enthusiasm over buying coal mined in Alberta if the dividends go into the pockets of the men who are controlling the mines in Pennsylvania.


Mr. BOURASSA:: Hear, hear.


Edward Joseph Garland: Hear, hear.


James Shaver Woodsworth: That is a matter
that will have to be considered in the days to come. The leader of the opposition warns us against "selling our estate." I agree with him, but I would ask him, can we look to him to deliver us from the control of those big corporations so very largely American in character? I appreciate the sentiments uttered by the leader of the opposition at the Conservative convention and also at the opening of parliament. I give him credit for having resigned from his dictatorship-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


James Shaver Woodsworth: His directorship.


An hon. MEMBER:: Leave it the other
way.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Little slips are
sometimes not so serious after all. I recall that the leader of opposition has been a director of the Canadian General Electric Company, which is, I am told, controlled by the General Electric Company of the United States; of the Royal Bank of Canada; of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, an American concern; of the Canadian International Paper Company, which I am told is a subsidiary of the International Paper Company of the United States, and according to an American publication, The Trend of the Market, controls the newly formed Canadian Hydro-Electric Corporation. The leader of the opposition was also director of the Imperial Oil Company, closely allied to
the Standard Oil Interests, and, of course, as we all know, for many years he was the legal adviser of the Canadian Pacific railway. I am very glad that he has resigned his directorates on these corporations, but since he is very fond of quoting scripture at times, I cannot but recall for his benefit one scriptural passage which runs:
Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots?	[DOT]
I hesitate to complete the quotation, but it proceeds:
Then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil.
Before the election, I was interested in reading some of the guesses that were being made as to the Conservative leadership. In MacLean's Magazine, August 15th, there was an article headed, "Who's the Tory Moses?" The article says:
Still it seems a pretty safe bet that Cahan will be proposed by powers which operate usually in St. James street, Montreal. A leader from Quebec must be suggested, if only to make impressive the apparent transfer of support to some other man.
Further on the article says:
It is a fair guess that, whatever is behind Cahan will go to Bennett at the appropriate moment.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It did not happen that
way.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Since there has
been so little legislation forecast in the speech I should like to suggest some measures that it seems to us ought to have been included. Perhaps the house hardly recognizes very clearly what are Canada's obligations under the labour section of the Peace treaty and the Washington conventions. I hold in my hand a very interesting memorandum issued by the Labour department showing the extent to which our obligations are met by existing legislation. This is rather a naive document. I should like to give a few illustrative extracts. Reference is made to the eight-hour day and forty-eight-hour week, with this comment:
Legislative jurisdiction is primarily vested in the provinces.
And so with a number of other provisions. Reference is made to persons engaged in work for the Dominion government. Here we have Canada's own admitted responsibility. The memorandum merely says:
The convention is partly met.
There is a clause with regard to mutual arrangements among members who have established systems of unemployment insurance. The memorandum says:

The Address-Mr. Woodsworth
This has no application to Canada, as no system of insurance against unemployment has been established jn this country.	_
A very easy way of getting out of it. Then there is a clause with regard to the prohibition of -night work for women. This is delightful:
The provincial statutes vary in the length of the night period during which this class of employment is forbidden.


An hon. MEMBER:: What class of unemployment is that?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Night work for
women. Again, reference is made to weekly rest in industrial undertakings. At last we have reached what is clearly federal jurisdiction. This is admitted, "as it involves jurisdiction relating to the criminal law." But what does the memorandum say?
It is met by the provisions of the Lord's Day Act.
Well, Mr. Speaker, in the language of the street, I would say, "it is to laugh"! Can we forget that there are large groups of labour in this country still working twelve hours a day and while there is a rest day once a fortnight it is earned by continuous work for twenty-four hours? Yet we are told that these clauses, part of a solemn treaty, are being met by the Lord's Day Act-yes, I was almost making another slip and saying, the Lord's Day Alliance Act.
Then there is a clause for the prohibition of the use of white lead in painting. This the memorandum says is:
Within provincial jurisdiction. . . no laws.
I would ask, why should not this come under the criminal code? If white lead poisoning is inimical to human welfare, even to human life, why should not its use in painting be made a crime in this country, as I understand it has been elsewhere? Again, there is a clause dealing with workmen's compensation and equality of treatment for national and foreign workers. Just listen to what the memorandum says in relation to this:
The practice varies in different provinces. . . in Ontario and Manitoba residents of countries which were enemies in the Great war are not entitled to compensation.
And this, notwithstanding the fact that we entered into the most solemn obligations with enemy countries.


Edward Joseph Garland: Who says
all this? We missed the origin of this.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I thought I made
it clear that these clauses are included in the Peace treaty of Versailles, and that I am

quoting from a memorandum issued by the Department of Labour of the federal government, showing how far we have legislation covering these points in the treaty.
There is provision in the Versailles treaty for compulsory sickness insurance. The memorandum of our Department of Labour says frankly:
There is no legislation on this subject in Canada.
In that connection may I say that my colleague from North Winnipeg (Mr. Heaps) is asking the house this session at least to go so far as to appoint a committee to consider this matter and see what can be done in the premises. As to unemployment insurance for seamen, the memorandum simply has to say:
No legislation.
Then, "prevention of unemployment in agriculture." Why, I would have thought this had something to do with the protection of harvesters. Is that the case? Not at all, for all the memorandum tells us on this head is that we have:
Provincial and private land settlement.
What a joke! Mr. Bryce M. Stewart in a recent book dealing with these Canadian labour laws and the treaty says:
In the matter of actual ratification Canada stands in the lower ranks despite her rating as one of the foremost agricultural and the sixth industrial country in the League of Nations. While certain provinces have recognized some of the conventions in legislation, and indeed have surpassed them in some instances, no single province has taken action on all the proposals, nor have all the provinces recognized any one.
Of course, division of powers between the Dominion and the provinces is pleaded as an excuse but, sir, let me give you a quotation which occurs in an entirely different connection. The Royal Securities Corporation condemns the inaction of the United States federal government with regard to the diversion of water at Chicago, which it characterizes as:
A flagrant violation of principles recognized by the law of nations and founded on abstract justice.
I would suggest that the following judgment pronounced on the United States with regard to water diversion applies with equal force to Canada in this matter of the ratification of the labour clauses of the treaty of Versailles:
The prolonged incapacity of the United States federal government to deal with this-
Water diversion.
-is a significant measure of its weakness and a warning to those who would rely upon its treaty undertakings if they happen to conflict with the interests of individual states.

'The Address-Mr. Woodsworth
Have we no sense of honour in Canada that we could enter into these most solemn obligations, which apparently there has been practically no effort -made to have implemented?


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Will my hon. friend allow me? Does he take into account the declaration that was made by one of the signatories to the treaty, that one hour before they signed it they had never seen it?


Edward Joseph Garland: Would it
have made any difference?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I do not know whether it would have made any difference or not.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: Well, it might have as far as the moral engagement is concerned.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I think the hon. member for Labelle will agree that we have certain responsibilities, and that if a nation undertakes to sign a treaty there is surely some obligation on its part to see that that treaty is lived up to.


Edward Joseph Garland: But is it not true that non-repudiation during the many years which have since elapsed would fully meet the question of the hon. member for La-belle?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Possibly. I was very glad to see that the Conservative convention at Winnipeg pledged itself to carrying out the treaty. I cannot see where the difficulty lies. The Prime Minister has written a book on Industry and Humanity. He is in favour of carrying out these obligations, the Conservatives are in f-avour; then why cannot we have the treaty carried out in its entirety?
I should like to have had time to call attention to other classes of social legislation which are long overdue. For example, the Old Age Pensions Act which was passed in this house last session gave pensions to certain classes of people of seventy years and over. I would point out that the railway companies are dismissing men at the age of sixty-five. It seems to me that if men are being turned off at that age, provision ought to be made for taking care of them before they reach the age of seventy.
And may I point out that a resolution of this house was passed some years ago by which prisoners in our penitentiaries were to be paid for their work, and in the case of married men the money was to be turned over to their families. So far as I have been able to learn, the Department of Justice has not proceeded to act on that resolution; in fact we have the rather anomalous situation
of the superintendent of penitentiaries begging that some action be taken along this line. He is reported:
To keep men in enforced idleness is not only most inhuman, but in one institution in a foreign country where it has been tried over thirteen per cent of the unfortunate inmates were driven insane in one year.
In regard to the Dominion of Canada he says:
Only one-tentli of the work possible to be done is being done. The government spends many thousands of dollars yearly for furniture, furnishing and equipment of various kinds, a portion of which could easily be made in the penitentiaries.
It does seem to me that when we have gone to the trouble for two years in succession of debating this question on the floor of the house, and have definitely passed a resolution, the matter ought not to be disregarded in this way.


Joseph Henri Napoléon Bourassa: My hon. friend must
remember that many of the labour organizations have unfortunately, for many years past, adopted resolutions petitioning the government against any sort of labour being carried on in penitentiaries. We have that situation to meet.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, but I would
point out that the object has been merely to ensure that prison labour shall not come into competition with free labour. I may say that labour is quite content to have our prisoners do many types of work that could be done in prison, work which is needed in this country.
Now, Mr. Speaker, like other hon. members I have been keeping my eye on my watch and I see that the time allotted to me is nearly up. I should have liked to discuss the larger questions in which we are becoming more and more related to international affairs, but unfortunately I cannot do so in the time at my disposal. I content myself at this juncture with directing the attention of the house to a resolution which is being placed on the order paper by my colleague from East Calgary (Mr. Adshead), to the effect that:
-the government of Canada should discuss with the government of Great Britain the desirability of Canada accepting article 36 of the statutes of the Permanent Court of International Justice providing for compulsory arbitration in international disputes.
With the feeling that is developing in some parts of the United States against Great Britain and the feeling which is developing in some parts of Great Britain against the United States-a feeling which is being voiced perhaps by rather irresponsible individuals, but which is nevertheless a reality that must
27ie Address-Mr. Guthrie

be reckoned with-I do not think that the present situation should be allowed to go unchecked. I fancy that some statement on the part of Canada looking to a better understanding in world affairs and a frank acceptance of the principle of arbitration would go a long way towards safeguarding the international situation.


Hugh Guthrie: I rise to make a few observations in what is a more or less formal debate in this house, particularly so when nothing in the nature of an amendment to the address has been moved. One has only ito read the address which His Excellency the Governor General delivered to parliament to realize that it is more in the nature of political propaganda than of a serious parliamentary document. The theory of the speech from the throne is that His Excellency shall give to parliament the reason or reasons for its being convened, and it is quite proper in that speech to mention anything of national or international concern which has taken place since prorogation. 1 submit however that in the present instance the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), who is himself responsible for every word which is in that speech, has gone beyond all reason in his attempt to pat himself and his government upon the back in almost every clause of that document. We on this side of the house have no objection to his proclaiming in proper terms the prosperity which the country undoubtedly enjoys at the present time. But the object of the Prime Minister in so doing is to claim credit for himself and his government, while we on this side of the house are inclined to give the credit for the present happy condition to the vigour, to the intelligence and to the adaptability of' the people of Canada. Clause after clause of the speeoh from the throne is merely a chronicle of last year's events, something which the members of the house all know, something which does not need to be repeated and which is entirely out of place in a state document of this kind. I do not wonder that one of the leading newspapers of this city has seen fit to call attention editorially to this remarkable document.
Now there are one or two suggestions in the speech from the throne to the effect that we are to have some legislation. We are advised that two of the departments of the government are to be amalgamated. It is proper to place that in the speech; that is contemplated legislation. It is suggested that some measure will be introduced in regard to scientific research: that too is properly placed in the speech. And I believe that one

other measure is contemplated in regard to new trade agreements. But the rest of the speech consists in an attempt to display before the country the activities or inactivities of the ministers who preside over the various departments of. this government. It is solemnly stated in the speech from the throne that the government is considering the question of returning their natural resources to the three prairie provinces-something the government has been considering since 1922 or 1923. It is solemnly stated also that ministers are considering the question of returning railway belt lands to the province of British Columbia- something they have been considering for two or three years past. Who cares what amount of consideration they give these matters? What we ask for and what we expect is action in respect of them. There is no intimation of any action, and I suppose we may take it for granted that these ministers will simply continue their consideration of these important and pressing questions; and next year when this parliament is convened I for one should not be surprised if these matters were then still under consideration by the government.
However, we must take the program as it is. The debate on the address has wandered rather widely from the text of the address itself, and I intend only to dwell upon one or two matters which have been raised in the discussion. One of these matters, to my mind a most important matter, is the question of the Dominion finances. That question was raised purposely by my hon. friend the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) with the object of drawing definitely to the attention of the government and of the Minister of Finance the absolute necessity of taking at once, at this session of the house, some definite action towards the retirement ultimately of the public debt of this country. This matter was raised in the house last session in a very able and well considered speech by my hon. friend from Toronto East Centre (Mr. Matthews). We raise it again now at the opening of the session and, in so far as an opposition is able to insist and demand, we propose to insist and we propose to demand that the government formulate some definite scheme whereby the debt of the Dominion of Canada may be retired within a reasonable number of years.
The Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb) has in his possession all necessary data in regard to that question. Financial authorities throughout Canada have discussed it, and have reported upon it. It is not a very

The Address-Mr. Guthrie
difficult matter to deal with, and if the Finance minister will display some courage in the matter he can evolve a scheme whereby the debt of Canada can be paid within forty or fifty years at most without causing any inconvenience or any disruption of a serious kind to the finances of Canada. The province of Ontario has adopted a scheme. Five or six years ago when the present government took office in that province it was confronted with a very serious financial situation. Something had to be done. Experts were called in. Proposals were made; a plan was evolved, and to-day we find that that government is annually setting apart a sufficient sum of money to retire the whole indebtedness of the province, I think within thirty years, and so far no inconvenience has been found in carrying out that scheme. I submit that a similar course should be adopted in this house. We draw the matter as forcibly as we can to the attention of the government, and so far as an opposition has any power to do so, we demand and we insist that some action be taken at the present session towards the retirement of the public debt,.
One has only to examine the public accounts and financial statements made by the Prime Minister and from time to time by the Minister of Finance to conclude that the situation in regard to the debt of this country is not dealt with as satisfactorily as it should be. We hear statements from time to time on the platform and in this house that tremendous amounts have been paid off on this, that, or the other occasion. Newspapers give great prominence to statements of that kind, and we are all inclined to rejoice when we hear that the public debt has actually been reduced by large amounts. But when one sits down to examine the public accounts one is not as well satisfied with the results. Is it known in Canada that the actual funded debt of the country, the amount of money which we have to pay to creditors, for which we have given the bonds of this country signed, sealed and delivered by the Finance minister, is twenty odd millions higher to-day than it was when the King government took power? I make the statement from the Canada Gazette of December 31 last, and the statement is correct. The funded debt of Canada, for which creditors hold our bonds, was on the first day of this year $2,442,228,000, twenty-two millions more than it was when this government assumed office. The Prime Minister yesterday, in discussing the finances of Canada, announced amidst the applause of his supporters that in 1925-26 we had redeemed the bonds of Canada in cash to the
extent of $20,000,000; in 1926-27, $43,000,000; in 1927-28, $29,000,000, $8,000,000 and $18,000,000, making a total retirement of $118,000,000 in the funded debt of the dominion, and at the same time on the 31st December last we find that we have twenty odd millions more funded debt than we had when this government came into power.
Now here is the situation: In 1921, when this government came into office, the system followed in the Finance department in respect to the national railways was that when we met with a loss we went to the treasury and paid it, and we charged it to the national debt. For the two years following the defeat of the Meighen government in 1921, Mr. Fielding, the then Finance minister, did precisely the same thing; when he had a railway payment to make and deficits to meet he went to the treasury, paid them in cash, and charged them to the debt of Canada. But when Mr. Fielding passed out and another gentleman became Finance minister a new scheme was evolved, and I do not say a bad scheme. It was decided that thereafter all outlays and deficits in respect to the national railways should be charged to the railways and not to the national debt of Canada, and instead of coming forward in 1923, 1924 and 1925 with deficits, as there had been in years previously, the government were able to come forward with surpluses, as the public accounts show, because they charged up railway defaults not to the national debt but to special railway account. How did they raise the money for the railroads, you ask? In former days it was raised on the bonds of Canada and charged to the debt of Canada. But under the new regime they raised railroad money on the bonds of the railway companies, and instead of signing the face of the bonds the Finance minister endorsed the back of them, guaranteed their payment, and allowed them to be charged against the Canadian National railways. That is the way he works out his annual surplus. What about the sixty-five millions of bonds that were issued by the railways last year and guaranteed by the Dominion of Canada, far more than they retired? In former times, and under Mr. Fielding's administration in the Finance department, those bonds would have been charged to the national debt, but under the new system of bookkeeping they are charged to the Canadian National railways. The country is the guarantor and the country will ultimately have to pay the bonds.
Now passing to another aspect of the matter. These claims of reduction in the national debt puzzle me. They always have puzzled me,
The Address-Mr. Guthrie

but I have been more puzzled in t'he last two years since I have studied the budget speeches of the present Minister of Finance. The trouble is that his budget speeches do not jibe with the public accounts. Which shall we accept? I am accepting to-night the public accounts of Canada, and I turn to the 31st of March, 1922-I am pretty generous; I am going back three months after this government came into power-the net public debt of Canada was $2,422,000,000. On the 31st of December last I find that according to the Canada Gazette the net debt of Canada amounted to $2,281,000,000, or an apparent reduction of $141,000,000 in five years. But that is not the whole story. That is not a correct statement. It may be correct on its face, but on examination it will not stand. In the first place, in 1922 we had an issue out of $241,000,000 of Dominion notes, which are the medium of exchange whereby trade in this country is carried on; they constitute debt so long as they are outstanding. On the 31st of December last Dominion notes outstanding stood at only $193,000,000; Dominion notes to the amount of $48,000,000 had been called in and destroyed. When they call them in I think the term they use is that they "cremate" them; they burn them and get rid of their debt in that way. There were $48,000,000 more of Dominion notes current in 1922, and that $48,000,000 should be taken off the debt reduction, leaving, as I understand the matter, the net reduction at $93,000,000 instead of $141,000,000, and that after nearly six years' operation by the government in power to-day, and the whole amount of $93 000.000 of reduction is dlte to the improvement in Canadian National Railways returns.
I must take issue with the Prime Minister >n another point. In his speech of yester-lay and to-day he made a bold claim in regard to the question of reduction of taxation. I cannot agree with him in the statements he has made, and I am trying to make my statement from the public accounts of Canada laid before parliament by this government. I state that the taxes collected from the Canadian people during the past five years are far greater than those collected during the previous five years by their predecessors. What counts in the matter of taxation? It is the burden upon the people; that is the only test. When I hear the Prime Minister, or the Minister of Finance as he certainly spoke in the campaign in North Huron, making claims that certain taxes have been reduced I must express my amazement. Why is this government not candid enough to say:	The
taxes we have taken off are the taxes we have fMr. Guthrie.]
put on? They maintain that they have taken off the stamp tax on cheques. That tax was only two cents a cheque when they took office and they promptly increased it to two dollars a cheque as a maximum. Last year they cut it down to two cents on cheques for over ten dollars. The increase was made by the present government, and tardily and after much persuasion from this side of the house they saw fit last session to take off the increase and put the tax where it was when they took power.
They made claim on the platform at Goderich that they had taken off the stamp tax on receipts. Who put it on? It should never have been put on in the first place. It was put on against the protest of those who sit in the opposition in this chamber. Last year, after much persuasion from the opposition, they reluctantly removed it and they claim that as an achievement.
Do hon. members recollect the statement made in this house yesterday by the Prime Minister in regard to the sales tax? Why, he said, they had reduced it twenty per cent. Twenty per cent sounds pretty well, but what are the facts? When the present government came into power there was a war measure sales tax in this country imposed to meet the awful expense of the war, a temporary measure. What did it amount to? It amounted to one and one-half per cent on the manufacturer, one and one-half per cent on the jobber, or three per cent all told. That was the tax when this government took power in 1921, but they were hardly in office before they started raising taxes. During the first session they raised the sales tax to five per cent instead of three per cent and the following session they raised it to six per cent. Then they found it was so high that it actually interfered with the trade and commerce of the country and they cut it down to five per cent. With a great sound of trumpets and much applause last session a reluctant minister of finance said: "I will take one per cent off," and one per cent off five per cent is the twenty per cent reduction to which the Prime Minister referred yesterday. The sales tax with this one per cent reduction now stands at four per cent, but when this government came into power the tax stood at three per cent; and yet they have the audacity in this house and on the platform to claim a reduction in taxation in connection with the sales tax. Why did they not, take the advice of the opposition last year? We endeavoured to plead with them to remove this sales tax altogether, and today and during this session, if it is in the power of an oppositi'-'" to insist or demand

The Address-Mr. Guthrie
we are going to insist and demand that the sales tax be removed altogether. We went so far last year as to divide the house on, the question; we moved in the house that at least the sales tax be taken off wearing apparel and boots and shoes. Do you think, sir, the government would do that? No; every hon. member on the government side voted down that motion and every hon. member on the opposition side supported it. The sales tax stands at four per cent to-day-and what was the excuse of the Minister of Finance? "Oh," he said, "if you abolish it, it will practically ruin the retail merchants in this country."


James Alexander Robb: Hear, hear.


Hugh Guthrie: If the Minister of Finance had a little more courage on this and on other subjects it would be better for the Dominion of Canada and the trade of Canada. What my hon. friend lacks is courage. He is content to sit at his ease and allow the Department of Finance practically to run itself. A little 'courage is necessary in that important department, and if he will take the courageous course and in his budget will wipe out that iniquitous sales tax he will have not only the support of the members of this house but the approval, of ninety per cent of the people of the Dominion of Canada.


James Alexander Robb: If I did that I would have to come back, or another government later would have to come back, and pay the automobile people as we paid them for remissions made by Sir Thomas White.


Hugh Guthrie: I am afraid my hon.
friend sees lions in the path. Let him have courage and he can do this. What about the burden of taxation in this country? This claim of reduction of taxes is so absurd, so unfounded, that it must be exposed.
I take the taxes collected from the people of Canada for the last five years. I take the customs tariff tax. I know that it is not admitted on all hands that that is a tax, but for the purpose of my statement I am going to include that as one of the taxes.


James Alexander Robb: Does my hon. friend claim that it is a tax?


Hugh Guthrie: I did not express any
opinion. I say I am including it in this calculation, and I am including also the sales tax, the stamp tax, the income tax, and all the other burdens which this government has imposed on the people of Canada. I take all those taxes imposed over a period of five years. I cannot bring my figures up to December 31st last; I have to take the return laid before the house on March 31st last, and what do I find? For the five years from 1922 up to the 31st of March, 1927, the average amount of taxation taken annually from the people by this government was 3387,780,000. I take the five preceding years. I add together the same taxes, and I find that during that period the annual average amount of taxation collected was $348,500,000, or $39,280,000 less per annum than the average amount taken by the present government from the people of this country during the last five years.
Now how does that work out in the way of a burden upon the shoulders of the people of Canada? We can only take an estimate of the population, and the best one I can get is the one which was given to this house last session by the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Malcolm)-evidently a carefully worked out figure; he estimated our population on the first of March last to be 9,390,000. On the basis of that estimate I find that the burden of taxation under this government is $4.18 per capita, or for a family of five, $20.90, more than it was during the five years preceding the advent to power of the present government. In the face of those figures, which are taken from the blue books prepared by this government, is it fair for the government to claim that there has been reduction of taxation? I have given you the taxation which the average individual in this country pays; I have given you the taxation which the average family of five in this country pays; I have taken the government's own figures, and their own estimate of population-


James Alexander Robb: But my hon. friend has conveniently forgotten the debt which he himself ran up as a minister of the government from 1915 to 1921.


Hugh Guthrie: I discussed the debt question before I entered upon this phase. I realize that the debt in those years did increase, and increase enormously. I realize that the afterwar debt was as serious almost as the debt which had to be piled on year by year during the war, and I am glad to say that during those war years and after the war we had an administration and a minister of finance who did not Jack in courage.
I have given the house these figures taken from the government's own blue books. They can be checked up; if I am wrong I want to be put right, but I am satisfied that I am not wrong in the statement I have given. In the face of those figures, let me ask hon. members
The Address-Mr. Guthrie

opposite to be careful when they make platform statements about reductions of taxation by the present government. I think a little care should be exercised by my right hon. friend the Prime Minister and by the Minister of Finance when they discuss either in this house or on the public platforms the question of debt retirement, when we know full well from the public accounts that the actual bonded debt which we owe to creditors is greater to-day by S20.000.000 odd than it was when this government took office.
Let me advert to one other matter which has been discussed to-day, although it. does not arise very directly out of the speech from the throne. It is a question which was the subject of a good deal of discussion in this country and in this house about a year ago arising out of the report of the Imperial conference of 1926. The discussion which has taken place in this chamber during the last day or two as to whether we had or did not have equality of status with the motherland and the other dominions recalls very vividly the debates which took place in this chamber last session. I do not know that the matter has been very much advanced in the interval. I am inclined to be well satisfied with the statement of the Prime Minister of Great Britain made in these buildings last August, when he stated in the presence of my right hon. friend the Prime Minister that so far as Canada was concerned, no limitation had been imposed upon the powers which she enjoyed, and nothing new had been added. That. was a very satisfactory statement, as well as a very brief one, and carried out my own understanding of that document which we call the report of the Imperial conference of 1926. But the point which my hon. friend and leader sought to emphasize was merely this:	The Prime Minister
and his ministers are inclined at all times to state that that equality of status, to which I think we all look forward with a good deal of satisfaction, exists at the present time. As my hon. friend from St. Lawrence-St. George (Mr. Cahan) said to-day, that it is an ideal not yet attained; I believe that is a correct statement of the situation, and until a committee of experts shall report upon some method or plan whereby certain imperial acts may be either repealed or abrogated or otherwise rendered non-effective, equality of status cannot be attained. I am not dissatisfied with the present situation in any respect; I am perfectly satisfied with it, but in my own view there is

another question, and a very important one, which can never be resolved in favour of equality of status. I doubt if actual equality as between the motherland and the dominions can ever be achieved. Where the force is, where the might is, where the power is, there is going to be the actual source, the real head of the state.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Would you call that
"functioning"?


Hugh Guthrie: It may be a "function",
as my hon. friend suggests. I had that thought in mind when my right hon. friend read that particular clause in the report today. The question in my mind is this: On that great question of war and peace can. we ever have equality of status? Shall we ever be in a position by any act of ours to declare war or to make peace on our own account? Can we by any act of ours involve the motherland, the other dominions and the empire in a war? No, we cannot. Can the mother country? Certainly. A declaration of war by the motherland involves this and every other dominion instanter, and it may be entirely against our will and against our desire. We may desire to avoid it, to dissociate ourselves from it entirely. That will not help us. Our land will be liable to attack, our commerce liable to be seized or destroyed, and our citizens to be taken as prisoners of war without any act of ours. Under circumstances of that kind can you have actual equality? I do not know that anybody ever desired such a thing. I for one do not. I am * absolutely satisfied with the position we have attained to-day, and I do not believe that in our generation, or in the generation to follow us, Canada can ever reach that plane of absolute equality, which is proclaimed in newspapers and political platforms, a position which we do not enjoy and which I do not believe we ever shall enjoy.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: Does my hon. friend
express the view that Canada will always be in such a position that we shall have no voice in regard to war?


Hugh Guthrie: I did not say that. I said our declaration would not be upon the same basis as the declaration by Great Britain.
Much has been said and suggested in regard to the right, which we do not now enjoy, of amending our own constitution. I confess that I have no very strong opinion upon that matter. I think it might be well if that power were v'ven to this country. It is a

.	The Address-Mr. Bancroft
power or a privilege which is now enjoyed by practically all the other self-governing dominions. I do not mean that I would agree that the power to amend our constitution should be given to this parliament alone. I would not agree to that, but the power to amend our constitution should be given to this parliament and to the nine provincial legislatures. However, as the matter stands we suffer from no disadvantages in that respect. I am absolutely satisfied in my own mind, and my opinion has been confirmed by conversations with such men as Mr. Baldwin and others, that at any time when this parliament and the legislatures of the provinces can agree and ask for an amendment to our constitutional act, the British parliament will not hesitate to amend it. First we must agree on what we want, and the moment we do agree and properly present our request to the parliament of Great Britain, it will be granted; so that we suffer to-day from no disadvantage in that respect. Our difficulty is to agree among ourselves. We hope for much from the conference which was held between the Dominion government and the various provincial governments last autumn. We hope there may be some important results from that conference, but I am afraid that they merely agreed to disagree on the main questions which they were called upon to consider. Certainly, so far as I read the report, no agreement was reached upon the question of senate reform, and no agreement seems to have been reached in regard to the question of amendments to the constitution. I have no doubt that interchange of ideas among prominent men is always a matter of advantage, but I do not think that conference got much beyond an exchange of ideas. Nothing concrete seems to have resulted from it-nothing at all events of an important nature. But I maintain, and have always maintained, that we are suffering from no difficulty and no disadvantage whatever by reason of the fact that we have not in this country power to amend our own constitution. I think I would like to see Canada have the power through this parliament and the legislatures of the various provinces. Whether it would be an advantage or not I cannot say, but I believe it is accepted and constitutionally settled in Great Britain that whatever the parliament of Canada, with the consent of the legislatures of the Dominion, should ask in regard to our constitutional act would be engrafted upon the statute.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: That is the principle that governs now.


Hugh Guthrie: That is the principle that governs now, and that is the principle that will always obtain. So that I do not feel very much concern myself about it, although the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) seems pretty strongly wedded to the idea that we should have the right to amend our own constitution. But I know at the same time that many of his compatriots in the province of Quebec, including the Premier of Quebec, take a directly opposite view to that of the Minister of Justice in that respect. They are quite content to abide by the British North America Act as it stands to-day, and that is my own view; I feel quite content to abide by it in the same way.
I do not desire to transgress the new rules, and therefore I resume my seat.


Mr. L. P. BANCROFT (Selkirk):: In
rising, Mr. Speaker, to take part in this debate, I desire first to congratulate my hon. friend from Hants-Kings (Mr. Ilsley), upon his very excellent speech in moving the address in reply to the speech from the throne. I was particularly interested in his speech, because be comes from my own native county of Hants in which I spent my earlier days, and I think I am voicing the opinion of all members of this house when I say that the people of Kings and Hants have every reason to be proud of their representative in this house.
There is one portion of the speech from the throne which is of particular interest to the people of western Canada, and that is the reference to the return of the natural resources. The statement made by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) this afternoon, in his very excellent address, that the government was prepared to return these natural resources to the prairie provinces and at the same time continue the subsidy at the present amount in lieu of lands which have been alienated, I think is most encouraging to say the least. The negotiations between the government and the province of Manitoba need not be very lengthy. Manitoba wants its resources and is prepared to take them over. If any difficulty arises in making the transfer-and I trust that no difficulty will arise-Manitoba is prepared to meet those difficulties by arbitration. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, with the government ready to return the resources to Manitoba and Manitoba ready and willing to receive them, the transfer should be made forthwith.
There is another paragraph in the speech from the throne in which I was particularly interested, and that is the paragraph concerning the Hudson Bay railway. It reads:

The Address-Mr. Bancroft
The work of reconditioning that portion of the Hudson Bay railway previously constructed has been finished. After a most careful examination and consideration, and upon the best advice obtainable, Churchill has been selected as the ocean terminus of the Bay route. A contract has been let for the grading and bridging of the railway extension to Churchill and preparations looking to the establishment of the necessary harbour works there are well advanced.
The manner in which the government has tackled the Hudson Bay railway question merits the approval of the people of western Canada. The Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) is to be congratulated on his courage in changing the terminus from Port Nelson to Fort Churchill before more money had been spent at the port. The change has met with very general approval from the people of western Canada.
. In the course of the very fine speech which the hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) made yesterday he stated, or I understood him to state, that the hon. Minister of Railways had changed the terminus from Nelson to Churchill without the authority of parliament. I have taken the trouble to look up the debate in this house last session when the estimate for $5,120,000 was passed for the work. The Minister of Railways had been addressing the house on the work under contemplation, and at page 2151 of Hansard of April 8, 1927 he is reported as follows:
I only want to emphasize in conclusion that there will be no holdup in the work as a result of the investigation now proceeding, and it is hoped that before the end of this fiscal year we shall be able to make a substantial start on the assembling of materials and machinery necessary for work at the port.
Mr. Guthrie:	At what port, may I ask?
Mr. Dunning: I have indicated, Mr. Chairman, that we expect to be guided by the investigation in that regard. We hope that it will be Nelson. It will be Nelson unless it is demonstrated to our satisfaction by the eminent engineer who is investigating it for us that Churchill can be more easily developed into a safer and better port, and that it will be economically advantageous to Canada to use that port instead of the other.
Mr. McGibbon: When do you expect Mr. Palmer's report?
Mr. Dunning: Not later than August.
I submit, Mr. Speaker, that when this house passed the vote after hearing the explanation of policy from the hon. Minister of Railways it gave him sanction to change the terminus if the report indicated that Churchill was the better point.
We used to hear a good deal in this house about Hudson strait. We were told that these straits were frozen up tight for ten months of the year. Investigation carried on by the

Minister of Railways by means of daily aeroplane flights, according to press reports, have shown .that the straits were open for navigation until December 1 this year. That in itself is something worth while finding out.


Charles Avery Dunning: Last year.


Leland Payson Bancroft: 

The Address-Mr. Bancroft

shall be a label with the name of the dealer and the number of feet of twine per pound in the ball marked or stamped thereon.
While binder twine is sold at different lengths per pound, I will confine my remarks to twine of 550 feet, that is, twine that measures 550 feet per pound. To each ball of this twine there is attached a label stating that the average length of twine contained in this ball is 550 feet to the pound. I turn however to the next page of the act, section 352, and I find this provision:
Provided that no deficiency in the number of feet of twine contained In any ball shall be deemed to be a contravention of this section unless the deficiency exceeds 5 per centum of the length indicated by the label.
This section allows the binder twine manufacturer a leeway of 5 per cent from the length stated on the tag. That is, a ball of twine that is labelled 550 feet to the pound may measure out only 522| feet and still be legal. The farmer would be paying for 550 feet of twine and be receiving only 522J feet, so that he would be 27^ feet short. In other words, his measurement would be 2,750 feet, or more than half a mile, short on 100 pounds of twine. It would be a very conservative estimate to say that the average farmer in the three prairie provinces buys at least 400 pounds of twine annually. Investigations that have been carried on by one branch of the organized farmers would lead one to think that some manufacturers are trying to make their twine 522J feet per pound instead of 550 feet. The individual farmer cannot check the length of the twine he purchases and must depend upon the act and its enforcement for his protection in the matter of length. Proof that the manufacturers do not need the five per cent leeway is contained in their advertising matter. I have a farm journal which contains the advertisements of two Canadian binder twine manufacturers. One of these advertisements declares:
. This twine is guaranteed for length, strength and weight-the ball of standard manilla must contain at least 4,400 feet of twine.
That is to say, it must be 550 feet to the pound. That is guaranteed in the advertisement of this concern and it is proof that this particular firm does not take advantage of the five per cent leeway allowed by law. On another page in the same journal there appears the advertisement of another binder twine manufacturing concern to this effect:
It is longer-full length to the pound as guaranteed on the tag.
These being two of the large binder twine manufacturers in Canada, I submit that by
fMr. Bancroft.]
their own admission they do not need this five per cent leeway. I would suggest to the government therefore that the Inspection and Sale Act be amended by reducing the leeway from 5 to 2i per cent.
Before resuming my seat I want to say a word on the tariff. The work of the tariff board has reached a point where the government should be in possession of sufficient facts to warrant some reductions in the tariff. I have followed the work of the board as closely as possible without having the verbatim reports of the hearings, and I would suggest to the government that reductions might well be made on some lines of clothing and on kitchen utensils without seriously affecting the manufacturers. Tariff reductions along these lines would reduce the cost of living in every Canadian home.


Mr. T. E. SIMPSON (West Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to discuss the different items in the speech from the throne, for I consider that speech as more a recital of past events than a forecast of the legislation the government intend to introduce at the present session. In passing, however, I should like to refer to the prosperity which it is claimed Canada is enjoying at the present time, and to express my pleasure that that prosperity prevails to a greater extent than during the past few years. This I attribute mainly to the following five factors: the growth of the industry of agriculture, the increased production of forest products, the increase in our mineral production, the increase in the amount of capital that has recently been invested in the development of hydro-electric energy, and the increase in cur tourist traffic.
I think everyone will admit that during the past four or five years the yield of agricultural products has been above the average, and the price that has been obtained, particularly for the wheat from western Canada, has been such as to add very materially to the wealth of this country.
As to the increase in our forest products, which in value are second only to those of agriculture, their value for 1927 is said to be no less than $475,000,000, of which approximately $283,000,000 were exported, chiefly to the United States-a material factor in maintaining the trade balance at as favourable a figure as it is. Looming large in connection with forest products is the pulp and paper industry, which is the most important manufacturing industry in Canada to-day, keeping in mind not only the value of the finished product but also the wage and salary distribution. The Prime Minister (Mr. [DOT]JANUARY 31, 1928
The Address-Mr. Simpson
Mackenzie King) said in his speech to-day that Canada had risen to first place in the world in the manufacture of newsprint. That statement is absolutely true. Canada, also occupies the proud position of exporting more newsprint than all the other nations of the world combined. In order to illustrate the growth of this industry let us compare the value of the product in 1913 with that of 1926. In the former year the total production of newsprint amounted to 350.000 short tons. In 1926 it had risen to 1,189,000 short tons, valued at $121,182,987, an increase in the newsprint production in that period of 438 per cent. The total production of pulp and paper for the fiscal year 1926 was $215,488,315.
Canada's rise to first place in the pulp and paper industry is due, in my opinion, to the wisdom and foresight of the provincial legislatures of Ontario and Quebec in placing an embargo on the export of pulpwood, notwithstanding what my hon* friend (Mr. Bancroft) has just said with respect to that action. I agree with my hon. friend, however, to this extent: I should like to see every stick of pulpwood that is cut manufactured in Canada, at least to the newsprint stage. If there is any discrimination against the actual settlers in Canada to-day surely some means can be devised whereby the settler shall be given a reasonable price for his wood, and yet maintain the manufacture in this country.


Leland Payson Bancroft: That is all he is asking.


Thomas Edward Simpson: Well, I think he should get it. When we consider the value of our forest products, the increased payroll which has come into existence as a result of the increase in the manufacture of those products during the last few years, and the increased capital which has been invested, not only in the enlargement of mills already in existence but in the erection of new mills, every one must admit that this development has played an important part in the prosperity that we are enjoying to-day. Then, as a result of the increase in the manufacture of newsprint, in the pulp and paper industry, and in mineral production, there has been a great demand for an increase in hydro-electric power, and as a result large sums of money have been expended in the development of hydro-electric energy. Let me give you a few figures to illustrate the growth of that development. The capital invested in hydroelectric development in 1910 was $121,000,000. To-day the capital invested is estimated at $900,000,000. an increase in seventeen years of over six hundred per cent. During the past three years over $180,000,000 of new
56103-6J
capital have been invested in the development of hydro-electric energy in this country.
During the past few years we have benefited by another increasing source of revenue;
I refer to the tourist trade. A few years ago this was not regarded seriously but last year, according to the figures compiled at Washington and by our own government, over $200,000,000 was spent in Canada by tourists from the United States, and when we consider the amount expended here by tourists from other countries we should probably be well within the mark in estimating that almost a quarter of a billion of dollars was spent by tourists in Canada last year-surely no small factor in promoting the prosperity which Canada is enjoying to-day.
Then we come to the mineral development. The production of our mines in the year 1927 is valued at $241,000,000, an increase of $155,000,000 in the past twenty years. Every one of the provinces with the exception of Prince Edward Island has contributed in some degree to this increase. Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec, in the order named, have been the greatest contributors, and while the increase in recent years has f been encouraging, I think when we look to the future, with the activity that we see on every hand with respect to mineral development to-day, none of us can form an estimate of the wealth that will be gained from the great pre-Cambrian shield in the years that are to come. When we realize that between fifty-five and sixty per cent of the total area of Canada is contained within the pre-Cambrian shield or mineralized belt, we may form some idea of what we may expect in the future from the mineral development of this country.
But I want to deal for a moment with the development in northern Ontario, not only because it has been the most active and important, but because I am a little more familiar with it. It is only about twenty years since the Ontario government constructed the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario railway north from North Bay and tapped the mining country at Cobalt. Since that time millions of dollars' worth of silver and other precious metals have been extracted from that section of the country. Several years later Porcupine was discovered and to-day they have a town with a population of between fifteen and twenty thousand, paved streets and several large gold manufacturing plants. From that camp alone more than $200,000,000 in gold has been produced. Before the war Kirkland lake was unknown. To-day there are several producing mines, some of them the richest in the world. In
The Address-Mr. Simpson

that it has to-day. A great deal of the steel that is imported under this item is used in the manufacture of automobiles, and I think the manufacturers of automobiles themselves will be the first to admit that in enjoying the reasonable degree of protection which they do on their finished product; this article, which is the finished product of another Canadian industry, should not be subject to the 99 per cent drawback. I would suggest that this item be changed to read:
Flat spring steel, steel billets, and steel axle bars, when used in the manufacture of springs and axles for vehicles other than railway, tramway or automobile vehicles; 99 per cent drawback.
I may say that steel such as that described in this item is manufactured in Canada today of a quality not surpassed by any manufactured in the United States or in any other country, and has been so manufactured for some time.
Then, thirdly, with respect to alloy steel; this is a comparatively new branch of the steel industry in Canada and there is no specific item in the tariff schedule covering this particular iine of manufacture. I would suggest that an item to cover it be considered.
The fourth and final suggestion I would make is in connection with structural steel. There is a provision in the customs tariff to the effect that when structural steel is made in Canada in all sections weighing up to 120 pounds per yard the present duty applied to sections weighing less than 36 pounds per yard shall be applied to the larger sections. At the time this section was drafted practically none of the larger sections were made in Canada, and consequently had to be imported from foreign countries. Since then conditions have altered considerably. Canadian mills are now in a position to supply every need of the consumer in all the sections of steel angles and in beams up to six inches and channels up to seven inches. The Algoma Steel Corporation at Sault Ste. Marie has had the foundations laid for several years past for the erection of a mill to take care of the larger sections. For financial and other reasons they have not been able to complete that mill, but I am given to understand that they have informed the tariff commission and the government that if the clause of the tariff with respect to the larger sections of steel is made effective, they will immediately proceed to complete their mill at a capital expenditure of approximately $10,000,000, and will then be in a position to meet the Canadian demand for practically all the larger sections of steel. This is asking nothing more than what was contemplated when the section was drafted,

and I think it is only what the industry is entitled to receive. If this were given effect to it would not interfere in any way with the steel imported by the manufacturer of agricultural implements or any of those items that are covered under specific regulations passed by the government in recent years. What would it mean to Canada if these suggestions were given effect to? It would mean giving a great basic industry a fighting chance for its existence. It would mean the manufacture in Canada of much of the steel now imported, thus providing employment for a very deserving and desirable class of citizens. It would help to improve our unfavourable trade balance with United States. During the year ended March 31,	1927, we imported in
structural shapes alone about 150,000 tons, and if we cut that only in half by Canadian manufacture it would have a very material effect on the trade balance as between this country and the United States. I cannot speak with respect to the other steel companies in Canada, but so far as the Algoma Steel Corporation is concerned, I am informed that it would enable them to round out their present plant and increase their operation from the present standard of 40 per cent to about 80 per cent, thus giving more steady employment to the 2.500 men now on their payroll, who for a number of years have been given on an average only five month's employment in the year. It would enable them to employ from 800 to
1,000	more men, with an increase in the annual payroll of $2,000,000. Surely a new industry, or an extension to an existing industry if you wish to put it that way, willing to expend that amount of money and to increase their payroll to that extent in order to produce a product not now manufactured in Canada, a product which is being imported in such iarge quantities, should be worthy of the consideration of this government, I ask, Mr. Speaker, in all sincerity, that the suggestions, if I may term them such, that I have made to the government to-night receive their sympa-' thetic support before the session is over, and that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Robb), particularly give them his most serious consideration before the budget is brought down,
I think I can say without hesitation that anything they may do along that line will receive the hearty and unanimous support of the members on this side of the house.
On motion of Mr. Pouliot the debate was adjourned.
On motion of Mr. Stewart (Edmonton) the house adjourned at 10.40 p.m.

Customs Inquiry Commission
Wednesday, February 1, 1928