1931-03-27

[Stage Direction]
A message from the Deputy of the Administrator, transmitting supplementary estimates for the financial year ending March 31, 1931, was presented by Right Hon. R. B. Bennett (Minister of Finance), read by Mr. Speaker to the house and referred to the committee of supply.
A message from the Deputy of the Administrator, transmitting further supplementary estimates for the financial year ending March 31, 1931, was presented by Right Hon. R. B. Bennett (Minister of Finance) and read by Mr. Speaker to the house.
Mr. BENNETT moved that the estimates be referred to the committee of supply.
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: On the motion of my right hon. friend (Mr. Bennett), I believe it has been customary in the past to have estimates which relate to the Canadian National Railways referred to a special committee of the house which deals with the national railway estimates. Has my hon. friend considered that point?


Mr. BENNETT:: It has not been the practice in the past to refer all supplementary estimates in that way. This is an estimate to take care of situations which have arisen 22110-23J
during the past year and with respect to which the provision made by parliament was not found ample. The railway company asked that this provision be supplemented by the sums mentioned, as will be observed in the estimates themselves. I did not look it up myself, but my information is that with respect to the supplementary estimates it has not been customary to refer them to the select committee, because frequently the committee has not been set up by the time the estimate is required to be passed in order to make it available during the current year. Perhaps my right hon. friend will observe that there is a provision making this estimate available until the end of May, although practically all sums have been expended already or the liabilities have been incurred for which the money is required. Particularly is that so with regard to the largest item, which arises from the shortage of traffic as compared with last year, and the resulting increase in the deficit^


Mr. DUFF:: These items can be discussed when the committee meets.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Certainly.


Hon. CHARLES STEWART (West Edmonton) :: But surely my hon. friend is not asking for supply by way of supplementary estimates to go beyond March 31.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, only with respect to the railways. My hon. friend will observe these words in the estimates:
Further amount required, in addition to the sum of $51,600,000 already appropriated, due to increase in the amount of deficit arising from operations in the year 1930, $11,410,400.85.
There are these further words also:
Notwithstanding the provisions of the Consolidated Revenue and Audit Act, this appropriation shall not lapse before May 31, 1931.


Charles A. Stewart: But that is not a supplementary.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That has been done before, and the reason is that the obligations have been created. The bills are not all in and will not be in by Tuesday next, and therefore it is desired to have until May 31 to audit the accounts and make the payments. When the bill comes before the house, if the house thinks such a provision-which is purely a matter of bookkeeping to facilitate the operations of the company-should not be there, it can be dealt with later. The estimate does not bind the house.
Supplementary Estimates


Sir EUGENE FISET:: Will these estimates be distributed?


Richard Bedford Bennett: They are in the distribution office now.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: May I point
out to my right hon. friend that the estimates now being presented always will be taken as relating to the fiscal year ending March 31. For that reason it is desirable in every way that if moneys are to apply to the next fiscal year or to another year they should be voted from estimates presented to the house as relating to that fiscal year. I hope my right hon. friend will consider that point between now and Monday next


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not desire to trespass upon the time of the house but I think perhaps my right hon. friend did not follow what I was saying a moment ago. The amounts covered by these estimates have been spent, or the deficits have arisen, but all the bills have not come in as yet. The accounts must 'be audited before payment is made, and unless some provisions of this sort were made, after Tuesday next they would have accounts which they could not pay but which had been incurred during the year that is past. I assure my right hon. friend that the matter will 'be discussed again in the select committee as usual, and my information from the railway company is very explicit that this does not cover a single dollar chargeable to any year except 1930 I think I might add that the year of the railway is the calendar year, and not our fiscal year.


Charles A. Stewart: I just want to remark that this is unusual, owing to the fact that the railway accounting, while not presented with the general accounting of the government, carried the same restriction, if my memory serves me right. You are asking for thirty days longer for the railway than is allowed in the government.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

['I shall see that the omission i*s repaired. My recollection of the minister s answer was, that he had answered the question day before yesterday.']
Richard Bedford Bennett: That this house will at the next sitting resolve itself into a committee to consider the ways and means for raising the supply to be granted to His Majesty.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
IMr. Bennett.]

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ROBERT GARDINER (Acadia):: I
wish to direct to the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) a question predicated upon a telegram received from Rome this morning, as follows:
European delegates outlined plans for boycott of overseas wheat as means of protecting their own agricultural industries. Despatch continues:	"Overseas delegates from Canada,
etc., listened grimly to the exposition of the plan." Preferential wheat tariff agreement among European nations discussed to shut out importations and provide for consumption of European crop at home.
Has the Prime Minister received any message along these lines, and if so will the government take proper action as soon as possible?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No intimation of any such action has been received by the government, but those of us who have followed the discussions that were antecedent to the congress at Rome of the European wheat-growing countries are familiar with just what the telegram indicates, and the fact that they have re-asserted the position at Rome does not in any sense indicate that it is acceptable to others than themselves any more than to us when it was originally put forward.


INTERNATIONAL BANK
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: A despatch from London
this morning states:
Montagu Norman, governor of the Bank of England, who is now on his way to the United States, is going to New York in connection with a proposal for establishment of an international bank to finance trade with new markets, primarily with Soviet Russia.
I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether Canada has been requested to participate in this arrangement.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The answer is in the negative.


MERGER OF PAPER COMPANIES
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. PETER HEENAN (Kenora-Rainy River):: I wish to direct the attention of
the government to what I consider a great

Merger of Paper Companies
national question. In the Globe of yesterday it is reported that a merger of plants is contemplated by the paper companies of Canada involving $690,000,000. The article goes on to give the names of the companies, with their assets. What I am most concerned about is this sentence:
It was considered probable that many operating economies would result from a fusion, principally by closing high cost mills and concentrating operations at the low cost plants.
I would point out to the government that many towns have been established and many families throughout Canada are living at high cost plants, and I am wondering whether the government would undertake, through the Combines Investigation Act or some other machinery, to see that the public is protected.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The question of the construction of
paper mills has been a provincial matter, except with respect to mills in the province of Manitoba. The hon. gentleman knows that it was under his regime that the situation to which reference is made came about, and I know of no power at the moment that lodges in the federal authority which would prevent a mill being shut down. This is a matter over which apparently the provincial governments would have control, being a question of civil rights. The government have no knowledge beyond what appears in the press, and have no reason to know whether it may or may not be an accurate statement of the situation. The Combines Investigation Act clearly would have no application to it.


CATTLE BREEDING CENTRES
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. T. F. DONNELLY (Willow Bunch):: I wish to ask a question of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir). I understand that the federal government is willing to pay freight on approved breeding cattle between the ages of eight months and five years from eastern provinces to the west. These cattle are to be inspected, tested and certified. Does this apply also to the stock within western provinces, or inter-provineially in the west, and if not, why not?


Hon. ROBERT WEIR (Minister of Agriculture) :: It applies to stock to be used for
the establishment of breeding centres and is applicable not only from the east to the west but inter-provincially in the prairie provinces, and also from British Columbia to the prairie provinces.


Thomas F. Donnelly: The minister says the
rate applies inter-provincially. Does it apply within the provinces as well?


Robert Weir: Yes, within the
prairie provinces.


Thomas F. Donnelly: Within each province?


Robert Weir: Each province.


WINNIPEG VETCRAFT SHOP
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. L. BEAUBIEN (Provencher):: 
Mr. SPEAKER:: I shall see that the omission i*s repaired. My recollection of the minister s answer was, that he had answered the question day before yesterday.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
William Lyon Mackenzie King: So that we may know the order of business for Monday-I may not have an opportunity of asking my right hon. friend at the close of the day-is it the desire of the government to proceed with a consideration of the supplementary estimates as the first order on Monday, or will they come on later in the day?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I thank the right hon. gentleman for bringing up the question. I was going to confer with him this afternoon and ask which would be more acceptable.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: If they were taken up at eight o'clock that would be the more acceptable time.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am entirely in the right hon. gentleman's hands. I thought that if the Senate sat we would consider the estimates in the afternoon and have them disposed of. If it would not be trespassing too far on the right hon. gentleman's indulgence we could take up the estimates first and that would
Privilege-Mr. Dorian

enable us, possibly, to have the Senate dispose of them that afternoon, providing we got through with them.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I have not had an opportunity of looking over the estimates carefully. I imagine they are not controversial to any extent, but we might desire to get information on some of the items before agreeing to their being passed. With this understanding it would be acceptable that they should be the first order of business.


Richard Bedford Bennett: If it is acceptable to the right hon. gentleman and his friends and to my hon. friend from Acadia (Mr. Gardiner), we will proceed with the supplementary estimates immediately on the orders of the day being icalled. But if that inconveniences my hon. friends we will go on in the evening, because it is a matter of consent and we are in their hands.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The estimates are being distributed now. This is Friday and a number of hon. members may not have an opportunity of seeing them until Monday. We might have it understood that we shall proceed with .the estimates the first thing on Monday afternoon. So long as it is known that the desired information will be forthcoming, and hon. members are able to obtain the estimates at once, that will be satisfactory.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I thank my right hon. friend. His cooperation is very much appreciated, because we shall be able to get the matter disposed of promptly.
PRIVILEGE-Mr. DORION
On the orders of the day:


Mr. C. N. DORION (Quebec-Montmor-ency) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to
a question of privilege. "Le Soleil" of Quebec, in its issue of Wednesday, March 25, in its account of the debates of this house, ascribes to me statements which are absolutely false. In its headlines of the debates account, we find the following words:
The member for Quebec county, Mr. Dorion will not tell the house whether he approves or not of Anderson, the Conservative leader of Saskatchewan, in his attack against the French Canadians.
I state, sir, that this is false, like other statements which this newspaper is in the habit of publishing. The hon. member for Joliette asked me the following question:
Does the hon. member approve or not of the acts of Anderson?

I answered:
I shall say to the hon. member for Joliette that he will have my answer in due time and place.
At page 301 of Hansard will be found what I said in this respect; it was in answer to the hon. member for Joliette.
I long for the dawn of the same intelligent spirit in Saskatchewan, for the disapproval of the mean and narrow-minded persecution of all we hold dear.
I again say that the statement of this newspaper is absolutely false, it is moreover a habit of the Soleil and its reporter.


Mr. BOUCHARD (Kamouraska) (Translation) :: What are the things which are dear
to you?


Charles Napoléon Dorion: I think it is unnecessary to give further explanations to the hon. member for Kamouraska. He is sufficiently intelligent to understand the sense of my words.



SPEECH FROM THE THRONE


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Thursday, March 26, consideration of the motion of Mr. Max D. Cormier for an address to His Excellency the Administrator in reply to his speech at the opening of the session, and the proposed amendment thereto of Mr. Mackenzie King.
Hon. IAN MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre) :: Mr. Speaker, in making a humble contribution to the debate on the address in reply, I re-echo the sentiments of those who have spoken before me and extend my personal congratulations to the mover (Mr. Cormier) and the seconder (Mr. Porteous) of the address in reply. May I also re-echo the sentiments expressed yesterday by the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) in regard to the wonderful fluency and felicity of diction demonstrated by those who are privileged to use both the official languages of this house. In taking part for the first time in a major debate in this august assembly, may I crave the indulgence of this house in that I am not permitted to address it in my own native tongue.
Your Honour has received already congratulations from some of the hon. members representing the eastern portions of Canada; may I be permitted to speak for those of us who come from British Columbia, and in a very special and personal way extend to Your Honour our most sincere congratulations and our high appreciation of the distinction you have earned to the honourable office you now occupy.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)
If the right hon. the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) had been present in the house-I regret very much to observe his absence-I would have identified myself with the hon. member for South Huron (Mr. McMillan) in extending the congratulations of those of us on this side upon his elevation to membership in the Imperial Privy Council, this being, in my opinion, the highest honour which can be shown to any British subject. I think the hope can be expressed, even from the opposition benches, that this is only the precursor of further honours which will be extended to the right hon. gentleman from the highest source in the British Empire..
I think I may be permitted to speak for every hon. member in this house in regretting that the former Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Malcolm) and the present Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens) are both absent from this house through illness. One of these hon. gentlemen is a valued personal friend of mine while the other is a much respected political foe. I think it is the. unanimous wish of this assembly that both these hon. gentlemen may be restored to the full vigour of perfect health and that they may be able to resume their duties for Canada with the same industry, activity and energy which have always characterized their activities in the service of the nation.
Before dealing with the national issues, which are involved in the consideration of the address in reply, perhaps this house will pardon me if I voice very briefly the sentiments of British Columbia in regard to two or three questions which are possibly more provincial than national. I invite the generous and sympathetic consideration of this house to a transportation question which vitally affects greater Vancouver. A bill will be presented to this house later on in the session, the passage of which will affect 300,000 people. On September 19, 1930, the Second Narrows bridge was destroyed by a ship in tow. This bridge involves an investment of $2,000,000 made by the municipalities surrounding greater Vancouver. This transportation facility is vital and essential to our community and to our municipal and corporate life. At this time I invite the generous and sympathetic consideration of the house to this measure when it is presented.
In discussing the matter of the fisheries of British Columbia, perhaps I may have the attention of the hon. Minister of Fisheries (Mr. Rhodes). I take this opportunity of congratulating .the hon. minister upon the wonderful impression he made during his visit to my province. He was neither too big nor too distant to refuse to meet any delegation, and I trust that he will carry out his promise that after this present session of parliament he will make a somewhat prolonged stay in our province and thus become familiar with one of the most important natural resources there is on the Pacific coast.
I would sound one note of warning to the hon. minister; we believe in the conservation of our fisheries, but we believe also with equal sincerity in the preservation of the white fishing population, amounting to 20,000. I protest against the introduction of any processes of super-mechanization into our fishing industry which would imperil the existence and livelihood of some of the finest men we have in the country, men who contribute to the life of the province and to the life and food supply of this Dominion of Canada.
I desire to say a word to the hon. Minister of Mines (Mr. Gordon) in regard to a suggestion which I believe has come already to his attention; I refer to the opinion held by economists in regard to the world's gold supply. I have been led to believe-the hon. minister will correct me if I am wrong-that at the present time Canada is second in gold production. South Africa, which is first in this production, faces a gradual exhaustion of her supply, and in this connection I would like to quote the words of the president of the Canadian Bank of Commerce, who recently said:
Within the next decade the gold production of Canada might reach $100,000,000, so greater research work should be carried on and every support given prospecting for minerals in new fields.
Mr. S. H. Logan, in speaking in the capital on a recent occasion is reported as saying:
"A possible shortage of gold might be averted by international action in subsidizing prospectors. Such action" he declared "would be of great benefit to Canada where gold mining was developing into one of the country's leading industries."
I would make a suggestion to the hon. minister, one with which I believe Your Honour is already acquainted, that during this coming session this administration assists in the transporting of let us say, fifty prospectors into that district in the northeastern portion of British Columbia and the southeastern portion of the Yukon. This territory, with which Your Honour is acquainted, is 100 miles wide by 250 miles long and most glowing reports have been received in regard to the possibilities of gold discovery and production. An investment by this government of the small sum of $35,000 would finance a monthly service of two aeroplanes, with a base at White Horse in Your Honour's constituency. This would permit of fifty or sixty prospectors
360	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)
entering the territory immediately, whereas ordinarily it would take them from four to six weeks. It would assist unemployment in that district and might lead to the discovery of further gold producing areas which would be a great asset for the Dominion.
My fourth point is not only of interest to the province of British Columbia but is in every way a national question. I refer to the completion of an outlet from the Peace River district to the Pacific coast. In this connection I desire to repeat a pledge given by the right hon. the Prime Minister, speaking in the name of the Conservative party, in his famous Winnipeg speech. I refer to pledge No. S, which is as follows:
We pledge ourselves to the improvement of the whole scheme of Canadian transportation, northward by the completion of the Hudson Bay route, and the construction of such branches as may be necessary to render it readily available to any part of Canada.
The following are the words I am going to emphasize this afternoon:
.... to the Pacific slope by a Peace River ontiet and east and west by the development of the St. Lawrence waterways and we pledge ourselves to aid existing traffic channels and to increase port facilities on the great lakes, Hudson bay and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and to the establishment of a national highway system.
Subsequently to that pledge written by the Prime Minister in his own hand on that occasion, he said, speaking at Renfrew on the 16th day of July, 1930:
These pledges I have made and by these I stand or fall.
Speaking in the house on September 9, 1930, at the special session, he said:
It must be remembered that promises with respect to policies are matters of profound importance to the Canadian people and the policies we promised to put into effect we propose to put into effect immediately.
I commend to the Minister of Railways (Mr. Manion) that word "immediately." It sounds to me somewhat different from the easy, amiable and progressive steps mentioned in the speech from the throne. Again, as reported on page 39 of Hansard of the special session, the Prime Minister said:
[DOT]	, s|lah content myself with saying to the
right non. leader of the opposition that we will keep the promises we made.
Again as reported on page 40, he said:
They were the proposals which were before the people, about which the people had information and which, with the return of this party to power, they expect us to consider. M'e will endeavour to carry out the proposals submitted to the electors.

Again in regard to the most vital point of all, the Peace River outlet, the Prime Minister, speaking at North Vancouver on .Tune IS, 1930, said:
After I am Prime Minister on July 28 I will see that my promises are carried out or the government will go out of power trying to do so.
Speaking on behalf of the far western province of British Columbia-and I am not speaking in a partisan spirit-I say we deeply and emphatically regret the absence from the speech from the throne of any reference to the contemplated policy of the administration in regard to this outlet. I should like to advise the administration that the construction of this outlet is of tremendous and vital importance, not only to British Columbia, but to the whole of the Dominion of Canada, By embarking upon such a scheme they would be doing something towards solving the great problem of unemployment we have at the present time in British Columbia, and at the same time they would be building up a veritable and valuable empire in that wonderful Peace River country.
I pass on to the national questions that are involved in the speech from the throne. First of all I come to the question of unemployment. We have been debating the issue in the house for the last three weeks and so far no mention has been made by the administration of what their policies are to be for the current year in regard to meeting national necessities in connection with unemployment. I do not think the house should permit this debate to be concluded until the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) explains his policy in regard to remedying agricultural conditions throughout Canada and until the Acting Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) explains the intentions of the administration in regard to meeting a worse situation than confronted us last September at the special session. I wish to register an emphatic protest against the continued absence from the house of the Prime Minister. I well recall during last September, when we were discussing the urgency of the Prime Minister proceeding to the Imperial conference, the right hon. gentleman arose in his place and told the house that he considered his duty to Canada was to remain inside the House of Commons rather than go to the Imperial conference in England.


Mr. BELL (St. Antoine):: Not those words.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The
statement will be found in Hansard of the special session. I submit to the Minister of

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)
Railways and Canals that the unemployment situation is much worse in Canada than it was last September. I can quote him figures to prove that such is the case in my own province and other provinces, and if it were necessary for the Prime Minister to be in the house during the special session of parliament, surely it is necessary for him to be here at the present time, because members of all parties are endeavouring to do the best they can to remedy the tremendous national economic condition now confronting us.


An hon. MEMBER:: He is better employed.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is
an insult to parliament. No member can be better employed than in occupying the seat with which the people who have sent him here have honoured him. It is useful now to recall the pledges that were made. I am sorry the Prime Minister is not present, but I suppose the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie), the Minister of Fisheries (Mr. Rhodes) and the Minister of Railways and Canals will assume responsibility for every word uttered by the Prime Minister during the campaign. They must do that or deny his leadership. What were those pledges? Speaking in his own city of Calgary on the 12th June, the Prime Minister said:
This is a new country and there is no excuse for unemployment in Canada if a government does its duty.
These words are either true or they are untrue. If they were untrue then, the Prime Minister was guilty of what he accused me of the other day when, on this resolution, he used the word "deception" in regard to myself. If they were true then, they are true now, and I wish to repeat them for the benefit of the judicial mind of the Minister of Justice:
This is a new country and there is no excuse for unemployment in Canada if a government does its duty.
Speaking again in Edmonton on the 13th day of June, the Prime Minister said:
I say again that I will call parliament together at the earliest possible moment to provide at once the remedy-employment for all who can and will work.
Employment for all who can and will work! What is the condition of Canada to-day? I shall come to that in a moment or two. Then he went back to my beautiful province of British Columbia, and speaking in Victoria on June 17, he said:
Is there any excuse for Canada to have hard times-if the government is discharging its duty as it should?


An hon. MEMBER:: No.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Then
the hon. member is going back on his own leader. The statement I have quoted was true or it was untrue. This is a declaration made by the leader of the Conservative party, the Prime Minister of Canada. If it were true in June, 1930, it is equally true in March, 1931. Again, in Vancouver, the Prime Minister speaking on the 18th June, 1930, is reported in the Vancouver Sun as follows:
He would undertake for instance completion of a highway across Canada from Cape Breton to Vancouver.
Where, oh where, is the Canadian national highway of which we have heard so much 1


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I trust,
Mr. Speaker, you will not put against my valuable time these valueless interruptions.
The Prime Minister said at Moncton, New Brunswick, as reported in the Canadian Press of July 10, 1930:
The Conservative party is going to find work for all who are willing to work.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I wish bon. members would go to their own constituencies and applaud that sentiment today. I wish they would greet it with applause in the presence of the thousands of starving people in the city of Vancouver, for instance. They dare not do it. The Prime Minister continued:
Mr. King promises to give consideration to the problem of unemployment. I promise to end unemployment.
I ask the Minister of Railways and Canals, (Mr. Manion) one of the most brilliant debaters on the other side of the house, does he subscribe to that sentiment of his leader? What did his leader mean by saying that he was going to end unemployment?


An hon. MEMBER:: When?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Immediately. At page 63 of Hansard of the special session last September the right hon. the Prime Minister said:
I find that at present in the province of Alberta there are 5,155 unemployed; during the winter it is contemplated that that number will reach 6,650.
I would ask my hon. friends from Alberta if there are not more than six thousand unemployed in that province to-day. I know there are.


An hon. MEMBER:: How do you know?
382	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Because I have seen the official figures. The Prime Minister went on:
In British Columbia at the present time the unemployed number 7,692, and it is expected that during the winter that number will increase to 14,700.
At the present time, Mr. Speaker, according to a recent statement made by the Minister of Labour of the province of British Columbia, there are over twenty thousand unemployed' in my province. That shows the success of the policies of the right hon. gentleman. The Prime Minister then goes on to give the total figures:
It will be observed that the present number is something over 117,000, and it is believed "at that number will approximate 177,000 dur-mg the winter. If the measures which we submit to this house are productive of the good which we anticipate, we hope that that uumber will steadily decrease, rather than increase, and that the maximum anticipated number of 1/7,000 will not be reached. . . . The figure ot 200,000 would seem to me to be almost incredible in this country at this time.
But, Mr. Speaker, the fact is that if you make a careful examination of the unemployment situation throughout Canada to-day, you will find that there are over 300,000 unemployed throughout the Dominion. So I am .forced to this conclusion, that the government has failed absolutely and completely not only bo end unemployment, but even to remedy it, as promised by the Prime Minister during the election campaign; and secondly, that the policies which the government adopted in the special session for that purpose have been proven a gigantic and grotesque failure.
I wish now to approach a phase of the situation which possibly may not disturb so seriously the tender susceptibilities of hon. gentlemen opposite. I wish to review the present situation in the light of world conditions, because despite the accusations unfairly and unwarrantably made against the late administration by the right hon. the Prime Minister and his colleagues, blaming the late government for the conditions of depression which we have had during the last twelve months, I for one believe that the present situation has been mainly, if not practically entirely, caused by world-wide conditions. But, sir, the situation in the Dominion of Canada has been intensified and accentuated by the hopeless tariff policies initiated by this government last September, which have put ramparts of ruin around the Dominion and exhausted the consuming and purchasing power of the ordinary Canadian worker. I desire now to place upon Hansard, 
without comment, the causes of the worldwide depression, as I have culled them from some of the leading economists of the world:
1.	Stock gambling and deflation of unwarranted stock values, and withdrawal of credit improperly extended;
2.	Shortage of purchasing power due to defective distribution of credit;
3.	Under consumption due to lack of confidence or loss of purchasing power;
4.	Overproduction in natural resources products, manufactured commodities, buildings and industrial equipment;
5.	Tariff walls prohibitory to trade;
6.	Modern efficiency in business and industry increasing production and distribution per man;
7.	Failure of the established foundation of credit, due to
(a)	Return to the gold standard
(b)	Shortage of gold
(c)	Mal-distribution of gold
(d)	Failure to accept silver as a support for gold in foundationing credit and currency.
8.	National debts;
9.	Inevitable decline of confidence as a reaction from the previous undue optimism;
16. Rise and aggressiveness of Russia.
I should like to summarize those ten causes under three heads. The real cause of the depression to-day-this is not my own opinion, but one I have gathered from the various authorities which I have consulted-has been, first, the appalling national obligations now extant; secondly, the impossibility of distributing the limited supply of gold to meet the credit demands that the liquidation period has developed; and thirdly, the rise of Russia as a force and power in international affairs and world trade.


An hon. MEMBER:: What about the
change of government?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: World
conditions will operate whether you have a Liberal or Conservative government in power, but I say that the policies of the present government have accentuated the conditions of depression throughout the Dominion.
I desire to commend a quotation that was given in this ddbate by the hon member for Macleod (Mr. Coote). He quoted the following from Viscount D'Abernon's Economic Crisis, Its Causes and its Cure:
If you desire a return to good market conditions in cotton or wheat or any other commodity-higher freights and more trade activity, you will achieve this with greater certainty and greater speed by dealing with the gold and currency problem than by any other means. A fearless scientific diagnosis is the first step.

The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)
I want to suggest to the house a very important consideration at the present time. We are aware that the gold delegation of the financial committee of the League of Nations has presented an authoritative report dealing with world gold stocks. The Bank of International Settlements has already been established in a very limited way, but it is hoped that it will develop into a real international bank through which, by international cooperation, world credit and world currency may find a real international foundation. Hon. gentlemen may be aware that the international chambers of commerce of the world are meeting in Washington on the 6th day of May next to consider the question of the international monetary system. I think that some time during the present session this parliament might very well be advised to make representations perhaps to the imperial parliament with a view to calling a conference of the parliaments of the empire or a world conference to discuss the international monetary system.
That brings me back, Mr. Speaker, from the world situation to the Domiinon of Canada. Many concrete suggestions have been made during the course of this debate. Some hon. gentlemen have suggested that we change the gold standard. Others have urged a remonetization of silver, and others that we should depreciate our currency. Some hon. members have made attacks upon our Canadian banks in the course of this debate. I am not concerned with the equity or inequity of these attacks, but I do believe that our Canadian banking system is tremendously involved in the present causes of depression in the Domiinon of Canada. I am going to make a suggestion to this house at this time. I am not going so far as to advocate the depreciation of our currency, the abandonment of the gold standard, or the re-monetization of silver at the present time, but I do say that when we complain about our banks in Canada it should be remembered that during the present crisis, whereas in the great republic to the south of us some $900,000,000 of depositors money has been jeopardized, in Canada not a single bank has endangered a single cent of its depositors' money; so I think we have reason to be proud of our banking system. But let us remember this, that the depositor of to-day may be the borrower of to-morrow. I believe that the Prime Minister, who is also the Minister of Finance, should immediately confer with financial authorities throughout Canada and with the Canadian banks, because it is absolutely unfair and unjust if through the action of Canadian banks men
in all the industries of Canada are to be squeezed out of existence during the next twelve or eighteen months. I therefore suggest to the government-I am not advocating it in any dogmatic way-the advisability of contemplating the practicability of a qualified moratorium on capital accounts for a limited period. That, of course, would have nothing to do with interest, and there would have to be safeguards established with regard to depositors' investments; new loans must not be endangered; and the moratorium would not apply to enterprises where there was not a reasonable prospect of recovering the security. I should like to suggest that in a most friendly spirit to the hon. the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) who is at the present time acting leader of the government. Now, sir, I suggest, instead of the spurious protection afforded by the policy of tariff tinkering to specialized and favorite industries that this would be a real policy of protection to legitimate industries throughout the Dominion of Canada. We heard the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) say that conditions were not so bad in the province of Saskatchewan. I have before me, Mr. Speaker, the votes and proceedings of the legislature of Saskatchewan dated March 2, 1931. This document contains an amendment moved by a member of the Saskatchewan administration, which reads as follows:
That in the opinion of this assembly-
And I would ask hon. members to remember that this resolution is moved in the face of the wonderful prosperity of the province of Saskatchewan at the present time brought about through the efforts of a Tory government.
That in the opinion of this assembly the government should call a further creditor and debtor conference with the object of evolving some practical scheme for the rearrangement or readjustment of indebtedness and that the government of Saskatchewan request the government of Canada to establish without delay a commission (similar to the Duncan commission in the Maritime provinces) such commission. when established, to investigate as speedily as possible eoonomic conditions in western Canada with particular reference to:
(a)	Cost of production of western farm products.
(b)	Cost to western consumers of goods purchased by them.
(c)	Freight rates in western Canada both incoming and outgoing and generally within the western provinces.
(d)	Interest rates.
(e)	Debt adjustment and amortization of debts and readjustment and amortization of loans on farm lands.
(f)	Home and export marketing of western
products.	.
(g)	Relation of the tariff to the economic welfare of the west.
364	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. Mackenzie (Vancouver)
(h)	All other matters having to do with the welfare of the primary products or affecting western economic conditions.
(i)	In the event of the government of Canada failing to implement this resolution the government of the province of Saskatchewan be instructed to approach the governments of British Columbia, Alberta and Manitoba, with a view to the appointment of such commission by the western provinces.
So, Mr. Speaker, seven, months after this marvellous increase in the tariff made last September by lion, gentlemen opposite and the wonderful panacea for our troubles advocated principally by my hon. friend from Regina (Mr. Turnbull) we have the Tory government of Saskatchewan, with his own political bedmate as premier of the province, asking this administration for a royal commission to investigate what, if you please?- an adjustment of the tariff to suit the economic welfare of the west.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: During
the debate I heard the voice of the hon. member for Stormont (Mr. Shaver) who tried to tell this house that if the one and a half million dozen eggs which were imported this year in excess of last year were allowed still to enter Canada that tremendously high price of eight or nine cents per dozen the farmers are to-day receiving for eggs in Canada would have been cut in two. I wonder if the hon. gentleman knows the extent of egg production in Canada per annum? I wonder if he knows that the egg production and consumption in Canada are practically equivalent, about three hundred million dozen per year. So hon. members will see that the one and one-half million dozen eggs to which my hon. friend referred so eloquently and affectionately mean one and one-half day's consumption by the people of Canada. I leave it to members of this house to contemplate the absurdity of my hon. friend's suggestion.
I wish to say a word or two in regard to the Russian situation which has been mentioned so frequently during the debate. Frankly I may say to the administration that possibly I appreciate very fully the motives which underly the adoption of this policy. On the other hand, sir, in view of statements we have heard during the debate I think it is the most fatuous policy ever adopted by a supposedly sane and sensible administration. Now. Mr. Speaker, what do we find to-day in the United States? I have before me a very recent report in regard to Russia and the United States. I read as follows:
For the next twenty-five years Russia will be a great competitor ....

And the house probably knows that the plan in Russia is not necessarily a five year plan but a twenty-five year plan. The present five year plan is only one unit of the whole scheme. To return to the quotation:
For the next twenty-five years Russia will be a great competitor, there is no doubt about that. But can we afford in times of such appalling unemployment and depression to forego during the next twenty-five years this tremendous trade opportunity? Sir Henry Deterding said one of the great causes of the depression was the fact that we had removed from the markets of the world 150.000,000 customers.
Remember that last year the United States did a business with Russia totalling over $145,000,000; that United States exports to Russia were over 64 times her imports from the United States; that there rvere over forty-four of the largest American companies doing business with Russia on a long-term credit plan; that Russians now owe their forty-four large concerns over $170,000,000; that the United States government does not recognize Russia but her business men are investing their capital and doing business there-that Colonel Cooper who is helping to build the largest hydro-electric plant in the world on the Dnieper river, said at the Senate commission the other day that in five years Russia will buy from the United States a billion dollars worth of goods annually.
Mr. Speaker, I suggest to hon. members opposite that despite the possibly commend' able motives which have influenced the action of the government, this policy is going to be detrimental to the interests of Canada because we will be forced to face more ruthless competition in the markets of the world for our surplus products. Now, Mr. Speaker before I conclude-


Mr. ROBINSON:: What does Mr. Tas-chereau think about it?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I am glad to hear that the administration is prepared to take a lesson or two from the Prime Minister of Quebec. We had during this debate a most marvellous spectacle. First there was the contribution made by the hon. member for Montmagny (Mr. LaVcrgne); then we had the contribution made by the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull). In my mind's eye I could see a new form of unity springing up in the Dominion of Canada. Here we have in the centre that great stalwart, the right hon. the Prime Minister of Canada (Mr. Bennett). On his right is his political henchman Premier Anderson of Saskatchewan. On his left sits his own appointee to the deputy Speakership of this house, the hon. member for Montmagny (Mr. LaVergne). "Unity in diversity" as Lord Milner said many years

The Address-Mr. Lucas
ago! I can imagine the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) introducing this trio to the Dominion of Canada, and the song they sing would be:
Behold how good a thing it is And how becoming well Together such as brethren are In unity to dwell.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: And to make the picture complete, for the sake of unity in Canada, we would have the hon. member for Long Lake (Mr. Cowan) taking up the collection.
My time is about gone, Mr. Speaker. Hon. members from Quebec have already deprecated the attacks on the memory of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, but perhaps I, coming from the far west, may add a meed of praise to that great memory. Surely we have sufficient contention amongst the living here to keep us from stirring up the ashes of our great dead throughout the Dominion of Canada. Laurier to-day is of the immortals, and his example and inspiration will always be something to guide us as a beacon light throughout future years, under the splendid leadership of my right hon. leader the hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Mackenzie King).
I wish to conclude my contribution to this debate with a statement of that great Englishman, Right Hon. Stanley Baldwin:
Canadians, the future is with you. Do not be in too much of a hurry. Your country is for the virile men. Let it be filled with the best. What does one hundred or two hundred years matter before your country is full? Keep the stock that you have and the men and women you have, and see that your future generations are in no way inferior to them. Time is on your side. Maintain your values and your standards, and may your prayers be that of the Greek sailor which lias been preserved by Seneca:
'Oh God, you may save me if you will, you may sink me if you will, but whatever happens I will always keep my rudder true.'


Mr. W. T. LUCAS (Camrose):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to offer my congratulations to the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Mackenzie) on the very excellent effort he has just made in delivering his maiden speech in a major debate in this house.
Parliament meets this year, Mr. Speaker, under circumstances differing perhaps from those under which the representatives of the Canadian people have ever met before. It is true that we have had depressions in the past from which we have temporarily emerged, but it is doubtful if we have ever been involved in
such world wide depression with so much unemployment in the midst of so much plenty in every industrial country in the world, and in which our whole social and capitalistic system has been challenged so strongly. Every thoughtful person admits the gravity of the situation and yet, Mr. Speaker, it is most discouraging to find, that while we meet here to grapple with and if possible solve the problems which confront us and give a lead to the people who are worrying and struggling to carry on, so much of our time is wasted in political, party warfare, wrangling over tariff issues and trying to decide how the last election was won, instead of endeavoring to make a proper diagnosis of our real problems and then dealing with them in a scentific and business like manner. I do not believe the people of Canada are at all interested in holding post-mortems over the results of the last election but they are interested in getting relief measures dealt with at this session of Parliament.
We have been attaching too much importance to the question of tariffs. These periodical depressions have taken place at times when tariffs were not such an important factor as they are to-day. It is my opinion that a proper diagnosis will show that dur major problems arise from sources other than the tariff. The same unemployment conditions exist in free trade England as exist in 'protected countries. Different countries have different fiscal policies, but they are all suffering in the same way. Most countries have the same monetary and financial system, based on the gold standard, so it would seem to me that a greater study of this question by this house would bring about more useful results than spending so much time in connection with tariffs, especially when we consider the time that has been spent on this question in this house and throughout the country for the last fifty years, and the meagre results that have been obtained. Lord D'Abernon, a well known English financier and diplomat gives two causes for the present world depression. The first cause he gives is a crisis in currency, and the second is a crisis in indebtedness. He attributes our currency trouble to the gold standard, and when we find two countries in the world to-day controlling approximately CO per cent of the gold, one is inclined to believe there is a great deal in his contention.
With the consent of the house I wish to read a short extract from an address delivered by Lord D'Abernon before the Liverpool chamber of commerce. He had this to say, in part:
We are in the midst of a severe crisis which affects industry, commerce and finance. It can-
The Address-Mr. Lucas

not be said that this crisis is more severe than others which have been experienced before and surmounted, but it is differentiated from them by certain marked features. It affects practically the whole industrial world, unemployment in the United States of America and Germany being, so far as we can ascertain, equal in amount to this country, if not greater.
Another peculiarity of the crisis is that, so far from being produced by scarcity or bad harvest or political disturbances, it occurs during a period of full production, both agricultural and industrial; it does not proceed from any dearth or insufficiency, nor has it been caused by political disturbance or labour unrest. On the one side we have a plentiful harvest; on the other, a development of industry producing goods in larger volume than ever before. So much is this the case that the superficial complaint is of over-production.
Now, I am inclined to be skeptical about over-production when applied to staple trades and the larger requirements of mankind. The more plenteous the bounty of Providence, the more effective the ability to produce, the better for mankind if mankind is intelligent enough to deal with the situation, and to handle the goods efficiently. That appears self-evident. When on the one side you have a vast volume of production, and on the other side you have millions of men insufficiently supplied with the requirements of life, such as food and clothing, the obvious conclusion is that failure proceeds from inadequate facilities of circulation and exchange rather than from excessive ability to produce.
Another peculiarity of the crisis is the complete failure of politicians in this or any other country to suggest an adequate remedy. What is the reason for this strange failure? In my judgment, false diagnosis of the real causes of the present distress. It has been treated solely as a trade crisis, when it should be considered rather as a crisis of currency in the first place, and a crisis of indebtedness in the second, the one complicating the other; both aggravated by defective lubrication through the money factor and through impediments to trade.
He-gives-as the second ..cause _of the present depression the indebtedness of the world, and he has this to say in that connection:
I turn now to the subject of indebtedness, which is another of the causes of the present crisis. Everyone recognizes that the world is heavily in debt-individual to individual, country to country. What they do not recognize is that a fall in the price of commodities, or, in other terms, a rise in the price of gold, unduly increases the burden of debtors.
I think this is quite true. We are living to-day under a debt-increasing system, a system which is gradually becoming so top-heavy that in time it will break down of its own weight. It is true also, as Lord D'Abernon says, that a fall in the price of commodities or in other words a rise in the price of gold unduly increases the burden of indebtedness. One of the chief problems with which our farmers are confronted is this very problem of the fluctuating value of the dollar. Debts are contracted largely during periods of inflation, and indeed I might say that is the

only time credit is plentiful and easily obtained. Take as an illustration a farmer who contracts a loan in good faith when wheat is at $1.25 a bushel and then attempts to repay that loan with wheat at 35 cents. His debt has been increased over threefold and he simply cannot pay. This policy of the banks I have never been quite able to understand, unless it is done deliberately to embarrass the farmer; and frankly I do not want to believe that such is the case. I believe I am stating the fact when I say that during periods of inflation, when only limited credit should be given, credit is almost forced upon us,, while in periods of deflation, when the element of risk is at the minimum, credit cannot be obtained. We find that situation in Canada at the present time. Certainly every farm commodity is deflated to the limit and there should be no risk in loaning money on present values; yet farmers to-day are unable to obtain any credit.
I think I am safe in saying that there is a general feeling that Great Britain will never be able to liquidate her huge war debt, which was contracted when all commodity prices were at the peak; and I am equally confident that the farmers of the west, under the present system, will never be able to liquidate their indebtedness contracted when wheat was at $1 and $2. Unless there is a definite understanding of this question, and a solution found, there can be no real prosperity. France has endeavoured to grapple with this question by inflating her currency and depreciating the franc to one-fifth of its original value, and France has not been considered an outcast nation for so doing.
There has never been a time in our history when industry and science have made such rapid strides as they are doing to-day. But there is a growing feeling that our credit and monetary systems are lagging behind. In support of that statement I wish to read an extract from Business Week of New York.
Business in general has given a good account of itself since the war. It has been remarkably successful in establishing a high standard of living in this country by energetic effort in making and distributing things cheaply and widely; and it has done the best it could through private initiative to soften the shock of depression for labour and the investor.
In the course of time we shall understand that this depression had its origin and will have its end in other, more fundamental factors than the management of individual industrial and commercial enterprises.
And here are the important words:
Of these, our monetary and credit system and our governmental machinery are the most

The Address-Mr. Lucas
important. Both are a century or more behind business in their development. Management can do only so much and no more to offset their deficiencies, and the stable progress of business is limited by them.
In my opinion there is nothing that will require so much boldness and courage to tackle as this huge question, and I believe there is no man in Canada who has such a wide grasp and thorough understanding and knowledge of the financial question as the present Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett). I believe he is also endowed with the courage and boldness to tackle it if he can only see his way clear to do so. I remember he gave a very excellent address in this house-I think it was in the session of 1927-dealing with the financial question, and no one following his speech at that time could help admitting that he had a thorough grasp of the subject. At that time, I believe, he recommended that a 4 per cent security should be developed and our banks and insurance companies be compelled to subscribe thereto. By so doing Canada would save over SI5,000,000 a year in her finances. I might point out in that respect that if our financing were done internally in that manner it might cause our dollar to take a different course and not be supported by making foreign loans as at the present time.
I am inclined to agree with the hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Coote), who spoke a few days ago, recommending the deflation of the dollar. I believe our dollar should follow the course of our trade. If our exports are not sufficient to balance imports, then our dollar should fluctuate with it. This would be the greatest means of bringing trade back to balance, because after all when the dollar is depreciated it becomes a source of protection, and it will eventually right itself.
In regard to the Russian situation, which has been under consideration in the house to some extent, I am not sure that the government acted wisely in stopping all trade with that country, unless they have some intimation or understanding that other countries are going to follow suit. Why should Canada sit back in a holier than thou attitude and refuse to trade with Russia when all other countries in the world appear to be vying with one another to get that trade? As reported in the press this morning, it would appear that even the bankers of Great Britain are now endeavouring to arrange financial credit with that great country. It is true that Great Britain so far has not refused to take Russian wheat. Whether the Russian experiment will succeed or not, no
one can tell. It is true that we have been pooh poohing her efforts for the past ten years, but in spite of everything Russia has succeeded to such an extent that the capitalist world is worried to-day more than they care to admit. It may be that some threat of this kind is needed to arouse our leaders to action, for when we find approximately fifteen million people unemployed in the world to-day, facing starvation or living on charity, men denied the right to work, surrounded with the greatest wealth the world has ever known, one pauses to question whether our system cannot be improved. Surrounded by plenty as we are, while in the midst of such poverty, we are like a man in a rowboat adrift on the ocean, with water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink. Why should we be afraid of this Russian experiment? If our own system is meting out justice to the people to-day then we should have nothing to worry about.
Senator Borah, chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee in the United States, speaking on the question of recognizing Russia, has this to say:
Are we afraid that the capitalistic system will break down if it conies in contact with communism? In such a struggle we have the-experience of 3,000 years on our side, plus the most dominant desire of the human heart, the will to possess property.
Have we lost faith and confidence in our institutions? Is our religion so feeble that it dare not come in contact with men who say in their hearts, "There is no God?"
I have no fear. During the French revolution, religion was disowned and property was confiscated, but the French people came back The Russian people likewise will come back. . .
The Russian people realize that the present rulers have done more for them in ten years than the old regime did in 200. But I do not think of Lenin. Trotsky and Stalin. I t-hini* of the 150,000,000 people who, in their own way and under adverse circumstances, are working out their own salvation.
The leaders are here only for to-day; the people are here for all time. The people will determine the destiny of Russia.
Our difficulties do not spring from these communistic teachings. Our difficulties arise from the unsolved problems of capitalism. The modernization of industries has left millions of men and women where they must adjust their lives to new conditions, to start life over. They are asking capitalism how- to do it. Capitalism has not answered.
Mr. Speaker, I endorse the statements made in this house in regard to economic conditions faced by the western farmer. The sooner we frankly face these facts, the sooner we will be in a position to find a solution for them. According to Mr. Legge, the ex-chairman of the farm stabilization board in the United States, wheat prices last fall were the lowest in 337 years. It is a well-known fact that the drop
36S
The Address-Mr. Lucas

in the price of all farm products has been out of all proportion to that of other commodities The people of western Canada are a hopeful people; they are generally over-optimistic and that optimism has carried them through many of their difficulties in the past. The men and women who have pioneered those western plains, who have withstood the difficulties of frost, hail and drought, who by their tenacity and courage have made civilization possible in western Canada, are not people to be easily discouraged, but I have never seen the morale of those people so low as it is at the present time. With grain prices so far below the cost of production, with such a disparity between the price of everything the farmer has to buy and what he has to sell, with no hope in sight for improved prices, with debts contracted at higher levels, with high interest rates of from eight to ten per cent and the banks refusing to loan money, men after years of toil see their life work slipping from them. The west has always 'been a great "next year's" country; it has always been optimistic but to-day the farmer is facing the coming season in a state of mind which is more or less bewildered. Everyone is telling the farmer that he should go into mixed farming, but today he is the most badly mixed man in the world. His experience in mixed farming has not always been a happy one.	-
I well remember the season 1919-20 when, because of deflation, a serious slump in the price of wheat occurred. The same advice was given and people pointed to the live stock grower as the man who was making money. In the fall of that year, owing to drought conditions, a serious shortage of feed occurred. The prices of cattle were high, in fact-they were inflated, but the banks came forward and voluntarily advised the farmer to hold his live stock and they would be quite willing to advance money with which to purchase feed in order to carry that stock through the winter. Everyone is familiar with what happened. The following spring prices dropped and the farmer was unable to realize an amount for his stock equal to the sum paid for feed alone. This is another example of the policies adopted by the banks, to which I referred a few moments ago. The farmers of western Canada have not forgotten that experience because the ones that did not go broke because of the slump in wheat prices, certainly were broke when the slump occurred in the price of cattle. I think it will be found that many debts were contracted during that period which still remain unpaid.
In spite of past experiences I for one believe that the western farmer will have to develop 
a more balanced production. There is no reason why all branches of agriculture should not be fully developed in Canada, but there will have to be some encouragement given in the way of better credits and lower interest rates. The farmer oannot continue to pay eight and ten per cent interest and hope to succeed. The proposition advocated by Mr. Beatty, the president of the Canadian Pacific Railway, sounds fine but not being familiar with its details I am not prepared to-day to criticize or commend it. I hope it will prove to be a success for anything which will assist agriculture will receive my support. Where we have a banking system with branches in every little hamlet and the different managers understanding local conditions and knowing every farmer in their district, where we have a farm loan board and provincial 'credit organizations, it does seem strange to me that we should- have to duplicate all this by setting up another financial organization to supply credit.
Mr. Beatty could help the farmers of western Canada in other ways. There is the matter of a reduction in freight rates, and I refer especially to the domestic rates. This matter has been referred to by other speakers, but I would point out the difference between the domestic and export rates. Take two carloads of grain en route from Calgary to Vancouver, both in the same train and drawn by the same engine. Because one is billed for export it has to pay only 20 cents per 100 pounds, while the other, being billed for domestic use, is forced to pay a rate of 414 cents. This is not a new question because it has been before this house for the last eight or nine years, but as yet no~ satisfactory answer has been obtained. I. think this matter should be dealt with immediately. The other day we heard a very excellent speech by the hon. member for Souris (Mr. Willis), in which he referred to a possible market for barley. British Columbia is a great dairying and poultry raising country and we in western Canada have considerable feed which would be suitable for both purposes. That feed has to travel to British Columbia under the domestic rate, which makes it impossible for us to do business with the British Columbia farmer.
There is another question to which Mr. Beatty might give his attention, that of a revaluation of company land. A very bitter feeling has developed in certain sections of the west where what are known as C.P.R. settlements are located. Certain settlers, having become in arrears, have been dispossessed

The Address-Mr. Lucas
of their property. The company will then revalue that land and offer it to a new settler at a very much reduced rate rather than give the man who has spent years on the land developing it and helping to develop the country, a chance to make good at the lower price. Very often the new settler is a man who has come from Europe without any experience in this country and yet he is given the advantage of this reduced price of the land instead of the man who is here, acclimatized and with experience on his side, being given a chance to make a fresh start.
I am going to offer a few suggestions which I think are reasonable and will help to improve the agricultural situation. I know some of these suggestions have already been made, but it will do no harm to repeat them.
1.	That the government establish an experimental processing plant to determine the spread between the live hog and the finished article.
There is no question in my mind that, as I have stated before, we have to adopt a more balanced production, and one of the greatest developments we could make in Canada would be that of our bacon industry. Yet we find that the spread is such in Canada as compared with what it is in Denmark, our chief competitor, that the farmer feels the dice are loaded against him, and there is very little use of his making any effort along this line. In regard to the government establishing this experimental processing plant, we have a precedent in the fact that a federal government some years ago established an experimental dairy plant at Finch, Ontario. Anyone who is familiar with that knows that plant did excellent work for the dairy industry. I understand that the plant carried it3elf and eventually was sold at a profit. The government could do no more popular thing to-day than establish an experimental processing plant to determine the spread between the live hog and the finished article in order to encourage the farmers to go into the production of bacon.
2.	That a conference of the packers and representative producers be called to see if a steady supply of bacon cannot be sent to the British market.
The hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Speakman), in the very able speech he made the other day, went fully into this question, and as my time is limited, I shall not dilate on it. There is something radically wrong in Canada, which is first of all an agricul-22110-24
tural country, when we consider the fact that last year we had to import agricultural products as follows:
Commodity	Quantity
Pork	
22,000,000	lbs.Beef	
5,241,937	lbs.Mutton and lamb	
4,979,227	lbs.
Canned meats, poultry and
game	
7,029,956	lbs.Butter	
42,000,000	lbs.Eggs	
2,853,277	doz.
Now we find Denmark, which has to import a great deal of her feed, is paying freight on that feed, feeding the hogs and shipping the bacon to Canada, selling it in some cases as far west as the prairies.
3.	Lowering of freight rates, especially domestic.
4.	A system of intermediate credits for live stock with lower interest rates.
5.	Lowering of all interest rates by putting a penalty clause in the Bank Act to enforce the present legal rate of 7 per cent.
6.	Encouragement of cooperative agencies.
In the present age the whole tendency is for the development of tremendous mergers and combines. Seldom does a week go by that one does not read of some gigantic merger or combine. We know the chain store is displacing the individual, and the large combine is displacing the small company in order to meet the keen competition with which we are faced in the world to-day. The only way the farmer can meet that competition is by organizing in a cooperative way, because he cannot combine in the ordinary w'ay that industrial concerns do. I believe it should be the duty of the government to bend every effort to assist the development of our cooperative organizations.
7.	The establishment of a federal bank of rediscount and issue.
I believe this would be a step that would go a long way towards helping to improve our present banking system.
Conditions are such to-day with agriculture that it is going to require the wholehearted cooperation of every interest in Canada to reestablish it on a solid foundation. I offer these suggestions for the betterment of agricultural conditions in Canada, in the hope that, as the government has done its best to help industry by increasing the tariff, by voting $20,000,000 to assist the unemployed, surely in view of the promises of the Prime Minister to aid agriculture, these not unreasonable requests may be granted. It is recognized that conditions are serious, especially in view of our wheat situation.

The Address-Mr. Lucas

It is true that there has been talk of secession in western Canada, but that movement has not received any widespread support. As one man put the matter to me when it was under discussion-and I think this expressed the view of a great many people- we do not want to see secession, but there is a feeling in western Canada that the people of the east do not recognize the serious condition with which the west is confronted. He said: "I do not want to see secession, but I feel that unless we do something to attract the attention of the people of the east, we will get no relief,"
The people of western Canada are just as loyal, just as patriotic, and love Canada just as much as anyone in the east. The men and women of the west are playing their part and playing it nobly in helping to develop this vast country. They are not asking for any special favours; all they ask is a fair chance, an equal opportunity to make good. Speaking for the province from which I come, I know of no other people in Canada who are giving so much earnest thought and study to the vital problems that confront them, and who are endeavouring to such an extent to develop an intelligent citizenship for the purpose of making Canada a better place in which to live.
Nature has left a physical barrier between east and west, but broadminded people realize that this vast country with its unlimited resources cannot be developed in any lopsided manner, and that agriculture and industry must march together hand in hand; and personally, I deprecate in the house any speeches that fend to create class, racial or religious prejudice, or divisions between east and west. I think these beautiful lines written by Wilson MacDonald express the view of every true Canadian:
The East hath her genius and culture; the West hath her vigour and brawn;
And one hath the splendour of noonday, and one hath the glory of dawn.
So, God give Thy smile to the Westland, wherever a true heart abides;
And God give Thy smile to the Eastland, and blot out the line that divides.


Mr. W. A. BEYNON (Moose Jaw):: In
rising to make my first contribution to the debates of this house, I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that it affords me a great deal of pleasure to join with the speakers who have preceded me in extending to the mover (Mr. Cormier) and the seconder (Mr. Porteous) of the address my most hearty congratulations. This might seem to be more or less of a form, but I want to assure these hon.

gentlemen that it is much more than that; for I really feel that they are entitled to the very heartiest congratulations on the able manner in which they discharged their duties on that occasion.
Many other speakers have contributed to this debate to whom I should like to extend my congratulations, but so numerous are the addresses worthy of mention that I feel I would be taking up too much of the time of the house were I to mention each one. I would like, however, to join with my friend and colleague the member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) in extending my congratulations to the member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) on his elevation to the very important position of the presidency of the farmers' party of Alberta. I wish him every success in that position, and perhaps the best I can wish him is that he may fill it with the same devotion to principle and the same farsightedness that characterized his illustrious predecessor.
I desire also to make special reference to two addresses made from the other side of the house, one by the hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Speakman), and the other by the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell). Of those two addresses I would say that one was most eloquent and the other a masterpiece of debate. To a new member they were not only very impressive but also very inspiring, setting an example that all of us as new members might well strive to follow.
Coming to the address in reply to the speech from the throne, there are some phases of the proceedings of this house which are more or less puzzling, if not bewildering, to the new member; and if they so impress the new member I think it is not unfair to-say that perhaps they have the same effect upon the man in the street. I had occasion early this week to visit the home of a friend in this city, a resident of Ottawa. He told me that he had read all the speeches that had been delivered in the house this session, and added, " I am very glad indeed to see someone from the west, for I would like to know what the real condition in the west is." After all the speeches that have been delivered in the house this session with respect to conditions in western Canada, it may seem a reflection on them that a citizen of Ottawa who had read them should have to ask someone from the west what the actual conditions in western Canada really were. But I think, Mr. Speaker, that it is not quite so bad as it seems on the face of it. It might appear from this gentleman's remarks that hon. members who spoke on that subject either did not tell the true story or else did not

The Address-Mr. Beynon
know what the facts were. However, I think the discrepancies are more fancied than real. My impression is that there is a tendency in this house, perhaps due entirely to our peculiar form of government, to accentuate rather than to minimize differences. The diversity of the opinions expressed with regard to western Canada is due, I believe, to two causes. In the first place, western Canada comprises a very large area; conditions in one district may not be nearly as bad as they are in others, and naturally one is inclined to gain his impression of conditions generally by looking at conditions in his own particular district.
There is another factor bearing on this apparent diversity, and that is that different people have entirely different ways of expressing the same thoughts and emotions; they use different terms. For instance, the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Mackenzie) who spoke a little while ago, being of the Scotch race, if he were asked to describe a certain condition, might say: It was not so good. Perhaps some of the Irish members on this side of the house, speaking of the same condition, would say: It. was very bad. O they might say: It was horrible. They are all describing the same condition, and they all mean the same thing, but they use very different language in giving expression to their thoughts. I think in the final analysis there is really not as much difference as there appears to be between the opinion of the hon. member for Regina and that of the hon. member for Red Deer as to actual conditions in western Canada, although the opinions they expressed in the debate seemed to differ very decidedly. It is well, I think, in estimating the conditions in western Canada to remember this.
A good deal has been said about conditions in western Canada that I think did not need to be said. We are all prepared, however, to admit this, that the condition in that part of the country is critical. I think we are prepared to go even a little further and say it is urgent, that it has ceased to be merely a condition and has become a problem, a national problem so urgent that it behooves this government to bring to its immediate solution the best thought and the best means at its command. Having admitted that much, why do we need to debate at great length the shades of differences of opinion as to the actual condition in western Canada? Having gone that far, that is all that the government needs to know, and upon that knowledge it 22110-24}
can take the action that is necessary with respect to western Canada.
There are some other things in the proceedings of this house which to a new member appear rather bewildering. On occasions it appears to new members that the older members are inconsistent in the statements they make in the house. I say, "it appears" advisedly, because I do not wish to do injustice to any hon. member. In this connection I wish to refer to certain statements that were made by the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) in his masterly speech on the address a few days ago. He criticized the Prime Minister very severely for his action in calling a special session of parliament. He contended that it was not necessary to call that session, that the money required for unemployment relief could have and should have been obtained by means of a governor general's warrant. At page 28 of Hansard of this session the right hon. leader of, the opposition, speaking of the right hon. the Prime Minister said:
Having the opportunity and the power he started at once to use that method in the special session. As all know, the special session of parliament was called for the purpose, nominally, of relieving unemployment. We were no sooner assembled than we discovered that the relief of the unemployed was a mere subterfuge, that the session in reality was to revise tariff schedules upward and to amend the Customs Tariff Act so as to give powers to the governor in council to do what council pleased with respect to many matters affecting the tariff.
Then in addition to that we read the following :
Throughout the campaign it was never thought that at the special session there would be changes of any extent in the tariff.
Those are the reasons, according to the leader of the opposition, why the Prime Minister was wrong in calling the special session. Turning to page 24 of Hansard of the special session, I find the following:
Speaking at Regina on June 10, the present Prime Minister said, as reported in the Regina Leader-Post, June 11, 1930:
If the party I belong to on the 28th day of July is given authority to conduct the affairs of this country, at the first session of our parliament. the government of which I am the head will pass laws that will give Canadians an equal opportunity with their competitors outside of Canada, or we go out of power.
Then again on page 25, I find the following:
At the first session of parliament the Conservative chieftain stated he would see to it that Canadians would be afforded fair competition, or perish in the attempt. Canadians must have their home markets first and afte markets abroad.
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Then continuing on the same page I find the following:
I propose, if elected to power, to call a session of parliament immediately after July 28 to deal with the unemployment problem, to authorize national undertakings which will give work to our workmen.
Then, listen to this:
Side by side, I propose to have enacted such measures as -will give Canadians fair competition and equal opportunity noth the nations of the world.
In view of the very definite statements made by the present Prime Minister during the election campaign as to what he would do if elected to power, it strikes me as peculiar indeed that the present leader of the opposition should have said that throughout the campaign it was not thought that there would be changes of any extent in the tariff. I believe the leader of the opposition was sincere when he made that statement. The undertakings made by the present Prime Minister before the electorate were read into Hansard by the leader of the opposition during the special session. Judging from the record of the Liberal party it is not difficult to understand the point of view that may have been taken by some that the election promises of the great Conservative party would not be implemented were they returned to office, because the failure of the Liberal party to carry out its election promises would lead the people to believe that the same thing would happen with respect to the promises made by the leader of the Conservative party.
The leader of the opposition said we would be perfectly justified in taking this money by issue of a governor general's warrant. If we refer again to page 142 of Hansard of the last session we find the leader of the opposition taking the most serious objection to the actions of the Prime Minister in this respect. He said:
The one exception that I have to take, and it relates to the bill in the form in which it appears, is as to the manner in which the government is asking this house to vote the moneys necessary for the purposes described. Why should there be at a special session any change in the procedure which is adopted at ordinary sessions of parliament in voting supplies that are necessary to carry out the various undertakings and obligations of the government? As hon. members well know, the usual practice, whereby parliament secures its control over expenditures, is for the house to be moved into committee of supply, for the Minister of Finance to bring down his desired appropriations in the form of estimates, for estimates to be fully discussed in committee of supply, and for appropriations to be made in that way for specific purposes as set forth in the supply bill.
[Mr. Beynon.1
The objection is that the Prime Minister did not proceed according to the views of the right hon. leader of the opposition. Yet at the special session the leader of the opposition stated that if the Prime Minister had merely obtained a governor general's warrant, and given no information to parliament the procedure would have been quite all right. At page 151 the leader of the opposition is reported as follows:
In all deference, Mr. Chairman, if we are to be asked to vote $20,000,000, surely we are entitled to ask any question whatever that relates to how that $20,000,000 is to be spent. It is impossible for the house to be asked to vote a vast sum of money of that amount and to be restricted in its discussion of how the money is to be spent.
In view of those statements by the leader of the opposition surely the Prime Minister would have been unwise to proceed by governor general's warrant and to have relied on the opposition giving that unquestionable support which at this late date they say they would have given. I believe the leader of the opposition was honest in his statement to this house that he did not expect any amendments to the tariff at the short session of parliament. And there were other members of the house who did not think the Prime Minister intended to carry out the promises he made during the election campaign. The speech from the throne delivered at the opening of the short session forecast certain amendments to the customs tariff. During the debate on the address in reply to the speech from the throne a number of speeches were made by members to the left of the official opposition and also by members of the official opposition. In a great many of those speeches-1 remember the phrase, "You cannot expect to improve the conditions very much by tinkering with the tariff." That phrase "tinkering with the tariff" was used in practically all the addresses up until the time the legislation was introduced. However when the legislation was brought down the phrase was conspicuous by its absence. The fact was brought home with staggering suddenness to the members of the house that at last we had a leader of government in Canada who meant "protection" when he said "protection", a leader who when he stated he would place on the statute books of this country certain legislation, had the courage to do so, a leader who believed his actions were in the best interest of Canada and, was prepared to stake his political fortune on carrying out the promises he had made to t'he people. When the legislation was brought down the official opposition gasped

The Address-Mr. Beynon
for breath. After they had recovered sufficiently they raised a hue and cry against the Prime Minister. This man who but a few hours before had been characterized as a mere tinkerer, as one who was not prepared to carry out the promises he had made to the people, became all of a sudden a brutal, driving, slashing, cutting, blazing, blasting, arrogant autocrat. That all happened over night, as it were.
The opposition have characterized the present administration as a one man government. They have stated that the leader of this government is an autocrat. In connection with that all I have to say is that the Prime Minister must be big enough and strong enough to gather round his council table the very best brains in Canada. He must sit in council with these men and yet be their unquestioned leader. Any man with less force of character or less power is not the proper man to be Prime Minister of this country.
I wish also to refer to the fact that during the last campaign this country was flooded from one end to the other with cartoons depicting >the present leader of the government as in bathing and the then Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning) stealing his clothes. I thought the inference was very clear, but the Liberal party seemed to have some fear that the public might be mistaken in the inference to be drawn. Chuckling with glee they told all and sundry that the Minister of Finance had stolen the Conservative policy of protection, and that is the policy which hon. gentlemen opposite now denounce so roundly. They vie with each other in the extravagance of their denunciation of it, and urge that it has accentuated the unemployment situation, has been the means of rendering ineffective the Imperial conference, has threatened our relations with the mother country, has threatened to disrupt the empire, and is bringing Canada to blue ruin and destruction. Yet the official opposition was prepared to commit larceny in order to obtain that policy. Another charge made against the Prime Minister was that, thus bereft of his raiment through the theft committed by the Liberal party, he shamelessly stole the slogan of that party, "Canada first." We are told that the Conservative party had no right to that slogan, that it never belonged to them. It would have been a pity if such a good slogan had been left unused; the Liberal party could not use it, because it did not fit their policy.
These, Mr. Speaker, are things of the past. For a great many years there has been much speculation throughout Canada as to the effect of protection upon Canadian trade and the
prosperity of the country. That question has been argued pro and con for some generations. At last it has been placed beyond the realm of speculation; to-day, for the first time in history, it is an accomplished fact. We have now a prime minister and a cabinet who are going to give this policy a trial. It is not now a question of arguing, speculating and prophesying what this policy will do; they are going to see what it will do. By its fruits ye shall know it. We have in power now a party which is prepared to stand or fall on the results of that policy.
I do want to point out, however, that the advocates of protection are subjected to a much more severe test than are the advocates of low tariff. You will remember that during the regime of the Liberal party, whenever they lowered the tariff and the price went up all they had to say was, "Well, we have done all we could; we wash our hands of the matter. If the price went up we cannot help it; we put down the tariff." If they put up the tariff on some commodity which we import and the price of that commodity went up they said, "We must have revenue. This is a tariff for revenue only. Pay up and do not split the low tariff vote." On the other hand, when the advocates of protection put up the tariff and internal competition forces the price down, then we are told, as we were told yesterday, that we have pegged the price at a high level, and if it did come down it did not come down as far as it would have come if the tariff had not been there. By that reasoning they can always produce an argument that no one can answer, because no one knows where the price would have gone if the tariff had not been there. That is the burden which is placed upon the advocates of a protective tariff.
The hon. member for West Edmonton (Mr. Stewart) painted a very gloomy picture, not only of the present but of the future as well. He told us that there was not a vestige of hope, that this country has heading for blue ruin as long as the present administration continued to support its present policies. I am inclined to think that perhaps the hon. member does not intend to stand for reelection at the end of this parliament. However, he has a colleague who I believe does intend to stand for reelection. I refer to the hon. member for St. James (Mr. Rinfret), who did not want to agree to the propositions suggested by the hon. member for West Edmonton. He did not want to go on record as having said that the country would be ruined unless the policy of this government was changed, so we find that he is willing to take in advance from this government am
The Address-Mr. Bey non

credit which might come to it, no matter
what the eo3t. At page 107 of Hansard he said:
I suppose after two or three years have passed, in the ordinary trend of events and the normal evolution of business conditions throughout the world this country, notwithstanding the fact that my hon. friends are in power, will again reach the point it had attained two or three years ago, and then my hon. friends will say: We have done it; give us credit for it; we have cured the evil, not at once, but it cured itself without our aid. Give us credit for it. We have at last redeemed our election promises.
So you see that already the hon. gentleman realizes that the policies which have been inaugurated by this government will bring Canada within two or three years back to what they themselves claim was a condition of prosperity. But when that happens, they are going to attempt to deprive this government of any credit for what it may have done.
In the very able speech delivered yesterday by the ex-Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe), he criticized the attitude of the Prime Minister while at the Imperial conference, and enlarged upon the statement that the empire is held together by sentiment rather than by dollars and cents. The hon. member stated that our trade with the empire is governed by sentiment, but I wonder if it ever occurred to him to consider whether, when the people from the mother country went to the Argentine, they did so because they had a greater sentiment for the people of that country than they had for Canada, or whether they did so because of dollars and cents. When the late administration gave away the dairy market of this country to Australia and New Zealand was it done as a matter of sentiment, or did the people of Australia ship their goods here for dollars and cents while we were selling our manufactured products to them for' the same consideration? After all, you cannot make an English miller weep very much by telling him sentimental tales, but if you go over there and talk dollars and cents probably you will be able to make a bargain with him.
We were also told that the statement made by the Prime Minister at the Regina meeting was the most unwelcome statement that had fiver been presented to the western people. We were told that the stage had been all set for a great ado and that the thing fell very flat. I will admit that the stage was set, but it was not set by the government or the supporters of the government. The stage was set by the Liberal press of Saskatchewan in an attempt to develop an expectation that no one but a wand-waver could satisfy. For days and weeks the people of Saskatchewan and
IMr. Beynon.]
western Canada were worked up to a pitch of high expectation, but what happened when the Prime Minister did come? I hold in my hand an article dealing with that meeting, appearing in a paper which I do not think can be said to be a supporter of the Prime Minister. The newspaper is the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, which is on very friendly terms with the Regina Leader. The writer sets out the various propositions brought forward by the Prime Minister at that meeting, and this is the comment which is made:
This is an impressive array of proposals in which few citizens of the west will wish to pick holes. This paper finds itself in substantial agreement *noth the program as stated and is ready to give crdit to Mr. Bennett for having faced the emergency boldly, sifted the numerous proposals put before him and stated his conclusions without hedging. Much will depend on the manner in which his policy is translated into action but, as it stands on paper, the policy is sound and calculated to give the farmers at least temporary relief.
Not a bad recommendation from a paper so bitterly opposed to the present administration.
I referred a little while ago to the addresses given by the hon. member for Red Deer and the hon. member for Mackenzie. We expected-at least I expected when I came into the house-to hear constructive criticism from that corner and from the sources whence those speeches came. I was not disappointed. These men came forward temperately, mildly, constructively, kindly, with suggestions to the government at to what might be done for the relief of conditions in Canada. I think perhaps the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) is sufficiently human not to be averse to being the one who should lead the country out of the difficulty in which it now is. But I will give him credit for this: I cannot refer to his love of party, because he has none; but I think his love of country is much stronger than his aversion to political parties, and I believe he is prepared, though not one of the government, in a position to lead the country out of its difficulties, to give all the assistance he can to the administration in finding a solution for the problems of the country. I believe that also characterises his followers in the main, and I was very much impressed with the addresses they gave.
The hon. member for Battle River (Mr. Spencer) was, I think, perhaps carried away by the sound of a certain phrase he used. I fancy it was sound rather than sense that appealed to him when he said that the reference to agriculture in the speech from the throne was nothing more than a hollow mockery. I do not believe he really thought

The Address-Mr. Beynon
that. The hon. member for Red Deer was much more cautious and, in my opinion, much better advised when he said that the speech from the throne might mean everything or might mean nothing so far as agriculture was concerned. That, I believe, is true of any speech from the throne; for after all, all that it is expected to do is to foreshadow the legislation, and the government may carry out seriously and earnestly the things that are foreshadowed or it may try to evade them altogether. In that sense any speech from the throne might mean everything or nothing.
I was quite interested in what the hon. member for Red Deer said about the attitude towards the farmer group in this house some years ago. He attributed the changed attitude largely, I think, to the change in the attitude towards agriculture. A good deal of it is due to that; a good deal is due to the fact that people are realizing, at other times than during elections, that agriculture is the basic industry of this country. I know that for as long as I can remember it was considered the basic industry of this country at least once in four years, while for the rest of the time it was not. Perhaps the hon. member for Red Deer is correct when he says that people have begun to realize between elections that agriculture is in fact the basic industry of the country. I have made on other occasions a statement which I am prepared to repeat here, namely, that the people who carry on the basic industry of this country should have a standard of living at least as high as that of any other class in Canada. It is a very nice thing to go around to the farmer once in four years and tell him he is the salt of the earth, that he is the horny-handed son of toil, and is carrying on the basic industry of the country. But if that means anything it means that he has the right to have a standard of living which will serve as the basis for the rest of the community.
I believe, however, the changed attitude towards hon. gentlemen who sit to the left of the official opposition is due to another factor, and I know my hon. friends will take this kindly. I think their own attitude to government, that is, the functions of government, and the difficulties of government as well as its possibilities, has changed considerably in the last ten years. I think they will admit this. A good many of the ideals they hold have changed-perhaps not the ideals, but the hope of the attainment of those ideals. They know the limitations that are placed upon governments and how far we are apt to fall below our ideals, let us strive
how we may. That, perhaps, has partly to do with the changed attitude towards hon. members in that corner. But I believe there is something else. No one could listen to those two addresses to which I have referred without being convinced that these hon. gentlemen had developed in that ten years into parliamentarians of such ability that any parliament, I care not whether in Canada or in the old land, must pay attention to their representations.
There are a good many other things I had thought of dealing with. The hon. member for Red Deer remarked that sometimes it roused his ire when people spoke about the kicking farmer. I was raised on a farm in western Canada myself. The hon. member spoke of having gone there forty years ago.
I did so before that. I know what pioneering in western Canada is and I know the character of the men who conquered the prairies.
I do not find fault with what the hon. member says because I have the same feeling when I hear people, who know nothing about the hardships that must be endured, and the courage and fortitude necessary to accomplish what has been done in the west, saying to-day that these farmers are always kicking. If you analyze conditions you will find after all that when there is inflation of prices the product of the farmer is the last to go up- nobody's fault, it is true-whereas when prices come down the farmer's prices are the first to fall. When kicking starts naturally the farmers are the first to start kicking, because they are the first ones to be hit. That is all the difference.
I cannot add in this debate anything to what hon. members have said about the question of interest and so forth. I think it was the hon. member for Battle River who spoke about certain practices of the past. The banks would tell a man that if he would come and pay his account, later on, after the first of the year, they would extend him credit; and that was a very trying and unfair attitude to the farmer. I am sorry to say I believe the hon. member is correct in that. Too many cases of that kind have come under my notice for it to be a mere matter of accident or mistake on the hon. member's part. I do think, however, that the head offices of the banks are unaware of that practice; I do not believe they are parties to it. Brit there is a responsibility upon them. If they say to their local managers, "You must get in the money that is outstanding," and then fail to enquire into the methods by which they get

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it in, they must be charged with that responsibility. I hope, therefore, that they will take notice of the fact that this matter is receiving public attention, and I trust the local managers of the banks will be instructed to deal fairly, honestly and uprightly with the farmers, because that is not fair dealing.


Mr. F. G. SANDERSON (South Perth):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to join the speakers who have preceded me in paying a sincere compliment to the mover (Mr. Cormier) and the seconder (Mr. Porteous) of the address in reply to the speech from the throne. It is a privilege enjoyed by young members coming into this house for the first time to move and second the address, and I think the house will agree with me that both hon. members performed their duty with credit to themselves as well as to their constituents. However, they were placed in a very embarrassing position because they were put up to defend the record of this government from the time it took office last summer until the present day. They must have known down in the bottom of their hearts, as do other hon. gentlemen opposite that no defence could be made of the record of this government.
They were put up also to defend, if I may use that word, the speech from the throne which was placed by the government in the mouth of His Excellency the Administrator. It was a difficult task for anyone to stretch his imagination sufficiently to defend the speech from the throne. I was rather surprised that the hon. member for North Grey was chosen to second the address, not because of any lack of ability, but because he demonstrated the fact that being" a farmer he was put up as a smoke-screen. An effort was made to show the farmers of this country that at least one farmer from the province of Ontario was ready to defend the government in regard to its attitude toward a great basic industry. If the hon. member for North Grey, as a farmer representing a farming constituency in the province of Ontario, can find any grain of comfort in the record of the government up to date as it pertains to the farming industry, or if he can find any grain of comfort in the speech from the throne, then he stands in a class of his own. I doubt very much whether the farmers in his constituency will endorse the defence he attempted to make of the record of the government and the speech from the throne.
I have the honour to represent what is largely a rural riding in the province of Ontario, and in passing I might say that South Perth is a farming constituency which stands second

to none in the Dominion. It has a record extending over many years, not only for the fertility of its soil but for the aggressiveness of its farmers. They have stood at the head of the list, not only in mixed farming but in the hog, dairying and cattle industries. All during my business life I have been in close touch with the farmers in my constituency, not only my Liberal friends but my Conservative and Progressive friends as well, and I have never found so much criticism of any government, so much discontent, so much downright bitterness at the result, as are to-day manifested by the farmers of South Perth irrespective of politics. I think the same would apply to every rural riding in the province of Ontario.
The reasons for this are plain; in order to discover them we do not need to go further back than the elections of last summer. The then leader of the opposition, now the right hon. the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) started out by making promises. He taught a lesson to those who were canvassing with him, and they started to make promises backed up by their chief. They said: This man, the Hon. R. B. Bennett, is a miracle man, he can turn day into night or night into day. He was portrayed as possessing the best business mind in the Dominion of Canada, a man who had accumulated a very vast fortune, and who deemed it to be his duty, if his party were returned and he became Prime Minister, to right immediately all the evils and all the wrongs suffered by the Canadian people. The farmers of Ontario, some in my riding and some in adjoining ridings, took these promises in good faith, but they have now awakened to the fact, as stated by the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss Mac-phail) in her admirable speech, that these promises were gold bricks. They were promises which no human being or party could keep. Our hon. friends would not listen to any talk of a world-wide depression; they went so far as to say that there was no worldwide depression but that the present economic conditions in Canada were due to the administration of the government which had held power from 1921 to 1930. The farmers listened, unfortunately for themselves, to these promises.
I should like to give the house an illustration of what took place during the elections in my riding, and I feel quite sure that the same procedure was followed in other ridings. A canvasser would come along with a Conservative candidate and say to the man who owned a farm: You have a nice farm there; don't sell it until after the elections in Sep-

The Address-Mr. Sanderson
tember, because if the Conservative party is put into power the value of your farm will go up fifty per cent. Not only that, but they were told that if Mr. Bennett, the wizard, the superman, got into power, they would be able to sell their wheat at $1.25 per bushel. They were told that the price of hogs would go up to war-time levels and that although they were getting only 32 cents per pound for their butter, when Mr. Bennett got into power the price would be 60 cents per pound.


William Duff: They were told in Nova Scotia it would go to 70 cents.


Frederick George Sanderson: So far, the record of
this government is a record of broken promises. They kept only one, that they would call an emergency session to relieve unemployment. Nothing was said in the rural parts of Ontario as to the possibility of their increasing the tariff at the special session. They kept that quiet, but the farmers have awakened to the fact that the increase in the tariff has not been for their benefit. It will not do them any good at all, and had the majority of the farmers of Ontario known that at the emergency session, in addition to the relief that was attempted for unemployment, there would be increases in the tariff on about 150 or 200 items, running all the way from 30 per cent to 150, 200 and even 300 per cent, I doubt if they would have voted for a Conservative candidate. So I say that the record of the government to date is one of broken promises. As usual-and this has been mentioned by several speakers on this side of the house, but I think it will bear repetition- they have trotted out their old panacea of tariff. That is the only medicine they can prescribe when there is a depression or when business is bad. It is the old, old story. It puts me in mind of the old days when the medicine fakir used to sell his medicine on the public market. He had a "cure-all" for everything from chilblains to tuberculosis. It was all in the one bottle, which he sold for a dollar, and around the bottle he wrapped a printed guarantee. He said: "We will guarantee this to cure all ills; it is a medicine that will cure everything." Finally, when he had got the dollar from the customer, he would say: "If it does not cure you, you can keep the guarantee." That is about the situation the country is in as regards the present government's high tariff policy as a cure-all for the problems that at present confront us.
Let me repeat that the tariff changes in September were not for the benefit of the farmer, the labouring man, the mechanic or the ordinary wage earner. The only people who have benefited are the manufacturers,
behind whom the government is prepared to stand at all times to the detriment of the masses of the people. It is true that at the special session of parliament $20,000,000 was voted for the relief of unemployment, but our Conservative friends said during the campaign that they were going to cure unemployment, to end unemployment. In fact some of the speakers said that in three days after the Conservatives came into power they would end unemployment. I know they say they were misquoted, but hundreds of people who perhaps did not read that in the newspaper, but heard it over the radio are prepared to assert that the statement was made that in three days after the Conservatives came into power they would end unemployment. What do we find? They have not ended unemployment. I want to be fair to the government; they may have relieved to a certain extent, temporarily at least, unemployment in some parts of the country. But as members in opposition pointed out in September, the government were putting into the hands of provincial governments a political weapon; they were practically giving the provincial government a blank cheque, and during the campaign the question of relief was made primarily a federal matter. Promises were made by Conservative speakers, led by the present Prime Minister, that the federal parliament would deal with the relief of unemployment. I am not going into the question whether the relief of unemployment should be a federal or a provincial matter, but I say that in the campaign they made it a federal issue. We on this side of the house pointed out during the special session that there was no check, no audit on the $20,000,000 appropriated for unemployment relief; that the federal share was checked out of the public treasury, a like amount from the provincial treasury, and a similar amount from the municipalities; that the federal authority had no control over the money after it left the federal treasury. That has been proven. As I said a moment ago, they placed in the hands of the provincial governments something in the way of a political weapon that could be and was in fact used. So far as the people of Ontario are concerned, during the eight or nine provincial by-elections that have been held since last September, the fact that the provincial government controlled that money was used, if not directly, then indirectly, to buy votes. If time permitted I could quote chapter and verse for my statement, and it may be that before the close of the session I shall have an opportunity of doing so. But, as I have said, the record of the government is one of
The Address-Mr. Sanderson

broken promises, promises that could not be kept, promises that will never be kept. The only promise they did keep was that a special session of parliament would be summoned.
As regards the question of the Imperial conference, if the Prime Miinster and the government did not want the Imperial conference to succeed as far as the Dominion of Canada was concerned, certainly when they increased the tariff on British importations they did the one thing that made success impossible. They were defeated in their cause before they ever went to London. I could never understand, and I doubt if the majority of the Canadian people understand, the attitude of the present government in increasing the tariff against the mother country. A few years ago the members of the Conservative party used to wrap the union jack around themselves and parade their loyalty on all occasions. They used to insinuate from time to time that they were really the loyal political party in this country. But in September last they adopted an attitude that, to my mind, is the worst thing they could have done in regard to preserving friendly relations between Canada and the mother country. The Prime Minister, some of his ministers and a large delegation went over to London, but nothing was achieved. There is no use in the Prime Minister or any of his ministers or supporters saying that the right hon. gentleman's visit to London was a success. It was an absolute failure and the majority of the Canadian people know it was a failure and lay the blame directly on the heads of the Prime Minister and his government.
Several speakers have spoken of the manner of approach of the Prime Minister at the conference. In his speech in this house the other day the Prime Minister rather took pride in the fact that he had spoken for only seventeen minutes at the conference. I will quote his own words, at page 65 of Hansard of this session:
I can only say that the presentation of the case from the Canadian standpoint before the second plenary conference took exactly seventeen minutes by the clock, and there was at least one Canadian there who, although not a member of the delegation, listened and thought it was as clear and as concise a presentation as it was possible to make.
I am sure, Mr. Speaker, that the people of Canada will be glad to know that there was at least one Canadian who endorsed the Prime Minister's statement on that occasion. I would point out to the Prime Minister, however, that a gentleman with his vocabulary

and with his temperamental nature can sometimes do more harm in a seventeen minutes' speech than it wild take seventeen years to repair; and I imagine the people of Canada, when they read that the Prime Minister presented his case in seventeen minutes, will say: Thank God he did not speak an hour.
The method of approach of the Prime Minister at the conference was one that could not possibly succeed. It is impossible to sit down at a business conference, and that was a business conference, one of the most important meetings which the Imperial conference has ever held, and work a bluff. You may attempt it, but usually your bluff is called. The Prime Minister's bluff was called, to the detriment of this country. The Prime Minister played politics when he was at the conference in England; at least, his actions had all the earmarks of playing politics. By gestures and by speeches he endeavoured to convey to the people of England that if they would only change their government and put in a Conservative administration, it might be better for themselves and for the Dominion of Canada. I say, Mr. Speaker, that the Prime Minister had no mandate from the people of this country to talk politics in England at all, and by playing politics, instead of helping his cause, he injured it. So on the whole, Mr. Speaker, the conference was a failure.
I should like to quote to the house what the hon. Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) gave as his opinion of the conference when he landed in Canada. He was interviewed by a reporter for The Toronto Daily Star on board ship before he landed. The interview is dated November 21, 1930, and is headed, Conference a Flop. It reads:
The Imperial conference was a "flop" to the extent that the economic branch which he characterized as "perhaps the most important branch" failed to come to a definite conclusion, Hon. Hugh Guthrie, Minister of Justice, and the first of Canada's delegation to return to her shores, confessed to The Star in the course of an interview before landing.
I will read to you the reasons which the Minister of Justice is reported to have given in this interview for the failure of the conference :
The failure was due to lack of sufficient definite information about the trade of Great Britain and the dominions, coupled with twn complications, the necessity of the Imperial parliament sitting, and the arrival of the Indian princes for the round-table conference now on.

The Address-Mr. Sanderson
Those are the excuses which the Minister of Justice gave for the conference being a flop. The interview continues:
The Star called Mr. Guthrie's attention to a report in the Manchester Guardian of Nov. 5, of a speech which he made at a luncheon tendered in London by the National Citizens' Union, in which he is quoted as saying: "I don't believe that the conference is going to achieve anything in the nature of concrete proposals at the present time." Asked whether this was a fair report, the Minister of Justice said that it was. "The economic branch came to no conclusion for the reasons I have already stated," he said.
It appears to me, Mr. Speaker, and I think it will appear to members of this house and the country at large, that these excuses which the Minister of Justice gave for the conference being a flop were really no excuses at all. Surely the Canadian delegation had advisers enough and secretaries and assistant secretaries enough to get all the information they wanted over there. I took the trouble to obtain some information as to the numerical strength of the staff they took over, and I find in the report of the Imperial conference that in addition to the Prime Minister and members of his government there were a staff comprising twenty-two persons. Surely they could get enough information together for the delegation to get down to facts. So I say that is no excuse at all; it is not even the semblance of an excuse, and the Minister of Justice is right in saying that the conference was a flop. The Minister of Justice is also reported to have said in this interview that there would soon be a British election and he hoped when it came off that Mr. Snowden and Mr. Thomas would be snowed under and the Conservatives take power.
This word "flop" is not an unusual word, but I looked up the dictionary to get the exact definition. I am sorry the Minister of Justice is not in his seat at the moment, because "flop" is a word which I think he has thought over very often, and probably dreamed about, and so it naturally came to his mind in speaking of the failure of the Imperial conference, in this interview which he gave on board ship. I find three definitions of "flop" in Webster's dictionary: first, "to throw oneself heavily or clumsilysecond, "to strike about with something broad and flat, as a fish with its tail, or a bird with its wings; to rise and fall." The Minister of Justice might have had in his mind the flop that he got with something broad and flat at the Conservative convention of 1927. The third meaning given is: "to change suddenly,"
and it gives as an example of the use of the word in that sense, the phrase, "He flopped to the other party." Those are the dictionary definitions, not mine. So I think, Mr. Speaker, that the Minister of Justice was quite justified in using the word "flop."
I should also like to read to the house what the genial Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion) said about his leader when he came back from England, but my time is limited.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Frederick George Sanderson: When the house rose
at six o'clock I had just finished a few remarks with regard to statements made concerning the Imperial conference by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) on his return to Canada. I mentioned that when the house resumed at eight o'clock I might make some further remarks about what the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion) had said concerning the actions of his chief at the conference. I would like to quote, Mr. Speaker, from the Toronto Globe of December 3, 1930. At a banquet on the evening of December 2, held in the city of Toronto, the Minister of Railways and Canals was the chief speaker, and naturally he touched on the conference. He spoke about the attitude taken at the conference by his chief the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister's great success at the Imperial conference. I quote from the report in the Toronto Globe of December 3, 1930:
The Conservative party, he said, "certainly is sitting on top of the world, such as the world is to-day."


Mr. YOUNG:: A very uncomfortable seat.


Frederick George Sanderson: My answer to the
Minister of Railways and Canals is that most people think the world is upside down at the moment, and if the Conservative party is sitting on top of the world-


Mr. MANION:: Where must the Liberal
party be sitting?


Frederick George Sanderson: The Liberal party will come back to the top of the world when it turns round the other way. Let me tell the minister that when conditions right themselves he and his colleagues in the Conservative party will find themselves at the bottom of the world, in the bottomless pit, and the Minister of Railways and Canals will be with them.
3S0
The Address-Mr. Sanderson


Robert James Manion: As you people are at the
present time.


Frederick George Sanderson: But he was not quite satisfied with that statement. The report in the Globe continues:
So much was Hon. R. B. Bennett the outstanding man at the Imperial conference, said Dr. Manion, "that I am told there are many people in the British Isles who would like to see Mr. Bennett one of their great leaders."


Frederick George Sanderson: I venture the opinion, Mr. Speaker, that there is no such good fortune in store for Canada and Canadians. There are a great many people in the Dominion of Canada who would welcome a change if it could be brought about. They would be pleased to see the gentleman who now occupies the position of Prime Minister of this country go to England as one of the leaders of that country. The report in the Globe continues:
In view of numerous press queries as to how federal ministers felt about Premier Bennett's London Snowden speech, "when Mr. Bennett speaks,' he said, 'lie speaks for the whole government of the Dominion of Canada." In other words the present Dominion government has one mind, not twenty minds, as was so often demonstrated in the Mackenzie King government.
We have it from the lips of the Minister of Railways and Canals that there is but one mind in the cabinet as it is now constituted. The contention from this side of the house and the opinion of most people of this country is that we have at the present time a one man government.


Robert James Manion: So much the bigger man.


Frederick George Sanderson: I can quite understand the genial Minister of Railways and Canals interjecting those remarks. Hon. members knows that the minister has been termed a convert to the Conservative party. His chief has said that a convert never could be trusted, that he was always liable to make a mess of things. However no doubt the Minister of Railways and Canals wishes to redeem himself in the eyes of his chief and therefore is doing everything in bis power to achieve that end; nobody can blame him for that. However it is a fact, Mr. Speaker, that we have a one-man government and I have no doubt that the Minister of Railways and Canals will be the chief "yes, yes" man as long as he is in the government. The reason is that he does not wish in any way to ruffle his chief. He knows if he did so he would not remain in the government very long. The report in the Globe contains the further statement:

The Liberal press, he said, trying to make out the Imperial conference and Canada's part in it as a failure. "What, may I ask the Liberal press," said Doctor Manion, "would Mr. King have done had he represented the Dominion at the conference?" What could Mr. King have done, he added, in the face of the attitude of Mr. Snowden? What could Mr. King have brought back from the conference that Mr. Bennett failed to gain?
My answer to that statement is that if the Right Hon. W. L. Mackenzie King had gone to the conference as Prime Minister, backed by the Dunning budget, which has been scrapped by this government, we would have to-day in Canada a different story to tell as far as trade and commerce are concerned. The attitude of the Right Hon. W. L. Mackenzie King at Imperial conferences is one of which the people of this country are proud. They are sorry that in the turn of the political wheel he did not have an opportunity to attend the conference.


Robert James Manion: They showed how anxious they were to send him there by keeping him at home.


Frederick George Sanderson: If the Minister of
Railways and Canals has any questions to ask I would be pleased if he would observe the courtesies of the house and rise when asking them.


Robert James Manion: I did not ask a question.


Mr. VENIOT:: Hon. members hope the
Minister of Railways and Canals will make a speech at a later time in this debate.


Frederick George Sanderson: Considering the limited time at my disposal, I hope, sir, that these interruptions will not be deducted from my forty minutes. However we can always depend on the Minister of Railways and Canals to come to the rescue of the Tory party. There was a time in his political history when he was a Liberal but now he is a Tory of the Tories.


Robert James Manion: Since I have become older I have gained in knowledge.


Frederick George Sanderson: The hon. gentleman,
has not gained in knowledge from experience, and sometimes I think he is very, very sorry he burned his bridges behind him.
I have given the opinion of another minister of the crown concerning the alleged success of the Prime Minister at the Imperial conference. I have not time to quote further from the speech of the Minister of Railways and Canals. May I just say, however, that he was in a very jovial mood on the night he made that speech, and during the course of his remarks he said, as he had said

The Address-Mr. Kennedy (Peace River)
so often during the campaign, that the conditions in Canada to-day and the depression in our trade and commerce could all be laid at the door of the Mackenzie King government.
Other opinions, however, have been expressed# in regard to Canada's part in the Imperial conference, and in that connection I want to quote to the house a letter which appeared in the Toronto Star of December 6, 1930. This article is credited to a gentleman named E. H. Durnin. I do not know him; I am uninformed as to his political views, but apparently he has kept in touch with the proceedings of the Imperial conference and the politics of the day in the Dominion of Canada. In a letter addressed to the editor of the Toronto Star Mr. Durnin has this to say:
Sir, what a hum about this humbug! What a blazing blast from the bellows! Mr. Bennett blasted his way into the party leadership. He blasted his way to the premiership. He blasted his way through the special session of parliament. He did his darndest to blast his way through the Imperial conference. Now- he has blasted this blasted Thomas. He is trying to blast Ramsay MacDonald, Thomas, et al from office. What a blast this blasting blaster has bl asted!
Well might this brilliant, able, vain and pompous man cry: "My kingdom for a sense of humour!" The late Elbert Hubbard had a maxim. "Don't take yourself too damned seriously."
Mr. Thomas' neglect to come back at Mr. Bennett leaves this august gentleman in a prolonged poise of pained and painful perpendicularity, a position of vindicated and isolated splendour. The devil of it is to get down again from a place like that.
That is the opinion of at least one Canadian voter, apparently a gentleman who is versed in the politics of the country.
Now I should like to point to some of the remarks made by the Prime Minister himself since he came back from the conference. The house will remember, as the country remembers well, that during the election of last summer the leader of the Conservative party, and all the members of that party, laid the blame for the depression solely at the door of the King administration. They would not listen to anything about world depression, although we were in the midst of a world depression. I want to say, however, that there was not a country in the world which came through the depression in better shape than Canada, and this was largely due to the wise, honest and able administration of the King government over a period of nine years.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. gentleman has been speaking for forty minutes.


Mr. D. M. KENNEDY (Peace River):: 
Mr. ROBERT McKENZIE (Assiniboia):: I hope that the hon. gentleman who has just preceded me (Mr. Kennedy), as well as other hon. gentlemen on both sides of the house, including the mover (Mr. Cormier) and the seconder (Mr. Porteous) of the address, will not consider me discourteous if I do not follow in detail the remarks which they have made. There is one matter to which I should like to refer, and it has to do with the remarks made by two hon. gentlemen from 22110-25J
western Canada on the opposite side of the house. I refer to the comments of the hon, member for Souris (Mr. Willis) with regard to a tariff on com, and the remarks of the hon. member for Rosetown (Mr. Loucks)r who, at page 234 of Hansard of this session, said:
I have pledged myself to support this tariff on corn; before I left home my supporters asked me if I would do my best to have that tariff imposed, and so I came here supporting that proposal.
That is all very well, Mr. Speaker, so far as it goes, but if these two hon. gentlemen really desire a tariff on corn entering this country from the Argentine and elsewhere, how is it that we do not see on the order paper any notice standing in their names of a resolution to that effect? It is not sufficient for them to get up in the house and say that they are in favour of a tariff on corn; they must have the support of their colleagues from other parts of Canada. I wondered, as these hon. gentlemen were speaking, just what would be the attitude of my hon. friend from Dufferin-Simeoe (Mr. Rowe), who was so vocal last year with regard to tariffs on agricultural products, but who this session up to the present has said nothing at all, not only with respect to a tariff on corn, but with regard to any of his pet hobbies of last year. I wonder also why we have not heard from my good friend from Haldimand (Mr. Senn) who represents an agricultural constituency, or from the hon. member for Durham (Mr. Bowen). Why are these gentlemen not saying what they think with regard to this proposed tariff on com?


Mr. ROWE:: I have no objections.


Robert McKenzie: We will see if the hon. member supports the proposal when hon. gentlemen from the west bring in their resolution, as no doubt they will.


William Earl Rowe: Certainly I will.


Robert McKenzie: I wish to make a brief reference also to the speech delivered by my namesake from Vancouver Centre (Mr. Mackenzie) this afternoon. For an hon. member to receive the attention he did from both sides of the house on the occasion of his first extended address in this chamber is indeed notable. His speech was worthy of all the attention it received.
Ever since I have been in this city, for some two weeks now, the one topic of discussion in this chamber, in the corridors, in the offices of members, on the street and everywhere else, is the seriousness of the economic condition of the country. It was re-
388	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. McKenzie (Assiniboia)
grettable that the Prime Minister (Mr Bennett) was not in his place to hear the address of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre. We are here to offer what we consider practical suggestions for the solution of the economic problems confronting this country. The hon. member for Vancouver Centre referred to several problems and offered practical suggestions, but the Prime Minister was not in his place to hear them. One hon. gentleman opposite said that he was better employed. Well, Mr. Speaker, I think the people of Canada will wonder just how the Prime Minister could be better employed than sitting in this chamber listening to the discussions and to the proposals for the solution of the problems which face us. And it is not the Prime Minister alone who is absent from his seat; if you look across the floor at almost any time you will see in their places only one or two cabinet ministers out of seventeen or eighteen to listen to the suggestions that are made with regard to economic conditions in Canada, which we all believe to be so acute.
The depression was so evident in the constituency which I have the honour to represent that I decided before I came down here to go through the riding, meet as many people as possible, and ascertain from them their ideas in regard to economic conditions. Where-ever I went among the farmers, among the business and professional men in our towns and villages-everywhere the people were asking this question: Why is it that in spite ol the numerous promises that were made before the last election by Conservative speakers throughout the whole country, the prices of all farm products are a great deal lower to-day than they were at that time? In July of last year wheat on the Winnipeg market was worth between 95 cents and $1; to-day I believe the latest papers .from the west quote 55 cents for No. 1 northern at Fort William-a drop of 40 cents a bushel. Butter, which was the subject of discussion to such an extent in all the constituencies of Canada, has fallen to the lowest price we have known for many years. Coarse grains have fallen to such an extent that in some parts of western Canada they are being burned for fuel, and no attempt is being made to 3ell them Raw hides, raw furs-the prices of all these commodities have been materially reduced from what they were last summer when our friends pretended to be so greatly concerned albout the welfare of the farmers of Canada. I shall not, however, dwell upon those significant facts.

There is a general feeling throughout my constituency that this government made a mistake last September when it increased the duties on practically everything the farmers have to buy. Let me tell the house some of the expressions which I heard in that connection. One was that the people of Canada expect the opposition at this session to make clear to the people of the country, and if possible to the government, the fallacy of high protection. Another view I heard expressed on more than one occasion was that this is not the time to pass legislation which can be of benefit to but a very small proportion of our people and a disadvantage to a much greater number. I was quite interested the other day to hear the hon. members for Stormont (Mr. Shaver) and Lanark (Mr. Thompson) tell of conditions in their constituencies. Their statements prove conclusively what I am now saying. Certain people are benefiting very materially from the legislation passed at the last session, but even though 15 or 20 per cent of the people do benefit from it, that legislation works to the detriment of the remaining 80 or 85 per cent. Our farmers in western Canada are not asking favours from any government; all they want is a fair chance to trade on an equal basis with Great Britain as outlined in the Dunning budget. No doubt this government is blamed for more than it should be blamed, but I have heard the complaint that the main trouble at present with the government of Canada is its inability to view economic questions from the standpoint of the common people.
During the election campaign of last year the trump card of our Conservative friends, in the cities especially, was the question of unemployment. I have in my hand a clipping from the Montreal Star of May 28, 1930- and Montreal Star is not by any means a Liberal paper or a supporter of the Liberal party. The quotation is as follows:
Employment in May favourable. Highest on record with only one exception.
The Dominion Bureau of Statistics tabulated reports from 7,208 firms who reported a decidedly upward movement in employment on May 1; the payrolls of these employers were increased by 31,470 persons to 976,224 on the date under review. . . .
Then the article goes on to say this figure is the highest on record in any year since records have been kept, with the exception of May 1, 1929. Employment conditions were favourable in this country on May 1, 1930. We read that on June 1 there was an increase in the number of people employed. On July

The Address-Mr. McKenzie (Assiniboia)
1, there was a further increase in the number of people employed. On August 1, probably for reasons best known to some of our friends opposite who come from the provinces where there are Conservative governments and where there was very little if any road work carried on through the month of July, employment reported from 7,357 firms showed payrolls accounting for 1,042,710 persons as compared with 1,043,681 on July 1-a decrease of about 971 persons. In September 7334 firms reporting to the Bureau of Statistics showed a decrease on September 1 of 18,800 persons. In October there is a further decrease from 7,384 firms reporting of about 2,900 persons. In November from 7,406 firms reporting there is a decrease of about
28,000	persons. On December 1, from 7,514 firms there is a decrease of about 31,000 persons.
The monthly bulletin of the Bureau of Statistics gives the following on January 1, 1931:
January 1 showed a pronounced curtailment which, however, involved a rather smaller number of workers than that indicated on the same dates of 1930 and 1929. In spite of the smaller falling off which was partly due to the stabilizing effect of unemployment relief work, employment was at a lower level than on the same date in the two preceding years.
From 7,431 firms reporting in the month of February 1931 there was a decrease of 8,765 in the number of persons employed.
In spite of the fact that our hon. friends opposite made so much of the question of unemployment during the election campaign, we find that on May 1, as reported in the Montreal Star, the employment situation was favourable. The number of people employed increased from month to month until August, and from then on there has been a decrease each month.
On December 30 last, the Prime Minister made a speech in the city of Regina. As one hon. member said this afternoon he had a message for the people of western Canada in regard to the wheat situation and economic conditions generally. I believe, Mr. Speaker, that there has never been a greater diappointment not only to the friends of the Prime Minister but to the people of western Canada as a whole. We were hopeful that he would have a message which would help to relieve the situation. Although I heard his address over the radio I bought a paper the following morning and read it through. For fear there would be something left out in the paper I bought, the Regina Leader-Post, I obtained a copy of the Prime Minister's paper, the
Regina Daily Star. I noticed that the report of his speech was very much the same in both papers, but I should like to direct attention to one very significant statement he made. After outlining the promises that he had made, he said:
Remember too that we inherited these conditions as a legacy of nine years of Liberal administration.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Robert McKenzie: My hon. friends say, "hear, hear." When we left this chamber about ten months ago, after the dissolution of the last parliament, we were all proud to go back to our constituencies and tell our people that although there was a world-wide depression, Canada was in a more prosperous condition than practically any other country in the world. We were able to say that although there was unemployment, that condition was not nearly as serious in Canada as it was in other countries, especially the countries which had adopted a high tariff policy.
In connection with this legacy I should like to quote some figures from the speech of my right hon. leader, delivered in this chamber on~ March 16, as found 'at page 16 of Hansard, where he said that for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1922, the aggregate trade of Canada was $1,502,000,000. That increased from year to year until in 1929 it reached its highest point at $2,655,000,000. No doubt owing to the world depression, in 1930 it dropped to $2,393,000,000. Our total exports for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1922, amounted to $754,000,000, while in 1930 they were $1,145,000,000. Canada had a greater aggregate trade per capita than any other country in the world. That was the proud position Canada was in. Not only that, but one would conclude from the statement of the Prime Minister that the financial condition of the country was in very bad shape when he took charge of affairs. In 1924 the national debt was reduced by $35993,594. There was a decrease in the national debt every year for the next seven years, and in 1930 the decrease amounted to $47,740,746, giving an aggregate for the seven years of over $276,000,000. That is the legacy hon. gentlemen opposite croak about, and about which they have been talking so much during this session.
With regard to these tariff increases there has been a great deal said. We wonder just what the inevitable result of such a condition of affairs is likely to be, and I cannot express my view better than by reading an editorial
390	COMMONS
The Address-Mr. McKenzie (Assiniboia)
which I clipped from the Toronto Star of October 18, 1930. It is headed "Inevitable Results" and continues:
Henry Ford tells the English people on his present visit that "within two years not a single piece or part of Ford products will be brought into England from the United States."
Further on the editorial continues:
The trade policy of the United States, persevered in, raises up barriers the world over to the manufactured products of the United States. For years Canada has gained industrially from this condition of things, for branch factories were started here to produce goods for export and meet with the more favourable acceptance abroad that Canadian goods received. But now that the Ottawa trade policy is to be the Washington trade policy-[DOT] all sell and no buy-how long will Canadian products enjoy that more favourable acceptance abroad which has been the secret of much of our industrial progress in recent years? Not for very long.
Then the editorial continues:
The strange notion that a country can sell abroad and do all her buying at home-the strange notion that a country can live within itself and prosper more greatly the more she does it-these strange delusions are abroad in the world and, possibly, nothing but disastrous experiment and experience will dispel the mental fog.
That expresses just about what we all feel with regard to the inevitable result of such a policy.
There is one other matter to which I should like to refer briefly, and that is the campaign which has been carried on, no doubt at public expense, by the Department of Trade and Commerce with regard to buying made in Canada products. The advertisement I hold in my hand was clipped from the Canadian National Railways Magazine, and is headed, "To give Canadians work, buy Canadian products." Then the advertisement proceeds:
To-day the opportunity is yours to render your country a service of inestimable value. And you can do it absolutely without cost to yourself in time or money. Exercise a little intelligent discrimination in your daily buying, and the thing is done.
That seems very simple to those who read advertisements, but after this advertising had been going on for some time we noticed a change. I just want to emphasize one other fact at this point. This advertising matter was carried in the daily papers and magazines, but the papers printed in my constituency, by men who are taxpayers and who will have to pay their share of the cost of the advertising, received no benefit whatever from this advertising campaign. I think our weekly newspaper men in smaller centres are entitled to a little consideration as well as 
the men printing our magazines and newspapers in the cities.
There is a very nice sentiment expressed in that advertisement, if you do not examine it too closely. We see that the Minister of Trade and Commerce, or somebody in his department, started out in a very fine, wide circle. One was going to sell to the other; they were going to do each other's washing, so to speak. They were all going to sell to each other and everything was going to work out fine, but as we watched these advertisements from week to week we noticed that the great circle on which they started out became smaller and smaller. Evidently they found that they would meet themselves somewhere near the centre before very long, and they came to a sudden stop.
A few days ago a constituent of mine sent me a little clipping which shows just to what extent those who hold up both hands in favour of this propaganda with regard to buying made in Canada goods practise it themselves. This clipping is a reprint from the Montreal Chronicle, and speaks for itself :
Damage in Dominion Textile Plant Estimated $350,000
Fire breaking out January 19 in the spinning department of the Dominion Textile Company's plant, St. Ann's branch, Notre Dame street east, caused damage estimated at about $350,000. The plant is covered by insurance placed in provineially registered American mutuals, of which the chief agent is A. O. Dawson, president of Canadian Cottons Company, Montreal.
Surprise is felt in some quarters that a corporation representing an industry which has been so conspicuous in seeking greater tariff protection should not have seen fit to patronize the_regular home markets for fire insurance. As it happens, local insurance circles find more cause to chuckle than to complain in this particular case, but the fact is not overlooked that many prominent proponents of "buy at home" movements are striking offenders in the matter of their fire insurance.
To me this is a serious matter. We know that the Dominion Textile Company received benefit from the tariff legislation passed at the September session. That benefit was given to them to the detriment of the consuming public. We notice too that Mr. A. O. Dawson, president of Canadian Cottons Limited, is chief agent for Quebec for these American mutual companies. I have no doubt that both these firms would hold up their hands and acclaim this as the proper thing. They would approve of this advertising matter which was got out by the Department of Trade and Commerce. Yet here is what they do in actual practice: they place their own insurance, not on the principle of Canada

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first, but with American mutual companies.
I have been in the insurance business myself long enough to know that there are quite a number of Canadian companies with head offices in Montreal. Why did not these people practise what they preached? Why did they not put into practice their made in Canada policy and insure with Canadian companies?
I am sorry the Minister of National Revenue (Mr. Ryckman) is not in his seat.
I wonder if he could not find some way of putting a dumping duty against these companies. He is very ingenious when it comes to imposing dumping duties against everything American. And what about the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir)? I regret that he also is absent. Why did he not see fit to bring this matter up when the question came before the cabinet council, as it did a short time ago, when they gave the Minister of National Revenue power to put a dumping duty against barbed wire? Why did he not raise his voice, if he wants the people of the west to follow out the policy he has been advocating, of diversified farming? Our people out there cannot go into stock raising unless they get wire for their fencing, and that is the only kind of fencing we can afford to buy. It looked as though they were going to get barbed wire cheaper this year than formerly. Why, therefore, if the Minister of Agriculture was present at cabinet council, did he not object to that dumping duty being imposed against barbed wire which the farmers might otherwise buy? I should like to have him, before the debate is over, express his opinion with regard to these dumping duties and explain why he sat idly by and allowed the cabinet council to give this power to the Minister of National Revenue. That minister knows nothing about western conditions, although when he came home from his visit last fall he said something to the effect that he had found nothing but the greatest optimism with regard to the policies which the Conservative party were putting into effect. I should have been glad to have him visit some parts of southern Saskatchewan and see what optimism there was there.
As a good many other hon. members have pointed out, farming conditions in the west are deplorable; things are in a desperate state. Our farmers are at their wits' end to know just what to do this spring. They do not know whether to sow a crop or not, and they are waiting for some pronouncement from the Minister of Agriculture as to just what he intends to do to solve the problems that face them. They are looking to him for some leadership. Not only that; when we go home,
as we shall be doing in a short time, we shall probably be confronted with some of the unemployed in our constituencies who will want to know what the policy of the Labour department is. As has been mentioned before, we have no Labour minister in this house; but whoever is responsible for the Labour department should announce what is going to be done for these unemployed men in our constituencies. These men are wondering what they are going to do this coming summer, and there is another winter ahead of them.
We wonder, Mr. Speaker, why it is that the government we have in Canada, who are adopting the high tariff policy, cannot see what has happened in other countries that have followed that same downward course. I remember hearing the Right Hon. Mr. Meighen, when he was leader of the Conservative party in this house, say .to the government of that day, " Why does not Canada follow the example of Australia and increase the tariff so as to give employment to her people?" Well, Australia increased its tariff and Canada was the only country that did not follow suit. And Australia had a greater problem of unemployment on its hands than we have. Their financial position to-day is desperate, much worse than Canada's although we are getting worse now. Cannot this government see that the countries which did not increase their tariffs were the last ones to feel the effects of the depression? Why do we plunge headlong where the United States has ventured and failed, where Australia has ventured and failed, and where other countries have met with the same fate? At a later date I shall dwell more upon this comparison. My time now is about expired.


Mr. T. A. FONTAINE (St. Hyacinthe-Rouville) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, I do
not wish to waste the time of the house, especially at this late hour; neither would I like to unduly prolong the present debate which has been going on for two full weeks. But, since we are not under high pressure as we were at the special session of last September, I believe that it behooves us all to properly fulfil our duties as representatives of the people by serving, to the best of our ability, and in all good faith, free from any narrow party spirit as also from all animosity, the interests of our constituents and of our Canadian people as a whole.
I must acknowledge, Mr. Speaker, that never before have I realized to the same degree the very deep truth contained in the words of the Gospel: "Tarde venientibus ossa," which I would translate under the circumstances: When he follows so many
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brilliant speakers, so many eminent parliamentarians, so many distinguished debaters as we have listened to since the beginning oif the discussion on the address in reply to the speech from the throne, the young member finds his task no easy one, indeed, and he feels that there is very little left for him to say.
In my turn, as a French Canadian member of parliament representing the province of Quebec, I deem it my duty, as my good friend the distinguished member for Hull (Mr. Fournier) pointed out the other day, to speak in my native tongue when I rise to-day for the first time as a member of this house. I believe that it is the duty of every French Canadian who is elected to this house to use the French language when he addresses the assembly for the first time.
Mr. Speaker, I trust you will allow me in all humility and with all due modesty to join with all my colleagues on both sides of the house in expressing to you my heartfelt and truly sincere congratulations on your elevation to the exalted position you occupy as Speaker of the House of Commons. This tribute seems to me all the more fitting since I have been given the privilege of occupying the same room in this building which formerly served Your Honour.
I wish also to offer my very cordial congratulations, as did all the hon. gentlemen who preceded me, to the hon. members for Restigouche-Madawaska (Mr. Cormier) and for North Grey (Mr. Porteous) for the very meritorious fashion in which they carried out the arduous task assigned them of moving and seconding, respectively, (the address in reply to the speech from the throne.
If time were not wanting, we should like to offer our congratulations also to the French Canadian members, and to the representatives of the other provinces, on both sides of the house, ^ for the very excellent speeches we have listened to during the past two weeks.
If I were a member of acquired standing, I should very likely not be forgiven for singing the praises of the constituency which does me the honour of selecting me as its representative in this house. But since all new members are sure of your indulgence, Mr. Speaker, and of the kindly feelings of all our hon. colleagues, I hope you will allow me to say that I represent, not the finest county in our whole Dominion-the hon. friends beside me would smother me with their protests-but I shall use the expression which can displease nobody-one of the finest counties of the province of Quebec. My constituency is partly agricultural and partly 
industrial. On the agricultural side we have general farming, the dairy industry, cattle raising, market gardening; we also produce quantities of hay and a very large yield of tobacco, particularly around St. Cesaire. The county abounds in magnificent orchards; and the country around Rougemont, St.-Hilaire and Abbotsford is aptly described as the most beautiful garden in the provinoe. We are also given over to the maple industry, to canning activities, to poultry raising and bee culture, etc. From the industrial viewpoint we have silk factories, knitting mills, shoe factories, tanneries and organ factories. We also have distilleries, we manufacture headgear, etc. In my riding during the last election, as was done in all the other counties in Quebec province, in fact in all the constituencies throughout the country, a special appeal was made to the farming community: In an effort to obtain their votes they were led to believe that if they elected the Conservative party to office they would receive much higher prices for their produce. The working people of the cities were promised more work. None of these promises have been fulfilled. But everywhere and always our opponents have fallen back on their well known slogan: "Canada First". Mr. Speaker, whenever the Conservative party is striving hard for victory it always has recourse to some stirring battle cry that resounds like a bugle call. We had an illustration of this in the 1911 campaign when the Conservative party triumphed to the tune of:	"No truck nor trade with the Yankees".
And in 1911, since we are on the subject, the Conservatives, just as in 1930, played a twofaced game. In one part of the country the fight was waged by feeding the people all sorts of fantastic notions concerning reciprocity; elsewhere the same bugaboos were called into service, but this time the butt was the proposed Canadian Navy. In the 1930 campaign the motto inspired by the Conservative chieftain himself was not quite so blatant: "Canada First".
A fine motto, Mr. Speaker, no doubt about it; perhaps the finest that could be inscribed at the head of a political program on the eve of a general election. "Canada First!", how well it looks in a proclamation, how it stands out in a speech. Every single one of us approves of this magic formula; but we wish to give it its real meaning, its precise and accurate significance.
If it is meant to convey that every effort should be made to find new markets for our products, or even to keep those markets we already have, we are for it. If it means striving to ensure national union, harmony

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and concord between provinces, between classes, between races, between creeds, we are for it. If this program means protecting the consumer and the middle classes, and not looking solely to the interests of the big capitalists of the country, we are for it. If it means protecting the farmer and the workingman to the same degree as the magnates of industry and finance, we are for it, absolutely and completely; for such, thank God, has always been the program of the Liberal party. But, Mr. Speaker, if by that magic formula it is sought, first and foremost, to support the might of wealth and power, and in the doing to ride roughshod over any and all obstacles; if, as a consequence of the reckless increase of our tariff, all other countries, one after another, close their doors against us; if, instead of a tariff for revenue, we find our custom receipts dwindling rapidly from day to day; if our country must relinquish the enviable position it had acquired in the world of trade among the first nations of the globe; if, instead of piling up a surplus and thus reducing our national debt, the public treasury is constantly losing ground; if, as a consequence, the government, instead of easing or even abolishing certain taxes which weigh heavily on the nation, finds itself under the necessity of increasing them and of creating new imposts; if instead of the peace, the mutual confidence, the respect, the harmony and unity, which must flourish in this Canada of ours if we wish to ensure the survival of confederation; if, I repeat, instead of all that, we find distrust, suspicion, animosity, constant bickerings among the provinces, between different parts of the country, between the classes of our population; if we even find in certain cases, sad to relate, the rights of minorities despised; ah then, Mr. Speaker, are we not justified in asking ourselves if this fine motto was not used to mask the sole object of gaining power through the application of the supremely false and evil principle:	"The end justifies the means."
During the campaign of last July, Mr. Speaker, our good friends to your right saw nothing but unrest, depression, unemployment, hardship and untold suffering. For our part we are quite willing to admit the existence of an economic crisis; but we have always maintained that it had its general causes in overproduction, the weakening of the wheat market, the inroads of mechanization, the slock exchange crash, etc. Our opponents absolutely refused to look beyond our own borders, to the countries of Europe of the neighbouring republic; they refused to study
the economic situation in other countries. After the election, they soon changed. Several of the hon. members who preceded me brought to the attention of the house statements made, after the election, by the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens), for instance, by the hon. Minister of Labour (Senator Robertson), by the hon. member for Argenteuil (Sir George Perley). The right hon. Prime Minister himself (Mr. Bennett), in the speech he delivered at the opening of the Imperial conference in London, on October 1st, duly stressed the fact that the conference was beginning its labours at a time when the entire world was going through a period of industrial depression. Let me quote his own words, which I find, Mr. Speaker, in the official report of the conference published by order of parliament:
We meet at a time of industrial depression, falling prices, slackening trade, diminishing revenues and rising unemployment. This situation is world-wide, and while some countries know it only in a modified degree, all are equally concerned in finding a cure for it. Those factors which once controlled the course of international trade and commerce have given place to others. The old order of things has passed. How far the present unhappy state may be regarded as the manifestation of change into a new condition of world affairs, it is perhaps profitless at the moment to enquire.
But whoever had listened to the speeches of the right hon. Prime Minister during the campaign, would have believed that if Canada were suffering from any such economic depression it was due entirely to the neglect and the incompetence of the Liberal administration. But hardly was the election over, when he unhesitatingly accepted the Liberal viewpoint. What a fitting occasion to quote the poet's words:	"Quantum mutatis ab illo!"
Whenever anything goes wrong our Conservative friends always have the same explanation to offer, whether before or after an election: Blame the Liberals. As people used to say at one time: Blame Papineau. The hon. member for Labelle (Mr. Bourassa) recalled this in one of his speeches during the campaign: "I know this refrain only too well," he said; "it was heard everywhere in the days of my great-grandfather: if the weather were bad, blame Papineau; if it rained, blame Papineau; if the roads were bad, blame Papineau; if the cows were barren, blame Papineau."
But if I remember aright, Mr. Speaker, our friends opposite boasted during the campaign that they had a wonderful cure-all that would immediately rid us of all the. evils that beset our country. They told the voters: "Give us a chance, and we'll change all this; our pro-
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tective tariff will put everything back on its feet again." The right hon. Prime Minister himself, stated in Nova Scotia,-his words will be found in the Halifax Herald of July 3rd and 4th; besides, I believe they are quoted on page 37 of the French version of Hansard:
If the Conservative party is victorious on July 28th I will see to it that old age pensions are paid in every province out of the federal treasury.
Let me, in passing, congratulate the hon member for Jacques-Cartier (Mr. Laurin) on the splendid speech he made last night, particularly on his eloquent treatment of this question of old age pensions. As I listened to him I thought: "If he delivered this speech in all the parishes of his county there is nothing surprising about his large majority.'' Mr. Speaker, who can say how many votes this promise of old age pensions rallied to the Conservative banner in the province of Quebec, and in the other provinces?
The Prime Minister went on-and this is important:
I ask the Conservative candidates who are elected to parliament from this province to vote against me and against my government if these promises are not kept.
Alas, like Sister Anne, we see nothing on the horizon. In the speech from the throne we are told: "Have patience; it will come in time: we have been in office only eight months. But these hon. gentlemen sang another tune during the campaign: there was to be no delay; everything was to be straightened out immediately. It was on the strength of these explicit pledges that they gained so many votes in Quebec and in the other provinces. Does anyone, for a single moment, think that the result of the election would have been the same if our opponents, instead of promising an immediate solution of all our difficulties, had said to the electorate: "We believe we can do better than the Liberals; but we do not know how much time we will need. One thing is certain: no improvement will be possible for a long time". That is what they are saying to-day; so much so that even after being in office for over eight months our Conservative friends are still not able to tell us when their marvellous remedies will begin to show some results.
If the situation is not one whit improved, say our opponents, if our income has decreased to the tune of $72,000,000 during the first ten months of the fiscal year which will end in a few days; if, in the same period our expenses have increased by $20,000,000 and the public debt by $44,000,000; if the government must face a deficit of $100,000,000, as the right

hon. Prime Minister himself has acknowledged, there is nothing strange about that: it is the fault of the Dunning tariff. But here again our Conservative friends are caught in their own trap; for if I am not mistaken the Dunning tariff only came into effect on May 1; and the government hastily repealed it at the special session of last September. Is anyone ready to believe that this tariff, in effect only a few months, could have such disastrous results? No, the Dunning tariff which sought to open up new foreign markets for our goods, had as its necessary object the increase of our revenue. The best proof of this is found in the fact that immediately after its repeal our revenue began to fall.
Frequent mention has been made of the Prime Minister's promises during the campaign. Several of our friends opposite have sought to show-without any satisfactory proof it seems to me,-that their pledges had been fulfilled. As a matter of fact I believe that only one was kept, and that only in part; I am speaking of the special session. What were the principal pledges made by the Prime Minister and the Conservative party to curry favour with the electorate? The first was that unemployment would be banished immediately through a special session called for that purpose. The second was an increase in the prices of farm produce, especially butter. That promise has not been kept. The third was to establish a system of old age pensions in all the provinces at federal expense. We have still to see its fulfilment. Fourth promise: A national highway from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from Cape Breton to Vancouver. What has become of that pledge, Mr. Speaker? Another promise unfulfilled.
Fifth promise: a bridge over the St. Lawrence at Laehine; and a bridge, if you please, without any toll-gate whatever. This is being implemented by the provincial government of Quebec province, and not by the federal government.
Sixth promise: The St. Lawrence waterway. Mr. Speaker, can anybody sincerely and in good faith claim to-day in this house that these promises have been kept, or are about to be fulfilled by the party now in power?
I do not intend,-time is flying-to recall most of the important declarations made by the Prime Minister on the eve of last election day, July 28th. But I shall quote a few, as briefly as possible.
When I have become prime minister, on the 28th, I will see to it that all my promises are kept or my government will go down to defeat in the effort to fulfill them.

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Here is what he said at- Halifax:
I ask the Conservative candidates in this province (Nova Scotia) who are elected to parliament to vote against me and against my government if these pledges are not kept.
And again:
Mr. King promises to study the unemployment problem. I promise to put an end to unemployment. Which plan do you prefer?
What a fine ring there was to such statements made in the course of a political speech. He also said:
What you want is not conferences, but work; and it is work you will get.
And the right hon. Prime Minister added, speaking this time in Quebec city-and this is important for our conservative friends; I have not yet the pleasure of knowing personally and intimately the Conservative representatives of our province, but they seem well-intentioned; those I have met in this house appear to be men of good-will and I feel sure that at the first opportunity they will dutifully follow the recommendation made to them by their leader in Quebec city-the right hon. Prime Minister stated that he wanted the Quebec members and the other members of his party to throw him out of office if, after his victory at the polls, he should be unfaithful to the pledges he had made to the Canadian people.


An hon. MEMBER:: No danger.


Joseph-Théophile-Adélard Fontaine: I have not the pleasure of knowing personally the hon. member for Montmagny (Mr. LaVergne); only I	know that he enjoys, and rightly,
a very high reputation; he has the honour to occupy, or he did occupy -I am not sure on this point-a position of trust at the Quebec Bar; if I mistake not he has been, may be even yet, batonnier. I tender him, in passing, my congratulations. He has gained in our own province, and throughout the Dominion, a high reputation as a stalwart champion of the French language. He was not afraid to criticize, as it deserved to be criticized, on the floor of this house, the conduct of the prime minister of Saskatchewan towards our brethren in those parts. But the hon. member for Montmagny has stated that in the last campaign ,the Quebec Liberals had raised the cry of prejudice, that they were all partisans, and that he himself had become a good Tory because he had become a good Canadian. Being a young member there is nothing I would sooner avoid than any unpleasantness towards the hon. gentleman; but I do believe that he might very well have refrained from such language. It was rather his
own leader who appealed to prejudice during the last campaign, claiming that the government was nothing 'but a mercenary group, kept in office through falsehood and subterfuge, looking solely to their own interests, unmindful of everything save their own personal advantage; he called them traitors and compared them to Judas. Never before in our history, I believe, has the chieftain of a great political party, denounced in such scathing terms the leaders of the opposing party.
It was not the Liberals of Quebec who appealed to prejudice. We remember the attitude of the Conservative party at the political meetings held throughout Quebec last June. They said that the three western provinces were represented in the cabinet by Messrs. Mackenzie King, Dunning, Crerar, Stewart and Motherwell; that these five ministers dominated the government and controlled its financial and economic policies.
I believe it was the hon. Secretary of State himself (Mr. Cahan) who, speaking one evening over radio station CKAC, in Montreal, said that for the past ten years that group had held in leash the solid Quebec bloc.
During this time what was being said in the west by the Regina Daily Star, that stupid paper, with only one ideal, one object, one policy: the persecution of our French Canadian brethren in the west; this paper which should not forget that in the province of Quebec and in the other provinces we have a French Canadian press which will always stand as a bulwark against all movements, all attacks directed against the rights of minorities in this country. This press has fought the good fight for twenty years in our province and, thanks be to God, the Saskatchewan paper can well meditate on Lafon-taine's fable:	"Le Serpent et la Lime;" in
spite of all it may do, it will never make the slightest headway against the rights and privileges guaranteed the French Canadian minority by the very terms of our constitution. But what was this paper, friendly towards our conservative opponents in the west, saying about the liberal party? This paper which never had, and has not to-day, the slightest fellow-feeling towards French Canadians, asserted that the federal cabinet was dominated by the province of Quebec, and that through the Postmaster General and the Secretary of State every possible means were being employed to impose the French language on this country and-surprising claim, which goes to show how far bad faith may lead one astray-to impose protection on Canada.
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In the west the voters were told that the liberal government was protectionist; to the eastern voters it was said that the government was under the free trade influences of the west. In Montreal it was claimed that the western members dominated the King cabinet; while in Saskatchewan our opponents appealed to prejudice by asserting that the Quebec bloc was forcing the French language and protection on the country. If that is not an appeal to prejudice, then words have no meaning.
A goodly number of those who have spoken, Mr. Speaker, tried to make capital out of the new immigration policy of the present government. On this subject I shall not repeat the excellent case made out the other evening by my hon. colleague from Bellechasse; but I should perhaps put clearly before the people of this country the plain fact that during the last twenty years it was the -Conservative party, and not the Liberal, which brought the greater number of immigrants to Canada. Under the conservative regime, from 1911 to 1921, there was admitted to this country a total of 2,123,920 immigrants while during the time that the Liberals held office, from 1922 to 1930, the total was only 1,145,475, or almost 50 per cent less.
It must be remembered also that when our Conservative friends claim to have put a stop to immigration, they are saying something which is not so. According to the statistics of the Immigration department, reorganized by the Prime Minister, 25,000 immigrants entered Canada during August, September, October, November and December last. During the month of January 1,480 immigrants were admitted, in spite of unemployment, in spite of the Conservative party's promises to end this evil, and their boast that since they are in office all immigration has ceased. I must mention also that the present Prime Minister lost no time in reviving the Department of Immigration, abolished by the previous government; and that during the session of 1929, as certain hon. members have already recalled, General McRae, chief organizer of the Conservative party, suggested the spending of 8300,000,000 for the purpose of peopling our western provinces with unemployed imported here, at our expense, from the British Isles.
We are often told that high protection is the best cure for unemployment. Those who use this argument have failed to note the experience of our powerful neighbours, the United States, high protection country par excellence. Let us follow the unemployment curve in these protectionist states during the

last few years. In 1928 the unemployed numbered 800,000; in 1929, 500,000. In June, 1930, this had been increased to 4,500,000 and in the following October, only a few months later, the figure had reached 7,200,000. If the number has increased at the same rate since, the United States will soon have an army of unemployed equal to the entire population of Canada.
But, Mr. Speaker, the United States are not the only country to suffer from high protection. One of our sister dominions, Australia, thought it would be an advantage to adopt a policy of high protection. Australia is at present labouring under a national debt of $5,000,000,000; nearly the entire revenue of the country is required to meet the interest alone. The people of Australia are on the way to national bankruptcy: they do not know how to discharge this debt, or even whether they can pay it. Like our friends opposite, they also built railroads that could not pay, oostly highways, and launched into numerous other undertakings of similar character. In spite of their policy of high protection they are suffering acutely from the crisis in the wheat and textile markets. The state has a hand in almost everything; state ownership has gone further in Australia than anywhere else. But all these things have not helped to restore the country s finances, which at the present time are in such a bad way that even the great international financial institutions refuse any further loan to Australia.
Which proves, Mr. Speaker, that every time a country increases its tariff the only result is to encourage other countries to retaliate in the same fashion.
During the last campaign our opponents blamed the low price of butter in 1930 on the treaty we had signed with New Zealand. The treaty was perhaps a contributing cause; and for that reason it lapsed on October 12th, through the initiative of the former government. But the New Zealand treaty was not the only cause, I even say it was not the chief cause, of the situation that existed. W'e must not forget that the increase in the American tariff on milk and cream had, as was to be expected, the immediate effect of drastically curtailing our dairy exports to the United States, which had come from the southern parts of Ontario and Quebec, and chiefly from the eastern townships, in the latter province. Once the American market was closed to them, our dairy producers had to ship their surplus to Montreal and other Canadian centres or to manufacture butter and cheese; inevitably prices fell as a result.

Civil Service Act
For -proof of this we have only to glance at our statistics which show that in 1929 our dairy exports to the United States were valued at $5,476,254; while the following year, 1930, this had fallen to $2,661,076. I have gleaned these data from the financial and commercial review of 1930 published in the Montreal Gazette of January 3, 1931. Moreover, if I had the time I could easily show that our butter market was no worse off than in the United States, where the highest of high tariff walls protect the American producer.
Before sitting down, Mr. Speaker, I would like to say a word on the question of mutual understanding, since it is mentioned in the speech from the throne, in the following words:
In adversity that union is made still stronger by the spirit of cooperation and mutual understanding which is the surest bulwark of the nation's welfare and happiness.
Is it really true that at the present time, all through Canada, in all the provinces, particularly in certain provinces where there is a minority, that we do find that this spirit of mutual understanding that we have a perfect right to expect in a country such as ours? In the Patriote de l'Ouest of March 4th, 1931, there was published an appeal, a veritable cry of anguish and despair, from the French Canadian and Catholic minority of those parts. I am going to read it to the house:
Citizens of Canada for centuries, explorers and pioneers of the west, it is hard for the French Canadians to see themselves, in their own country, put in the same footing as the immigrant of yesterday. It is hard that the French Canadian alone should have no say in laws which concern only himself. It is painful to see himself despoiled of rights acquired at the very dawn of our history, and for motives which have not even the appearance of truth.
Altogether aside from the Catholic and French aspect of the question, we are convinced that premier Anderson of Saskatchewan is making a mistake in outlawing the teaching of our language. The result wall not be a stronger union among the citizens of our province, nor any progress in the field of education. Whether he knows it or not, Mr. Anderson is leading the country towards a Communist reign of terror and not towards that spirit of brotherhood which is based on the respect of each other's sentiments. This coercive policy will be brought into play in other fields, will strike other groups than ours, perhaps some people dear to Mr. Anderson. Once tyranny is let loose it creates much greater havoc than its master ever willed.
The French tongue will reecho over our immense country long after the present prime minister -will have disappeared from the scene; and many experiments, of a religious or nonreligious nature, will have run their course, when the silver voice of our Catholic belfries will still be heard consoling the souls of the faithful with the hope of a future life.
I will end on that. I trust that such appeals will be heard and understood, and that the province of Saskatchewan, emulating the example of the province of Quebec, will safeguard the rights, advantages and privileges of the French-Canadian minority guaranteed them by the constitution of our country; rights, advantages and privileges which Quebec province has always held sacred as regards our English-speaking minority.
On motion of Mr. Dupre the debate was adjourned.
On motion of Mr. Guthrie the house adjourned at 10.12 p.m.
Monday, March 30, 1931