1931-07-10

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Mr. W. C. S. McLURE (Queens) moved concurrence in the second report of the joint select standing committee of both houses on the printing of parliament presented to the house on Thursday, July 9, 1931.
Motion agreed to.


Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister) moved:: That it be resolved that a message be sent to the Senate informing Their Honours that this house doth agree in the address to His Excellency the Governor General praying that His Excellency may be pleased to transmit our joint address to His Most Excellent Majesty the King, relative to a measure to be submitted to the parliament of the United Kingdom, and more particularly set forth in the said joint address; and have filled in the blank space therein with the words "and Commons."


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Motion agreed to.


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Bill No. 118, to incorporate Service Loan and Finance Corporation.-Mr. Lawson.
Mr. STIRLING (for Mr. Lawson) moved that the bill be referred to the committee on banking and commerce.
Motion agreed to.

Richard Bedford Bennett: Before the orders of the day are proceeded with, I think I should inform the house that the cable arrangements with Australia contemplate a statement being made on Monday with respect to the trade agreement made between Canada and that dominion. Owing to the difference in time it will suit the convenience of the ministers there if the statement is made here about nine o'clock in the evening, and I trust that the house will afford us an opportunity for such a statement to be made on Monday evening at nine o'clock or thereabouts. I 'have not yet received the agreement. The mail apparently has been delayed, and if anything should intervene to prevent its being received

between now and Monday the statement might be deferred, but I promised the house that I would advise it as soon as I received word as to the time at which the statement would be made.



BRITISH AMERICAN OIL COMPANY


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think I should direct attention to the fact that a few days ago the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Heenan) made a statement regarding labour conditions, and the attention of the president of the British American Oil Company, Limited, having been directed to his statement, quoting a statement which appeared in a newspaper not published in Canada, a memorandum was sent to me which reads as follows:
On page 3465 of Hansard, July 7th, are remarks dealing with the labour policy of The British American Oil Company Limited. These remarks are misleading and untrue.
The construction of the refinery at Montreal is, in the main, under contract to various firms, and such work as is being performed by the company is being paid for at rates prevailing for similar work in the city of Montreal.
No labour organization, or individual, for that matter, has made complaint to the company as to rates of wages being paid according to testimony of the Montreal office of the company.
The policy of the company has, since its incorporation in 1906, been very favourable to labour.
Employees, after two years' service have their lives insured in favour of their estate, or such beneficiary as they may name, the total expense being borne by the company; this insurance continued in force so long as the worker remains in the employ of the company.
The company contributes 50 per cent (the employees the balance), to a sick benefit fund which gives employees income during illness and carries with it payments in connection with funeral expenses to worker or any member of his family.
The present rates of wages are not below those effective during the war period, or subsequent thereto.
Employees have a works committee which meets with management, and never once has there been a demand for increased wages, and consequently there has never been a strike in any of the company's plants.
It is significant that the subject matter to which reference is made appeared in a United States labour publication, namely "Labor." Washington, D.C., June 30, 1931. If there were foundation for the charges then, why did not one, at least, if not all, of the Canadian labour papers deal with the matter? Canadian labour is not unmindful of the fact that through the construction of refinery at Montreal The

Business of the House
British American Oil Company is contributing in this item alone over $1,000,000 directly to the workers.
Mr. Heenan mentions The Toronto Iron Works Limited as a close ally of The British American Oil Company. There is no connection between The Toronto Iron Works and The British American Oil Company. A. L. Ellsworth, the president of both companies, established The British American Oil Company in 1906, and The Toronto Iron Works in 1907. While A. L. Ellsworth and P. W. Binns are officers of both companies, yet they are inactive in The Toronto Iron Works Limited, and the companies have no community of interest through stock ownership.
The Toronto Iron Works Limited has done much work over the past years in the eastern provinces, including Quebec, and is paying today rates of wages at Montreal no lower than paid in the past. The maximum rate is 83 cents per hour, and the minimum rate for unskilled labour is 35 cents per hour.
The company, in common with most contractors, employs its men nine hours per day.
No Sunday work.
There is not one iota of excuse for the use of the words, "bludgeoning, bullying and discriminating," as used by Mr. Heenan based upon the matter contained in the Washington publication.
I make no comment on this memorandum in any way, shape or form, but I think in all fairness I must, as minister, communicate it to the 'house in the same sense in which it was forwarded to me by the president of the company concerned.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: May I say that apparently the right hon. gentleman does not agree with the ruling of the Deputy Speaker that we are not allowed to read in the house communications from outside reflecting on statements that have been made in the house.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I was not present, I think, Mr. Speaker, when that ruling was given. All I can say is this, that a sense o*f fair play must always govern deliberative bodies.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Both sides.


Richard Bedford Bennett: When a statement is made to this house by a member who has been a former minister, surely the people affected have a right to direct the attention of the government to it in order that equal publicity may be given to their side of an issue as was given by the minister.


Ernest Lapointe: I am quite willing to agree, provided that my right hon. friend sides with us in future when the Deputy Speaker prevents us from doing the same thing.	.


Hon. PETER HEENAN (Kenora-Rainy River):: I sincerely welcome the remarks of
the Prime Minister with respect to this matter because it is only fair that both sides of any question should be put before the house. I would remind the Prime Minister, however, that there was no statement made by me with respect to this matter. I was simply quoting from a labour paper.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not published in Canada.


Peter Heenan: The conditions were reported upon by a Canadian corespondent, who is a very prominent man in this country. When he was making the investigation he had labour men associated with him. I propose when the labour estimates are discussed to bring up on the floor of the house that very same question.



CRIMINAL CODE AMENDMENT

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On the orders of the day:
Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, I am surprised to see in the votes and proceedings, at this late stage of the session, a notice for the introduction of a bill amending the criminal code. I do not know whether the measure is of an emergent character to cover a special situation, or whether the amendments proposed are extensive or important.


Hon. HUGH GUTHRIE (Minister of Justice) :: There are no radical provisions in the proposed change, with the exception of one concerning Doukhobor parades in western Canada. The other amendments are of a simple nature.


Mr. POULIOT:: The Ku Klux Klan should lend their nightshirts to the Doukhobors.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: Before we proceed to further business may I ask my right hon. friend if this bill will be the last of the legislation to be brought down with the exception of that which is to deal with unemployment relief?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My right hon. friend says "No." I do think it is about time he had a little appreciation for the

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position of hon. members in this house. Instead of acting as a Prime Minister he behaves as a dictator-and a disagreeable dictator, at that. All through this session he has been indifferent to the convenience of hon. members and has not seen fit even to bring down the proposed legislation in a manner which would enable it to be properly discussed. When, on repeated occasions, we have tried to accommodate him, all we have received by way of thanks has been a lecture or some rude remark.
I am speaking very plainly to my right hon. friend; he may continue to run the business of the house in the way he considers best, regardless of others, but it may be well for him to remember that there are two sides who have to do with and will have a say in the handling of it.



WAYS AND MEANS


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The house in committee of ways and means, Mr. LaVergne in the chair.
The CHAIRMAN:: When the committee
rose last night it was considering item No. 55 of the schedule. Shall the item carry?


Mr. DONNELLY:: Mr. Chairman, when
we were speaking about corn last night I referred to the fact that the western grain growers would like to have cheaper freight rates for grain and fodder so that their coarse grains may be shipped at lower rates to the markets throughout Canada. I wish to substantiate what I said by reading an extract from a publication by the National Dairy Council of Canada following its meeting of March, 1931. On page 76 I find the following:
Cheaper feeds are.essential if there is to be an expanding production of dairy products. These are attainable through:-
(a) Cheaper distribution of grains and mill feeds. This involves lower freight rate to the extreme eastern and western parts of Canada in addition to bulk shipments and storage. The operations of the coarse grain pool promise to materially assist in this regard.
In other words the National Dairy Council is urging that there should be cheaper freight rates for coarse grain. I maintained last night and repeat to-day that the proposed duty on com will mean added expense to those people who are carrying on the dairy industry, trying to fatten cattle or to raise poultry. My suggestion to the Prime

Minister would be to leave the duty on corn as it is, namely, to leave it free for feeding purposes. As he has seen fit to allow a five cent freight rate on wheat I would suggest that he should make the same rate applicable to barley and coarse grains for domestic feeding purposes in order that the farmers in eastern Canada may be able to obtain barley at a cheaper rate. Either he should do that or cut the freight rates. It is absolutely essential however, if we are going to continue as a dairy producing and mixed farming country, that we should have our feeds distributed at cheaper rates throughout the Dominion. Either our farmers in western Canada must have assistance to bring their coarse grains at cheaper rates 'to eastern Canada and into British Columbia or assistance must be given either through cheaper freight rates or by the five cents which is being given to the wheat growers. In my opinion that should apply also to the barley growers so that their coarse grains may be delivered at cheaper rates. I should like to know whether or not the Prime Miinster will take into consideration the wishes of the National Dairy Council and the farmers throughout Canada.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Freight rates will not be dealt with by this legislation, because the government does not make them. They are made by the Board of Railway Commissioners. In my view the matters referred to by my hon. friend are not relevant on these tariff items. The remarks of my hon. friend with respect to freight rates have been repeated frequently, and sometimes I wonder whether hon. members realize the deficits with which the railways are faced at the present time and where those railway companies will find themselves if such deficits continue.


James J. Donnelly: What about five cents a bushel?


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is to help the wheat growers.	[DOT]


Mr. MacLEAN:: If I may be permitted to say so, about the only way that coarse grains from the western provinces can be brought to the maritimes is by some change in the freight rates. A couple of years ago I thought I had made a good case concerning mill feeds and course grains before the railway commission on behalf of the farmers of eastern Canada. Despite that fact however we received no reduction and no benefit. The condition of maritime farmers in regard to mill feeds and coarse grains is this: The

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farmers of Denmark and other European countries can procure their feeds cheaper than the farmers of the maritime provinces. I would like the Prime Minister to say whether or not he thinks that is fair either to the producers of coarse grains in western Canada or the farmers in the maritimes. The export rate on grain and mill feeds is so low that they can be brought to the seaports in the maritimes, shipped to Europe and our friends in Denmark can get their feed cheaper than we can. That is the competition we have to meet on the markets of the world. I do not think any government in Canada should tolerate such conditions as that. Canadian farmers should be .given a fair chance with the farmers of other parts of the world. If the party in power is a Canada-first party I think they should endeavour to see that all parts of Canada are treated fairly in this matter. I have no objection to five cents on wheat for export, but I think it should apply to coarse grains as well so that bran and millfeeds may be brought more cheaply to the farmers of the maritimes. As to the duty on corn increasing the sale of coarse grains in the maritime provinces, I do not think it will have this effect unless there is a revision of the freight rates. The fox ranches of Prince Edward Island use large quantities of corn meal, and if the price of furs continues to drop we may have to resort more than ever to corn meal, as it is the cheapest feed available. I understand the corn is imported and ground in Canada and shipped all over the Dominion.


An hon. MEMBER:: Educate them to eat barley.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: I do not think there would be any chance in the world of the prairie provinces finding a market for their barley in Prince Edward Island, for our farmers already grow enough of this grain for their own use. I understand that the barley crop is not as large in Nova Scotia as it is in Prince Edward Island, and consequently there is a larger market there for the sale of barley than in my province. The only grain we bring in is corn, and naturally we would be opposed to the imposition of this duty.


Mr. McMILLAN (Huron):: Mr. Chairman, while I have no intention whatever of holding up this item, I wish to make another appeal to the right hon. Minister of Finance (Mr. Bennett) to allow corn for feeding purposes to come in free of duty. When the committee rose last night I was saying that in my boyhood days I had been brought up
at the feet of such men as Doctor James Mills, Professor Panton and Professor Day- men who did so much to make the Ontario Agricultural college and experimental farm the famous institution that it is to-day, for its reputation extends throughout the world. I have under my hand a pamphlet issued by the animal husbandry division of the dominion experimental farm which strongly advises the feeding of barley to our stock.


An hon. MEMBER:: How about a little
barley corn?


Thomas McMillan: It will take
me just that much longer if my hon. friends of the opposition wish to interrupt.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: We are not on
the opposition side.


Thomas McMillan: Although my
friends are sitting on the government side they are in opposition to what I am saying at the present time. I would remind the committee that the men who direct the Ontario Agricultural college would not think of publishing a bulletin unless it were based on experiments carefully conducted over a period of years. May I call the attention of older members of the committee to a fact, which no doubt they will recall, that a certain variety of two-rowed barley was given to the farmers all over Ontario to test out on experimental plots. In those days I was conducting experiments on my father's farm. We experimented with that grain for four successive years and then considered it sufficiently good to recommend it to our fellow farmers. The second year, however, we found that grain was a dead failure, and I may add that after four or five years' further experiments by many farmers in Ontario as well as by the Ontario Agricultural college, that grain went out of use much more rapidly than it came in. In the light of that experience I am strongly of the opinion that a bulletin such as this should not be distributed until the experiments in the use of barley as a feed for stock had been conducted over a sufficiently long period to remove all doubt regarding its merits as a stock food ration. I notice a section of this bulletin headed Barley as a Feed for Horses. Let me quote:
Another reason is the general impression that barley is 'a dangerous grain for horses, in that its use is frequently conducive to a scurfy condition of the skin and to itching, scurfy legs, 

"too heating," the horseman says. Possibly a third reason is the comparative lack of palatability of barley compared with oats.

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So far as the section comprising Ontario and eastern Canada is concerned, I am satisfied that barley in its raw state is a dangerous feed for our horses; boiled it is much more palatable and safe; although I do believe from information I have received that barley may safely be fed to horses in the United States on the Pacific slope. But for our dairy cattle and young growing animals, it is a grain which no one with any experience would recommend except as forming a very small percentage of the ration.
Speaking from my own experience and in view of the fact that corn is eagerly sought after by the farmers of the western section of Ontario, particularly in my own county, I would plead again with tlhe Minister of Finance to allow this grain to come in free. I ask him to allow the farmers of Ontario to use their own judgment. They will not bring in corn if they do not think it pays them to do so. As I said last night, it was only after they had agitated for years that corn be put on the free list for feeding purposes that the government of that day, some 'thirty-five years ago, saw fit eventually to do so, and from that day to this corn has been allowed to remain on the free list. As my la^t word I would urge the Minister o'f Finance to allow corn to remain on the free list and so permit our farmers to exercise their own judgment as to whether they will purchase this grain or not.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should be sorry to think that this was the last word of the hon. gentleman-


Thomas McMillan: On the matter of corn.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Oh,-or would I be deprived of a very great pleasure. I think I forgot to say to the hon. members for New Westminster (Mr. Reid), Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill), and Hants-Kings (Mr. Ilsley) that South African corn, which is now a very important factor in the world's production, will come in free, and therefore reach the ports of Halifax and Vancouver as heretofore under the British preference. I should also state, what possibly is fairly well known to some hon. gentlemen, that there was a time when we produced 15,000,000 bushels of corn, but the advent into this country of the oorn-borer reduced our production to less than
5.000. 000.	Last year it was approximately
6.000.	000 bushels. It was said last evening by the hon. member for South Essex (Mr. Gott) that it is believed the production will reach
10.000.	000 or 12,000,000 bushels this year, and the area is being increased by thousands of
|Mr. T. 'McMillan.]
acres during the present season. It is not improbable therefore that to some considerable extent the requirements of Ontario will be met by Ontario production, but to the extent to which it is not in other parts of Canada, having regard as I pointed out to transportation costs, there will be the opportunity for the use of Coarse grains which will not bear the cost of export. Under these circumstances I do not know that I can add anything to the very laudable desire of the hon. gentleman, whose ripe experience and rich fund of humour contribute so greatly to the happiness of the government.


Mr. ROBINSON:: I do not wish to prolong the debate, but I am anxious to relieve the mind of the hon. member for South Huron (Mr. McMillan). Last night the hon. gentleman spoke of getting Essex corn in his boyhood days, which would not keep because of the moisture content. In recent years Essex and Kent counties have been carrying on experiments, and now are growing a very high grade of corn, which is only 10 per cent greater in moisture content than Kansas corn, which is supposed to be the hardest and dryest corn on the continent. So I do not think the hon. member for South Huron should worry over a corn famine in Huron county because of this duty, since the county of Essex will be able to take care of their requirements, either by shiploads or carloads. In past years Essex county has shipped thousands of cars of corn to all parts of western Ontario, and personally I have never heard any complaint with regard to its quality. It is not the fault of the government if a shipment happens to be too moist; that is the fault of the inspector who ships the corn. I believe the 25 cents a bushel duty will 'help the farmers of Essex, Kent and Elgin counties very materially, since corn is one of the most profitable crops they can grow, therefore, I am heartily in favour of the proposed rate of duty.


Mr. BROWN:: If the Prime Minister makes another speech probably he will shatter completely the hopes of the farmers of the west. Last night when he indicated that under the treaty with the Argentine corn would come in at 18 cents instead of 25 cents I thought I saw a look of dismay come over the faces of some of my hon, friends from Manitoba. Now he tells us that corn may come in from South Africa free, so I think the hopes of the farmers of Manitoba will be down 100 per cent by now.
I am not going to discuss this matter from the standpoint of the "dietetic eccentricities"

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
of a chicken-and if Hansard will put those words in quotation marks I will not be robbing my hon. friend from Souris (Mr. Willis) of that very choice phrase-but I do wish to discuss it from the standpoint of common sense. Before coming to this house, and since I have been here, I never pleaded for protection on any farm products, and I do not intend to begin now. In my judgment the farmer who links himself up with the principle of protection completely destroys his own position when seeking relief from the burdens which the protective system imposes upon him. I can well understand the attitude of some of the hon. gentlemen from the west, and in a measure I sympathize with them. They realize that they must go home carrying very little in the way of spoils and with very little to show in the way of the fulfilment of the promises made during the last election, so they are very anxious to have this little bit of a duty on com which, in my judgment, really will amount to nothing as far as the western farmer is concerned.


Mr. STITT (Nelson):: Will the hon. member permit a question? Is he opposed to this duty on corn; yes or no? Do not hedge, now; what is the answer?


John Livingstone Brown: That is a question I do
not object to answering, but before doing so I should like to ask another question of hon. members opposite; if I answer questions they should be willing to answer questions also. Before answering that question I should like to ask hon. gentlemen from the prairies if they are in favour of the 25 per cent duty on agricultural implements; if they are in favour of what has been done in regard to the raw material for the manufacture of binder twine; if they are in favour of what has been done in regard to barbed wire and a host of other things. I can put questions to hon. gentlemen opposite which will be just as embarrassing as questions they may put to me. I am going to answer that question, and I can do it with no embarrassment at all. I am opposed to the whole policy of this government in regard to tariffs. I am opposed to a duty on corn for the reason that I do not propose to hamstring myself when I come to advocate a reduction of the duty on those things which I use. In my judgment this proposition to put a duty on corn will be of very little, if any, advantage to the grower of western grain. When hon. gentlemen opposite from the prairies will answer the questions I have put to them as candidly as I have answered their question, we will have an interesting exhibition in this house.


Mr. MULLINS:: Will the hon. gentleman
permit me to answer his question? We gave a pledge to the electors in that country that we would support protection as long as the prices were not raised. [DOT] The prices of machinery and all other commodities have gone down under the policy of the right hon. Minister of Finance.


John Livingstone Brown: I said I could sympathize
with hon. gentlemen opposite. They know they must go home with very little to show in fulfilment of the promises they made during the last election, so they want to carry home this little duty on com and the five cent rate on wheat.


Mr. WILLIS:: Are you in favour of that?


John Livingstone Brown: That is another question
of the same kind. I want to tell hon. gentlemen opposite that what they will have to show their constituents as a result of their labours will be but as dust in the balance compared with the duty on agricultural implements, the imposition in regard to barbed wire, the action of the government in regard to the raw materials entering into the production of binder twine, and a host of other things. For my part I am going to take good care that the eyes of the farmers are not blinded by these little things to the neglect of the many more important things in this budget.


Mr. BOYES:: I should like to add just a
few words to what has been said with regard to corn. Last night the hon. member for West Middlesex (Mr. Elliott) spoke on this matter and opposed the duty on corn. I am from the eastern portion of the same county, and I wish to say that I am decidedly in favour of the duty. Our people in the county of Middlesex can raise corn in abundance, and I am sure that they will strongly favour this duty. I believe the farmers of our country should receive protection on a great many commodities, and the duty on corn is one of the ways in which we can protect our farmers to some extent.


Mr. PERLEY (Qu'Appelle):: As one of
the members from the eastern part of Saskatchewan I think it is my duty to make just a few observations as to my position with respect to this duty. During the campaign last year one of the issues was the placing of

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a duty on corn and it met with favour. I have had many letters from my electors and they are very much in favour of the government's action in placing a duty on corn. In the eastern part of Saskatchewan we have been growing more and more barley, and, as the hon. member for Souris said last night, we have great quantities of this grain in storage.	[DOT]
As regards the comparative feed value of barley and corn, I do not think it is necessary to say anything further. Statistics have been given, and the hon. member for Souris in his first apeecih made a very good case in favour of barley. At any rate, the difference, if any, is so slight that it is not worth considering. Practical feeding tests have proven that you can get as large a percentage of gain on the average animal with barley as with corn. With respect to the feeding of poultry, a good deal was said in the house last night, and I would direct attention to the evidence given before the committee on agriculture [DOT] on June 9 by Mr. Brown, chief of the poultry division of the Department of Agriculture, in which he stated that eggs from the western provinces had a premium in the Montreal market. He stated further that prairie extras on the Montreal market were a product to be proud of. At the present time hens in the west are not being fed com.
I with to refer to a point that has not yet been discussed in this house with reference to corn. I think hon. members will agree with me that the area in which corn is produced on the North American continent is gradually extending north. I think it was three years ago-the ex-Minidter of Agriculture will bear me out-that we held a corn show in the town of Indian Head. We showed corn that was produced in all parts of the western provinces of Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, and the exhibition proved conclusively that corn grown in the prairie provinces is equal in qualty to any com produced in the states to the south of us. A representative from that com area in the United States attended the show and he said that our corn was of equal quality with any corn grown in the United States. This spring farmers have had inquiries for com grown in the western provinces for seeding purposes in the states south of us as far as Texas.
I venture to say that under normal climatic conditions we can produce a large quantity of good corn in western Canada. It would not take a very great amount of corn to supply even the demand for feeding purposes. Take British Columbia, for instance: two hundred thousand acres of corn would supply 
the demand. Under favourable climatic conditions, therefore, that industry could be developed right in our own country so that there would be no need for us to worry about corn coming from other parts of the world.
It has been suggested on the other side that it would be better to have a reduction in freight rates. I think the placing of a duty on corn is a very good argument in favour of an adjustment of domestic freight rates, and it would appear to be necessary. And if the extreme east and west would come in on it, that would be a great argument in support of such an adjustment. I am surprised to observe that many hon. members on the opposite side from the western provinces are quibbling on this question. They are trying to justify their opposition to the duty on corn. When their electors read the speeches they have been making on this question the impression will not be very favourable to them.
I am delighted to note the veiy ready response we have had on this side of the house from the extreme eastern and western members in supporting us with regard to this duty on corn. It is gratifying to see such a splendid spirit of national cooperation among the eastern and western members in this respect, and I am only too pleased to endorse and support the action of the government in placing the duty on corn.


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: I think we are all agreed that the government is desirous of helping someone, presumably the barley growers. Now, however, we find it is the corn growers whom this duty is intended to help-maybe both. At all events, it will put up the price of com. That is obvious. If you put on a duty of 25 cents a bushel, does anyone suggest that the result will not be an increase in price? I say it will put up the price; it will compel the buyers of corn to pay that much more for this commodity. And that will adversely affect the poultry industry. Now, the question is, what additional price will it require to move barley from western Canada either to the Pacific or down here? It cannot move itself; it will not pay for its carriage. The result is that a good deal of it is still on the farms. Low grade barley will have to be raised from 10 to 12 cents before it can begin to move. Will this duty on corn raise the price of barley 10 cents? If it does not, then the object of this duty will not be realized. You must get the barley to move, and it is not moving because of the low price. A good deal of

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low grade barley and low grade wheat did not carry itself to Fort William, and the farmer had not only to give the barley away for the freight rate, but he was even billed by the railways for more. He was minus some dollars for freight besides giving away his barley or his wheat. I say, therefore, that this assistance, with all due respect to the Prime Minister in his desire to help the barley growers, will be ineffective unless it extends sufficient help to get the barley moving. And that will take 10 cents a bushel. Again I ask, will a duty of 25 cents on imported corn raise the price of barley 10 cents? I do not believe it will raise it one iota. It may give a market for the best barley, the kind of grain that will carry itself, to the extent of four million or five million bushels if that much corn is shut out by this 25 cents duty. But I do not know whether it will do that. One thing is dead sure, however: it is going to hurt the poultry growers. They will have to cough up more for their corn. To talk about barley being a substitute for corn in the feeding of poultry is absolute nonsense; you cannot get the poultrymen anywhere, in the east or in the west, to support such a contention. Ask the poultry themselves by throwing a mixture of corn, wheat, barley and oats before poultry and see which they will take first. They will take first the corn and next the wheat and then either the oats or barley depending upon which is the better quality. Poultry do not like barley in the whole state. I have a friend in Hamilton who is a manufacturer of high class poultry feeds. I am told by the best authorities that just to the extent that barley is substituted for corn, thus increasing the fibre content of the mixture, there must be added a quantity of hulled oats in order to keep down the fibre content. Not only that, but those mysterious vitamins of which we hear so much are lost. If barley is fed you must make up for the absence of the vitamins by the use of cod liver oil. Hon. members should not laugh at that, because that is the fact. The hon. member for Stanstead (Mr. Hackett) referred to the duck farm at Knowlton. I had the pleasure of visiting this farm and one would think the whole top of the earth was a moving mass of ducks. The primary purpose of a duck is to be eaten. Enough eggs must be laid of course in order to perpetuate the species but the primary object is meat production. A duck is not very particular as to the palatability of its food; it will eat anything and that is one of the reasons why barley is used to the extent it is at the Knowlton farm.


Mr. STEWART (Edmonton):: They do
not need cod liver oil.


William Richard Motherwell: I understand that
for the first three or four years this Knowi-ton farm was a failure because of an insufficient number of ducks. They had to get the quantity up and the cost of feed down, and I believe they have reached that point to-day and for some years past and are making a great success. This is an entirely different thing to feeding hens for egg-laying purposes.


Mr. ELLIOTT:: Do I understand correctly that this item includes corn for seed purposes as well as for feed?


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is a certified or
registered seed item.


John Campbell Elliott: Registered seed corn will
come in free. In reply to the statement made by the hon. member for East Middlesex (Mr. Boyes), who referred to the wishes of the farmers of the county of Middlesex in regard to this duty, I would say that he is not as familiar with the wishes of the farmer in regard to a duty on corn as are some of the other representatives from that county. If he had been he would not have made the remark he did. When the agitation was on for the removal of the duty which formerly existed in regard to corn, no one was more anxious that that should succeed than the cattle producer of the county of Middlesex. These men produce perhaps a greater number of fat cattle in the northern and western portions of the county than do the farmers of any other county in Ontario and they were very active in the agitation to have the duty on com removed.


An hon. MEMBER:: When was that?


Mr. STEVENS:: It was in 1896.


John Campbell Elliott: I think it was shortly
after 1896. It was a great boon to the farmers in that district and to the cattle raisers throughout the whole of Canada.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I must correct the statement I made in connection with certified seed. The practice has been to refund any duty paid by means of an order in council rather than to make the item free. We have endeavoured to develop a seed corn business in this country, but where it becomes necessary or advisable to change the seed a refund of the duty is made.


John Campbell Elliott: Looking at the schedules
I see that seed peas and seed beans come in free. I cannot understand why these should be permitted to come in free while a duty is imposed on seed corn.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think they are free only under the British preference.


John Campbell Elliott: As I read the changes,
they are free altogether.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They are free from the
United Kingdom.


John Campbell Elliott: I notice some dashes
here, what do they mean?


Richard Bedford Bennett: That means that they
are not free under the intermediate and general tariffs.


John Campbell Elliott: What is the duty?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The ordinary seed rate,
which I'think is 22i and 25 per cent.


John Campbell Elliott: I take it that I am being assured-


Richard Bedford Bennett: The rate is 10 per cent, under item 72.


John Campbell Elliott: I take it I am being assured by my right hon. friend that seed com will come in free if properly certified.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It pays a duty, but where an application is made and the facts are established as to its being certified or registered seed, then the custom has been to refund the duty by order in council.


William Richard Motherwell: As I understand,
the suggestion made by the hon. member for Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly), in regard to freight rates, it is that the five cents absorption policy, which my right hon. friend has with such good intentions put into effect on export wheat, be applied to all wheat and coarse grains. That would then take care of the barley situation and not penalize the users of corn with but problematical help to barley growers. I do not know whether or not my right hon. friend understands what I am driving at.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, I do.


William Richard Motherwell: If 1 wanted to take any political advantage out of this matter I would allow the right hon. gentleman to go on and make this mistake.


An hon. MEMBER:: Why don't you?


William Richard Motherwell: Because it is a mistake which would hurt the poultry industry. Even though I say it myself I think I have been privileged to do something to develop the poultry industry of Canada, and I do not like to see it prejudiced at this critical stage.


Mr. FAFARD (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, before passing this item, it might be well to ascertain the policy (of the hon.

Postmaster General (Mr. Sauve) in connection with the new tariff on corn. Considering the present prices for eggs, bacon, and butter, I think it would be detrimental to farmers to exact from them higher prices for the cereals they make use of in producing butter, pork, and eggs. I should like to ascertain what are the hon. Postmaster General's views on this question because, in Quebec, barley is not grown in any quantity.


Mr.   SATJVE@Translation: Mr. Speaker,
I think the hon. member for l'Islet (Mr. Fafard) has had a sufficiently long parliamentary experience to know that the policy of the Postmaster General is the same as that of the Government.


Joseph-Fernand Fafard: Good or
bad?


Mr. MORAND (Translation):: It is always a good one.


Mr. SAUVE (Translation):: You know what you did yourself in the past.


Mr. ILSLEY:: Under what item would the drawback on com imported for the manufacturing of cornmeal be found? Where can I find the provision which makes the duty 18 cents instead of 20 cents on corn coming in from the Argentine by direct route?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Those are two perfectly fair questions. The answer to the first will be found in the item itself -as read last night by the chairman, item 54a.


James Lorimer Ilsley: As amended.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes. There is no drawback. It provides that it is free when used for human consumption.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Is not most corn meal used for human consumption?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The term is broad enough to cover that at any rate. The corn meal mills in the part of the country from which my hon. friend comes number four or five. It is one of the few parts of Canada in which corn meal mills Still continue. There will be no refund or drawback. It is free.
The second question is answered in this way: The Argentine has a trade treaty with Canada. The rate is therefore under the intermediate tariff, 20 cents, but it is provided that when shipped direot to a Canadian port there is a reduction of 10 per cent, which makes the rate 18 cents. That becomes the rate under the most favoured nation clause and the provision of the section which was read last evening.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


James Lorimer Ilsley: The 'treaty is not published in the customs tariff as so many treaties are. That is one of the old treaties?


Richard Bedford Bennett: If the hon. gentleman will do me the kindness of recalling what I said when I brought down the budget, mow some weeks ago, he will recall that I gave the Argentine treaty as an illustration of an old British treaty.


Mr. BOUCHARD:: I fail to see how this new tax on corn is going to help the farmers. Of course, we were told during the campaign that if the Conservatives were put into power the farmers would receive every consideration, but up to now I do not see how this government has helped the farmers in any way. Most of the poultry men, on the contrary, will suffer because of this increased tariff of 25 per cent on incubators for hatching eggs and on brooders for rearing young chickens, and complete parts of such equipment. I shall not be as prudent as the Postmaster General. I want to express myself very clearly on this question. I agree entirely with the ex-Minister of Agriculture when he says that this tax on corn cannot help the poultry men in eastern Canada at least. I am surprised that barley as a substitute for corn is at all palatable to the members sitting on the government side of the house. I think it is really more palatable to them than it is to the hens. I was also very much surprised a't the efforts of professional men in the house to convince the hen that barley was good for her. Thy may succeed in convincing their electors that barley is a good substitute for corn, but as a poultry man myself I challenge any one of them to make a trial of this substitute. In confirmation of this, let me quote from a very valuable bulletin published by the Department of Agriculture, under the genial direction of the Hon. Robert Weir, B.A., Minister of Agriculture, and of Dr. Archibald, director of the Dominion Experimental Farms. I quote from Seasonable Hints from the Dominion experimental farms, in its issue for the summer of 1931. It says:
Owing to its extremely low price barley is making up a greater part of the ration than ever before. At the present time it is more satisfactory ground and incorporated in the mash mixture rather than in the scratch grain owing to the fact that it is not very palatable to poultry.
Note that: It is not very palatable to poultry. I hope some hon. gentlemen will read this statement, which is published by the Department of Agriculture, before making
all sorts of statements in this house. It goes on:
That this lack of palatability is due to the hull-
It is not often that a lack of palatability is due to Hull:
-has been demonstrated at this division, where some machine-hulled barley has been used in an experimentental way with excellent results.
But note what follows:
Providing that the cost of hulling can be lowered sufficiently, hulled barley becomes the logical form in which to feed that grain in the scratch grain mixture.
But it has not been demonstrated that the cost of hulling barley can be lowered.
We have other instances of the sort of action this government is taking. They raised the tariff all around before establishing a tariff board. They raised the tariff on glass, for instance, before they knew what was coming. Now they have raised the tariff on corn, to encourage the use of barley as a substitute for corn, and as I have just shown by the quotation from the bulletin issued by the Department of Agriculture, barley as a substitute for corn for feeding hens is still in the experimental stage. I wonder if the very learned Minister of Agriculture has been consulted about this matter.
But the bulletin, after dealing with the lack of palatability of barley, goes on to say:
Barley may be substituted for corn in both scratch grain and mash mixtures providing that its deficiency in vitamin A be made up through the addition of good quality alfalfa leaf meal, green cut clover or alfalfa and cod liver oil to the ration.
Alfalfa is not grown to a very great extent in the province of Quebec. Its cultivation is, in fact, barely beyond the experimental stage, but I think there is a big future for alfalfa in the province of Quebec. It is recommended in this bulletin that there be added to the ration alfalfa leaf meal, green cut clover, or alfalfa and cod liver oil. I do not know if there is a tariff on cod liver oil. If not, it must have been forgotten and will no doubt be remembered next time.
I really fail to see how the farmers have been helped by this government. I remember distinctly my opponent in the last election, a very genial orator-it is my privilege always to have good opponents-promising that if the Conservatives got into power the price of butter would rise. But what is the price of butter to-day? It is all right to have the home market, but we are in the export market, and we will remain in the export market for a long

3628	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
while. What is the price of eggs? May I say that if the farmers as a last resort were able to sell a few dozen eggs at a good price they would be assured of at least a little cash. The government proposes to increase the price of corn by 25 cents a bushel. Unless the good Tories succeed in educating the hens I am very much afraid we will not be able to substitute barley for corn, because particularly in the winter time such a substitution would be impossible. On many occasions I have tried it, and as for nine years I have been president of the poultry association in the province from which I come I think I ought to know something about the matter. In different contests I have received many prizes for my hens, and have taken an interest in poultry raising. I fail to see in this instance what good the government is doing.
Later on when we reach the subject of wool I shall have something further to say because I believe that is the only commodity in connection with which a tariff will give an advantage to the farmers. Certainly it has not given any advantage so far as butter, eggs and grain are concerned. Now the poultry men are faced with this impediment, and I think I am voicing the view's of the poultry men of the province of Quebec when I register my opposition to the proposed tariff on corn.


Mr. BURNS:: To my mind it is rather
amusing that some hon. members opposite should find fault with the action of the government when it tends to increase the price of farm products. For about three months we have listened to speeches from hon. members on both sides of the house and most of them have dealt with the depression with which this country is now faced. In the main I think the economic condition may be traced to the lack of purchasing power of Canadian farmers. Surely any steps taken by this government to increase that purchasing power should be in the interests not only of Canadian farmers but of Canadians as a whole.
I hope the ex-Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) will not misjudge my remarks when I say that I have been unable to follow the force of his argument. He has said that he is opposed to the proposed tariff because it will increase the price of farm products, and that among other things it will increase the price of corn. Hon. members have said that large quantities of corn are grown in Canada, and that when a demand is made more will be grown. If we wish to place the farmers in a purchasing position w-e must give them something more than the bare cost of production. One of the first acts of this

government was to introduce legislation to increase the price of farm products, but strange to say that action has met with severe criticism by hon. members opposite. The ex-Minister of Agriculture has said that the price of corn will be increased, and that therefore the price of that commodity grown by Canadian producers will also increase. He has admitted further that to some extent, at least, the price of barley will increase.


William Richard Motherwell: No.


Patrick Burns: I thought my hon. friend
said that.


William Richard Motherwell: No.


Patrick Burns: I think it is evident that the price of barley will be increased. Let us suppose however that the price of that commodity does not go up and look at the matter from a different viewpoint. At present there are 100,000,000 bushels of barley in storage waiting for a market. If a feed market can be secured whereby the poultry producers and stock feeders of Canada will feed barley instead of corn surely the producers will be in a position to dispose of great quantities in storage. In western Canada money will be placed in circulation and the farmers will be in a position to make purchases, resulting in great benefit to Canada as a whole. To my mind that is a logical argument.
I would ask hon. members to place themselves in the position of the farmers in western Canada who have millions of bushels of barley in storage which they cannot sell. Their first thought is to find a market for their product and this government has taken a step which will secure a market for at least a portion of that great amount in storage. For that action I think the government is to be commended.
Something has been said concerning the palatability of barley. I do not wish to take up the time of the house in dealing further with that matter, but I wish to ask hon. members on both sides of the house who enjoy their fall shooting where they find the wild ducks? If hon. members wish to go out for a stubble shoot where do they go? Do they go to the wheat stubble; do they go to the oat stubble?-no, they go to the barley stubble. That is where they find the game, and as the hon. member for Comox-Alberni (Mr. Neill) has said, "You cannot fool a hen." Likewise, you cannot fool a duck. There they are to be found in their wild state, and they pick out barley every time upon which to feed.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Bernard Munroe Stitt: Before this item is carried may I say that I was one who wrote several letters last fall asking for a duty on corn. I come from the north country where we do not grow either corn or barley, although the Swan river valley in my constituency constitutes one of the best agricultural areas in western Canada. I wrote letters only after I had received communications from farmers in the Swan river valley asking that some steps should be taken.
During this session I 'have heard a great deal about the wheat pool, and as the hon. member for Lisgar (Mr. Brown) is a member of the pool and a great exponent of it I shall read for his benefit and that of the committee a letter I received from the secretary of that body:
Manitoba Wheat Pool Wheat Pool Building'
Winnipeg, Canada
January twenty-sixth, 1931. Mr. B. M. Stitt, M.P.,
House of Commons,
Ottawa, Ont.
Dear Sir:
I was instructed by the board of directors of Manitoba wheat pool to send you the following resolution, which was passed at a meeting of the members of the Swan Biver wheat pool local held on January 6th:-
"Resolved:	.
That we petition the government to place an embargo on feed corn for one year."
Our board respectfully urges your serious consideration of placing restrictions on imports of corn into Canada.
Yours very truly,
(Signed) F. W. Ransom,
Secretary.
I have before me another letter from Ken-ville, Manitoba, which is also in the southern part of my constituency. At a meeting of the United Farmers of Manitoba held in that place the following resolution was passed:
Moved by W. C. Hunt, seconded by F. Wood that with a view to creating a better market in eastern Canada for our barley we ask the federal government to place an embargo on feed corn.
Those are the letters which were responsible for my asking the government to place a duty on corn. I do not wish to discuss the relative merits of corn and barley, because as I am not an agriculturist I leave those matters to the decision of the lawyers. I have felt it my duty to place these letters on the records of the house.


Charles A. Stewart: It seems to me we are spending a considerable amount of time upon this item and I just wish to reassure my hon. friends opposite in con-22110-2311
nection with a matter brought up by the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins) that in every case where duties are imposed there is to be no increase in price. Of course the government is pledged to that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not on agricultural products.


Charles A. Stewart: Is agriculture exempt? The government will not intervene by order in council if the price of agricultural products increases?


Richard Bedford Bennett: We are not interfering with them.


Charles A. Stewart: God help
us; the farmer gets it again. Well, it certainly worked that way with butter, and I see my right hon. friend is now taking in cheese. But if the fanner gets an increase in price then the poor consumer is not to be protected as he would be if textiles or boots and shoes for example, were increased in price. This is rather an astonishing doctrine, and it works invariably againsit the farmer.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, for him.


Charles A. Stewart: If prices go up the consumer is not to be protected against the farmer, but if the price of agricultural implements goes u.p the farmer will be protected 1 This policy shoots two ways. An hon. friend of mine suggests it is a ga.tling gun policy, but the gun turns both ways. Aim I to understand that no action will be taken by the government if the price of corn goes up?


Raymond Ducharme Morand: Would you object to the price going up now?


Charles A. Stewart: I am not
talking of that, I am talking of the principle and how the government would apply it.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-63. Rice, cleaned, per one hundred pounds: British preferential tariff, 50 cents: intermediate tariff, 90 cents; general tariff, $1.
When in packages weighing two pounds, each, or less, the weight of such packages to be included in the weight for duty.
Richard Bedford Bennett: The change is in the intermediate and general. The present rates are 50, 65 and 75 cents; they will become 50 cents, 90 cents and SI. This is cleaned rice, not uncleaned. We import a large quantity on the Pacific coast and an extensive industry is carried on in cleaned rice. We have an undertaking from the largest producers in this counltry that the price will not be increased.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Charles A. Stewart: What proportion comes in under the British preference?


Richard Bedford Bennett: In 1930, 168,200 hundredweight, valued at $565,000. Seventy-one thousand hundredweight came from Hong Kong and 56,000 hundredweight from the United States.


Mr. YOUNG:: I want to draw the attention of the committee to the way in which the customs regulations work out, but not for the purpose of blaming the government, because it happened before this government came into power. Rice grown in British Burma used to fee shipped to Holland and there the hulls were removed; then it was shipped to Canada. The importers claimed it should be admitted to Canada under the intermediate rate because we had a treaty with Holland, but the customs officials said, "No, there is not sufficient Dutch labour in it to qualify under the intermediate tariff." "Very well," said the importers, "if this is not Holland rice it must be British rice"-it came from British Burma -"and therefore it should enter unden the British preference." "No," said the customs officials, "once this rice left British Burma and entered Holland it lost its nationality and now it cannot come in as British rice, nor can it come in as Dutch rice; it is rice without a country." As I said, I am not attaching any blame to the government in this case, but I just wanted to draw attention to the fact that our customs regulations are such that sometimes we get the most ridiculous rulings. Here is rice that ordinarily might come in under the intermediate tariff, but being denied that rate is not allowed to be admitted as British rice under the British preferential rate.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I happen to know the case to which the hon. gentleman refers and I did make inquiries with respect to it. The answer which I received at that time seemed to me to be a fairly good answer:	It is not
British rice because it did not come direct from a British possession to Canada, therefore it is not British for customs purposes. There was not sufficient labour of the country from whence it came to entitle it to the intermediate. It is not a question of nationality, it is a question of its being entitled to the benefit of certain tariff provisions. I have not yet been able to see that the answer given to me is not a fairly good one. The statutory requirement with respect to British rice is that it must come direct to qualify as such.


John Livingstone Brown: How would that explanation fit in with the provision we have in the

West Indian treaty, that where goods come direct to Canadian ports we give them a ten per cent reduction? Surely if that is a sound principle, then-


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am afraid the hon.
member for Lisgar (Mr. Brown) did not follow me. Had the rice come direct from British Burma to a Canadian port and the rate had been in excess of fifty cents, there would have been a reduction of ten per cent. That is so also with respect to West Indian commodities provided for by the treaty and the Customs Act. But the difficulty was that in the case mentioned by the hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Young) the rice did not qualify with respect to either under the statutory conditions and therefore was subject to the higher impost. I felt, and I think I did indicate to the minister at that time, that the ruling should be changed, but it was indicated to me,-and I am bound to say it seemed to me to be fairly so-that if you make an exception in favour of direct importation into Canada from the country of origin, you never know where you will end, and that it is better to stick to the principle rather than depart from it. That is what the government of that day did. I am bound to say I thought the reason given me at the time was sound and I did not raise the matter in the house, for reasons that the hon. member can understand-that if I suggested an exception to the rule, and he suggested an exception to the rule, and some one else suggested an exception to the rale, then the rule with respect to direct shipment vanishes and the benefit disappears.


Edward James Young: I think it is just a question of the wisdom of the rule.


Charles A. Stewart: This is a
substantial increase of twenty-five cents on the general and the intermediate. I suppose the usual pledge is given that the price will not be increased, but our experience in this particular commodity is that cleaned rice has brought the same price plus the duty paid.


Richard Bedford Bennett: In the United States
they charge two and a half cents a pound. In this country that has not been the case. Last year our production amounted to $1,400,000.


Charles A. Stewart: I do not
understand why we need such extravagant increases in order to establish the industry. I am perfectly willing to take the right hon. gentleman's assurance that the price will not be increased. But he will find the price will be increased to pretty nearly the extent of

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
the duty. If that were not so, then what in the name of common sense is the use of increasing these duties so much? The question answers itself.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I will answer it again.


Charles A. Stewart: I have a
pretty good idea of what my right hon. friend's answer will be, although I should not anticipate it. But if it is necessary to put on an extravagant duty, and then have the trade give an undertaking that they will not make use of that duty, what is the use of imposing it? I know only one industry in Canada that observed its undertaking and that was the rubber industry.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I will not trespass too long on the time of the committee. I shall content myself with saying that the effort is to secure to the Canadian producers the cleaned rice market in Canada. Last year it amounted to SI,400,000. We brought in a substantial quantity from Hong Kong and a quantity from the United States. We can sell none to the United States, there being a duty against us of cents per pound, and as the export trade is thereby prohibited we have endeavoured to ensure that Canadian production shall be available for the Canadian consumer.


Mr. NEILL:: Where are these rice cleaning plants located?


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is one in Vancouver and one in Montreal of which I know; those two come to my mind at the moment.


Mr. REID:: But is it not a fact, Mr. Chairman, that this industry is not entirely in the hands of Canadians in Vancouver, and that this does not really help Canadians? My information is that the majority of workers are Chinese or Japanese who are not citizens of this country.


Richard Bedford Bennett: My hon. friend has raised a question which is far removed from tariff discussion. I could not answer the question, but at least this is a Canadian industry. The question of employment is a matter with which the provincial authorities have power to deal. I can only indicate that this would not be so with respect to the Montreal plant, so far as I know, and it does follow that in a good many industries to which the hon. gentleman might refer there are employed men and women who have come from other parts of the world. In some cases they are naturalized and in others they are not, but in the main they are naturalized Canadians and I do not think the fact that their employers avail themselves of the services of some employees who may not be Canadians should militate against the soundness of the principle that if possible this industry should be allowed to supply the requirements of the Canadian people, provided the tariff is not used for the purpose of exploitation.


Mr. BOTHWELL:: I wanted to direct the attention of the Prime Minister to the Canada Year Book, in dealing with this question of rice. I notice that there are six rice mills in Canada, having twenty-seven salaried employees who were paid $74,000 and fifty-one wage earners, who were paid $52,000. According to the government reports, for the year ending March 31, 1930, we imported 175,884 hundredweight of cleaned rice and 402,923 hundredweight of uncleaned rice; the cost of the cleaned rice was about $3.92 a hundredweight, while the cost of the uncleaned rice was $2.99 per hundredweight, leaving a difference of almost $1 per hundredweight which would be available for cleaning purposes. Having that in mind I wonder whether there can be any necessity for increasing the duty on rice to $1 a hundredweight which, if these figures are correct, would give the rice mills $2 per hundredweight for cleaning a commodity which is worth about 3 cents a pound.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is worth nearly 4 cents a pound on invoices of importations, and the raw rice is worth nearly 3 cents per pound at invoice prices. To that must be added transportation costs, including insurance, freight and brokerage charges. The result has been what I have indicated, that at present rates the industry has been threatened by importations from other parts of the world. If there is no increase in price-and if there is an increase the benefits that may accrue from this duty will be removed-it is believed that the maintenance of that source of supply in Canada for Canadians is beneficial to this country.


Charles Edward Bothwell: Has there been any increase in the importation of cleaned rice?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Last year we imported
168,200 hundredweight, as I indicated a moment ago, and there was a slight increase. But I indicated yesterday, with respect to these matters, that where the consumer could be protected in this time of emergency in regard to prices we were going, as far as might be within our power, to maintain that Canadian industry for the supply of Canadian requirements. The question of salaries and wages is one that might be discussed at very
3632	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
great length, but this is a milling industry. There were 27 men or women who were paid 874,000 in that year, which it will be observed is an average of something like $2,700, and the work people apparently were paid over $1,000 on an average. That is a far closer approximation of similarity than you will find prevailing in many industrial plants in this and other countries. I do not think an argument can be founded upon that condition, except that presumably those who drew salaries were also risking their capital and those who obtained employment were, if this business were interfered with, running the risk of losing their positions. For that reason, among others, this legislation is offered to the house, and that is the theory running through most of these items to which attention will be directed.


Edward James Young: What are the wage costs
in cleaning a pound of rice?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I could not answer that question.


Thomas McMillan: What were the importations of uncleaned rice?


Richard Bedford Bennett: We imported from the
United States 200,528 hundredweight; from British India, 108,083 hundredweight; from Japan, 50,413 hundredweight; from Hong Kong, 48,050 hundredweight and from other countries 44,383 hundredweight, making a total of 449,457 hundredweight valued approximately at $1,100,000.


Alan Webster Neill: I fear that this will prove
a very heavy tax on the housewife, because rice is a very common food.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There will be no increase in price.


Alan Webster Neill: I am coming to that; it will be a heavy tax unless the minister takes advantage of his power to prevent any increase in price. But I would ask whether this does not come under subsection 2 of section 17, which provides that "neither subsection of that section shall apply to agricultural products." Is not rice an agricultural product in the strict interpretation of the word?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not from our standpoint; it is not produced in Canada as such, and when it comes into this country it becomes a raw material to be manufactured lere.


Alan Webster Neill: I hope that wall be duly incorporated in the law, because rice as a matter af fact certainly is an agricultural product.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is not necessary.


Mr. SANDERSON:: Might I point out to the Prime Minister that rice is a food not produced in Canada. We are increasing the duty on a food largely used by wage earners and people in moderate circumstances. Was not the duty in force prior to this increase sufficient protection for these cleaning plants? It appears to me it is a small industry simply for the cleaning of rice. You are not protecting something produced in Canada.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No. There are nearly
seventeen million pounds of cleaned rice imported into Canada. The facilities in Canada are ample for the cleaning of all Canadian requirements, there will be no increase in the price of the commodity, the enhanced protection being for the purpose of enabling those facilities to provide the seventeen million pounds, or all that they can of the seventeen million now imported from abroad. I cannot sav more. That is the case for the increase.


John Livingstone Brown: What will be the effect on
the revenue?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am bound once more
to say that I still believe Henry George is right. Revenue is not a question to be considered with respect to the maintenance of a Canadian industry.


Frederick George Sanderson: The Prime Minister
says there will be no increase in the price of rice. He bases that, I suppose, on the promises he has obtained from those who clean rice. Are those promises written or verbal? This is an article of food used by the common people of the country, and an increase in price under present conditions would be a serious matter. Will the Prime Minister put himself on record before the committee, that if there is an increase in the price of rice he will restore the old rate or allow the commodity to come in free, in order to protect those who are compelled to buy rice as a food?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The solicitude of the
hon. member is pathetic. Rice is an article of food used by almost everyone; its use is not limited.


Frederick George Sanderson: It is a cheap article
of food.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is a cheap article
which almost everyone uses; and so long as there is no increase in the cost of raw material, which of course is taken for granted as part of the undertaking, there will be no increase in the price of the finished commodity. The undertaking is given in writing. If it is violated action will be taken at once under section 17.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Edward James Young: Will there be any increase
in the price of imported cleaned rice?


Richard Bedford Bennett: If people prefer to send abroad for that which they may get at home, we presume that they wish to pay more for
it.


Edward James Young: Then you intend to have all rice cleaned in Canada?


Richard Bedford Bennett: As fas as possible, I
said.


Thomas McMillan: Who made
application for this increase?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I believe it is the custom in the committee, when there is no monopoly, to say that the manufacturers, in this case the cleaners of rice, made application.


Alan Webster Neill: The housewives of Vancouver will have to pay a good deal more to give employment to a few more Chinamen.


Richard Bedford Bennett: If I were not aware that the hon. gentleman knows better than that, I would not rise to contradict him. They will pay no more. Bu't if they do, the provisions of section 17 will become operative. Those provisions will be used in the event of the raw material not increasing in price.


Mr. VENIOT:: Has the Prime Minister any guarantee that those asking for the increased protection will be in a position to clean all the rice necessa^ to meet the Canadian demand?


Richard Bedford Bennett: We have satisfied ourselves that they have the facilities to meet the requirements of the Canadian people, as indicated by the production and imports of the past year.


Peter John Veniot: In the event of their not being able to meet the requirements we shall have to import cleaned rice to supply the demand. On the quantity above what the cleaners will be able to furnish will not the price be increased as a result of this duty? How will you avoid it?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have said that the
facilities are ample for any likely increase in demand. When the time comes that they ire not equal to the demand we will deal with the case, and not until then.


Peter John Veniot: By reducing the duty on imports?


Mr. HOWDEN:: How will you check up on rice if it is found that they are increasing the cost to the housewives? How will information be laid before the board? What will be the procedure?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should assume, from what I know of the hon. gentleman and those beside him, that with the postal facilities of the country at his disposal he would at once acquaint the government of the fact.


Thomas McMillan: The humour of the situation is supreme.


John Power Howden: I was not joking.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Nor was I. I should expect the hon. gentleman to seize at once the nearest telegraph blank or write a letter advising us of the fact. If he does so we shall at once investigate the matter, and if the fact is established we will do what is always done in such cases: we will give an opportunity to those accused to be heard. If they do not satisfy us we will take action under section 17.


Alan Webster Neill: We must go to the tariff
board?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should think it would be unnecessary, because it is one of those cases in which tihe exercise of a little intelligence on the part of whoever happens to be Minister of Finance will be sufficient to satisfy him.


Ernest Lapointe: Unfortunately, there might be a new minister.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It might be a new man. My hon. friend would not give me credit for possessing that intelligence.


Ernest Lapointe: I was thinking that we might be safer with the right hon. gentleman.


Mr. HOW  DEN@: It would require more than a little intelligence for the average housewife to make her troubles known to the Department of Finance if she found that the cost of rice had considerably increased. I was asking a very simple, honest question* and I am still somewhat at a loss to know just what my wife, for example, would do if she found that the cost had increased. What steps would she take? Should I telegraph immediately to the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and inform him that the cost of rice had increased materially since this duty had been put into force? What steps are the common people of Canada expected to take in such an event?


Richard Bedford Bennett: My experience has taught me that there are no common people-


John Power Howden: We are all common people.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is another matter. I presume that the hon. gentleman's good wife would at once tell her husband of the dis-
3634	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff__
covery she had made; and in all seriousness I said I thought the hon. gentleman would communicate at once with the Minister of Finance, whoever he might be, advising him of the situation. There might be a change of government; but despite the fact that the hon. gentleman would then be considerably older, he would no doubt communicate with the department and action would be taken accordingly. But the traders and those interested would make the matter known to the government. There is never any trouble about the government receiving all the information that may be necessary so long as the hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Young) and others of his kind are living. And they serve in that regard a useful purpose, making known to the government any departure from what they believe should be the established rule. In any event the traders, those concerned in the business, are usually the first people to hasten to inform the government of any condition which they believe is at variance with the situation as they see it.


Frederick George Sanderson: Might not the traders put up the price themselves?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. gentleman's mind runs in "mights". I am dealing with something else.


Thomas McMillan: The Prime Minister has told us, with respect to this item, that the question of revenue is of secondary consideration, if of any consideration at all. Are we to understand that this opinion applies to all the other items?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Don't put it too strongly, my dear friend. There is no necessity of putting it any stronger than it was put. I am sure my 'hon. friend with his usual benevolent moderation and his lack of extreme views will realize that all I was endeavouring to indicate to the committee was that that had not been the primary consideration in dealing with the matter. Of course, revenue is important, otherwise how could we defray the expenses of this committee and provide for a record of the hon. gentleman's speeches?


Thomas McMillan: I think if the right hon. gentleman looks at his statement which will appear in Hansard to-morrow he will find that he told the committee that revenue was not the consideration.


Frederick George Sanderson: I did not catch the
sarcastic remark of the Prime Minister-
{Mr. Bennett.]


Richard Bedford Bennett: It was not sarcastic; I
said the hon. gentleman was talking of mights while I was dealing with facts.


Frederick George Sanderson: The Prime Minister
said that the traders might get in communication with the government and tell them that the price had been raised or advanced, and my remark was to the effect that the traders themselves might advance the price. The right hon. gentleman will remember what took place in the glass industry a few months ago; it was not the manufacturers of glass who raised the price, it was the retail and wholesale men. The same thing might very well happen in connection with rice.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. gentleman is
quite right, but the government is not neglected. The Minister of Finance happened to be in England at that time but it was not long before he knew of what had happened, and action was taken immediately.


Edward James Young: We told the right hon.
gentleman before he left that it would happen.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Perhaps that confiding
spirit which is so prevalent on this side of the chamber induced us to believe that the factory would be in operation sooner than it was, with the result that action was taken under the provisions of the law without delay


John Livingstone Brown: I am interested in the admission of the Prime Minister that perhaps the hon. member for Weyburn may serve a useful purpose. May I mention David Hamm who said that a reasonable number of fleas was good for any dog.


Mr. MANION:: That is a little hard on
the hon. member for Weyburn.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. member for
Lisgar (Mr. Brown) will notice that I did not make any such observation with respect to him. This merely points a moral and adorns a tale.


Alan Webster Neill: I am afraid there will be
great difficulty in searching out any overcharges which might be made. There is something approaching a combine in this matter and if a wholesaler or retailer gives the information which the minister suggests, he might speedily find that his supply of rice is cut off. He may give information once but he will not do it the second time. I am afraid it will be put up to these men that if they give information against what is practically a monopoly-it is practically a monopoly in the hands of two or three companies- their supply of rice will be cut off. How will the minister get around that situation?

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Alfred Edgar MacLean: What was the total import of this commodity?


Alan Webster Neill: I believe the hon. minister
is considering his answer.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have nothing to add
to what I have said already. I have twice given the figures about which the hon. member inquires, but I can give them again. The total imports of uncleaned rice amounted to about 449,457 hundredweight, and of cleaned rice, approximately 17,000,000 pounds.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: I understand there is paid out in this industry an annual total of $126,000, and if it is going to cost the people of this country one dollar per-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not a cent.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: The previous duty was
75 cents, to which 25 cents is being added. Any rice brought in will have to pay one dollar per hundred pounds, and the amount of the duty will be added to rice cleaned in Canada.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is exactly what will not happen.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: This rice will have to be sold in competition with rice brought in, and it will not be sold below the price of the imported article upon which duty is paid. An added cost of one dollar per hundred pounds is being made for the sake of paying $126,000 to a few employees. This is much more than it is worth; it would be much better to pension these people and let the people of the country have their rice free of duty.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The observations of the
hon. gentleman should have been directed to the government he has supported for the past nine years.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: They have been.


Richard Bedford Bennett: He has been so silent
in this house on this subject that it must have disappointed him to have been vocal last year, but of which we have no knowledge. If the addition to the price is made, then the action I have indicated will be taken. There will be no increase in price; there will be no added burden on the consumer barring an increase in the price of the raw material.


James Lorimer Ilsley: If there should be a decrease in the price of the raw material will the government insist upon the price of the finished product being decreased, and if it is not decreased will they remove this additional protection?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Section 17 reads as follows:
In the event of producers of goods taking advantage of any duty imposed under this act to increase the price of such goods to the consumer, or using any such duty to maintain prices at levels deemed by the governor in council to be higher than should prevail, having regard to general economic conditions in the country, the governor in council may reduce or remove such duty.
That is the answer. The power is there and the only question is as to its exercise. I am speaking only for one government, but that government will exercise that power.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-67. Macaroni and vermicelli, containing no egg or other added ingredients, per 100 pounds:	British preferential tariff,
fiee; intermediate tariff, $1.25; general tariff, $1.50.
When in packages weighing two pounds, each, or less, the weight of such packages to be included in the weight for duty.
Richard Bedford Bennett: The change is from free, free and $125 to, free, $1.25 and $1.50. The imports in 1931 were about 2,700,000 pounds valued at about $198,000, coming chiefly from the United States. There is no reason why this country should not supply itself with these commodities. The exports in the same year were about 750,000 pounds valued at $54,000, principally to New Zealand. The production is rather large, in the last year for which we have complete figures it amounted to over 18,000,000 pounds valued at over $1,500,000.


Charles A. Stewart: There will be no increase in price?


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is guaranteed.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-69. Straw, per ton: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, $1.75; general tariff, $2.
Peter John Veniot: How much straw was imported from England last year?


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is no change in the straw item, but there is a change of rate in the general tariff with respect to hay. I need hardly say that hay is produced in large quantities in Canada, and it has been found that our market has been very considerably invaded and taken from our bay dealers. It is proposed to increase the general rate to five dollars.


Mr. LUCAS:: What were the imports of hay and straw last year?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The imports were not large; last year they amounted to $66,000.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
Our exports were much larger than that, but the imports come in at an inopportune time and place, and have the effewt which I dare say hon. gentlemen who are in business would expect sudh importations to have. They break our own Canadian market, with the result that frequently a condition arises that is injurious to the hay producer; and particularly is that so, I may say for the information of the committee, in British Columbia and in the southern part of Alberta.


Alan Webster Neill: It comes in there?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, from other countries.


Peter John Veniot: I notice that hay and straw are free under the British preference. I distinctly remember that when the Dunning budget was brought down, the present Minister of Finance attempted to ridicule the idea of making hay and straw free under the British preferential tariff. I wonder why he made it free. Was it just to follow the example set by the Liberals?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No. He did not change it; he left it just as it was.


Peter John Veniot: My right hon. friend condemned us for having it there. He said that it was only to blindfold the people, and he laughed at the idea.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I laughed at the idea of straw being made free under the British preference, and I do yet. But you have to put something there, and inasmuch as the item carried the word "free" before, the word "free" remains.


Peter John Veniot: I do not see the right hon. gentleman smiling now.


Richard Bedford Bennett: He certainly is endeavouring to reflect the cast of countenance of the hon. gentleman.


Peter John Veniot: He took up time last year condemning us for doing what he is doing now.


John Livingstone Brown: In regard to the duty on hay, the finance minister admits that the imports of hay are insignificant compared with the exports. The imposition of this $5 duty simply means that that amount will be added to the price which the consumer of hay pays, and many importers of hay are actual farmers. I have no doubt that hay is sold in certain sections of Alberta and British Columbia to mining men and to lumber men, but it is also true that it is sold to farmers, and since the average price paid for imported hay is $15.54, it simply means that this $5 duty will be added to the price which these consumers of hay have to pay. It simply means

that other industries will have to pay the duty. It is another illustration of how continually rising prices are going to raise production costs all around.


Mr. SPENCE:: Cannot the farmers grow
their own hay?


John Livingstone Brown: The house should remember that this is an item that does not in any degree, or at least only to a very slight degree, affect the farmers of Quebec and Ontario.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, northern Ontario.


John Livingstone Brown: It may affect northern
Ontario to a very limited extent. In Ontario the only importation of hay is by way of the Soo, I presume.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, the Soo.


John Livingstone Brown: I tried to find out at just
what point it entered Canada, and I was not able to get the information. While hay may be bought in northern Ontario by other than farmers, frequently it is bought by the farmers themselves. In the main, this added duty on hay will benefit only a comparatively small number of farmers in the southern part of Alberta and possibly in British Columbia. It will simply have the effect of raising the price of hay by $5 a ton. To show you the difference between imports and exports, and how little this means to the farmers of Canada as a whole, I will give the figures for just one year. In 1926 we exported 368,787 tons of hay, valued at $3,711,840, and we imported in the same year 8,510 tons, valued at $142,249. I have the figures for five years, but it is not necessary to give them, because the figures for 1926 illustrate the situation as it is. Probably it will be heralded all over the Dominion that the government is taking great care of the farmers by putting this duty on hay, but to the vast majority of the farmers of Canada it means nothing at all.


Mr. MALONEY:: I should like to ask
my hon. friend what is the present price of hay in Lisgar?


John Livingstone Brown: I am afraid that if the
present crop conditions continue hay may go to $40 or $50 a ton in Lisgar.


Martin James Maloney: What is the price today?


John Livingstone Brown: The hon. member does not understand conditions to-day. Hay is not a marketable commodity in Lisgar. It is neither bought nor sold under general conditions. This duty means absolutely nothing to the farmers of Lisgar.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Alan Webster Neill: This is another case, Mr
Chairman, where the poultryman in British Columbia is going to be made the victim. Not content with thrusting the sword into his vitals by putting a duty on corn, the weapon is now to be turned in the wound by increasing the price of another product that he buys largely, and must buy, and that is alfalfa hay. He cannot raise it on his scanty five acres, because it is not adapted to the growing of alfalfa. Only comparatively small areas of British Columbia are adapted to the growing of alfalfa. But the poultryman must have alfalfa hay, and of a particular grade. If I remember correctly, it is the second or third cutting that he requires, the first cutting being too rank [DOT] and coarse, and not having the proper foliage. He obtains from the western states the alfalfa that he needs for feed. This duty may possibly, as the hon. member for Lisgar says, benefit a few hay producers in the southern part, presumably, of the interior of British Columbia. I would like, however, to point out to the house this fact, which is perhaps not generally known; it is very bad economics to encourage the farmer to sell hay, because when he does that he is selling his farm piecemeal. It has been calculated by government experts that when you sell a ton of timothy hay-and the loss would be greater in the case of alfalfa- whatever price you get for it you have depreciated the value of your land by ten or eleven dollars, because you have taken practically all the fertilizer value away and left nothing there in return. You have depreciated your farm. The expression is common among farmers that such and such a man will not get ahead because he is selling his farm piecemeal. There is nothing to replace the fertility that has been taken out of the soil if the farmer sells his hay. It is calculated -this is not my opinion; if you go to the Minister of Agriculture he will tell you the same thing-that the loss to a farm in fertilizer content by selling a ton of butter is somewhere in the neighbourhood of only 50 cents, and it takes a good many tons of hay to produce a ton of butter. That illustrates how short-sighted is the farmer who persistently sells off his hay. His farm cannot long endure it. It is bad farm economics to pursue. It is a well known fact that the man who buys feed buys fertilizer, and oil cake meal or other such feeds and brings them onto his farm increases its value. As the saying goes: More fertilizer more grass, more grass more cattle, more cattle more fertilizer, in an ever enlarging circle of prosperity. Those are matters however which
effect the hay producer; they are his troubles, not mine. The proposed duty will add S3 a ton to the cost of one of the items of the poultryman's expenditure and will accrue to the benefit of some producer who has devoted his energies to the selling of hay.


Edward James Young: The increase in the duty on hay is to the extent of 250 per cent. In the year 1930 we imported 4,502 tons of hay valued at $61,175, or at a rate of about $15 a ton. All of that hay came from the United States or from Alaska. During the same period we exported 162,000 tons valued at $2,007,944. Of that tonnage 35,179 tons went to the United States, valued at $321,000, or an average price of a little less than $9 a ton. From these figures hon. members will see that while our imports were valued at $15 a ton, our exports were valued at only $9 a ton. Why the difference? The explanation is that hay is not a commodity which will stand shipment across a continent; it is too bulky, and the freight rate is too high. If a part of Canada is suffering from a hay famine it will look for its supply to the nearest point from which that supply can be obtained, and purchases are frequently made in the United States. It is much cheaper to bring that hay in from the United States than to bring it across the continent and pay higher freight rates. That accounts for the fact that our imports are valued at a much higher rate than our exports. The few thousand tons we import are brought into different parts of Canada where there is no supply or where there may be a hay famine. I have said that while we buy only 4,502 tons from the United States we sell to them 35,179 tons. Are we going to jeopardize our market for 35,000 tons, in round figures, in order to shut out the 4,500 tons which we must have and which our own growers in other parts of Canada because of freight rates are not in a position to supply? Will the minister not learn anything from what happened in New Zealand? Will he not learn anything about what happened to his potatoes? Will he not learn about what is likely to happen in the Argentine when he shuts out their corn? Does he not think the United States will retaliate and shut out our 35,000 tons of hay because we are attempting to exclude their 4,500 tons?


Sidney Cecil Robinson: What is the duty on Canadian hay going into the United States?


Edward James Young: I do not know. I have not the rate before me.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is exactly $5, as increased by the last tariff.


Edward James Young: Is this in retaliation?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, it is an effort to provide conditions whereby Canadians and Americans may trade on a basis of equality. As my hon. friend has said, we are buying in smaller quantites from them than they buy from us. By their last tariff their rate was increased to $5; our rate will now be the same.


Edward James Young: Surely my right hon. friend is not already abandoning the position he took the other day when he was speaking to the tariff board bill. At that time he said the object was not to equalize duties but to equalize production costs. If after investigation the United States have said that hay can be grown cheaper in Canada than in their country, and that a $4 or S5 duty is required to equalize the costs, surely my right hon. friend will not say that the very reverse is true.


An hon. MEMBER:: That would not be true.
Mr. .YOUNG: Yes it would. If their costs are higher than ours, ours cannot be higher than theirs. We do not intend to fix our duties according to the manner in which the United States fix theirs.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear. I would
suppose that is the reason my hon. friend supported countervailing duties last session.


Edward James Young: We are going to fix our
duties to meet our own interests.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear.


Edward James Young: Sault Ste. Marie and British Columbia were mentioned as places where hay must be imported, and it is to their interest to get their hay at the lowest possible cost. We should have a lower, rather than a higher duty. W7hat do we care what the United States charges? What they do should not affect our rate at all.


Thomas McMillan: This is just
another instance where the government is going to put behind the farmer the whole weight and power of the Dominion of Canada.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear.


Thomas McMillan: They are not
going to buy hay until they wish to do so, but if the Canadian live stock feeder wishes to buy any of that commodity this government will compel him to pay $3 a ton more.


Alan Webster Neill: Will this come under the
provisions of section 17 of the customs tariff resolutions, so that if the price is raised action will be forthcoming by the government?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff

71. Hemp seed for agricultural purposes: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Charles A. Stewart: The last
item represents another instance of my hon. friends opposite hunting around through the schedules to find some agricultural item which they think they may assist by imposing a duty.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The request was made
in this instance by the province of Alberta.


Charles A. Stewart: I should
not be surprised because some people in the province of Alberta would ask for almost anything.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Except the former Minister of the Interior (Mr. Stewart).


Charles A. Stewart: Well, they
have put up with me for quite a while-in fact as long as they have put up with my right hon. friend. I venture the prediction that since both of us are about the same age and I expect to live as long as he does, we may be even in that respect.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think so.


Charles A. Stewart: We have
managed to get along very well together, although we do not agree on different policies. I do say that there seems to be an attempt to place duties upon agricultural commodities so that we may secure that famous home market; but in actual practice it is amusing to see how the efforts of my right hon. friend work out. For- two or three years we were bombarded by the people of Ontario to place a duty on beans. My right hon. friend has done that, and to-day they are cheaper than they have ever been.


Richard Bedford Bennett: My hon. friend put that
duty on.


Robert James Manion: What about your theory that duties always raise prices?


Charles A. Stewart: I am just pointing out that there are certain commodities in connection with which duties cannot raise the price.


An hon. MEMBER:: What are they?

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Charles A. Stewart: Surely I do not have to run over the whole list of exports from Canada. My hon. friends seek to camouflage the matter iby putting dirties on articles we export. Why, the whole thing is so futile as to be unworthy of argument.


Richard Bedford Bennett: "Cut flowers and cast iron pipe."


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Customs tariff-71a.	Timothy seed, per
pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 2 cents; general tariff, 2 cents.
Richard Bedford Bennett: The changes in these
items commencing at No. 71a and running down to No. 76c arise from representations made by the seed growers of Canada, who have given much study and time to the matter.
I may say that seed growing in this country has become a very substantial industry. Hon. members who have t'o do with agriculture undoubtedly are aware that the farther north seeds can be produced the better they are. Seed from Canada is gaining a veiy excellent reputation. The seed growers have given much attention to the production of their products, and the schedule now before the committee is one upon which they have agreed. In one or two instances the rate is lower, but in no instance is the rate higher than that suggested by these gentlemen.
Mr. STEWART (Edmonton); Is the rate not higher on timothy seed?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, it is not higher than the rate suggested by the seed growers.


Charles A. Stewart: Oh, I beg your pardon.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The classifications have been made according to what is believed to be the best practice, having regard to the fact that these items are not easy to administer.


Charles A. Stewart: The information I have with respect to timothy seed is that we imported over 11,000,000 pounds from the United States. The change proposed by this item would mean an increase of duty on that importation of $220,000. No one but farmers purchase this seed.


Alan Webster Neill: I should like to point out
that while it is difficult to follow the percentage increase because the method of computation has been changed, it is a very heavy increase. Roughly speaking it would be haif a cent a pound under the ad valorem rate before, now it is put up to two cents a pound. That is an enormous increase. The minister said that these changes from 71a onwards were
recommended by the seedgrowers' association or some such body. That being so it is very natural that the changes are substantial. It is like allowing a man to write his own ticket. I think this is a case that it would have been highly advisable to have submitted to the tariff board.


Thomas McMillan: On the amount imported last year the duty was $101,459; under the present rate it would amount to over $220,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The truth is that the
exports of timothy seed last year amounted approximately to $850,000, and the imports to $1,330,000. It has been abundantly established that timothy seed produced by Canadians is of excellent quality, and under proper conditions with respect to markets they can produce sufficient to meet our own requirements and a substantial export demand. The United States, from which timothy seed has been purchased, imposed a duty of twenty cents a pound, which is the rate here prevailing. If my memory serves me, it was suggested that a higher rate should be imposed. Timothy seed produced in Alberta is as good as, if not better than, timothy seed produced in any other part of the world. This increase is intended to be just what it indicates-an encouragement to the production of high class timothy seed to meet our own requirements and provide for the export demand.


Alan Webster Neill: To what countries do wo
export?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Our exports are sent to
two countries, Great Britain and the United States.


Martin James Maloney: Are these spruce and
pine seeds?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, those come under
item 71c, tree seeds for reforestation purposes only.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: What is the total export of timothy seed?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Our exports are divided
roughly between two countries, Great Britain and the United States; the exports to other countries are small and I have not brought the figures with me.


Edward Joseph Garland: What is the quantity?


Richard Bedford Bennett: It amounts to 165,000
bushels; value $850,000.


Frederick George Sanderson: What was the importation of clover seed from the United States?

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Richard Bedford Bennett: Timothy seed and clover were mixed under the former classification and it was not possible to separate them and ascertain what quantity was imported from the various countries. That is the reason this change is now being made.


Edward James Young: Formerly the duty on this
was ad valorem, now it is specific. Why was the change made, and what will it amount to on the ad valorem basis?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The duties are made specific all the way through, and it is believed that that is more in accordance with the best tariff practice. It is also in accordance with the views of the horticultural council-for which the hon. gentleman has such great affection-the seed growers and others interested in the development of that branch of agriculture. The practice is clear, Specific and plain. It takes the unit which is well known to everyone and places the rate against that unit.


Edward James Young: And enables one to charge a very much higher rate without its being noticed.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No; the ad valorem obviously would be higher. In these days of changing values the general tendency is to have recourse to specific rates with respect to commodities that are usually ascertainable by a standard or unit that is fixed by law- pound, ounce, yard.


Peter John Veniot: What was the ad valorem?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Ten per cent.


Edward James Young: What would two cents be, reduced to an ad valorem basis?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have not the price beside me at the moment. It varies very greatly all the way across this country.


Alan Webster Neill: It is easily figured. Suppose timothy seed is worth five cents a pound on import; ten per cent on that is half a cent a pound. The duty is now two cents a pound. There is the difference.


Edward James Young: Forty per cent of the price., or a 300 per cent increase of tariff.


Ernest Lapointe: Carried on division.
Item 71a agreed to on division.


The CHAIRMAN (Mr. MacDonald, South Cape Breton):: Shall we deal with all the rest of the seed items together, 71b to 76c?

Customs tariff-71b. Clover seed, including alfalfa seed, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 3 cents; general tariff, 3 cents.
Customs tariff-71e. Tree seeds for reforestation purposes only: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Customs tariff-71d. Seed potatoes, imported for use exclusively for propagation purposes, under regulations by the minister: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Customs tariff-72. Field and garden seeds not specified as free, valued at not less than five dollars per pound, in packages weighing not less than one ounce each: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.
Customs tariff-72a. Aromatic seeds which are not edible and are in a crude state, and not advanced in value or condition by grinding or refining or by any other process of manufacture, viz., anise, anise star, caraway, cardamom, coriander, cumin, fennel and fennugreek:	British preferential tariff, free;
intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Customs tariff-72b.	Seed peas and seed
beans, from the United Kingdom: British preferential tariff, free.
Customs tariff-72c. Seed of the sugar beet, for agricultural purposes: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.
Customs tariff-72d. Millet and rape seed: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.	.
Customs tariff-72e. Bent-grass seed: British preferential tariff, 15 per cent; intermediate tariff, 30 per cent; general tariff, 30 per cent.
Customs tariff-73. Field seeds, n.o.p., when in packages weighing more than one pound each: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff. 15 per cent.	.
Customs tariff-74. Seeds, viz. beet (excepting sugar beet), mangel, parsley, parsnip and turnip, when in packages weighing more than one pound each, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 5 cents; general tariff, 5 cents.
Customs tariff-75.	Seeds, viz. cabbage,
radish, cucumber, leek, lettuce, carrot, borecole or kale, when in packages weighing more than one pound each, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 10 cents; general tariff, 10 cents.
Customs tariff-76. Seeds, viz. cauliflower, celery, onion, pepper and tomato, when in packages weighing more than one pound each, per pound:	British preferential tariff, free^
intermediate tariff, 25 cents; general tariff, 25
Customs tariff-76a. Root, garden and other seeds, n.o.p., when in packages weighing more than one pound each, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 10 cents; general tariff. 10 cents.
Customs tariff-76b. Seeds, viz. field, root, garden and other seeds, when in _ packages weighing one pound each, or less: British preferential tariff, 15 per cent: intermediate tariff, 224 per cent: general tariff, 25 per cent.
Customs tariff-76c.	Annatto seed and
mushroom spawn: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, free; general tariff, free.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Mr. GERSHAW:: What is the amount of alfalfa seed imported? In the irrigated districts of Alberta the production of alfalfa seed is becoming quite an industry.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I indicated with respect to clover and timothy, and should have added alfalfa seed, that heretofore there was no separation of these items. With respect to the item referred to by my hon. friend from South Renfrew (Mr. Maloney) seeds for reforestation are all free as is indicated. That is for the purpose of replenishing our forests and sometimes, if thought desirable, changing the type of seeds so used.


John Livingstone Brown: This is a very high increase in the ad valorem rate on clover seed.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is true. I will ask my hon. friend the Minister of Fisheries (Mr. Rhodes) to move an amendment to item 72.


Mr. RHODES:: I beg to move:
That the words "n.o.p." be inserted after the words "per pound" in item 72, thus:
72.- Field and garden seeds not specified as free, valued at not less than five dollars per pound, n.o.p., in packages weighing not less than one ounce each: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Item as amended agreed to.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Does the committee
desire to ask any questions on any of these other seed items down to 75c?


Charles A. Stewart: What is
bent-grass seed used for?


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is used in the preparing of golf greens and lawns, I understand.


Charles A. Stewart: There must be considerable importations?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite so, but there are
no statistics available under the existing classification. It has developed into quite a business in this country, especially in Prince Edward Island, and I may say the representations from those interested in its production were for a higher rate than is proposed now. This is a rate comparable to that applying to other seeds of a similar character, and it was thought this change should be made.


John Campbell Elliott: Is this seed produced in
any other province?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I believe so, in a small
way, but there is no definite information on that point. I believe we import it largely from other countries.
In connection with item 76b there is a slight change. The rates now indicated, it will be observed, are 15 per cent, 221 per cent and 25 per cent, but it is proposed to change to a specific duty. In looking into the matter, and having in mind the representations made by the horticultural council and the seed growere it is thought desk-able to make the item reac free, 10 cents and 10 cents per pound.


Charles A. Stewart: Is this also the recommendation of the council with respect to seeds?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I said these rates represented the considered opinion of the seed growers, assisted by the horticultural council, except that the department, in going over the various figures suggested, have made some reductions. In no case has there been an increase over the suggested rates.


Charles A. Stewart: My hon.
friend stated a few moments ago that practically all these rates had been changed from ad valorem to specific duty, but that is not so. More than half are still ad valorem, and it is utterly impossible, without the information before us, to know what increases or decreases are being made.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think I said there were a few exceptions.


Charles A. Stewart: More than
one-half are left under ad valorem duties. My hon. friend says he is changing this particular item to a specific duty, and it is almost impossible to know what the change means.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I was referring to item
76b, which covers a very large number of seeds, as the hon. member will see. The difficulty was with the very small packages of seeds weighing a pound or less, and it was believed that the proposed rates might cause a very great deal of difficulty. So the rate suggested is free, 10 cents and 10 cents per pound, which I think will operate in some instances as a reduction rather than an increase.


Charles A. Stewart: My right
hon. friend may be right, but I do not think there will be any reductions.


Richard Bedford Bennett: We might let this item stand, and perhaps I will be able to get some further particulars.
Items 71a to 76 inclusive agreed to.
Item 76b stands.
Item 76c agreed to.

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is a new item
which it is proposed to insert as item 76d.


Hugh Guthrie: I beg to move that the
following item be inserted in resolution No. 2 of June 1, 1931:
76d. Seeds, viz.: canary, mustard, celery and sunflower, when in packages weighing more than one pound each, imported for use exclusively in manufacturing or blending operations: British preferential tariff, 5 per cent; intermediate tariff, 10 per cent; general tariff, 10 per cent.


Edward James Young: I notice in the large sheets item 83. which is not dealt with in the present budget but which was altered during the September session. When would the minister wish us to deal with those items, as we come to them, or later on?


Richard Bedford Bennett: With regard to the new
item, obviously these seeds must carry a very low rate, since they are used in manufacturing or blending. It is regarded as desirable that these should come in under an ad valorem duty as indicated.


Edward Joseph Garland: What is the definition of a package of more than one pound in weight? Will that include sacks and cartons of all kinds?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The one item deals with packages which are familiar to everyone; these are the packages bought by the housewife in the spring to be used in her garden. The other case is that of what might be called the wholesale gardener, who plants on a larger scale. You will observe that in the one case you may have packages weighing as little as an ounce, while the other deals with packages weighing more than a pound. I understand this to be purely a matter of administration.


Edward Joseph Garland: But the
point troubling me is that when you get beyond the tiny bottles and packages in which you buy your garden seeds, the next size is the small sack, varying from the size of a salt sack to that of a sugar sack, depending upon the size of the seed. I wonder if that is included in the definition of a package.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. gentleman will observe that items 73, 74, 75 and 76 deal with packages weighing more than one pound each, and that these perpetuate the form and description of the former items. There is a sharp distinction made between the package weighing a pound or less and the package weighing a pound or more; that seems to have been the line of division between bulk and package commodities. Whether or not
TMr. Bennett.]
it is right I do not know; I can only say it has been the habit of the department to use that division line for many years. There must always be a line of demarcation, I suppose, between articles in bulk and packaged articles. In a great many instances, as the hon. gentleman says, it comes in bulk.


Edward James Young: What will be the rate in
that case?


Richard Bedford Bennett: That will carry the bulk rate.


Edward Joseph Garland: Suppose
the seed is packaged, not in cardboard cartons or in envelopes, but in small sacks?


Richard Bedford Bennett: If they are less than a
pound, the same rule applies.


Edward Joseph Garland: It would be
packaged in that case?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes; that is what I am told is the practice.


Edward Joseph Garland: Then all
sacks are packages?


Richard Bedford Bennett: When they happen to be less than a pound.


Edward Joseph Garland: Under this, all packages are not sacks, but all sacks are packages.


Richard Bedford Bennett: When less than a pound.
Motion (Mr. Guthrie) agreed to.
Item 76d agreed to.
Customs tariff-89. Vegetables, prepared, in air-tight cans or other air-tight containers, the weight of the containers to be included in the weight for duty:
(a)	Beans, baked or otherwise prepared, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 2 cents; general tariff, 3 cents.
(b)	Corn and tomatoes, per pound: British preferential tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 2 cents; general tariff, 3 cents.
(c)	Peas, per pound:	British preferential
tariff, free; intermediate tariff, 2 cents; general tariff, 3 cents.
(d)	N.o.p.: British preferential tariff, free: intermediate tariff, 27J per cent; general tariff, 30 per cent.


Edward James Young: What about 83?


Richard Bedford Bennett: If the hon. gentleman
wishes to discuss it.


Edward James Young: What is the status of the
duty on potatoes to-day? Is it 75 cents per 100 pounds as shown in the tariff of last September, or are arbitrary valuations placed by the minister?

Ways and Means-Customs Tariff


Thomas McMillan: It does not
make any difference what the rate is; it can be changed at any time. It is an on and off tariff. You never know what is going to be done.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am grateful to the hon. gentleman for being considerate enough to answer the question-


Thomas McMillan: Give us another lecture.


Richard Bedford Bennett: -and I appreciate it greatly. It is not an unfair answer to make. As I said yesterday, we have provided that wherever Canadian agriculture or industry is being attacked we may, by order in council, fix values for duty purposes. And whenever this is necessary it will be done so long as we are here. Hon. gentlemen opposite would do the same if occasion arose. They would not stand by and see Canadian industry or agriculture destroyed. In the meantime the duty is 75 cents per 100 pounds.


Edward James Young: It is only 75 cents?


Richard Bedford Bennett: So far as I know. As the hon. member for South Huron (Mr. McMillan) says, there is no outstanding order fixing permanent values for duty purposes.


Peter John Veniot: Since the change has been made in regard to radishes, have any orders in council been passed or considered by the government with respect to potatoes?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Many orders in council have been promulgated. They appear in the Canada Gazette. It is not to be expected that I can carry in my head all the orders n council that have been promulgated, and knowing the hon. gentleman's industry, I am sure that, by perusal of the Gazette from Saturday to Saturday, he knows just as much about the matter as anyone else.


Charles A. Stewart: The difficulty is that they last only four days sometimes. One must be agile to follow the changes made by order in council fixing values. My right hon. friend apparently had suddenly brought to his attention the fact that a serious mistake had been made in the fixing of values on potatoes; because I notice that in four days' time-perhaps it was a little longer-the change was made from potatoes to radishes. I never was able to understand why that action was taken so suddenly by the government.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have no doubt that necessary changes may be made in a single day; at least I hope so.


Edward James Young: From potatoes to radishes?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No; that would not be quite sufficient for the hon. gentleman. It was not changed from potatoes to radishes. There is scarcely an hon. member who is not familiar with the fact that goods that were to be exported from Canada to the United States at a time when a bargain was made were subject to a higher duty before they reached there. In many instances, where it is found that a situation has suddenly developed threatening the life of a Canadian industry, whether it be potatoes or radishes or anything else, action will be taken as quickly as possible. And in the case of potatoes action was taken with respect to what I might call old potatoes-that is, the carry-over which the farmeT was anxious to get rid of before the new season began. The statute was not intended to cover that particular class of potato. The order was put into operation and remained in operation until it had served the purpose intended1. Radishes had nothing to do with that; it was an entirely different transaction. When potatoes were taken out of the item, radishes remained. There are other commodities to which I need hardly refer-cherries, strawberries, lettuce, asparagus, apricots, raspberries, peas, beets, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, cucumbers, and eo on. With respect to these articles, I put this question to my hon. friends opposite who are agriculturists: Whether we should not have what I may call immediate tariff action to save the situation. The season in some countries is much more forward this year than last year, and the seasonal tariff must therefore vary with the season in the community affected. When our vegetables and fruits are ripe, it follows that south o'f us they have ripened previously; and if the foreign vegetables and fruits come into this country they will, unless some action is taken, displace our fruits and vegetables. The reason is a simple one. The season is ending in one country just as it begins in the other, and the surplus, the accumulated product which is left over after having satisfied the requirements of the country in which it is grown, is available for export to Canada. Now, unless we are able to take immediate action to prevent it, the effort and labour of our fruit growers and vegetable growers will be destroyed. Whenever it is necessary, therefore, proper action has been taken. And such action will continue to be taken. If we are wrong we shall be replaced by others who will do what is

3644	COMMONS
Ways and Means-Customs Tariff
right. But so far as this government is concerned, it proposes to proceed1 on that principle and to endeavour, by the use of this instrument, which is the only one I know of adequate for the purpose, to secure to the Canadian vegetable and fruit grower an equal opportunity to compete with the producers of other countries. It gets back to that fundamental principle. It is the privilege of the house to censure the administration for taking such action, but I have no hesitation in saying that this is the principle upon which we shall proceed so long as we are here.


Thomas McMillan: For the year
ended December 31, 1930, there came into this country $889,421 worth of potatoes, and we exported to the United States $4,720,946 worth. The Canadian Canners during the season of 1931 .paid to the Canadian growers of fruits a lower price than had been paid for years.


Finlay MacDonald: I would point out that this
matter is not before the committee. There will be opportunity given at the proper time to discuss this question.


Richard Bedford Bennett: We agreed last year,
and have done so again this year, that the items which appeared in the tariff of last fall would be discussed if the committee so desired. The hon. gentleman asked for permission to discuss item 83 of the September resolutions, and he was proceeding to do so.


Charles A. Stewart: I think it
would be much better to take the September items one after another.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. member for
Weyburn (Mr. Young) asked that he might discuss this item.


Charles A. Stewart: To take up the September item would give the minister an opportunity to have the information before him.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The proper thing to do
would be to finish the June items, but I do not want to lessen the opportunity for discussion.


Finlay MacDonald: They are not before the committee.


Charles A. Stewart: I do not
think the Minister of Finance is correct when he says that there was no substitution. I

have in my hand a copy of the order in council, but without reading it I would like to point out to the minister and to the committee that the order in council distinctly says that radishes were substituted for potatoes. I was wrong in my deduction that it was in effect only for four days. The first order was passed on April 2, 1931, and the amending order is dated May 1. This order distinctly says that the Minister of National Revenue is authorized to fix the value of, for duty purposes, potatoes, and substitute therefor, radishes. I merely wish to draw the attention of the right hon. gentleman to the fact that there was a substitution.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What I meant to say
was that it was dealt with as a separate item and not in the sense that radishes were substituted for potatoes. In the sense in which the word "substitute" was used it seemed to indicate that we were going to eat radishes instead of potatoes.


Charles A. Stewart: When the
hon. member from Prince Edward Island was holding up the small potato, I did not have an opportunity of making inquiries; I wanted to 'be sure that it was a potato and not a radish which he was exhibiting upon that occasion.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.
Progress reported.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILL


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 30, respecting the St. Lawrence River Bridge Company.-Mr. Rowe.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. W. G. ERNST (Queens-Lunenburg) moved that the house go into committee on Bill No. 97, to amend the Canada Shipping Act.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. LaVergne in the chair.

Immigration Act
On section 1.-Requirements for certificates of service as masters and mates.
Ernest Lapointe: What is the purpose of this bill?


Mr. ERNST:: Under the Canada Shipping Act a master without a certificate may sail a fishing vessel, but he may not sail a vessel that ceases to be a fishing vessel. Owing to the economic depression, which has affected the shipping industry in eastern Canada as it has, for instance, wheat growing in the west, a large number of vesels are not now fishing and are engaged in other lines. The masters cannot sail them although many of them own a substantial share in the vessels. The result has been that a great number of vessels of Canadian registry have been transferred to the registry of Newfoundland or Barbados, which do not require certificated masters. The purpose of this bill, which introduces no new principle-the principle was adopted in 1920-is to enable a man who de facto has had experience within any one of ten years previous to 1931 to go before the examining board and take certain examinations which are specified in the explanatory notes to the bill-as to his sobriety, experience, ability and general good conduct on board ship, and a sight test-and upon passing those tests he gets his certificate. The principle was adopted, as I say, in 1920.


Ernest Lapointe: Do the officers of the department approve of this bill?


William Gordon Ernst: Yes. The minister appeared in person before the committee and accepted the bill.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Bill reported, read the third time and passed.


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Tuesday, June 2, consideration of the motion of Mr. Woods-worth for the second reading of Bill No. 44, to amend the Immigration Act.
Mr. SPEAKER:: Is it the pleasure of the aouse to adopt the motion?


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: Mr. Speaker,-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: If the promoter of the bill speaks he will close the debate on the second reading. If any other hon. member wishes to speak he should do so now.


James Shaver Woodsworth: It is rather curious, Mr. Speaker, but I have not yet had a chance to speak on my own bill.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. gentleman's oportunity is now. Does he desire to speak on the bill?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, Mr. Speaker, but I understood that your ruling was that my speaking would not close the debate, but that it would be closed by my colleague who opened the discussion.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The Clerk reminds me that another member promoted this bill, although it appears in the name of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth), so, if the hon. member speaks now, it will not close the debate.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, the bill consists of two distinct clauses which seek to. do away with certain anomalies in the present Immigration Act. In the last few years there have been a very iarge number of deportations from Canada. Last year 1,806 were deported as public charges; 701 because of convictions for criminal offences, and inmates of penitentiaries and gaoils; 71 on account of convictions under the Opium and Narcotic Drug Act; 445 inmates of mental institutions, including insane persons, feeble minded persons, epileptics and mental defectives; 320 physical defectives; 97 because of misrepresentations and stealth; 5 on account of having been previously deported; 70 miscellaneous cases, and 510 dependent members of families accompanying deports.
I recognize quite clearly that it is very difficult to have passed by this house any public bill introduced by a private member. As a matter of fact in the last five years only three public bills introduced by private members have actually passed the house. Therefore I am under no illusions as to the possibility of my bill becoming law. I can quite readily understand that there are other sections of the Immigration Act which should be modified. I realize further that the proposals I am making may not be the very wisest conceivable, and that the department may see fit to bring forward others. I bring two matters to the attention of the house, however, in connection with what I believe to be certain hardships existing under the act. If the Minister of Immigration (Mr. Gordon) can find any better way of meeting the needs I have outlined I shall be very glad to accept his suggestions.
Immigration Act

The first clause in my amendment reads as follows:
Notwithstanding anything in this act or any amendment thereof or regulations made thereunder, an immigrant who has completed ten years continuous residence in Canada, shall not thereafter be liable to deportation.
A large number of people have come to Canada in good faith, have lived here probably ten, fifteen or eighteen years and yet have had no opportunity to establish domicile or permanent residence. For that reason they are liable to deportation. It seems to me some limitation should be placed upon the period during which deportation proceedings may be taken. A year ago our attention was called to a number of cases concerning epileptic women who had been placed in institutions and at the request of the provincial authorities, who found their care a burden, were deported. Surely anybody who has been in Canada for fifteen years has acquired some rights. If before that period of time has elapsed the authorities have not discovered something wrong with them and deported them I think they ought to be allowed to remain, and we ought to accept the responsibility. In a ten-year period undoubtedly they will have severed their connections with the old country; the likelihood is that their families will have been broken up and they will have no home to return to should they be deported. Under the circumstances I think it but reasonable that we should place some limitation upon the time within which such deportations may be carried out, and I have suggested ten years as a reasonable period.
The second clause of the bill is of a different character. It attempts to recognize a right of citizenship on the part of persons who in good faith have come to this country and lived here for a number of years, but for some reason or another have been forced for the time being to go to the United States or elsewhere on this continent to seek employment. I do not suppose that from this time forward there will be so many of that class, because the people of the United States have put up the bars against immigration and it is not easy for people living in Canada to get to the other side of the line. In the past, however, a great many people have come to Canada, especially to the western country, intending to make it their home. There came a time when they were unable to find work; some of them were induced to go to Chicago. Detroit or other larger centres of the United States to seek employment. After a while their employment ceased and they desired to return to Canada, but were refused readmission. Apparently they had forfeited all
fMr. Woodsworth.]
rights, and some of them were confronted with the possibility of being forced to return to their country of origin whence they had departed a good many years before.


Mr. GORDON:: Would the hon. member
permit a question? When he says that the immigrant is forced to return to his country of origin, who would return him?


James Shaver Woodsworth: As I understand
it, the Canadian authorities refuse to allow him to reenter Canada and the American authorities return him to his country of origin.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Why?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Simply because
they did not want him in their country.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: My hon. friend wants
him to come back here because they do not want him in the United States?


James Shaver Woodsworth: No, not because
they do not want him. I know of a number of such people who were not of the undesirable type. A few weeks ago there was considerable comment in the newspapers concerning the case of August Gabert.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The Gabert case?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes; the minister
may recall it.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I do.


James Shaver Woodsworth: It may illustrate
the point I have in mind. Roughly speaking, the case Was something like this: Twenty years ago August Gabert came to Canada from Germany. He rented a cottage, got work and one year later sent for his two sons, Edward aged eleven and Frank aged seven. In 1912 he entered Canada at the port of Quebec. He obtained work at the A. R. Williams Machinery Manufacturing plant in Toronto and reported twice a month as an alien. With Mrs. Gabert's money they bought a lot and have paid the taxes on it ever since. The boys attended school in Toronto. Mr. Gabert was receiving $13 a week and Mrs. Gabert worked in the New Method laundry. In 1924 Mr. Gabert went to Detroit, taking with him his wife, sons and his daughter-in-law. The one son, Edward, had married an English girl in Toronto. Mr. Gabert had no steady work. Mrs. Gabert said they had obtained visas from the American consul at Toronto to enter the United States, but they were not naturalized in either country.
Mr. LaVERGNE: Why?

Immigration Act


James Shaver Woodsworth: I suppose they
still considered themselves residents of Canada.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Why should the hon.
member say that?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Well-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I know the hon. gentleman is trying to be fair to the immigration department, but why make a statement like that when it is obvious that the man had dissociated himself from this country and had been years in the United States?


James Shaver Woodsworth: But he had not
entirely dissociated himself from this country. He had property in this country and had gone over to the United States to get work. Perhaps I may be permitted to give the remainder of the few notes I have on the case;
I think they are fairly correct:
Frank, motor mechanic, also Detroit. Mrs. Gabert and Frank motored back to Canada via Windsor (no papers).
There was some trouble over papers:
Signed "certain reentry papers" at Windsor. Gabert got work at Welland (for one year). Last fall Gabert went to visit his son in Detroit. Refused reentry to Canada (home not listed in the directory by an error). Gabert kept in jail in Detroit for six months. Then deported to Germany. Frank who was ill (twenty-six) charged with having reentered Canada illegally. Threatened with deportation. Never strong. Died March 12. Brother allowed to enter (for one week) after the death. Father, (still in jail) refused entry. Now Mrs. Gabert under threat of deportation (illegal reentry). Department says it has information which should not be divulged.
I have not gone further into the history of that case and have no personal knowledge with respect to it, but hon. members must have noticed a good deal about the case which appeared in the papers. Considerable popular sympathy has been expressed towards the woman on account of the very awkward situation in which she finds herself-she living in Toronto and her husband deported to Germany'. In view of circumstances of that kind I have ventured to suggest this amendment to the act.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Would my hon. friend
give me some other instances so I may clear them up?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I have notes of
other cases that are somewhat parallel to that, but they are in my office. I did not want to go into the details of each case. I have simply given this case as an example of
what I have proposed by my amendment to guard against, namely:
No immigrant who has resided in Canada for a continuous period of ten years, and thereafter voluntarily leaves Canada to reside elsewhere on the continent of North America for the purpose of seeking employment or engaging in any occupation, and who desires to return to Canada, shall be refused reentry into Canada by reason of such absence.
My thought is simply this, that a period of ten years' residence in Canada ought to entitle an immigrant to claim domicile here; he ought to have certain rights in this country after that period of residence.


Mr. CHAPLIN:: Whether he becomes
a citizen or not?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, I would say whether he becomes a citizen or not. But that is another matter, because it has been made very difficult for some of these men to become citizens. A great deal of the rough work across this country has been done by people who have never been able to become Canadian citizens; so that if a man has lived here for the long period of ten years and then is faced with the situation which faces a good many labouring people, is not able to find a job here for the time being-and anyone who knows the tragedy of labour drifting backwards and forwards over the international border in years past knows that such a man has to take whatever job he can get no matter where it may be-that man, I say, if he is obliged to go across the line and perhaps leave his wife here, should not later on be prevented from reentering this country. I am not blaming the department for their action in regard to such cases, for I think any one who has had dealings with the department knows they have a great many complicated cases to handle. But they have to deal with these cases and it does seem to me that it would be a good thing if we modified the law in this regard. I am not trying to make it easy for people to refrain from taking out citizenship papers. I think they should be encouraged to do so, and that this should be made easier for them than it is at the present time. But I would urge that we ought to look at this matter from a humane standpoint, recognizing that these people come over here from Great Britain or continental Europe, that they intend to become citizens, and that they ought by the very fact of associating with us and working in this country for ten years to have some rights of Canadian citizenship. Hence the reason for my two amendments. As I said

Immigration Act
at the beginning, if the department has any other way to suggest by which some of these difficulties could be overcome, I should be very glad to adopt their suggestion, but I have taken this means of bringing these cases before the house in order that we may do something to prevent their recurrence.


Mr. IRVINE:: What would be the status of an immigrant who after becoming a Canadian citizen leaves Canada for an extended period and then seeks reentry?


James Shaver Woodsworth: My hon. friend will have to ask the Minister of Immigration.


Thomas Reid: What would the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth) do if a Chinese immigrant, a dope peddler, after eleven years' residence in this country drifted across the line and later sought to reenter Canada?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I have not had orientals in view in drafting this legislation, but as far as I am concerned, I would not be inclined to deny those people all rights of citizenship in this country. If they come in here and do their work and are to all intents and purposes good citizens, I do not think we should discriminate against them; but I do not think there are many cases of the kind suggested by the hon. member.


John Livingstone Brown: Mr. Speaker, in regard to the first clause of this bill, 1 do not think it would be wise for us to dispense with the power that we now have of deporting those who have offended against our laws and whose deportation would be in the interests of the country. Of course, I think the department ought to judge any particular case on its merits. But in regard to the second clause, I have a great deal of sympathy with the purpose which the sponsor of the bill has in view. I have a case in mind, although I may not be correctly informed on all the details, and it does seem to me that in such a case there should be some modification of the regulations. For instance, I am informed that a man came to Canada from Russia in 1911, about twenty years ago. His family came with him. He himself became a British subject, and I am informed that three of his sons also became British subjects. I am not well-informed as to the status of the fourth son-he may or may not have become a British subject at the time his father became naturalized. We know that it is possible under such circumstances for a father to secure naturalization for his minor children. On the TMr. Woodsworth.]
assumption that this young man did become a British citizen I will proceed with my argument.
If I understand the matter correctly, for the last seven years this young man has been going 'back and forth across the international houndary between Manitoba and North Dakota; I think the fact is that he has spent the greater part of his time on the United States side of the boundary during that period. The situation now is that he is in gaol in 'Grand Forks, North Dakota, for having violated the United States immigration laws. W e are not informed that he has 'been guilty of any moral or criminal offence, but simply that he has violated those immigration laws The United States1 authorities want to deport him; they have offered to send him back to Canada, but the Canadian authorities will not receive him because, according to the documents, he has lost what domicile he ever acquired in Canada.
Mr. LaVERGNE: Then he is not a Canadian subject.


John Livingstone Brown: I am not dealing with the law as it is, but as I think it should be. That is an answer to my hon. friend.
Mr. LaVERGNE: That changes the case altogether.


John Livingstone Brown: We are talking about changing the law, and this is the time to speak about this matter. I proceed on the assumption that this young man has acquired British citizenship. What does that mean? Does British citizenship mean something to a man who has been born in Canada, under the British flag, and something entirely different to the man who becomes naturalized? In my judgment British citizenship should mean the same to every person who is a British citizen; I believe it is a privilege that should be esteemed very highly by everyone. In the days of Rome it was the proud boast of a man to 'be able to say he was a Roman citizen, and I believe we should be equally proud to boast that we are British citizens. But is it or is it not a fact that British citizenship means different things to different people at different times? I am not one of those who think we should make the acquirement of British citizenship easy; I think we should exercise care in granting it, but once that citizenship has been granted it should carry with it to the naturalized person all the rights which are enjoyed by the native born citizen.
Mr. LaVERGNE : It does.


John Livingstone Brown: 
John Livingstone Brown: I am the third or fourth generation of my family. However, if I should go across the line, an absence of ten years would not prevent me from returning to Canada; I couldi not be kept out. Is a young man who has acquired British citizenship through naturalization treated differently? Is the case any different in regard to him? Can he be kept out, or should we receive him when he wants to come back to Canada, even though he is being deported by the United States, not because of any criminal offence but because of a violation of the immigration laws of that country?
As the Minister of Immigration knows, I have brought this matter to his attention on other occasions, and as yet he has not given me an answer. I placed before him the documents which were forwarded to me, but I have not had an opportunity to see him personally with regard to the matter. However, this is the case as I see it. I am not going to express an opinon as to what is the law at the present time, but I am expressing an opinion as to what I think the law ought to be. In my view section 2 of the proposed bill harmonizes with what I think should be the proper attitude on this matter. It reads:
No immigrant who has resided in Canada for a continuous period of ten years-
Perhaps we should make it "British subject."

and thereafter voluntarily leaves Canada to reside elsewhere on the continent of North America for the purpose of seeking employment or engaging in any occupation, and who desires to return to Canada, shall be refused reentry into Canada by reason of such absence.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: With respect to
this bill I must compliment the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woods-worth) upon the moderation with which he expressed his views in connection with a subject which in large measure, has to do with the human equation. I am not unmindful of the interest the hon. member takes in questions of this character.
I am opposed to the bill. Section 3 of the Immigration Act is the one which would be affected if this bill became law, since that is the section which has to do with prohibited classes. With Tpsnect to prohibited classes
some criticism has been offered in the recent past, and in fact for very many years past. In dealing with immigration we must bear in mind that heretofore the Dominion government has directed, encouraged and controlled -and I use the word "controlled" with a degree of hesitancy-migration into Canada. What responsibilities does that immediately create? If care is not taken in the encouragement of peoples to come to this country, and if no discipline is exercised, upon whom falls the responsibility? Once an immigrant is legally landed in Canada undoubtedly he acquires a certain status under our laws. He has a perfect right to go from one province to another, or from one city or town to another, and the responsibility for that person is cast upon the province or the municipality in which he happens to be. Therefore I suggest that parliament in a matter of this kind should exercise extreme care, though not by any means to the point of exclusion. While at present there must be a degree of rigidity which in normal times would not be exercised, yet at all times great care should be exercised, and particularly at a time like this, although under normal conditions desirable people undoubtedly would be welcomed in this country. Upon whom falls the burden? In a period of depression these matters come into bold relief, let me say.
During the two years prior to last summer new peoples came to Canada to the extent of almost a quarter of a million, including almost 100,000 adult males. Where are those people to-day? They either displaced Canadian labour or they themselves are to-day in the ranks of the unemployed. That is the situation that faces the people of this country. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre is, I believe, and always has been an ardent advocate of the labouring man. I myself, while probably not as well known as he in my advocacy, am considered, I believe, in those restricted areas where I am known, as having been not unmindful of the labouring man's needs.
The introduction of new people into this country in large numbers, at a time when thoughtful Canadians must have known that we were approaching and were then, indeed, actually in a period of depression, was a direct challenge to the worker in Canada. My hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre, in his sincere advocacy of labour, must recognize that, I am sure. When this department was given to me to administer that was one of the first things I had to take into consideration, and it was not a time when one could allow one's sympathies to be unduly the guide. I have great sympathv for any human being
Immigration Act

who is having a hard struggle to get along. I have great sympathy for those new people who came into the country in years gone by and even for those who came in the near past, and it is no source of satisfaction to me to see them now in the ranks of the unemployed. But when it comes to changing the law of the country in the way proposed in this bill, I tell the house that my sympathy first goes to the worker of Canada, who needs the protection of a law such as our Immigration Act. And while in the administration of that act I may make mistakes, they will certainly be made in favour of the working men of Canada as against people from other countries, because those other countries have responsibilities of their own with regard to their own nationals.
Unquestionably one's sympathy often goes out to those who have to be deported. But let me point out that if this act became law and the officials of the Immigration department were divested of the authority to send back to their country of origin those people who do not comply with our law, then I should be obliged at this time to allow into Canada tens of thousands of people who are in a situation similar to that referred to by the hon. member. Of course those people would come into Canada, because the United States are determined to send them back to their country of origin. They would come to the border and declare that they had lived in Canada at one time and wished to come back. Why? Because, if they did not get the chance to come in, they would be sent back to their country of origin. They would not be allowed to remain in the United States, either because they do not comply with the laws of that country or because their presence in that country is not desired.
Now, can we in the interests of the labouring man of Canada take such steps as this bill would seem to contemplate? In view of the dispassionate way in which the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre has discussed the bill, I suggest that we can afford to take no such step as this bill proposes. From time to time, under the present law, deportations have to be made. The provinces and the municipalities have rights. In the poorer municipalities of northern Canada the burden of taking care of people who are not able to take care of themselves, by reason of physical and mental defects, is thrust upon the public. And those municipalities are having a hard enough struggle as it is to get along, without having that additional burden thrown upon them.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Does not the minister think that the officials responsible at the gates should, in the first instance, keep out such people, or Should discover within the first ten years that they are undesirable?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: That question has been
asked me many times. Many cases have passed our immigration officials, and I doubt seriously whether the officials could possibly have discovered defects that existed without introducing a system of inspection that would be most irritating to many people who would pass with a very casual inspection. It is true, the time seems long; and it might be said with some degree of force that the defects should be detected. But it is utterly impossible for the Department of Immigration to employ a sufficient number of officials to follow up all immigrants coming into Canada to find out whether or not they entered legally. The onus is surely upon the immigrant seeking entry into Canada to see that he complies with the laws of the country, and not upon the Dominion to supply a preventive or investigating force to follow up each immigrant year after year to see whether or not on his arrival he complied with the law.
In cases of deportation every chance of appeal is given. Boards of inquiry are established and appeals are available. Evidence is taken. Nothing is done in a haphazard way, and while occasionally hardship ensues, yet if we founded our general law upon any provision to meet one or two cases of hardship, then we should be adopting a most dangerous principle; for a great number of people who come in legally would be immediately affected by the introduction of that general law made to apply to a particular case. That would not be at all desirable.
My hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre spoke about the desirability of recognizing that a person coming to Canada should have the right freely to go over to the United States and return, crossing and recrossing the boundary as fancy suited him, in his search for employment. The hon. member suggested that a man W'ho out of a job should have that right to cross and recross the boundary. That is not my conception of what should be done in that regard.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The minister asked me to give him a concrete case. This man Michael Corahe, a Pole, was ordered deported by the United States immigration authorities. He had served four years in the Canadian army. He came to Canada at the age of five and enlisted at sixteen. Eight years ago he went to the United States. He was unable

Immigration Act
to reenter Canada. He was a naturalized Canadian, his brother and sisters were bom in Canada and are now in Toronto. It would seem to me that that is a case of real hardship.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: What is the name, please?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Michael Corahe.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I have the record of that case. This man was allowed entry into Canada, but I may say that it was with reluctance I permitted his entry. He was born in Poland and came to Canada in 1907 with his parents. He was in the Canadian forestry corps between May, 1917, and July, 1919, being discharged at Winnipeg. He applied for admission to Canada from the United States in October, 1930, claiming to have resided in this country from 1907 to May, 1930, having proceeded to the United States to reside on the latter date. He was rejected, being unable to comply with the occupational and passport requirements of the law. The department, in view of previous residence, further investigated the case and it was ascertained that this man had not proceeded to the United States in 1930 but had been working in Detroit for approximately eight years. Despite the misrepresentation and the length of residence out of Canada, the department allowed entry in view of previous residence in this country from childhood and because of the man's military service. The hon member will see that his instructions in this case do not coincide with the facts. I reluctantly gave an order allowing this man to return to Canada.
Criticisms will be levelled from time to time at the Department of Immigration, but I propose to assume full responsibility, both for the policies of the department and the acts of its officials. At times I will make mistakes, and then I will have to rely upon the generosity of those who criticize. The rule in the department is to see that the laws of the country are observed. Every departure therefrom is a step forward in imperilling the position of the Canadian worker, whose cause is so strongly advocated by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre.
I believe if the hon. member thinks this matter over he will agree that w'hile there may be some merit in his bill, if it should pass it would be an added hardship to the man who has come to this country, established his home and is bringing up a family. The jobs of workers in this country would be imperilled by permitting any indiscriminate crossing between the United States and
Canada, as times are better here or better there. I believe that the worker who has established his home and family in this country should get every bit of protection which our law allows and should be given preference against the transient worker who is ready to go wherever fields look the greenest.


Mr. JOHN VALLANCE (South Battle-ford) :: Mr. Speaker, while I agree almost
entirely with what the hon. minister has just said, that those who have established homes in and are residents of Canada should receive consideration, I should like to draw to his attention a case which I took up with the department before he assumed charge of it, which has caused me to feel that I should support this bill. This was a British subject, born in the old land, who came to Canada and had resided here for some twelve or thirteen years. He homesteaded just a few miles from me, and while pursuing his occupation as a farmer he met with an accident which brought about complications which, in his opinion, could not be successfully dealt with by the doctors in Canada. He went to the United States to some place where he was advised he could obtain treatment, but probably neglected to tell the authorities that he would be gone for more than six months. He stayed in the United States for eighteen months, and when he found that the treatment was not giving the results he expected he attempted to return to his home. He was stopped by the immigration authorities, who claimed that he was not a Canadian citizen. He had nothing to show that he was a Canadian citizen, although he was a British subject. I was wired about this young man, and I took the matter up wTith the then Minister of Immigration. I was told that if the United States was determined to deport him there was only one place to which they could deport him, and that was back to Scotland. Although this man had had twelve or thirteen years' residence in Canada, the authorities claimed that he had no domicile here. It is because of this case that I feel I must support the bill. It may be, as the minister has said, that the door will be opened wider, but I do not think it is fair to the minister or to the department to ask them to give special consideration to any one immigrant. For these reasons, I assure the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) that I have a great deal of sympathy with his bill.
Mr. LaVERGNE: Was that man deported?
Supply-Geological Survey

M,r. VALLANCE: No, he was not. However, it was not the law that prevented that deportation, it was simply the courtesy of the department in allowing him to reenter Canada.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hour for public and
private bills having expired, the house will proceed to government orders.



MINES AND GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

[Stage Direction]
The house in committee of supply, Mr. MacDonald (South Cape Breton) in the chair.
Geological Survey-
For explorations, surveys and investigations, wages of explorers, topographers and others, $100,000.
For publication of English and French editions of reports, maps, illustrations, etc., $70,000.
For maintenance of offices and museum, expenses of special exhibitions pertaining to natural resources, purchase of instruments, chemicals, books of reference, miscellaneous assistance and contingencies, $65,000.
For museum equipment, $12,000.
For purchase of specimens, $2,000.-Total, $339,000.
Mr. SPENCER:: What is the reason for the decrease in this item?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The decrease mainly arises from the curtailment of the number of geological survey parties sent out this year. The vote was decreased with some reluctance so far as I am concerned.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Were any survey parties sent out at all this year, and if so, what are they doing?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Yes. There are about forty geological survey parties out in the field this year. They are keeping up the continuity of the geological surveys, and I hope that the coming years will see these parties increased.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Grant to the Imperial Institute, $9,733.33.
William Thomas Lucas: Will the minister explain
what this is for?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Under an agreement made at the Imperial conference some years ago between the British government and the dominions, each government contributes a fixed amount towards the Imperial Institute for the purpose of investigation of the mineral

resources of the empire, and keeping a general set of records which constitutes something in the nature of a clearing house of information as to the mineral resources of the empire.


Jean-François Pouliot: So long as there is unemployment I think that all immigration should be stopped completely. When people here cannot find work I do not see the use of bringing even the best class of people to this country.


James J. Donnelly: What is the reason for the reduction in this item?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Australia felt that it was not desirable to put up the amount that had heretofore been subscribed by that country, and our contribution has been reduced proportionately.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Salaries, $312,555; contingencies, $40,000.
Mr. LaVERGNE : May I inquire from the minister whether the British Empire Settlement Act is still in force, and what the scope of that act is so far as immigration to Canada is concerned?
Wesley Ashton Gordon: The British Empire Settlement Act, of course, is an act of the imperial parliament. Generally it provides for assistance in the movement of British peoples to the various dominions. I think we are not alone just now so far as the dominions are concerned with respect to restrictions under the agreement.
Mr. LaVERGNE : I understand that under that act a certain amount is loaned to the sett'ler-immigrant coming to Canada to tide him over his first years, and that he reimburses the money to the government when he has made enough .money to do so. I think, and I believe this was understood by the convention at AVinnipeg, that first aid should be given to the Canadian, and that the best way to settle our country is to settle it with our own people. We should profit by the mistake of the United States. It is years ago since I raised my voice in the house on this subject. I have not changed my opinion since then. I still believe that it is not by filling our country with foreigners that we are going to build it up. It should be filled up according to the traditions of the country. More important than material prosperity is moral and intellectual prosperity. I am not allowed to refer to a past debate, but only to-night we had an instance of what happens: some people who come heTe do not think enough of this coun-

Supply-Immigration
try to become naturalized Canadians. They run about with their troubles and sometimes their diseases, physical, moral or intellectual. I do not know whether the British Empire settlement policy is still in force, but if we can afford to lend money to immigrants from other countries to settle here, we can very well afford to do it for our own people. I understand that to-day it costs less for a man to leave Liverpool and settle in the west than it does for a settler from the province of Quebec, the lower provinces or the province of Ontario. My opinion is that the best immigrant to fill up the west is the Canadian immigrant from the old provinces, who is already assimilated, who knows the traditions which the Englishspeaking and French-speaking Canadians have cherished in this country for the last one hundred and fifty j'ears.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver):: Might I point out that vote No. 125 deals specifically with what my hon. friend is now discussing?
Mr. LaVERGNE: I am very glad the hon. gentleman called me to order. I do not want to take up the time of the committee when I am not on the right item, but when that other item is reached, I shall have an opportunity to speak. I repeat that the best migration with which to settle Canada is Canadian migration, and if any favours are to be given they should be given to Canadians. It is very unfortunate that .people should come here from foreign countries and receive special favours when Canadians cannot settle in another part of the country which so long has been theirs.


James J. Donnelly: We have been told that for the past few months immigration to this country has practically ceased, yet we find that while there was $324,000 spent last year, $312,000 is to be spent this year. Hon. members will notice that there is but a slight reduction, and I am wondering why the staff is being kept in service.
Mr. LaVERGNE: To keep them out.


James J. Donnelly: Nobody is being allowed to come in, yet we have this large amount being paid in salaries.
Mr. LaVERGNE: To keep them out.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: In answer to the hon.
member for Montmagny (Mr. LaVergne) may I say that I am thoroughly in accord with much that he has said. I assure him that no assistance such as he has suggested has been given by this government to people from other lands. In connection with the British migrants to Canada I trust-and I believe that the hon.
member for Montmagny will agree with me- that the time will never come when the Britisher will not be welcomed in Canada. I think my hon. friend will join with me in welcoming all Britishers who have come to Canada "under their own steam" and are prepared to take care of themselves. That is the position to-day. We are not advancing moneys nor have we advanced moneys with the exception of certain cases where assisted passages have been given. Outside of existing agreements which will shortly expire that practice has been entirely discontinued.
Replying to the hon. member for Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly), I have found it much more difficult to keep people out of Canada than to bring them in. Even during this period of depression, strange to say, there are many people striving to get in. In fact if the effort to come into Canada is any indication of our recovery from the depression I should say that we are recovering very rapidly, because we require a large staff along our boundary lines to see that those who should not be allowed into Canada are with the least possible irritation kept out. I should like to indicate to my hon. friend the importance of the work that these men are doing. The records of the Immigration Department disclose that during the last calendar year the officers along our boundary line passed into Canada, either for temporary visits of only an hour or two or for longer periods, excluding immigrants and entries at ocean ports, over 32,000,000 people. Hon members will readily recognize the necessity for a well organized and disciplined preventive force.


Henry Elvins Spencer: In how many j'ears did
that number enter Canada?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: In one year. In the month of August alone the number was over 6,000,000.


Ernest Lapointe: I agree with the remarks of my hon. friend from Montmagny, and it is rather interesting that at the present time everj'body seems to be endeavouring to discourage immigration. That, however, has not always been so, and the government of which I had the honour to be a member was strongly assailed because it was not taking steps to increase the population of Canada and to bring in immigrants. That criticism was made as recently as the 1929 session. I shall quote from Hansard of 1929, page 22, where the present Prime Minister is reported as follows:
Is there any Canadian who regards this problem as being adequately dealt with by the present system? We have here one of the largest undeveloped areas in the world; we have a very pressing necessity for more people. There need be no misapprehension about that, notwithstanding what has been said from tima
Supply-Immigration

to time to the contrary. It will be found that the increase of population in this country, brought about through bringing additional people in, will not only lessen unemployment for those who are now in it, but will increase all employment. Those who have studied the problems connected with the movement of people realize that instead of there being a diminution of opportunities for labour, the now of new peoples into a country means the increasing of the opportunities for those who are there as well as providing work to those who may come.
In view of certain statements which have been made, more particularly in my province, I wish to remind the committee that we were attacked not because we were bringing too many immigrants but because we were not bringing enough.
Mr. LaVERGNE:	I am glad to see that
the memory of my hon. friend goes back at least two or three years. Probably due to the fact that I am getting old mine goes back much farther than that. I can remember in the good old days back in 1905 and 1906, when immigrants were coming to Canada at the rate of about 500,000 a year. I remember the time when I was assailed in this house because I thought that the ratio of immigrants to population was far too high. That was in the old days of the North Atlantic Trading Company and the Saskatchewan Land Settlement Company.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Who was in that deal?
Mr. LaVERGNE : I remember giving figures at a time when the population of the United States was about 52,000,000 and ours was about 7,000,000 or 8,000,000. We were begging for immigrants to come here, with the result that we filled up our country and to-day we are beginning to pay the piper. The theories which have certain currency out west, especially in the city of Winnipeg, were practically ignored in Canada at that time. When we imported those immigrants we imported their doctrines of very advanced socialism, and probably communism. We introduced into our country the famous Doukhobors and many others which have not greatly improved our population. I agree with the Minister of Immigration that we should build up our country with the two basic races, those of British and French descent, which are already assimilated. I hope my hon. friend's memory will go back 'to a time about twenty-five years ago, as it did to the resolution he read a minute ago, when I was laughed at in the house because I made the statement that we

were sacrificing the intellectual and moral prosperity of our country for material prosperity Which would prove in the future to be dangerous to Canada.


Ernest Lapointe: Two years ago my hon. friend would not have agreed with this program, either.
Mr. LaVERGNE:	Certainly not. I am
open to conviction, but until it is proved I am wrong I hold to my view. I think if my hon. friends went to the United States and talked with any patriotic American who belonged to the good old Yankee stock or belonged to the southerners-


Ernest Lapointe: One hundred per cent
American.
Mr. LaVERGNE: I would interject at this point that the 100 per cent American of fifty years ago has practically disappeared. I should think that the smell of the melting pot in the United States should open our eyes and caution us to go slowly when we are filling up our country, and impress us with the necessity for building our citizenship with the Canadian races which are already assimilated. We know of the common traditions in Canada which are absorbed by the British and French people who should constitute our population. Let us fill up our country with the sons of the soil, the sons of people who are inspired by the traditions of 150 year's of common life with our English-speaking compatriots. This is the beat immigration. Why this hurry in filling up our country with all the riff-raff of Europe? In this way are we going to make Canada happier and more prosperous? I think Canada, especially the province of Quebec, is prosperous in a way that other nations may well envy. I do not think any people in the world enjoy more happiness and more liberty, and have a greater respect for the rights of others than the people of the province of Quebec. And that enviable condition is due to the traditions which have been handed down to us by our forefathers for the past 300 years. I think the democracy that has been built up in that province is an outstanding example to the world in freedom, in happiness, in contentment, and in respect for the rights of others, especially of minorities.


Peter Heenan: I had intended to deal
with this question on votes 124 and 125, but inasmuch as it has been discussed on this particular item I suppose I may as well continue it. I was very happy to hear what I considered the very courageous remarks of the hon. Minister of Immigration (Mr. Gor-

Supply-Immigration
don) with respect to immigration, especially when he said he was not going to permit the dictation of railroad companies or of immigration agents to continue any longer. The only trouble I see is that he will not only have to offset their dictation, he will have also to offset their influence. I have had some experience in this regard, before I entered t'he cabinet, while I was a member of the cabinet and since I have tried to maintain the position that he is trying to maintain at the present time. If I failed in that regard it was because of the political manoeuvring of hon. friends opposite who now support the government.
I noticed in the Ottawa Journal of March 22, 1930, a despatch stating that the agent of one particular church wishes to double the number of our British settlers. I may say to the minister that the Catholic church, the United church and the Salvation Army are striving to bring in settlers. They have men engaged in that work, and those men seem to think that the greater the number of settlers they can induce to come to this country the more important their respective positions will become. In 1931, an official of the Salvation Army, Lieut.-Commissioner W. J. Barnard Turner, of London, England, visited this country and stated that he was seeking to move 2,000,000 Britishers to Canada. I see that votes 124 and 125 oover grants to assist that gentleman to carry out his plan.


Finlay MacDonald: We have not yet reached votes 124 and 125.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I have already raised that point of order, Mr. Chairman.


Finlay MacDonald: If the committee consent
to finish this discussion on the item now before us, well and good.


Peter Heenan: I do not see why the committee Should be asked to consent, because I am discussing the matter after other members have been allowed to do so.


Finlay MacDonald: I do not know whether the
minister is going to take up vote 124.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The next item will be
125, I hope.
Mr'. HEENAN: I am heart and soul with the minister in his endeavour to stop immigration, but I do not think for a moment that he is doing so. The minister admits that Britishers are permitted to enter who oome "under their own steam" as he says.
Why should Britishers or any other nationals be allowed to come into this country "under their own steam" and flood the labour market?
I do not think we should allow Britishers to come in freely, especially when we know they are encouraged by the propaganda of immigration societies to come to Canada.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: What propaganda does
my hon. friend refer to?


Peter Heenan: At the present time their agents are travelling throughout the British isles telling the people what fine prospects there are in Canada for intending immigrants. In my room only yesterday a young returned soldier from the British isles-from the same part of the country as I came from-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I hope we did not deport him.


Peter Heenan: No, they are all decent people who come from that part of the country. He asked me to get him a job and I am trying to do so. I inquired why he came to this country. He told me that throughout Britain to-day there are immigration officers paid by the different churches and citizen's committees urging young men to come to this country, and offering to lend them money to pay their passage. Those agents are telling the people that immigration into Canada from continental Europe being practically stopped, now is the time for them to come in as a preferred class so that when conditions improve they will be right on the job.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: What churches?


Peter Heenan: All the churches; I am not speaking of any particular church.


Mr. PRICE:: Nonsense.


Peter Heenan: There is no one in the house better acquainted with what is nonsense than the hon. member who has just interrupted me.


Otto Baird Price: Where do you stand on this question?


Peter Heenan: I do not want to be further interrupted. When I was Minister of Labour I was obstructed by gentlemen of his calibre who did not know the difference between common sense and nonsense.


Finlay MacDonald: Do not invite reprisals, please.


Peter Heenan: There are citizen's committees going up and down the British isles, especially in the industrial centres in the north of England. The members of those com-
Supply-Immigration

mittees make house to house calls asking the boys to emigrate as a matter of patriotism. This is the formula: You joined the colours at a certain time in 1914; it is just as necessary to join our band now and emigrate to Canada, Australia and other parts of the British empire in order to save the situation in England. There is an impression throughout the country that the government has stopped immigration and yet the minister tells the house that anyone who comes here "under his own steam" is received with open arms. I hope the minister will be successful in stopping political propaganda and overcoming political influence, because if there is anything that will tend to destroy Canada as a country for immigrants it will be political manoeuvring.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Might I ask just what the hon. member means by political manoeuvring?


Peter Heenan: I will give it to you in a few moments, and when I get through you will not have any doubt of what I mean. In 1915 the Conservative government of Ontario thought it wise to appoint a royal commission on unemployment. The report of that commission was delivered in 1916, and from that time to the present propaganda has been circulated to induce people to come to this country from all parts of the world. I find the following at page 50 of the report of the royal commission appointed by the Ontario government:
_ Your commission recommends such reform in immigration methods as will make directly for the settlement of Canada's vacant agricultural areas, stimulate the development of the country's natural resources and combat the universal tendency of population to concentrate in cities. Your commissioners would further advise such united action by the imperial and dominion authorities as will lead a greater proportion of British immigrants to the overseas dominions instead of to foreign countries, thus conserving the man power, and adding to the strength and wealth of the empire. For these economic and patriotic reasons the dose of the war should find us ready with a courageous inter-imperial immigration policy in which the imperial, dominion and provincial governments and railway and other great employing corporations will have a responsible share. For Canada the primary problem is to bring the right sort of people to the land and to assist them in every way possible to make the land productive and themselves prosperous citizens of the dominion. If necessary, the governments interested should furnish such financial assistance as will enable the newcomers within a reasonable time to become self-supporting on the soil.
Carrying on from that point, we find the politicians interesting themselves in immigration, and during the last dominion election we had Mr. Ferguson saying too many people were coming to this country. I caught him 
deliberately .misrepresenting facts, as is well known; he spoke of a protest he had made to Ottawa, meaning of course to the Dominion government, but finally he had to confess that he had protested to Sir William Clark, High Commissioner for Great Britain in Canada. I find the following editorial comment in the Brockville Recorder and Times of December 1, 1928:
Mr. Ferguson addresses the transportation club in Toronto and says, in part, that:
"In the first place, we cannot hope to populate this country with British people alone. There are only a few millions to spare at most, and when we talk about bringing people and putting them on the land one has only to learn that in the British Isles there are only three million farmers, to understand there is not much of a source to draw from in that respect. But there are large areas of the continent from which we can draw most desirable people, who have characteristics so much like our own, and who can be readily assimilated into our Canadian life and make good Canadian citizens and good British subjects."
Those were Mr. Ferguson's words, two years before the election.


Martin James Maloney: My hon. friend quotes from the Brockville Recorder and Times. I should like to ask who is the owner, proprietor and general manager of the Brockville Recorder and Times.


Peter Heenan: I do not know. I do not know who owns or controls any paper in Canada, and I am not very much interested. But I can tell the hon. gentleman, who is a good friend of .mine, that these; are the words uttered by Mr. Ferguson; they are not the words of the editor of the newspaper.


Henry Elvins Spencer: When and where was Mr. Ferguson supposed to have made that statement?


Peter Heenan: I;f the hon. gentleman will just follow me I will give him all that Howard Ferguson ever said, and that is not much. In 1930 Mr. Ferguson said we were bringing too many immigrants to this country, but I quote his words from the Toronto Star of October 5, 1928:
"There are splendid migrants in Britain," he said, "anxious and willing to come to the new portion of the empire. Some of them have cauliflower ears and hare lips; some have flat feet. But we have lots of fellows of that kind in this country and they get along splendidly. But as long as we take the position that there will be no more hare lips than what we produce ourselves, of course we are going to discourage immigration."
He wanted people with hare lips and bow legs and everything else.


Otto Baird Price: What do you mean by that?

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Peter Heenan: I continue quoting:
"Let us be sensible about it. If it was not necessary when we brought out those harvesters to ask more than three or four questions, and tell them if they found jobs they could stay here, why ask four or five sheets of family history and set up technical difficulties for others? There are a lot of little, irritating things that can easily be removed, and I am quite sure, having had it brought to their notice, the government at Ottawa will see that they are removed."
Premier Ferguson intimated that if it lay in his power he would encourage any movement to Canada from Sweden.
"What they need in Norway," he continued, "and what all Europe needs, and what the British Isles need, is more accurate, truthful stories about the conditions that exist in this country, if we are to get immigration. In every country I was in I visited-
He had just returned -from a trip to Europe.
In every country I was in I visited some of the transportation offices. In some, I visited a great number, and everywhere I asked for literature about Ontario. I found some agents had never heard of such a place, and where I did get literature it was Canadian literature-
You see, he does not think Canadian literature is worth much unless it has to do with the province of Ontario.
-it was Canadian literature and the illustrations were entirely of interest to the western people-wheat fields, threshing operations, cattle ranches-there was nothing to indicate the diversity of opportunity that exists in Canada for people who want to come here. I hope we have taken some steps to cure that, even at expense of the province.
Mr. LaVERGNE:	Will my hon. friend
allow one question?


Peter Heenan: No, I do not want to be interrupted. I do not mean to answer discourteously, but my hon. friend will talk about Quebec, and I do not know anything about that province. I am talking about Ontario.
Mr. LaVERGNE : I was only going to say I would be more interested in my hon. friend's opinion than in any opinion expressed by Mr. Ferguson.


Peter Heenan: My opinion is that we
would be better off if we followed the Prims Minister's policy and kept Canada for Canadians, shutting out all immigrants. That is what should have been done years ago, and that is what would have been done if it had not been for the propaganda of the Tory party. According to the London Advertiser of July 24, 1930, I find that the province of Ontario spent the following sums in inducing immigrants to come to this country:
1925		 $124,225
1926		 165,830
1927		 167,056
1928		 171,129


Martin James Maloney: Who spent that money?


Peter Heenan: The province of Ontario
spent it, and in 1929 Ontario spent $181,049 to induce immigrants to come to this country. Just one year after that, in 1930, Mr. Ferguson, who had been spending the taxes of the people of Ontario to induce immigrants to come to this country, and who maintained an office in London for that purpose, went up and down this province protesting against all the people who had been brought into the country.


Otto Baird Price: What did you do?


Peter Heenan: No one is a better judge of jokes than my hon. friend on the other side. But let me tell the hon. gentleman who interjected that question that when the statement was made that we had room here for thousands of Britishers, I took it upon myself to point out, although it was a matter on which the Minister of Immigration should have made a statement, that this propaganda was not in the interests of the country or in the interests of the immigrants themselves, because when they came here and were unable to find employment they became dissatisfied, and someone had to take care of them. If they went back home they told of the hardships they had met in Canada; and I pointed out, as I have said, that this was not in the best interests either of Canada or of human beings coming to the country.
Let me read certain extracts to show what my position was. The Evening Standard of London, England, in its issue of July 28, 1928, made the following statement:
Canada Closed to Miners. Trade Union Manifesto Speaks of "Misleading Propaganda."
There is no opening in Canada for the 200,000 British miners who are declared to be surplus to the home industry.
This point is emphasized in a manifesto issued by the Canadian Trades Labour Congress.
The manifesto states:-"Too long has the Canadian government remained silent and allowed misleading propaganda as to opportunities for employment in Canada to continue without any official contradiction.
"The statement by Mr. Peter Heenan, Canadian Minister of Labour, that the records show a surplus at the coal mines already in Canada should give the quietus to those who seek to exploit the misery of the British miners by seeking to induce them to emigrate to Canada."
Following that statement, the great glorified agent of the Tory party, the Montreal Gazette, had this to say in an editorial in its issue of Thursday, July 26, 1028:
Mr. Heenan to the Rescue
The Canadian government's answer to British parliamentary criticism of Canadian immigration restrictions comes from Hon. Peter
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Heenan, Minister of Labour. That the Minister of Labour should be speaking for the Minister of Immigration and Colonization is significant in itself. It has been realized long enough in Canada that the voice of the Canadian government in immigration matters has been nothing more, or better, than a rebroadcast of the voice of organized labour. The views and aims of organized labour in this connection are too well known to call for much discussion; they have been defined and proclaimed upon every convenient occasion by labour bodies and labour leaders, and they can be summed up in the one word "restriction.' That is why the operation of the Canadian immigration system in Britain has been confined to so small a field, and so barren a field. What Mr. Heenan says as to the complete absence of restrictions applicable to Britishers who are physically acceptable and willing to pay full fares to Canada is altogether beside the point, since it has nothing to do with the work of bringing over immigrants, as such, by means of assisted passages and the like.
It will 'be seen that at that time I advocated the very policy which the present Minister of Immigration is carrying out. And that is what I got from the Montreal Gazette. On December 7, 1928, the Montreal Star had something to say. I understand that this newspaper organized a soup kitchen at its own expense last winter and made capital of the fact that it was feeding a number of people in this country; and the Minister of Immigration-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The people they were
feeding were in large measure people who were brought into Canada by the government of which my hon. friend was a member.


Peter Heenan: By the propaganda of the Montreal Star and the Conservative party-


Mr. QUINN:: It was done by your own
government.


Peter Heenan: This is what the Montreal Star said:
There is something tragic in the contrasts which the situation offers. Canada is calling earnestly for men and women to develop her matchless resources and to build up her agriculture and industry. This Dominion needs half a million men and she could absorb that number in a single year if the same effort was put forward that was initiated in the dark days of the Great war.
These men who are out of work are ablebodied, physically strong and are trained to use their muscles through long hours.


James Dew Chaplin: Give us your own opinion, not the opinions of newspapers.


James Houston Spence: How many years back is
that?


Otto Baird Price: What are you reading from?


Peter Heenan: Where ignorance is bliss
it is folly to be wise.

They would make admirable settlers if they could get over the difficult period of the first year of settlement. They would find new homes here if they were encouraged and given a helping hand.
The Montreal Gazette of July 26, 1928 had this to say:
Debaters in the British parliament appear to think that the Canadian government is not doing its best to secure immigrants from the old country but is giving preference to Europeans. The complaints here has been that the Canadian government has not been trying very hard to obtain immigrants anywhere.
That is the kind of propaganda we were up against during the last two or three years when your humble servant was trying to preserve Canada for Canadians, just along the line that my hon. friend from Montmagny-


James Dew Chaplin: Who is joshing you now?


Peter Heenan: -is advocating. The
Montreal Gazette of July 31, 1928 made this statement:
The Hon. Robert Forke, Minister of Immigration, has shown full realization and a right appreciation of the seriousness of the problem that confronts his department, and he has done all he possibly can to speed up British settlers in larger numbers. But Mr. Forke is bound by a government policy obviously influenced by the view of organized labour, openly confessed last week by the Hon. Mr. Heenan, a member of the government-that the minimum of people should only be allowed to come in until everyone in Canada is prosperous and in a job! Yet Canada has room and resources to maintain a productive population larger by millions than she has to-day.
That kind of propaganda was going on all through the British Isles. Men and women out of work were led to believe that a few of us in Canada were trying to preserve this country as a closed shop, and they preferred to believe newspaper propaganda rather than to take the word of those who were really interested in the Canadian working man. And so they came to Canada and found themselves deceived when they arrived here.
Mr. LaVERGNE: How many immigrants came in between 1900 and 1911?


Peter Heenan: I do not know, but I will give the figures later on.
Mr. LaVERGNE: It was almost two millions and a half.


Peter Heenan: 
James Dew Chaplin: If that had been, read to
the immigrants they would have stayed out.


Peter Heenan: That was published in
192S, two years before the elections. The Hamilton Spectator of November 26, 1928, contained the following:
Lord Melchett Suggests Plan Canada to Grant Land. Britain to Pay Cost
London, November 26.-A suggestion that Canada should make land grants and that Britain should finance settlement schemes on the instalment basis, is made by Lord Melchett, formerly Sir Alfred Mond, who says he would like to see a really big migration movement started which would bring out at least 100,000 people to Canada without undue hindrance.


An hon. MEMBER:: Carried on division.


Peter Heenan: My hon. friend would like to have the item carry, but I intend to put a few more things on record before it is carried. This is the kind of propaganda indulged in by politicians, and which has been supported by politicians for the last few years.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: What politicians?


Peter Heenan: I will prove my statement.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: It conveys nothing to my mind when the hon. member says "politicians."


Peter Heenan: Politicians from the Conservative party, one member of which party is over in London representing the spirit, the voice and the soul of the government of the
day.


An hon. MEMBER:: Who is that?


Mr. SPOTTON:: He will be back.


Peter Heenan: I hope he does come back, because I lost an asset when he left. Will my hon. friend tell me why he ran away?


George Spotton: He will be back.


Peter Heenan: The Port Arthur News
Chronicle, a paper in my part of the country, under date of October 1, 1928, had the following to say:
If Britishers will not come to Canada, we must look elsewhere for men and women who will come. Much of the dominion still remains to be settled. Much work has to be done.
There is work that neither Britishers or Canadians will undertake if they can find other people to perform it. Large employers of labour know this. Thus we see on the railways in extra work, foreign labour with the barest sprinkling of English speaking men among them.
At this point I want to say that that is where the railway companies come in. I refer to both companies; they love to have a surplus ' of this kind of labour in order that they may encourage work at thirty cents an hour for any number of hours they like. They want to pay a wage which will not permit of a decent standard of living. The article continues :
We see the great construction works manned by non-English men in large proportions, simply carrying out instructions issued by the few supervisors. If the Britishers would come and do the work, there would be no necessity for the bringing in of so many non-English speaking men, but they will not come, and Canada cannot cease living until the Englishmen fulfil the original idea of the intention of making Canada a colony for the settlement of Englishmen alone.
The following is from a paper in my own riding, the Rainy River Record. Under date of November 11, 1928, they had this to say:
Saturday Review (London): (The report of the Industrial Transference Board shows that there are at least 250,000 more workmen in the British Isles than can be supported by the industries of the country). The remedy in which the Industrial Transference Board see most hope is in migration to the dominions. It would like to transfer to new careers 200,000 workmen with their families, for the excess of unemployed in the coal mines alone is probably at least 200,000-not one of whom has a chance of reemployment in his old work-and the migration of 200,000 abroad is therefore not an excessive transference, nor would it be throwing on the dominions by any means the whole of our surplus population. Since the war the stream of emigration from this country abroad has almost stopped, and the emigration of even 200,000 would do little more than make ud the accumulated arrears.
In the Montreal Gazette of September 15, 1928, the following appeared:
It is largely because of the Heenan-organized labour attitude that one government after another in Canada has failed to evolve and enforce an immigration policy that will bring immigrants.
I draw this to the attention of the Minister of Immigration in the hope that the Montreal Gazette will not twist that around and say that the Gordon-organized labour attitude of one government after another in Canada has failed to bring immigrants to this country. Under date of March 10, 1928, the following appears in the Montreal Gazette:
Ottawa, March 9.-An impressive and constructive immigration program was submitted to parliament this afternoon by General A. D. McRae (Conservative, North Vancouver) in his

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contribution to the budget debate. His plan contemplates "the ultimate settlement ol 60,000,000 acres of land by some 250,000 farmers. These, with their families and the urban population whieh will be required, and the consequent developments which will follow, will add 2,000,000 new people to the prairie provinces of Canada. I propose we start out to double the present population of the west. Do this and the rest of Canada will grow and prosper.''


Otto Baird Price: Why is so much of the time of the committee taken up with the useless junk which the hon. gentleman is reading? Why should the committee be held up, at a time when we are trying to get legislation passed, with a reading of numerous newspaper reports? It is absolutely useless and of no interest to the general public at large. It is a nuisance.


Peter Heenan: Now that the hon. gentleman has got that off his chest, -let me read something from the Montreal Gazette, quoting what the Toronto Mail and Empire had to say:
We are pleased to learn that General McRae, M.P., North Vancouver, who met with a serious accident in Ottawa last winter, has returned from England completely restored in health. He has for many years taken an active interest in immigration and settlement work, and shortly before his accident, presented a plan which attracted widespread attention. Briefly it was to settle three hundred thousand on fifty million acres of land at a cost of $30,000,000.
The Mail and Empire, which is a Conservative paper, goes on to say:
If, as estimated, it would add two million to our population in ten years the cost does not seem excessive. General McRae's was one of the few really constuctive plans proposed for public consideration, but unfortunately his illness prevented the discussion of it which it deserved.
I would ask the hon. member who has just spoken (Mr. Price) to take up the cudgels where General McRae left off, and advocate now the bringing in of 300,000 people at a cost of $30,000,000 a year to settle on useless land. I defy any hon. member on the government side of the house to get up and say that that is the policy that should be pursued in Canada. Yet they induced thousands of people in the old country to sell their little sticks of furniture and start off for this great, prosperous country of Canada, and) when they got here and could not find employment, we had the spectacle of the Conservatives going up and down this country saying: These are the people that the King government brought over.


Finlay MacDonald: Time is up.


Peter Heenan: I am sorry because I am only half through.
Mr. LaVERGNE:	I agree entirely with
what my hon. friend said, but I do not think that quoting newspapers puts the responsibility on the right people. I was in the house when I was almost alone in denouncing immigration, and I lived to see the whole Conservative apposition supporting me when I was combating the immigration policy of the Laurier government. Deeds of governments speak louder than quotations ifrom newspapers, which are not responsible to the people. Who brought the immigrants to this country? That is the question. During the Liberal regime of Sir Wilfrid Laurier three million immigrants, paid immigrants, came into this country-advertised immigration, bonused immigration, and sometimes Scandalous immigration. I recall, for instance, the North Atlantic Trading Company. I was in the house in those days, and it was precisely on one of those questions that I separated from that party. It was when the Liberal party was filling up this country with the riff-raff of continental Europe. That was the policy pursued by the Liberal party for at least ten or twelve years, and it was denounced in this house first by the hon. member for Labelle and mysel'f, then by Conservatives from Quebec, and then by the leader of the opposition, Sir Robert Borden, and the whole Conservative party. And it was defended by whom? By Mr. Sifton and Mr. Frank Oliver, then Minister of the Interior and Minister of Immigration respectively. Thus, deeds speak louder than quotations from newspapers, which may be Conservative. My hon. friend quotes the Montreal Gazette. Everybody knows that the Montreal Gazette is the Taschereau organ in the province of Quebec. I do not know that Mr. Taschereau is so much of a Conservative. It may be so, but he is not supposed to be Conservative in the eyes of my hon. friend.
I remember reading to the then Minister of Immigration in the Laurier government a list of twenty-nine new races which had been brought into Canada by the immigration policy of the Laurier government. Those were the days when we had bonused immigration, premiums on immigrants, scandals involving different companies. I remember the North Atlantic Trading Company. You could not name those people because if their names were given out in public some of them would have to commit suicide. But the present Minister of Immigration has put a stop to that policy, which was ruinous to the welfare of our

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nation and to the best traditions of both races in this country, and I think the whole house should stand up and thank him for adapting such a policy. .1 have fought the Liberal party's immigration policy for the last twenty-five years, and I have fought many a battle alone. We should look at things squarely, and say that both parties have been guilty, both parties have gone the wrong way, the Liberal party more than the other; but the Conservative party was the first to put a stop to that policy this year.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Immigration salaries and contingencies, including grants to immigration societies, women's hostels, provinces, and loans-for stock, equipment, etc., for Canadian boys, as may be authorized by the governor in council, $1,905,000.
Peter Heenan: I wish the hon. member for Montmagny (Mr. LaVergne) had been in the Conservative party during the last two or three years, because he would have tried to stop this propaganda in the British Isles. I want to say this to him. He said that the Liberal party brought those people here. I say it was the Tory propaganda that brought those people to this country.
Mr. LaVERGNE : There was no Tory government in 1904, 1905 or 1906.
Mr, HEENAN: Let me read what the present Prime Minister said in this house in 1929.


James Dew Chaplin: May I ask a question?


Peter Heenan: No. You don't need to ask anything because I am not going to answer it.


James Dew Chaplin: Will you tell us who
brought that bunch up into the northwest that do not wear any clothes?


Finlay MacDonald: Will hon. gentlemen kindly address the chair and stop this cross-fire back and forth?


Peter Heenan: It would seem that hon.
members opposite do not like the medicine they are getting, to hear that they are responsible for bringing immigrants into this country. They have misled thousands of people and brought them to Canada to suffer misery and starvation. They do not like to be reminded of the fact that they are responsible for lowering the wages of the working men in Canada.
I shall read what the present Prime Minister said as reported in Hansard of February 11, 1929:
We have here one of the largest undeveloped areas in the world; we have a very pressing necessity for more people. There need be no misapprehension about that, notwithstanding what has been said from time to time to the contrary. It will be found that the increase of population in this country, brought about through bringing additional people in, will not only lessen unemployment for those who are now in it, but will increase all employment. Those who have studied the problems connected with the movement of people realize that instead of there being a diminution of opportunities for labour the flow of new peoples into a country means the increasing of the opportunities for those who are there as well as providing work to those who may come.
I have before me a similar statement reported in the Calgary Herald of February 1, 1929. In 1930 Mayor Webb of Winnipeg led a delegation of unemployed to this city. He and his delegation said that the reason for unemployment throughout Canada was the number of immigrants which had been brought in. Then he went back to Winnipeg and was invited to speak before the Sons of England society. His speech is reported in the Free Press of April 24, 1930. I would ask hon. members to bear in mind that this is the same gentleman who after blaming the government for bringing in too many immigrants left Ottawa, returned to Winnipeg and addressed the meeting to which I have referred, as follows:
Mayor Webb told of a fine young Englishman who was in Winnipeg looking for work. He had been sent out to this country as a result of efforts made in his home city to help young fellows anxious to try their fortunes abroad.
"That is the type of man we want in this country" explained the mayor, who expressed the hope that thousands more like him would be sent to Canada and given a fair chance to succeed when they got here.
"The best thing for this country would be the arrival of a million Britishers," declared mayor Webb.
I want to point out, without mentioning further editorials of a like character-I do not wish to burden the committee because I know that it must be very trying to hon. members opposite to listen to this repetition -that this is the kind of propaganda that the King government and this country had to submit to for the last two or three years.
I know that there were thousands of miners and other people in the British Isles who were thinking of the great opportunities which prevailed in Canada and who with the assistance of immigration societies borrowed money
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to come here. When they arrived they found conditions just as I pictured them in a public speech delivered before the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: When were those miners brought to Canada to which my hon. friend refers?


Peter Heenan: Those miners were coming over here expecting to find work when they arrived.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: In what years did they come?


Peter Heenan: Continually.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: They are not coming now.


James Dew Chaplin: They came when the hon. member was in office.


Peter Heenan: They are coming because of the propaganda of my hon. friend and his friends.


James Dew Chaplin: Who brought those naked Doukhobors into the northwest? You and your government.


Jean-François Pouliot: They are naked, too.


James Dew Chaplin: You don't like that, do you?


Mr. McINTOSH:: That is ancient history.


James Dew Chaplin: May be it is, but they are still running naked.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Why not go out and tell it to the world?


James Dew Chaplin: You are trying to dress it.


Peter Heenan: I believe my hon. friend from Lincoln (Mr. Chaplin) and his friends are rather excited.


Mr. STITT (Selkirk):: What about the unemployed?


An hon. MEMBER:: Carry on.


Peter Heenan: I think I shall. I just wish to say that-


James Herbert Stitt: You were a fine lot of servants for the country.


Peter Heenan: What is my hon. friend growling about,-or is he grouching? Have you a grouch, too? Does my hon. friend not like this? I know it is rather hard medicine for the Tory party to take. I wish to say to the Minister of Immigration, however, that whether he believes it or not I am trying to maintain his position. I am trying to show that when I was in a position somewhat similar to his I had to withstand the criticism of editorials throughout the country.


James Dew Chaplin: You are not making it any easier for the minister.


Peter Heenan: They never changed my views because I still contended there were too many immigrants brought to this country. They came because of propaganda of the Conservative party, especially the branch of the party in the province of Ontario, and the taxes of the people were paid to bring those immigrants to Canada.


James Herbert Stitt: Why don't you
speak out so that we can hear you?


Peter Heenan: When the minister was
willing to allow a resolution to go through to provide for the' eight hour day throughout Canada the hon. member who is now interrupting was the person who talked out the measure and thereby killed it.


James Herbert Stitt: Yes, after you were Minister of Labour for years and could not put it through. Now you are trying to stand up and defend it.


Peter Heenan: That might be true, too. The fact remains however that the hon. member prevented his own government from putting the measure through when they were willing that it should go through.


Jean-François Pouliot: He is a hot wave.


Peter Heenan: He is the hon. member who undertook, after the minister had agreed-


Finlay MacDonald: I would suggest that the hon. member keep to the subject before the committee.


Peter Heenan: I am going to, and I want you to keep the hon. member opposite quiet.


Finlay MacDonald: I certainly shall. I ask the hon. member to the right kindly to keep order.


Peter Heenan: I wish to say again to the Minister of Immigration that I am heart and soul with him.


Ernest Lapointe: Deliver me from my friends.


Peter Heenan: I do not think, however,
that the hon. member sitting to his left is with him, or he has changed his mind within the last year.


Robert James Manion: Whom are you talking about?


Peter Heenan: The Minister of Railways, more particularly.

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Robert James Manion: I am wholeheartedly with him.


Peter Heenan: Well you and I are going to shake hands yet. I made a speech, Mr. Chairman, with respect to people being brought into this country, and the whole Tory party including the present Prime Minister took exception to my remarks. The Tory papers also objected. On November 22nd, 1928, the Moose Jaw Times contained this editorial:
The Montreal Gazette has been devoting considerable criticism to Hon. Peter Heenan, Minister of Labour, in connection with immigration matters. Mr. Heenan has been returning the compliment and seems to be no better pleased with The Gazette than The Gazette is with him.
To the Toronto Star there is nothing surprising about this. In coming into conflict The Gazette and the Minister of Labour are both attending to their jobs and upholding the beliefs that are within them. The Star says:
Mr. Heenan is censured by The Gazette for having said that any miner-harvester excursion next year would be contingent upon the demand for extra labour that might then exist. This does not please The Gazette and is taken as indicating a hostility to immigration, a subject which, it says, Mr. Heenan should not discuss, but should leave to Mr. Forke, Minister of Immigration. But the fact is that Mr. Heenan, as Minister of Labour, was talking of labour, not immigration, when he made the statement complained of. "Any bringing over of harvesters," said Mr. Heenan, "would be contingent upon the demand for extra labour that might then exist." No Minister of Labour could very well be attending more strictly to his own business than was Mr. Heenan when he made that statement.
1 am reading these extracts to give the minister an idea of the character of the propaganda inspired by certain interests during the last two or three years in an attempt to bring in immigrants, and, conversely, to criticize anyone who would dare take the stand the present minister has taken. Therefore, Mr. Chairman, I cannot see why the minister should still desire to pass this vote to grant financial assistance to immigration agents. Consequently I move that the vote be reduced to $1.


Martin James Maloney: Mr. Chairman. I would
not intervene in this discussion were it not for the fact that certain statements have been made reflecting on the capability of our high commissioner in London. We have as our representative in London the Hon. G. Howard Ferguson, one of the ablest men that Canada ever produced. Undoubtedly since he has been in London he has placed Canada on the map. Never in the history of this country have we had a more capable administrator than the Hon. G. Howard Ferguson, ex-
Premier of Ontario, who to-day with such distinction fills the office of High Commissioner to London.


Thomas Reid: I have a case to which I
should like to direct the attention of the Minister of Immigration; and I ask the indulgence of the committee while I explain the details. This is the case of one Joseph Gordon Smith, who was dismissed from his position as temporary immigration inspector at Pacific Highway, British Columbia. In regard to his civil service examination I might say he obtained a mark of 85 per cent on the written examination and a very fair mark on the oral examination as well, and was placed sixth on the permanent list. I asked lor the papers in connection with the case, and it is from these official records I am now giving the facts.
'Complaints started to come in from the inspector in charge there with regard to this man, but at one time it was decided that he would make a fairly good officer. I read from a report dated October 16, 1930, from division inspector F. W. Taylor to the division commissioner at Vancouver. This is with reference to Inspector J. G. Smith:
The vacancy created by the transfer of inspector McNamara back to White Rock could, I am sure, be filled temporarily at least by officer Smith; and while I realize that the department would like to deal definitely with these appointments after the person concerned has been in the service a reasonable length of time, in the ease of Mr. Smith if it is possible to have him continue at the Highway office for another few months to make up the quota of inspectors required at this port, I would recommend this action, as Mr. Smith is steadily improving in his inspectional and all-round work, and I feel reasonably sure that he will continue to do so.
So you see, Mr. Chairman, this man was progressing very well, and it looked as though he would make a fairly good officer. As I say, however, complaints started to come in with regard to his work, and the two chief complaints lodged against him were later proved to be entirely unfounded. I am going to read the first complaint made against him, and also give the real facts of the case. This is a report to Mr. A. E. Skinner under date of February 21, 1931:
Referring to Mr. Whiteley's recent report in connection with the employment of Inspector J. A. Smith wherein Mr. Whiteley makes reference to a couple of complaints in Mr. Smith's inspectional work; these complaints were inquired into at the time, the first one being made by a Mr. Louis F. Bachman, who claimed at the time he was being interviewed by Mr. Smith at the Highway that he was a Y.M.C.A. worker from Milwaukee, although he did not have any credentials to identify himself and
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very little cash for his maintenance during his contemplated somewhat lengthy stay in this province, and although the man was allowed to come forward he called at the United States consular office to ascertain why he should have been questioned so closely and on following the matter up we found that Bachman was arrested a few days later by the R.C.M.P. officials in Alberta, where on being liberated he lost no time in returning to his home in Minot, North Dakota.
That was the first complaint, which was later proved to be entirely untrue. I quote from the same report, with regard to the second complaint:
The second complaint was made by Mr. H. A. Goodhugh, who was sailing from Vancouver on the ss. Aorangi on November 12th last, and this entleman called here on the morning after eing admitted at our Highway office to complain of the indifferent manner our inspector answered his many questions with reference to certain information he was endeavouring to secure concerning Vancouver and vicinity, as this was his first trip through British Columbia and it later developed that Mr. Smith unfortunately was not familiar with the particular things "Mr. Goodhugh was asking about and when he secured the information from myself he was quite willing to overlook Mr. Smith's apparent indifferent attitude in the matter.
Those were two main complaints against Mr. Smith during the time he was temporary officer, and as I have stated they were not only proved to be unfounded and unwarranted, but I think were entirely uncalled for.
Now I should like to take uip the further reasons given for his dismissal. The first is is because of his advanced age. He is an overseas active service man, and passed with a high mark, and there is a different age limit for those men than for others. His age when he passed the examination was 51, and when he was dismissed he was 53. The second complaint is that he would never make an efficient inspector, that he had always worked as a labourer or farm hand. This is entirely untrue. He had been a chef and always had followed that line of work; he had also been a chef in the British army during the last war. The only time he worked as a labourer, or anything of the sort, was when he took up a ranch at a place called Newtonbury, but this is what the inspector says:
He has always worked as a labourer or as a farm hand, and it is very hard for a man of his calibre to step into a position of this kind at his age and be successful.
I think that complaint also is entirely unfounded. Then the inspector goes on to state that this man never had any clerical experience. As a matter of fact the temporary inspectors are never given any chance to do clerical work; all the reports were filled in

by someone else, so how can they say he has no clerical experience when he had no chance to do clerical work? Then there is another statement which I find in these official records. The inspectors says:
I am very sorry that for the past two years I have had to turn down all the temporary men but one, but I take it that the department wants efficient men appointed to the service, and I am doing my best to this end.
I ask the minister to take serious note of this statement. These men are appointed as temporary inspectors, and my information is that if they do not fit in with the other men there, it is openly stated that they have the skids put under them and out they go. One man by the name of Griffin was a temporary officer in New Westminster, and just before he was made permanent he was sent out to this port and the skids were put under him. This is not a case where one can blame any political organization; this is the fault of the officials in charge of this work. It is practically a closed corporation, and it is a common saying in that district that they can put the skids under any of the temporary inspectors and prevent them from becoming permanent officials.
Those were the most important complaints, but there is a further point which aroused the ire of myself and very many others. The officials looked around to see if they really could find a reason for dismissing this man. He was efficient in every way; he had been recommended a few months back, but ju3t before he was to be made permanent they decided it was about time to get rid of him, so what do you suppose they found against him? I should like the minister to listen to this, because the middle name of this man is the same as the minister's name, and I am sure the minister will be interested in this complaint. I now read from the report:
There are two complaints against Inspector Smith, that I may say is not that he is discourteous, but his Scotch dialect is so broad that the majority of the travelling public cannot understand him when he is trying to examine them.
Do you blame me for being hostile? This is part of the official record, and to think we have come to a time in the history of Canada when a man with a Scotch dialect is to be discriminated against! I have heard the deputy speaker refer with commendable pride to the French race, but I can tell him that the record of the Scotch is not very far behind that of the French in the building up of this country of ours. I can go back to Sir John A. Macdonald and go right down the

Supply-Immigration
list of men of Scotch extraction who have done very much for this country. I think this is a gross insult, and I ask the minister that this case be investigated. I would ask the minister to remember this: they have not put on a permanent man for over two years. There are skids put under all those who do not fit in, but this is the last straw, and I am asking in the name of common justice that this slur on Scotland be removed. I have been quoting from the official records, and the only thing that they could find against the man is his Scotch accent.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The hon. member need
not fear; I will take the necessary steps to see that Scotchmen get their rights. I am told they get them anyhow. The case has not come before me, and obviously I cannot offhand go into all these various cases on the international boundary. I will look into this matter and if there has been any injustice I will see that it is attended to.


Thomas Reid: This is not a dismissal under
any political organization. The matter is more serious than that. I have here a letter from which I might quote the following:
You will be surprised to know that Joe Smith has been fired from the immigration service at the highway here under circumstances that merit some attention. The complaints have been fostered by another member of the staff, but of course the signing of the report was done by the man in charge. They complained of Smith's Scottish accent. I never thought the day would come when a Scottish accent would be a detriment in this world but more especially in Canada.
This letter is from a man who was a prospective Conservative candidate in the last provincial election, and therefore it shows that the matter is more serious than a mere political dismissal. It is high time that an investigation took place at the customs and immigration ports of British Columbia.


Peter John Veniot: I wish to say a word or two in regard to this question of immigration, and I do so for the benefit of the hon. member for Montmagny, who in his speech blamed the Liberal party so severely for bringing so many immigrants into the country. According to the hon. gentleman the Liberal party was entirely to blame for all the immigrants brought into the country in the last fifteen or twenty years or more. Let me direct his attention to page 2746 of Hansard of May 22, 1929, reporting a speech made by the present Minister of Railways. That hon. gentleman was then criticizing the policy of the Liberal party in regard to immigration,
and he was attempting to show that that policy had been a failure. In his speech he said:
During the first year of Liberal rule the British immigration into Canada amounted to 47 per cent of the total immigration; last year it was 33 per cent, which shows that the British immigration is decreasing, whatever the cause may be.
The following, particularly, is what I wish to call to the attention of the hon. gentleman:
During the last four fiscal years before the war, 1911 to 1914-
Our Toiy friends were in power then, and the hon. member for Montmagny was supporting them.
-we received into Canada, 1,451,000 people.
Mr. LaVERGNE: Before the war?


Peter John Veniot: The hon. gentleman was
referring to the period before the war.
During the last four years during which this government-
That is, the Liberal government.
-has been in office-
That is, from 1922 or 1923 up to the time the hon. gentleman was speaking.
-we have received exactly 501,000, or a little more than one-third of the immigration during the four years before the war.
I wish to ask the hon. member for Montmagny to sleep on that.
Mr. LaVERGNE: My hon. friend asks me to sleep on his words. It reminds me of the old days. Let me tell him something that happened under the Laurier regime, when the Liberal party was making an attempt to bring in immigrants of every description- the Salvation Army, ex-convicts, prisoners and loafers. That was during the Liberal regime. The reason for that immigration which the Laurier government wished to bring in will be found at page 6151 of Hansard of April 9, 1907. That reason was stated by Mr. Smart, then Deputy Minister of Immigration, in Liverpool. He said on that occasion that this immigration was necessary to drown the French element in Canada. I would ask my hon. friend to sleep on that.


James J. Donnelly: There is an arrangement with the provinces for bringing in settlers, whereby we pay a certain proportion of the interest on the money loaned for improvements on the land. Can the minister give us some idea of what this is costing the government in New Brunswick and elsewhere?
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Wesley Ashton Gordon: That applies to what is known as the New Brunswick scheme. Five hundred families are being brought in. All but about fifty of the families have come in, and I do not think there is any possibility of further families coming forward this year. I have not the figures with regard to what is known as the tripartite agreement with New Brunswick but I should be glad to get them and give them to the hon. gentleman.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The other evening when these items were under discussion I was asking the minister a question with regard to the British Immigration and Colonization Association. I have since then received a return which gives a good deal of the information I sought. I note that this organization has brought in 5,358 boys. It has received in the past year from the government a total of 535,140.08.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: That is from the commencement.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The last six years.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: From the time we first took an interest in it.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I have no fault to find with the present administration with regard to this organization, but I do think that in the future the policy of the government should be to refuse to allow private organizations of this kind to bring boys to Canada. As I understand it, this organization is today on the rocks. They entered into a solemn arrangement with the government that they would supply after-care to the boys who were brought over. They have no financial resources and the responsibility for carrying on the work among these boys is left to the railroads-they were originally closely associated with the organization-and to the department itself. The Dominion government has been loaded up with a large number of boys who really are not needed in Canada. Throughout the west there are at the present time thousands of school boys who do not know where to find a job. I know something of old Ontario, and the same condition exists there. I had a letter only the other day from some people who stated that they did not know what to do with their own boys on the farm. In many cases our orphan homes are unable to place the children. I will admit that in the past many farmers got cheap labour by this means, and no doubt many boys of a fine type were

brought out. However, at the present time we have sufficient boys right here in Canada to meet our needs.
Governments in the past have been willing to enter into negotiations with associations which may have had a certain financial backing but which have not been prepared to carry out their original arrangements, and the load has been passed on to the government. This brings me to the question of deportations. There have been deported 246 of these boys, and 199 have been returned under charity arrangements. A few weeks ago I gave an illustration to the house of one particular case that had been brought to my attention, a boy who had been brought to this country under some such arrangement as this and who had gone down hill and was likely to become a criminal. He was a mere tramp, drifting about, riding on freight cars, and so on. That is positive tragedy, even when confined to one individual, but it is an appalling condition when it applies to hundreds of boys who have been brought over here and allowed to drift about from place to place. A certain number of them will get into trouble; many of them have had to be deported, and it is a very serious condition. When we were discussing the question of deportations a little while ago the minister took the ground that we had to protect ourselves. Looking back over the past ten years I find that there has been no group in this house which has stood out so solidly for protecting our Canadians against immigration as has the group in this corner.
However, when these immigrants are brought in, the least that we can do is to give them a fair chance. I know the minister is faced with the task of clearing up a lot of the mess which was left for him as a result of the policies pursued for many years, but I think we must give a certain amount of humane consideration to this matter.
May I be permitted to give one or two examples which would not come under the provisions of the bill which was under consideration earlier in the evening? The following case in a western municipality came to my attention. A man from central Europe had come to Canada four years ago with his wife and three children, the eldest of which was ten years of age. He bought a home on Montreal street in Regina, and had it paid for. Last summer he was required to put in a couple more rooms, as well as water and a sewer system. This meant debt which because of unemployment he was unable to meet. He could not borrow money on the property, and he was forced to appeal to the

Criminal Code
city. He received relief to the extent of about fifty or sixty dollars, and then an attempt was made to deport him. Fortunately strong representations were made to the city council and the municipality did not urge deportation. I have no fault to find with the department in connection with this case as they had taken no definite action when I communicated with them.


Martin James Maloney: Was the eldest child a
girl or a boy?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Just at the
moment, I do not recall. I do not understand what the hon. member's question has to do with this matter.


Martin James Maloney: There is so much difference.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I have not the
telegram before me, but there is nothing in the information I have which refers to that particular point. I contend that it is not fair to the people whom we have asked to come here that we should force them out of the country when they get into a little trouble.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: There was no effort made to deport that particular man.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I said distinctly
that I was not blaming the department.


An hon. MEMBER:: Why bring that up?


James Shaver Woodsworth: We are dealing
with the immigration policy of this country, and I suggest that we are reaching the point where we are not being fair with the immigrants who have been brought here.
I have another case, in connection with which I made inquiries of the department. This man was a printer who was arrested as he was about to enter Canada after spending some time in the sanatorium of the International Typographical Union at Colorado Springs. This man, by name James Reid, was ordered to be deported, and died in New York on Friday, May 29, before the deportation order could be made effective. I was told by the department that had this case been appealed, the man probably would have been allowed to die in this country. This man had been living in the city of Toronto where his brother and sister are located; he was sent to a sanitorium and when it was found that he was not doing so well he was sent to the sanatorium at Colorado Springs. When it was obvious that he had not very much longer to live he decided to come back to die at his sister's home, but he was refused entry to Canada. I suggest that in cases of this kind a little humanity should prevail.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Wherein did the Canadian officials fail in that case?


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would say that
in a case of that kind the man should have been permitted to come back into Canada.


Finlay MacDonald: An amendment has been moved by the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Heenan), that the amount of the vote be reduced to one dollar.
Amendment (Mr. Heenan) negatived.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Monday, July 13, 1931.