1929-05-28

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Mr. L. S. RENE MORIN (St. Hyacinthe) the eighth report of the select standing committee on standing orders was concurred in.

[Stage Direction]
On motion of Mr. Morin (St. Hyacinthe): Bill No. 282, respecting the New Brunswick Railway Company was referred to the select standing committee on railways, canals and telegraph lines.

[Stage Direction]
SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES On the orders of the day:
Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Leader of the Opposition) :: Before thg orders of the day are
called I would like to ask the Prime Minister when we may expect the supplementary estimates determining to some extent when we may be able to close our labours.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: I should hope by Friday
of this week.



TREATIES AND CONVENTIONS MADE BY OR AFFECTING CANADA

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. C. H. CAHAN (St. Lawrence-St. George):: May I ask the Prime Minister when there will be brought down the return shewing imperial treaties and statutes having application to Canada as well as treaties
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negotiated by Canada herself. In view of the announcement that the committee of experts is to meet in October, some of us would like to be in a position to criticize the actions of the government in dealing with that committee, and the information I ask for forms the basis for such criticism.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I may say to my hon.
friend that I was told by the Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs that the task which had been assigned to the department was a very onerous one, that for some weeks he had had one or two officials of the department at work on the preparation of the material asked for, and when I spoke to him he was very doubtful as to when the work could be completed. But I will be glad to have placed at my hon. friend's disposal anything that we have up to date. His order was a large one.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: It simply indicates 'the
magnitude of the task the Prime Minister _and others have undertaken.
IMr. MACKENZIE KING: Quite.



REPORTS OF HARBOUR COMMISSIONS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of 'the day:
Mr. MURRAY MacLAREN (St. John-Albert):: I wish to ask a question of the
hon. the Minister of Marine and Fisheries (Mr. Cardin). Penhaps the Prime Minister will kindly convey this question to him. When may we expect to have tabled the reports of harbour commissions? I refer more especially to the report of the harbour commission of St. John.



MOTOR AND PLEASURE BOATS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. PETER McGIBBON (Muskoka):: I
would like to ask the Prime Minister when we may expect a decision of the cabinet on the repealing of the tax on motor and pleasure boats on the Muskoka lakes.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I doubt if my hon. friend's wish in that particular will be met at any rate while the house is in session.


Peter McGibbon: Will it be met after
the house rises?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That I cannot say.
[Mr. Cahan.J



NATURAL RESOURCES OF WESTERN PROVINCES


[Stage Direction]
Hon. CHARLES STEWART (Minister of Interior) moved the second reading of Bill No. 311, respecting water-power in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Explain. The minister
said he proposed making a more lengthy statement.


Mr. STEWART:: This bill is to meet the request of the house formulated in a motion that the administration of water-powers alone should be transferred to the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, and that these water-powers dhould be administered in the same manner as is provided for in the Railway Belt Waters Act, and under an agreement similar to that existing between the province of British Columbia and the Dominion government. In the case of British Columbia the Dominion government is the owner of the lands-the railway belt and the Peace River block. In the three provinces mentioned the ownership of the waters remains within the jurisdiction of the Dominion government. At first glance it would appear to be an easy matter to outline the provisions by statute and to declare in what manner this was to be done. The law officers of our department, as well as the law officers of the Justice department, found it most difficult to do that. I have had them prepare what I am offering to-day, that is, legislative authority to make agreements, and in all particulars where they will apply the provisions will be similar to those of the Railway Belt Waters Act. That is briefly all I am asking to be dene to-day.
I understand that in one case in Alberta, while they have not in any sense passed a water-powers administration act, they have as a government secured authority from their legislature to take advantage of this legislation when passed by the Dominion parliament. So that the matter will be simply one of agreement between the two governments, this government binding itself to turn over the complete administration of the water-powers of the province.
I may observe in passing, however, that some difficulties are bound to arise in connection with the administration of these powers. In every instance in which a waterpower will be created the streams are interprovincial. This has caused us a good deal of difficulty 'in the province of Manitoba; and

Natural Resources-Western Provinces
without in any way reflecting on any authority I think it is fortunate that the federal government had some control in relation to the administration of water-powers as between Ontario and Manitoba. Some very serious difficulties arose there, and I think I am safe in saying that it was by the good offices of the federal government that these difficulties were ironed out, with the result that they enjoy a complete utilization of the Winnipeg river and of the waters that flow out of Ontario into and through Manitoba. No doubt the same situation will present itself in connection with the administration of the water-powers of the three western provinces, but it is highly probable that the transfer of all these resources will take place in the near future, and the water-powers will, of course, go with all other resources. But from this date on, whenever the provinces are ready to avail themselves of it, they will have complete control of the administration of the water-powers, subject, of course, only to the same provision as is contained in the Railway Belt Water Act, namely, the right of veto on the part of the Minister of the Interior of the federal government.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: The minister stated, I think, that Alberta had passed legislation which would enable the province to take advantage of this act. Was this act referred to the government of Alberta and has it been approved by them?


Charles A. Stewart: N'o; that was unnecessary. The act merely gives us authority to transfer the administration-not the waternpowers but the administration of the water-powers-to the provincial government.


Edward Joseph Garland: I hope that when we are in committee on the bill the minister will indicate in what respect this legislation is of particular advantage to Alberta. I should like to know the extent of the water-powers in Alberta affected by this legislation.


Charles A. Stewart: All the
water-powers of every sort not already allocated.


Edward Joseph Garland: Except that within the park areas.


Charles A. Stewart: Yes, and in reserves.


Edward Joseph Garland: What is left?


Charles A. Stewart: They are reserved in the British Columbia act in that respect.


Mr. ADSHEAD:: But what is there left in Alberta outside the park areas?


Charles A. Stewart: I am not prepared to say offhand, but there are indications of a good many chances to establish water-ipowers on the Athabaska river. All these rivers fall very rapidly from the mountains. On the Red Deer river there are possibilities.


Richard Bedford Bennett: This bill means really nothing; it is merely a pretence and that is all, for the simple and obvious reason that it is predicated on the assumption that the property ownership remains in the Dominion, and that the administration may, subject to the power of veto of the Minister Of the Interior, be granted the province. In other words, if the province prepares a lease which is in any sense dissimilar from the ones now in use, the minister's veto power may be exercised- I do not say will, but may be. But there is a greater difficulty which we must face sooner or later, and that is that there are no water-powers in Alberta outside the parks. Such water-ipowers as are in the province of Alberta must necessarily be water-powers that have their source in the Rocky mountains, and with the wide extent of the boundaries of the Rocky Mountains park and other parks in the north, it is now painfully apparent that there can be no utilization of these water-powers for industrial and commercial purposes so long as they remain in the park, for the park authorities have made it perfectly clear that they will allow no one to undertake hydro-electric constructions within the park. That has been made perfectly clear, and they have gone so far that I ventured the other day to direct the minister's attention to the rather ridiculous position taken in relation to a dam away up in the mountains in connection with the Spray lakes. The minister himself felt that the situation was little short of ridiculous. My hon. friend from Vancouver Centre (Mr. Stevens) is very much given to the maintenance of the beauties and scenic attractions of western Canada. I submit, however, that we must face actualities, and the fact is that there are in Alberta no water-powers which are at present not within the park areas. For that reason, so far as we_. are concerned, the bill is nugatory
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Charles A. Stewart: There is
only one within the park area which it is possible to develop and that is lake Minne-wanka.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I understand that further north there may fee, by utilization of storage-


Charles A. Stewart: We have cut that out under the new boundaries.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The new boundaries have not yet been settled?


Charles A. Stewart: No.


Richard Bedford Bennett: If the minister contemplates changing the park boundaries then he and I are at one. But as the boundaries now stand-


Charles A. Stewart: The Spray
lakes will be outside.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, that meets the position to which I am directing attention.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Johnston in the chair.
Sections 1 and 2 agreed to.
On the title.


Mr. COOTE:: Under this bill will the province have jurisdiction over the water-powers on rivers where irrigation rights have been granted-that is to say, where the right has been given to utilize water out of these rivers for irrigation purposes?


Charles A. Stewart: Yes; that applies already to Bow river, both irrigation and power development being provided for.


George Gibson Coote: Will the government wish to retain control or to have the final say in regard to what may be done in the way o'f developing water-powers on the rivers in view of the interest they have in the irrigation system ?


Charles A. Stewart: I cannot
conceive of any difficulty arising by reason of the water-tpowers. The water-powers that can be established will all be out of the irrigation outlets; they are all lower down. You might develop power at Bassano but that has been already granted for irrigation purposes, and irrigation in that case would be paramount.	.


George Gibson Coote: It is conceivable that the
government might be asked at some time to have reservoirs created for water for irrigation purposes, and that water might be required at a time of year when the power company might be seeking a franchise and

be desirous of getting water for power. In other words, there is room there for a conflict of interests as between those concerned in irrigation and those who are developing power. Would the Dominion government in that case wish to retain control of those rivers for the protection of those interested in irrigation?


Charles A. Stewart: My hon.
friend will notice that the bill provides that all grants made heretofore are fully protected and cannot be interfered with. But in any case irrigation is paramount. As to the question whether the establishment of a storage dam in the mountains for power purposes would result in a conflict between the power and irrigation interests respectively, that of course could happen; but in the plan now contemplated as affecting the southern irrigation district this would not occur. I have gone very carefully into that point. That happened perhaps in other cases where irrigation was established, but it would not affect the irrigation in this particular case. .


George Gibson Coote: It does seem to me there
is quite a possibility of friction between the Dominion government and the provincial governments; a provincial government might perhaps want to use some storage of water for power purposes and the Dominion government might want to use it for irrigation. I was just trying to find out how this bill would affect a situation of that kind.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They can use it for both.


Charles A. Stewart: Yes. I do
not think there will be any conflict as between the Dominion and the provinces; the only conflict I fear is the conflict which may arise as between the provinces themselves. There may be claims if storage dams are created in order to obtain more power; it may be said that this is holding up water that should pass down the stream, but that would only apply to the other provinces. It will be remembered that When we had our proposed agreement for the transfer of the resources the province of Saskatchewan asked that the whole Rocky mountain slope be made a federal forest reserve in order that the sources of the interprovincial streams might be maintained. That was one of the provisions of the proposed agreement, but I anticipate no difficulty as between the federal and the provincial authorities.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: On the Bow river, entirely outside the park area according to the plans I have seen, there are certain power units which have been established even below

Natural Resources-Western Provinces
the Ghost river, I believe. What will be the position of those units; will they be under the jurisdiction of the province or of the Dominion government?


Charles A. Stewart: They will
be under the administration of the province. Every license issued from the date of the passing of this act will come under the administration of the province, unless the province refuses to take advantage of this legislation.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: Have any of these licenses been granted as yet?


Charles A. Stewart: No.


Edward Joseph Garland: The last
statement of the minister is very interesting, but it does not really mean very much. The value of the undeveloped1 power sites still left in the province of Alberta is not very great; they are all within the present boundaries of the park area.


Charles A. Stewart: No, my hon. friend is wrong in that statement; he is very wrong as far as the Red Deer river is concerned. There may be storage basins in the park area, but there is no power site.


Edward Joseph Garland: We mean
the power development; the possibility will be determined by the exclusion of certain areas now within the park boundaries. In part at least the minister admits that, and in answer to a question by the leader of the apposition he suggested that certain areas now included in the parks were to be placed outside the present boundaries. I would like to ask the minister when he proposes to bring in [DOT]that legislation.


Charles A. Stewart: I do not
propose to bring it in at this session, but for the information of the hon. gentleman I may say that the Spray Lake proposal comes within the park boundaries. The only possibility of increased power in the Banff national park would be the raising of the level of lake Minnewanka, which now is raised considerably *and which is used as a storage basin by the Calgary Power Company.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But it is not much giood.


Charles A. Stewart: No, I admit that, because the w'ater freezes on the way down, but the utility of that basin could be increased very materially by raising the dam. We have objected to that; I say frankly that I have objected to it and I suggested to the
Calgary Power Company that they take the Spray lakes.
I ward to make our position clear with regard to the Spray lakes. After a great deal of negotiation we have practically come to an agreement with regard to that question. A great many memfoens of this house object to that development altogether on account of the scenic properties which will be interfered with, but in order to quiet a public opinion Which is becoming aroused over the thought that we are going to trespass on the scenic properties of the national parks reserved for the people of Canada I have tried to readjust the boundaries of the park to cut out all the coal areas, with the single exception of one seam of which we know, and of course with the exception of the precious metals which might be discovered. We have a proposed new line whidh is fairly satisfactory to the government of the province of Alberta and to ourselves, with the exception of some very minor adjustments, which cuts out the Spray lakes, but of course the Spray river which is the outlet from the Spray lakes area, flows down through the Banff national park, past the golf course and the hotel, to enter the Bow river.
I may say that there is some doubt as to the utility of this development, which involves cutting a tunnel through the mountain almost two miles in length. The damming of the area itself is a small matter, but it has been suggested that we might very well establish a power-house up at the location of the dam and allow the water to come down the Spray river. I may say frankly that I object to that suggestion for many reasons, but principally on account of the fact that the water would be used in very severe winter weather; it would freeze all the way down, leaving large blocks of ice lying about the flat area where the golf course has been located by the Canadian Pacific Railway at some very considerable expense. That would destroy the looks of our park for at least the first month of the tourist season, which is the season when our own Canadian people visit the park.
With regard to the development as first proposed, there is no objection in the world; I have said that the Calgary Power Company may have that license provided that for the months of June, July and August we are guaranteed a flow of 350 second cubic feet daily down the Spray river. We believe that is the smallest flow which will provide against, the fire hazard and not destroy the appearance of a very beautiful stream. That is the only restriction which has been placed upon the
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development of the Spray lakes up to the present time. It will be outside the park boundary and, of course, if this act becomes law it will be under the jurisdiction of the province.


Edward Joseph Garland: But when
will it 'be outside the park boundary?


Charles A. Stewart: When those boundaries are established.


Edward Joseph Garland: When will
that be?


Charles A. Stewart: Probably at the next session of parliament.


Edward Joseph Garland: Then this bill is not of much value just now.


Charles A. Stewart: This bill
will place the administration of the Spray lakes under the province, with the exception I have stated. As I have said, we are in agreement with regard to the park boundaries with the exception of a small portion at the northern end of Jasper park; all the othei boundaries have been agreed upon by the two governments. There is a small area about which there is a slight difference of opinion and that is the only portion of the boundary upon which we are not in agreement. It has been all surveyed and it is all allotted on the map; except for that one area we might very well have brought in that legislation this session. I anticipate some trouble, of course, because we are putting in force very stringent reservations with respect to mining development and developments of other kinds within the park boundaries, but I have tried to get everything capable of development outside the boundaries of the park.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then the act changing
the park boundaries will not come down this session?


Charles A. Stewart: No, but I
do want to make it clear that as far as the Spray lakes are concerned, if this bill passes I cannot issue the license for that development, but if the province desires to create a storage dam there it can do so provided we get 350 second cubic feet during the months I mentioned.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is it not rather the other way round? The park area is not affected by this bill, and only the minister can deal with it.


Charles A. Stewart: The Spray lakes will be outside the park.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not this year.


Charles A. Stewart: Not until
the amending act is passed, but I want to make it clear that we do consider these lakes outside the park area now for administration purposes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But they are within the
park area now and we are not going to amend the National Parks Act this year, so they will continue to be within the boundaries of the park and this bill will have no effect.


Charles A. Stewart: Is this bill
dependent entirely upon the Spray lakes or, for that matter, on lake Minnewanka or some other storage basin that may be found later on at the head of the Red Deer river? There are certain sites on the Athabaska river.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: The minister mentioned
350-second feet which will be reserved in order to preserve the flow. Is it not a fact that the minister has received a letter from the Calgary Power Company saying that they have no further interest in the matter?


Charles A. Stewart: Yes, I have a letter stating that if we go beyond 150 feet they will not be interested.


Mr. SPENCER:: Do I understand that the Calgary Power Company will have the opportunity of developing this Spray lakes site?


Charles A. Stewart: If the province is agreeable.


Mr. EVANS:: Mr. Chairman, I confess that previous to this morning, I had not read this bill, but I think that we are dealing with a very serious question, one which affects the relationship between the provinces and the Dominion. In this bill the Minister of the Interior reserves the right to control the water-powers within the park areas. Under the British North America Act the ownership of the national parks is vested in the provinces.


Charles A. Stewart: I would
point out to the hon. member that the provinces do not own the park or the land itself; at the moment we are dealing with the property of the Dominion, not with the property of the provinces.


John Evans: This question is bound to
cause trouble in years to come. As I say, the British North America Act does not give the ownership and control of any part of the Dominion to the Dominion government; those areas are all within the provinces and the provinces have the sovereign right with respect to them. Why should this government say that they have the power to restrict the operation of the water-powers and assume con-

Supply-Immigration
trol over those powers within the park areas?
I confess that I view this bill with some suspicion. The natural resources should be turned over to the provinces and although we have had many promises that this would be done we are now asked to pass this particular bill before the fulfilment of those promises. A year ago the Prime Minister himself made the promise that the three western provinces would receive their natural resources after the last session of parliament, but we are still in the same position.


Mr. ROSS (Moose Jaw):: Will the effect of this bill be to give to the three prairie provinces control over their water-powers until such time as their natural resources are returned?


Charles A. Stewart: It is not the intention to transfer the ownership at all; it is administration only.


John Gordon Ross: But they will have control?


Charles A. Stewart: They will have control by administration, yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Subject to the veto of the Minister of the Interior?


Charles A. Stewart: This bill is identical with the British Columbia Act.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.



IMMIGRATION AND COLONIZATION

[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Johnston in the chair.
Civil government-immigration and colonization-salary, $314,505; contingencies, $45,000.
Mr. GARDINER:: I notice that there is an increase in the salary of the deputy minister; would the minister explain the basis of that increase?


Hon. ROBERT FORKE (Minister of Immigration and Colonization):: It was made by order in council. I suppose the government thought that that was an adequate salary, or at least that the deputy minister was deserving of that increase.


Mr. IRVINE:: Is the deputy the only one to receive an increase? There have been no increases issued around the House of Commons at all, or is that within the power of the minister?


Robert Forke: No.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Immigration outside service-salaries, $1,080,000.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Would the minister give us the particulars of the increases which amount to nearly $200,000?


Mr. STEVENS:: They have amounted to
$330,000 in four years.


Robert Forke: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: How many new employees would be included in that increase?


Robert Forke: Thirty-five.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That would not use up the whole $185,000 ; 35 people would hardly average that much.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I rise to protest against
the amount of money that is being spent in the Immigration department. I am not particularly criticizing the minister of the day, but the whole policy for many years past seems to be wrong. I have some figures which I wish to place upon Hansard. Some of them have been given before, but as they are important they are worth repeating. The estimate for the present year is $3,462,900, or an increase of $178,267 over that of a year ago. The census of 1921 shows that Canada had a population of 8,788.000, while the immigrants received in the period from 1921 to 1928 numbered 962,000; the births in Canada from 1921 to 1928 have been 1,939,000, making a total that we should have of 11,689,000 people.
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If we deduct from this number the deaths of
824,000	during those years, we should have a balance remaining of 10,805,000. According to the Bureau of Statistics, the estimated population for 1929 is 9,655,000, or a shrinkage in eight years of 1,210,000 people. We have been spending around $3,000,000 a year on immigration and losing at the rate of 1,210 people in eight years, or in other words we have been losing people just about as fast as we have been bringing them in. Furthermore, a number of people who come in do so on their own, and if we charge the whole cost against those people who come in through seeing immigration literature, this would make the figures still worse.
Going back as far as 1881, I find that we have brought in altogether, according to a statement made by the Minister of Immigration as reported in Hansard of March 15, about 5,000,000 people. But we have paid out, according to th| departmental figures, to bring in that number of people, no less a sum than $51,618,024. It seems to me that if all our departments pursued the same policy as the Department of Immigration, where we are paying out a great deal of money and not getting results and where, if we are getting the people, we are not keeping them, this country would be about bankrupt. Furthermore, the great effort for many years has been to place the incoming immigrants on the land, which is about the last place that we should attempt to place them, as long as farming is practically the poorest paying business in this country.
The hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) during the budget debate placed some illuminating figures on Hansard. [DOT]: She showed that in 1926, of insurance funds to the amount of some $73,000,000 invested in farm mortgages, there was in round figures a loss of $1,313,000, while at the same time investments made to the amount of $192,000,000 in urban mortgages, or two and three-quarter times as much, showed a loss of only $256,000, or one-fifth the loss that was made in investments in rural mortgages. It has been shown more than once that every $7 invested in agriculture brings a return of $1. Any man who has been in the game for the last twenty or twenty-five 3'ears knows, taking everything into consideration, that is practically correct. On the other hand, we find that an investment of $3 in industry brings a return of 82.
I want to comment for a moment or two upon some of the propaganda that is being used. A great deal of it is half true, which is far worse than a direct lie. People who do

not know any better are likely to think what is being said is absolutely true and are misled by it. The other day I saw a pamphlet entitled "Boy Settlement in Canada" issued under the authority of the Minister of Immigration, and the following is a quotation from it:
The settled portions of Canada lie in much the same latitude as do the British isles, except that some portions of Canada reach further south than any part of England. Indeed, the southernmost' parts of Canada are further south than any part of France. The seasons in Canada correspond with the seasons in Great Britain, and the practices and customs of the people are practically the same.
That is absolutely correct as far as latitude goes, but climatic conditions in the two countries are entirely different; practices in many ways are also quite different, and the statement is very misleading. I do not think for a moment the Minister of Immigration saw that pamphlet before it went out because I believe enough in his honesty to feel that he would not have allowed it to be issued. This is a further statement from the same pamphlet:
Why should one select farming in Canada as a life pursuit? Because it offers all the advantages which have already been set down as contributing to real success. There is first the prospect of a good financial return from the very beginning.
That in itself is not true. There have been a few fortunate men who have in a short time probably made a good return on their outlay, but the minister knows as well as anybody else in the house that the majority of people who take up farming, either east or west, do not make a fortune and-do not make an easy living in a short time. I should like to quote the following from the speech made by the minister only the other day:
I say that quite a large percentage of those who started with open prairie under very favourable circumstances have failed.
That is quite different from the statements made in this pamphlet issued under his authority. This is another statement that the minister made:
Will the population that is at present living in Canada gain by a tremendously increased immigration?


Robert Forke: What is the hon. member
reading from?


Henry Elvins Spencer: I am reading from Hansard a statement made by the minister in the house a few days ago. The minister said further:
But a large immigration does not necessarily mean that we shall be happier or more prosperous.

Supply-Immigration
In that I quite agree with him. Yet he brings in these estimates showing an increase year after year and asks us to pass them without criticism. I should like to refer to another statement that has been issued. I cannot blame the Minister of Immigration in this case, but I picked up a pamphlet issued by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company; a quotation from which is as follows in reference to last year's crop:
Not only has the generality of crop production been uniformly fine and satisfactory but many yields have been recorded which would in other countries be considered exceptional or beyond possibility but to which western Canada in her bumper years has grown accustomed.
There is a misleading statement. It goes on:
Yields between 50 and 60 bushels to the acre have been fairly common-
That is referring to last year's crop:
-and there have been many in excess of this, ranging as high as 88 bushels per acre, which, for the extent over which production was secured, is considered a world record.
Nothing could be more misleading. I cannot blame the minister or his department in a case like this, but at the same time I think it is his duty or the duty of his officials to contradict such extraordinarily foolish and irrational statements that are going out supposedly on accepted authority. We all know that there was great promise of a fairly good crop last year, but we also know that owing to a disastrous frost before the crop ripened, the yield was cut down easily one-third and much more in some cases, and the average yield in the province from which I come was 18 bushels per acre instead of reaching to 50 or 60 or 88 bushels per acre.
Not only are we spending this large amount directly under the Department of Immigration, $3,462,000, but under the land settlement board, according to the estimates, we are also spending $1,400,000, and under the Department of Health, we are spending on immigration, $300,000 and I understand that the railways have also paid approximately $1,500,000 to bring in immigrants, or a total of $6,662,000. At the same time, with all this expenditure, we are not increasing our population. It does seem to me that we-would be ahead in this country if we closed down for the time being our Immigration department. The work could easily be looked after by, say, the Minister of Agriculture, who would know where agriculturists were needed. The Minister of Labour would also be in a good position to say when more labour was needed in Canada, and probably the work of the Minister of National Health could be increased a little because he has already considerable work to do in connection with immigration. It does seem to me that we are spending a lot of good public money uselessly through this department. I am not going to criticize the minister because I think probably he is doing his work as well as any other minister who has filled that position, but the whole immigration policy of this country for the last twenty years or so has been wrong. Since 1881 we have spent over $51,000,000 and brought in 5,000,000 people, most of whom we have lost. I think that fact proves my contention.	-
Further, such schemes as are being put forward for forcing more people into this country, and putting them on the land to grow greater quantities of wheat, is another proof that the policy we are following is along false lines. It is only this year that having only two-thirds of the crop we expected last year, with the world's crop being somewhat large, prices have dropped lower than we have had for several years. What would prices have been if our crop had developed as we hoped it would in 1928?
Then we have people-I am glad to know they are not farmers, and they will not be farmers, because they see too clearly the direction in which we are drifting-but people who are not farmers who eventually hope to .take advantage of those who are on the land are advocating different immigration schemes from time to time. The minister knows perfectly well that it is a false line of argument to say that we need more people in this country and particularly on the land. What we should aim at is to improve conditions so that there will be a decent standard of living on the farms, and when the man on the land is assured of a reasonable return on his capital outlay and from the labour he expends, then we need not be afraid of not getting enough people into this country; because the job then will be to keep them out. But to-diay when those engaged in the basic industry of this country are not enjoying a decent standard of living, and the minister knows perfectly well that they are not-the standard of living of the farmer from the east to the west is not nearly so 'high as it ought to be considering the amount of capital he invests and the amount of energy he puts into his work-we are going out to seek immigrants, but until we get a decent standard of living for the man on the land, is it worth while to spend any more public money trying to get immigrants to come to this country to farm?
There is one other point. Other hon. members have asked for figures showing how many
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Canadians have left this country, but we are always given the reply: "0'h, the figure cannot be Stated. The cost of gathering that data is too much, so we have not kept a record." I would ask why cannot the same officials who check the people coming into the country also check the people going out. Then we would know where we stood. At the present time we have to go to the officials at Washington to find out how many people have left this country for the United States. Surely with all the money that is being spent on this department we Should have an accurate statement of who is coming into this country, who they are, what they do, and how many leave. I do think that we are making a tremendous mistake spending a huge sum of money every year on immigration, When we are not doing any more than just keeping our population at its present level.


Robert Forke: I might make some explanation of the increase in this vote as compared with last year. The vote this year is $1,080,000; last year it was $1,033,955, but owing to a mistake of the accountant that amount was not included in the estimates last year, and so we asked for a supplementary estimate of $138,955 last year, which we did not get. The Minister of Finance told us that we had better try and get through with what we had, and we had to do so. We were accordingly unable to create the organization that we had in mind last year, and we had to carry quite a number of employees as temporaries who should 'have been on the permanent list. The temporary list will be smaller this year owing to a number of the temporaries 'being put on the permanent list.


Mr. CHAPLIN:: What was the amount
expended last year?
Mr. FORIiE : We got along with less than the amount asked for. In reality there is not much difference between the vote this year and last. I cannot say just how much the expenditure for temporary help was increased owing to our not having the amount in the estimates last year.
Mr. CH'APLIN:	Surely the minister can
tell us exactly what was expended last year independent of whether these men were temporary or permanent employees.


Robert Forke: The actual amount spent
was $863,841. I should perhaps make an explanation right here. Although this estimate calls for a certain amount of money it does not follow that that amount has been spent. I think I will be able to show that before I am through.


Mr. MANION:: If the minister spent only $895,000 last year why is he asking for $1,080,000 this year? It is over $200,000 more.


Robert Forke: My deputy informs me that
the reorganization, that was intended last year did not go into effect, and the amount of money that we intended to spend last year was not spent.


Robert James Manion: Will the minister explain
the reorganization he refers to?


Robert Forke: Well it extends all through
the service, putting it on a more efficient basis. We may not be getting very many immigrants but we are getting sufficient to require a very efficient service.


Robert James Manion: Does the minister mean
that the whole service is to be reorganized, every branch of it?


Robert Forke: It has been reorganized.
The reorganization is complete.


Robert James Manion: And it will cost $200,000
more to handle it.


Robert Forke: I suppose it will.


Robert Gardiner: What proportion of this vote is purely for the purpose of securing immigrants?


Robert Forke: That more properly belongs to the next vote. I think I can give you the details. This is the cost of the permanent outside service.
Eastern district	$521,495
Western district, 109 employees.. ..	159,675
Pacific district, 17 employees	 61,840
United States, 39 employees	 80'855
British Isles and Irish Free State,
115 employees	 181,830
The continent, 20 employees	 31,820
Womens' division, Canada, 18 employees	 29,325
Juvenile immigration division, 7 employees	 12,000
Unforeseen expenses	 1,070
That makes up the total of $1,080,000.


James Dew Chaplin: Mr. Chairman, I notice
in the Auditor General's report that there is given a list of places where the minister has agencies, presumably for the purpose of getting immigrants. Will the minister tell us how many immigrants he gets, for instance, from San Francisco, where he has an agency, or is this just a place where some good Canadian can go for a rvinter holiday? I am surprised that I do not see in this list such places as San Diego and Florida, although I notice an agency at Manchester, New Hampshire, which is in the Green mountains, or the White

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mountains. I suppose that is a good place for a summer resort but not much of a place to get immigrants. Will the minister explain the necessity for an office at San Francisco or Spokane?


Robert Forke: I had better read down the
whole list.


James Dew Chaplin: Just give us San Francisco for example.


Robert Forke: There were 132 inquiries,
426 interviews, prospects of 35 farmers, and [DOT] others who called were 12. Forty-seven heads of families came to Canada, 93 people all told, and they brought in from San Francisco last year capital to the amount of $163,240.


Robert Gardiner: What was the cost of the office at that point?


James Dew Chaplin: The cost of that office was $13,000 according to the Auditor General's report.


Mr. KELLNER:: Does that include the oil prospectors and operators?


Robert Forke: My deputy handed me the wrong paper. I was rather surprised myself at the numbers that I had to read out. The number of inquiries last year at San Francisco was 1,593; heads of families, 188; number of immigrants, 463; number of carloads of settlers' effects, 2; value of effects, $402,120; good prospects outstanding, 47.


James Dew Chaplin: Do I understand that the value of two carloads was $462,120?


Robert Forke: That is what it says here.


James Dew Chaplin: Well you had better have those figures revised. Would the minister just explain that $402,120, the value of two carloads of settlers' effects?


Robert Forke: That is the total brought into the country. They 'brought in two carloads, and the total effects included cash and everything else amounting to $402,120.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Where is the office from which we had 47 families?


Robert Forke: That was for the same place, but it was only a monthly report.


Robert Gardiner: Has the minister any information as to what pursuits those families engaged in when they came to Canada? Were they farmers?


Robert Forke: I think they were all farmers. I have not the report here. Farmers are the only clas that we are recruiting over there.


Robert Gardiner: There is no recruiting going on for any other class except farmers as far as that office is concerned


Robert Forke: No.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: Will the minister kindly answer the question I put to him? Why cannot we check up the people going from Canada to the States?


Robert Forke: I am mot an expert at that. My deputy informs me that to do that would take about double the organization we have.


James Dew Chaplin: Is that because there are so many leaving?


Robert Forke: With regard to the figures we get from the Bureau of Statistics at Washington, I believe they probably overstate the number of people who really leave Canada. The other day I looked over some statistics of the number of people in the United States born in Canada; the number is growing less every ten years, so that if the volume of emigration to the United States was as great as it is claimed to be, the number of native born Canadians in the United States would be on the increase.


Robert James Manion: But a large proportion
of those going over from Canada are not native born Canadians. They are people who are naturalized Canadians, and they usually put themselves down as English, Irish, Scotch, French, or whatever nationality they belong to, so that they are not entered as Canadians at all. Now frequently the minister and his officials make precisely the same statement which the minister has just made, namely, that these figures are all wrong which we obtain from the American offices in regard to Canadians going to the United States. On what ground do they make the statement? Surely the United States authorities have no reason for padding their immigration list to show a larger proportion of Canadians entering that country than actually do go in. Indeed, there is far less reason for the United States to pad their immigration figures than there is for the Minister of Immigration here to pad his. Are we therefore to draw the conclusion that the minister is judging the United States immigration department by his own? Are we to conclude that the Canadian figures are wrong and that they are being padded? Unless the minister can prove to us that the American figures are wrong I see no reason why he should question them. We do not keep any record ourselves of Canadians leaving this country, so that the only means we have of finding out is to take the figures given
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by the officials of the United States immigration department. And those figures, we are always being told, are wrong. I repeat, unless the minister can prove that they are wrong it is time the government stopped challenging them. I personally have no reason for believing that those figures are wrong. On my desk I have the figures for the past ten years and I can tell the minister that a large proportion of Canadians leaving this country are not native born but naturalized.


Robert Forke: I do not like to exaggerate the number of people leaving Canada for the United States.


Robert James Manion: We are not exaggerating; we are giving the official figures.


Robert Forke: Instead of making the number larger I should prefer to make it as small as I could.


James Dew Chaplin: We find that other ministers take the same view.


Robert Forke: Hon. members know that
the statistics for past years will show that the condition was much worse years ago than it is now.


Robert James Manion: Never. The worst years
we have had have been the past six or seven under this government, and I make that statement without fear of contradiction by anyone. There is no doubt whatever that, according to the figures supplied by the United States, the worst years we have had were those particularly from 1923 to 1927. The last two years have not been quite so bad, but generally speaking the last six or seven have been the worst period we have ever had of emigration to the United States. There is not an atom of doubt about that. I shall be glad to be corrected if I am wrong, but I do not think I can be corrected because I have checked the figures. I resent the implication that we wish to paint things worse than they are; we paint them simply in accordance with the official figures of the United States. I want to tell the minister that we are just as optimistic as he is in regard to this great country; in fact, we are more so, because the other day he uttered a wail of despair about Canada. He took the same attitude as has been taken this morning by the hon. member for Battle River (Mr. Spencer). We have a country containing immense areas, magnificent resources and vast possibilities, a country with a greater future than that of any other country in the world. To my mind there is not the slightest doubt about that; yet the minrMr. Manion.]
ister and the hon. member for Battle River throw up their hands and say, "We do not want immigrants to come to Canada." Are we going to put up our shutters and bar our doors and windows against prospective Canadians?


Henry Elvins Spencer: Let people come in
naturally; don't force them.


Robert James Manion: Every country that wants immigration must take the proper means to see that it gets the right type of immigrant, and to this end there must be some . organization. I do not agree for a moment with the hon. member in this regard. I do n-ot dispute the suggestion that there may be too much money spent on immigration for the results we are getting; I am not sure that this is not correct. But I do not see how you can possibly handle immigration without an adequate organization, and certainly I cannot endorse any such idea as that this magnificent country should put up its shutters and close its doors completely, taking the stand,
" We have great resources; let us hang on to them and keep other people out." Surely we have a more encouraging conception of Canada's future greatness. I personally do not understand the attitude taken by the hon. member for Battle River and by the minister himself.


Robert Forke: It is rather unfortunate that I should be attacked by the hon. member for Battle River and then by the hon. member for Fort William (Mr. Manion) for entirely different reasons. One complains that I am admitting too many immigrants and the other suggests that I do not admit any. I see that the Toronto Globe makes the statement that I am like Daniel in the lions' den.


Robert James Manion: And just as helpless, I
am afraid.


Robert Forke: Let us hope the Lord is
with me anyhow.


Mr. POWER:: The lions roar but they
don't bite.


Robert Forke: I take second place to no
hon. member in my faith in this Dominion, and I do not like to hear the hon. member for Battle River speaking about excessively hard times. According to the speeches heard in 1921 and 1922, there was nothing but ruin and degradation and misery facing us at that time.


Robert Gardiner: Was that not correct
at that time?

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Robert Forke: But we are all here and
just as well off.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister was better
off then.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The minister was one of those who were wailing then.


James Dew Chaplin: The item under discussion is an important one; will the minister give the headings of expenditure. What, for instance, is the expense in connection with advertising?


Robert Forke: This item is entirely for
salaries; I can read over the list if my hon. friend wishes.


James Dew Chaplin: No, I do not want the individual salaries. I thought there were some other items besides salaries.


Robert Forke: No, this is entirely salaries.


James Dew Chaplin: It seems to me that for
a department which is showing as little result as the Immigration department the least we can do is to keep salaries where they were before. I do not see any excuse whatever for increasing salaries in this department. If we are getting somewhere there might be some excuse, but this is a hopeless proposition; it is absolutely impossible; you are wasting money.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Since the minister has
gone over to the other side he has lost touch with agriculture in this country. He knows perfectly well that agriculture has been in trouble for many' years, and the hon. member for Fort William will realize this too if only he will look into the matter closely.


Robert James Manion: We have feiw of the
troubles which my hon. friend deplores so much.


Henry Elvins Spencer: We are spending $51,-
000,000 and bringing in 5,000,000 people and losing them. Is that good business? I think it is bad business.


Robert Forke: We do not spend $51,000,-
000.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I am taking your own
figures.


Mr. JACOBS:: I have been discussing immigration estimates for the last ten or twelve years and I am further behind now than when I started. I am not impressed with the policy of the government; I never was; I have always criticized them and I think rightly so.


James Dew Chaplin: But never voted.


Samuel William Jacobs: There never was a vote
on these immigration estimates in the house.


James Dew Chaplin: No? Well, let us have one now. I will support any resolution you propose for reducing this estimate.


Samuel William Jacobs: What good will that do?


James Dew Chaplin: It will save a lot of money anyway.


Samuel William Jacobs: As a matter of fact, I am
in favour of spending much more than we spend now. I am in favour of the open door; I want to bring into the country everyone who wants to come and who is white, healthy and mentally and morally fit. That is the party to which I belong and I am sorry to say I have not one follower yet.


Mr. BELL (Hamilton):: What about the Minister of Finance?


Samuel William Jacobs: I do not know what his
views are on this point; he is so busy with finance that he cannot bother with immigration.


James Dew Chaplin: Why not move a resolution with regard to this one-man party you talk about?


Samuel William Jacobs: Who will second it? I
merely rose to answer the statement made by the hon. member for Fort William. He speaks about the overwhelming exodus from this country, particularly in the years 192425. He should know that was due entirely to the quota law of the United States; in 1924 they put into force a very drastic quota law which made it imperative for them to allow Canadians into their country if they were to have any immigration at all. Under the two per cent quota only some 100,000 or
150,000	people from Europe are allowed to enter the United States, but all native born Canadians can go into the United States without let or hindrance, and I should say they are rather a good element to have; they are as good as any immigrants the United States could get and they are equal to any of the people residing in that country now, so it is not at all surprising that they put into force this rule which prevents unrestricted immigration from Europe. This is the only country from which they can draw immigrants.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mexico is on the same
basis.


James Dew Chaplin: The trouble with us is
that the whole of Europe is going into the United States through Canada.


Samuel William Jacobs: My hon. friend should know that is not what is happening.
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James Dew Chaplin: I do know; I am on the border as much as you are, and that is what is happening.


Samuel William Jacobs: I think my hon. friend is on the border of unreason when he makes that statement; we have here the figures showing the number of people who enter Canada. My hon. friend should know how difficult it is for people to come to this country; the rules are being applied in a most drastic manner, because it as the wish of this parliament. It seems to me that the Minister of Immigration should have some support here. We have the hon. member for Fort William on the one hand and the hon. member for Battle River on the other advising different courses; those behind cry "forward" and those in front cry "back", so what is the minister to do? He cannot take the advice of both.


Richard Bedford Bennett: He can stand still, as he is doing now.	*


Samuel William Jacobs: 
Robert James Manion: No, I did not advocate
bringing in sheep; I advocated building up the sheep population by a proper policy.


Samuel William Jacobs: Yes, bringing in men and
bringing up sheep.


James Dew Chaplin: You want to bring in the goats.


Samuel William Jacobs: No, I want to send the goats back if they turn out to be goats. Up to the present there never has been any difficulty in absorbing immigrants in this country. I venture to say that in the great city of Montreal, which has a population of about
1,250,000,	there are not 500 people unemployed, and those people could obtain employment if they went after it. That condition exists in every city throughout Canada, and there is no reason why that should not be so. This country is just on the eve of an immense expansion; we read every day about the mines in the north, the lumbering, the pulp and paper industry and so on, but only certain classes of people will do the menial work connected with these industries. Tb use the expression of my hon. friend from Fort William, you cannot get red-blooded Canadians to do work that Italians, Czechoslovakians and others will do. They will not do it; Canadians have gone up in the social scale and the digging of canals, the building of railways and all that sort of work must be done by the foreigner. In the second generation the foreigner's children will not do that work either; they will want to become members of parliament, university professors and so on, and that is only right. This is a country for ambitious people; it is a country of ambition.
Under our immigration regulations the map of Europe is divided according to racial lines; for instance, an Austrian cannot come to Canada unless the minister permits him to enter, while on the other hand a German has no trouble coming here. It would take a person more clever than many hon. members of this house, including myself, to tell the difference between an Austrian and a German. Why should Austrians be kept out and Germans permitted to enter? I cannot see. any reason.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I will tell the hon. gentleman one reason. As a matter of experience one finds that frequently the German is the man who owns, controls or directs a business, whereas the Austrian gravitates towards that lower class of labour to which my hon. friend has referred. That is a very marked difference between the two.


Samuel William Jacobs: I do not see why a barber who comes from Berlin is a better man than a 'barber who comes from Vienna.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Thait is not the proper comparison.

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Samuel William Jacobs: Yes, it is; they do not make any distinction between Germans and Austrians in that respect. Then we will not admit Italians. I am not here for the purpose of eulogizing the Italians or any other people, but accepting the theory laid down by the Immigration department, I claim an Italian from the north of Italy is quite as good as a German from central Germany; there is no difference. Why should a man from Italian Lomlbardy be refused entrance to Canada while a German from Berlin or Frankfort is permitted to enter?


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: We get Italian immigrants now.


Samuel William Jacobs: We are not getting very
many of them.


Robert Forke: Mussolini will not let them out; he needs them all at home.


Samuel William Jacobs: That is a good reason why my hon. friend will not let them in; he is in alliance with Mussolini.


Leslie Gordon Bell: They are dodging Montreal, that is all.


Samuel William Jacobs: We have room for Italians
in Montreal, and we have room for other people from Europe; we have been taking them for 150 years and so has the United States. I say it is silly on the part of this country, which is looking for population according to my hon. friend from Fort William, to refuse admittance to these people.


Mr. ROSS (Kingston):: Will my hon.
friend say that no Italians enter Canada?


Samuel William Jacobs: Italian agriculturists are
allowed in, but that is all.


Arthur Edward Ross: That applies to
other countries too.


Samuel William Jacobs: That applies to every other country in Europe. Take Russia, a country with 140,000.000 people of stern, hardy stock; I think every one will admit that these are people who should be welcomed to Canada, because they know what work really is. They have been living close to the ground, and that is the class of people we want in a country like this, which is just beginning its expansion and development. These people are not allowed to enter this country except as farmers, and- it is almost impossible for them to farm because they have no money. Within the last few years they have been given certain plots of land by the bolshevist government, but many of those people are not satisfied with conditions existing in Russia.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I would remind the hon.
gentleman that 957 Russians entered last year.


Samuel William Jacobs: That makes quite a hole in
140,000,000. I venture to say that perhaps of that 957 I brought in 950, and someone else brought in the other seven. Many of those people were coming to join their relatives and friends on this side; fathers and mothers joining their children and children joining their parents, but they are the only class which are permitted to enter this country. It is quite true that these people do not speak English but we can have them avoid Toronto because a person must speak English there in order to talk at any public meeting; we will allow them to come to Montreal. They pick up the language pretty rapidly. It was only just recently that some young lad from Russia, a boy of eighteen years of age, won the oratorical prize in English in some Ontario town.


An hon. MEMBER:: It was the Ontario
championship.


Robert James Manion: I notice that a French
Canadian from Quebec won the oratorical contest at Toronto where my hon. friend from Winnipeg was one of the judges.


Samuel William Jacobs: They do not need to go
to Toronto to win oratorical prizes; every French Canadian could win a prize in the province of Quebec without exposing himself to the dangers of Toronto. If any member of the committee is sufficiently interested in how these foreigners, particularly Russians and Poles get on in Canada, let him pick up any newspaper published in Montreal this week and he will find that out of 443 graduates from McGill university over 100 were of foreign extraction, and I venture to say that 95 per cent of the prizes won were won by those foreigners. I think that indicates their worth. If you do not want to open the doors wide, open them at least half way and give people of this type a chance. There is no danger of this country becoming bolshevized or Russianized by permitting these people to come in. Take the case of those people out in the west, the Galicians, the Ukrainians and others who have gone on the farms. I do not know of one case where an unworthy foreigner is allowed to remain in this country because he is immediately sent back under the provisions of our deportation laws. I think we are making a serious mistake in enforcing the immigration laws as we do. We have the opportunity of our lifetime right now when the American doors are closed to every form of immigration. For 150 years the United States permitted immigrants to come into that
revised romon
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country, and they have become very great as the result of that policy. They would not have been the United States they are to-day had they depended simply on the plain living, high thinking Puritans who came over in the Mayflower. It is the mixture of the races which has made that country the greatest in the world, and we can stand a little of that mixing here without fear that our whole British system will go under. The second generation of the foreigner is quite as good as the native born Canadian; he has lost his language-perhaps an unfortunate thing-by his attendance at the public schools, and he has taken on the colour of his surroundings. He becomes even more patriotic than the native bom Britisher; he sings the national anthem with much more gusto than the man who comes from the Clyde or the Mersey. I am not finding any fault with that because I think it is a fine idea to inouloate these principles into the children. In the second, third and fourth generation these children will be not only as good as the native born, but perhaps better.


Henry Elvins Spencer: In 1928, 166,000 people
were brought into the country, of that figure
81,000	were brought in from countries other than Great Britain or the United States.


Samuel William Jacobs: They were intended for the farms.


James Dew Chaplin: That is a pretty wide
open door.


Samuel William Jacobs: It is not a wide open door. I would like to have the figures of the Russians and Poles and Czechoslovakians who came to this country not intended for the farm.


James Dew Chaplin: Apparently you blame
Toronto for not allowing these people to come in.


Samuel William Jacobs: Not at all.


James Dew Chaplin: Why pick upon Toronto; I am not from Toronto, but I would like to know why the animosity towards Toronto?


Samuel William Jacobs: A regulation was passed in
Toronto recently declaring that no one could speak at a public meeting except in English.


Mr. GEARY:: It was not a municipal regulation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The constitution of the
United States says that.


Samuel William Jacobs: That is the impression that has got. abroad, that they cannot talk in their own tongue where they hold public meetings; they will be refused a permit unless they talk in English, or perhaps also in French.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is a police regulation.


Samuel William Jacobs: A man may be talking in
his own tongue and they may think that he is talking sedition while he may be eulogizing the king. Does the hon. member say that foreigners can hold public meetings and talk in their own tongue?


George Reginald Geary: They do it every day in
the week.


Samuel William Jacobs: What about the municipal
regulations?


George Reginald Geary: I do not know whether or
not the hon. member was in the house when this matter was discussed, or whether he is simply indulging in a popular form of amusement by attacking Toronto.


James Dew Chaplin: That is all.


Samuel William Jacobs: That has been an amusement which has been consecrated by years of usage.


James Dew Chaplin: If you are not satisfied
with the immigration laws why do you not attack the government?


Samuel William Jacobs: I have been attacking the
government; this is my form of attack.


Robert Forke: He attacks me every week.


James Dew Chaplin: He is afraid to attack,
that is all.


Samuel William Jacobs: I always have attacked the
government; perhaps I have made a mistake.


James Dew Chaplin: In that case, why do
you not vote in the right way?


Samuel William Jacobs: There was one occasion
when I was not present in the house, but if I had been here I would have voted for my hon. friend. He should not cast that up to me, but should reckon it unto me for righteousness. I do not believe that any remarks I make, no matter how often they are repeated, will be of any utility in causing the government to change its views, and the reason is quite plain. Every government keeps its ear to the ground, this government as well as other governments. The Union government had exactly the same rules in force as the present government.


Robert James Manion: They apparently did not
hear very well.


Samuel William Jacobs: Probably not, or they might have been in power to-day.


Robert James Manion: They must have had wadding in their ears.

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Samuel William Jacobs: Or perhaps they did not
have any brains behind their ears.


Robert James Manion: The hon. member may
have his brains behind his ears, but most of us have ours in front or above.


An hon. MEMBER:: Or in between.


Samuel William Jacobs: I do not know very much
about the human anatomy.


James Dew Chaplin: Does the hon. member
make that suggestion with reference to the present government, about their brains being behind their ears?


Samuel William Jacobs: Not at all, I would be hurried to the tower if I did. Influence more powerful than I possess would have to be used in order to bring this government, or any government which may succeed it, into line with my ideas. My hon. friend from Fort William talks very glibly about what he would do, but I want to tell him that were he in power, which the Lord forbid, he would take the same view-


An hon. MEMBER:: It won't be long now.


Samuel William Jacobs: -which the present Minister of Immigration has taken.


Robert James Manion: Not at all.


Samuel William Jacobs: Perhaps he would change
it by adding a few more sheep.


Robert James Manion: Those sheep seem to be
worrying my hon. friend. I could understand that if it were pigs he was objecting to, but I do not know why he should object to sheep.


Samuel William Jacobs: I may say with regard to the pig, it never crosses my lips; it must not, but as regards sheep, I think we can be on common ground.


Mr. BALDWIN:: I shall have to take the hon. member to task. It has appeared in Hansard for many years that the hon. member for Stanstead has said that he is willing to allow to come to Canada everyone who is law-abiding and prepared to work. It was such a policy that built up the population of the United States to more than 75,000,000 before they imposed any restrictions even upon public charges who had to be cared for by municipalities. In this country we have very much better climatic conditions, and from a geographical standpoint we do not have, as they do, the Mexicans to the south, of whom there have come into the United States something like 5,000,000. They are getting quite numerous in the great city of Chicago. I would not have any barriers 78594-184J
whatever against people coming into Canada from any other part of the world, because our climatic conditions would prevent the coloured races coming here to any great extent. I have no apologies for making the remarks that I have made in past years, and those remarks have been quoted by former ministers of immigration. To-day I would pursue the same policy. I would mot allow one dollar of a vote in the estimates of the department under consideration if every Canadian when he was at home or abroad would tell of the beauties of this great country and of its wonderful opportunities, inviting people from every other part of the world to come here and enjoy our great resources as regards soil, mines, fisheries and timber. We have in this immense country resources such as no other country in the world possesses. We have, in the develoment of our great hydroelectric industry, vast possibilities. At the present time we have in this Canada of ours, from the centre to the circumference, a wonderful period of development. Not one person within the realm may go without work and we could invite thousands, tens of thousands, aye, even hundreds of thousands of peotple to come here and go to work on their own initiative.
I believe a policy of assisted immigration brings to this country a pussy-footed, spineless people who are not worth while. If we would just advertise to the whole world that this is a most wonderful country, there would be no difficulty in getting people to come here. Enthusiastic Canadians travelling through the greate centres of the United States and letting it be known that the Canadian abroad is a live wire; that he can speak for his country, can do far more for immigration than a dead-wood official sitting in an office in Manchester, New Hampshire, San Francisco or other places. Such officials have not enough life to show that they have a soul of their own, to say nothing of their being ambassadors to bring people to this country. It is a shame and a disgrace-and I do not care what government undertakes it-to assist certain immigrants to come to this country to the exclusion of others. As I said before, I would allow everyone to come here, and I am against voting a dollar to assist people to come. Let our wonderful resources be made known, perhaps by advertising. Let people know that they can come here, enjoy the full rights of Canadian citizenship and take up, on their own initiative, some business that will make them rich and successful. We have many examples of that, but this pussy-footed, sissified, spineless people whom we are assist-
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ing to come to this country are not worth two cents either to Canada or to themselves. They will become public charges and I am against a dollar being voted on their behalf. Let us take down the bars and invite everybody to come here. There is no danger. The hon. member for Stanstead has been quoted perhaps as saying that he would put some restrictive measures against the coloured races. I am not strongly opposed to them. I have seen black people with white hearts and I have seen people with white skins who are black and dirty-hearted.
In the Niagara belt they have not enough people to gather the fruit. Sometimes we are eating cherries canned in the United States while our own cherries, peaches, strawberries and other fruits are lying on the ground an inch thick in the Niagara belt. It is sad to think .that intelligent members of parliament will cavil over immigration restrictions. The charge should go back to the Union government for their work in keeping Scandinavians and other good people out of Canada, but I am glad the war period is over and the results of the harsh words that were said here in those days are dying out. I feel keenly that such a vigorous, virile people as we are with such a vast and amazing country, are not making greater strides in regard to population. As was said by the previous speakeri, the United States were keen on putting a quota restriction against other countries while they left an open door for Canadians and Mexicans. The reason why they leave an open door for the Mexicans is that there are vast stretches along the Santa Fe and the Union Pacific where a white man cannot work with the thermometer running from 110 to 120 degrees for months, so that they gladly welcome the Mexican to that labourious work in the intense heat of their southern climes. It seems to me too elementary for parliament to >be talking about immigration restrictions as they have been since I came here twelve years ago. I want the hon. member who preceded me to remember that that I have always advocated, as he has done, that no one should be prevented from coming to this country.


Robert James Manion: There has been a discussion for some time as to the number of Canadians going into the United States, and their racial origin. I have under my hand figures sent me at my request by the Immigration department of the United States, and it is worth while giving them because I think they should be on record. The heading is:
Immigrant aliens admitted to the United States from Canada (last permanent residence for a year or more) -
IMr. Baldwin.]
So they do not have to be naturalized in Canada. It is just the permanent residence here for a year or more.


Samuel William Jacobs: They must be bom in Canada to be allowed in under the quota.


Robert James Manion: Let me read the statement. The heading is:
Immigrant aliens admitted to the United States from Canada (last permanent residence for a year or more) during the ten fiscal years ended June 30, 1919 to 1928, by principal races or peoples, showing annual average with comparative per cent, as specified.
I will take just the year 1928:
African (black)	 161
Armenian	 43
Bohemian and Moravian	 51
Bulgarian, Serbian and Montenegrin. 27
Croatian and Slovenian	 41
Dutch and Flemish	 800
The next few items I am going to read constitute the sad part for Canada:
English	 24,253
French	 14,227
Irish	 10,672
Scotch	  13,077


Samuel William Jacobs: Any soda with those Scotch?


Robert James Manion: Well, they do not take
Scotch and soda over in the United States now; they make it up fresh.
Finnish	 79
German	   3,005
Greek	 64
Hebrew	 1,761
That is the race my hon. friend should feel
sorry about. I am	sorry, too, because they	
are good friends of mine,		and I have a lot of
them in my riding.	To	continue:
Race or people		1928
Italian (North) ..			 256
Italian (South).. .		
Lithuanian				 65
Magyar				 158
Polish				 474
Roumanian			
Russian				 228
Ruthenian				 221
Scandinavian. . . .			 2,242
Scotch				 13,077
Slovak				 271
Syrian			
Welsh				 474
All others				 196


Samuel William Jacobs: That was on the two per		
cent quota. They only permitted1 two per cent from those countries, but in England, Ireland and Scotland the two per cent is very much larger based on the population in the United States previous to 1890.


Robert James Manion: That is possibly correct.
The total for 1928 was 73,154. I will also

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put on record the totals of those leaving this country for the United States for the ten years, as given by the United States officials.
1919		 57,782
1920		 90,025
1921		 72,317
1922		 46,810
1923		 117,011
1924		 200,690
1925		 100.895
1926		 91,019
1927		 81,506
1928		 73,154
The years 1923, 1924, 1925 and 1926 were t'he big years.	-


Robert Forke: For some of those years
Newfoundland is included.


Robert James Manion: This does not include Newfoundland.


Robert Forke: Newfoundland is included
from 1920 to 1925.


Mr. SANDERSON:: Has the hon. member the figures of those who returned to Canada from the United States during the last three years?


Robert James Manion: No. I have asked for those figures, but none of those who leave this country for the United States are entered there as Canadians, and none leaving the United States are entered as Canadians. They are entered according to nationality. For instance, it gives the number of American citizens leaving.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: Mostly tourists going through Canada.


Robert James Manion: No. The figures I have
given are people who have gone over there to live and to make their permanent home in the United States.


Samuel William Jacobs: As the hon. gentleman remarked, there was a large increase in 1924.


Robert James Manion: Yes. The worst year was 1924, and the four worst years were 1923, 1924, 1925 and 1926.


Samuel William Jacobs: That was after the quota
law was put into effect.


Robert James Manion: Possibly that is to a certain extent true, tout it is also true that times were worse in this country then than they are now, and that more people were going across. I gave these figures the other day but not for the separate years, and I showed that from 1919 to 1921, for which the Conservatives were responsible, the number leaving
this country for the United States averaged
66,000	people, and for the six years during which the Liberals were in power from 1923 to 1928, the average was 111,000 a year.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.
The committee resumed at three o'clock.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Chairman, we are
still dealing with immigration. I wanted to take two or three minutes to finish some figures that I had. but I gave the figures to Hansard and I have not yet received them back. I have sent for them. The point that I want to make is that the United States statistics as to our emigration to the United States, in addition to giving the number of people coming over from Canada according to nationalities or races also gives them according to occupations, and I notice that out of the 73,000-I think that was the figure for last year-who went to the United States, there was a large proportion of skilled artisans and professional men. In other words, of the
73,000	who crossed to the United States there were about 23,000 who were skilled artisans or professional men. That is my recollection. If that figure is not correct I will correct it when I get the figures.


Mr. CAHILL:: Canadians?


Robert James Manion: Of those that went from
Canada. They were English, Irish, Scotch, French and other nationalities. That means that out of those thousands there are 23,000 men whom we have trained to be either skilled or professional men. The cost of training a boy to a profession is tremendous in this country to-day. I know it rather well myself. It runs into a large amount of money, when you think of a boy growing up to eighteen or so and then going to college for at least four or five years; it means probably the expenditure on the part of the parent of something like 810,000. That is what is spent by the parent, but what of the money being spent by the provinces on educational facilities, universities and so forth? I have tried three or four times to estimate, if possible, the amount it costs this country to educate a boy to some profession, and we are losing some thousands of these men to the United States. While the skilled man is not perhaps so costly to the country yet the professional man is terribly costly, and the skilled man is certainly costly as well, when everything is taken into consideration, and we must bear in mind not only the cost but the loss to our
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country of those men who have gone to another country to produce wealth for that country. We are losing very heavily. I merely wish to impress that point. I have sent for the papers; they are not down yet, but 1 will let the figures go as such, and if they are wrong I will correct them when the papers come down.


Mr. LUCHKOVICH:: I think I would be
very remiss in my duty, Mr. Chairman, if I did not take this opportunity to deal with certain phases of the question of immigration, especially in view of the insidious insinuations and provocative statements that have been made by many of our newspapers in Canada, and by many of our public men, with respect to the alleged belligerent attitude of our so-called foreigners in Canada, and the implied inference as to their unfitness to qualify for Canadian citizenship.
My desire to take a little of the time of this house has been greatly stimulated by a sheet called The Advocate of the National Association of Canada, published at Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, dated February 15, 1929, in which all the vituperative vitriol at the command of Bishop Lloyd has found vent in a bitter denunciation of the central Europeans, in fact, of all foreigners in Canada. I oannot regard the subject matter printed in The Advocate in any other light than as a frame-up against the central European, an attempt to make him the goat of all our social ills, and to credit him with all the dirty work committed by somebody else. And while I am not prepared to prove the neurotic and unchristian Bishop Lloyd as the chief instigator of all this business, I am safe in saying that this kind of propaganda meets with the hearty approval of this false apostle of the Prince of Peace.
Allow me, Mr. Chairman, to read a letter which Bishop Lloyd sent to the ministry of the Protestant churches of western Canada. I am not so much concerned with the first part of 'his letter. He has made one statement, however, to which I wish to direct attention. He has said:
These dirty continentals coming in are out of all proportion to the British immigrant.
I have some statistics here, given me by the Minister of Immigration whidh proves that this statement is absolutely untrue. In the year 1926-27 we had coming into Canada 122,966 immigrants. Of those 49,000 were from the British Isles; 30,000 were from the Scandinavian countries, and only 42,000 were from other countries. In 1927-28 the immigrants from the British Isles numbered

50,872; from the Scandinavian countries 30.702; and from other countries such as the central European countries 42,000. In 192829, 58,880 immigrants came from the British Isles; 29,000 from the Scandinavian countries, and 48,703 from such countries as the central European countries. Those figures disprove the statement made by Bishop Lloyd in The Advocate.
The second part of the letter reads as follows:
The Ottawa committee recommended to parliament the lionrenewal in its present form of the existing railways' agreement expiring in 1930. But why should this western country be inflicted with another three years of these dirty, ignorant, garlic-smelling, unpreferred continentals as we have been in the last three years? Surely this country ought to be able to govern its railways rather than let the railways demoralize our population.
It is no use appealing to the Roman Catholic clergy to help, because they, as well as the poor type politicians are the profiteers. The best work in this connection is being done by the National Association of Canada, but whether you lend your assistance in that way or not, at least you might wu-ite your individual protest to the government and approach your municipalities and urge them to take some step to mitigate this national nuisance.
Believe me to be,
Yours very faithfully
(Sgd) George Exton Lloyd,
Bishop of Saskatchewan.
That is a letter from Bishop Lloyd to the ministry of the Protestant churches of the western provinces dated June 29, 1928. Six months later The Advocate published a news item Which read as follows:
The "Unpreferred European" Question
We have copied from the "Saskatoon Star-Phoenix" the following special telegram. It is probably quite correct and iudicates that the National Association of Canada are in for a great battle to maintain these three western provinces as really "British" territories. It also clearly indicates the length to which these "continentals" are prepared to go under the guidance of the agents of the railway and steamship companies:-
Central Europeans in the West to Petition Ottawa-Object to rule
Articles in Wide Range of Languages Issued On Prairies
Special to The Star-Phoenix
Winnipeg, Man., Feb. 6.-Central Europeans domiciled in western Canada are preparing to deluge Ottawa with petitions protesting against what is termed "The discriminatory ruling against the entrance into Canada of more than a very limited number of central Europeans".
50,000	signatures
The first of these petitions is signed by 50,000 naturalized Ukrainians and is to be supported by at least two other national groups, the Hungarians and Czechoslovakians, who also are said to he getting petitions under way.

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Articles discussing the reduction planned in immigration from the non-preferred countries by the department of immigration are circulating throughout the west in Ukrainian, Polish, Czechoslovak and Hungarian papers. One of these articles carries the following:
"The department's gratuitous insult to a fine type of solid and thrifty Canadian citizenship will require a great deal more explanation than has so far been forthcoming, before it can be accepted as justifiable by any class of Canadian in any part of Canada."
Ukrainian petition
The Ukrainian petition will oarry a preamble, it is understood, pointing out that the Ukrainians form the third largest racial group in Canada; that they were good enough to produce a goodly portion of the national wealth; to contribute their full share of the taxes; to seTve in the war and to support the Red Cross; that, in fact they were considered good enough to assume and carry their share of the responsibilities of the country and now the government turns around to say that their relatives are not good enough to be admitted to Canada.
The petitioners will point out further, it is understood, that in 17 ridings they can elect their own candidate to the federal house if driven to unite on an issue of sufficient importance as to affect their very existence in this country. The petition forms are expected to be in circulation within a very few days.
Mr. Chairman, the surprising thing about this whole shady affair is the fact that this same news item appeared simultaneously together with much editorial comment in many of our chief newspapers throughout Canada. It looks to me very much like a conspiracy to bring the foreign born Canadians into conflict with the native bom Canadians. On February 26 I asked the Minister of Immigration (Mr. Forke) whether he had received any of those alleged petitions and his reply was emphatically in the negative. Anticipating, however, the passive attitude which I knew would be taken by our press, I immediately sent a copy of Hansard to all those newspapers that had given so much publicity to the aforementioned false rumours. Not one single newspaper in Canada so much as mentioned my question of February 26. On April 18 I again asked the Minister of Immigration concerning the receipt of any petitions from Ukrainians in the west, and needless to say I was told that no such petitions had been received. Relative to the question I asked the minister on February 26, I beg to place on Hansard two editorials from two Ukrainian newspapers in the west. The first editorial, under the caption "Ukrainian protest re immigration", which appeared in the Ukrainian Voice of February 13, 1929, reads:
The Free Press Daily, February 6th, 1929, published a sensational news item, wherein certain unnamed Ukrainians planned to deluge the government at Ottawa with protests against the restriction of Ukrainian immigration. It is
noted that 50,000 Ukrainians contemplate signing those protests reinforced by further petitions from Hungarians, Czechoslovaks, and other nationalities. The Ukrainian protest is supposed to proceed from the premise that the Ukrainians are the third nationality with respect to numbers in Canada; that they were materially instrumental in producing a large part of the wealth of Canada; that they paid their share of the taxes; that they did their c ^Ie "reat world war; that they supported the Red Cross; that they performed all their duties as citizens- and now the government repays them by disallowing their relatives entrance into Canada. It is noted further that said protest contemplates threatening the government. should said government not ease up on the matter, with a reorganization of Ukrainian forces, with a view to electing their own members in 17 electoral districts.
All our efforts with respect to acquiring information as to just which Ukrainians plan said protest, have met with no success. It appears therefore, that 50.000 Ukrainians are planning a protest, and a threat of electing 17 members to parliament; but no Ukrainian knows anything of this matter, and if he does know anything he has not the courage to admit it. The Free Press, alone, evidently is cognizant of the matter. Nevertheless, this did not prevent this daily newspaper from forwarding to the Ukrainians some fatherly advice wherein they were dissuaded from doing anything foolish, and wherein it was also noted that neither the Ukrainians nor any other nationality from central Europe resident in western Canada, had any real grounds to register any grievance against the recent departmental restrictioon on the number of immigrants from central Europe, and neither has another daily newspaper, the Winnipeg Tribune, been backward in its reprimands. This daily offers the following question to the Ukrainian leaders: Do you protest as Ukrainians. or as Canadians? In view of your threat to elect 17 members it behooves us to reinforce our own strength and make every effort to safeguard ourselves from any further danger in this respect.
Irrespective of what our views may be on restricting immigration from central Europe, we wish to state most decidedly that not one of the responsible Ukrainian leaders in Canada has had anything to do with the news item in the Free Press; and that if mention is made anywhere of any action contemplated therein, such action in our opinion, is tantamount to mere bluff and provocation.
The second article, entitled, "Insidious insinuation", appeared in the Canadian Ukrainian of February 20, 1929:
Some time ago a sensational news item appeared in the Winnipeg English newspapers with respect to a concerted action of Canadian Ukrainians, protesting against the recent immigration restrictions, adding that 50,000 persons of Ukrainian, Hungarian and Czechoslovakian origin are planning to deluge Ottawa with petitions, and that in the event of a refusal the Ukrainians would elect their own members in electoral districts of Canada. This mysteriously originated item, promulgated with lightning-like rapidity through the length and breadth of Canada, evoked many various comments in the Canadian press.
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The most noticeable thing in the whole affair is the fact that everyone else seems to know something about the matter except those who should be primarily interested, namely the Canadian Ukrainians. It thus becomes very evident that some unknown person who has an axe to grind wishes to further his interests at the expense of the Ukrainians. This can be inferred from the extreme haste with which this false rumour was so widely propagated; it can be detected in the awkward manner in which two contradictory lines of action are contemplated, including as it does in this fantastic manoeuvre the Hungarians and Czechoslovaks, and finally concluding with a foolhardy political threat.
We believe that the new immigration restrictions will not hurt the Ukrainians very much since they will, notwithstanding, still be able to bring in their relatives and friends to Canada on affidavits or special permits; and that only those central European nationalities would be affected which had none of their own farmers in Canada.
Notwithstanding this, however, we understand that, certain interested factors are furthering their efforts in the same direction with a view to finding real facts to prove their untenable theory. It is therefore, quite possible that some group of impostors, posing as "representatives of the Ukrainian population", for certain considerations will allow itself to be utilized in the above-mentioned scheme, even going so far as to actually rallying our citizens in western Canada with a view to deluging Ottawa with petitions in the interests of the Ukrainian people.
We therefore most decisively wish to note that this whole affair is the initiative of some non-Ukrainian body; that nobody has the right in such an irresponsible manner to abuse the good name of the Canadian Ukrainians. The new immigration restriction with respect to farm labourers from central Europe will do us little harm if our farmers make an early effort to secure permits for their relatives and friends and thus give them an opportunity to arrive here early in the spring.
This thoughtless Free Press item has done much to compromise us in the eyes of the Canadian public, arousing as it does the fictitious menace of a political separatism. Canadian Ukrainians should therefore shun any move that would harness them to the wagon of hostile and false interests.
Hon. members will agree with me, after hearing these denials, that there is some sinister power in Canada whose main purpose is to engineer a so-called pogrom against Ukrainians in Canada, to compromise them in every possible manner, and whose despicable plans have no doubt gained the sympathy and unqualified support of the Advocate and Bishop Lloyd, the would-be Bis-mark of Prince Rupert, who has this to say in the Advocate:
Here in Saskatchewan we have a score of nationalities kept within barricades to prevent their becoming full Canadians, a little Ruthenia here, a little Latvia there, a lttle Slovakia, a little Roumania, a little Poland and so on.

It is a crime against these people that they should be thus kept prisoners within their national compound and prevented from full assimilation as Canadians.
Yes, and it is a crime against Christianity, against civilization and against Canadian unity when a bishop, who Should be following in the footsteps of the Prince of Peace and preaching the gospel of eternal love and the brotherhood of man, can see nothing better in Central Europeans than a class of "dirty, ignorant, garlic-smelling, unpreferred continentals." Notwithstanding this indictment by the "saintly" bishop, does it not seem passing strange that from amongst these "dirty, ignorant, garlic-smelling, unpreferred continentals" have sprung such world figures as Paderewski, the world's greatest pianist; Tolstoy, the world's greatest philosopher and humanitarian of the nineteenth century, and from whom Bishop Lloyd might learn many a lesson in humane and temperate conduct; Madam Curie, the lady who discovered radium, an element which some day may help to cure even so hard-crusted a personage as Bishop Lloyd; Caruso, whom Bishop Lloyd would no doubt designate a dirty, ignorant, garlic-smelling, unpreferred dago, but the records of whose golden voice may even now be giving supreme pleasure to the goodly bishop, if such a thing be possible to one of such warped sensibilities-and a host of others whom the time limit set on my speech will not allow me to mention.
I do not think it is necessary for me to reiterate my views on immigration. These views were fully covered in a speech I delivered on June 7, 1928, and it would be superfluous for me to repeat what I said on that occasion. Suffice it to say that I am heartily opposed to the subsidizing of immigration because I believe it is based on a vicious principle. I do not believe in too great an influx either, because I do not believe the economic conditions of Canada today warrant such an influx.
In the few moments left at my disposal I do not intend to deal with any general arguments with regard to immigration, but I do intend to flay and flout the ignominious references made by Bishop Lloyd to the central Europeans. The central Europeans are neither dirty, ignorant nor unpreferred, and as for being garlic-smelling, I consider such a weakness a thousand times better than filling one's mind with the hideous and discriminatory epithets I have mentioned, which appeal to the mentality of, and could be uttered only by, a moron. I repeat most

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emphatically, Mr. Chairman, that the central European is not what Bishop Lloyd would make him out to be; his opinion is an insult not only to the central European but to humanity in general. It is true that most of these central Europeans are rather poor when they come to Canada, but they make up for this " disqualification "-and I would put that word in quotation marks-by their thrift, their sturdiness, their perseverance and their determination to reclaim homes for themselves on our prairies.
Once these Europeans come to Canada they stay here; they are stickers in the fullest sense of the word. It does not take them long to fulfil their homestead requirements; it does not take them long to pay off their debts and obligations, and that is more than I can say for a number of those so-called preferred European immigrants. In the old country their fare was the simplest and poorest, yet they finely thrived on it; they had very few home comforts as we know them in Canada, yet they dearly loved their rude dwellings. They were family men in a much closer sense than is usually known on the North American continent; they lived, they loved, and their whole world was the land on which they worked. They retain in Canada those fine characteristics for which they were noted in the old country, and unquestionably Canada has been a gainer thereby. One can draw this conclusion from the speech of no less an authority than the Minister of Immigration, delivered in this house on March 15, 1929, as follows:
To prevent misconception I want to pay a tribute to the people who have come from those countries. They have made contributions of permanent value to the life of the Dominion; they are taking an active interest in Canadian problems and government, as witness members of local governments and one member of foreign birth in the Dominion parliament. They have worked in our lumber camps, helped to build our railways and highways, dug our ditches and given good service for wages received. They have cleared thousands of acres of our scrub land in the northern part of the prairie provinces and have made the wilderness blossom as the Tose. They have built their modest homes; in many instances they have every modern item of equipment on their farms and have purchased more machinery and equipment in recent years than other agriculturists, and they have added to the wealth of the country by the production of millions of dollars' worth of farm produce. They have not Jagged behind in other respects; they have sent their children to high schools and universities, fitting in this young and growing nation.
Then, Mr. Chairman, one of the hon. members opposite referred to certain Russian boys who have received prizes in different lines of
endeavour. I could name hundreds of those boys and girls in Canada who have received prizes in public and high schools as well as universities. Only two years ago a young girl, whose name I have forgotten but who originated in the southern part of Russia, received the highest marks obtained at one of the Toronto universities.
Arvo Vaara was sent to gaol for uttering in Canada certain seditious sentiments and in his charge to the jury Mr. Justice Wright had this to say:
-was the article calculated or intended to excite ill between different dasses of the King's subjects, because that comes within the definition of sedition-*
If Vaara, because of this article, was sent to gaol for six months I contend that Bishop Llovd should be sent to gaol for six years, because his reference to the different races in Canada was just as bad as the article written by Vaara in the paper which he edited somewhere in Ontario.
Now, Mr. Chairman, with respect to immigrants from Europe I do not believe there should be any of this humbug and tommy-rot we hear about the superiority of one race over another. I challenge any member of this house or any scientist to prove biologically that one race of people could not do as well as another race under similar circumstances. What does our Minister of Immigration have to say on this point? Allow me to read another passage from his speech:
A good deal of controversy exists in regard to continental and British immigration. I have never agreed, Mr. Speaker, that there are superior and inferior people. There are backward and forward people and backward and forward nations. We all know, looking into the dim past, that geat nations have existed and have passed away, and left little more behind than a name. In more recent times, we also know that nations have reached the peak of progress and civilization and have then faded out of the picture, as it were, and other nations have taken their place. That is what has happened in the past and doubtless the same will happen in the future. Some nationalities, however, are much more easily absorbed than others, and we have to take that into consideration in considering this question of immigration.
Doubtless there is a good deal of truth in that statement, but the last sentence is open to challenge. Measured by any standard whatever, I fail to see wherein and how it takes longer to make a desirable Canadian citizen of the central European than is the case with any other European. He learns English just as fast; he educates his children just as well; he serves on school and municipal boards just as readily, and in the matter of paying off his debts and obligations he

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need not take off his hat to anyone, be he a foreign born or a native born Canadian citizen.
Therefore, Mr. Chairman, having these facts in view, I think it is not fair to classify these immigrants as non-preferred. Supposing the Minister of Immigration were to call the members who sit to the left of the Speaker the non-preferred party, would the Conservatives like it? They certainly would not, because deep down in their hearts the Conservatives feel that they are just as good as the members who sit to the right of the Speaker, and perhaps better. It is only human nature for any man to think he is just as good as the other fellow, and it is also human nature for him to resent the insinuation that he is in some way inferior. That is what this stupid classification does; it differentiates; it discriminates; it prejudices; it provokes and, in a word, it tends to stimulate a bitter antagonism among the newcomers to Canada.


Robert Forke: I would like to just point
out to the hon. gentleman that there is nothing in the Immigration Act or in the regulations which speaks of preferred or non-preferred immigrants. That is a common expression, but it is not embodied either in the act or in the regulations.


Michael Luchkovich: Perhaps not, but
that is what it amounts to in practice. Now, think of the future; suppose you were the Hungarian or Ukrainian or Bohemian or Czechoslovakian father of a couple of intelligent, athletic and alert young men who were just beginning university courses, to whom it was remarked by their Anglo-Saxon fellow students that they were a couple of bohunk sons of an unpreferred immigrant. You would not like the reflection; neither does the immigrant. I say again we must think of the future; why should future posterity suffer because of the folly of the present generation? Whilst it may be true that a rose by any other name smells just as sweet, still I do not think it would be very flattering to the rose to call it garlic. So why not give the immigrant his due and call him by the name he deserves? The discriminatory application of the words " preferred " and " non-preferred1 " can do nothing to bring about that unity without which no country can become really secure and great.
I would like to deal with a suggestion made by Bishop Lloyd's Advocate with regard to the segregation of our immigrants in large colonies as being inimical to their complete absorption as Canadian citizens. When I 
speak of the susceptibility of the immigrant to assimiliation and his readiness in accepting our laws and our constitution, I know I am dealing with a subject which is of grave concern to those whose patriotic fervour and ardent love of country foresee in the existence of any foreigners within our borders a potential menace. It is little wonder that the advent of any newcomers to our shores is a signal for a great stir in our social, educational and political circles, directed, no doubt, with a view to finding the best method of coping with the problem of welcoming the immigrant and making of him, in the shortest time possible, a desirable citizen sharing with us all that such citizenship entails. There are some good people in Canada who would come to the aid of the immigrant purely from an altruistic, humanitarian point of view; others would exploit him to the limit or else help him for practical opportunistic reasons; while people of the type of Bishop Lloyd would herd all our immigrants on one ship and then let it sink in the middle of the ocean.
The Advocate foresees a great menace in the segregation of immigrants in large colonies and, therefore, I would infer that as an alternative measure it would sandwich all our newcomers in with the rest of the nationalities; but would Bishop Lloyd be willing to have Hungarians, Poles and Ukrainians as neighbours? Not on your life-no dirty, ignorant, garlic-smelling, unpreferred immigrant is going to be permitted in his back yard; and here we have the key to the whole situation. The idea of mixing the races in this way is a good one so long as each race is willing to tolerate the other; but when you have a situation where one element is offensively trying to lord it over the other you create the germs of a dissension which is bound to keep the races apart no matter how willing eadh component element may be to do its part in the attainment of one common ideal. The rest of us tolerate the immigrant only in so far as he looks up to us, but as for accepting him into our social circle, that is another matter.	It
is another matter to the immigrant also.	If
he has any gumption at all, and he usually has, he will discern the discrimination and he will resent at. How? Simply by leaving the community in which he resides and moving to a district where he knows he has an even chance, or in other words, where he knows he will find his own level. All this talk of assimilating the immigrant without extending to ham a helping hand, without meeting him half way and without giving him a square deal is mere cant; it simply cannot be done.
There is no question in my mind that the best way to deal with assimilation is to leave

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it alone. Let us remember that the psychology of our immigrants cannot be changed in a generation but that this metamorphosis will come about only by a slow and gradual process as man becomes inured to his new environment. Our would-be reformers lose sight of this fact when they charge the immigrant with the retention of what one would call a certain sentimental bond with the land of their birth. This, in my opinion, is not a regrettable propensity. It is a universal and spiritual quality which has manifested itself in mankind the whole world over for countless ages; it is the natural impulse which transports in imagination or in actuality the hon. member for Rosetown (Mr. Evans) to his little village in Wales; our Minister of Immigration (Mr. Forke) to his wonderful Scottish highlands; our Minister of Railways (Mr. Dunning) to his beloved Leicestershire; and our Minister of Labour (Mr. Heenan), the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland), the hon. member for Skeena (Mr. Brady), and all other Irishmen in the house, to their beautiful lakes of Killarney.
I once had as a neighbour an adorable old Scotch lady. Unaware of her presence on her veranda one evening I put on the gramaphone an old Scotch song, "The Bonnie Banks o' Loch Lomond." When she heard the strains of what was to her a very familiar old melody, she came right over to our porch and made me play it over and over again, crying after each time I played it as though her dear old heart would break. It is because of this innate quality inherent in mankind that I think we should be very careful how we meddle with the sensibilities of other people; for if you take away what is human and natural in a person without replacing it with something better or at least something just as good, you destroy his usefulness, not only to himself but to his newly adopted country as well. For this reason I believe that the best way to deal with assimilation is to leave it alone. Our immigrants know very well that it is futile to try to swim against 'he current and so they are not *offering the resistance which our would-be professional reformers claim they are.
I am very well acquainted with this ambitious reformer type. He or she usually is a dogmatic university graduate, or a hard-boiled crank like Bishop Lloyd, who imagines that the future welfare of the world rests on his or her shoulders. They start out by concocting a tailor-made scheme for the complete absorption of the foreigner, believing that the remedy can be applied in the same manner as feeding the machines in our great industrial plants. They overlook absolutely the personal and human element with the result that
their efforts are met with the righteous indignation and hearty contempt of those they so thoughtlessly wish to help. You cannot treat an immigrant as a menial and expect him at the same time to accept our citizenship wholeheartedly and unqualifiedly. If shown sympthy he will reciprocate; if shown antagonism he will react toward it. The only method which should be followed is that of absolute fair play. Let us meet him half way and extend to him a helping hand and give him a square deal. This is the one and only way of assimilating the immigrant.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Chairman, I desire to give the correct figures which I promised the committee I would let it have. During 1928, 18,730 skilled labourers and 3,884 professionally trained people left Canada for the United States, making, in round figures, 23,000, which was the figure I gave. To illustrate the heavy drain this is on the country, I would like to point out that in 1924, the heaviest year of emigration, we lost 41,345 skilled labourers from Canada, according to the American figures.
I would like to make a correction in regard to Hansard. I stated that Hansard had the papers I required and they had not been returned, but I find that they had been placed in a closed envelope on my desk and I had not noticed them. I do not wish to do Hansard any injustice in this regard.
I think the whole house has listened with a very great deal of interest to the speech of the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat. I believe the people of Canada can take pride in the fact that one who, although born on this continent came of Ukrainian parents, has been able to deliver, as member of this house, a speech of which any hon. member might well be proud.
The hon. member quoted from the remarks of the Minister of Immigration and I would like to supplement what he said with regard to foreigners, or what I choose to call new Canadians, by saying that many such statements alko have come from this side of the house. I would like to warn the hon. member and some of his friends against the tactics which were employed in past elections, and particularly in the last one. A man who had r.o connection with this house, who was not a candidate for election, but who was a Conservative and who happened to get up on a platform to speak at a Conservative picnic, criticized the so-called foreigners and that speech was used throughout the whole of western Canada as a criticism which was made by this party. The speech was printed and
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sent to all sections of the western country where there was a newcomer or foreign population, and used with such marked political effect that it cost our party many thousand votes. It has been stated many times that the Right Hon. Arthur Meighen himself lost his seat because of that very statement for which he was in no way, by any stretch of the imagination, responsible. I just wish to point out. to my 'hon. friend, for whom we all have a great deal of respect, that he, enlightened, educated, able to put forward his ideas as he is, would be well advised to inform those of his people who have not had his opportunities, to be just a little careful at times in 'blaming a whole party for the irresponsible statement of somebody who has no direct connection as a candidate or a member of that party.


Mr. LUCHKO  VICH@: Do I understand the hon. gentleman to suggest that this emanated from me?


Robert James Manion: Certainly not. I did everything I could to compliment the hon. member. I had no intention of doing anything else.


James Dew Chaplin: Before one o'clock we
were discussing a certain item, and the minister told us that the expenditure on the same item last year amounted to $863,000. Now he is asking us to vote $1,080,000 or an increase of more than $200,000. I wish to point out some items that appear in the public accounts of Canada. We are, for instance, maintaining an office at Detroit. Imagine keeping an office a,t Detroit at an expenditure of nearly $15,000 when we could have an office on our own grounds at Windsor, only half a mile away. Imagine keeping an office at Saginaw, Michigan! The minister may say: Well, this has been done before. In that case it is time for a change. Imagine keeping an office at San Francisco, another at St. Paul and another at Spokane! Is the committee aware that in the whole of Germany we have only one office, at Hamburg; only one office in France, one in Holland and one m Riga, Latvia, but we have forty in the United States. If a United States citizen wants to come to Canada, does he need to go to Detroit, if there is Windsor across the river to come to? The thing to me is absolutely absurd. From the results which we are receiving from this office there is no occasion for the minister to ask us to vote $200,000 under this item. I therefore beg to move, seconded by the hon. member for Fort William:
That vote No. 54 be reduced by the sum of




Mr. WARD:: We have for several days
been treated to a feast of-I do not know what you would call it-from the opposition as to why we should spend a sum in the neighbourhood of $300,000,000 on an immigration scheme according to the resolution of the hon. member for North Vancouver.


Robert James Manion: That was not the resolution. That wias his suggestion.


William John Ward: I notice the hon. members
all supported it. It occurred to me that we might erect along this wall in very large letters just opposite my hon. friends across the floor, the motto "Consistency". During the last eight years, while I have been in the house, we have had a number of new theoretical ideas as to bow or why we might improve conditions in this country, but of all the illogical, half baked, ill-digested theories that have been presented to the house in those eight years, the scheme of the hon. member for North Vancouver is the worst. It was clear evidence of a man with no practical experience whatever. To those of us who have had experience in the clearing and settling of land, it was so ridiculous that- well, I give .the party credit for almost withdrawing the motion yesterday.
We have now the spectacle of the hon. member for Lincoln moving a motion to reduce this item by $200,000; although a few days ago his party were prepared to force the country .into an expenditure of $300,000,000 on a scheme that would have cost us another $300,000,000 to get the people out of the difficulties into which they would have fallen had we ever attempted to carry out that scheme. Surely it is time we commenced to grasp the facts, bo get two feet on the ground and to consider these matters in the light of the best interests of Canada and not to run off at tangents as hon. members opposite have been doing all through the debate. I very much favour the philosophy of the hon. member for Veigreville, and I want to congratulate him on the excellent speech he has just made. No other member during the whole debate kept two feet Closer to the ground and discussed the matter i-n more fundamental terms than he did.
I am opposed to assisted immigration of any character. I have often said that I think we should have a policy of an open door, with certain restrictions so that no man would be admitted to Canada unless he was financially-


An hon. MEMBER:: Consistency!

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William John Ward: My hon. friend over there says: Open the door and let them come in from any part of the world. If we opened the door and said that no man should be admitted to this country unless he had at least S5,0Q0, $6,000 or $7,000, which it costs today to establish oneself on any kind of a farm, we would perhaps secure a different class of immigrants. As the hon. member for Yegreville says, in our present condition the people of central Europe are about the only ones who can establish themselves upon a farm. The people from Great Britain cannot unless they are pap fed, unless we provide them with $5,000, $6,000 or $7,000 to buy a farm and equipment and then educate them along farming lines. I am opposed to a system of assisted immigration to this country whether the people come from Great Britain or central Europe. I think the system is vicious, but if we intend to continue a system of assisted immigration, we might very well say that we shall open the doors to all the white nations, but under certain restrictions, physical, mental and financial, so that we shall get a class of citizens who will take care of themselves when they come to Canada.


Mr. ARTHURS:: My hon. friend stated
that the estimates presented by the minister amounted to $3,000,000. As a matter of fact, they amount to $3,462,000, in addition to which there is before the house an estimate for the Soldier Settlement Board amounting, so far the Department of Immigration is concerned, to $1,400,000. This department some years ago, was started for the purpose of settling returned soldiers in Canada and by degrees it has become a part of the Department of Immigration, so much so that in their report of 1927 they make this statement:
There has been continued development during the year of the strictly colonization features of the hoard's work. Land Settlement branch officials have undertaken:
(1)	Settlement and establishment on the land of families brought forward by the Department of Immigration and Colonization under the 3,000 British family scheme.
(2)	Settlement on farms of continental families brought forward by the railways under the government continental family scheme.
(3)	Placement and aftercare of married and single British farm workers recruited by the Department of Immigration and Colonization, including trainees from British training farms.
(4)	Investigations of the bona tides of nominations made by residents of Canada in favour of residents of Great Britain, and aftercare of British farm workers, married and single, brought forward by the Department of Immigration and Colonization, as a result of such nominations.
(5)	Aftercare of British farm workers brought forward by the Colonization departments of the two great Canadian railways, and by the Ontario government.
I would like to call particular attention to this last. This is a charge against the Department of Immigration under the vote of the land settlement board, now so-called.
(6)	Investigations concerned with applications to the Department of Immigration and Colonization, for the admission to Canada ot alien immigrants.
Last year this was a subject brought forward very prominently before a committee of the house and apparently it had been investigated by a subdepartment of the Immigration department itself.
(7)	Investigations of the settlement conditions of foreign farm workers, brought forward by the railway companies.
These are two items under the railway companies' agreement.
(8)	Investigations of applications for commutation of pensions.	,
(9)	Surveys to ascertain lands available tor colonization.
(10)	Reception of distinguished guests from Great Britain and other countries, who desire to report to their governments on settlement opportunities.
In other words, this department is attempting to conceal the fact that they are spending under another guise practically $1,500,000 each year, which is not included in the estimates of the department but is attributed to the Soldier Settlement Board.


Robert Forke: The hon. member has
accused the department of trying to conceal expenditures or publishing them under false pretences. The hon. gentleman is entirely wrong.	.


James Arthurs: I am not. The minister
admits that this money has been expended by the department.


Robert Forke: By the land settlement
board, under the Department of Immigration.


James Arthurs: That is only camouflage.


Robert Forke: It is not camouflage.


James Arthurs: As a matter of fact, has
this sum been expended or not by or for the Immigration department?


Robert Forke: It has been spent by the
land settlement board for the Department of Immigration.


James Arthurs: That is all I said in the first place.
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Robert Forke: The hon. gentleman said
that the expenditure was camouflaged under the Soldier Settlement Board.


James Arthurs: Yes, I said that, and I believe it yet.


Robert Forke: Let us be fair. All the
work that is carried on under the Soldier Settlement Board is charged to the board. Then we have a land settlement board, under the Department of Immigration.


James Arthurs: There is only one board, and the minister is now talking of that board as the Soldier Settlement Board. That is what I complain of. There is only one board, and the minister calls it the Soldier Settlement Board.


Robert Forke: If the hon. gentleman would only allow me to finish, I have no wish to mislead anybody. The land settlement board has the same personnel as the Soldier Settlement Board. When the Soldier Settlement Board is dealing with the soldier settler, it acts as a board under the act. When it acts as the land settlement board, it is under the control and direction of the Immigration department. There is no attempt at all to conceal the facts. The first item under the Soldier Settlement Board estimates is for Soldier Settlement Board work, and the second item is for land settlement board work under the Department of Immigration. There is no camouflage at all.


James Arthurs: I said most distinctly
that the first item was under the Soldier Settlement Board.


Robert Forke: But the hon. member said
the expenditure was camouflaged.


James Arthurs: And the minister has
confirmed everything that I said. In the twenty or thirty times that he has mentioned that board just recently he called it, as Hansard will confirm, the Soldier Settlement Board. As a matter of fact, two-thirds of the activities of that board are land settlement work which is directly attributable to the Department of Immigration and has no connection with soldier settlement at all. While the vote for soldier settlement this year is
SI,000,000, the vote for immigration is $1,400,000, but every dollar of the overhead of this department is charged against the Soldier Settlement Board.


Robert Forke: No, that is absolutely wrong.


James Arthurs: Show me where I am
wrong.


Robert Forke: I have tried to explain, but I cannot furnish my hon. friend with the intelligence to grasp it. .


James Arthurs: The estimates speak for themselves, and I am willing to put my intelligence up against that of the Minister of Immigration. The vote reads, $2,400,000 for the Soldier Settlement Board. Now $1,000,000 of that is for soldier settlement purposes, and $1,400,000 for immigration purposes. The minister agrees with that. He has not denied it in any particular, but every bit of the overhead is charged against the soldier settlement.


Robert Forke: To show how absurd the
position of the hon. gentleman is and how he has not grasped the situation, let me say that the last part of vote 60 reads, "Amount required for general land settlement advances,'' and $690,000 of that is British money that was advanced.


James Arthurs: The estimates do not
show that.


Robert Forke: It is the fact all the same.


James Arthurs: I am talking of the estimates as they appear. I have already pointed out that the Soldier Settlement Board themselves state in their report of last year, covering the year 1927-28, that their principal activities, 65 to 70 per cent of their activities, were directly attributable to the Department of Immigration. I have mentioned some of them, and I will read a little further. If the minister wants a little more, I will give him all he wants.


Robert Forke: The total vote for laud
settlement administration is S600,000 for administration instead of $1,400,000. Perhaps we can straighten this out better when the soldier settlement estimates are up.


James Arthurs: The point I am trying
to make is, why does not the minister bring down these estimates under his own department?


Robert Forke: They are under my own
department.


James Arthurs: Why are they not shown
under the Department of Immigration, and why is this document I hold in my hand not one of the documents distributed to hon. members by the distribution office at the House of Commons?


Robert Forke: The land settlement branch of the Department of Immigration issues a statement along with the Soldier Settlement Board statement.

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James Arthurs: Why are they not issued under your department?


Robert Forke: That is a matter of detail.


James Arthurs: No, it is a matter of
convenience. I venture to say there are not fifty, perhaps twenty or even ten members of this house who have received a copy of this report which I hold in my hand.


Robert Forke: That may be true.


James Arthurs: It is not distributed to
the members of this house.


Robert Forke: Oh, yes.


James Arthurs: No, it is not. The
minister is absolutely wrong in that. I had to send for it. I want to go a little further, Mr. Chairman, I am quoting now from the report of 1927-28:
The relative importance of these strictly colonization activities is shown in the diaries of the field supervisors of the board. The diaries show that more than 65 per cent of the time of field officials, during the period from April 1 to September 30, was spent in connection with general land settlement as distinct from soldier settlement. During the period under review, 27,561 visits were made in connection with soldier land settlement, while 48.413 visits were in connection with general land settlement and departmental investigations. The total mileage travelled was 1,167,265, and of this a total of 406,849 miles was on visits to soldier settlers and 760,460 miles in connection with other settlers.
This proves conclusively, Mr. Chairman, that the major portion of the activities of the Soldier Settlement Board1-so called by the minister, not by me-relate to the Department of Immigration, and obviously their estimates should be presented by that department, and presented in the ordinary way. There is no question that the reports of this board are not issued in the ordinary way by this government, but separately by the department itself. They are not distributed in the way that the estimates, or the report of the minister himself, are distributed.


Robert Forke: Oh, yes; I laid those reports on the table at the commencement of the session, and they are available to every member of the house.


James Arthurs: I did not say anything
about that. I simply said that they were not distributed in the ordinary way as are the reports of the Department of Immigration, and the minister cannot deny it.


Robert Forke: I do not know anything about the distribution. I know they are laid upon the table and are available.


James Arthurs: They are not available
unless you send for them. I said before that the expenses of the Immigration department were approximately 13,000,000. As a matter of fact the estimates for this year are practically $5,500,000. There is also an estimate for the land settlement board, about which we have just been talking, of $1,400,000. We also have an expenditure by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company, and have had for many years, of $750,000, and about the same for the Canadian National. All these grants come directly or indirectly out of the people of Canada. There is also a vote for quarantine, directly attributable to immigration, ol about $200,000 or $250,000. There is alsc the rent, upkeep, and so forth, of buildings in connection with this department. In other words there is a total vote for immigration outside of the railways, amounting to about $5,162,900, and the railways are paying about $1,500,000 in addition, all of which comes out of the pockets of the taxpayers of Canada.
Then we must remember that we have m Canada certain provinces at least which are directly interested in the immigration question. Ontario, the province from which I come, expends quite a considerable sum annually, and maintains -an office in Great Britain. In 1928 Ontario paid $176,128.92 on account of immigration, according to the public accounts. Then we 'have various other agencies. We have the Church of England council of empire settlement; we have the Church Army of the Church of England; we have the Salvation Army; we have the Catholic emigration society; the orphan homes of Scotland; the Doctor Cossar homes; Fegan's home; Church of England waifs and strays society; British immigration and colonization association; Doctor Barnardo'a homes; National Children's Home and Orphanage; Middlemore's homes; and a whole lot more that I am not going to enumerate. Every one of these institutions is supported by church organizations, or supports itself. The minister is attempting to delude-I do not want to be called to order-the house into the belief that he has brought into this country a certain number of immigrants during the last fiscal year. As a matter of fact, nine-tenths of these immigrants have been brought in through the agencies to which I have referred, agencies which have no part or parcel in the estimates of $5,100,000 of the Department of Immigration.
I remember two or three years ago that the minister had a little squabble with the Salvation Army. I will not say that he sent his officers, but his officers went for the ex-
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press purpose of trying to make trouble with this particular organization. As a matter of fact the Salvation Army were able to cure the whole evil, and to prove that they had done nothing irregular or contrary to the law. They have had had the direct support of the province of Ontario, and they have brought into Ontario during the last two years over
2,000	boys under nineteen years of age. I am glad to leam that the minister has withdrawn his antagonistic attitude towards this particular organization, and is now supporting it, in some degree at least. I might mention that Ontario is supporting this particular organization more than any other agency so far as they are concerned, they are contributing to the Salvation Army at the rate of about $17,000 per year, or about one-eighth of their total expenditure, being satisfied that they are bringing the right kind of immigrants into Canada.
The minister in his defence some days ago stated that we were receiving more immigrants than we deserved. He did not exactly use the words I have just spoken, but he said that he did not want any more immigrants to enter Canada unless they had opportunities afforded to them before coming to Canada. The members for Marquette, Rosetawn and Southeast Grey have practically told the government that they should cease all activities so far as immigration is concerned. Rut in spite of the advice of their friends-because they are their friends-the government continues to make expenditures.
The minister has stated-I have not the figures under my hand at the moment-that we have received from the United States upwards of 33,000 returning Canadians. We have in Canada 245 constituencies, which would mean that there would be an average of about 150 returning Canadians to each constituency. I defy any man in this house to get up and state on his word of honour that 150 of those who went to the United States from his constituency have returned to- that constituency. I am speaking only of the average. So far as I am concerned I have not found one come back. What occurs is this: a native Canadian coming back to Canada from the United States for the summer, or to visit relatives, is asked when he gets to the port of entry, "How long have you been cut of Canada?" He may answer, six months; then he is asked whether he intends to remain in Canada.. The reply is, " Certainly, if I can get a job and he is marked down as a Canadian returning to this country.

But the fact is that these men are not coming back to Canada and never will come back so long as the present policy continues under this regime. What we need in this country is to provide work which will attract back to Canada these boys and girls who have gone to the United States. Provide sufficient employment and you will not only keep in the country those who are already here but you will bring back others who have left.
A good deal has been said about the colonization of the west and considerable criticism has been made of the hon. member for North Vancouver. Some hon. members to my left and others opposite have pointed out that the western provinces were not populated by people from the British isles or by people directly froim Europe. The backbone of the whole opening of the west consisted indeed of settlers from the older provinces of the Dominion, and we believe that if you will give to the native Canadian in Ontario and Quebec and in the maritime provinces the same opportunity you are now offering foreigners, or attempting to offer them, you will get all the settlers you desire or need in the western provinces.
Last year there was before the committee a motion which I regret that the minister dlid not include among the recommendations. That motion asked that provision be made for a survey in each province of the land and opportunities available, and that cooperation be made easy; officials to be appointed by the provinces and the Dominion. It was also recommended that a list be furnished in each province showing the opportunities available for acquiring land for farming, as well as the opportunities in regard to industry. It was further requested that details be furnished the house annually with respect to the operations in the provinces. Under a proper scheme I do not think it would be at all difficult to keep in Canada those who would otherwise emigrate, the young men growing up on the farms. The young man on the farm is under a handicap, because if there are two or more sons on the farm only one can remain, as a general rule. In the past there were two exceptions to this rule: In the first place there was vacant land near the farm where the boys resided, and in the second place there was a subdivision of land, because agriculture and industry went hand in hand and many of the farms, especially in Ontario and Quebec, were being subdivided from 200 to 100 and then to 50 or 40 or 30 acres. That condition does

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not exist to-day, so that if there are two or more sons on a farm one remains and the others must necessarily leave either to go into some other line of business or to take up agriculture elsewhere. I submit that we should give to these young men the opportunities we are affording the foreigner to-day.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: We have had suggestions from various sections of the house regarding the manner in which the Department of Immigration has fallen down in not bringing more farmers in. It seems to me a logical question to ask-what is the matter with the Canadian fanner? If we look up the statistics we shall find that the Canadian farmer to-day is making more progress than the farmer of any other country the wide world over. For instance, at this very moment the United States congress is holding a special session for the purpose of introducing measures for the relief of American farmers. No one has ever heard of this parliament doing any such thing for the Canadian farmer. In the British Empire the farmers have been relieved of practically all taxes. Nothing of the sort has been done fqr our farmers. On the other hand, the per capita production of the Canadian farmer is greater than that of the farmer of any other country in the world. So that I believe we have in Canada probably the most competent aggregation of farmers to be found anywhere in the world. I would ask, therefore: What do you expect to do by bringing in from other countries a lot of farmers who are not so competent as the farmers at present in Canada? Take the price of grain to-day, which is lower than it has been at any time in the past fifteen years. Certainly it would be economically unsound to bring in a lot more farmers and have them grow more grain without making provision for an additional market. Dairy production in Canada has been very rapidly falling off in the last th-ree 'years and will depreciate still further. On the other hand, the Canadian fanners are helping to support the agricultural implement manufacturers, who charge a good deal more for their implements than do the manufacturers of any other country. So that the Canadian farmer has reached the distinctive position where he *can get along without government assistance and even in spite of the handicap in regard to the purchase of implements.
The hon. member (Mr. Luchkovich) made a very strong plea for fair treatment to all the farmers we have in Canada and particularly to those of the same racial extraction as himself. I wish to make a plea for what I may term the native-born Canadian, the es-78594-183
tablished farmer in Canada. I do not think I can bring the matter out more definitely than by citing a certain case that occurred in my own constituency. There we had an Indian reserve which the government intended to take over in order to place immigrants from the 3,000 British family scheme. The residents of that district made strong complaint. They claimed that there were many native-born Canadians there who were anxious to get land and were entitled to a certain portion of the reserve. The result was that the land was divided fifty-fifty, part of it being used for immigrants under the British settlement scheme, the rest being sold to residents of the district. The land purchase^ by native Canadians and established farmers was sold by public auction. There were a large number of real estate dealers there who bid on the land, with the result that it went up to three or four times its actual value. When that land was brought under cultivation the purchaser had to fence it, plough it and provide his own equipment. On the other hand, the land given to the immigrants was not sold at all; the government simply billed it to them at what it cost to take it over and improve it. The land was broken, fences were erected and buildings put up and the immigrant, was brought in and placed, although he had not a single dollar. Compare the situation of the native-born Canadian who had to buy his land, improve it and provide his own equipment at market price, and then enter into competition with the man who had not a dollar. Furthermore, the equipment for those settlement farms was purchased through the soldier settlement scheme and the price paid was 20 to 30 per cent less than that paid by the average farmer. So this situation prevails: If an established farmer goes to price exactly the same implements he will be asked at least 10 per cent and on some implements from 20 per cent to 30 per cent more than is paid by the immigrant. I do not think it possible to maintain the enthusiasm or patriotism of the Canadian farmer if he is treated in this way. I do not think there is any question but that the farmers we have in Canada now are just a little superior to any farmers we could bring in from other countries, but without a doubt we are going to lose a number of our farmers if we refuse to give them the same treatment we give our immigrants. So far as nationalities are concerned, we get the good and the bad from all countries, but generally speaking I think we produce people in

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Canada a little better than, we get anywhere else. It is my contention that any special privileges which we give to immigrants from any other country should be available to our native bom Canadians and to the established farmers at present in Canada.
There is one other matter I would like to discuss in connection with the assisted settlement scheme. If we should come to a period of extreme depression, which undoubtedly is coming in the agricultural industry, and these fellows get a little behind with their payments, consider the difference between their situation and that of the man who is dealing directly with the implement agent. The ordinary farmer must deal either with the bank or with the implement agent, and when has note is due it must be paid; if he cannot pay it he will be sold out. The case of the immigrant who is working with government assistance, however, is different. A government collector comes around; certainly it would be a serious thing to sell out one of these immigrants and let that advertisement go abroad, so as a result he does not pay at all. If that is carried to a logical conclusion and we come to a period of acute depression, it seems to me that one of two things must happen: Either this great agricultural industry of ours will be carried on as a government undertaking with these immigrants as the hired men of the government or, if the people of Canada will not subscribe to that scheme, eventually a lot of real estate sharks will go in and buy out and operate these farms. Then, instead of having individual fanners who own their own land we will have a few big operators for whom the farmers will be working. It is worth remembering that particularly in England and I think in every other country in Europe there have been a great many fights and a good bit of bloodshed in order to remedy that situation, and it does not seem reasonable that at this late date Canada should evolve a scheme which will cany her into the pit from which the countries of Europe have had such a hard time escaping. I believe that before we engage in a scheme of immigration too ambitious for this country, that matter should be considered.
Then we must consider the question of markets and the further question of special privileges which are granted to our immigrants but are not granted to our established farmers. I think if we put these facilities at the disposal of the farmers we have now it would be only a short time until the production would greatly exceed any prospective markets we may have for farm produce.

The proposals which are being considered in the United States at the moment undoubtedly will hurt the western farmer. There is no doubt that butter, which is very largely produced in northern Alberta and sold across the line, will be practically shut out of the American market. On the other hand we have the competition of butter from Australia and New Zealand; these countries ship butter to Canada under a duty of one cent per pound, and their governments pay a bonus of about five cents for every pound of butter exported. So I feel that Australia and New Zealand butter will come into the larger cities of the west, particularly during the winter months, just as cheaply as Alberta butter can be produced, because the bonus given the farmers in Australia and New Zealand just about covers the cost of transportation. It must be remembered also that butter produced on grass alone can be produced much more cheaply than is the case where cows must be winter fed for six or seven months. When this parliament gets down to consider the real problems which confront the Canadian farmer to-day I think we might be in an intelligent frame of mind to deal with the situation, but it seems very illogical to me that we should advocate a huge influx of immigrants without considering what they are going to do if they get here and how we are going to dispose of what they produce.
I want to compliment the hon. member for Lincoln on moving a reduction in this vote; his attitude is quite different from that taken the other night by the hon. member for North Vancouver, who suggested an expenditure of $300,000,000. The absurdity of that suggestion apparently is becoming plain, and now we are offered a suggestion which, all things considered, is much more intelligent.
I want to make just one or two comments with regard to the Department of Immigration and Colonization and the minister who is in charge of it. I think probably he has done a service to Canada by falling down on 'the job, to use a term we often hear; I am satisfied that it would have been a sad thing for Canada if he had made a success of his job. We have here a department which is of no practical use at all; since we have that kind of department the best thing to do is to put in charge some one who will make a failure of it, because in that way it will be the greatest success. '


Arthur Edward Ross: I think the minister has had a good rest in listening to these speeches, so now I would like to ask some questions and obtain some information with respect to his department. He has told us

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that on the continent of Europe we maintain seven examination stations. What is the procedure by which an intending immigrant who has received a permit from the department may find his way to one of these examination stations?


Robert Forke: I understand that he comes
down to the port of embarkation, where we have an officer who conducts the examination.


Arthur Edward Ross: Surely the minister can see that there is a great hiatus in that procedure. If we have no offices on the continent how does the immigrant get his information and his instructions with regard to his examination?


Robert Forke: He is directed by the transportation companies, who are doing the recruiting, and I might inform the hon. member that this is one of the great hardships in connection with the whole immigration matter. Most of the immigrants are given a preliminary examination by their own doctor, perhaps 600 miles from the port of embarkation; they are passed as being healthy, but when they came to the port, say Riga, the medical officer of the department examines them and one member of the family may be turned down. That is one of the hardest propositions the department has to meet. The family sell out and come down to the port, where they find that they are forced either to leave cne behind or go back to their home town. The department does not do any recruiting on the continent; that is all done by the transportation companies, who are supposed to be careful to see that no one is brought forward who cannot pass the examination at the port.


Arthur Edward Ross: Our expenditure
there is wholly in the interests of the transportation companies?


Robert Forke: Our expenditure there is
wholly in the interests of Canada, to prevent people coming here who should not 'be allowed to enter the country.


Arthur Edward Ross: We are carrying on these examinations in order to aid the transportation companies?


Robert Forke: It is really to prevent a
hardship being imposed on the people when they arrive at Quebec. We could make that examination at Quebec but the hon. member knows what would happen; it is much better to stop them on the other side and for that purpose we send over our medical officers to make the examinations in order to prevent all possible hardship.
78594-X85J


Arthur Edward Ross: Are you preventing
it?


Robert Forke: To a very large extent.


Arthur Edward Ross: Will the minister
compare the two sets of figures for the two different years, 1927-28 and 1928-29, in connection with the rejections? He will find that the rejections are arising only in two places, in Great Britain and Italy.


Robert Forke: I should have mentioned that there is both a medical and a civil examination, and I think the examinations have been more rigid during the last year or two, which may account for the difference.


Arthur Edward Ross: In spite of all that you have still three hundred rejections at the ports of Canada. I am trying to find out what improvement has been brought about through this changed method. I can find no difference except in Great Britain and the examination of the Italians; as far as the other countries are concerned, there has been no reduction whatever.


Robert Forke: The hon. member knows
that that matter comes under the Department of Health, and when those estimates are up the minister may be able to give a better explanation than I can with regard to these examinations and rejections.


Arthur Edward Ross: I am only asking
for information respecting the report of the Department of Immigration and Colonization..


Robert Forke: What page is that?


Arthur Edward Ross: It is on pages 27, 28 and 32.


Robert Forke: I have no doubt it is correct.


Arthur Edward Ross: I claim that we
are making that expenditure in Europe in the interests of the transportation companies. Under the law if a transportation company brings an unsuitable immigrant to Canada it must return him, but we are placing upon the shoulders of the taxpayers of Canada this large expenditure in order to maintain these offices simply in the interests of the transportation companies.


Robert Forke: I beg to differ with the hon, member.


Arthur Edward Ross: I doubt very much if this is having the result expected, because they are still coming to the ports of Canada and suffering the great indignity of which the minister speaks in being rejected here. They are rejected at the Canadian ports in spite of the examinations carried on by the medical
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representatives of Canada in Europe. The minister says that we are doing a great deal of good, but I think a great deal of harm is being done. After having these immigrants passed by our own Canadian examiners we turned back some 300 in one year, and 500 in the other. I cannot explain that, and I would like the minister to offer some explanation. If it is a great injustice and hardship to be turned back, say at the port of Amsterdam or Rotterdam, it is a much greater hardship to be turned back at the ports of Quebec, Montreal, St. John or Halifax, after having been examined by our own Canadian medical examiner. We are making this expenditure for no other reason than that of saving the transportation companies some money.


Mr. KING (Kootenay):: The hon. member is wrong when he says that we are merely trying to save the transportation companies some money. As a matter of fact, an immigrant coming to this country has three or four barriers to get through. The transportation companies do soliciting in Europe by means of their own officers in the different communities from which the immigrants come. They make their selections with the knowledge of the barrier which has to be passed at the port of embarkation, and they are very careful in making those selections, knowing that they will be liable for the return of the individual free 'of charge should he be refused entry into Canada. During January of this year there were some 1,444 examinations reported. Of that number, 1,349 were passed, 3 were certified in class (a), 36 in class (b); 49 in class
(c), 2 in class (k), 4 in class (m), and 2 awaiting further report. This makes a total rejection of 96 of the number which came forward at that time. From his own medical knowledge the hon. member will know that to receive all who arrive at the port of Quebec would be impossible. A boy or a girl who has passed the physical examination may develop an epileptic fit while on board ship. That case is reported by the ship's surgeon to the officer at the port of debarkation. Tracoma may be discovered on board ship, which may have been overlooked in the examination, and these cases are all reported. As I see it, the advantage of this system is that we see the individual in his home country and make our selection there. Oftentimes a man may be able to earn a living although he has some physical defect which has been certified to, and he is admitted. To say that this work is being done in the interests of the transportation companies is entirely outside the fact.


Robert Gardiner: Will the minister explain the various classes he mentioned?


John Warwick King: These are included in the Immigration Act. The classifications are as follows:
(a)	Idiots, imbeciles, feeble-minded persons, epileptics, insane persons, and persons who have been insane at any time previously;
(b)	Persons afflicted with tuberculosis in
any form or with any loathsome disease, or with a disease which is contagious or infectious, or which may become dangerous to the public health,	_
(c)	Immigrants who are dumb, blind, or otherwise physically defective,
(d)	Persons who have been convicted of, or admit having committed any crime involving moral turpitude;
(e)	Prostitutes and women and girls coming to Canada for any immoral purpose and pimps or persons living on the avails of prostitution;
(f)	Persons who procure or attempt to bring into Canada prostitutes or women or girls for the purpose of prostitution or other immoral purposes;
(g)	Professional beggars or vagrants;
(h)	Immigrants to whom money lias been given or loaned by any charitable organization for the purpose of enabling them to qualify for landing in Canada under this act, or whose passage to Canada has been paid wholly or in part by any charitable organization-
And so forth. That is outside of the medical field. Then we have;
(k)	Persons of constitutional psychopathic
inferiority;	,
(l)	Persons with chronic alcoholism;
(m)	Persons not included within any of the foregoing prohibited classes, who upon examination by a medical officer are certified as being mentally or physically defective to such a degree as to affect their ability to earn a living.
That includes all the classes, I think.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Of the numerous questions that are asked an immigrant, I understand one is: What religion do you belong to? What gain is there in the departmental officials finding out what religion a man or woman believes in? I know the question is obnoxious. It is not liked by many who have to answer it.


Robert Forke: I do not think the statement is ever published. It is taken for statistical purposes. Probably it serves a useful purpose to know what the religion is of people coming into the country. Even a minister of immigration is always learning something and I found out just lately that Protestants are supposed to say what denomination they belong to. I think, if the classification were to be made as to Roman Catholics and Protestants or something like that, it would be quite sufficient. The way I found that out was that a very good friend

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of mine who is a .Protestant but who does not belong to any denomination, was asked the question: What church do you belong to? He said that he did not belong to any: that he was a Protestant.


Robert Gardiner: How did he get in?


Robert Forke: I do not know, but he
got in. I think the two divisions are sufficient. Of course there are rationalists, agnostics, and so forth, but the two main divi-vions, Protestants and Roman Catholics, might be sufficient. I am only giving that as an opinion because I have not looked very carefully into the matter. My deputy informs me that the different churches are very anxious to obtain these statistics. They look after the people when they land and the information serves a useful purpose in that way. For instance, the Anglican Church look after immigrants belonging to that faith and the churches do valuable work in taking care of immigrants after they land in this country.


Arthur Edward Ross: I am not quite satisfied yet in regard to these medical officers examining intending immigrants at continental ports. While I am not opposed to a medical examination, yet I think we are assuming a responsibility which perhaps we have no right to assume, I would sooner have these men retained at St. John, Halifax, Montreal and Quebec and have their rigid examination there than have the poor immigrant put to the injustice of being examined overseas by a medical man of our own selection, a man who, according to this report, has been especially selected. The Minister of Immigration is not responsible for this, but the Minister of Health is. It is stated that these medical men are specially selected-I do not know what the special selection consists of-they are trained specially and in spite of that, several hundred people have been sent back not on account of all the excuses that have been put forward to-day because we have a list of the reasons for their deportation. The examination falls down because, so far as I know, the medical men are not supposed to look into the civil causes ot deportation.


Robert Forke: No.


Arthur Edward Ross: Therefore the
department is not preventing that immigrant from coming here. A history of criminality is one of the great factors as regards deportation and that escapes the department. We are paying for a partial medical examination; the other examination is foregone and the immigrant comes here. I think Canada could not only well afford to reduce this item by
S200,000	but cut out the medical examination, bring these officers back to Canada and let them make a rigid examination at our ocean ports. In that case you would not have this long list you have of reasons for deportation, such as anaemia, asthma and arthritis. I could quite understand trachoma and venereal disease springing up on the date of embarkation, but here are a dozen or so diseases which have escaped detection, and these people have come to this country and been sent back. Consequently we are bearing an expenditure that I think is absolutely unnecessary. I really believe that a place has been made over there for some fellows who have political leanings of some kind, and they have gone over there to take these jobs. I think there should be fewer cases of returns than have been showing in the last two years, or there will be still stronger condemnation of the medical inspection.


Mr. SPEAKMAN:: In considering this
subject of immigration it had been, and indeed still is, my purpose to confine my remarks mainly to the subject of land settlement, and with that end in view I propose to reserve them until that particular item is before the house. I have been driven, however, to making a few remarks by an apparent misapprehension on the part of members of this house, a misapprehension which has been expressed a good many times and on a good many occasions, as to the attitude of those in our corner of the house, and of the farmers we represent in regard to immigration. I think perhaps the whole misapprehension may be epitomized in the words used by the hon. member for Fort William, that we were ready to close the shutters and lock the door, and, as it were, put a no-admittance sign on Canada-please keep out.


Robert James Manion: I did not speak of the
party as a whole. I was speaking of my hon. friend from Battle RiveT (Mr. Spencer) and of the minister himself.


Alfred Speakman: I appreciate that his
remarks were directed towards some remarks that had been made by the hon. member for Battle River, but the hon. member for Battle River was expressing in his way, as we all do in our own way, a feeling which is very generally held not only in this corner but also amongst the farmers whom we represent. That feeling is this, not that we should lock the door and tell people to keep out, but that we should not go out into the streets.
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and into the highways and byways in an endeavour to compel people to come in. In other words, we want to have the door open simply with the policemen at the door, if you cane to put it that way, to see that only those enter who will make decent inhaibtants of the house when they get in.
There is another exception which is taken by the farmers of my riding, and I presume of many others, but in my province particularly, to the immigration policy as it is at present enforced, and that is that they cannot nor can I see why farmers alone should be encouraged to come to Canada, why the fanning profession should be picked out as the one profession whose requirements demand a greater population, and as the one profession apparently into which an influx of people will do, not harm, but good.


Robert Forke: 
Alfred Speakman: Precisely. I have no
desire to plaice the hon. minister or the policy of the governhment in any wrong light, but it is obvious that so far as encouragement is given, and so far as any distinction is drawn-and that distinction is drawn in countries other than Great Britain-the farming class is what you might call the preferred class; I am not using that term in any unpleasant sense. In other words, such encouragement as is given, is given primarily to those who are prepared to engage in agriculture.
Why is (hat? There are several reasons advanced, some of which are reasonably sound and some of which, in my opinion, are not. One opinion is that agriculture in a country such as Canada, with fairly large areas of good land, and without exaggeration I can say that we have fairly large areas of good land in Canada still not brought undbr cultivation, farmers are more likely to make a success than immigrants of any other class because they are not dependent upon being hired or engaged by other people but have a reasonable opportunity, and a greater opportunity than thht offered to other professions, to become self-supporting citizens and to make good for themselves and be an asset to the country.
Another reason that is advanced is this, that in agriculture alone and in agricultural

products alone the law of supply and demand does not operate as it does in other industries. That is, the impression is held by many that it is impossible to over-produce on the farm. Those who share that point of view recognize that the market for manufactured goods of almost every kind and the opportunity of labour to find a place for itself in any other industry is fairly well limited, that you cannot increase the production of manufactured articles without damage unless you see before you a market that is capable of absorbing that increased production. But in the case of agriculture so many people, men in public life, men writing in the press, and men discussing it in private life, seem to be under the impression that this law of supply and demand does not operate in connection with farmers, and that no matter how much the farmers produce it will not affect their well-being or the prices they receive for the products they produce, that we can absorb almost an infinite nurhber of farmers in this country without affecting adversely those who are already engaged in the business in this country. To my mind that is altogether a mistake and an erroneous impression. The market for foodstuffs, just like the market for all other goods, is limited exactly by the effective demand for that produce; that is, not only by the desire or the need which may exist for that produce, but by the ability to purchase as well as to consume that production. The effective market is limited in the case of farm products just as it is in the case of all other products. It certainly is my impression, an impression which I think is borne out by irrefutable facts, that at the present time we are fairly close to the point of producing all that we can consume without so congesting the market as to bring financial distress on all those engaged in the industry.
There is another reason, and this is not one which is advanced but one which is certainly held by many people. They feel that any increase in our population is good in itself, no matter what may become of the people who come here, no matter in what circumstances they may find themselves, no matter what effect the presence of those people may have on other people now here. There is the feeling that population in itself is an end, an objective to be attained, and not merely one of the means to attain an. end. With those people I take decided issue. I think with them that the greater the density of population, the better, so long as that population can find work or can produce, and produce at a profit, and live comfortably on a decent standard of living. I say at once that I agree

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with those people that the greater the density of population, under those circumstances, the better for Canada and the better for those already in Canada. In saying that I am looking back some forty years to the time when I as a small boy went with my parents to western Canada at a time when, western Canada was, not an unknown wilderness, but still in the embryo stage, and when settling as my family did in what is now the most densely populated part of Alberta we found ourselves with our nearest railway station in Calgary, 100 miles away. We know and I know the hardships, the discomforts, the physical and financial disadvantages which faced us through lack of population. We had no roads, no schools, no churches; we had no social life, and the handicaps and the hardships imposed upon us by the mere fact that so few people were there induces me to believe that other things being equal a comparatively dense population makes a better country to live in than a country that is empty and vacant.
I am not referring now to the taxpaying ability of the new immigrant. I think that that is one of the most absurd arguments that could be advanced to induce people to come here, to say that we welcome them because they will shoulder a percentage of our debt and assist us in reducing our taxation. In another way density of population works to the good not only of those who are here but of those who come because by increased tonnage on the railways we can properly reduce our railway rates and provide better roads and better facilities for all. That is good for all of us here. But I repeat that that again is limited. All these advantages are swept aside, they do not exist by mere population alone, but by population plus the ability of that population to produce at a profit, to build up homes for themselves and to live decently.
The next reason that is advanced is this. We want population to improve our traffic conditions, to provide more money for the banks, to increase^the market for our manufactured goods. We find it impossible to bring in any large supplies of labour because the labour organizations are so strong and so effective in their united voice that they will not permit it. We cannot bring in large delegations of professional men because the professional organizations now here would certainly raise very strenuous objections. We cannot bring in more retailers and people of other classes because those already engaged in the business in this country, speaking with united voice, would make that political suicide for any government. But we can bring in
more farmers, because through their lack of unity in the past they were unable to render or articulate their disapprobation or to express resentment in any practical manner.
In saying those things I am not finding fault with the present minister or the government for holding those views, but I am trying to show that many people who speak on platforms and write in the press, and advocate in private increased population by mass immigration, hold this view in the bottom of their hearts. That was true a few years ago. It is becoming less true day by day and I say that the fanners have found themselves, they have found each other, and. they are now able to speak articulately and unitedly as to their needs. And who has a better right Mr. Chairman, to speak on this subject, or to hold views on this subject than the western farmer? He belongs to a class comparatively small in numbers, it is true, a percentage only of the total population, but he is primarily interested in any scheme of immigration on a large scale such as suggested, or in any scheme of colonization on a large scale which is suggested and which has as its object the placing of more farmers in the prairie provinces. The farmers already there are expected to accomplish wonderful work in the way of assimilation. Assimilation is to them, not a phrase but an absolute reality. They will be the people who will be affected adversely or beneficially by this influx of people. The farmers, through their provincial governments must .supply the means of education, must supply hospitals, must supply roads, must supply all those things which the people need. ^Those men and women are the ones par excellence who should have a voice in our immigration policy.


Peter McGibbon: Would the hon. member tell the house what he thinks of the speeches delivered by the member for Rose town (Mr. Evans) in the last ten years about people leaving the farms?


Alfred Speakman: Well, I may say at
once, of course, that although I think highly of the member for Rosetown I am not responsible for him, nor am I bis interpreter, and perhaps you will pardon me if I express for a few moments my own opinion instead of commenting on his. He is perfectly able to explain his own views at any time. But it is a fair question, why the people leave the land, and I was coming to it in a moment.
I have been going over the reasons Mr. Chairman, why so many people advocate immigration on a large scale, and why those same people think in their minds all the time of an influx of farmers into this country, and
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particularly the western provinces, and naturally, as my colleague says, they have no particular intention of following their own advice and going out there themselves and building up one of those happy, free, independent homes.
I was endeavouring to point out that the farmers themselves were entitled to hold very strong views on that matter, and I was endeavouring to show that there was a misconception as to their motives, and a misconception as to t'heir actual statements of fact. The statement of their policy, as I can see ;t -and it is not contradicted by anything said by any member in this comer of this house- is this:	We are prepared to leave the door
open to immigration under reasonable restrictions as to placement and the quality and kind of people who come here. We say, come here if you think Alberta is good-and we think it is-coime here, take things as you find them, work your way up, act upon your own initiative in coming, follow your own line When you get here, and take upon yourself responsibility for your failure or success. That is what we say, but that is a long way from the policy of maintaining either agencies or publicity departments or any other factor to induce or morally to compel people to come here. That is the difference between my interpretation of the farmers' attitude towards immigration and' the interpretation placed upon their attitude by others who are not so familiar with their views as I am myself.


Robert Forke: Most of the immigration
from central and southeastern Europe last year ^vas based upon a direot request from the farmers of the three prairie provinces for farm help.	.


Alfred Speakman: Precisely.


Robert Forke: We simply tried to fill the demands of the farmers of the three western provinces. It might be news to the hon. member for Red Deer to say that I had a request from Alberta just a few days ago, asking if w'e could possibly supply six hundred more farm labourers for Alberta.


Alfred Speakman: That covers two points. I can assure the minister, however, that I am not trying to make any unfair statements on the matter at all. I quite appreciate the fact that a. large number of people from certain countries, people who otherwise could not enter, are- permitted entry on the personal nomination or personal application of farmers in western Canada. If a farmer in western Canada has made good', if he thinks that his brother coming out can also make good, and if he is pre-
pared to find employment for him, then I say that that is the best kind of immigration policy we can have, and the immigration policy as far as publicity is concerned that we have always advocated. But when the hon. the minister speaks of 600 labourers, that perhaps brings up a slightly different point. If those 600 were individual applications from men who themselves were prepared to offer employment then all right, but dif it was simply an estimate placed upon the potential needs of a district by people who perhaps are not qualified to have an opinion, then it is a very different question altogether. . I am fairly familiar with the workings of the department, because I have tried to follow the work in its different branches, not in an antagonistic spirit hut in order to work with them if I can for the betterment of conditions here. And in doing that I found myself up against that very thing the minister has spoken of; the intimation to the department by individuals, or groups of individuals, that there will be certain mass vacancies, and that certain districts can absorb so many hundreds, or bo many thousands of farm help, which is a very different thing from personal nominations, and while I approve of the one I am far from approving of the other.
Just one more point in that particular connection; I have indicated our attitude, or my conception at least of cur attitude, towards the subject of immigration itself. And I have indicated that we are not opposed to immigration as such, but we are only opposed to what is commonly called assisted or encouraged immigration, that is over-encouraged. We are willing to have people come in if they are decent people, but we are not so far gone in Canada that we must give approval to the idea qf going out into the highways and byways morally compelling people to come. We are particularly opposed to that because those who are compelled to come are almost invariably people of our own class whom we will have to assimilate, and our condition will be adversely or beneficially affected by them. Again I say that if any in Canada have a right to speok on immigration it is those who will have to shoulder the burden of immigration, the burden of assimilation, and to whom assimilation is not a mere sounding phrase but a natural matter of everyday life in connection with neighbours for whom they have had no responsibility and in the selection of whom they have had no choice.
That brings me to the next point. I read with a great deal of interest, and followed

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very carefully the discussion in the agriculture committee of last year, and I studied, so far as I could study, the recommendations. The recommendation there which struck me as being the soundest and the most sensible, and offering the greatest potentialities for future success in our work was that simple suggestion that to the provinces themselves should be delegated a greater pant of the responsibility, a greater part of the authority as to how many and what classes should come into those provinces.


Robert Forke: But how can you get them to take it? They do not like to.


Alfred Speakman: Possibly they do not like to, but I a.m inclined to think, from such knowledge as I possess of the views of one at least of the provincial governments, that if given that right and given it without strings-given that right so that they would be not merely expressing an opinion but taking action1-they would undertake it. And more than that, I believe it is the only method whereby you will properly provide for immigration; for, after all, once the immigrant crosses the portals of this country he ceases to be a responsibility of the government who brought him out and becomes a direct responsibility of the province, who have had no say as to whether or not he should be here. And that to my mind is wrong.
Working with our municipal authorities, discussing the matter with our own government, I have found this. We have the very finest machinery in the world for ascertaining how many people can be properly and profitably absorbed in a province during the year. We have information on which a competent committee decide as to where people may properly go, as to the kind of people who are desired, as to the occupation which will afford them opportunities. Through all the various municipal councils in the provinces the authorities can supply, and I am sure, from applications to myself, that they would be willing to supply, full Statistics as to any possible vacant farm which may lie within their boundaries, as to the amount of capital that would be necessary to enable a farmer to go on that farm, as to the kind of people they would like to have in the district-and this depends partly on the class of people already settled there. They could furnish the government with that information, and I am sure they would.
I have a suggestion to offer, and I do not claim that it is particularly a constructive one or particularly a new one. However, let that suggestion come from whichever side it may,
it should be tried out partly from time to time-and in this lies our only hope of mastering the problem of increased population. My suggestion is this: The provincial government, through municipal machinery, know what employment is in sight for the year; they know what lands are available; they know what the effect of increased population on the farming industry generally will be in the province; and they might make a reasonably intelligent report. On that report the Department of Immigration here could act through its agent, admitting any desired number of immigrants, seeing that their destination was wise, advising them as to the parts of the country to which they might go, giving them all information possible as to the means of reaching their destination, and supplying them with information as to the best way in which to carry on after they had arrived. There is a great work for the Immigration department to do in the elimination of the unfit and in giving information and advice to those people who come to the country, often bewildered and ignorant of our halbits and sometimes of our language. The department could do a splendid work in that way. And it should give to the provinces some at least of the authority which should go with the responsibility that becomes theirs the moment an immigrant enters Canada.
My time is almost up, but I was asked a question which I shall try to answer. The question is: Why are so many people leaving the farms? In the first place, it is undoubtedly a question of dollars and cents; that is what Strikes one primarily in looking into the matter. Is farming a congenial business, is it a profitable business? Well, the minister knows that while it is one of the finest forms of life-and I believe this because I have followed it all my life-farming is a life that imposes upon the man who pursues it a great many hardships. He has to face hard physical labour; he has to work out in the snow and rain and cold winds; he has to take a sporting chance as a gambler with nature, as to whether or not he will have any results at all from his year's toil. He has to face all these conditions; he has to work hours longer by far than those which are put in in any other industry, except possibly in this house; he has to work under conditions more uncertain than those that prevail in any other occupation; and frequently he has to work in loneliness and deprivation so far as social comfort is concerned. And when you add to all this the fact that no farmer- no farmer, at least, of whom I have knowledge
Supply-Immigration

-ever made more than a decent living, while many farmers, to <my knowledge, in spite of honest and earnest effort have failed and gone down, you can see the reason why farmers leave.
But there is another reason and perhaps it is more fundamental still. To my mind it does not make very much difference in the long run how profitable farming is; you are bound to have an exodus from the country to the cities, and for this reason. During my lifetime in that province-and I am still a comparatively young man-the productive ability of every man has increased four or five times through the introduction and use of labour-saving units of machinery. The result is that it is requiring a smaller and smaller percentage of men to produce the necessary amount of food. While that does not apply absolutely to all Canada-because we feed other countries than our own-it undoubtedly does apply to agriculture as a whole, and there is no question that it must and will apply to Canada generally as time goes on. A smaller and smaller percentage of men will remain on the land and a larger percentage will go to the centres, because in these centres are new industries providing for all the new wants, and luxuries which, deplored by some, are in my opinion a dispensation of Providence in that they absorb the labour continually thrown off from the basic industries by the adoption of larger and larger units of machinery. Throughout the world, therefore, and in this country as well- for Canada is not immune from the law of supply and demand-no matter how profitable farming may be, no matter how agreeable the conditions may be made, no matter how hard men may work, it will happen inevitably that a larger percentage of men will be found in the cities and a smaller percentage on the' land. But while that is true it does not mean that we should add thereto the factors of economic uncertainty and lack of economic reward.
I must apologize for having spoken at greater length than I had intended, I got up in the first place simply to correct a misapprehension with reference to our attitude towards immigration, and I did not expect to be led into so long a discourse as I have made. My chief interest at the moment is to direct the attention of the committee to the question of land settlement, a question regarding which I have some knowledge, with which I have been fairly closely in touch, and on which I hold some fairly strong opinions. However, I shall leave that until the proper item comes up. In the meantime, I repeat for emphasis -because apparently it is an exceedingly

difficult thing for other people sometimes to appreciate the fact-that we are not opposed to people coming into the country but that we are opposed, for the credit and for the economic future of Canada, to the idea of going out and inducing or assisting them to come here.


Robert Forke: Some of the remarks that
have been made lead me to believe that this is an opportune moment to make a statement as to the actual cost to Canada of immigration. We have heard the figure of five millions stated, and I have seen six and a half millions reported as having been suggested in a public speech not very long ago. I have the figures for last year and I will give them. The cost of securing immigrants for Canada was $1,404,463.30; that is the actual cost of our immigration offices and the seeking and securing of immigrants. The care and placement of these immigrants after landing in Canada was $196,294.12. This makes a total, for recruiting immigrants and taking care of them after arrival in Canada, of $1,600,757.42.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does that include everything?


Robert Forke: That is the cost of bringing them to Canada and looking after them.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: In what way do you
take care of them?


Robert Forke: Well, getting the immigrant a situation, if he is farm help, or getting him placed if he is a farmer.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: There were some immigrants who came to Alberta for whom the province had no responsibility but who were brought out by the minister's department. They were stranded in Calgary and we had to take care of them. Hospital bills were incurred amounting to some $1,000 towards which we asked the department to contribute, but they washed their hands entirely of responsibility in the matter. Will some of the money to which the minister has just referred be used to take care of these immigrants? Will his department pay that bill?


Robert Forke: I do not know who those
immigrants were:


James Dew Chaplin: Do the figures which the
minister has given include cost of civil government?


Robert Forke: No, they do not include
civil government.


James Dew Chaplin: Is not that part of the
cost of immigration?

Supply-Immigration


Robert Gardiner: The minister said it
cost $196,000 odd to take care of immigrants after landing. Will he explain exactly what he means by taking care of them? How far does that go?


Robert Forke: Under the care and placement of immigrants we have the following:
Women's division		.. $ 34,141 01
Grants to societies	
14,750	00Inspection of juveniles	
27,542	47Agencies	
119,860	64
I presume that latter item has to do with the placing of immigrants under the three thousand family scheme, single farm labourers, juveniles and so on. I cannot itemize it, but is the money actually spent in Canada looking after immigrants?
I did not finish my statement; to make up the total vote of last year there is also an amount of $784,742.66 for the preventive service. I think everyone will recognize the face that even if we had no solicited immigration we would still have those people coming to Canada who are willing to come on their own, and they would have to be examined. Then there is another thing which the house may have forgotten. During the last few years and particularly during the last year the United States made a great clean up, I think every crook in that country has headed towards Canada lately, and if we had not possessed a good preventive service we would have had a large increase in our population made up of that kind of people. Some people cannot understand why there should be any immigration inspectors at all, but not a day passes without some undesirable characters being turned back at the border. Then there is the administrative service, amounting to $480,165.36, making the total estimate for last year of $2,865,685.44. In order to obtain the total amount spent by the department there must be added $600,000 which was charged up to the land settlement branch under the Soldier Settlement Board, and that will give a total of about $3,400,000 as the actual amount spent last year. I do not know where my hon. friends secured the figure of $6,000,000; I cannot see where that came from at all.


Mr. LUCAS:: Does that include medical
inspection also?


Robert Forke: No, the medical inspection
accounts for another $300,000, but that would have to go on even if there were no immigration. We might have a smaller staff, but _ we would still have medical inspection.


Arthur Edward Ross: Then there would
be the medical inspection overseas, which would account for another $300,000, and that would bring the total to nearly $4,000,000.


Robert Forke: Probably that would be correct.


George Reginald Geary: I do not understand that,
when the total as shown by the Auditor General's report, page 836, is only $3,065,000.


Robert Forke: That is for 1927-28?


George Reginald Geary: Yes.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I should like to follow
up the question I was asking a few moments ago, with regard to the immigrants being required to state what religion they profess. The minister suggested an amendment to the regulation so that the immigrants would not need to give so many details, but then he said this information was useful both for the census bureau and for the churches, which were glad to get it. First I would like to ask the minister if this information is passed on to the churches?


Robert Forke: If they ask for it.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Whether they ask for
it or not I know that representatives of the churches usually meet the immigrants at the port of debarkation and ask them personally as to their religion. I passed through the immigration sheds at Quebec in 1927 for the purpose of seeing how this was done. I found different ministers asking the immigrants personally to what churches they belonged, so I think it is quite unnecesary to ask that question if it is done only for the purpose of supplying information to the churches. As far as the census goes, we get all the information we need from the census statistics, so I think we would be well advised not to ask that question at all. I take it for granted that no one of good character will be refused entry because of his religion, so I do not see why the question should be asked at all.


Robert Forke: These facts are all recorded in the index book on board ship before the immigrant land's. All the religious societies have agents at Quebec, and some at Montreal.


Robert Gardiner: So there is no escape
at all.


Robert Forke: I think they do very good
work there. The representatives of the churches are given an opportunity to look at the index book, and they look after people of their own denomination when they land. They get in touch with the friends of the immigrants, tell them they have landed and when they will arrive at their destination, and taken altogether I think a useful purpose is served. There is no publicity; this in-
Supply-Immigration

formation is never published but is simply-obtained for those people who are anxious to get these figures. As I said before, I do not think anyone would be turned back if he simply said he was an agnostic, with no religion at all, so long as his moral character was all right.


Henry Elvins Spencer: But does the minister
realize that many people object to being cross-examined in that way?


Mr. YOUNG (Saskatoon):: What is
objectionable about it?	[DOT]


Henry Elvins Spencer: The hon. member who just interrupted may not object, but certain people of whom I have knowledge do object.


Robert Forke: As a matter of information we - think the benefit outweighs any objection which might be taken to it, and the statistical bureau gets that information also. This is not done in order to annoy or restrain these immigrants; it is largely for the benefit of the different religious denominations who like to get that information and really, from my own experience during the last three years, an immigrant is much better off if he is looked after by a religious society, regardless of what denomination he belongs to.


Mr. BARBER:: In these figures there are
certain amounts set aside for the repatriation of Canadians.


Robert Forke: It is not in the vote.


Harry James Barber: I have the Auditor General's report, and on page 23 of part H, under "colonization," I find a sum amounting to about $35,000. Under that there appear salaries and wages, $9,204.19 and travelling expenses $25,081.61. In the first instance, the salaries were paid to fourteen clergymen and the travelling expenses were paid to eighteen clergymen. This question was up in the house some time ago and we were advised by the minister that this was for the purpose of repatriating Canadians.


Robert Forke: What year is the hon.
member quoting from?


Harry James Barber: 1927-28. Are those clergymen still employed by the government?


Robert Forke: No.


Harry James Barber: What has been substituted for that service?


Robert Forke: We have been cooperating
with the provinces and have offered to pay 50 per cent of any amount expended on repatriation. The only province which is actively engaged in this work is the province
fMr. Forke.]
of Quebec, but one of the maritime provinces is thinking of taking up the work. The same offer stands open to every province of the Dominion.


Harry James Barber: What was the amount
expended last year?


Robert Forke: We set aside $50,000 as
the maximum for any one province.


Harry James Barber: Was that expended?


Robert Forke: My deputy informs me
that we expended $29,680 last year.


Harry James Barber: In one province?


Robert Forke: And the province of Quebec spent $46,000, so apparently part of their expenditure must have been in colonization work. I discussed this matter first with Premier Taschereau when he was here a year ago last summer, and then the Minister of Mines and Forests came here and we entered into that bargain. I could not see my way clear to do anything for the province of Quebec which would not be open to all the other provinces. I expect that one of the maritime provinces will go into repatriation work in a short time in an endeavour to bring back some of their people from the New England states. I think the money is well spent, probably bringing in the best results of any money we spend upon immigration.


Mr. MALONEY:: In connection with this question of repatriation, I would like to read a letter which I received from New Bedford, as follows:
I have just read your speech in the House of Commons on immigration in Canada. I was specially interested in that part of your speech in which you refer to the French' Canadians of New England. Let me tell you that if the government of Ottawa would only lend to a family, say, $1,000 you would have a train going to the Peace River every two weeks of good farmers of Canadian stock who wish to go back to their country and make a home once more on the farm. The Quebec government offers us money to go to the Abitibi district. We don't want to go there, we want to go to the west. We are starving in here and our government does not want to help us get to our mother country. I know quite a number of my friends who wrote to the government in Ottawa asking them for help to go back and every time the answer was "We have no right to do so."
Believe me,
Yours truly,
J. Vachon.


Frank S. Cahill: Where is that from?


Martin James Maloney: New Bedford.

Supply-Immigration
Mr. FORIvE: A French Canadian who has been residing in the States for a number of years and who wishes to return to Canada is granted the same rates on the. railroads as an immigrant from Great Britain.


An hon. MEMBER:: Why not better rates?
Mr. FORIvE:	He gets the immigration
rates. It is the railways which grant those rates. The hardship arises through the fact that a French Canadian who has remained' in his own province has to pay the full rate when he desires to go to the west, while the French Canadian who has gone to the States and wishes to return is granted the cheaper rate.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: We were told earlier in the session that the government would not continue to extend aid for highway development or for technical education upon the ground that it was a vicious principle for the federal authorities to subsidize the provinces. I would like to ask upon what principle the government is now subsidizing the provinces in order that they may oarry on this immigration scheme?


Robert Forke: I do not think it is in the
nature of a subsidy. They have settled some twelve or thirteen new parishes in the province of Quebec, and' I think the money is well spent.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not suggesting that the money is not well spent, but I do suggest that the principle is one which was called a vicious principle earlier in the session and I am anxious to know how it is being justified in this case.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: May I say to the hon.
member that immigration is one of the two subjects which are placed under the joint control of the federal and provincial governments by the provisions of the British North America Actt.


James Shaver Woodsworth: That does not touch upon the principle.


Ernest Lapointe: It is the constitution.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The principle of one body raising funds and the other body distributing them.


Mr. VENIOT:: There are jointly interested.


Mr. BELL (St. John-Albert):: Mr. Chairman, in discussing this immigration question I shall deal with it almost entirely as it concerns the population, colonization and settlement conditions in my own province of New Brunswick. As you are aware, that
province, like the other maritime provinces, has suffered from the migration of its people to the United States and to the six western provinces.
In 1901 we had a population of 321,120; in 1911 this had increased to 351,880, and in 1921 it had increased to 387,876. It might be well to note at this point that the province of New Brunswick has an area of 27,895 square miles. As the greatest migration was from 1921 to 1928, it is doubtful if there has been any increase in population during those years. While the other provinces suffered a loss of population by migration to the United States during that period, New Brunswick and the other maritime provinces suffered an additional drain by migration to the west and to the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. While we regret the conditions which forced our people to leave their homes, that regret is tempered, to some degree, by the fact that many of them remained Canadians by locating in other provinces. There is not this feeling towards the other migration as the New Brunswickers who have gone to the United States are lost not only to Neiw Brunswick but to Canada. It is quite possible that in the New England states and the six Canadian provinces west of the maritimes the New Brunswickers and their descendants outnumber those who remain in their native province. This is not as it Should be. New Brunswick is a province of varied and valuable resources. Sixty per cent of it is valuable mixed farming land; there are great pulp and timber resources, valuable water-powers, never-failing fisheries, excellent transportation, and its products are at the Canadian outport for the European trade.
Through St. John many European and British immigrants enter Canada, but the only ones who remain in New Brunswick are those specially selected and brought there by the local government. Do not think that I, as a New Brunswicker-and I believe I represent the prevailing sentiment in that province-am jealous of the expansion in population, wealth and development of Ontario, Quebec and the west. We do not ask the government to relax its work in colonization and settlement in those provinces; in. fact, we urge even greater efforts in their behalf. We welcome Canadian development in every part, but we do ask greater consideration, greater activity, better results in retaining ou.r own people, repatriating those who have gone to the United States, and more satisfactory efforts in adding to our population from the people of Great Britain and Europe, who
Supply-Immigration


Harry James Barber: Under the heading of "Great Britain and the continent of Europe, Miscellaneous," I find an item of some $8,000 spent for the packing and distributing of Canadian peonies. What was the object of sending those Canadian peonies overseas?


Robert Forke: That was in 1927.


Harry James Barber: I think I may ask for an explanation of this item even if the expenditure took place in that year. Why was this expenditure made?


Robert Forke: It was in commemoration of confederation year. These peonies were sent from Canada to Great Britain, and were exhibited all over London and throughout the United Kingdom/ To show just how .well these peonies were preserved, they were sent over to London, were distributed from the railway offices, from Canada House and all the principal buildings in London and throughout the United Kingdom, and some of them arrived back in Canada in perfect condition after having crossed the ocean twice. I think that was money well spent. lit was one of the beet pieces of advertising that has been done for Canada.


Frank S. Cahill: Under vote 55 I notice an item for Canadian boys. I would like to know what percentage of this item wias spent last year, and what is proposed for this year.


Robert Forke: None of this money has been spent. The department has been trying to make an arrangement with the different provincial government similar to that made with the Imperial government, and if the provincial governments would come through, I think that there would be no trouble in getting the Dominion parliament to meet them. The British boys are supposed to have saved $500, to have lived and worked on a farm, and must show that they were capable, industrious and intelligent. Then the
Sm ppl y-Immigra tion

British government will advance to tihem a loan of $1,250 and the Dominion government a like amount, making a total of $2,500, which with the $500 already saved gives the boy a capital of $3,000 on which to start farming. If the [DOT]provincial governments would come through and meet us in the same way as the Imperial government has done, I have no ' hesitation in saying that we would make a similar arrangement with them. I am longing for the time when we can do for the Canadian boy dxacbly what we are doing for the British boy.


Frank S. Cahill: Was there an item in the estimates last year for this same purpose?


Robert Forke: Yes, but we have never been able to make an arrangement with the provincial governments.


Frank S. Cahill: No money has been spent?


Robert Forke: No. There is a great deal of talk about the tremendous amount of money that has been spent on immigration and assisting people to come here, but all that we are spending in that direction is our share of the assisted passages for people who are going on farms. This government has never contributed one dollar of oash towards any settlement of land up to to-day.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think it is very desirable to make that statement because the position is much misunderstood in the country. Perhaps the minister would amplify it.


Robert Forke: When the British government offers a loan of $1,500 to the British boy if we will provide a like amount, it is very difficult to say that we will have nothing to do with it. A vast amount of money has come into this country and been spent under that scheme.


Richard Bedford Bennett: How much altogether?


Robert Forke: I could not say offhand, but the deputy will look it up. We hear a great deal said about the large amount of money that is being spent on bringing people in from outside in comparison with what is being spent on the settlement of Canadians. What we are spending is for the assistance of these people after they come here, giving them assistance and advice along the lines the hon. member for Red Deer spoke about. I think the house has a wrong impression as to the amoumit of money that is being spent by the Canadian government to bring immigrants to this country. I want all the facts brought out. I have nothing to hide, and if the house does not like the facts-


Richard Bedford Bennett: You have a majority behind you anyway.


Robert Forke: It seems rather difficult to get them in line this afternoon.


William Thomas Lucas: The minister said a while ago that if the provinces would come forward and provide loans for the Canadian boy as the Imperial government is doing for the British boy, the Dominion government would pay its share. What would be the position if an individual took the place of the province in putting up the amount of money required to settle Canadian boys? Would the Dominion government put up an equal amount?
At six o'clock the Speaker resumed the chair and the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.



DIVORCE PROCEEDINGS


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed, from May 21, consideration in committee of Bill No. 75, respecting the domicile of married women in proceedings for divorce-Mr. Ward-Mr. Johnston in the chair.
On section 2-Married woman separate from husband.
Mr. POULIOT:: Mr. Chairman, this bill
brings before the house a very interesting question on constitutional law. The question is, have we the right to do something or not? What are the rights of this parliament, and what are the rights of the legislatures in each province?
Sometimes we have every sympathy for a sad case, or for some people who are in trouble. If a beggar goes to another man and says " I am destitute, I want some help, I badly need assistance," and the other man gives him a counterfeit one hundred dollar bill, that is no help at all for the beggar, because if he goes to a store and tries to change that bill the merchant will have him arrested and sent to gaol. The help, therefore, that we give to people must not be counterfeit help, so to speak, but help that really does assist. I heard some of my colleagues in the house relate some very sad divorce cases. For instance, the husband goes away and leaves his wife in charge of a family without any money. What can the wife do if the domicile of the husband is where he is, and if he does not happen to live in the country

Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
in which the couple had resided then where is the domicile, or where can the wife have a domicile in order that she may be able to take divorce proceedings against her husband?
There are some very sad cases indeed. But Canada has a constitution, granted by the imperial parliament, and we can help people who are in trouble only in accordance with our rights under that constitution. In order to know what kind of help we can give to people in such destitute circumstances, or to know whether we can give them any help at all, we must refer to the British North America Act, enacted by the imperial parliament in the year 1867. Section 92 of that act., paragraph 13, reads as follows:
Exclusive powers of provincial legislatures.
92. In each province the legislature may exclusively make laws in relation to matters coming within the classes of subjects next hereinafter enumerated, that is to say,-
13. Property and civil rights in the province.


Mr. RYCKMAN:: Read marriage and
divorce in section 91.


Jean-François Pouliot: I will read what I have
to read, and when my hon. friend wants anything read he will do it himself.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Oh, oh.


An hon. MEMBER:: Read what Taschereau says about it.


Jean-François Pouliot: I will tell you later what
happened at the interprovincial conference, and it will be a good lesson for you. Section 146 of the British North America Act, relating to the admission of other colonies into the Dominion, reads thus:
It shall be lawful for the queen, by and with the advice of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, on addresses from the Houses of the Parliament of Canada, and from the houses of the respective legislatures of the colonies or provinces of Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island and British Columbia, to admit those colonies or provinces, or any of them, into the Union, and on address from the Houses of the Parliament of Canada to admit Rupert's land and the Northwestern Territory, or either of them, into the Union, on such terms and conditions in each case as are in the addresses expressed and as the queen thinks fit to approve, subject to the provisions of this act;-
"Subject to the provisions of this act," therefore subject to section 92.
-and the provisions of any order in council in that behalf shall have effect as if they had been enacted by the parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
There is also the following provision in the British North America Act, 1871,	34-35
Victoria, chapter 28, section 4:
The parliament of Canada may from time to time make provision for the administration, peace, order, and good government of any territory not for the time being included in any province.
When the province of Prince Edward Island entered confederation the following address was passed, as found in the schedule to the order in council of Her Majesty in council admitting that province into the union in the year 1873:
We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects. . . . humbly approach Your Majesty for the purpose of representing:
That the constitution of the executive authority and of the legislature of Prince Edward Island shall, subject to the provisions of the British North America Act, 1867, continue, as at the time of the union, until altered under the authority of the said act, and the House of Assembly of Prince Edward Island existing at the date of the union shall, unless sooner dissolved, continue for the period for which it was elected.
So that we see that even after confederation, after the British North America Act was passed, an order in council was issued by Her Majesty in council, in which reference is made to that act; and the statement appears that when Prince Edward Island entered the Canadian confederation it should be subject to the provisions of the British North America Act of 1867. It will be seen, therefore, that the constitution has not changed and that this parliament is vested with certain powere and rights exclusively, while the legislature of every province is similarly exclusively vested with peculiar rights and powers. But what is most important to know is the fact that in that part of the act which retfers to the powers and rights of the provinces there appear the words "ex* elusive" and "exclusively". This means that the provinces may do certain things which this parliament oannot do. And the fathers of confederation were wise when they incorporated those provisions in the act inasmuch as they obviate conflicts in law.
What member of this house will dare to say that domicile is not a question of civil right? Domicile is the place where a person, in the legal sense of the word, has- his place of business. The domicile of the head of a family is the place where that man is supposed to have permanent residence, the place where he lives all the time. Domicile comes from the Latin "domus," meaning a house or home. Domicile therefore is the place where a man has his home. A man has only one domicile, and it is not only the place where he can exercise civil rights under the law; it is also the place where he may be found when anyone wishes



IHVISRD EDITION

[Stage Direction]
Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
to sue him in any case in which he is the defendant. Domicile is the place where he conducts his chief business and where he lives.
Now with regard to the family: the wife has the same domicile as her husband. I could cite some old precedents to that effect, not only from the history of the province of Quebec but also from that of England. For example, I could cite the case of Queen Marie Henriette of England, who was a daughter of Louis XIII. That queen of England was born in France where she lived for twenty-five years, and she was Queen of England when she died. Her heirs claimed the right to her estate, amounting to 100,000 crowns, and they would have been entitled thereto had the French law applied in England. But it was decided that she could not have any other domicile than that of her husband in England. This case is reported in Phillimore's Law of Domicile, pages 28 and 29.
Mr. CASGRAIN:: What edition?


Jean-François Pouliot: I have not a note of the edition. This is an old case, but there are other cases decided by the privy council. Now I submit that the fact that domicile is a question of civil rights, the fact that the exercise of civil rights comes within the purview of the province exclusively, shows very clearly that even if we were of the same opinion as the hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Ward) it would be impossible to carry his point of view because we have no power to pass any such act.
But there is something else of considerable importance. I have here a very interesting book called' Beauohesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms, prepared by the clerk of this house, who is an authority on questions of constitutional procedure. I have taken some notes from that book and now I wish to refer to Beauchesne, Rule 520, page 154:
When the chairman of a committee has been ordered to make a report to the house, he shall leave the chair without question put.
Therefore the amendment moved in committee on May 7 by the hon. member has been sent to the chairman of the committee of the whole who has been ordered to report, but the amendment is not attached to the bill and is not before the committee. I may quote further from Beauchesne, rule 409, at page 129:
No member may amend his own motion, but with leave of the house he may withdraw it and substitute another.
The hon. member cannot amend his own bill except by unanimous consent, even though

his amendment is supported by our charming colleague, who is not in the house at present; I refer to the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail).
We are confronted with a very peculiar situation. The hon. member for East Toronto said some time ago that the bill should be amended so that a woman could not obtain a domicile outside of Canada for divorce purposes, and my hon. friend from Swift Current moved an amendment which was to the effect that the words "or otherwise" should be struck out. My hon. friend from Dauphin came along with a further amendment, which he read, but there is no amendment before the committee now. Instead of putting questions the hon. member for East Toronto should renew his suggestion; in any case the hon. member for Dauphin might get a friend to bring in a proper amendment, or if my hon. friend from East Toronto thinks it is so important to have that amendment made he should see that it is done properly. So I ask you, Mr. Chairman, whether the bill is amended as it is now before the committee?


The ACTING CHAIRMAN (Sir Eugene Fiset):: The amendment is moved by the
hon. member for Swift Current, and not by the sponsor of the bill.


Jean-François Pouliot: Was the question put on
the amendment?


Eugène Fiset: No.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then is there an amendment before the committee now?


Eugène Fiset: There is an amendment before the committee, which has been read.


Jean-François Pouliot: Who seconded the amendment?


Eugène Fiset: There is no need of a seconder in committee.


Jean-François Pouliot: Then let me take this
opportunity of congratulating you, Mr. Chairman.
Now, to sum up, this is a serious situation. I do not wish to obstruct this bill but I would like to state my views in connection with it. The question is very simple. There are some sad cases of women who are in despair because they have been abandoned by their husbands, but what does this house do in the case of divorce? This house cannot legally impose any charge upon the guilty party, and we have had some very interesting discussions in connection with this question This house cannot impose such a charge be-

Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
cause those are civil matters relating to the provinces, in which we have absolutely nothing to say. So if that argument is sound when we speak of alimony it must be sound when we speak of domicile, because the question of domicile is a question of civil rights just as much as the question of alimony. In addition there is something more serious, the question of the children belonging to the family. The children should be looked after and protected, and I think every member of this house will agree at least in principle with the eloquent presentation of this problem which was made by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre and the hon. member for Labelle.
Now I would like to take up the question put me by an hon. member opposite, who asked, "What did Mr. Taschereau do in that case?" Let me tell the committee that at the last interprovincial conference the question of amending our constitution to meet [DOT]the new requirements of the country was fully discussed. Some premiers, members of the conference, thought the boy who was growing up could not always wear the same clothes.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I rise to a point of order. The hon. member who is now speaking discussed this subject for fifteen minutes last Tuesday night, and it is not fair to the rest of the members of the committee that he should be permitted to speak more than forty minutes altogether.


Mr. POITLIOT:: I do not wish to take up too much time, but I believe this is a most serious question.


Eugène Fiset: On the point of order, I think the hon. gentleman has a right to speak more than once in committee. He has not yet exhausted his forty minutes to-night.


Jean-François Pouliot: At that interprovincial
conference some premiers held the view that the constitution should be amended by unanimous consent to meet the new requirements of the country.


Mr. DUNNING:: Speaking further to the
point of order, I think the hon. gentleman now speaking actually had the floor at the conclusion of the hour devoted to private bills the other evening. In that case surely he cannot continue now for another forty minutes.


Eugène Fiset: I
am sorry to disagree with the Minister of Railways, but another member spoke after the hon. member for Temiseouata.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.
78594-186^


Eugène Fiset: The hon. member for Lisgar spoke, I believe.


Jean-François Pouliot: I spoke for only five minutes on Tuesday last. Some other premiers at that interprovincial conference held the view that the constitution should not be amended. Others stated that the constitution should be amended to meet the new requirements of the country, but the premiers of Ontario and Quebec were of the opinion that the constitution should not be changed in spite of those new requirements. I sincerely believe that the day the guilty party is forbidden to remarry we will have much fewer divorce cases before this parliament, but that cannot be done without amending the constitution. It will be a very good' thing when that is done for that purpose because we will probably have only one-half the cases which now' come before this parliament, and I do not think that any member will complain about that change for the better.


George Reginald Geary: Mr. Chairman, although I
am opposed to the bill, either in its original or its amended form, I think every opportunity should be afforded for its discussion by the house. I need not go into the constitutional aspect of the question, because the question of what constitutes domicile is well settled. With all due respect to the hon. member who has just taken his seat (Mr. Pouliot) domicile is not what he says it is; it is not where the husband happens to be, but is an entirely different thing. It depends a great deal on intent to remain and to make the place where he happens to be his domicile.
Our divorce jurisdiction is operated under the laws of England as they stood. I think it was, in 1870, and the laws of England regarding divorce are indissolubly connected with our jurisdiction. I need1 not go back to the time of Louis and Catherine in order to refer to the case cited by my hon. friend, because we have more recent cases decided by the privy council, notably-Lord Advocate of Scotland versus Jaffray, which was followed in the Cook case. I view with a great deal of disfavour any attempt to make a special ruling in regard to the law of domicile. That is a matter of private international law or common law, and has been too well established to be interfered with lightly. As far as I know this is the first time 'that it has been proposed to pass legislation directly affecting what is or what is not to be a domicile. The law has grown up after years of consideration and I think it may be taken to be firmly established. The husband's domicile is the domicile of the wife, not only because

Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
she has agreed to live with him but because of the unity which came into effect with the marriage tie. I think the Jaffray case is perhaps the leading authority on this question. In that Case the domicile of the husband had been transferred1 to Australia, and notwithstanding the fact that a separation under the English law might have been ordered under the circumstances, and the court said that there was no reason why a divorce could not be obtained if the action had been taken in the proper place, that is Australia, the court saw no reason to interfere with the well established law applying to divorce by making any variation in that part of it which related to domicile.
It seems to me that the amendment is very loose, and I do not see how this house can pass it. Apparently it is proposed that for the purpose of securing a divorce-


Mr. THORSON:: Only.


George Reginald Geary: -for the purpose of securing a divorce a domicile may be obtained by the wife. She must be deserted by and live separate and apart from her husband for a period of at least two years, but the bill does not say how that is to be determined. I suppose an action will have to be taken or the matter settled in a legal tribunal to determine whether or not she has acquired a domipile and whether or not she has been deserted under the circumstances set out and has lived apart from her husband for a period of two years.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: In petitions for divorce
it is a necessary part of the evidence to establish domicile. Under this particular act a separate domicile may be acquired by a married woman and it will be necessary for her in her action for divorce to establish, in the first place, that she has been deserted, and, in the second place, that she has acquired a separate domicile, in order to give the court jurisdiction to pronounce a decree of divorce.


George Reginald Geary: I do no't think that anyone who has read the aict will doubt that it will be necessary for some tribunal to determine that the woman has acquired a domicile, a domicile for this one specific purpose. If my hon. friends had wanted to enable the wife to sue in certain jurisdictions, it seems to me that it might have been effected by leaving out all reference to domicile, and then it would have read:
-and lived separate and apart from her husband for a period of two years and upwards, and is still living separate and apart from her

husband, may commence an action for divorce in the province praying that her marriage may be dissolved, and that the courts of that province shall have full jurisdiction in the premises.
I view with a great deal of distrust any interference by statutory enactment with this well! established principle in divorce, because there are so many complications which might follow, such as successions after death and so on, and .it would be very difficult for us to guard against every (eventuality which might occur where the wife could be given by statute a particular domicile.
I do not think we are concerned with the question of whether or not it is a matter of civil rights. This house has jurisdiction in the matter of divorce. We have a bill here *which will give a domicile to a deserted wife in the place where she is living, and not in the plaice where her husband's domicile may be. We are not concerned with whether or not the provinces desire to assume the responsibility for enacting such legislation with regard to their own court.
Apart from all this, I would say that without any question this bill would simplify the obtaining of a divorce.
I do mot understand the attitude of my hon. friends opposite who profess that they do not want to see an increase in divorce in this country, but still object to giving the province of Ontario the right to have a divorce court. Everyone knows that where a divorce case is tried in open court, subject to all the rules of evidence and the careful scrutiny of same, there is very little likelihood of a divorce being granted in a mistaken case as may haipp'en before the Senate committee, rushed as it is. I do not agree with the actions of th-ait committee in many ways; I think it is overpressed and it is not a tribunal properly set up to look into the evidence and make a proper adjudication thereon. Each province should have its own divorce courts where these actions could be tried in the usual way, and, as I said before, I do not understand the attitude of my hon. friends opposite who, professing to a desire to restrict the elase with which a divorce .may be Obtained, still vote against a divorce court being established in the province of Ontario.
I agree thoroughly with them that we do not want anything which wil make it easier to obtain a divorce. In regard to the marriage tie there has grown up a sort of premeditated uncertainty which is endangering the social life of this country. I think we are making it much easier to obtain divorce by passing such a law as is here suggested, and for that reason, aside from the interference with the private international law and common law

Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
of the country, I am absolutely opposed to this bill. As I said before, the domicile of husband theory is not based only upon the faJat that the wife has agreed to live with the husband, but one of tlhe members of the court, I think, it was the late Lord Chancellor; said in the case to which I have referred:
"It is quite possible there may be cases in which the husband may deprive the wife of her remedy by changing his domicile" but this application of the law of domicile which has been invariably adhered to in the English law regarding the dissolution of marriage "preserves that unity of idea and fact with regard to the domicile of the married parties which has hitherto always been upheld by the law."
I believe that should be maintained in this counltry; that parliament should not interfere with that well-established principle, and, therefore, tfhalt the amendment should be negatived.
Amendment agreed to on division: Yeas, 36; nays, 28.
Section 2 as amended agreed to on division.
On section 3-Retains domicile of husband until she acquires domicile of choice.


Ernest Lapointe: I do not want to repeat what I have already stated three or four times in my opposition to this bill, but may I direct the attention of the committee to the fact that the hon. member for St. Lawrence-St. George said the other day that we would establish a Reno in Canada, or a number of them? This, however, is going to be worse than Reno, because residence in Reno for three months is necessary in order to acquire a domicile for the purpose of securing a divorce, whereas under this bill a woman may go to Manitoba or Saskatchewan and say: "I am going to establish my domicile here for my divorce", and she will start divorce proceedings the next day. That is much worse than Reno, and it is what my hon. friend is asking for.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister is entirely
in error.


Ernest Lapointe: I am not in error.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is a matter of judicial determination whether or not the two factors of fact and intention exist. Unless the court decides that there is an intention to remain in that jurisdiction forever, together with the fact of residence, no domicile is established, and the judicial determination takes the case out of the Reno class.


Ernest Lapointe: My hon. friend is entirely wrong. He need only read the
amendment to see that. It says that a woman, after she has been living separate and apart from her husband for a period of two years, may go to any province in Canada in which there is a court having jurisdiction to grant a divorce, and She may there establish a domicile of her own choice for the purpose of instituting proceedings.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite so.


Ernest Lapointe: In Reno she would have to stay three months. In Manitoba ox Saskatchewan she need stay only one day.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Surely the minister
knows the law of domicile better than that. For a domicile to be established, a judge in the forum in which she appears must be satisfied (a) that she has gone there with the intention to remain there forever as her home, and (b) that the fact of residence has been established'.


Ernest Lapointe: If my hon. friend is
right, the bill is entirely unconstitutional because she would have to go there and establish a domicile. Only the province has jurisdic

tion in that matter. We, the federal government, have no jurisdiction. We must bring-the bill within the question- of divorce solely and absolutely; if you go outside of that, you go outside the jurisdiction of this parliament. My hon. friend by his amendment has sought to bring the bill within the jurisdiction of this parliament by not touching the question of domicile as a whole but confining the bill to establishing domicile for the purpose of divorce and for that purpose only. Ti is stated in the -bill, "a domicile of her own choice," for that reason, and slhe can acquire that domicile in a day, while at Reno it takes three months.


Mr. BLACK (Yukon):: Has not the minister overlooked the fact that section 3 begins with the words "for the purposes of this act"?


Ernest Lapointe: I know that.


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: The amendment provides that sections 2 and 3 of the bill as printed are deleted, and the amendment is substituted for those two sections. The amendment has been carried by this committee.


Ernest Lapointe: It is the amendment that I am discussing.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The amendment has been carried.


Jean-François Pouliot: Can this parliament by any act change the nature of domicile?



Z'J32 COMMONS

[Stage Direction]
Divorce Proceedings-Domicile
Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: This parliament undoubtedly has the right to lay down the conditions for divorce, one of which at present is that the parties to the divorce action shall be domiciled in the province in which the court is exercising jurisdiction. This bill proposes to give to a married woman who has been deserted by her husband the right to acquire a separate domicile as one of the conditions for bringing an action for divorce. I think there is no question as to the jurisdiction of this parliament to pass an act of this sort.


Ernest Lapointe: I think so. I do not say no.


Eugène Fiset: May I call the attention of the committee to the fact that the amendment is substituted for sections 2 and 3 of the bill? That amendment has been carried, and therefore the bill is carried. This discussion therefore is entirely out of order.


Ernest Lapointe: I agree, but it was because you called section 3, Mr. Chairman, that I spoke.


[Stage Direction]
Preamble agreed to, on division.
Title agreed to, on division.
Bill reported.

[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 24, to amend the Precious Metals Marking Act, 1928.-Mr. Letellier de St. Just.

[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Johnston in the chair.
Immigration contingencies and general expense®, including grants to immigration societies, women's hostels, provinces, and loans for stock, equipment, etc., for Canadian boys, as may be authorized by the Governor General in Council, $1,300,000.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Would the minister be good enough to tell the committee how that grant was spent last year? I suppose he has the particulars handy.


Robert Forke: I can read the items if required.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Perhaps the minister
would not mind doing so, because there is a great deal of interest taken in this vote. I do
[Mr. Pouliot.l
not desire to weary him too much, but if he will read the memorandum it will be greatly appreciated. Perhaps he could put part of it on Hansard.


Robert Forke: There is an amount of $400,000 for publicity. The vote includes provision for advertising in Great Britain, the Irish Free State, the United States and certain countries on the continent of Europe. It also provides for all immigration literature printed for distribution in the above named countries. The items are as follows:
Advertising, $141,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is that both in and out
of Canada?


Robert Forke: Yes. It takes in Great
Britain, the Irish Free State, the United States and1 the continent of Europe. The
item is made up as follows:-
Advertising	 $141,000
Literature	183,000
Lectures and shows, exhibition
motor cars	and miscellaneous.	76,000

General printing done by the King's Printer for the service outside of Ottawa in Canada, $10,000. . , ,
This is to provide for the printing of books, manifests, cards, indexes, forms, questionnaires, letterheads, printed envelopes, etc., for use at the various immigration agencies, immigration hospitals, at immigration halls and at our boundary inspection offices all over Canada.
Stationery supplies obtained through the King's Printer for the service outside of Ottawa in Canada, $15,000.
This amount is to provide for the stationery supplies required for our various agencies, seaport officers, detention hospitals, immigration halls and boundary inspection offices throughout Canada. These supplies consist of typewriting machines and supplies, dictaphones, envelopes, writing and wrapping paper, pens, ink, pencils, erasers, rubber bands, fasteners, writing pads, blotting paper, calendars, parliamentary documents, etc.
Salaries of temporary employees in Canada chargeable to contingencies, $100;000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Are they appointed by
the Civil Service Commission or not?


Robert Forke: Oh, yes, they are appointed
by the Civil Service Service Commission. The temporaries may be permanents employed in a temporary position.
This item is to provide for the salaries of temporary clerks, stenographers, office boys, inspectors, guards, caretakers, firemen, matrons, charwomen, maids, deportation officers, etc., employed at headquarters in Ottawa, but especially at our various seaport agencies, inland agencies, at immigration halls and at boundary inspection points. The item also covers the salaries of about 157 customs officers acting as part time immigration inspectors all

Supply-Immigration
along the boundary line between Canada and the United States, who are paid salaries varying from $50 to $400 per annum for their extra services. The aggregate salaries for these customs officers being about $22,110 per year.
Contingencies and general expenses in Canada,

This is to provide for the travelling expenses of investigating officers, for legal expenses in connection with cases of prosecutions or habeas corpus under the Immigration Act; for miscellaneous and unforeseen expenses not provided for under any specific service.
Postage, telegrams, cablegrams, telephones, freight and express charges in Canada, $20,000.
This is to cover the cost of postage on letters, pamphlets, atlases, parcels, etc., mailed to points outside Canada; for telegrams, cablegrams, long distance telephone calls; freight and express charges on books, forms, manifests, maps, atlases, pamphlets, stationery supplies shipped to points in Canada as well as outside of Canada.	_	.
Inspection of British immigrant children, $23,000.
This item is to provide for the expenses of inspection of children emigrating to Canada under the auspices of various homes and societies in the British Isles, and also brought to Canada under the provisions of the empire settlement scheme.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What is the total of
that last item?


Robert Forke: $23,000, inspection of British immigrant children.
Expenses of seaport agencies, detention hospitals and halls, $25,000.
This is to provide for the expenses of administration, upkeep and maintenance of agencies and offices at the various seaports: St. John, N.B.; Halifax, N.S.; Boston, Quebec, Montreal, Vancouver and Victoria; and also for equipment, administration and maintenance of immigration detention hospitals at St. John, Halifax, Montreal, Vancouver and Victoria.
The expenses consist of cost of uniforms; salaries of cleaners and charwomen; telephones, laundry, medical supplies, bed sheets, mattresses, pillows, pillow slips, towels, blankets; of cost of board of detained immigrants and deports; travelling expenses of officers attached to these agencies. Most of these detention expenses are, however, recovered from the steamship companies according to the provisions of the Immigration Act.
Inland agencies and maintenance of immigration halls in the west, $48,000.
This item is to cover the expenses of our various inland agencies like Toronto and Hamilton in the east and Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary in the west and other small agencies throughout Canada; also for the equipment and maintenance of immigration halls at various points in the west. These expenses consist of cost of uniforms, telegrams, telephones, freight and express charges, wages of cleaners, laundry, pillows, blankets, sheets, towels, medical supplies and hospital expenses; cost of board for immigrants and deports temporarily maintained in our buildings; and for other miscellaneous expenses necessary for the upkeep and maintenance of these agencies and halls.
Mr. BENNETT; Is that the cleaning charges right here in Ottawa?


Robert Forke: No, that is in the west.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: What is an immigration hall?


Robert Forke: It is a place where the
immigrants get off and perhaps stay for one or two nights until they are distributed.
Deportation expenses, $65,000.
This is to cover the travelling expenses of our deportation officers; the cost of uniforms; meals for deports on trains; rail and ocean transportation of deports in cases where the railway and steamship companies are not liable for free transportation, etc.
Boundary inspection expenses, $90,000.
This item is to provide for the cost of uniforms of boundary inspectors, for living and travelling expenses of travelling or relieving inspectors; for overtime on Sundays and statutory holidays; for meals and lodging of inspectors when away from headquarters and for miscellaneous and incidental expenses incurred for the maintenance of offices at certain points on the boundary line between Canada and the United States.
Contingencies and general expenses in the United States, $135,000.
These expenses consist of rent of offices; furniture, typewriting machines, stationery supplies, printing of cards, letterheads, envelopes; postage, telegrams, telephones; freight and express charges; light and fuel; office furnishings and equipment; living allowance of agents of certain grades at the rate of $500 per annum; temporary assistance; travelling expenses of agents; expenses and salaries of a certain number of field men, etc.
There are seventeen emigration agencies at the following places:-Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Omaha, Fargo, Great Falls, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Manchester, Saginaw, St. Paul, Spokane, San Francisco, Woonsocket, Columbus, Buffalo, Minneapolis.
Contingencies and general expenses in Great Britain and Irish Free State, $165,000.
This item is to cover the expenses of equipment and maintenance of our agencies established in the British Isles. These expenses consist of rent of offices, furniture, taxes, light, fuel, stationery supplies, printing of books, letterheads, forms, envelopes; postage, telegrams, cablegrams, telephones; freight and express charges; salaries of temporary employees; travelling expenses of agents and officers, typewriting machines, etc. Ten agencies are in operation throughout the British lies at the following points:-London, Birmingham, Bristol, Liverpool. York, Glasgow, Inverness, Belfast, Dublin, Cardiff.
Contingencies and general expenses on the continent of Europe, $35,000.
This is to provide for the expenses of equipment and maintenance of our offices established at certain points on the continent of Europe for the purpose of the vise of passports and civil inspection of immigrants coming to Canada. The expenses consist of rents of offices; taxes, light and fuel; furniture, office furnishings; salaries of temporary employees; freight and express charges; telegrams, cablegrams, telephones, stationery supplies and printing of books, forms, letterheads, envelopes; travelling expenses of officers and inspectors, etc. The offices established on the continent are six in number at:-Antwerp, Belgium;
Suppl y-I mmigration

Rotterdam, Holland; Hamburg, Germany; Danzig, Poland; Riga, Latvia; and Paris, France.
Expenses of women's immigration division, $40,000.
This is to provide for the expenses of conductresses accompanying on trains parties of girls coming to Canada to engage especially in domestic service; for uniforms of women officers; for grants to women's hostels maintained in the principal cities in Canada for the temporary assistance and welfare of immigrant women; for an allowance at the rate of $1.50 per day to these hostels for the free accommodation accorded by them to immigrant girls and women, such free accommodation not to extend in any case to more than 48 hours; for travelling expencses of women officers outside of Ottawa, etc.
The statement in regard to colonization expenses and grants to immigration societies is as follows:
Colonization expenses, $60,000.
This item is to cover grants and expenses in connection with colonization and especially to cover expenses re repatriation of French Canadian families from the New England states.
Colonization agents-
Rev. J. Hamelin, Peace River district. Rev. P. M. Roussel, Northern Ontario.
Grants to immigration societies and to provinces, etc., $35,000.
This item is to cover the cost of cooperation with provincial governments in their training schools for immigrant boys and for other grants in connection with immigration work.
Unforeseen and miscellaneous expenses, $13,000.


Henry Herbert Stevens: In order to get an idea as to just how the money is being spent, I have been looking up the Auditor General's report for the year ended March 31, 1928, and I find page 11-23 under "Miscellaneous" an item for advertising, Desbarats Advertising Agency Limited, Montreal, amounting to 161,865.09. What would that be for?


Robert Forke: That is for advertising in the United States. That advertising agency works on a percentage basis, and the advertising is done in a number of farm journals. This year we are giving the work to the Advertising Service Association of Toronto.
Mr. STEVENS; What is the total amount being spent in the United States? I have it in the report in a score of items but it is difficult for me to get the total cost. Can we be given that?


Robert Forke: I am sorry to say it would take some time; you would have to get all the salaries, office expenses and advertising.


Henry Herbert Stevens: I would refer the minister to the office in Fargo, North Dakota, the expenses in connection with which amount to $14,767.53; the one at St. Paul, Minnesota,

amounts to $19,829.56; the one at Spokane, Washington, amounts to $11,076.11, and the one at San Francisco, California, amounts to $13,301.68. Now if we turn over to the European agencies we find that the agency at the port of Hamburg, which is the point of departure for most of the European immigrants, amounts to $7,483, while Riga amounts to $5,509, and Rotterdam, $6,176. There is a marked difference between the amounts paid to these agencies respectively. The offices in the United States are costing very large sums, whereas these main embarkation offices in Europe are costing about one third of what we are paying to the American agencies, notwithstanding that quite obviously they are giving much greater results so far as numbers are concerned. Can the minister . explain the reason for the difference?
Mr. FORKE; I do not think you can very well compare the work done by the United States offices with the work carried on by the continental agencies. The continental offices are merely inspection points. They carry on no propaganda of any description but simply pass the immigrants. I had the pleasure of seeing a shipful of immigrants examined at Paris and as I watched the performance it occurred to me that the inspection was rigid enough for army purposes. However, I suppose it is absolutely necessary to be careful in these examinations. The United States offices, on the other hand, are engaged in an active campaign in immigration and maintain a considerable staff. Immigrants from the United States brought in last year, in the way of cash and effects, property to the value of $14,971,670. They are a good class of immigrants.


Henry Herbert Stevens: Does that include the two cars which carried $400,000?


Robert Forke: Yes.


Henry Herbert Stevens: What would they be bringing in-diamonds?


Robert Forke: This represents settlers' cash and effects.
Mr."STEVENS: Did they bring the cash by freight?


Robert Forke: My hon. friend will have his joke, of course.


Peter McGibbon: How many new offices have been opened in the United States in the last two years and how many closed?


Robert Forke: Two have been closed but no new ones opened.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: What two were closed?

Supply-Immigra tion


Robert Forke: One in Indianapolis and the other in the east.


Peter McGibbon: How many immigrants from the United States have been sent back by the American patrol at the border?


Robert Forke: I cannot give that information offhand.


Peter McGibbon: That is important, is it not?


Mr. KENNEDY:: I notice in this item, in the statement of the purposes for which the money is being voted, a reference to loans for stock, equipment and so forth, for Canadian boys, which loans may be authorized by the governor in council. I listened carefully while the minister was making his statement and I gathered that no money was advanced last year for this purpose by order in council.


Robert Forke: It comes under the grant for immigration or colonization societies, amouunting to $35,000.


Donald MacBeth Kennedy: And that has been
actually advanced?


Robert Forke: Not one dollar has been spent yet. As I explained before dinner, the boy will have to have $500 and must work long enough on the farm to show that he is possessed of intelligence and industry and is capable of managing a farm. The land settlement board will have to decide that. After that question has been settled-I am referring now, of course, to British boys; I will discuss Canadian boys later-$1,250 is advanced by the Dominion and $1,250 by the imperial government. This makes a total of $3,000, and the money will be spent under the care and direction of the land settlement board.
I spoke about the Canadian boys; I made the statement that the Dominion government would be ready and willing to advance the same amount to Canadian boys provided we could get any of the provincial governments to grant an equal amount, either by way of a farm or in cash, to take the place of the grant by the imperial government. Last summer I took up this matter with the governments of the three prairie provinces and their excuse was that they did not have their natural resources; they said if their resources were returned to them they might be able to come to some arrangement along that line, so that is how the situation stands at present, although I hope in the future to be able to come to something definite. In regard to the British boys not a dollar has been spent as yet; it may be years before the
money is expended, but it has been and will continue to be provided. As to this item for Canadian boys the chances are that the money will not be spent this year, although I hope we may come to some arrangement.


William Thomas Lucas: Before six o'clock I questioned the minister as to the attitude of the department in case a private individual agreed to assume this responsibility in place of the province.


Robert Forke: In that case the province
would have to agree to assume the aftercare of the boy. That is not new; the question has been discussed from that angle also, but nothing has been accomplished as yet.
There is nothing like speaking plainly at times. With the exception of some in the province of Quebec there has not been any great desire shown by Canadian boys to go farming. I do not say there are not some boys of this kind in other provinces, but the same desire is not shown elsewhere that we find among the young French Canadians. At least two-thirds of the boys growing up on our farms in western Canada-and I can speak for Manitoba if not for the other provinces-have no intention of continuing farming. I would like to see the boy who wants to farm given every possible encouragement by the government.


Peter McGibbon: Would the minister tell us if the government has considered reversing its decision with regard to allowing Barnardo boys of school age to enter Canada?


Robert Forke: Barnardo boys over fourteen years of age.


Peter McGibbon: I was referring to Barnardo boys of school age.


Robert Forke: Fourteen years is the limit.


Peter McGibbon: Would the minister tell
us for what reason?


Robert Forke: I think almost every
society dealing with juveniles has recommended that the minimum age be fourteen


Peter McGibbon: Would the minister be
good enough to name these societies?


Robert Forke: The child welfare societies
of the different provinces have made that recommendation, together with the provincial governments. Really I have seen no great desire to have the minimum age lowered except on the part of the Barnardo people and the Marchmont homes, which are operated by the Cadbury people, who make cocoa and chocolates and so on. I had the
Supply-Immigration

pleasure of having dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Cadbury, and I could never hope to meet finer people; if I could have done anything for anyone I would have done it for the Cadburys.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Surely a good meal
would not influence the minister?


Robert Forke: It might help; and we
had chocolates also.


Peter McGibbon: Surely the minister recognizes the fact that for years this work has been carried on successfully. He must recognize that the best citizens of this country are our own people; the second best are the British, and the most successful of those British born citizens are those who come to Canada at school age, which permits them to be educated in the institutions of this country and moulded into the political, social and economic life of Canada. I have been credibly informed that only one society has objected to bringing out these younger children. They are being sent to Australia; there is no objection to them in that country, and I have been told that of the thousands of these children brought to Canada less than two per cent have been charged with any crime. To-day many of these boys are occupying positions in this country with great distinction, and it does appear to me that when an organization will bring children to Canada, pay for their keep in this country with money raised in the old land, educate the boys and girls to be Canadian citizens and have them inspected every three or four months, you have an organization doing the very work this government wants done. The Barnardo people have told me that they know of only one organization in this country which has objected to the admission of these children, and if the minister knows of others I think he should give the names.


Robert Forke: I have mentioned the child welfare societies and the provincial governments, and the British government itself does not encourage tlje emigration of children under fourteen.


Peter McGibbon: That movement is going on between England and Australia at present.


Robert Forke: Not to a very large extent.


Peter McGibbon: It has been transferred from Canada to Australia. Perhaps the minister might say whether the Ontario government officially objects to these children being brought in?


Robert Forke: My deputy says he does
not know that the government of Ontario has officially objected.


Peter McGibbon: The minister said so.


Robert Forke: Probably I was mistaken.


Peter McGibbon: If you were mistaken
with regard to the Ontario government perhaps you were mistaken with regard to the other provinces.


Robert Forke: There are the provincial
child welfare associations.


Peter McGibbon: That is only one organization, and I am told it is the only association which has made any objection.


Robert Forke: With the exception of the
one of which my hon. friend spoke I do not know of any organization that has asked that children under fourteen years of age be brought to this country.


Peter McGibbon: I am not asking for
those who have requested the government to take this action; I want to know those who have objected.


Robert Forke: It is a matter of opinion.
I have no doubt the hon. member thinks it would be a good thing to bring in children under fourteen years of age, but in the department we have taken the opposite stand, believing it to be in the best interests of the young people themselves, and these welfare societies have taken the same view. Possibly we -may be mistaken, but it is thought that children of tender age coming to a new country might find themselves in uncomfortable surroundings, and it has been deemed advisable to draw the line at fourteen years of age. It may be a mistake, but we think it is best in the interests of the children themselves.


Peter McGibbon: I have no hesitation in telling the minister that in my opinion it is a mistake. This policy has not been in force in Canada for many years; this is a recent change. I can safely say that I have observed hundreds of these boys in my own district;
I know one family which has had thirty-five of them. These boys and girls are brought to Canada; they are educated here by money collected in the old country, and without that education I believe you cannot lay the foundation for the very best Canadian citizenship. A boy coming to Canada above school age is barred from entering any of the professions here because he has not the necessary primary or secondary education; the girls cannot become nurses; these children cannot enter our

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universities and take professional courses. They are handicapped in many lines of business, and I claim that the minister and his department have deliberately shut out the very best type of immigrant we can get. They are British; they are young, and without expense to the government they are inspected, every three months with regard to girls and every four or five months with regard to boys. An inspector is sent to their homes, and if necessary they are brought to Toronto where they are not subject to any outside influence and where they can tell exactly how they have been treated. This government has deliberately reversed the policy which was in force for many years and under which some
280,000	boys and girls were brought to this country, of whom over 98 per cent made good; less than 2 per cent of the immigrants were declined. I am credibly informed that no provincial government has objected to this policy. Objections were made by one organization, headed by a lady who had no doubt good intentions but who probably does not know very much about bringing up children. I think the minister should give us a little more information than he has up to the present.


Robert Forke: My deputy suggests that in
the morning I give you all the resolutions which have been passed by different societies and sent in to the department.


Peter McGibbon: Let it go until the
morning.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: I asked the minister
where the two offices in the United States which were closed were located, and he could not tell me at the moment.


Robert Forke: They are at Harrisburg and Portland, Maine.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: What were the grounds
for closing those offices?


Robert Forke: They were closed upon the
advice of the officials.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: Did the officials justify
the continuance of the other offices? Does the minister say that all the other offices in the United States are productive of good in the immigration policy of Canada?


Robert Forke: I have the list here.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: You have read the list
already.


Robert Forke: I think they are rendering
very good service. Of course I do not want to hide behind my officials, but I think everyone will recognize the fact that a minister has
to trust to his officials to a large extent in matters of this kind. These offices were closed and the territory in respect to other offices was widened out.


Edmond Baird Ryckman: Are those offices inspected regularly?


Robert Forke: Oh, yes; we have a commissioner of colonization who inspects them regularly. If results are not being obtained an explanation is requested.


James Dew Chaplin: Will the minister tell us why the Detroit officei .could not be as efficiently carried on in the city of Windsor?


Robert Forke: It is a matter of opinion, but I do not think so. The Detroit office is a good office and has been producing very good results. Some complaints were made this afternoon about the San Francisco office. The agent there, Mr. Roche, is an elderly man and perhaps a younger man would be able to obtain better results in that office.


James Dew Chaplin: Has the minister ever
been in Detroit?


Robert Forke: No.


James Dew Chaplin: The minister does not know the relative situation as between Detroit and Windsor?


Robert Forke: I have looked at the map.


James Dew Chaplin: They are only five or six minutes apart by ferry or by bridge. Does the minister not relalize that one who wished to oome to Canada could go to the office in Windsor just as conveniently as to the office in Detroit? We would thus be carrying on the business in our own country instead of in the United States.


An hon. MEMBER:: You would not be able to get the Detroit gunmen.


Robert Forke: I think the United States people are more likely to go to the Detroit office than to come over to Windsor.


James Dew Chaplin: Anyone wanting to come to Canada would come to the city of Windsor to ask for information.


Frank S. Cahill: They would be in Canada then.


James Dew Chaplin: That would be too bad.


Robert Forke: That office has been in existence for quite a long time.
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James Dew Chaplin: Then I suggest that the minister consider making the change.


Robert Forke: AH right, we will take it into consideration.


Donald Ferdinand Kellner: The minister states that the government has not spent any money to provide land or equipment for the immigrant. When the hon. member for Fraser Valley (Mr. Barber) was speaking last evening he complained about the high prices which an immigrant had paid for fend, and the minister said that nothing was being paid at the present time. If the government has not advanced any money why is the hon. member for Fraser Valley complaining about the payments being so high and the minister stating that they were not being made?


Robert Forke: Those people came in under the three thousand family scheme on money supplied by the British government. The Canadian government undertake to collect that money and pay it over to the British government; they are not collecting the money for themselves.


Harry James Barber: It is being charged up against the people just the same.


Frank S. Cahill: We are collectors.


Peter McGibbon: I must object to the minister coming before the house in the last days of the session and knowing absolutely nothing about his own department. Whenever we ask a question the minister replies, "I have not the information, I will give it to you later." I think that attitude is a discourtesy to the house.


Robert Forke: If the hon. member states that it is done through ignorance, I am quite willing to bow under the yoke.


Peter McGibbon: Do not put words into my mouth.


Robert Forke: But I do not consider that it is a discourtesy, because I will give the members every courteous answer I can.


Peter McGibbon: The trouble is that we cannot get information.


Robert Forke: I think you are getting a fair amount.


Arthur Edward Ross: Has the minister any information with regard to domestics entering this country? Can he tell us how many remained here after the second, year?


Henry Herbert Stevens: And how many got
married.


Robert Forke: The following domestics
came in under the assisted passage scheme during 1928-29, and were received at the following places:
Halifax	 8
Montreal	"	728
Toronto	] \ j 1,145
Winnipeg	'.	'	'125
Regina	 146
Calgary	    207
The department have made arrangements with the following organizations to receive houseworkers who are also placed by the employment service:
Nova Scotia, Halifax:	Catholic Women's
League.
New Brunswick, St. John: Young Women's Christian Association; Rosary Hall.
Quebec, Que.:	Young Women's Christian
Association.
Montreal: Catholic Women's League Hostel.
Ontario, Ottawa: Young Women's Christian Association; King's Daughters Guilds: Rosary Hall.
Kingston: Young Women's Christian Association.
Toronto: Catholic Women's League Hostel.
Hamilton: Young Women's Christian Association.
London: Young Women's Christian Association.
Saskatchewan, Saskatoon: Teacher's Hostel accommodating girls for British Women's Emigration Society.
Manitoba, Winnipeg:	Catholic Women's
League Hostel.
Alberta, Edmonton: Church of England Hostel; Young Women's Christian Association; Catholic Women's League Hostel.
British Columbia, Vancouver:	Young
Women's Christian Association;' Queen Mary's Coronation Hostel.
Victoria: Young Women's Christian Association.
Kelowna: Joyce Hostel.
Those are the numbers of domestics that come out and the different organizations that look after them.


Arthur Edward Ross: Gan the minister
tell us the possibilities of finding these girls within two years?


Robert Forke: Our officials have endeavoured in every case to follow up and find out what becomes of these girls. No doubt a number of them disappear. Many of them do not stay where they are placed but drift into other lines of work. The Salvation Army is the only organization I know of that claims -they keep all their women just where they place them. Women's immigration is probably more difficult to conduct than men's. More care is taken to look after women when they arrive at Quebec or Montreal. They are taken charge of by conductresses and conducted to a distributing centre whence they

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are sent to the place where they are required. AVe have found by experience that many of these women come with two addresses, the one to which they are ostensibly going, having been recruited for it by the Immigration department; the other to which they want to go and to which they will eventually go if possible.


Peter McGibbon: When these domestics
come here, say from northern Europe, or, indeed, from any country, what provision does the government make for following them up and looking after them?	-


Robert Forke: In Canada?


Peter McGibbon: Yes, for those who cannot speak the English language.


Robert Forke: The hostels are really clearing houses. I have under my hand a statement of the houseworkers by origin arriving at ocean ports during the fiscal year, all of whom are looked after, sent to the hostel and distributed by our own officials. Those who come out under the different associations are looked after by them and a report is made by the organization as to where they have gone. There is no method of keeping a girl in domestic service if she does not want to remain, at least none that I know of.


Peter McGibbon: The minister does not
get my point. I have had complaints from people who have hired these girls who cannot speak the English language. When they no longer require their services there is no place for the girls to go to and they are under the necessity of finding another job for them before they leave their first employment. There is no agency in Toronto to which to send them, no organization that cares a fig for them; they are left in this country, not being able to speak the English language, practically helpless,


Robert Forke: There is in every large city a hostel towards the maintenance of which the department subscribes. Our officials are supposed to keep an eye on the girls when they go into domestic service. Of course everyone will recognize that it is impossible in every case to keep track of a girl if she is determined to slip out of sight. I know the difficulties our women's branch has in looking after these girls.


Peter McGibbon: My point, if I can make it clear to the minister, is this: these girls do not slip out of sight. They come to Toronto and somebody employs them. When that employer is through with them, there
is nobody to look after them. They cannot speak the English language; they have no place to go to and their employer has to keep them until he goes out and finds another place for them.


Robert Forke: I had the great pleasure of
visiting the Toronto hostel and addressing the girls there on one occasion. That hostel is a home for any girl in Toronto who has come from a foreign country, and if such girls go there, they will be treated as well as their mothers would treat them.


Peter McGibbon: Who is in charge of it?


Robert Forke: I was at the hostel, but
really I do not know where it is as I was taken down there in a car. It is in the city of Toronto.


Peter McGibbon: This is another example of the great efficiency of the department and of the minister.


Robert Forke: If friends drive one in a car to a point in a city the size of Toronto I do not think it is surprising that one should not know its exact location. It is a very good hostel. Hon. members from the city of Toronto ought to know something about it. It is a large institution, well run, and a great credit to that city and the people who are in charge of it. When those girls go there these are the different organizations that look after them:
Women's Auxiliary, Anglican Church.
Girls' Friendly Society.
United Farm Women of Ontario.
Toronto Catholic Women's League.
Presbyterian Church.
Women's Patriotic League.
Toronto Young Women's Christian Association.
Municipal Chapter of the Imperial Order ol Daughters of the Empire.
Ladies connected with this organization were kind enough to take me down to see the hostel.
Georgina House.
Traveller's Aid.
Women's Institute.
Women's Christian Temperance Union.
Toronto Local Council of Women.
United Church Missionary Society.
All these organizations are interested in the girls and are assisting the. Immigration department in seeing that they are properly looked after.


Peter McGibbon: Do they take care of
them in their homes?


Robert Forke: The hostel is the home.


Peter McGibbon: Where is it?
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Robert Forke: I am informed it is on Jarvis street. If I were in Toronto, I could soon find out where it is.


Peter McGibbon: That is all the minister knows about it.


Robert Forke: Yes, my hon. friend will have to be content with that:


Arthur Edward Ross: When I raised this question, I was interested in another phase of the matter. I was wondering whether the minister and his department made any attempt to follow up and find out the result of this policy. We have a two-sided policy- agricultural labour and domestic assistance. I wanted to know if the minister had followed up these cases to find out if Canada was getting any results from this immigration. I can speak only for our own section, but it is my belief that you cannot find fifteen per cent of these domestics in Canada after two years, and under this policy you are only paying out good Canadian money to provide splendid domestic assistants for the United States. As soon as they have finished one year's service here and paid off their indebtedness they are on the train bound for New York City, where they get big pay. Has the minister any information on that? I know that in our district you will not find fifteen per cent of the Scotch domestic servants here after two years. They stay just long enough to qualify for entrance to the United States. If that is the case generally, we are simply providing another means for the United States getting the domestic help that they badly need, and are spending money without much result so far as this country is concerned. I do not blame the girls for going. The ones who come into our district are splendid girls. .


Robert Forke: The department uses its
best endeavours to see that these girls stay in Canada, but I am afraid that there is too much truth in what the hon. gentleman has said, and that quite a large number slip away across the border. At the same time we could never begin to fill the demand for these girls in Canada. All we can do is to get the best girls we possibly can and send them to the points that are asking for them, and then follow them up and try to keep them in the employment to which they have been sent. I admit that quite a large percentage do leave the country. I believe that some come with 
United States addresses in their pockets and are just awaiting a chance to slip over the line. We try to meet that situation as best we can. The demand from Toronto, Winnipeg and other large cities for these girls is great. I think my hon. friend will find that the situation he complains of is worse in the smaller towns than in the big cities.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister is familiar
with the difficulties in the Calgary hostel in connection with the women that came there. Would it be possible for the minister to indicate who selects these girls and what effort is made to secure the right type when they come to Canada? I think the minister through his official will understand what I mean without my going into details. Some of them have not been exactly the type that it is thought should be brought over. What supervision is exercised?


Robert Forke: The girls that are recruited in Great Britain are recruited mostly by our own women officials.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am sorry to hear that, because I could not have thought it possible that some of these girls could have been recruited by any of our own people. I will speak to the minister personally about it, because certainly the situation is very undesirable, very.


Robert Forke: The hon. gentleman refers
to immigration from the United Kingdom?


Richard Bedford Bennett: They came to the west
from the United Kingdom. As a matter of fact some of them came from north of the Tweed.


Robert Forke: It is a very difficult situation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I know.


Robert Forke: I have looked at it this way. Fathers and mothers will think twice before they let their girls go to a new country unless they know that they are going to a good home.
Mr. 'SPENCER:	According to a return
which I received, over 16,000 female domestic servants entered Canada in 1928. Would the minister tell the committee how many of these spoke the English or the French language, and how many spoke some other language?


Robert Forke: All I can give is the countries from which they came. I am afraid that

my hon. friend will have to guess the tongue they spoke. The figures are as follows:
Albanian.. ..
Arabian	
Armenian.. ..
Austrian	
Belgian	
Bohemian	
British-
English	
Irish	
Scotch	
Welsh	
Bulgarian..	..
Croatian	
Czech	
Dutch	
Esthonian.. ..
Finnish	
French	
German	
Greek	
Hebrew	
Italian	
Japanese	
Jugo-Slav.. ..
Lettish	
Lithuanian.. ..
Magyar	
Maltese	
Moravian.. ..
Negro	
Persian	
Polish	
Portuguese.. .. Roumanian..	.
Russian	
Ruthenian. . .. Scandinavian- Danish.. .. Icelandic.. . Norwegian.. Swedish.. . .
Serbian	
Slovak	
Spanish	
Swiss	
Syrian	
Turkish'	
5 1 4
58
2,859
1,443
2.664
9
17 54 85 26
1,279
1,142
691
6 42
18 201 212
3
2
2
95
1,404
5
289
144
56
1
Total
14,798


Henry Elvins Spencer: Do I understand that
Japanese are encouraged to come in as domestic servants?


Robert Forke: There is a gentleman's
agreement between the British government, the Canadian government, and Japan under which a very small quota comes in every year.


Henry Elvins Spencer: What is the quota?


Robert Forke: I do not know that I am
at liberty to disclose that. I think the Prime Minister mentioned the agreement in the house, and perhaps gave the number. It is only a small number.


Henry Elvins Spencer: If it is a gentleman's agreement, an international agreement, surely the members of this house are privileged to know how many are allowed to come in.
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Robert Forke: I did not say that it was
an international agreement, but a gentleman s agreement.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Surely the 245 members
of this house are entitled to have that information.


Arthur Edward Ross: May I point out
to the minister that the list which he has read does not purport to give domestic servants only? Many of those who came out came to get married or to meet their relatives, so this is not a list of domestic servants. It says underneath the table:
The foreign women listed in table above were destined either to husbands, relatives, or to be placed in domestic work.
iMr. FORKE:	They were all brought out
under (the care of the Immigration department. It was a mistake, of course, to read them out as domestic servants. As stated at the bottom of the table, they were destined to husbands, relatives or to be placed in domestic work.


Arthur Edward Ross: I think there is a
great deal in what the member for Muskoka (Mr. MicGibbon) said, that the government should make some permanent arrangement in regard to those who cannot speak the English language very well, and who perhaps after a certain time have terminated their agreement. With regard to this hostel that the Minister has spoken of, the arrangement there simply is that these girls are kept for twenty-four hours.


Robert Forke: I have mentioned the places where hostels are run under the auspices of different organizations.


Arthur Edward Ross: The arrangements
are only for the detention of those girls there for twenty-four hours, whereas a girl should be . kept in some place until she has another place of employment to go to. I think the government could very well take up that line of work.


Robert Forke: When I visited that hostel
there were, I would say, almost 200 girls there who were working in the city of Toronto, and who had come to the hostel when 'they arrived in Canada, They go there in the evening to pass a social hour. It is a home for domestic girls who have come from abroad-


Mr.   BOSS@Kingston: What they do is
to form an overseas club, which is a splendid idea. They have their own entertainment, but unfortunately, from what I know about them, they stay there about two years and
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then go away, an!d it seems to me that we are just providing a Splendid class of girds for the United States. I do not agree with what the minister said about these girls. I know something about the Scotch girls, and I say absolutely that his statement is untrue. The Scottish domestic Who is brought out here is a splendid type of girl, and she can usually get any place she likes and can demand her own pay in the United States.


Robert Forke: I think the hon. member
misunderstood what I said. I cast no aspersion against the character of any girl. If I did, I did not intend to.


Arthur Edward Ross: I thought that was the gist of what the minister said, that you could not gat a good type of girtl to leave her home and come to do domestic work. I find it to be veiy opposite as far as Scotch girds are concerned.


Mr. ROBINSON:: I would like to draw
the minister's attention to the fact that on January 1, the international bridge between Detroit and Sandwich is likely to be opened, and provision should be made in the supplementary estimates to take care of the additional immigration officers who will be required for that post.
While I am on my feet, I may say that before I went overseas I had some correspondence with the minister in connection with the annoyances at the ferry docks at Windsor and Walkerville where we have practically adopted the United States system of inspection, which I do not approve of. I do not know what has been done in the meantime, but I have made inquiries since I arrived in Ottawa on Sunday,
I received a telegram to-day from a thoroughly reliable source, which reads as follows:
Undoubtedly a feeling exists here that there is too much immigration red tape at the ferry docks. Objections come from Canadians returning from Detroit.
What I am anxious to have is a statement from the minister placed on Hansard which will satisfy my constituents in regard to the situation there. If the minister was going back and forth between Windsor and Detroit every day he would be stopped every time and asked where he lived. He might live in Timbuctoo, yet he could tell the officer that he lived in Walkerville or Windsor or Sandwich and go on. It is mere child's play, and I am sure the minister would think the same thing if he watched the proceedings at the ferry dock. It is more annoying in the winter than in the summer. In the winter you usually get a cold northwest or northeast wind; I have timed myself and found 
that it took sometimes from five to fifteen minutes to get through in the rush hours. It all depends on how long the officer will question some of the people going through. For instance, I know some people who have lived in Windsor for years and years who have an English accent, and these officers will not take their word; they catechise them just as they would a school child. I am sure it is the desire of the department that harmonious conditions should prevail there, conditions that would satisfy the people living in the border cities. A Canadian, born in Canada, who has lived in Windsor nearly all his life, certainly objects to getting an identification card to return to his own country from his everyday work in Detroit. I know I would not do so, and I do not think we should call upon them io do it. I am anxious to assist in any way I can. When people have to remain on the dock in the winter time, with a cold wind blowing, they are liable to catch a heavy cold. I have received hundreds and hundreds of complaints, and I have tried to assure those who complain that the department will ultimately work it out to the satisfaction of all concerned.


Robert Forke: The extra help has been
provided for the new bridge in the estimates this year. In regard to the examination crossing at Windsor, an officer has been sent down there several times to inspect and report and his report has always been favourable. I shall be glad, however, to look into the matter again, and to have things smoothed out as far as possible. My deputy informs me that everything is working very well at the present time. Is the telegram the hon. member referred to of recent date?


Sidney Cecil Robinson: It is dated to-day. I
know it is from a thoroughly reliable source.


Robert Forke: I will see that a thorough
investigation is made.


Sidney Cecil Robinson: I think one of the difficulties is due to the fact that the officers are so frequently changed. When a stranger is put on there he will stop everyone. Then others feel that if they let some go through whom they recognize as persons who live in Windsor or the border cities, complaint will be sent in against them that they are not doing their duty, and they tell me that in order to avoid that they have to question everybody whether they know them or not.


Robert Forke: I will have an examination and report made.


Richard Bedford Bennett: May I ask the minister
a question with respect to the appointment of an official at Sutton, Quebec, under his

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department? We have heard a great deal of Sutton recently in connection with the Post Office Department. I have received a communication with respect to an appointment in the immigration service at that place. Perhaps it is not possible for the minister to go into it now, because he is dealing with his estimates, but it may be that he will give us the information at a later date.


Robert Forke: The information will be
given.


Robert Gardiner: The minister, in giving the details of the item, mentioned $65,000 for deportation cases. How many cases of deportation occurred last year?


Robert Forke: For medical reasons, 519;
public charges, 430; criminality, 426; other causes, 257; persons accompanying those deported-if for example, a husband and wife come out and the wife 'is deported, the husband goes back with her-254, or a total of 1,886 By nationality, these were 1,047 British; 297 American; other countries, 542. It is one of the most difficult and one of the saddest aspects of the work of the Minister of Immigration' to be under the necessity of deporting people, for it touches his humanity as nothing else can.


Henry Elvins Spencer: It would seem from the
figures the minister has given that by far the largest percentage of those who are deported come from the United States.


Robert Forke: No, the British figure is
1,047 and the United States 297.


Henry Elvins Spencer: But the proportion of
people coming from Great Britain is greater than that from the United States.


Robert Forke: Yes, it is larger.


Robert Gardiner: Is the fact that there
are so many deportation cases to be explained by an inefficient inspection before the immigrants leave for this country?


Robert Forke: If an immigrant, after his
arrival in Canada, commits a crime within a year, we send him back, and no examination on the other side could possibly have obviated that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Over 400 are accounted
for by criminality.


Robert Forke: Criminality and public
charges comprise half the cases and you cannot very well anticipate those causes. If someone comes here and becomes a burden on the public there is noting to do but send him back where he would be better taken care of among his own people.


Robert Gardiner: Did the minister say
that the number of those becoming public charges was 510?


Robert Forke: No, 430.


Robert Gardiner: Would they become
public charges in the n*unioipalities in which they reside?


Robert Forke: Yes; they would be unable to make a living and therefore nothing could be done with them. Someone has to look after them and so they are deported. Probably they are kept in the immigration buildings for a time until a sufficient number are ready for deportation. Of course those that are deported from the different ports generally go back by the next steamer.


Robert Gardiner: I presume that those
who are deported as public charges will probably have lived in Canada for some time.


Robert Forke: They may or may not.


Henry Elvins Spencer: You cannot deport after five years.


Robert Forke: We draw the line at five
years; after an immigrant has been five years in the Dominion we do not think he should be deported.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Those deported for medical reasons numbered 519. Does this mean that the examiners on the other side fell down in their work?


Robert Forke: What we consider a really
thorough medical examination on the other side began only last year.


Henry Elvins Spencer: But 519 came through.


Robert Gardiner: How is the present system working in comparison with the old?


Robert Forke: I think it works better; it is much more rigid. The fact that a number of persons may be deported does not argue that the inspection is not efficient, because, as I have stated, the inspection is much more rigid than it was in former years.


Robert Gardiner: Can the minister give some information regarding the training farms in the old country? What experience do immigrants get there? *


Robert Forke: If you will let this item go through that question can be answered under the next vote with reference to empire settlement.


Henry Elvins Spencer: The minister informed us a little while ago that there was one man kept in Peace River. What is a man there for? What are his duties?

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Richard Bedford Bennett: To keep the peace.


Robert Forke: That is in connection with repatriation work. We are giving $5,000 to the Salvation Army, $1,000 to the Anglican church, $1,000 to the Presbyterian, and $1,000 to the United church. Those are all the grants given. In connection with repatriation work in Quebec, in relation to French Canadians returning from the New England states and going to Peace River or northern Ontario as ' immigrants, we have two Catholic priests acting under the department, one in northern Ontario and one in Peace River. These repatriation fathers receive no salary but we have been allowing them $100 a month and expenses. I thought that was due to the Catholic community as their share of the grants that were being paid.


Robert Gardiner: Will the minister give us details of the amounts paid to the various societies under the item for immigration purposes?


Robert Forke: I have mentioned them
all.


Robert Gardiner: You gave some of
them. I should like to have the grants given to all organizations engaged in immigration work.


Robert Forke: I do not know of any other organizations getting money. I, have given certain grants including those to workers in Peace River and northern Ontario. Then there is $5,000 to the Salvation Army, $1,000 to the United Church of Canada, $1,000 to the Anglican Church and $1,000 to the British Settlement Society of Toronto, which is the continuing Presbyterian Church. I do not know that I am greatly in favour of making grants to religious denominations in this way, but these people are doing splendid work in selecting and placing immigrants and I think the money is well spent.


Mr. CAMPBELL:: I do not think the minister gave us the particulars of the grants to the provinces.


Robert Forke: I gave that information this afternoon; or does my hon. friend refer to the British boys?


Milton Neil Campbell: The direct grants to the provinces.


Robert Forke: There are no direct grants to the provinces, unless my hon. friend means in connection with repatriation, and I went into that matter very carefully this afternoon.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Does the minister call upon these societies which obtain government grants for any report as to how the money is spent?


Robert Forke: Yes, they report exactly how many immigrants they bring in and where they place them, and our officials also check up their work. I must say that the church societies especially bring in a very good class of people.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Empire settlement scheme, including grants to immigration societies, provinces, women's hostels, etc., as may be authorized by the governor general in council, $1,000,000.
Frank S. Cahill: This appears to be quite an old item in the estimates, but I do not think it adds very much to Canadian immigration or benefits Canada in any way. I think the expenditure of $1,000,000 proposed here could be made to much better advantage on many other things in Canada, and I believe that the general opinion on this side of the house at least, and I believe throughout the country generally, is that assisted immigration is a mistake on the part of Canada. We have a good country here which naturally attracts people, and if we were to eliminate assistance to immigrants I think we would attract a more desirable class of people, increase our immigration and satisfy our own people to a greater extent than is the case with this assisted immigration.
I have discussed this matter on previous occasions, and while I do not expect many hon. members on this side of the bouse to support me, feeling perhaps that loyalty to their party is stronger than any other feeling at present, still I believe that if a free vote could be taken without any obligation to support the government or the minister in the matter, this item would be defeated by a very large majority. I have no criticism to make with regard to the present minister; I think perhaps he is doing as well as any minister could under the circumstances, but the time has arrived when Canada would be much better served by allowing healthy, energetic and enterprising young people to come here of their own accord instead of taxing the people of this country in order to assist what may be more or less undesirable class of people to come to Canada. In fact, Mr. Chairman, I would go so far as to say that we might abolish the Department of Immigration altogether without any great hardship to Canada. I think if we must have our present quota of ministers, a minister of

Supply-Immigration
mines would serve a much better purpose thau a minister of immigration. Any restrictive measures necessary in connection with immigration could be undertaken by the Department of Justice and the medical inspection of immigrants could be looked after by the Department of Health. I believe if we entirely eliminated the Department of Immigration more people would seek' entrance to Canada than is the case to-day. I would even say that where we have caused a certain amount of hardship or grievance by the appointment of medical officers in Europe we might well withdraw those appointments and leave everyone free to come to Canada on an equal basis subject to our willingness to admit them. Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I desire to move in amendment:
That vote No. 56 he reduced by three-fourths of $999,999.


Mr. BOULANGER:: I heartily support the amendment just moved, for reasons I have previously indicated and which I do not intend to repeat to-night. This afternoon we had consistency and logic preached to U3, and if I desire to be consistent and logical I must-support the amendment.
I should add that in supporting this amendment I do not impute any blame or criticism to the Minister of Immigration; we realize that he is an honest and capable man doing his level best with a bad job, but we do blame the policy, for which the minister is not responsible. He inherited that policy and he is trying to navigate as best he can with it, but in my humble judgment this policy is a misuse of the taxpayers' money. More than that it is useless, because we have been told that all the people whom we bring to Canada at such great cost do not stay here. For these reasons I desire to support the amendment.


Charles Gavan Power: While I am not perhaps
prepared to go the length to which my hon. friend from Pontiac wishes to go, in this item is included grants to provinces. I am prepared to leave out those grants, but in order to show that I heartily approve of the principle enunciated by the hon. member for Pontiac, namely that this government should no longer vote money for the assistance of immigrants, I am prepared to vote for his amendment. I firmly believe that the vast majority of the people of this country no longer wish any of the taxpayers' money to be expended in inducing people to come to Canada. If they wish to come here we should allow them to do so, provided we surround their entry with certain medical and moral safeguards but to have an agency in Europe 78594-1874
or in any part of the world to ask people to come here after describing to them in glowing terms the future they will have in this country I think is going altogether too far. I do not believe that ten per cent of the members of the house are prepared to get up and say that they desire more assisted immigrants in their own constituencies. I will say that we do not want any more in my constituency. The members rise in their seats and say that we must people the fertile plains of the west, but very few of them would be prepared to say that they have room in their own home towns or their own home cities for any more people from the other side.


Mr. GOTT:: Bring back the Canadian boys.


Robert Forke: I would like to offer a word of explanation in regard to this vote. The total amount spent last year amounted to $034,(399.70. The Dominion government pays the full amount of the passage and then later on the imperial government repays its share. When we strike the estimate we have to allow for a sufficient amount to cover the total cost of the passages, but that amount is reduced by what is repaid by the British government.


Robert Gardiner: What are the items
which go to make up that total?


Robert Forke: That figure of $634,699.70
was all that was taken out of the $1,000,000 vote of last year. A balance of $365,300.30 was never withdrawn from the Dominion treasury. The same thing will probably happen next year, and to a larger extent. That amount was made up in the following manner:
Salaries	$ 22,399
Administration and general expenses. .	42,738
Canadian share of passage grant.. ..	532,228
As far as Canada was concerned, the total cost of the assisted passages amounted to $532,228, which is a long way from the $1,000,000 which many members seem to think we are paying for these passage grants. A grant of $20,640 was made to hostels and societies, and our share of the passage loans, which are recoverable, amounted to $16,693.17. That reduces the total expenditure for last year which will not be returned, to $618,592. I think a very careful analysis of the whole Immigration department activities by am expert accountant would be a very good thing, and if it is my luck to present the estimates another year I intend to have that done so that I will be able to show the house that the amount spent on immigration is very much smaller than the estimates would aptpear to indicate.
I would like to point out to the house what the imperial government is contributing to-
Supply-Immigration

wards that amount. The figures I am giving include the whole period during which the Empire Settlement Act has been in force, the last six years. As Minister of Immigration I ha.d no connection with the bringing in of that act. It has been in force for six years and will inn out at the end of the present year. That would be the proper time to take such steps as are being taken here to-night. We have an agreement with the British government which we cannot repudiate and I do not think the hon. member who has moved the amendment realizes that fact.


Robert Gardiner: When does that agreement expire?


Robert Forke: The last day of the present year.


Robert Gardiner: The fiscal or the calendar year?


Robert Forke: It will be the calendar year. That would be the proper time to take such steps as are being taken at the present moment. This government has entered into a bargain with the imperial government which it is in honour bound obliged to carry out. The British government has paid, under this Empire Settlement Act, $4,105,977.43 in loans and passage grants. That expenditure was made in connection with the three thousand family scheme. That passage money will never be repaid, except the small amount which has been loaned, but the land grants will be recoverable. In all the British government has paid out in cash $9,105,977, and of that amount $5,000,000 will be recoverable from those brought out under the three thousand family scheme. I would like the committee to pay attention to this, because it is very important.


The CHAIRMAN:: Order.


Robert Forke: The Dominion government has paid out in passage grants during the six-year period the amount of $1,814,891.40. That is & much smaller amount than the $1,000,000 per year which some members seem to think this country is paying out.


Milton Neil Campbell: Would not the minister classify the grant to the provinces as assisted immigration, just the same as this item?


Robert Forke: They are not the same.


Milton Neil Campbell: You do not consider that grant as assisted immigration at all?


Robert Forke: You mean the $10 we pay for every boy which the province brings out?


Milton Neil Campbell: I think the minister has missed my point.


Robert Forke: You mean the $50,000 we are
paying?


Milton Neil Campbell: Yes.


Robert Forke: I think that is a different thing altogether; that is entirely a Canadian arrangement -and the British government does not come into it at all. We can step out or continue that arrangement just as we see fit. It is an agreement which we have made, open to every province in the Dominion, that the Dominion government will pay 50 per cent of the cost of the repatriation work carried on by the respective provinces.


Milton Neil Campbell: I do not object to the amount at all, but I am saying that if there are objections to this $1,000,000 vote, then the same objections would apply to the $50,000, and my hon. friends raised no objection to that.


Robert Gardiner: Is that $5,000,000 spent by the imperial government expended by the land settlement -board?
Mr. F-ORKE: Yes.


Robert Gardiner: Is that expended for the purpose of acquiring -land?


Robert Forke: No, it is for stock and implements. This is the $1,500 which is loaned under the three thousand family seheme, and it is recoverable.


Robert Gardiner: The different amounts
the minister gave totalled $18,000,000.


Robert Forke: No, $9,000,000.


Robert Gardiner: That is for loans, passage money and so forth. The three items he gave, come to $18,000,000.


Robert Forke: No, there must be a mistake somewhere.


Robert Gardiner: I am speaking now of
the money spent by the imperial government.


Robert Forke: The imperial government
has spent on loans and passage grants $4,105,977.43, and on loans, land grants, $5,000,000, making a total of $9,105,977.43.


Robert Gardiner: I understood the minister gave an item of $9,000,000 for cash advances.


Robert Forke: No, that is the total
amount.


Robert Gardiner: Can the minister give
any information as to the total value of land used by his department for the purpose of settling British settlers under the British land settlement scheme?

Supply-Immigral'ion


Robert Forke: I think we can get that
better when the soldier settlement and land settlement estimates come up. These lands have all been revalued and sold to British settlers on twenty-five-year amortized annual payments.


Robert Gardiner: It does not come
under the empire settlement scheme at all?


Robert Forke: It is part of the empire
settlement scheme. We provide the funds.


Robert Gardiner: The minister has not
the information until we come to the soldier settlement estimates?


Robert Forke: It would be more convenient to get it at that time. I will try to arrange to have it.


Eccles James Gott: Although I have no intention of supporting the amendment, yet I think possibly not the Minister of Immigration, because he may not be here another year, but the department should take heed and discontinue a great deal of the unnecessary expense it is incurring in the United States. In Boston, Columbus, Chicago, Detroit, Fargo, Great Falls, Harrisburg, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Manchester, Omaha, Saginaw, St. Paul, Spokane, Syracuse, San Francisco, Woonsocket-in all these places immigration offices are maintained. I doubt whether there is any business for a number of these immigration offices.


Robert Forke: I went over these item by
item and mentioned all the business done at these offices. If hon. members are not in the house, it is pretty hard to have to go over them the second time.


Eccles James Gott: I notice the minister was not in touch with the situation at the border or at the Detroit office. I would suggest that the Detroit office be moved to Windsor, because that business could be taken care of at Windsor just as well as at Detroit.


Robert Forke: That has all been discussed
with hon. members on my hon. friend's side of the house.


Eccles James Gott: If the minister is not more
closely in touch with the other offices in the United States than he is with the Detroit office, he should not discuss any of them, I notice some huge expenditures in maintaining offices in the United States. In one there are four clerks and in most of them there are one or two clerks and an immigration agent drawing S3,120 a year. Stenographers are maintained; in several offices there is only one, indicating that there is
very little work to be done, and I believe several of these offices could be closed without any loss to the Dominion. In view of the opinions that have been expressed to-night, the department should take heed and reduce these huge expenditures for maintaining offices in the United States.


Robert Forke: There is only one thing I want to say: I know the hon. member will be very sorry if I am not here next year as head of the Immigration department.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then the hon. gentleman is going.


Robert Gardiner: I should like the minr ister to give the committee some further information with regard to the $532,000 paid out for passage grants. How many people came in under this item?


Robert Forke: There is a little difference in the two numbers, owing to the conditions under which they came in. The Canadian statement is 89,321 and the imperial government's is 87,284, a difference of about 2,000. The difference arises in the way some passage grants are paid. Actually 89,321 people came in.


Alfred Speakman: There is just one question I should like to ask in connection with this vote and the amendment. I believe my views are pretty well known; at least, I endeavour to express them clearly. Am I correct in assuming that the larger part of this vote is already under commitment; that is, to fulfil commitments, either legal or moral, with the British government and other organizations, and that this money now is practically morally due; that 'is, that commitments have been entered into covering almost the full extent of the money, which commitments will not be discharged until the end of the present year?


Robert Forke: The hon. member is quite correct. The people are coming in now and getting their passage money at reduced rates under this agreement. I do not think we can do anything but leave the estimate as it is for the present year.


Alfred Speakman: That is what I think. A notice of motion as to a future year's policy might be quite in order, but I feel strongly on the question of the commitments we have entered into and I would hesitate very much before refusing to vote for money which we are almost bound in honour to pay, unless we are prepared to cancel the commitments we have made.
Supply-Immigration


Herbert Bealey Adshead: Con the minister give us the items in regard to assisted passages?


Robert Forke: We have an estimate of $1,000,000.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: But that covers several schemes. How much is for assisted passages?


Robert Forke: That will depend largely on the movement.


Herbert Bealey Adshead: How much was it last year?


Robert Forke: 


Mr. NEILL:: I notice the empire settlement scheme has about run out. When will it finally cease?


Robert Forke: The end of the present year.


Alan Webster Neill: This calendar year?


Robert Forke: Yes.


Robert Gardiner: How is the three thousand family scheme working out?


Robert Forke: That will be better answered under the land settlement estimates.


William Irvine: Would the minister be satisfied if the amendment were carried?


Robert Forke: I certainly would not.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Would the minister tell the committee just how much we are indebted to the British government? Personally I should like to support the amendment before the committee, but I wish to know the actual extent of our commitments, because we cannot break our pledge if we are committed.


Robert Forke: We have been carrying on since the month of January under the present year's estimates and we will carry on until the 31st December of this year. The amount will depend entirely upon the number of immigrants who come out under the assisted passage scheme.


Robert Gardiner: Has the minister been
approached as to any extension of this agreement?


Robert Forke: I do not think so.


Robert Gardiner: Is there any possibility of the minister entering into another such agreement?


Robert Forke: I am not going to promise ahead. I have listened to what has been said in the committee to-night, but I am not going to make any promise.


Robert Gardiner: Will the minister consult the house before making a further agreement?


Robert Forke: If the house was in session I would certainly consult it, but I might be called upon to take the responsibility when the house was not in session. It would be a matter for the government, not the minister, to decide! The minister, of course, has power to enter into an agreement, but from what I have learned and from what I have heard in the house to-night I would not be prepared to enter into any agreement with the British government unless it was an arrangement made with the Canadian government as such.


Robert Gardiner: The minister has evidently heard the opinions that have been expressed here to-night. Before voting on this item I would like some definite information from him. Will he promise to consult the House of Commons before entering into an agreement similar to the one he now 'has?


Robert Forke: If the house is in session it *can be done at the time. The hon. member knows my private opinion about this, and I do not 'think I should be called upon to make a statement as to what I am likely to do twelve mouths henlce. I think the hon. gentleman should be content with that answer. He is asking me to commit myself when I do not know what th'e circumstances will be in the future.


Henry Elvins Spencer: When was this arrangement entered into?


Robert Forke: In 1923.


Henry Elvins Spencer: The reason I ask is this: If the minister intends to make a new arrangement, is he going to make it for one year or for six years, in view of the feeling of the house on this matter?


Robert Forke: I do not think it is fair
for hon. gentlemen to seek to commit me as to what I shall do twelve months hence. I am responsible for what is taking place at the present time, and I feel I would be remiss in my duty if I attempted to say now what I shall do twelve months hence. I do not know what the circumstances will be then.


Robert Gardiner: Would it be asking too much to ask the minister to consult this house before entering into another agreement?


Robert Forke: I believe in parliamentary
government wherever possible.
Mr. NEI'LL: I find myself in a good deal of accord with the remarks of the two hon. gentlemen directly opposite. Apparently this is about the first time that some of the more remote members of the house have had a chance to express themselves on this immigra-

Dominion Elections Act
tion policy, and it is easy to see from the remarks that have been made that hon. gentlemen do not stand for a largely assisted immigration policy. I do not want to embarrass the government if they have made commitments that we must in good faith keep, but I entirely agree with the leader of the Progressive party that we are entitled to some statement, if we vote this money, as to whether we will be consulted before a similar policy is inaugurated in the future. The minister says that we must in good faith pass this estimate, but he can make the same remark next year or the year after. What I would suggest-I do not want to be put in the position of bartering with the government at all-would be that, if we pass this vote to relieve the government of the unpleasant position of having made commitments amid not being able to fulfill them, which we do not want to see, he will very seriously consider the feeling that has been exhibited here to-night and will consult this house before he goes into any extensive system of assisted immigration in the future. Speaking for my district, I have consistently opposed it and I know that that is the feeling of the people I represent. I came out in the steerage myself, unassisted, and nobody hand-fed or paip-fad me when I got here, I am quite wiling that other people should have similar opportunities.
Amendment (Mr. Cahill) negatived.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Chinese immigration-salaries and contingencies, $70,000.
Harry James Barber: I suggest that this item stand because there are several members who wish to discuss it.
Item stands.


Ernest Lapointe: We should like to take up a railway item.


Richard Bedford Bennett: You can only take
supply for a department with respect 'to which the motion to leave the chair was made.


Ernest Lapointe: On Thursday and
Friday-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Thursday and Friday,
automatically.


Ernest Lapointe: But to-day we can
take any department.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, not any department. You cannot go into supply for any department without a motion previously made.


Charles Avery Dunning: The motion is general, and the estimates of any department can be taken up.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not think so.



RAILWAYS

John Frederick Johnston: Vote No. 93, page 28 of the estimates:
Canadian Government Railways: to provide for additional ear ferry and facilities for car ferry service between the mainland and Prince Edward Island, $3,500,000.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Wednesday, May 29, 1929