1932-02-18

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)

Mr. SPENCER:: How many members of the House of Commons have applied successfully to the Board of Pension Commissioners for a pension since June?
Dropped.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Question No. 4 dropped.


ST. JOHN HARBOUR COMMISSION
Mr. VENIOT:: 1.	How much of the $10,000,000 loan to the St. John harbour commission was expended to date?
2.	Is the St. John harbour commission asking for any further sum to be expended during the fiscal year 1932-33?


Mr. DURANLEAU:: 1.	To 31st January,-1932:
For reconstruction of facilities destroyed by fire last year.. 83,670,059
For other work	 998,142
Total	$4,668,201
2. Yes.


CHINESE IMMIGRATION
Mr. REID:: 1.	Has any change been made in the regulations in regard to the time allowed Chinese who leave Canada and who wish to return?
2.	If so, what change or changes were made?
3.	Were any representations made requesting a change in regulations?
4.	If so, for what reason or reasons were any such changes made?


Mr. GORDON:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Section 23 of the Chinese Immigration Act, 1923, provides for the outward registration of persons of Chinese origin who intend to return to Canada, and Section 24 of the said act provides that such persons who reg-

Public Servcie-Salary Deduction
ister outward shall be entitled to return within a period of two years of such registration. By order in council P.C. 3173, dated 29th December, 1931, the two year period was extended for an additional two years in the case of those registering outward between the dates of 1st January, 1930, and 31st December, 1932, both dates inclusive.
3.	Yes.
4.	To enable persons of Chinese origin now visiting in China to remain there until employment conditions improve, thus assisting to relieve the unemployment situation in Canada and to reduce the number of Chinese persons who would otherwise apply for relief.


TOST OFFICE DEPARTMENT-REVENUE
Mr. VENIOT:: 1.	What revenue was received from April 1,
1931, to January 1, 1932, by the Post Office Department from:	(a) postage stamps, post
cards, etc.; (b) paid in cash on newspapers;
(c)	paid in cash on third class printed matter;
(d)	paid in cash on metered mail matter; (e) paid in cash on parcels?
2.	What revenue was received from the above for the last nine months of the fiscal year ending March 31, 1930?


Mr. SAUVE:: 1.	April 1st, 1931, to December 31st, 1931.
(a)	$20,774,608.07;	(b)	$1,241,848.37;	(c)$657,132.95;	(d)	$2,064,19022;	(e) $2,913,-
619.70.
2.	July 1st, 1929, to March 31st, 1930.	(a)$20,864,150.21;	(b) $1,263,307.61;	(c) $971,-
874.14; (d) $1,581,054.16; (e) $3,156,982.61.


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
Mr. MOTHERWELL:: 1.	To what provinces has the Dominion government made loans during the fiscal year endinn March 31. next?
2.	What is:	(a) the aggregate amount of
such loan or loans to each province; (b) the respective dates upon which they were made;
(c)	the dates upon which they become due;
(d)	the interest charged thereon; (e) the security taken therefor; (f) the purpose or purposes for which they were made; and (g) the source from which the Dominion Minister of Finance secured the necessary money to make such loans to the provinces?


UNEMPLOYMENT RELIEF
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. E. J. GARLAND (Bow River):: I
should like to ask the administration whether it is their intention to renew the general program for relief work after March 31, when the present act, I understand, lapses.


Hon. HUGH GUTHRIE (Minister of Justice) :: All I can say in answer to my hon.
friend at the present moment is that the matter is under consideration.


THE PUBLIC SERVICE
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. JOHN VALLANCE (South Battle-ford) :: I should like, Mr. Speaker, to direct a question to the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett). I notice he is not in his place, so I will put it to the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) who is now leading the house. In view of the debate that took place on Tuesday evening regarding the proposed 10 per cent cut, and of the statement of the Minister of Justice that a bill would be drafted dealing with the matter, will the Prime Minister accede to the request made to him some days ago by the Civil Service Association to allow a deputation to wait upon him to lay the case of the civil service before him; and will this deputation be received before the bill is actually drafted?


Hugh Guthrie: I may state that the government has
in contemplation such a bill. I think it will be introduced within the next two or three days. But I may tell my hon. friend that if the civil service desires to place their views before the government they are entirely free to do so at as early a date as possible. It is the intention of the government in the very near future to introduce a bill.


REPORT OF BANK MERGER
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. S. FACTOR (Toronto West Centre):: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Minister of Finance (Mr. Rhodes) whether he has received an application from one of our chartered banks for his consent to its absorption or merger with another bank, or have any representations been made to him with regard to the matter?


Hon. E. N. RHODES (Minister of Finance) :: Mr. Speaker, I would prefer that the question be placed upon the order paper in the regular course.
ROYAL CANADIAN AIR FORCE On the orders of the day:


Hon. W. D. EULER (North Waterloo):: I should like, Mr. Speaker, to address a question
Farm Relief-Mr. Vallance

to the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Sutherland). I am sorry I had no opportunity to give him notice of it. I have a wire before me to the effect that eighty nonpermanent officers, mostly married and returned men, are discharged from the air force with two weeks' pay. I need not give the remainder of the telegram. Is it the. intention of the government to confine the remuneration of these men to two weeks pay?


Hon. D. M. SUTHERLAND (Minister of National Defence):: I regret that I cannot
give my hon. friend a specific answer at the moment. I will look into the matter and let him know during the day.


William Daum Euler: It seems very short notice.


GRIEVANCES OF VETERANS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. CAMERON R. McINTOSH (North Battleford):	Mr. Speaker, last Friday I
asked the Prime Minister or the Minister of Pensions and National Health (Mr. Mac-Laren) a question in regard to the appointment of a special committee of the House of Commons to deal with the grievances of veterans throughout Canada. The Prime Minister answered my question, but it was a noncommittal answer.
Hon. MURRAY MacLAREN (Minister of Pensions and National Health):: I have nothing further to add at the present time.


FARM RELIEF
[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Wednesday, February 17, consideration of the motion of Mr. McKenzie (Assiniboia):
Whereas the policy of extending federal assistance to -western farmers on a bushel basis rather than on an acreage basis has worked out most unfairly and unjustly to the residents of those districts suffering from failure or near failure of crop,
And whereas a largely signed petition and memorandum has been presented to the government by the secretary of Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities, praying for additional legislation to partially remedy the situation that exists,
Therefore be it resolved: that, in the opinion of this house the government should give immediate consideration to a more equitable and less discriminatory solution of this problem.
John Vallance: Mr. Speaker, in rising to address the
house on the resolution presented by the member for Assiniboia (Mr. McKenzie) I should like at the outset to make a few com-IMr. Euler.)
ments on what was brought out in the debate yesterday. For once I find myself in agreement with the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) on his interpretation of the legislation in question. It seems to me that there is a misunderstanding throughout the country as to its intent. The purpose of the legislation was to grant a bonus to the farmer on each bushel of wheat that he had grown. So the man who had no wheat certainly could not participate in this bonus. I was rather amazed by the statement made by the hon. member for Rosetown (Mr. Loucks). Yesterday he said:
I am stating my own views to the house. The motion refers to the presentation by the representatives of the municipalities of a resolution asking for a dollar an acre. I take it that this applies to the whole province of Saskatchewan;
Now, that is not the intention of the memorandum presented to the government. I hold in my hand a copy of that memorandum, and it states very definitely what the associated rural municipalities were seeking. With the indulgence of the house I should like to read the five requests:
1.	That the Dominion government provide for a bonus in the drought areas on the seeded acreage-
Mark you, "in the drought arehs."
-for the year 1931, the basis for payment to be one dollar per acre where the crop was a total failure, and where a partial crop has been harvested and the bonus of five cents per bushel has not resulted in the farmer receiving a bonus equal to one dollar per acre, that an additional bonus be paid so that a minimum of one dollar per acre may be established regardless of the yield per acre.
I hope my hon. friend from Rosetown will observe that statement.


Mr. LOUCKS:: Did not the representatives of the municipalities ask for a dollar an acre, to be applied province wide? In other words, they did not stipulate the "dried out areas."


John Vallance: I hold in my hand a
copy of the memorandum presented to the government. The Prime Minister was kind enough yesterday to telephone the department and have this copy sent to me. Therefore, I must assume that it is an accurate copy of the presentation of the rural municipalities. Number 2 is this:
2.	That the payment of this bonus be made at the earliest possible date in order that it may be utilized for the purpose of purchasing seed and feed for 1931 spring seeding purposes and for taking care of the human necessities for the winter months, thereby relieving the Saskatchewan Relief Commission of the necessity of advancing relief to those who from the one dollar per acre bonus would be enabled to take care of their own requirements.

Farm Relief-Mr. Vallance
3.	That such payment be made only to the grower, and be subject to the same restrictions as to exemption from garnishee, assignment, etc. as is provided for under the regulations governing payment of the bonus under an act respecting wheat.
4.	That the information necessary to enable the government to make such payment be secured through the offices of the various rural municipalities in the affected area.
5.	That the parliament of the Dominion of Canada, at the next session, give careful consideration to the urgent necessity for an extension of the bonus system for the year 1932 and to the advisability of having the bonus paid on the acreage basis instead of on the bushel basis.
I will be quite frank, Mr. Speaker, in saying that this memorandum was the basis of this resolution, and it was because of the advances made iby the rural municipalities, and because of the lack of interest, or at least the dearth of information given by the government to the public that we deemed it necessary to bring in the present motion.
The hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy) suggested that only land in fit shape for putting in a crop should ibe considered, and he thought that would be one of the difficulties in administering a plan of this kind. That has been taken care of in the memorandum, which states:
In connection with suggestion No. 4 we would suggest that each grower might submit to the secretary of the municipality in which he resides a sworn statement of his seeded acreage for the year, this statement to be reviewed by the council of the municipality and the relief officer of the Saskatchewan relief commission in their district, and that a certificate of their approval be endorsed on the application before payment is recommended.
So the objection raised by the hon. member for Peace River is met in that memorandum.
As a member coming from the northern part of Saskatchewan I wish to tell the government that as far as the northern parts of the provinces are concerned, they were indebted to the government and were grateful for what was done in this regard, but I believe, and it is also stated in the memorandum, that had the government adopted the suggestion of the rural municipalities it would not have cost a great deal more than the five cent per bushel bonus cost. It was pointed out very definitely yesterday, and it has not been denied, that the bonus was a straight gift to the farmer who had wheat. We are all agreed on that. It is true also that through the interpretation placed on the word "grower" by the grain commission, many of us felt that an injustice was done. When I make that statement I have in mind individuals in all three prairie provinces, and in fact I think probably in
every province of Canada, Who are operating their farms on a one-third crop lease. Under the interpretation placed on the word "grower" by the grain commission the owner of the land received no part of the bonus. I might cite my own case as an instance. I operate a farm; I own and control everything on that farm. I pay the taxes; I pay for all repairs;
I own the equipment; I own the land, and all that the other fellow supplies is the labour. He did not receive five cents per bushel; he received 15 -cents per bushel, though I got two-ithirds of the crop -for my share because of the investment I had in the farm. I am not kicking, but that is what happened, and that injustice, or apparent injustice, was brought about in many cases by that legislation.
Now I wish to turn to the farmer in the southern part of the province, from whom this petition comes. I would urge on the government with all the force at -my command the absolute necessity, if we are to save that huge country from going down and out, of either adopting this policy or suggesting something' that will be better for that part of the country. I have pointed out that the bonus was a straight gift to the farmer in the north. The individual in the south, who was not so favourably situated, had to fill out this paper before he could get any relief, and as the hon. member for Weytburn (Mr. Young) pointed out yesterday, after the farmer gave all this information -and sold his birthright, as it were, he had to sign a note by means of which at some future date the government might -collect this money.
Yesterday the suggestion was made that probably these men never would be asked to pay these notes. Probably it would not have been a good thing to broadcast that information, because undoubtedly the western farmer is like the average individual; probably he would have asked for more relief than otherwise might have been the case if he had to sign a note, but if it is the intention of the government not to press for the collection of these notes, I think now, when the financial year is about ended and we will have either to renew this policy or bring in a new one, the time is appropriate for the government to announce to those individuals affected that these notes will not be collected.
I might deal extensively with this memorandum, but I do not think it would do much good. Some days ago I asked for copies of all correspondence that had passed-between the government and this organization, but so far I have not received those details. I should have liked them before making these remarks, because I would have been
Farm, Relief-Mr. Vallance

glad to find there some reason for complimenting the government on the action they had taken or had promised to take with regard to this memorandum, but at the moment I am not in a position to say what has been done.
I would ask the indulgence of this house to have this memorandum placed on Hansard, so that each member may read and study it. Then when the government bring down whatever relief bill is to be brought down, we will be in a better position to discuss the question from the point of view of those most vitally interested.
The memorandum is as follows:
Re: Dollar Per Acre Bonus Hon. R. B. Bennett. Premier of Canada, and Hon. Members of the Government of Canada:
The request we are making to the federal cabinet to-day is not alone for the farmers of Saskatchewan or for the people of that province, but is, we believe, for the Dominion of Canada as a whole and for the welfare of all our population. Few people appreciate that it is the great prairie sections of western Canada with their limited rainfall that has produced and will continue to produce that high protein content wheat which has made Canada famous and contributed largely to the prosperity of the whole dominion. It is also this territory that can compete with any country in the world in the growing of wheat both in low costs of production and in high quality product.
There is nothing radically wrong with western Canada or with the people who have settled in those provinces. Our present situation is the result of extreme and unusual climatic conditions for the past three years and the reduced prices which we have been compelled to accept for the produce which we have for sale and which we were forced to market at a time when the price did not meet the cost of production.
The position of the farmers in the drought area of Saskatchewan is reflected in the manner in which they have applied to municipal councils and to the relief commission for necessary relief. In 1929 only a very small percentage asked for assistance from their municipal council, and in many instances these applications were made by farmers who had suffered a severe crop loss the previous year due to hail or frost damage. In 1930, when the second crop failure occurred, the number asking for relief was greatly increased, while in 1931 we are informed that in some localities over ninety per cent of the residents have found it necessary to seek assistance. Relief to the value of over five million dollars was advanced by the rural municipalities in Saskatchewan up to the date on which the responsibility was taken over by the Saskatchewan relief commission. These advances consisted of food, fuel, clothing, fodder for live stock, gasoline and machinery repairs. The greater portion of the amounts borrowed from the banks by municipalities to enable them to grant these advances is guaranteed by the provincial government. It is a direct charge against the recipient and where he is the registered owner of the land which he operates,
(Mr Vallance.]
or where the consent of the registered owner has been secured, the amount of the relief advance is a direct charge against the land. Consequently these advances will require to be repaid at some future date. The experience of municipalities in previous years indicates that the greater proportion has been repaid.
An official of the Saskatchewan farm loan board is authority for the statement that about twenty per cent of the farmers of the province own their own land and are free from debt. He further states that another thirty-five per cent have no debts except a mortgage with the interest paid and principal reduced. Under ordinary economic conditions these people would not ask for relief from public bodies but would borrow money from loan companies, giving a first mortgage on their land as security for repayment or they would arrange for a temporary loan from the bank to tide them over the period of depression. This procedure is now almost impossible, as mortgage companies are not loaning money on this form of security and banks are consistently refusing loans to farmers, regardless of the financial position of the applicant, or the satisfactory manner in which iiis obligations to the bank have been retired in previous years. The funds of the municipalities are exhausted and the provincial government has gone as far as they can reasonably be expected to go in assisting their people. Consequently, the only assistance they can now secure is from the federal government through the agency of the relief commission. The value of relief extended in this form is expected to be repaid and the applicant signs an undertaking to that effect. No doubt the larger proportion of people will make an honest effort to pay these advances when conditions return to normal. There may be a small percentage of the residents who will secure goods from the commission and who will have little or no intention of repayment of the amount involved if that responsibility can be easily evaded. There are always a few of this class in every community, but it is not with them that we are chiefly concerned at the present time. Our interest is centred in those farmers who have been the backbone of the province, who have carried on through good years and bad, and who have made such a wonderful contribution to the building up of the great Dominion of Canada.
These people are now at the parting of the ways. Their problem is to consider whether or not further effort is worth while. Are they going to undertake the labour and expense of seeding another crop in the hope that conditions will improve and that they may regain their former position of being able to pay their debts and provide for their families the standard of living to which their labours would appear to entitle them? We submit that the morale of these people is in danger of being seriously impaired by the adversities through which they are passing, and it is the solemn duty of the government of this dominion to carefully consider the best means of assisting them at this time in order that they may retain their selfrespect and be prepared to face the future with courage and determination, in order to overcome the obstacles now confronting them.
It is for this purpose that we appear before you to-day as representatives of the farmers of Saskatchewan, and respectfully request that the assistance now being given be further extended

Farm Relief-Mr. Vallance
in the form of a direct cash payment to compensate these farmers for a small portion of their very heavy losses. There has been a heavy loss on their part as represented in their labour, wear and tear on machinery, depreciation of capital involved, and taxes where the same have been paid or allowed to accumulate, all of which have been a dead loss to the farmer.
We wish at this time to extend our appreciation to the government for the assistance which has been given to Saskatchewan through the payment of a bonus of five cents per bushel on wheat as provided for in the act respecting wheat passed at the last session of parliament. This bonus is of material assistance to those farmers in the province who are fortunate enough to have a crop to market, although we are of the opinion that a bonus on the acreage basis would have been more acceptable to a greater number of people under present conditions. We realize at the same time that certain difficulties would arise in arranging for payment on this basis, but believe these difficulties were not insurmountable and that they could have been overcome. As an example of how the present bonus applies to producers of wheat in Saskatchewan we might cite an imaginary case of two brothers, one living in the Melfort district in the north, and one living in the district surrounding Avonlea in the south. We will assume that the brother living at Melfort had two hundred acres in crop on which he had an average yield of thirty bushels to the acre. He receives from the federal treasury by way of bonus the sum of three hundred dollars, in addition to having for sale approximately six thousand bushels of wheat. The other brother has cropped a similar acreage but has had no return by reason of a crop failure and is entitled to no bonus under the regulations as they exist at the present time. This is inequitable if the purpose of the said legislation is to foster and encourage the agricultural portion of our population to continue farming their land. If it is a question of assisting only one of these two parties we submit that the one party under the present arrangement has been assisted and the brother most entitled to encouragement and assistance receives nothing.
We are not losing sight of the fact that the payments now being made are a bonus on wheat production. In might be submitted that under ordinary circumstances and with the return of normal economic conditions both in Canada and in the world at large, no bonus is necessary to encourage the farming industry, that the necessity for such a bonus only arises in times of economic disturbance such as those through which we are passing and that the bonus was proposed to encourage and assist those whose whole earnings were invested in this particular undertaking. Such being the purpose of the act, we submit that it is not functioning towards that end-that farmers who should be encouraged and assisted at the present time, and those who during the past two or three years have, owing to conditions over which they had no control, operated at a loss, in many cases a very serious one. The remedy which we claim to have discovered is to be found in the proposition which we lay before the cabinet to-day.
The 1931 seeded wheat acreage of Saskatchewan is placed at 13,881,000 acres. Statistics of the provincial department of
agriculture indicate that the average wheat yield for the past ten years' period in the province is 16J bushels per acre. Under normal conditions we would have a probable wheat crop of 222,076,500 bushels and after deducting 21 million bushels to take care of our 1932 seed requirements, we would have an aggregate of approximately 200 million bushels for sale, and Saskatchewan farmers would have received from the five cent bonus an amount approximating $10,400,000. No doubt when the bonus question was first considered by the government, the finance department were aware that such an amount would be required for the purpose mentioned. As a result of climatic conditions we find that our yield has been greatly reduced and our present estimated wheat yield for 1931 is set at 101,000,000 bushels, so that after deducting seed requirements we have 80 million bushels for market, and four million dollars will be the amount paid under the five cent bonus. Or, in other words, the amount payable under the scheme will be $6,400,000 less than it would have been had crop conditions been normal.
It was the intention of parliament that it was in the national interest of Canada that assistance in the form of a cash bonus to western farmers should be granted, and it was stated in the debate on the bill that such assistance would have an admirable effect on the morale of the people and that it would greatly lessen the amount which the government would be called upon to contribute in the form of direct relief. We submit that any money which may be paid out in the form of a cash bonus per acre will relieve to almost an equal extent the direct relief contribution of the federal government in Saskatchewan. The bonus on the bushel basis has resulted in payments to those who in many instances do not require relief in that they have a crop to market and are not under the necessity of purchasing large supplies of fodder and seed grain, while those who have had a crop failure and most urgently need assistance have not received aid except in the form of relief roadwork and direct relief through advances of fodder, fuel, food, clothing, etc. all of which is expected to be repaid. It might further be pointed out that the roadwork program carried out resulted in a number of farmers leaving their homes for the purpose of working on roads to Becure funds sufficient to take care of their families, while at the same time their farms suffered as a consequence through lack of cultivation, and additional labour would be entailed in preparing the land for seed in 1932, which will more than offset the amount which they have been able to earn from roadwork.
Believing that a measure of relief other than that at present provided for is desirable to enable the farmers in the drought area to continue in residence and operate their farms, we are requesting assistance from the federal government in the following manner.
1. That the dominion government provide for a bonus in the drought areas on the seeded acreage for the year 1931, the basis for payment to be one dollar per acre where the crop was a total failure, and where a partial crop has been harvested and the bonus of five cents per bushel has not resulted in the farmer receiving a bonus equal to one dollar per acre, that an additional bonus be paid so that a minimum of one dollar per acre may be established regardless of the yield per acre.
Farm Relief-Mr. Vallance

2.	That the payment of this bonus be made at the earliest possible date in order that it may be utilized for the purpose of purchasing seed and feed for 1931 spring seeding purposes and for taking care of the human necessities for the winter months, thereby relieving the Saskatchewan relief commission of the necessity of advancing relief to those who from the one dollar per acre bonus would be enabled to take care of their own requirements.
3.	That such payment be made only to the grower, and be subject to the same restrictions as to exemption from garnishee, assignment, etc., as is provided for under the regulations governing payment of the bonus under an act respecting wheat.
4.	That the information necessary to enable the government to make such payment be secured through the offices of the various rural municipalities in the affected area.
5.	That the parliament of the Dominion of Canada, at the next session, give careful consideration to the urgent necessity for an extension of the bonus system for the year 1932. and to the advisability of having the bonus paid on the acreage basis instead of on the bushel basis.
In connection with suggestion number four, we would suggest that each grower might submit to the secretary of the municipality in which he resides a sworn statement of his seeded acreage for the year, this statement to be reviewed by the council of the municipality and the relief officer of the Saskatchewan relief commission in their district, and that a certificate of their approval be endorsed on the application before payment is recommended. It might be pointed out that the greater portion of the municipalities in the area affected are under the operation of the Saskatchewan municipal hail insurance scheme, and the municipality has a record of the seeded acreage of all parcels of land which have not been withdrawn from the operations of the municipal hail insurance act. These acreages are authentic in that they were reported before June 10, and it is on the owner's statement of acreage in crop that the municipal hail rates are levied. Consequently it would not be to the farmer's advantage to report an acreage in excess of that actually sown. Further confirmation, if necessary, could be secured from the census returns. There would be no cost to the government in so far as the securing of information on this basis is concerned, as we have the assurance of municipal officials that they will take care of any necessary cash outlay for securing the required statistical information to enable payment to be made.
From the figures quoted it is evident that our wheat production in Saskatchewan this year is about forty-four per cent of normal, and if the same percentage applies to the acreage basis our proposal would call for payment of fifty-six per cent of 13,881,000 acres or a total outlay on the wheat acreage of $7,773,300. The total seeded acreage of other grains is as follows:
Acres
Oats	 4,660.000
Barley	 1,459,000
Fall Eye	 562.000
Spring	Eye	 107,000
Flax.-	 458,000
Total cOarse grain acreage. . 7,246,000 
The percentage of loss of the coarse grains crop is not so great as wheat for the reason that seeding of same was later in the season and the rainfall during the latter part of July in some districts materially assisted growth. A reasonable estimate of the crop loss in coarse grains would be forty per cent, or approximately three million acres. This amount, added to our above estimate of the amount which would be payable in respect of the seeded w'heat acreage gives a total of $10,773,360.
When our proposal was submitted to Honourable E. B. Bennett and Honourable Robert Weir at Eegina in the month of August and was later refused by the premier, we undertook to secure an expression of opinion from the farmers of the province regarding the matter. For this purpose a series of meetings were held at various strategic points throughout the province at which the proposal was placed before the people for discussion and consideration. In every instance unanimous approval was given and we were strongly urged to again take the matter up with the federal cabinet and to press for reconsideration of their previous unfavourable decision. We further have in our office and present to you to-day resolutions and petitions from various public bodies throughout the province of Saskatchewan supporting our application. Approximately two hundred rural municipal councils have by resolution given their approval and the petitions submitted herewith contain the names of upwards of five thousand farmers. In addition, many resolutions have been received from individual ratepayers' meetings of the municipalities. Eesolutions and petitions have also been received from various other organizations such as ratepayers' associations, cooperative trading associations, boards of trade, and councils of urban municipalities.
In presenting this request to the government we are confident that our application for a bonus on the acreage basis has the support of practically one hundred per cent of the people of the province of Saskatchewan, regardless of whether they are resident in the drought areas or not. Other areas of the province fortunate enough to have a crop to market this year also support our request. We therefore respectfully urge that this matter again be carefully considered by your cabinet, and assure you that a decision to grant our request would be most favourably received by the people of the province we represent.


Edward Joseph Garland: The
greater part of the problem facing the government in connection with agriculture to-day is chiefly due, in my opinion, to the extraordinary decline in the prices of farm commodities as compared with those of manufactured and other products. The last report of the Bank of Nova Scotia clearly pointed out this fact, and it was also made evident in the report of a year ago. An examination of the statistics in this connection will indicate that prices of farm products have declined from 35 per cent to 40 per cent, and in some cases even more, while wholesale prices have declined from 20 per cent to 25 per cent at the most, and retail prices from 11 per cent to

Farm Relief-Mr. Garland (Bow River)
15 per cent. Undoubtedly it was a recognition of this extraordinary disparity between the price level of agricultural commodities and that of the goods the farmers must buy that was an influence in inducing the administration a year ago to institute this so-called five cent bonus. The question was discussed in this house, and at that time some speakers on the government side described it as an alleviation by way of reduction in freight rates, that is, that it was supposed to pay a part of the cost of freight. Others said it was a measure of direct relief; others described it as a bonus, while many people throughout the country have looked upon it as a straight gift. It was also explained as compensation for the tariff, but no one with any sanity could ever regard a five cent bonus on wheat as a compensating adjustment for the tariff. There is no doubt in my mind on that point. It would require many times that amount per bushel, under present price levels, to recompense the farmers for the enormous costs in connection with tariff adjustments of this and previous years.
The point I want to make is that the government cannot solve the present problem of agricultural conditions by mere miserable bonuses or bounties. If applied on a sufficiently large scale to one branch of industry such a scheme might afford temporary relief, but that could be done only at the expense of the taxpayers of the whole country. This bonus in the long run falls on the backs of the taxpayers and comes ultimately out of those classes that are the least organized and the most unprotected in regard to their own price levels. We have no power over the price levels of our own commodities. It has been alleged that at one time we attempted to secure this by organization of the wheat pools, but no effort was made-and I have the word of every officer of the wheat pools- to try unnecessarily or unduly to increase the price level. The whole object of wheat pooling was to try to eliminate many of the intervening costs in the actual handling and marketing of grain and so to improve the position of the grain grower. But so long as the farmers of this country must depend on export markets for the principal bulk of their commodities, and so long as export market prices govern prices in this country, nothing in the way of bonuses is any answer to the problem facing us.
I have just received one or two letters in connection with this matter. It is true .that in certain districts that had very large or reasonably large crops there was an expression of aipipreciation of this five cents a bushel
cheque that came along. Undoubtedly it may have helped some of these men to pay their threshing bills. But the fact of the matter is that even with the bonus the price received by the farmer was far below the actual cost of production, and this gave no recognition whatever to general agricultural conditions. The result is that to-day agriculture as a whole is in a worse position than it was a year ago. I have a letter dated .January 12, from Redland, Alberta, in which the following statement is made:
I will cite the case of one farmer which will illustrate that of many others. This man threshed enough wheat for his spring seeding and has been compelled to sell this wheat in order to merely live through the winter. He said they had been going to bed at dark to save the price of kerosene. Of course there are other farmers who didn't thresh any wheat.
Now I am aware that you understand this impossible situation as well as I. You see the man who sells his wheat is not permitted to get seed from the government even though he has nothing left. Surely this situation can be righted. Comparing him with the man who raised a bumper crop and received a bonus besides should be sufficient.
Another matter freely discussed was the fact that people in this drought area are being pressed to the limit for collections by oil and machinery companies, and even the banks. The method of compounding interest by some of these collectors would make Shyloclc look like a philanthropist.
That last statement touches one crucial aspect of the problem in which undoubtedly the government could be of material assistance to us. I urge upon the administration the calling of a federal conference of all the mortgage companies, loan companies and banks in order to find out whether or not the private financial interests in Canada are willing to undertake to carry their share of this load of depression. It is utterly unfair to ask the primary producer, whether he be farmer or fisherman, to carry this gigantic load of increasing interest rates-not decreasing rates- in the face of existing conditions. I have another letter which comes from the acute drought district. And may I at this stage suggest to the government that we in Alberta feel that there has not been fair treatment of the drought area in that province as compared with the treatment meted out, poor though it may have been, to the farmers in Saskatchewan. Our province has not had any share of that 100 per cent relief granted by the federal government. An hon. gentleman suggests that we are not Tory enough. Well, I am rather proud of that; I hope we shall never be Tory enough in the minds of hon. gentlemen opposite. But I have this to say. In common with my hon. friend from Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) and my' hon. friend from Medicine Hat
314	COMMONS
Farm Relief-Mr. Garland (Bow River)
(Mr. Gershaw), I represent a constituency which is almost entirely within the drought area. Last year and the year before there were very small crops and very low prices, and this year we were almost completely wiped out. Practically the entire area is a total failure. These men have nothing to sell for which they will receive a profit, and how they will finance this year's operations, without any cash in their pockets, is a problem which they cannot solve. Now if agriculture is to be regarded in the future as the principal industry of this country, it is vitally necessary that this government should undertake a definite scheme now, and not later, to see that these men have, by some means or other, sufficient resources to secure the necessities for seeding and harvesting operations for this year. They have no resources whatever, but that is not because they have not gone into mixed farming. To the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) let me say that I have long held the view that those who attempted to explain conditions in western Canada by saying that we had no diversified farming but were putting all our eggs in one basket were speaking exceedingly stupidly or without a sufficient consideration of the facts. The fact is that per head of population we produce more diversified products in western Canada than are produced in any other part of the dominion. But what of it? Suppose we embraced wholeheartedly the suggestion of the Minister of Agriculture with regard to diversified farming.


Mr. WEIR (Melfort):: Will the hon. member inform the house when I have ever made any statement with regard to diversified farming in western Canada, either in this house or anywhere else?


Edward Joseph Garland: I have not the statement at the moment but my impression was that the hon. gentleman has on many occasions advocated diversified fanning.


Robert Weir: At no time, as far as I aim aware, have I ever advocated diversified farming as the cure-all for the ills of western Canada or of any other part of the country.


Edward Joseph Garland: I am glad to hear the minister say that, and I sincerely trust that the newspapers will interpret his statement correctly this time. He is quite right; it is not a cure-all and will not even modify conditions at the present time. The only effect of diversified farming at the 'present time is that the farmer may be able to live a little longer under this rotten system of 
injustice than he otherwise might. That is all; he can drag out a miserable existence on the products he is raising at a loss. Under date February 11, 1932, the following letter has come to hand:
This district on the whole in 1931 did not thresh as many bushels of wheat as was sown, and the complete failure of oats, barley and rye forced a great number of farmers to drive a portion of their live stock great distances to irrigated districts and trade or exchange them, usually at a sacrifice, for feed to keep the remainder of their stock alive.
The 1931 crop failure, following as it did the light crop and poor prices of 1929 and 1930 which reduced the farmer to a point financially where he had to put forth every effort to finance seeding of the 1931 crop, places him in a position where his hardships can hardly be exaggerated.
I know they cannot be.
The prices of the farm produce at the present time are:
Eggs: 10 cents per dozen.
Butter: 8 cents per pound.
Cattle: 2 cents per pound.
Hogs: 2J cents per pound.
With the price levels as given in this letter, and which I know prevail in the district spoken of in the southern part of my constituency, it is utterly hopeless for these unfortunate farmers to expect to carry on during this year. They have not been able to obtain a sufficient revenue from the small herds of stock or flocks of poultry to keep body and soul together, much less to buy the necessary clothing for themselves and their children.
Under these circumstances, I submit that an entirely new agricultural policy involving a change in other directions is also required. So long as this government continues, as have preceding governments, to press down upon the primary producer who is carrying the load of the development of industrialism, just so long will agriculture be placed under a handicap and sooner or later it will vanish. This government through the imposition of unfair customs duties has increased unnecessarily our difficulties; it has succeeded in pegging the prices of manufactured products while we have had to take what we can get in the foreign markets. So convinced of this fact was the annual convention of the United Farmers of Alberta, that this year it passed the following resolution:
Whereas, the fiscal policy known as protection or a protective tariff which has been on trial in Canada for over fifty years since its inauguration in 1879, has belied every promise of its promoters, both then and since, and has utterly failed to promote the general well-being of the people of Canada and has developed instead a most pernicious maldistribution of our wealth, and is on this account immediately responsible for that disparity in market values as expressed in present day prices, which exists

Farm Relief-Mr. Cowan (Long Lake)
between what the farmer sells and what he buys, which disparity is one of the principal causes of the present industrial debacle and the general economic depression;
Be it therefore resolved, that the time has come for an immediate all round reduction in our custom duties to the intent that within a period of not less than five years every feature and constituent of this barbaric economic superstition be eliminated from the fiscal policy of our country.


Mr. ARTHURS:: Does the hon. gentleman endorse that?


An hon. MEMBER:: Who wrote it?


Edward Joseph Garland: I am informed that it was written by a well known Presbyterian minister in the constituency of the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy). In itself, it is a tribute not only to the intelligence but to the penmanship of the people of that constituency.
There are many other factors which affect agriculture, but at the present time the two principal ones are, first, the enormous load of debt and interest charges and, second, the unfair position in which agriculture is placed in relation to other producers of manufactured goods. Unless there is a modification downwards of our capital obligations plus an elimination if possible, or at least a considerable reduction in interest rates, I venture to predict that it will be difficult to bring about a recovery of agriculture in western Canada. This prediction may be pessimistic and gloomy, but it is the fact.
No new markets have been discovered to extend the sale of our products. Foreign markets are rapidly narrowing due to the stupid nationalism of certain European countries, in which stupidity we are now the supreme participator. How this country expects to continue to keep alive an industrial expansion which has been the result of available f oreign markets by a policy of restriction, by continuing a stupid fiscal policy which does not operate, is beyond my understanding. Until this administration about faces with its fiscal policy and either by international agreement or by frank action on its own part attempts to break down the barriers between nations or to open up new markets for our products, there is but little hope for the future of agriculture in Canada.
I grant that the modification of our policy in regard to banking and credit and the creation of national control and planned distribution of our whole monetary machine will have a healthy and salutary effect upon the internal consumption of manufactured goods, but unfortunately agriculture is not in the same position. We must continue to sell abroad the great bulk of our commodities.
Take wheat alone; in a normal year we can expect a crop of 450,000,000 to 500,000,000 bushels. Of that crop we sell abroad all but
150.000.	000 bushels. It might be possible to increase internal consumption by 25,000,000 or
50.000.	000 bushels, but that still leaves an enormous surplus to be shipped overseas and for which surplus we must take a price determined by international competition in the limited foreign markets available. Even a financial reform along the lines advocated by those of us in this corner of the house can have but little real effect upon market conditions. Unless this government undertakes a drastic alteration in its policy with regard to international trade at will be deliberately damning agriculture to a steady decline.


Mr. W. D. COWAN (Long Lake):: Mr. Speaker, this debate seems to be an attempt to discover whether or not the 'farmers of western Canada are satisfied with the relief which has been granted, first, in the form of the five cent bonus on wheat grown last year, and, second, by means of the measures adapted to apply in those territories where the 'bonus was not paid. As I understand it, some $10,000,000 has been paid out to the farmers of western Canada through this bonus.
I have yet to meet or hear of a farmer who refused to accept that five cent bonus. I never knew of a system to be put into force which gave greater satisfaction than this. No one has made any money out of the administration of .this bonus; it is not a rich man's job at all. Hundreds of thousands of farmers have benefited, and I have yet to hear of a single instance where the money was misapplied, misappropriated or misdirected. The government is deserving of congratulation upon the business methods pursued in the handling of this bonus.
During the early part of last session this five cent bonus was discussed, by many Saskatchewan members and others. At that time none of us had any intimation of the calamity which was to occur because of the drought which affected many portions of the west. We were very glad to be granted this bonus and at that time it was understood that it would apply to the whole province of Saskatchewan. As far as the intentions of the government were concerned, there was no thought of discrimination. Later on a very large area covering some 200 municipalities become badly drought-stricken, and it was evident that the five cent bonus would not apply to them, because there was nothing on which that five cent bonus could be paid. What was to be done? Were we to ask the government or was the government to ask parlia-
316	COMMONS
Farm Relief-Mr. Cowan (Long Lake)
ment to abandon the whole proposition because some 200 municipalities out of probably 1,000 would be unable to secure any benefits under this plan?
The only course for the government to pursue was to carry on along the lines already adopted. In spite of criticism we decided what we were going to do and we did it. Then, when this new drought condition arose, it became the duty of the government and of parliament to devise new methods to meet that new condition. That was done. It was decided that a relief commission should be appointed to administer relief affairs in those areas. That has been carried out. The hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance) has presented a new proposal, namely, that this dollar per acre scheme should be handled by two different bodies, by the municipalities and the relief commission. It is impossible for one and the same thing to be handled by two different bodies.


John Vallance: My hon. friend must have misunderstood me. My whole argument was based on the memorandum presented to the government by the Rural Municipalities Associations, so I could not make any such statement as he suggests.


Walter Davy Cowan: But you
wanted to get a finger in the pie and you tried to get it in. The man who suggested that, I do not care who he is, is a ranker Grit than you are, if you know what that is. You want two different bodies to handle one affair and that cannot be done successfully.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I would ask the hon.
member to address the chair.


Walter Davy Cowan: I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, I should have been addressing you at the time except that I was answering the hon. member's question.
You cannot have two different bodies handle the same affair, so the government was well advised when it instructed the commission to proceed to carry out the relief measures in those areas. The hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) said that the relief measures were not adequate. That depends upon one's interpretation of the word " adequate." I might think I was well paid if I received S3,600 a year while some other member might think he was not. But there are occasions when one has to be satisfied. The people in those districts will be satisfied to be carried through this winter until springtime so that they can again get busy and restore things to their normal condition. Has the government carried out this policy?


An hon. MEMBER:: No.


Walter Davy Cowan: My hon. friend thinks he knows more about the matter than I do. I say they have done it. To-day the relief commission is operating with entire satisfaction and I challenge any hon. gentleman opposite to correct that statement. Never before in the west has there been a business organization which has handled things better than this one has done. It is the cleanest administration I ever saw in my life. I see it working every day.


John Vallance: Do you want to enter into a discussion of that?


Walter Davy Cowan: Yes.


John Vallance: Then put a motion on the order paper so that we may have an opportunity. You are issuing a challenge.


Walter Davy Cowan: Address the chair. My hon. friend does not like me to address him directly. I do not wonder at it.


John Vallance: The hon. member is
absolutely right.


Walter Davy Cowan: The relief
commission operating in those areas is the most complete relief organization I ever saw. They have disbursed millions of dollars. We must remember the extent of the country. There were more than 200 municipalities to be covered and a new organization had to be created. There were 250,000 people, who were scattered over hundreds of miles, thrown into a state of destitution and they had to be provided for. The facts had to be ascertained; men had to be appointed and committees had to be formed in those different areas. This took time and at the beginning hon. gentlemen had their opportunity, but they were not equal to their job. While this preliminary work was being done, the people were in a state of dismay; they did not know what was ahead of them; so far as they could see, nothing was being done. But the committee set to work and created their organization. First they laid down their plans, and then, having laid down their plans, they proceeded slowly, surely and in a most conservative way to carry them out.


John Vallance: I rise to a point of
order. What has this to do with the dollar-an-acre scheme?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for
Long Lake is in order.


Walter Davy Cowan: When my hon. friends bring this up as a substitute for the plan that we now have, I do not wonder they

Farm Relief-Mr. Beynon
are in a quandary; they have no argument. Let them keep quiet and we shall finish the job.
I have described the situation as it is and, as I say, the operations of the relief commission have been carried out successfully. I think it is well the people should know this, because the money is coming out of the public treasury. It was decided that the outlying posts should be the first places covered in order that there would be no trouble in such areas should a blizzard suddenly come up and catch them unawares. After the outlying parts were covered, they gradually crept in and covered the areas closer in according to their drought-stricken condition.
This is the result. Three weeks ago a gentleman in Regina who travels constantly throughout southern Saskatchewan, who knows conditions there and who has no personal interest in the matter, said to me: "Cowan, if a single child had died of starvation in the province of Saskatchewan, wouldn't the Grits have raised a deuce of a holler?" There has not been a single death through starvation or neglect. The administration has been excellent. Not very long ago a big farmer accosted me in a village in my constituency. He said:	"There is my farm; I have put
$30,000 into that farm and it is not worth anything now to me. I have not a dollar and I cannot get one, but the relief commission is supplying me and my family with what I require and I am taking everything from them with thankfulness." That is the spirit in which the people out there are receiving the commission. They know that the commission is doing the best they can. I would also point this out to my hon. friends across the way. I know that they can never see a day ahead. The Liberals never can and never could. They want all the money spent right now.
There is one thing more we know, Mr. Speaker. We know that these people are being carried now. We know also that if we spend millions and millions now, they will all be wasted unless something else happens. These people must be provided with the means of carrying on their operations next summer. Seed has to be provided. With my hon. friends across the way knowing all that which is yet before us, staring us in the face, and it will cost at the very least $15,000,000, would they have us spend all our money now, and if so, where are the farmers going to get their seed? All these things have to be taken into consideration, and we have to reserve a sufficient amount in our treasuries to carry our people. But a year from now
our hon. friends opposite will look back and will then admit that we, the Conservative party, have dealt with the people out there very generously and have done our work, and have done it mighty well.


Mr. W. A. BEYNON (Moose Jaw):: I had not intended to speak on this resolution and would not have done so but for some of the remarks made on the other side of the house. The hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance) stated that there had been some inequity owing to the fact that the owners of the land who were perhaps getting two-thirds of the crop got none of the five cent a bushel bonus. That provision of the act I think was one of its wisest. The situation is simply this: In western Canada perhaps 75 per cent of the farms are mortgaged, and in a great many cases the original owner who mortgaged the land to a mortgage company is now operating the land on a lease from the mortgage company, and had it not been for the provision in the act that the actual producer of the grain shall get that five cent a bushel bonus a large part of the bonus would have gone to the mortgage companies.


John Vallance: We argued that to the
government last year.


William Addison Beynon: Then why does the hon.
gentleman try to show that there is inequity because the owner does not always get the bonus?


John Vallance: If the hon. gentleman
will read what I said, I think he will agree that he is wrong in the statement he is now making. I was not making any criticism, but I was placing before the house the standpoint that was placed before me.


William Addison Beynon: But the hon. member gave his own case as an example.


John Vallance: Yes, but I was not complaining in my own case.


William Addison Beynon: Then why criticize at all?


John Vallance: I was not criticizing at
all.


William Addison Beynon: Then why mention it at
all? The hon. member for South Battleford also referred to the document that had to be signed before the people in south Saskatchewan could get relief. He waved this document before the house and said: This is what the man had to sign, virtually sign away his birthright before he could get relief. But he made no criticism of that document, and I do not think any member of this house can read it and say that the commission or the
Farm Relie/-Miss Macphail

government could have done anything less and protected the funds which this house voted to the government to carry on that work. There is no question in the document that should not be answered by a man who is seeking relief. There is no information asked for which the government should not have before granting relief. Why then wave this document before the house and say: This is what the man had to sign, practically sign away his birthright before he could get relief?
A good deal has also been made of the fact that these people had to sign notes for the return of the money before they could get relief. Let me say that as soon as this question of relief was mooted in the house I began to receive from the constituency of Moose Jaw telegrams urging me to represent to the government that some provision for repayment should be made. Otherwise the farmers of that community would not accept this relief at the hands of the government. That is the spirit of the people in that district, and that is why that provision was made in the act.
The hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland) made a statement which gave a very wrong impression to this house. His statement was to the effect that the province of Alberta had not received from this government the same consideration in respect to relief ias had the province of Saskatchewan. He stated that Alberta had not received any of this 100 per cent relief. There are certain portions of Saskatchewan, <the greater portion, in fact, which did not receive any of this 100 per cent relief. Saskatchewan received precisely the same consideration as the province of Alberta. One section of the province of Saskatchewan did receive 100 per cent relief from this government, and not from the local government.


Edward Joseph Garland: May I ask a question? Is there any portion of Alberta that received 100 per cent relief for agriculture?


William Addison Beynon: I am just going to explain why they did not.


Edward Joseph Garland: That was all I said.


William Addison Beynon: The hon. member said that they had not received fair treatment as compared with Saskatchewan.


Edward Joseph Garland: Exactly.


William Addison Beynon: I am going to show how they received equal treatment. The basis of relief was this: Saskatchewan was divided into three parts. Part A comprised those portions

of the province of Saskatchewan which had had three successive crop failures; part B, where there had been two successive crop failures, and part C, where there had been one crop failure. There was no part of the province of Alberta which had had three successive total crop failures, and only in that respect and for that reason was Alberta treated differently from the province of Saskatchewan. The basis was precisely the same in each province, but no part of the province of Alberta had suffered from three successive crop failures as had many parts of Saskatchewan.


Edward Joseph Garland: The hon. member is not well informed on Alberta. There are several districts there which have had three successive crop failures.


William Addison Beynon: The relief was granted on the reports received from the province of Alberta, from the government of the province and from the municipalities of the province. Every effort was made to deal absolutely fairly with all parts of all three western provinces. The only difference that was made was that in Saskatchewan wheTe there had been three successive crop failures 100 per cent relief was granted. I rose simply to correct those few points which have been raised on the other side of the house.


Miss AGNES MACPHAIL (Southeast Grey):: I doubt very much, Mr. Speaker, if
agriculture can tax itself into prosperity. Looking at the estimates we find that one of the big increases this year is an increase in interest of $30,000,000, which looks as if we could not tax ourselves into prosperity.
On general principle I am opposed to the idea of a bonus, but speaking for Ontario farmers, if the five cents a bushel bonus on wheat will keep the western wheat farmer growing wheat I think it would be worth while to the farmer of Ontario in order to keep the western farmer out of mixed farming, which is ruining the Ontario farmer. So looking at it from that point of view, not that it makes any difference because the government does what it likes, I suppose for the time being we had better support the bonus because if any more mixed farming products come upon the markets of Ontario from the west things are going to be even worse for the farmers of Ontario. I had never believed that mixed farming was the solution of western conditions. True, it would give the western farmer more to eat, since that is all he has at the moment, but it would also give him more lines on which he could lose money. Mixed farming suits Ontario, and if the prairie provinces go into mixed farming it will be very disastrous for

Farm Relief-Mr. Mullins
this province. So, speaking for my agricultural constituency, for the present I support the bonus on wheat. I do not believe in it, but it may for the time being keep the western wheat farmer running after the five cents and not encourage him to do the thing that we do not want him to do.


Mr. H. A. MULLINS (Marquette):: It
had not been my intention, Mr. Speaker, to participate in this debate, but when I hear so many hon. members on the other side making a political handle of the resolution I have to take a hand in it too. I represent a purely agricultural constituency in western Canada; it has not got a single smokestack in any part of it. When I am speaking of conditions in that constituency I do so from personal experience. My life has been forged on the anvil of experience, and not in a university as was my friend's from Bow River (Mr. Garland); I never had the opportunity of even scratching my back up against a college wall; but when it comes to practical experience on the prairies, probably I have had as much as any one of my hon. friends opposite.
To substantiate what I am going to say I want to read this little clipping which I cut from the Manitoba Free Press a few days ago:
Forty Years Ago To-day
H. A. Mullins, well known live stock exporter


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Henry Alfred Mullins: That is all right.
-had taken hold of the well known Binsearth stock farm at Binsearth, Manitoba.
That was forty years ago. For forty years I have been farming on the prairies of western Canada, and probably what I shall say will have some little weight to keep up the spirits of some of those whining Jerusalem demigods. I remember well in the old days on the prairies when produce was much cheaper than it is to-day. I remember coming to the city of Toronto with a trainload of hogs. I came under the pressure of that multimillionaire that my hon. friends opposite talk about and I sold the shipment for four cents a pound. What happened? The following year hogs were worth eight to eight and a half cents a pound. I say in an advisory way to the men on the prairies: don't go out of hog raising; don't listen to these whiners from the other side; and don't go out of live 6tock raising; keep in; the best opportunity in the world can be taken advantage of at the present time. Our friends opposite say that
we on this side of the house did not do anything for the west last session. There are men in the constituency of Marquette who are offering thanks to the government for that five cent bonus. It helped them out. Then you will find another man with political leanings not favourable to this side who will say: "Oh, yes, the five cents was quite all right, but you didn't give Smith the five cents. Why didn't you"? I said, "How many bushels did you have"? He said, "I had four thousand bushels of wheat." I said: "Why didn't you divide up with Smith"? No, there was nothing doing along that line. He would not divide up with Smith, no; he took the two hundred dollar bonus that the government gave him, but because of his political leanings he had to whine about the five cents subvention in order to find fault with the government. If the angel Gabriel came down he would not satisfy some of the hon. gentlemen on the other side! That is a well known fact. But I do know some hon. members on that side who are big enough men to acknowledge that the five cent bonus was all right-but they don't say much about it.
Our friends opposite say that we on this side of the house did nothing for the west. Let me tell something for your information -and this is from personal experience, not from mere hearsay. I advise the western farmer to keep in the live stock industry. There is a twelve dollar rate out of Montreal to England. Did you from Bow River say anything about it? Why not? There is a $10.85 rate out of Montreal for stockers, and if it was not for the depreciation of the British pound sterling and their clamouring in Scotland-but I don't want to talk about the Celt, I want to deal with these wheat growers. They have been troublesome all the way down from the days of Cain and Abel. You know that men came to the prairies and wanted to make their wheat farming a steam plough proposition. They would not look at a hand plough, they would not look at a team of oxen.


John Vallance: I have used a team
of oxen many a time.


Henry Alfred Mullins: The member for South
Battleford (Mr. Vallance) knows the situation very well, he has had experience, and if he is broadminded enough he will be prepared to give credit to this side of the house for the five cent subvention. . They wanted a steam plough proposition, and they tore the bunch grass all to pieces until the land is of no use.
Farm Relief-Mr. Mullins


John Vallance: Might I suggest to the member for Marquette that if we go into live stock we will not get the five cent bonus?


Agnes Campbell Macphail: Keep to wheat growing.


Henry Alfred Mullins: I ask my friends opposite to read Mr. John W. Dafoe's book on the Life and Times of Clifford Sifton. Sir Clifford Sifton was one of the cleverest men who sat in this house. He tells us that when they took from the rancher the land south of the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway they were wrong. The member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) knows that. They are working now on the weaknesses of the poor farmers. I think of the Weyburn district in the early days. I think of the day when the horse I was riding went into the cracks and nearly turned somersaults two or three times on my way to Weyburn and Yellow Grass. Take the country south of the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway all the way from Swift Current to Medicine Hat, where I used to ranch. The settlers came in. God help them. I felt sorry for them. I told them "You cannot grow wheat in this country." But they went at it and ruined the land. I say to the Prime Minister "If you would use good judgment, move the poor settlers from that country to the country north of the main line, to the Peace River country." You may woi'k your politics on the weaknesses of the poor fellow who is suffering on the land south of the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway, but you cannot get much support if you come up to Marquette where the farmers are all engaged in diversified farming. Yes, I should like to read this letter that I received to-day.
We have great cause to thank kind Providence for the blessings we have received during the year. We had a fair crop of wheat, but oats and barley were poor. We have confidence in the country-we have prepared lots of good land for next year. We had to draw on what we had saved during the prosperous years,

Now, get this:
We had to draw on what we had saved during the prosperous years. It is hard times on a great number of farmers around here, they are so much in debt.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Henry Alfred Mullins: That is quite correct. If the gold were all around their feet they could not pick it up.


Edward Joseph Garland: Read the
rest of the letter.


Henry Alfred Mullins: Why do you;laugh at these conditions? I know the conditions of the

farmers on the prairies; I motored all over my constituency to observe them. The gentleman who sat here representing Marquette, Mr. Glen, sent up a whine and got behind a lady to send a challenge. He did not challenge me; he got a lady to write me a letter asking for a debate on better policies for western Canada. I will not get any woman to write-I will stay right out in the open. I will not ask any woman to write a letter, at a time like this, challenging anyone to a debate on better policies for western Canada. Now I want to finish this letter, which states:
They never will be able to redeem themselves.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Henry Alfred Mullins: They put in their crop
on the stubble; they are too lazy to plough it. They grow a mass of weeds, so how can they redeem themselves? I ask hon. members, will they ever get out of trouble? We have sow thistle and weeds all over the country because of poor farming, and then hon. gentlemen opposite try to make capital of it for the sake of party politics. I do not care if I never sit in the House of Commons again, but I came here to represent agriculture and I am going to do it fairly in spite of the man who got a country newspaper to write an article saying I travelled over Marquette at the end of a leash.
I did travel over the constituency of Marquette, and while doing so I stopped in to see one of my best Liberal friends in the town of Hamiota, the town in which my hon. friend from Provencher (Mr. Beaubien) lived. He knows the man very well. I sat with him one day interviewing farmers and finding out their problems in order to come to this house prepared to tell hon. members of the difficulties confronting the western farmers at the present time. While I was sitting there a farmer drove up in his car and said: "I want ten gallons of gasoline." My friend said: "Go out and help yourself." In how many other places could that have happened? The farmer went out and filled his car, and later came in and sat down to discuss his problems with me. I found out the true situation in western Canada, and then one of the newspapers in that district published an article saying there were men in one town in my constituency *who could get only $1 a load for wood, which they had to draw seven or eight miles, and wondered if I understood the situation. Why, I sat on the corner of the sleigh with the man who had the load of wood, and discussed the problem with him. I sat there with him for one hour. That is

Farm Reliej-Mr. Mullins
the situation, and hon. gentlemen opposite want to make capital out of it for the sake of politics.
Now let me speak on the question of relief. I have men in my constituency, though not a great many of them, who need relief. Let me tell you that Marquette is in fair shape financially, and Marquette thanks the government for what it has done with the five cent subvention. The government has come to the help of the farmers in that constituency. I have a list of the w'orks the government are carrying on at the present time. I was surprised when I saw that list; I had no idea that all this was going on. The government have been fair to the people in that constituency in helping public works, and they thank the government.
Before I sit down I want to say that we shipped three oars of produce from Marquette to this area in southern Saskatchewan, the country that is supposed to be in such bad shape. Those goods were loaded in Marquette by horses. Understand me; horses drew this produce to the cars when it wias being loaded, but at the other end it was unloaded by motor trucks. That is one of the things that is wrong. We make too much of motor trucks and motor oars, we need to go back to horses, and go a little slower. Some hon. member on this side of the house said that in 1925 Saskatchewan had 90 per cent of the mules in Canada in that district.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Henry Alfred Mullins: I am referring to fourlegged mules. If the farmers will go back to mules and horses they will be better off. There is too much gasoline being used; there are too many tractors. There is too much exploitation of the soil, with the farmers ripping the fibre out of it. I listened to the exMinister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) say, "We must have more fibre in the soil." That is right, but you drove out the men who were putting fibre in the soil; you drove out the real money-making industry of live stock, and it gave way to the farmers.
I am sorry for the farmers to-day; my sympathy goes out to them. I know of the hardships through which the farmer is going at the present time, but you cannot expect to rob the top six inches of rich, fertile soil, and then grow anything but weeds. Any man who has had practical experience, who has stood behind the plough and worked on the prairie, knows the truth of what I am saying. I ask the hon. member for South Battleford if that is not a fact. The fibre has been taken out all the way from Moosejaw 41761-21
to the Rocky Mountains. The land never should have been taken away from the ranchers; the leases never should have been cancelled. If you read the book written by John Dafoe you will find that Hon. Clifford Sifton made that prediction thirty years ago, and I made the same statement on the floor of this house in 1925.
I have taken up quite some time, and in concluding I wish to place one or two further statements on Hansard. To the farmers of the west I say, "Keep in the live stock and do not listen to these grain growers. Do not be carried away with the idea of growing wheat alone. You cannot live by bread alone, and you cannot live by growing wheat alone. Keep in the live stock, because the day will come when the markets will be opened and you will be able to ship to the British market. Prices will go up. It may be hard just now; you may be suffering from low prices, but from my years of experience I tell you to stay with the hog industry and the cattle indristry. Feed cattle. If you read the old Bible you will find that the very best men in those days were in the oattle business."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Henry Alfred Mullins: Is that not true? When Joseph was introducing his brethren to Pharaoh, did he not say, "These are men of flocks and herds"? I do not know what to call those gentlemen who are trading on the misfortune of the farmers, but I cannot sit here and see that sort of thing going on without a protest. Some of these gentlemen will not learn a lesson no matter how much you preach, but they are all wrong, and my advice to the people of western Canada is to go in for mixed farming. That is my advice; I impress upon them, not to get a professional man at the head of affairs. I do not want to say a word against my lawyer friends, but I say this:	Do not get a professional man behind your endeavours but get a man whose life has been forged on the anvil of experience; otherwise your efforts will end in failure. I say that to the head of this government, to Mr. Beatty and to everyone else.
What about the cow scheme in Alberta? Let me ask hon. gentlemen who come from that province-What about the Duncan Marshall cow scheme which cost Alberta so much? In Saskatchewan you have the same condition, and in Manitoba, a lot of agricultural students directing affairs. What did they do in connection with the Winckler cow scheme? That enterprise cost Manitoba many dollars, and what happened? I suggest that hon.

Farm Relief-Mr. Mullins

gentlemen go to Quebec and study the old traditions there. In Quebec, when the old father was passing away, he gave to his daughter-


An hon. MEMBER:: A cow.


Henry Alfred Mullins: Yes, an immortal cow that never died. If you followed the old traditions of that province you might get somewhere in western Canada, but you will do no good by going around the country and talking about the weakness of the poor grain grower in southern Saskatchewan and Alberta. I have here some verses that appeared in the Manitoba Free Press, and perhaps it might be well for me to read them. I asked the editor of that paper why he published an article like that. I told him that I had devoted the best part of my life to the improvement of live stock and farming generally in an endeavour to get away from exclusive grain growing, and I could not understand why ho would write an article like this. This is what he wrote:
Now conies a new Moses, whose vision is strong,
To tell me the growing of wheat was all wrong.
That only in bacon, eggs, butter, or meat Will I find the rich fortune I lost growing wheat.
Dear Colonel, pray pardon us if we refuse To take your advice, but just do as we choose. We prefer to grow wheat, even if we "go bust,"
Than be swineherds, or chore-boys, as you say we must.
Those are the kind of people who are ruining the country. For the forty years I have lived in that country, since the days of the buffalo, and after that experience I can assure the house that the best offering to-day is the good half-section in western Canada or the 200 acre farm in Ontario. To the mortgage companies, I say, "Keep your hands off the poor man." Some farmers have been inclined to be extravagant and have speculated in the stock market, and a number of them have gambled in grain. The result is that they are now in a very difficult position and some of them have given me stock certificates, which I have brought with me. They are not worth the paper they are written on. These unfortunate people have handed me these stock certificates and asked me to try to get them out of their trouble. Why do they find themselves in this position to-day? They have no credit reserve. I met one of my French Canadian friends and I asked him, "How are you getting on, Napoleon?" He said, "I am doing fine." I asked him how it 
was that so many people were not doing as well as he was. He replied: "A good father came here from Quebec and told me to get a reserve right away in '25, and I make a reserve and I have it right now." I say to the farmers of western Canada: Create a reserve now and w'hen conditions improve you will be ready to face the next depression if a depression should ever come again. I can remember, Mr. Speaker, when as a boy I threw a bag of silver into my grandfather-inlaw's buggy. He was buying cattle. At that time he was buying American silver for 50 cents on the dollar, and buying live stock with that silver. To-day our dollar has depreciated to such an extent that when we sell a shipment of cattle we receive, owing to the present rate of exchange, from S7 to S8 per head less than we did formerly. That, of course, is a very serious condition, but we have passed through worse times than we are now experiencing. In the years from 1890 to 1895 we experienced conditions that were far more serious, and it exasperates me to see men sitting back in silence and refusing to speak the truth as they know it. I do sympathize with the man that lives around Wey-burn and Yellow Grass; as regard that steam plough proposition, I can only say I am sorry for them.
I do not want to take up the time of the house any longer, but I could not help speaking out on behalf of western Canada, the land I love and which I have lived in since the buffalo days. I have seen prosperous times there and I have no doubt that prosperity will return; and in order that this may come about I say to the people there: Create a reserve so that you will be able to meet bad times if ever they should come again.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I rise to take but a small part in the discussion of this resolution. Before I refer to the resolution itself I feel I must say something in reply to the speech which we have just heard from the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins). It ill becomes him or any other member in this house to oast a slur as he did on the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland) on the score of that hon. gentleman's having seen the inside of a university. The hon. member for Marquette makes a boast of the fact that he has never been inside a university but was brought up in the hard school of experience. I need not say that anyone can see that the hon. gentleman was never inside a university. I take exception also to his insinuation with reference to the hon. member for Southeast Grey (Miss

Farm Relief-Mr. Spencer
Maophail). I have not the slightest doubt that what both the bon. member lor Bow River and the bon. member for Southeast Grey have said with regard to their constituencies is absolutely true. The hon. member for Bow River happens to come from a part of Alberta where probably the .people are going through harder times than are being experienced in any other part of the province, and in what he stated to the house he was giving the absolute facts. I say, therefore, that it ill becomes any hon. member from any part of the country to doubt another member's word when giving his views with regard to the constituency he represents. The hon. member for Marquette boasts that he has been in that country for forty years, but he forgets that many of us have been there twenty-five and thirty years and have as great a right as he has to speak for western Canada. I have got rather tired now of hearing the hon. member professing to speak solely for the farmers of the west. The speech he has just delivered was filled with contradictions. He claims that conditions 'are so good in his particular constituency that the people there are well on the way to prosperity.


Henry Alfred Mullins: The hon. gentleman is
making an incorrect statement, I said nothing of the kind. I stated that the people were not in a good position. The bon. member is making that statement for bis own purposes.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I have no desire to misquote the hon. member, but I will throw back to him the remark he made to the hon. member who sits behind me, that he was making his speech for political purposes. We all know the condition which prevails in Manitoba. We do not blame this or any other government but state simply that the conditions in that province are as bad as prevail in any other western province.


Henry Alfred Mullins: I agree with the hon.
member.


Henry Elvins Spencer: The hon. member did not say that.


Henry Alfred Mullins: I did say that.


Henry Elvins Spencer: The hon. member did not lay stress upon the actual facts. Will he contradict the statement that in certain parts of Manitoba the price of barley last year was so low that it was burned in furnaces for heating purposes?


Henry Alfred Mullins: What part of Manitoba does the hon. member allude to?


Henry Elvins Spencer: I obtained that information from the daily press.
41761-21i


Henry Alfred Mullins: They used no barley for fuel purposes in Marquette.


Henry Elvins Spencer: Marquette must be in a
better position than the rest of Manitoba. The hon. member speaks of the grain farmer as though he has no right to exist, as though he should not go into that type of business. I would remind him that more people in western Canada are carrying on diversified farming than those confining themselves solely to grain. The farmers who carry on straight grain farming do so because it pays. The hon. Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) will not publicly advocate mixed farming as a panacea for all our ills. The farmer has just as much gray matter in his head as has any other man.


Henry Alfred Mullins: Absolutely.


Robert Weir: The question under discussion was diversified farming; do not confuse the so-called diversified and mixed farming with balanced farming.


Henry Elvins Spencer: I do not quite follow the hon. minister. Those farmers in the prairie provinces who can go in for diversified farming are doing so. No man in his senses will destroy his farm for the fun of it, and it ill behooves any hon. member to increase the misunderstanding which exists unfortunately between eastern and western Canada by furthering the belief that farms are being destroyed through carelessness. When one considers that hogs fetch from 2 1-2 to 3 cents per pound, that cattle bring half the price they did two years ago, that butter is as low as 15 to 17 cents per pound as it was when I left Alberta, that eggs were selling at from 8 to 10 cents per dozen in the middle of this winter, he will recognize that there is not very much in mixed farming. I have spent sufficient of my time in replying to the speech of the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins), but I felt I could not let his statements go unanswered as I considered he was very unfair, not only to hon. members on this side of the house but to the general farming communities of western Canada.
Statements have been made by hon. members who come from drought stricken areas. I happen to be fortunate enough to come from an area which was not stricken but which had an average crop of from 23 to 25 bushels per acre. However, certain areas were destroyed by hail, and it is in this connection that remarks apply directly to the resolution now before us. As everyone knows, grain this year

Farm Relief-Mr. Luchkovich
is being produced at a loss. Some farmers had their harvest ready to cut when they were visited by hail; they had gone to the expense of producing the crop and just before they put their binder in the field or just after they had started cutting the hail swept down upon them. These farmers were left in the position of having gone to all the expense of raising a crop and then having practically nothing to take off. Having had their crops destroyed, they could not take advantage of the five cent bonus granted last year. A petition signed by a large number of farmers in the hail-swept areas was sent to the Department of Agriculture requesting action similar to that mentioned in the resolution. There is no doubt that something should be done in cases where all the expenses have been incurred and the crop destroyed just at maturity either by hail or other causes. No farming community which at any time finds great difficulty in making both ends meet can withstand this added difficulty.
Taxes have been coming in very slowly the last few years, but still less will be collected this coming year in such hailed areas. I do not think it is necessary for me to go into the details of this situation as they have been covered very fully by the hon. members for Southeast Grey (Miss Macphail) and Bow River (Mr. Garland).
In reply to the contention put forward by the hon. member for Marquette and others that stockraising is the one thing which will bring prosperity to the farmers, I would state that I know of one association shipping cattle to Great Britain which has lost no less than $19,000 during the past few months because of the difference in exchange. Whenever the hon. member for Marquette rises to speak I always think of a certain type of man often referred to in western Canada, not a farmer but one who farms the farmer. I venture to state that if the hon. member is well off in this world's goods, and I believe he is, he has not been brought to that position because of what he actually made off the farm, but rather because of what he made off the farmer, possibly through selling large tracts of land to new Canadians. I mention this simply because it is time the condition of western Canada was recognized for what it is; Canada cannot afford to allow the great industry of agriculture to go down as it surely will do if something is not done to rectify the conditions under which we are living to-day.


Mr. MICHAEL LUCHKOVICH (Vegre-ville):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for
Marquette (Mr. Mullins) objected to this corner of the house because of the way they

scratched their backs and howled; and out of the corner of his eye he looked at the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland) and, I think, referred to him as the howling demagogue from Jerusalem. I understand the hon. member for Bow River was born in Dublin, Ireland, and if that be so, he is the first Irishman who ever came out of Jerusalem. I believe, however, the hon. member for Marquette arose in his place to deal with this matter in a humorous vein rather than in the vein that has been suggested by this resolution, which is a specific one dealing with a specific subject. Most of the hon. members who have spoken during the past hour and a half have spoken about everything but that which is contained in the resolution.
The resolution refers simply to those farmers who were hailed out or who, through some other act of God, were unable to secure any advantage out of this five cent bonus that was legislated here last year. I do not rise to discuss the principle of the bonus or to support that principle; what I do wish to speak of is the inequitable manner in which the farmers of the west have been treated with respect to this legislation. Yesterday I asked an hon. member who, I believe, is a very brilliant lawyer, the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) what he thought about the bonus. He said that the bonus is nothing but a subvention to the farmer. I asked him whether he thought the bonus was a relief measure and he said that the bonus under no circumstances was legislated in this house as a relief measure. I cannot understand the difference between a bonus and a relief measure. If an industry in this country is in bad straits and needs help, the government gives it a bonus. Why give it a bonus if that industry is not in bad straits? On the same grounds if agriculture were not in bad straits, why should we legislate to give five cents for every bushel of wheat raised on the western prairies last year? In that respect I consider this five-cent piece was a relief measure to the farmers in the west. It was a relief measure to the extent that there was a great disparity between the price the farmer was getting for his products and the price he had to pay for other goods and services. It was an aid to the farmers of the west and in my estimation it certainly was a relief measure to aid those farmers who were not receiving an adequate price for their wheat.
The hon. gentleman referred to some hon. members as university graduates, or as men who scratched their backs on the walls of a university. If scratching one's back is necessary, I do not see any difference between

Farm Relief-Mr. Porteous
scratching one's back on a university, or a church or a hall, or on the gatepost of some farm.
I have under my hand a resolution which was passed in my own district and which reads:
Whereas, all the hailed-out farmers are in the poorest financial position of any other Canadian farmer; and
Whereas, we will ultimately have to pay to the dominion treasury our share of the bonus now paid per bushel of wheat; and
Whereas, the bonus does not relieve the farmer who was hailed out and went to nearly as much expense in growing a crop; and
Whereas, this bonus had incurred an added burden on such farmers in that they have to pay five cents extra for all feed and seed; and
Whereas, the purchasing power of said farmers has been reduced to worse than nothing by reason of said disaster; therefore be it
Resolved, that the federal government make arrangements to pay a bonus of one dollar per acre on the hailed-out acreage of wheat and that such acreage be determined from the 1931 census returns.
I repeat that the question is not so much on the principle of the bonus as on the application of it. If the hailed-out farmer is not going to receive any benefit from this five-cent piece, I should like to know what alternative there is for those farmers who have been hailed out? In my district, to the south of me, there is a stretch of territory about 100 miles long and ten miles wide that has been hailed out; in the north there is another stretch of territory 100 miles long and ten miles wide that has also been hailed out. The people in those areas are receiving absolutely no benefit from the legislation parliament passed last year. I do not think this is fair to those farmers who, through no fault of their own, have no crops to take to the elevator and therefore do not receive the five-cent piece for each bushel haled there. I believe, in lieu of this five-cent piece, in lieu of this aid, the people who have been hailed out are entitled to some alternative to the legislation which was passed last year.


Mr. Y. C. PORTEOUS (North Grey):: Mr. Speaker, I agree with the previous speaker, that much of the discussion has centred, not on the bonus but on other points that have arisen in the debate on the resolution which is at present before the house. The reason why last year legislation was enacted providing a bonus of five cents on wheat was that there were several complaints as to the price of wheat. I should like to direct the attention of the house to the fact that the price of wheat has materially increased in the last year, and I believe that average increase is in the neighbourhood of fifteen cents a bushel.
I should like to point out also that during that period other agricultural products have decreased in price. Therefore if the wheat grower is to be bonused, other producers of agricultural products should also be bonused. We have heard complaints from northern Saskatchewan because they were not in relief districts; we have heard complaints from southern Saskatchewan because they did not receive a bonus, but so far as the debate has proceeded on this resolution, we have not heard complaints from the vast majority of the farmers in the rest of the dominion.
The question of relief has been spoken of in connection with this resolution. I am not in a position to comment upon that except that I believe that relief should be given in any area where there is no crop and where the farmer of necessity needs relief. As regards bonuses, I am not in favour of them, but if we are to bonus one branch of agriculture, we should bonus all branches of agriculture which are suffering just as much as the wheat grower. We should not single out the wheat grower and give him a bonus while the man who grows oats or other grain is not bonused. If the government is contemplating any further legislation in that regard the bonus should apply to all branches of agriculture and to all parts of the dominion.


Mr. W. G. WEIR (Macdonald):: I am very sorry that the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins) has left the chamber. I hope he will avail himself of the first opportunity to make in his own constituency the same address that he made here this afternoon. Might I add that I am sure the opportunity will be afforded him almost any time at his convenience, and if there is any hiding to be done, I think it will be my hon. friend who will do it. In his discourse this afternoon he quite conveniently left out that part of his speech he usually makes where he takes around with him his cream can. I must confess that I cannot see that his speech had anything to do with the matter that is really under discussion this afternoon, namely, the application of the five cents a bushel bonus on wheat.
I listened yesterday to the very fine distinction made by the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) with respect to the application of the five cents a bushel bonus on wheat and the giving of direct relief. If I understood him correctly, he placed the five cents a bushel bonus on one side, as applying to one particular need, and direct relief on the other, for another purpose. I have no objection whatever to that division. In fact, I think
326	COMMONS
Farm Relief-Mr. Weir (Macdonald)
that is exactly how it has worked out. So far as the farmers of my own constituency are concerned they were mighty glad to receive the five cents a bushel bonus cheque with the signature of the Prime Minister upon it-that is, those who got it. But the problem is in taking care of the class of farmers who had some crop on which they could receive some money by way of the five cents a bushel bonus, as contrasted with the class of farmers dependent on direct relief. I could name a large number of farmers in my constituency who this year did not thresh as much grain as they sowed last spring. I could name other farmers who got less than 1,000 bushels of all kinds of grain from a half-section of land. This class of farmers could not participate in the five cents a bushel bonus on wheat simply because they had to keep all their grain for feeding purposes; nor on the other hand can they claim that they had a complete crop failure. I doubt very much if a crop that yields 1,000 bushels from a half-section is of any benefit at all. It might just as well be regarded as a complete crop failure. At the present time I know of several farmers in my constituency who are hauling two year old wheat straw for feeding purposes a distance of eight to twelve miles. I am told that along a certain highway running about twenty-five miles, thirty dead horses can be seen from the road. The local veterinary tells me that he has never before had as many calls to attend sick horses as he has this winter; and he attributes the sickness to lack of feed.
Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, we had an invasion of grasshoppers in our district last year. They covered quite a large area and did considerable damage. I am not sure that we really know how much damage they did to our grain. Whether or not these grasshoppers damaged our feed, such as we have, particularly roughage, to any great extent I do not know. The fact of the matter is that such feed as our district has does not seem to have substance, with the result that we are not getting results from the feeding it.
I have in mind also another district which previous to two years ago had really three successive crop failures, not from drought, not from drifting, but, as hon. members may be surprised to learn, from flooding. Here is the situation in that area. They had a fair crop last year and again this year, and on this year's crop they secured the five cents a bushel bonus, but having had two or three successive crop failures previous to that, and with the low price of grain prevailing, they are hardly in any better position than if 
they had had no crop at all this year. If these farmers had had a complete crop failure they would have been able to participate in direct relief, but as they had some crop, they must simply carry on as best they can, and I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that they are not carrying on very well. The farmers I speak of are between the divisions which the hon. member for Regina has described. They had a little crop, so it cannot be said they had a complete crop failure, but they did not have sufficient crop on which they could sell any appreciable amount of grain from which they could get the benefit of the five cents a bushel bonus. They have no money, they cannot borrow any. The municipalities in which they live are not in a position to assist them, and are certainly unable to meet the situation. More than that, the provincial government is not in a position to materially assist them. The particular municipalities that I have in mind-and I hesitate to refer to this-a year ago only collected something over 50 per cent of their taxes, and last year only in the neighbourhood of 30 per cent. It is very easy to see therefore that they are quite unable to meet the situation.
I have been in touch with the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) on this matter, and I am satisfied that he realizes the situation that prevails. I know it is a very large problem, one with far-reaching effects, but I do want the house to appreciate the disadvantage suffered by the man who is in between the one who can qualify to receive some benefit from the five cents a bushel bonus and the man who has had a complete crop failure. He is in a very difficult position, and I know of my own knowledge that in many cases he is not able to carry on and put in a crop, let alone maintain his live stock until the grass grows, unless he receives some form of assistance. It is necessary to have feed shipped in from a distance, carload lots of hay and grain, and the freight charge increases the price about 30 per cent. Surely there is some opportunity for relief in that direction.
I hope before this debate closes the Minister of Agriculture or some member of the government will be able to tell the house of some policy which the government is prepared to adopt to relieve the situation which I have described. It is essential that something be done, and if we can look forward to some definite policy to meet the situation I for one will certainly give it my wholehearted support.
There is another matter in connection with the five cents a bushel bonus on wheat to which I might refer. We in the province of

Farm Relief-Mr. Brown
Manitoba produce ordinarily about 50 per cent, roughly speaking, of the barley grown in western Canada. That is an important item with us. Barley is one of our main cash crops, yet we are not in a position to receive anything in the way of a bonus on barley when we come to ship it to other parts of Canada. We also find that the freight rate is such that we cannot ship it locally without being subjected to excessive freight costs. It is more to our advantage to ship it for export rather than for domestic use. That is the situation, and I think it is only fair to say, although I do not want to draw any distinction, this five cent per bushel bonus on wheat in reality acts more to the advantage of Saskatchewan and Alberta than it does to Manitoba.
Mr. Speaker, I think the federal assistance to our western farmers would have worked out much more equitably if it had been applied on the basis as suggested in this resolution, and for that reason I shall lend it my support.


Mr. J. L. BROWN (Lisgar):: Mr. Speaker,
I agree with what the member for Vegreville (Mr. Luchkovich) has said, that very much of this discussion has been entirely outside of the matters referred to in the resolution itself. It is not my intention at this time to enter into a discussion of the general situation that confronts agriculture. I hope that we shall have an opportunity of doing so before the close of the session.
So far as the five cent bonus is concerned, I do not think there was any particular need for members on the other side to come to the defence of the government in regard to it. It was not opposed by any member on this side of the house, and so far as those who received the bonus were concerned, I am certain they received it gladly. So far as I know the question was not discussed by any bodies of organized farmers in Manitoba. True, at the annual convention of the United Farmers of Manitoba we did make a very clear declaration that we did not accept the five cent bonus as a "compensating adjustment," as the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) referred to it a year ago, for certain other disabilities under which we labour. I tried to make that point clear in the house a year ago. We accepted the five cent bonus as an earnest of the willingness of the government to help the western farmers to bear the very serious losses that they had incurred during the last two or three years.
I do not think it was worth while making any fine distinctions-such, for instance, as the member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) made
-between the five cent bonus subvention to the growers of wheat and the relief measures that were necessitated in other parts of the province. I hope at some future time the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) will develop his argument and tell us what the distinction is between mixed farming, balanced farming and diversified farming. I shall listen with a good deal of interest when he expounds his views on the matter. Foolishly I had thought those were three different terms for the same thing. However, perhaps my mind is not capable of grasping those very fine distinctions.
I am sorry that the member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins) is not in the chamber, for I received a message from a friend of mine the other day that I should like to deliver to him in the hearing of the house.
I think we should turn our thoughts definitely to the resolution before the house. It seems to me that if we keep our minds fixed upon it we need not carry on the discussion at very great length. Undoubtedly the particular measures of relief that the government adopted last session have not worked out equitably. I do not think it needs any argument to prove that. There are farmers in the northern part of the prairie provinces who reaped large harvests, and they got their five cents per bushel bonus. It is not at all to the point for the member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell) to say that even that bonus did not put farming on a profitable basis. To carry out his argument logically, it would be better if the farmers had small crops instead of large. The district I represent is in the same condition as the district represented by the hon. member for Macdonald (Mr. Weir). It is an open question whether a crop that barely pays the cost of harvesting places the farmer in any better position than if he had a complete crop failure. I have seen crops hailed out, and the farmer in grave doubt as to whether it would pay the cost of harvesting. Everybody who has farmed and who has had experience of hail damage knows that. In very many cases when the farmer has harvested his hailed crop he has found he would have been very much better off had he not touched it at all. This is true of the situation that prevails in many sections of Manitoba-not a complete crop failure, but so close to it that the crop itself did not pay the cost of harvesting.
The situation that confronts us, as the member for Macdonald has pointed out, is that a very large number of farmers find themselves short of feed, their horses and cattle are dying,
32S
Farm Reliej-Mr. Brown

and up to the present, wherever the fault lies, they have not been able to get any measure of relief. As a result in the coming spring many of those farmers will be unable to provide themselves with the necessary feed and seed in order to put in their crops. I visited the centre of my constituency a short time ago, and there met forty or fifty farmers at an afternoon meeting. They laid their case before me very fully. It is a comparatively small district, but they told me that they would need in the neighbourhood of twenty-five hundred bushels of wheat, oats and barley for seed, and about six thousand bushels of oats in order to feed their horses while they were putting in their crop. As has been pointed out, the municipalities are not in a position to give that assistance. Before I left for Ottawa I made it a point to get in contact with the secretaries of the municipalities, and I would judge that even the best of them had not up to the first of January been able to collect more than forty per cent of their taxes. One municipal secretary wrote to me that they had $75,000 of unpaid taxes on their books, and owed the schools $50,000. So it is no use looking to the municipalities to provide relief. Neither is it any use to look to the provincial governments, for they are now at their wit's end so far as finances are concerned. I fully realize that even the Dominion government could not borrow enough money to recoup the farmers for the losses they have sustained during the last two or three years. Still the Dominion government, more than any other governing body, is in a position to afford some measure of relief, and this is a situation we must face. It is true that it will be a measure of relief to the individual farmer, but it is also a great national question which this parliament should consider. As far as possible we should give such help as will ensure that the land which properly should be seeded in grain will be so seeded. At the moment it may seem that the raising of wheat is being carried on at a loss, nevertheless it is true and will continue to be true in the future that the wheat crop is the one thing above all others on which we must depend for the prosperity not only of the western farmer but of all lines of industry east and west, since the sale of the wheat crop in late years has been our one source of new wealth.
So, Mr. Speaker, I think I shall content myself at the moment with emphasizing these paints and lending my support to the resolution which has been presented to the house, the effeot of which I think is perfectly well understood. The giving of the five cent bonus

has not worked out equitably with regard to all classes of agriculture, while the granting of relief on an acreage basis, though more difficult to administer, would work out in a more equitable way. I have no criticism to offer of the way in which the five cent bonus was administered; I do not object because the landlords were not able to get the advantage of that bonus. Indeed I think that was a very wise provision. The suggestion was made from this side of the house last year that care should be taken to see that none of that money went into the hands of the mortgage companies or banks; I think the bon. member for South Battleford (Mr. ValLanee) particularly emphasized that point. It may be true-and in fact I know there were individual cases-that certain landlords should have received a part of the bonus, but to have carried out that plan would have meant the investigation of every individual lease, which in the very nature of things was impossible. So I freely admit that nothing else could have been done in that respect than was done.
That is all I desire to say at the moment, Mr. Speaker. At some future time I will avail myself of the opportunity to discuss in a more general way the conditions of agriculture and the means of affording relief.


Mr. J. L. BOWMAN (Dauphin):: Mr. Speaker, until a moment ago I had not intended to say anything with respect to the resolution now before the house, but the concluding remarks of the two previous speakers seem to have indicated the attitude of the house with respect to this question. After all, the giving of this bonus is a matter of business administration, and if the house is to adopt a different method of giving assistance 'to the farmers of the west, that method must be based upon some scheme which can be administered by the government.
At the outset I must say that I am quite in accord with much that has been said by the -hon. member for Macdonald (Mr. Weir) and the hon. member for Lisgar (Mr. Brown). I am quite free to admit that the five cent bonus is not perfect. The government did not expect that it would be a perfect measure of relief to the farmers of western Canada. When the bonus was put through it was felt that it would meet, as well as any other method which had been suggested, the need it was intended to meet.
I agree with the hon. member for Vegre-ville (Mr. Luchkovioh), who said that the discussion this afternoon had taken in matters far beyond the scope of the resolution. But he went on to say that the resolution before


IS, 1932
[Stage Direction]
Farm Relie!-Mr. Bowman
the house was specific in character, and with that statement I entirely disagree. I cannot imagine a more vague or indefinite resolution being submitted to any legislative body. There is absolutely no suggestion in the resolution as to how this particular bonus is to be substituted for t)he five cent bonus. The hon. member for Macdonald closed his remarks by suggesting that the Minister of Agriculture should see that something was done. The hon. member for Lisgar, in concluding his remarks, stated that such help should be given as would ensure that the land which should be seeded to grain next year would be seeded, and throughout the different speeches that have been made on this subject we find this vagueness which I should think would make the resolution unacceptable to the government of 'the day.
After all, if the government is to pay out a large sum of money it must be done on some definite and distinct basis. In the resolution there is no suggestion that the new bonus, subvention or measure of relief, whatever you call it, should be based on the wheat crop. It is left very indefinite; the bonus is to be given to those farmers suffering from failure or near failure of crop. I am quite in accord with what the hon. member for Lisgar said this afternoon, that it cost those who harvested their crop more than it would if they had never cut it but simply left it in the field.
How, I would ask, is the government to estimate the difference between failure and near failure? Again, if the government is to change its plan and adopt another method of bonusing, what particular sort of failure is to be taken into consideration? Is it intended to cover the farmer who has sown his land to wheat only, or is it to cover the farmer who has sown his land to oats and barley? In the province of Manitoba the barley crop is most important. For the past year it has not been a successful crop, and the farmers have suffered a great loss. Is this resolution intended to apply to such a farmer? I submit that if the resolution is passed, it will apply to him. More than that, it opens up this whole tremendous problem, so that the farmer, no matter what branch of the industry he may be in, will be coming along asking for relief.
An hon. MEMBER:: Why not?


James Langstaff Bowman: That is quite proper,
but mind you we are dealing with the 1931 crop. Take an individual farmer who has had a partial crop failure:	How are you
going to indicate what the percentage of his
failure is? Or what portion of the dollar an acre or any other scheme which may be decided upon is that farmer to get? How are you going to figure it out at this late date? It seems to me that if the government adopted a scheme such as is here suggested it would cost millions of dollars to put it into operation, to get the necessary information, and to make payment on the basis of any scheme suggested by the resolution.
So far as Saskatchewan is concerned, I have nothing to say but this, that whatever relief may be given to the southern part of that province I am sure the rest of the dominion will be only too glad to pay its share. To any other part of western Canada which may have suffered from drought or hail large sums of money will have to be paid in direct relief. Large sums will have to be paid to provide seed, and it does seem to me that while the five cent bonus has not reached those farmers, nevertheless the direct relief which it will be necessary to pay will compensate, and in a great many cases more than compensate, for the five cents a bushel.
I believe it was the hon. member for Wey-burn (Mr. Young), who said, speaking of that area, that all the farmers in the district were on relief, and the figure he gave was 50,000 farmers. I understand it has been estimated that some six or seven million dollars will be required to provide seed. Perhaps I omitted, in the proper sequence of my remarks, to refer to the statement made by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Kennedy) that only land in fit shape for putting in crop should be considered. If we take that statement, how is the government at this date to decide, with respect to 1931, just what land in fit shape for crop is to be taken into consideration? I am sure that all hon. members on either side of the house representing rural western constituencies would be only too glad to get together and if possible devise some different bonus which would perhaps be made acceptable than the five cent bonus. Personally I should be glad to support anything of the kind, but up to the present time no better method has been suggested. The five cent bonus policy has been acted upon and at this late date I do not see that the government could adopt an entirely different policy, and one upon which no two members of the house seem to be agreed. The adoption of this resolution by the house would do nothing more than throw the matter open again; that is the only effect it would have.
There is absolutely nothing definite in the resolution. No definite proposition was suggested by the hon. member for Assiniboia

Farm Relief-Mr. Hepburn
(Mr. McKenzie) when he made his speech. He filed a resolution which had been passed by one of the farmer parties in Saskatchewan, and in view of the fact that this immense problem would be thrown open once more, it seems to me an absolute impossibility for the government to adopt the scheme proposed if in fact one is suggested. For that reason and that reason only I cannot see my way clear to support the resolution, much as I should like to support any resolution which would deal more equitably with this question or with the problem of the western farmer.


Mr. ILSLEY:: Is it the hon. gentleman's interpretation of the resolution that it refers only to the 1931 crop?


James Langstaff Bowman: Yes.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I took it that it applied to the future.


James Langstaff Bowman: No. I was not clear on that point myself and I sent a note across to the hon. member for Assinilboia (Mr. McKenzie) who replied that it referred to the 1931 crop. Consequently my argument is along that line.


Mr. M. F. HEPBURN (West Elgin):: As one opposed to 'the application of a bonus of any kind so far as it applies to basic production, I want to say a word or two before voting on this resolution. To-day we are suffering from world wide overproduction due to the application of just such policies as the one here proposed. As a matter of fact, I should like to vote for the abolition of the five cent bonus entirely. We are suffering from overproduction because of acts like this one which we are asked to pass upon. Some people will say we have underconsumption, but we have overproduction so far as the basic producer is concerned so long as he is not getting cost of production. Take any basic commodity and trace the history of its marketing for the last few years and you will find that the low price is attributable to interference by meddling politicians with the law of supply and demand.
Some time ago I spoke with regard to the abrogation of the New Zealand trade treaty and I referred to what was happening in connection with the sugar industry. There,
I pointed out, was an industry which had the advantage of every possible protective tariff and bonus; but to-day the price of sugar is about 1| cents per pound so far as the basic producer is concerned, and that is due to the application of an unsound economic policy. What is wrong with wheat to-day? What is the reason for this low commodity price? 
It is due-and I say this in all kindness- to the action of some of our western friends with respect to the western wheat pool. That pool was formed primarily for the purpose of maintaining an orderly system of marketing, but instead of that the whole pool went off on a tangent and endeavoured to take out more than it put in. It disregarded the law of supply and demand and bolstered up a false price for wheat. The price was maintained as long as the pool held the wheat off the market; but unfortunately for the pool, simultaneously across the line a similar effort was made to disregard the law of supply and demand, although by a different method. President Hoover, who made promises similar to those made by the right hon. the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) during his campaign, promised the wheat farmer a higher price for his commodity, and in an endeavour to fulfil his promise he permitted a large quantity of wheat to be kept off the market. The upshot was that between Canada and the United States we held something like four or five hundred million bushels of wheat which should have been put on the market in an orderly way, with the natural result that there was a world increase in the price of wheat. But the price was maintained only so long as we adhered to an uneconomic policy of holding marketable wheat off the open market. Other countries took advantage of the high price created by our action and sold their wheat. We held back and finally had to dump our wheat on the market, and this simply brought about chaos. It was our own fault entirely. With this condition of overproduction, does any reasonable man think that the solution is to bonus production and further aggravate the situation?
My hon. friend from North Grey (Mr. Porteous) mentioned the dairy farmer. In my district the dairy farmer gets 16 cents a pound for his butter, which is below cost of production. He is therefore as much entitled to a bonus out of the public treasury as the western wheat farmer, but I do not advocate any such unsound economic policy. If we have an overproduction in dairy produce, and obviously we have, the cure is not to stimulate production and thus probably aggravate the situation.
Let us look at the situation from another angle. Governments only have one source of revenue, they must tax from the pockets of the people. Admittedly we have an overproduction, but that condition is world wide and the struggle for markets is becoming fiercer. The countries which will be put out of competition in this process of elimination-we

Farm Relief-Mr. Swanston
must have a process of elimination to get back on sound economic ground-will be the countries with the highest cost of production. When we dip into the treasury to the extent of $11,000,000 or $12,000,000 and distribute that amount in an effort falsely to bolster up the production of a commodity with which the markets of the world are now glutted, we are doing an injury to the country as a whole and to the wheat producer in particular.
I do not know just how I can vote on this measure. I am sorry it emanates from this side of the house because I had hoped that we would get back once again to good, sound economic grounds. The meddling politicians who have interfered with the law of supply and demand have created this condition of chaos. I believe the only thing left for me to do is to vote against my hon. friend's motion, and, should the opportunity present itself, I intend to vote against the principle of granting a bonus to any basic commodity.


Mr. J. A. FRASER (Cariboo):: Mr. Speaker, I desire to express a word of appreciation of the extension of the bonus on wheat to the Peace river block in British Columbia. I assure the house that the people in that district appreciate the payments which have been made to them. The crop there has been quite abundant, but because of the distance from export markets a substantial amount of the value must be paid in transportation charges, and the five cent bonus has been of considerable help. The people there have asked me to express to the government their appreciation of this bonus.


Mr. J. B. SWANSTON (Maple Creek):: Mr. Speaker, the resolution under discussion reads in part as follows:
Therefore be it resolved: that in the opinion of this house the government should give immediate consideration to a more equitable and less discriminatory solution of this problem.
The resolution does not suggest any new method of meeting the difficulty. Certain portions of the constituency of Maple Creek were able to produce small amounts of wheat, and naturally those farmers who were able to grow some wheat are very appreciative of the bonus. However, along with others, I was unfortunate enough not to be able to produce any wheat; therefore I received no benefit from the bonus. At the time the budget was brought down on June 1 we had no idea that there would be a crop failure. Later on in the session, when we found that a crop failure would occur, the western Conservative members interviewed the government to see if the bonus could be put on an
acreage basis. We were told that there were difficulties which could not be surmounted and that it would have to continue as a five cent per bushel bonus.
With reference to the suggestion that a dollar per acre be paid, I know that the people in the territories which were dried out and where there was no crop will be quite * willing to accept anything. If, after carrying the burden of relief and supplying seed for this year, the government can see its way clear to give us one dollar or more per acre, I am sure it will be greatly appreciated.
Mr. CAMERON R. McINTOSH (North Battleford):	Mr. Speaker, in continuing for
a brief time the debate on the resolution moved by the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. McKenzie) I intend to refer to the remarks of a number of the previous speakers.
I could not hear the remarks of the speaker who immediately preceded me, but I did hear, and with considerable satisfaction, the short speech of the hon. member for West Elgin (Mr. Hepburn). He stated that the wheat pools of the west interfered with the economic law of supply and demand. That is the usual argument against the wheat pools of western Canada; but as one who has given consistent support to these pools, both on the platform and in my own press, I feel it necessary to point out that the leading men in the pools, especially in Saskatchewan, state that as far as they were concerned they never held wheat off the market. When there was a market for wheat, they were on the market, and the one outstanding principle of the wheat pools is to keep the market from being flooded and thus placing the farmer in the position of receiving nothing of value for his wheat crop. The pools operate to regulate the market, not to interfere with the economic law of supply and demand. Although the wheat pool of Saskatchewan is still in difficulties, as far as the elevator end of it is concerned it will repay every dollar owed to the provincial treasury.
The hon. member for Dauphin (Mr. Bowman) has asked: why open up the question? That would seem to indicate fear on his part; he is afraid to open up the question in order to solve it. I do not think that is statesmanship. Statesmanship has very little fear in it; it generally has an objective, as far as the nation is concerned, and it goes forward to work out that objective. If this legislation is inequitable, if it is unfair and unjust, the government should come to the rescue and make it fair and just. There should
Farm Relief-Mr. McIntosh


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Mr. McINTOSH:: Just a minute. I know my hon. friends opposite are trying to defend their policy in Saskatchewan because there is one Liberal on the relief commission, but the man, if he be a Liberal, who is on that relief commission, does not represent the Liberals of Saskatchewan; he represents the banks. That is all he does. Even if the government has one Liberal on that commission, that is no argument that everything is satisfactory about it. I believe, as regards the administration of relief in Saskatchewan, the commission to a large extent is really trying to do its best, but when you consider that every relief agent appointed by that commission has been appointed by an out-and-out Conservative, you can have an idea immediately how the outside work in the way of administering that relief in Saskatchewan is handled.


Robert Weir: Does the hon. member suggest that every relief officer in Saskatchewan is a Conservative?


Cameron Ross McIntosh: I did not say that. What I said was that the man who appointed them was a Conservative. You can 'draw your own conclusions. It is not necessary to go into his history. If you need it, it may come at some future time.


William Addison Beynon: It was the commission who appointed these men.


John Vallance: The government lent him to the commission.


William Addison Beynon: No. One of them I know was nominated by the Hon. J. G. Gardiner, ex-Premier of Saskatchewan.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: I notice my hon. friend does not know very much about the matter.


William Addison Beynon: I know more than my
hon. friend does.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Well, if you do you have not given expression to it. Coming to the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins), he talked eloquently this afternoon about mixed farming or balanced farming, if you like to call it that. I am not in balanced farming, but I have worked on a farm. I earned on a farm money that helped to put me through school. My father was a farmer, a pioneer in eastern and western Canada. From both sides of the family I am of agricultural stock and I am not ashamed of it. So far as

Farm Reliej-Mr. McIntosh
defending the farmers and fighting their battles is concerned, it is not necessary to be a dirt farmer to 'be able to do that. A university man like the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland), for instance, can defend the farmers just as well as if he never saw a farm. It is true he is a .practical farmer too, and that does not do him any harm. But the hon. member for Marquette goes out of his way to put before the house practically the idea that it is unnecessary to have an education. There is the interpretation of Toryism at its worst. There is a representative conception of what the Tory party stands for-darkness, not light. When you get a man representing a western riding telling parliament and the people of Canada it is not necessary to have a college education, it is not necessary to have any education to defend the farmers-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No, no.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Yes, I know hon. members laugh, but let them laugh at the man who made the statement. I am simply stating his argument; I am not making the statement;
I am laughing at it. I always thought education was power; that education meant the development of mental power. It would appear that as yet the hon. member for Marquette does not understand that. If a man has not some mental power, how is he going to adjust himself to mixed farming, live stock raising, producing pigs, horses, mules, jack asses or anything else? It cannot be done. We shall have to leave it to the hon. member for Marquette to make a success of these various activities.
Perhaps I had better get down to saying something about the resolution. After the theatrical performance we have had from Long Lake and Marquette this afternoon on making the production of mules, asses, other live stock and so forth, attractive or profitable, it might be well to tell the house that so far as the constituency which I have the honour to represent is concerned, we grow wheat, we grow practically every other cereal product; we are in the live stock business; we are in dairying; we have lumbering and fishing and we have every requirement in the way of building up a district that is possessed by any other part of Canada.


Mr. BEAUBIEN:: Do you produce any
mules?


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Not yet. We are going
to import the hon. member for Marquette to show us how.
May I say this: any setback to mixed farming in northern Saskatchewan or in northern Canada, east or west, came about at what time? The biggest setback that the production of live stock has ever had in this country was given in 1911 when hon. gentlemen defeated reciprocity. There is no question about that. That movement on the part of the Conservative party in Canada practically ruined or wiped out live stock raising in that part of Saskatchewan which I represent in the House of Commons. It is only now beginning to come back. We had the spectacle in 1930 of hon. members of the party opposite going to the country and giving a pledge that if returned to power they would support the live stock industry-the very thing which they destroyed in 1911. In North Battleford today we are organizing stock yards, and we are going to take care of our own production. We are going to return to the farmers every cent possible in connection with live stock production-that's diversified farming for you.


An hon. MEMBER:: What about the resolution?


Cameron Ross McIntosh: I have been speaking
on it indirectly dealing with hon. members across the floor. Coming now to the resolution-[DOT]


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: No, on second thought
I do not think I will. I wish to refer to a statement or two made by my hon. friend from Regina (Mr. Turnbull). I always like to hear him. He and I work on the same committee of the house, and I was delighted to hear him speak yesterday. In trying to make out that the relief legislation was well rounded out, as it were, that it should apply to the northern part of the province but that it did not need to apply to the south, he went into the derivation of the word "relief", and his argument was that it would be all right to have the five cents a bushel bonus apply in the north and the government measure of relief apply in the south. That may be all right to a certain degree; I admit that, but I believe that if this resolution were worked out properly and the acreage bonus applied to all Saskatchewan, it would be very much better.
My hon. friend in carrying forward his argument said that there was a distinct difference between "assistance"' and "relief."' I was a little curious and I looked up the
Farm Relief-Mr. McIntosh

etymology of the words. You know, Mr. Speaker, that words, like our hon. friends opposite, have a history. There is a certain evolution about them. They have a primitive meaning, which reminds me of the national policy of our friends opposite-it is very primitive. It does not appear to apply at all to civilization as we have it now. It is absolutely unworkable. It is too primitive, like some of the methods used to prolong its existence.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Mr. Speaker, by way of recapitulation of my remarks before recess, it is evident that the Liberal party would not pursue a policy of fear in dealing with a resolution of this kind. The Liberal party would broaden it out in order to build on it sound legislation. Fear is always dissociated from any policy of the Liberal party. It is a tradition of the Liberal party to deal with a problem courageously and go through with it to the end. Consequently the policy I am advocating is not a policy of fear, neither is it a policy to be applied to one branch of agriculture and not to another branch. The Conservative party are ready to apply the bonus or bounty principle to one branch of our industrial life, but they are afraid to apply it to the other. That to my mind is not sound policy; it is an unstable foundation upon which to build a great dominion. Since, this policy is applicable only to wheat growing and not to the other divisions of agriculture, perhaps, as I said before, it grows out of the national policy of my hon. friends opposite, and as such it is false and should not be supported.


An hon. MEMBER:: Sure.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: As my hon. friend opposite says, "sure," obviously he shares my view that we cannot build up Canada into a great manufacturing and agricultural country by' trying to bind all parts of the dominion together by bonuses and other similar means.
Moreover, if a policy is nothing but practical, what good is it? Why should we approach a question of this kind as an elephant or a buffalo might charge an express train, relying wholly on physical strength, and not attempting to bring to our aid logic and common sense? The approach to this problem should not be merely practical, we should combine practice and theory in the right pro-
portions; in a word, our approach should be scientific. If we were to pursue the policy of the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Mullins), a policy formulated outside of ou-r universities or parliament, we would ignore all intellectuality and not get very far.


Henry Alfred Mullins: When I referred to education I had in mind a man with brains; I did not mean the man who has no brains, but has education. If the hon. gentleman wishes to take that to himself he can do so.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: I was not referring in a personal way to my hon. friend, but if it comes down to a discussion of not having any brains, I know he might be accepted as an authority on the question, so I shall not waste time discussing that with him. I am merely pointing out what the approach of the Liberal party would be to a question of this kind-how it requires brains, not simply noise. Neither should this question be approached in the light of what an hon. member described this afternoon as the "sound financing of the Conservative party." He was telling us what the Conservatives had done for Canada in a financial way. I have read some history, and I find that since confederation all the Conservative party has done for the benefit of Canada financially speaking, over a period of beyond a quarter of a century, was to cut the national debt by 127,000,000. What is the history of the Liberal party in this respect? They put the nation on a sound financial basis, and then the nation went forward to victory in the sphere of home and foreign trade.


An hon. MEMBER:: Beauharnois!


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Never mind blowing off steam about Beauharnois. A little order, please.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Order.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: 
Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Cameron Ross McIntosh: Yes, that is the significance. But we will proceed. Other meanings are:
-help, aid, succour, support.
Murray's New English Dictionary gives this definition:
The action of helping or aiding in an undertaking or necessity; furtherance, succour, the help afforded, aid, support, relief.
Now, let us take the dictionary meaning of relief:
Relief: payment varying in value or kind, aid, help, assistance in money towards saving something.
In other words the term "assistance" means "relief;" and the term "relief" means "assistance." Now, things which are equal to the same thing are equal to one another; therefore the term assistance simply means relief; and the term relief simply means assistance. That is all there is to it. So there is no use wasting any more time about that.
I want to prove in another way that the term assistance means relief, and I propose to do so out of the mouth of the Prime Minister himself. When he introduced this measure on July 24, 1931, he advanced three arguments in support of it. The first argument was the low price of wheat; the next, this low price of wheat in relation to the cost of production up to that time; and the last argument was expressed in these words:
The third reason is the necessity of a measure of relief for western Canadian producers.
According to the statement made by the Prime Minister on the floor of this House of Commons, this bonus legislation was at best a relief measure. I want to make that plain in order that the people of western Canada may be put right in connection with it.
Now before concluding, let me say that we may divide the resolution into three parts. The first statement is that the legislation of last year was unjust and unfair. I do not think there is any doubt about that. The next point is that it was so unjust and so unfair that the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities took up that unfairness and unjustness and, as a result, petitioned the government. That association covers Saskatchewan from one end to the other; it
represents the rural municipal life of the whole province, and consequently it means something. In that connection we say that since the legislation was unjust, unfair and inequitable, and since it did not appeal to the province of Saskatchewan or to western Canada the cabinet should come forward courageously and reshape this legislation into something that will have more appeal to the farmers of the prairie provinces.
In that connection may I say, Mr. Speaker, that I am only too glad to commend the Prime Minister and his cabinet for going as far as they have gone in this direction. I do not think it is sound, but there may be the argument of emergency in its favour. I know from where it comes; I know what is back of it, but in the present emergency in western Canada I would be the last to say that the farmers in my riding who received the five cents per bushel should not be thankful for it. But throughout my riding I made it plain that although many of the farmers in the constituency of North Battleford received five cents a bushel for the wheat they produced, in accepting that bonus they should be very careful not to allow the government or the Conservative party of Canada at the same time to sell them the principle of protection, because after all is said and done a five cent sop is not enough to sell agriculture in this country into protective bondage for all time.
Might I say further, Mr. Speaker, that in the riding of North Battleford the average wheat production would be perhaps 30 bushels to the acre which, at 5 cents a bushel, would mean $1.50 per acre. Therefore, as far as the constituency of North Battleford is concerned, I do not see that any great benefit will come from this proposed legislation. There are some parts of the riding down towards Saskatoon where the average production would be only from eight to ten bushels to the acre, and in those districts a limited number of farmers might receive 50 cents, 40 cents, or 25 cents more per acre. That would be helpful. Beyond that they would not benefit by this legislation at all. I am speaking for the rest of the province and for the farmers throughout western Canada. If the SI per seeded acre bonus could be applied generally all over the west, the money paid in the areas where relief has been necessary could be applied on the amount spent for all such relief.
While I am on this point let me say that I think this note business is wrong. I do not know who initiated it, whether it was planned by the Prime Minister or by his cabinet, but
Farm Relief-Mr. McIntosh

some person is responsible for it. They tell us legislation is initiated in the House of Commons, by the cabinet and sometimes in the office of the Prime Minister. Well, some person initiated this giving of a note in each case of relief, and what I fear in connection with it is that each of these notes may be held as a political club at election time. If that is the case that is enough for me; I would go out and fight my own party on a principle of that kind. Why take the note at all? There are thousands of merchants in Canada carrying accounts ranging from S100 to SI,000 without notes. They have trusted their customers and they are likely to get more money in that way than the government may ever receive through these notes. So I say these notes should be discontinued, and a policy adopted which will be more just to the farmers of western Canada.
In closing may I say, Mr. Speaker, that I support this resolution. I do not think it is sound from the point of view of my constituency, my province or this dominion, but I am supporting it because for the time being we cannot get rid of the national policy out of which it has grown. Therefore, in order to help the farmers in an emergency I am only too willing to stand in my place in parliament and say that if the government in its wisdom could go further and grant a bonus of SI for every acre seeded, I believe in the long run we would be further ahead. I say this although I am opposed to the principle of the resolution, because I believe public money would not be wasted, as much of it is now, by so doing.
Let me make one further observation. Had the Liberal principle of unemployment insurance been adopted fifteen or twenty years ago in this country we could have had built up by now a sum of money sufficient to take care of our industrial workers for several years. We could have had millions of dollars in a fund of that kind, which would be available for individual unemployment relief purposes. The money we are spending to-day, in many ways uselessly, in trying to help the industrially unemployed, could be used in behalf of agriculture, for the benefit of those who have had no crops, those who are destitute and others who could be put on a better basis by spending national funds in a legitimate way to help them through a trying emergency until they would be able to care for themselves.
I will conclude, Mr. Speaker, by endorsing the resolution and hoping the house may take favourable action upon it.


Mr. G. D. STANLEY (East Calgary):: We have had a fairly wide discussion of the motion itself, as well as of almost every other subject which, directly or indirectly, could be related to the motion. As I understand it, this resolution has brought about a discussion on the granting of a bonus on the wheat raised in western Canada as opposed to the granting of a bonus, on an acreage basis, to those who may undertake to raise wheat. The question which naturally suggests itself is whether it is a wiser plan to extend the bonus to those who have produced wheat in western Canada or, on the other hand, to extend it to those who prepare acreage, actually producing or not producing wheat as the case may be.
The principle of the bonus, judging from the attitude of the mover of the resolution, is not condemned; it seems to be accepted as a good thing. When we come to the purpose of the government in regard to this matter, I take it that they propose to advance to the producers of wheat certain assistance, and they have some reasons for so doing. Turning to Hansard of 1931 I find at page 2171 the following announcements by the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett):
The third matter to which attention might be directed is that touching the movement of wheat. There has been a succession of bad harvests in some parts of western Canada, and during the last few weeks lack of moisture-I speak subject to correction, I hope- has caused a loss of this year's prospective crop in a great deal of that area. My advices by telephone were that very few days would determine the fate of a considerable portion of the crop. In some parts of the country this is the third crop failure and the reserves of the people are entirely exhausted. Two things must happen: First, provision should be made to assist those who have a crop, because they have considerable obligations, taxes, etc., which must be discharged. Other methods will be taken to deal with the situation of the provinces which are not in a position to assist those who with their reserves exhausted and their crops a failure for the third time are practically ruined.
I think the statement there .sets out fairly that relief is to be given and the purpose of the government with respect to the matter.
Why did the government extend assistance to the wheat growers in western Canada, particularly to the prairie provinces? That I think is also explained in the statement made by the Prime Minister. Let us go back and consider the circumstances that obtained for many years leading up to the crop of last year. We know that the farmers of western Canada, as in no other part of the dominion, were encouraged to concentrate to a very considerable degree on the growing of wheat. They were so encour-

Farm Relief-Mr. Stanley
aged not only by governmental agencies and by their own organizations but also by transportation, financial and banking institutions, as well as by other organizations in the country. They all encouraged the farmer to concentrate on the growing of wheat in western Canada.
Now, coming to the situation that existed at the time this statement was made, the house will recall that wheat had gone down very rapidly. There was a crash and it meant that economic conditions in western Canada would be very serious indeed. As a result the government undertook to give a bonus upon the wheat which was to be produced. The hon. member for West Elgin (Mr. Hepburn) in the course of his speech made the statement that in a large measure the crash in the price of wheat was due to the attitude taken by the wheat pool of western Canada. That statement of course is not substantiated by the facts; indeed, it is ridiculous to those of us in western Canada who know something about the proceedings of the wheat pool. While I am not here to defend the actions of the wheat pool-they can take care of themselves -I must point out that they had very little to do with any change in the price of wheat or with the determination of the world price of grain on the British market. The fact is that we found ourselves in such a position that we simply had to take for our grain on the British market precisely what the rest of the world was taking. The amount of wheat held by the wheat pool in Canada, even granting that they purposely held as large a quantity as some people say that they held, did not have a great deal to do with the crash that came in the price of this commodity. We all know now what has happened during the many months that have succeeded. The world wide financial crash and the financial conditions which have obtained ever since were to a very considerable extent the factor which brought down the price of wheat and which has kept it down to the very low level it has since maintained. This I say in justification of the salesmanship of the organizations in western Canada and not in justification of the local attitude taken by the grain organization out in those provinces.
Coming to the justification of the bonus, 1 am not going to take up very much time discussing the principle of it. The fact is that we have long since passed the point in this country-and the same is true of any other civilized country in the world to-day- where we are left with much choice as to what we are going to do in regard to duties, subventions, bonuses and so forth. Free trade countries no longer exist. The restrictions of 41761-22
trade, if you want to put it that way, that are found necessary in the various countries of the world, exist largely as a matter of self defence, and we are in exactly the same position in western Canada. I can say, speaking as one who comes from the west and who has had very much to do with the farmers of western Canada, that it does not hurt my conscience one bit, and I am quite satisfied that it does not hurt the conscience of many a western farmer, to take the bonus which is given through this five cents a bushel on wheat. When, in common with all other countries, we are extending duties, subventions, bonuses and so forth, we are simply giving a portion of one of these forms of assistance to the farmers of the west by way of a five cent bonus on wheat. One justification for the five cent bonus has been given, and another justification for it has been intimated in the statement of the Prime Minister. Taxes have to be paid, business has to be carried on as usual, and municipal and provincial obligations have to be met. Who are going to meet them? Well, to a large extent out in our province they are going to be met by the farmers who have to pay their taxes. The farmer who produced the grain and who suffered from this drop in price will be the one who will meet this obligation, not the farmer who has had no crop for the past three seasons. If the province is to carry on, if the school districts are to be kept intact, if different municipal undertakings are to be carried out, these are the people who must meet the obligation. The help granted to them by the bonus of five cents per bushel has not made them plutocrats, although it has helped them out a little.
The suggestion has been made that the bonus should be paid on an acreage basis. In my opinion that would be impracticable. This government has no organization in the west whereby it could determine the number of acres upon which payment should be made. It would require an army of inspectors to offset the many attempts which would be made at deception. The administration of such legislation would be impossible with the present organization.
The -payment of a bonus on a bushel basis is an altogether different proposition. As the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turn-bull) has pointed out, the bonus is one thing, but there is also the granting of relief in the broadest sense of the word. If relief is to be given by the different- governments and municipalities, it would have to be upon an entirely different basis. It must be granted -to those who need it, and that could not be done on

33S
Farm, Relief-Mr. Blair

an acreage basis. To do that would not be to extend relief in the real acceptation of the term. It would be granting a bonus only to those engaged in the grain business, but there are others who should receive assistance according to their actual needs.
I agree with the argument made by hon. members on both sides of the house as to the need of relief in various parts of the western provinces. The southern part of Saskatchewan and certain parts of Alberta require relief on a rather extensive scale, but it should be granted without any relation to a bonus on the production of wheat.
The next question is as to how this. relief should be granted, and here the matter of jurisdiction of the various governments comes in. As I understand it, it would be impossible for the federal government to undertake a relief program in a municipality in Alberta without consulting both the provincial and the municipal authorities. To grant relief on an acreage basis would necessitate a complete understanding as to the respective jurisdictions of the federal, provincial and municipal authorities.
The hon. members in the United Farmers of Alberta section of the house appear to me to be in one breath praising the government for having spent approximately $5,000,000, and in the next saying exactly the opposite. This they have done not only in this house but in the convention recently held. There seems to be a certain degree of duplicity in their actions, and one cannot help but think that when they utter their commendation they do so with their tongues in their cheeks. This is borne out by the fact that they were ready to pass a resolution which commends the government for what it has done, and then goes on to demand something else. I have no objection to the United Farmers of Alberta or any other organization demanding an extension of this bonus, but I want it distinctly understood that when the suggestion goes abroad that the farmers of Alberta are not grateful to the government which gave that assistance from the public treasury, those who make the suggestion are expressing a sentiment which does not exist among the rank and file of the farmers of that province. Nor do I feel that, farmer representatives or even the United Farmers in their convention have the right to speak for the great bulk of the fanners of that province, particularly when they approach the subject with the attitude which has been manifested in their discussion of this question, notably in their discussion of it on the floor of their convention.

Just as was said yesterday by another hon. member in the discussion of this matter, I want the eastern representatives in this house to feel that the people of the west, and certainly the farmers of our province, are thankful for the assistance they have received. When we require more assistance by way of seed grain and of aid to those who are destitute, having regard to the financial condition of the government of our province, in all probability we shall have to come back to this government and parliament to ask for further assistance for the men and their families who are suffering. Without entering into the party politics of our province, I am sorry to say that what has occurred in our provincial legislature during the last two years makes it evident that we shall certainly have to look to the federal government to provide us with the funds to carry on the. necessary work of our province. This being so, I want to be able to feel as a representative from that province that when we approach this parliament and this administration, they will realize that we are grateful for the assistance they are giving.
In conclusion, very often I think an entirely wrong interpretation of the conditions prevailing is given to the house and to the eastern part of Canada by our representatives from the west. The position of our farmers and of the residents of our cities, towns and villages is not as desperate as it is represented to be. That spirit of optimism, of determination, of courageousness that enabled them in years gone by to overcome the obstacles which presented themselves on every hand, still exists, and they are still going ahead. While we shall have to assist many farmers as well as many residents of our towns and cities, and continue to assist them for a time, there is that spirit of determination to make good which has always prevailed in the west. I bring it as a final word in this discussion, that while at times we may appear to criticize unduly, we still have left a spirit of thankfulness and optimism, and the courage to make good.


Mr. J. K. BLAIR (North Wellington):: Mr. Speaker, I could not let this opportunity pass without registering my disapproval of the motion which is before the house. I cannot understand how the hon. member for Compton (Mr. Gobeil) could maintain that the farmers' organizations can approve of this. It seems to me it is against the principle of all farmers' organizations or any Liberal organization and is opposed to the principle of many Conservatives, that is the idea of subsidizing or bonusing anything that is not standing on

Farm Relief-Mr. Boyes
its own feet. So long as it is a matter of charity, we cannot disapprove of it when it is necessary, but to uphold some industry that cannot stand on its own feet is quite a different problem and has to be considered very seriously.
The farmers of Ontario have assisted and nobly assisted the western provinces. In the first place they assisted them to develop their natural resources, and when the time came, those natural resources were handed over to the western provinces to be controlled by them. If the western provinces have difficulties, then those difficulties should be looked after largely by the west, except in the case of extreme necessity when they cannot cope with the situation and then the federal government should be asked to assist. But we must realize that many Ontario farmers are also growing wheat and many of them have crop failures. A winter like the present one almost ensures a crop failure for the coming season. No one is subsidizing the Ontario farmers. I do not see why the farmers of Ontario, having assisted the people of the west in their early years, having given them all the natural resources which belonged to them, should be expected to subsidize those who are their competitors. The farmer of the west can grow grain much more easily than the Ontario farmer can; he can raise sheep much cheaper than the Ontario farmer can, and I do not see why the Ontario farmer should be asked to subsidize the farmer of the west. As a matter of charity it might be all right, but I object to the principle of subsidizing when the necessity for charity does not exist.


Mr. FRANK BOYES (East Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a few observations in connection with the resolution before the house. Last year when this matter was under discussion I heartily concurred in the action which was taken by the government. At that time I fully realized that the producers of wheat in the west had their difficulties. The price was low and surely some assistance was required. We from the most westerly part of eastern Canada felt it our duty, when any other portion of the dominion was in distress, to render assistance in order that the situation might be relieved. I heartily concurred in the granting of five cents a bushel on the wheat for the prairie provinces. I am more than surprised to-day to hear a number of hon. members opposite expressing themselves as they are. They are 41761-22J
disagreeing with the principle that was adapted last year; they are saying that they wish it carried out in a different manner this year, and in fact a number of them have gone almost so far as to say that they disapprove of the five cent bonus. I am very gflad to know that the speakers on this side of the house who come from the west express a different view. They know that the farmers of the west who are raising wheat have certainly been very thankful for the bonus of five cents a bushel.
I should like to express the view of one who comes from the western part of the province of Ontario, from the riding of East Middlesex. In western Ontario we do produce some wheat, but we also raise a great many other farm products. We are engaged to a great extent in the dairying business. W e manufacture butter and produce milk for many purposes, the chief of which is the manufacture of cheese. We have not heard very much in this house regarding the manufacture of cheese, which is carried on to quite an extent in western Ontario, and more so in eastern Ontario, very nice revenue having until recently been received from this source. Last year when this five cents a bushel bonus was granted, the price of wheat was low, but to-day it is considerably higher. On the other hand, cheese was higher in price a year ago than it is to-day, and the same applies to other dairy products. As I say, we granted the bonus of five cents a bushel on wheat because wheat was low in price at that time and we wished to relieve the distress in the west. It is quite true that we did that and did it cheerfully. But for the coming year things do look somewhat different from last year. As I said before, I am very willing to help the west. We did so last year. We carried out the program which we had in mind. But so far as the coming year is concerned, a demand is arising from certain parts of the province of Ontario that other agricultural products besides wheat be bonused. My own view is this, that in view of the financial condition of the country to-day it is possibly a little away from the mark to expect that we may continue to do as was done last year, and hon. gentlemen opposite who are trying to increase the bonus by putting it on an acreage basis are possibly defeating their own ends by not favouring the scheme which the government put into effect last year. So far as I am concerned I feel that for the coming year, in order to give

Farm Relief-Mr. Weir (Meljort)
satisfaction to our farmers in the east who are having their own troubles-the pri-ce of their cheese is depressed due to the fact that to a great extent it is exported to England where the depression is being felt, resulting in a lower price than we got before, for cheese-as well as for other dairy products-we should discontinue the bonus on wheat.


Robert Weir: I think the majority of the hon.
members who have spoken have found themselves more or less at a loss due to the unfortunate circumstances that this resolution was not much more definitely worded. Had it been worded as definitely as it exists in the mind of the hon. member who moved the resolution* it would naturally have fallen into three parts. First, what was the intention of this five cent bonus? What elements went to make up the five cents? If it were granted as a solution of some particular problem, and if later another different problem arose, should the same remedy be applied, or should there be another solution of the new problem? Next, would it be compatible with the financial obligations resting upon the government to do what has been suggested by many of the speakers? I had not intended to take . up more than five minutes in what I have to say on this resolution, but I think hon. members will agree that I am forced into the position of deviating to a certain extent from the resolution itself to reply to some of the statements that have been made. I shall however be as brief as possible, having regard to what I have suggested.
First, what led to this bonus of five cents a bushel on wheat? Speaking for myself, before entering this so-called realm of politics I found that many farmers in western Canada had followed very closely the policies of the different political parties in Canada and had come to the conclusion that in one respect the two major parties seemed to be at one, namely that they were both protectionist. Whether or not it was due to a more astute political leadership, I think the average person in the west will agree that there was created in western Canada a feeling on the part of a certain section of the public that the Conservatives were protectionist and that the Liberals were against protection, although, as I have stated, the majority of the people felt that both parties were protectionist. The result of this public opinion which had been created, whether wittingly or not for the purpose, was that there arose in the west a certain division of feeling, a certain resentment,

against the so-called financial interests and the manufacturers, including the implement manufacturers, in the east. That was the regrettable thing in connection with this policy, presented as it was. When therefore I accepted the office I have been called upon to occupy I felt that whatever in my humble way I could do to break down that division that had been set up would be some slight contribution to this country of which we are all so proud. Accordingly I took the first available opportunity at the short session of discussing the problem with members on this side of the house, and particularly with some of the members of the United Farmers group from Alberta and Saskatchewan. They agreed with me that if it was possible, in addition to protection, to make some arrangement by which this division could be overcome, something would be accomplished.
There were many varying elements and circumstances to take into consideration. I think we all agree that the one class of agriculturist that receives less protection from the tariff than any other is the wheat farmer of the west, chiefly because the great preponderance of his production is forced into export. Therefore I set out to find in the most generous way I eould what these straight wheat farmers did pay on account of the tariff for their machinery and equipment more than they would have had to pay had there been no tariff. I was very much surprised at the estimate I arrived at, because I must admit that I myself felt that the effects of the tariff were much more considerable than the conclusion to which I was forced to come.
I went with this proposition to my chief, the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett). It appealed to him. The problem was: how to provide some compensating adjustment for this particular class of people. The matter was brought before the cabinet, and in the discussion that arose as to what could be done of a compensating nature, it was found to be so small per bushel that finally another item came up that is very near to those of us who are western farmers, and produce wheat-the price of wheat had sunk so low that the proportion of the freight to its price was much greater than it had been when prices were what we had been pleased to consider more normal. It was finally agreed that some assistance should be given in the nature of a bonus to help decrease the disadvantages proportionately to the price of wheat at that time. I think that this is as direct and clear a statement as I can give with reference to the five cent bonus. It was, as I have stated, for the

Farm Relief-Mr. Weir (Melfort)
solution, to a certain extent, of more than one particular problem in western Canada.
At the conclusion of the session we found in western Canada a problem of a different nature-the greatest problem that has arisen in this country so far as agriculture is concerned-the calamity arising from the drought condition in the prairie provinces, particularly in Saskatchewan. It was decided that I should go to Saskatchewan on account of the nature of this difficulty, and devote a great part of my time in cooperation with the provincial government and with the farmers of that province to seeing what could be done for the alleviation of this calamity. I did so, with the result that since last session I have spent practically seven weeks in Saskatchewan with the exception of some short time in Alberta and Manitoba. The nature of the work was such, and the demand on one's time so great, that although I own a farm in the province I have been able to spend only two days on it since the election in 1930. So my time was devoted to this work, and to this work solely during those seven weeks.
What condition did I find in western Canada? I realize that it has not a direct bearing on the resolution, yet it has been referred to in so many different ways during this debate that I feel it is only fair to the house that having made a personal survey I should give in the simplest form some idea of what I found. There was an area of seventy-six municipalities that had practically no crop of any kind for three years. Hon. members in this house who have not been west and who have read certain misrepresentations in the eastern press, due to lack of correct information, and those who have heard from other sources various presentations of the case, will, I am sure, be surprised to realize -at least those who have thought that a great deal of that area should not have been devoted to farming-that most of the land in those seventy-six municipalities has produced more agricultural wealth per capita than perhaps any other area in this dominion. The farmers there never knew anything in the nature of a crop failure. Year after year until three years ago in the Regina plains between Regina and Moose Jaw and in the area south the land yielded 25, 30 and 35 bushels per acre of the best wheat produced in the west. Their farm homes were unexcelled anywhere. Not only that, but their live stock was of a very high quality. Many people have the idea that in that part of the country there are nothing but cayuses and scrub live stoek, and on many farms no live stock at all. The best indication that I can give hon. members
of the quality of that live stock is that the greatest percentage of the live stock from Saskatchewan that came year after year to compete with the best live stock from the different parts of this country and from the republic to the south carried off much more than their share of honours on the basis of numbers. The wheat production in that area alone for the fifteen years before the first crop failure averaged over 83,000,000 bushels. That will help the house, I hope, to realize the problem that we had to deal with. It was not a question of moving the people away after the successive good crops that they had had for so many years, but of holding them there and assisting them financially and otherwise as far as was in our power, until a cessation of the present difficulties. There was another area consisting of ninety-six municipalities in which there had been two practically complete crop failures; a third area of sixty-four municipalities in which there was a crop failure last year for the first time in the past three years. Practically two-thirds, if not more, of the cultivated land in this great province of Saskatchewan had been dealt this unprecedented staggering blow, and this was the problem we had to face.
Some of you, perhaps, within sound of my voice have been inclined to ask: If the farmers there have produced that great amount of wealth within ten years, then why was it not possible for them to withstand the difficulties in which they have found themselves? Let me say that the extent of the area is something like old eastern Ontario from Toronto to the Quebec border, but larger in extent, where for years we have had some of the thriftiest and most scientific farmers in the country. They have practised diversified, balanced farming with a skill perhaps unexcelled by any other people in this country. Yet how many of those farmers, if for three years in succession they did not have anything in the nature of a crop, not even sufficient to feed their live stock, and were therefore forced to dispose of it, except so much as would provide the very necessities of life, and with respect to which the government have to assist them-how many, I say, of those farmers could stand a blow like that without some help? The only way in which they could have done it was perhaps to have hoarded their wealth somewhere. But the average man, I think, in the east as well as in the west, after making a reasonable allowance for the future invested his money in stocks and other investments that even to the best financiers seemed absolutely sound but proved far otherwise.

Farm Relief-Mr. Weir (Melfort)
That you may have a picture not only of the extent of this calamity but of the difficulty of handling the situation, may I say that there is in that area approximately 250,000 people. It is one thing to handle that number of people in a city, or in an area where they are closely placed together, but in that wide area, scattered away in their homesteads in isolated districts, and with the approach of winter in a climate like we have in western Canada, we had to be prepared to act before the danger of early winter came, and I can assure the house that only those who were charged with the responsibility of meeting that difficulty could fully appreciate its gravity. We felt that if ever there was a time when the question should be handled in a manner absolutely free from prejudice, this question should be handled in that way. Therefore it was decided that it should be handled absolutely free from political interference of any kind, and a relief commission was appointed. The personnel of that commission I shall describe to hon. members, and I will leave them to be the judges as to whether or not those gentlemen would be likely to be influenced by political partisanship.
We selected five commissioners, with Henry Black as chairman, after interviewing some of the most successful business and professional men in Regina and Moose Jhw. These men agreed to work without remuneration of any kind, without receiving even living expenses. One of them, when I approached him, asked how many hours he would have to work. We discussed the problem for a few moments and pictured those people who have had no money for three years, with practically no clothing and no reserve strength. They represented a problem that had to be met in a very short time, and my answer was that the members of the commission would be fortunate if they got off with the longest hours they ever had to work a't anything else. Since then they have realized that even that estimate was very conservative.
So then we had three of the best business and professional men in Saskatchewan working day and night, without recompense of any kind except the satisfaction of doing a public service. Yet to-day the members of that relief commission were charged with carrying on this work for political reasons. I leave it to the judgment of this house if men who are giving their lives without payment, as these men are doing at present, are the type of men whom we associate with modern day politics. Personally I think not.

We were also particularly fortunate in being able to secure the services of Mr. George Yuill, of the Royal Bank, whose services have been invaluable. Then it was felt that because perhaps the greatest sufferers from this calamity would be the women and children, it was essential that a woman should be placed on this commission. After going over the field of women wihom we felt could give us the greatest service, it was decided that we could not do better than ask Mrs. Johnston, who happened to ibe president of the Saskatchewan branch of the United Farmers of Canada, to serve on the commission especially to give its members the benefit of her advice with regard to the women and children in that area. I doubt if any better selection could have been made, not only because of Mrs. Johnston's long contact with farm life and farm women in western Canada, but because of the fact that she had previously exemplified her great ideals in public service. I think we were particularly .fortunate to secure the commission that was finally appointed.
I happened to be present when the appointment of the man to be in charge of the relief officers was discussed. This man was appointed by the relief commission. I remember that names were submitted, and after a discussion -in which I may say I took no part because I had never met the gentleman who wtas appointed before he came in-it was decided that at least he should be given a trial. I believe he was taken on for a month so that if his work was not satisfactory he could be relieved of his position. Care was also taken -great care, as far as I was concerned, in any advice I gave-in connection with the appointment of the relief officers in the various municipalities and sub-areas of the district. They were appointed by the week, at a weekly salary of $18, so that if their work was not satisfactory they could be immediately replaced.
I say again that great care was exercised in the selection of these relief officers.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Robert Weir: Hon. gentlemen
say " hear, hear". The impression given here this afternoon was that these appointments were purely political. I know very little about them, but I will say that one of the officers whom I appointed to give me first hand information with regard to the working out of the relief scheme said that the relief officer who seemed more anxious than any other to

Farm Relief-Mr. Weir (Melfort)
cause difficulty in the carrying out of his work was a man who had been recommended by a gentleman who might be described as the leading Liberal in the province of Saskatchewan.


John Vallance: I should like to ask the minister a question. I really expected the minister to do just what he has done now. Would he mind telling us-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


John Vallance: Have I permission to
ask a question? I should like to ask the minister who appointed Mr. Kendal, the organizer, and on whose recommendation he was appointed, since the minister has dragged the political side into it.


Robert Weir: So far as I am
concerned I do not know whether or not the man appointed to select the relief officers was named Kendal. He was appointed by the relief commission, after discussion.


John Vallance: Borrowed from the
liquor commission, from the government.


Robert Weir: I could not say; I
did not remember his name, because that was the only time I heard his name under discussion. I want to follow this matter further;
I do feel very strongly that you people in eastern Canada who have so generously contributed to the relief of our people should not be given a wrong picture of how that relief work is being administered, because it would only lead you to feel that the very praiseworthy efforts you have put forward have not been given their full value in the west. I doubt if any commission has ever had the record this commission will have when its work is completed. The latest figures show that out of every dollar expended for relief 96j cents goes right into the hands of the people who receive the relief, and that it only cost 3J cents out of every dollar for administration.
The insinuation has been made that this talk of mine would be of a political nature, therefore I feel duty bound to make one further remark. It was only natural, I suppose, for a farmer like myself, especially interested in the difficulties of the farmers, to want to stay there, to see the whole picture and keep in contact with these people. I could not do so. Demands were made upon me from different parts of the country; I had to come to Ottawa to join in cabinet meetings, and I felt that the only way I could get that picture, and be sure I was getting the right picture, would be by appointing three
men whom I felt personally were thoroughly qualified to understand the farm problem, to advise farmers where necessary, and to give practical advice to the relief commission with regard to feed, care of animals and so on. Therefore I selected three men whose duty it was as expert farmers to keep in very close touch with this whole situation; to advise me personally if the relief commission was falling down in its work; to advise if there were any particular difficulties they thought should be dealt with immediately, and so on. I doubt if there could have been chosen in western Canada, and especially in the time available to us, three men better qualified.
Until the question of politics came up I did not know the political leanings of two of those three men. One of them is a personal friend of mine living near my own farm; I understand that in later years especially he has been a Progressive, and before that I believe he was a Liberal. Of the other two I understand one has been a life-long Liberal, and the other is a Progressive. Personally I do not understand how any normal person who appreciated as I did the calamity in the midst of which I stood could have done other than I did, and therefore I take no credit for it.
I did not intend to touch on this question, but I have taken pains to make it clear, so that you in the east who contributed so generously may know that as far as was physically and humanly possible this work has been carried out so that every bit of assistance given has been used to the fullest extent in the relief of those who needed it.
We have divided Saskatchewan into three areas, and the only payment that we as a federal government have made has been in that seventy-six municipality area, the three crop failure area in which we felt we should bear the cost 100 per cent on food, clothing and fuel. In the ninety-six municipality area we have no agreement; in the sixty-four municipality area we have no agreement. After our meeting with the provincial government of Saskatchewan, and it was understood that we were giving 100 iper cent relief to the seventy-six municipality area, the authorities in Alberta got in touch with me in Regina and represented that they had areas equally bad as those in Saskatchewan. I went to Edmonton and interviewed the Alberta government and it was decided-I felt it was the fairest thing to do-that we would use the services of the three federal seed inspectors in western Canada, one of them situated in Manitoba, one in Saskatchewan and another in Alberta, and that they should not work just in their own respective provinces but in groups so

Farm, Relief-Mr. Weir (Melfort)
that they would have a complete picture of the whole situation. It was considered advisable that they should work in cooperation with the Department of Agriculture of each provincial government and obtain from them the facts regarding those areas which it was felt were in the same situation as the Saskatchewan areas. They would get the average crop, the average yield per year each year for the last three years, in order to determine m which class they should come. They would also get the average collection of taxes, the average immediate indebtedness of each municipality, and with that picture before us we felt that we should then be in a position, when the matter had been fully dealt with, to give the fairest treatment possible to each of the three western provinces. I shall pursue this phase of the matter before dealing with the question that seems to arise naturally out of it because of the information that has been asked for by members both from Alberta and from Manitoba.
So far as I know, our treatment has been satisfactory in Alberta; the provinces have been treated equally. It is the duty of the provinces, if they cannot finance the problems that face them, to come to the federal government and present their case, indicating what they need financially, and it then becomes the duty of the federal government to decide whether or not the provinces will be given further financial assistance. No province has been given everything it has asked for; the demands have been carefully gone into. When I was last in Kegina in January I was informed that there was a critical situation in the southwestern part of Manitoba. I got off the train in Brandon and drove ninety miles across the country in a car, in January, having arranged beforehand to meet the officials of those municipalities that felt they had not been cared for as they should have been. I made that journey in order to ascertain what their criticism was and to learn what suggestions they had to offer by way of remedy. In taking part in the discussion of the matter, both before and at the meeting, I came to the conclusion that there was some misunderstanding, to put it mildly, between the province of Manitoba and our government regarding the question as to how the matter was to be dealt with. My idea had always been that the provincial governments should receive from the federal government whatever money was absolutely necessary and be responsible for looking after their own people; but I realized that to leave the matter there, in a more or less theoretical state, would not get us anywhere. There were farmers who were in need and I made the 
only practical suggestion which I thought I could offer:	I invited them to appoint two
or three delegates and I agreed to take them with me to Winnipeg, there to meet the Minister of Municipal Affairs, the Premier of Manitoba, and also the Minister of Agriculture, to see whether, without further delay, or quibbling, or press notoriety, we could agree as to what action was necessary. I leave it to anyone here whether I could have taken more definite action or have done anything more practical. The whole question was fully and frankly discussed. Premier Bracken was not able to attend the meeting, and in order that no opportunity which could be taken advantage of might be lost, so far as I was concerned, of clearing up the matter, I went to see him at his own house before leaving to come east. All I can say regarding the difficulty in Manitoba is that the duty of the authorities there is to put their case before the government, indicating what money they require; and in the meantime I should hope that they would strain every effort to look after their own people with the money received.
One of the first problems I encountered when I went to Saskatchewan was this. There met me a delegation of farmers who had dear titles to their land. This is one of the points that came up for discussion this afternoon. I was surprised at the number of people in that district who had clear titles to land; yet they could not borrow money from either 'the mortgage companies or the banks. I asked the manager of the Saskatchewan farm loan board what percentage of the people in that area had clear titles to their land, and his estimate was 25 per cent, which was very much higher than I thought it would be. After discussion with these people as to the amount of money they thought they should borrow as a minimum to enable them to carry on, and realizing that new conditions were arising of which we had had no idea, and that the drain on finance was so much greater than we had ever contemplated, much as I wished to do it, and fair as their request seemed, I decided that I could not recommend to the federal government that we should loan money to the extent asked for even on those lands with clear titles. I do not think any demand could have been fairer than that which they made, had we considered it was possible for us to meet it. These men took this attitude:	Surely
with a clear title, with no encumbrance in the way of mortgages, we who have contributed so much to the country are not going to be reduced to the condition of receiving charity. That was their position and they insisted that

Farm Relief (Mr. Donnelly)
they be given the privilege of repaying. That was the first time that question came up. I will leave it 'to any hon. member of this house to say, had he been in my position at that time, with this problem immediately before him, whether he would have taken any other action than that which I took, namely, to recommend that 'these people be given permission to repay the assistance they received.
The question before us is this: What are we to do with people who have been hit as they have been hit in Saskatchewan? What are we to do that will be just to them in view of the whole picture as we have it? Outside of the seventy-six municipality area our obligations are in conjunction with those of the provincial government; and in the drought area in Alberta and Manitoba, as in Saskatchewan, the percentage that we bear, if we bear any percentage of the loss, has yet to be determined. We have before us all the information which we shall require. We have before us the information regarding the acreage seeded and also the indebtedness of each municipality, and we shall have to take into consideration the financial position of the provinces in determining what assistance will have to be given.
I omitted to mention one point in connection with this first visit of mine to the west. I was met by the reeves of the various municipalities, who waited upon me in delegation to present a case something like 'that set out in the petition. It is said that more consideration was given to those farmers who had crops than to those who had not, and that we should consider the giving of a bonus of one dollar per acre. I explained the whole proposition to these men and they seemed to be satisfied. They realized the problem we were facing; they knew that we had to make certain that every man, woman and child in that area should be clothed warmly enough to meet the winter, that fuel should 'be provided before the first blizzard came along, that potatoes should be in the cellars before the winter came on, as it does sometimes with very little warning. They realized that large sums of money would be required to provide feed for their stock, and that on top of that additional sums would be required-amounting to $5,000,000 in Saskatchewan alone-to seed the land this spring. Gasoline, fuel oil and so forth to the amount of 32,000,000 or $3,000,000 would be necessary to put in the crop.
There are many difficulties in the way of a bonus paid on an acreage basis. It is suggested that we are to pay one dollar per acre and to take into iconsideration the bonus of five cents per budhel paid on the wheat produced. That information will not be available until July 1 when this present bonus legislation runs out. If 'this bonus is to cover the cost of seeding, would it be equitable to pay to the man who has seeded his land three times without a crop the same amount received by the man who has missed only one crop? Even though a census be taken with the greatest care I think that those of us who are farmers will agree that it would not be very accurate. It 'has been the rage of late in western Canada 'to try to obtain all kinds of statistics, and I know in connection with my own farm that information 'has been given when I was absent which was not at all accurate. The best example of this is the attempt to collect information in connection with our program of restricted areas. Animals should foe easy to count and yet it has been found that the number of cattle given in applications for restricted tubercular areas has sometimes been only half the actual number.
This is the greatest problem that agriculture has ever faced, and it must be met directly. As I see it, a final adjustment will be made towards the end of the present fiscal year. A't that time the provinces will be in a position to give this government their true financial positions and state the commitments which they can undertake in the carrying on of this work. Serious consideration will be given to this problem; this government will do everything possible to give the most generous treatment. The farmers of western Canada have assurance in the treatment they have received up to the present time.


Mr. SPEAKMAN:: The information which the minister has given to the house is of tremendous importance and I, for one, would have liked him to proceed further. I would like to see the house give the hon. minister its unanimous consent to complete his presentation.
Mr. THOMAS F. DONNELLY (Willow Bunch):	Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak on
this resolution, I am sure I express the view of all hon. members when I say that everyone regrets that it was necessary last year to pass a measure of relief for the farmers of western Canada; and we regret also that it is now necessary to refer to this matter again. The condition prevailing in western Canada, especially in my own constituency, is
Farm Relief (Mr. Donnelly)

calamitous. There has been no crop there for three years, yet the people still believe they will have a crop this year. Some of these people have lived in this district for the last twenty years; some went up into the northern part of the province to look over the country but they returned and are satisfied to stay in the south, believing that they will again have crops. The question of crops is not their greatest concern; they are wondering what price they will get, and how, with the prices as they are to-day, they are going to be able to pay their past debts as well as those which are to-day piling up on them because of the relief which they are receiving. That is the problem which faces the west. I have found that some of the sturdiest hearts and strongest wills are beginning to break down. Men are beginning to be discouraged; they wonder if they will ever get out from under this burden of debt.
Neither the government nor anyone else can be blamed for the climatic conditions, but it is another matter when we consider the general conditions which prevail. I would like to read what the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) said, speaking last year on the address in reply. I am willing to accept the opinion he then expressed, as follows:
After all, the question is not exactly what are conditions in western Canada but, to some extent, whose responsibility is it that conditions in the west are as they are.
He then laid the blame on the Liberal government. I suppose in view of the fact that conditions have been growing worse during the past two years, he will now shoulder this responsibility and place the blame upon the present government.
Relief may be divided into three classes. First, there is charity; and in this connection I desire to express the gratitude felt by those in the drought-stricken areas to the people from one end of Canada to the other for the wholehearted and magnificent manner in which they responded. Carload after carload of vegetables, fruit and clothing came into the districts affected and were distributed fairly and evenly. In my journeys from one part of the country to another I never heard a complaint; it was nothing but gratitude for the splendid response to the need of the people in those areas. It is a wonderful thing to see such a spirit shown to those in dire need.
The next item that we come to is this bonus of five cents a bushel. I quote from the words of the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) himself: Speaking on July 24 of last

year, he is reported at page 4149 of Hansard as saying:
The third reason is the necessity of a measure of relief for western Canadian producers.
I agree with him that it was a measure of relief handed out to the farmers of western Canada. I am sorry to say I must disagree with the hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance) and the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) when they say this was not a measure of relief. The Prime Minister, on another occasion said, that this was not only a measure of relief but was being passed as a compensation for the payment of duties. As reported on page 3766 of Hansard of last year, he said:
May I say to the hon. member for Maoleod that for the first time in the history of the country an earnest effort has been made to make an adjustment between the farmer's production and what he may pay with respect to duties and tariffs. . . . The farmer is being given a compensating adjustment which more than meets the sum which on the average he will pay in duties with respect to motor cars or other items of this nature with respect to the tariff.
He says that it is a compensating adjustment for the tariff. The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) just a little while ago, referring to the tariff, said that in the west they considered both policies high tariff. We heard that for years and years, but at the present time in western Canada there is no doubt at all as to which is the high tariff policy.


Robert Weir: Did I make the
statement that they considered them both high tariff?


Mr. DONNELLY:: Both protection.


Robert Weir: My hon. friend is very much at fault.


James J. Donnelly: That there is very
little difference between them. We had the hon. member for Mackenzie (Mr. Campbell) writing a letter saying to the people before the last election that there was no difference between the policies as regards high tariff. The farmers of western Canada know now who are the high tariff people. The Minister of Agriculture went on to say he had figured out how much extra the farmer would have to pay for machinery. When did he do that? Was it before he raised the tariff in the fall of 1930? If he did it before, there would not be very much extra, but if he did it after, I can tell him it would be a very large amount on our average importations. In western

Farm Relief (Mr. Donnelly)
Canada from year to year we have been importing from the east somewhere in the neighbourhood of $200,000,000 worth of manufactured goods, the average protection on which would be 25 per cent. In other words, there has been taken out of the pockets of the farmers of western Canada either directly or indirectly the sum of about $50,000,000 a year. We do not believe the bonus actually adjusts this, by any manner of means. It may be a small amount; it may be a bite.
As regards this bonus of five cents a bushel, we do not regret that the people in the north have got it. I have not heard anybody in the house object to the people in the north getting it; the only thing I am sorry for is that they did not get more. I am glad to see them get it. I wish we were getting it in the south too. The point is that we are not getting any, and it costs us five cents a bushel more when we go to buy seed wheat. We have no crop-none whatever; no grain, no grass, no feed of any kind for the chickens or pigs, and yet we have to pay five cents a bushel more for the wheat we buy from the people of the north.


An hon. MEMBER:: Why?


James J. Donnelly: Because they are giving five cents more to the people of the north, and every farmer, realizing that if he sells his wheat through the ordinary channels he will get five cents a bushel more, will demand that much more if you are buying from him.
As regards the inequality of handling this five cents per bushel, one member said that he defied anybody to show where this had not been handled justly and fairly. Let me give an illustration. I know many men in the west who own their horses, machinery and seed and who rent their land. The renter gets one-third of the crop and the man who owns the land takes two-thirds because he pays the threshing bill, pays for the twine and does everything but the labour. In other words, the labourer gets one-third and the man who owns the land gets two-thirds. But when the wheat is hauled into the elevator, the man who owns the farm and who has to pay the taxes and pay for the twine and seed, gets no five cents a bushel. The man who rents the land gets fifteen cents a bushel for his share and the man who owns the land gets nothing. You may call that fair or just, but that is not justice as I understand it. That is the way it works out. It will not help the man in paying his mortgage or his taxes, and probably the next year the man who rented the land has gone to some other district.


Mr. BO YES:: Does that not depend on the deal between the farmer and the man who works the land?


James J. Donnelly: Not unless the lease
was made afterwards, because the lease is to give the man who owns the land two-thirds and the other man one-third. The Board of Grain Commissioners, who are administering this legislation, have decided that the man who rents the farm or does the actual labour gets all the bonus.
Let me come to the next point, the question of direct relief. In my constituency we are receiving direct relief. The Minister of Agriculture came out west and travelled through my constituency one day, then returning to Regina. Shortly after that we saw some reports in the press saying that the people of western Canada who were taking direct relief were too proud to take charity; that they wanted to pay for it. Everyone I saw out there said he did not want charity, but that he expected just what the Prime Minister promised when he spoke in Regina, and that is work. The Prime Minister had promised them work; he had said that those people wanted work and he was going to give them work, not charity. They expected work and they did not get it. But every dollar they got out there they signed a note for. If they get groceries or coal or anything else, they sign a note for it; they sign on the dotted line. I understand in many of the cities in both the east and the west, if a man is a bachelor and wants a lodging for the night or a meal, he does not sign any note; he does not sign on any dotted line. If any householder in Ottawa or some other eastern city is up against it financially for groceries or fuel, I do not believe he signs on any dotted line. The only people I know who are signing for everything they get are the western farmers. Why should it be so? The western farmer in the drought stricken area looks around and sees the unemployed in the cities in the east and other parts of Canada getting relief for nothing, people in the north getting a bonus of five cents a bushel and others getting $1.25 and $2 an acre. The result is the farmer needing relief is there with both hands out saying: If this relief is going for nothing, give me as much as I can get; I do not want to sign any note. He is willing to take just as much charity as the other fellow. They believed in the first place that they were going to be given work, but they did not get it. I remember hearing the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) say in this house last year
Farm Relief (Mr. Donnelly)

that conditions were not so bad in western Canada, and when we from the west on this side of the house began to speak of the actual conditions out there the Prime Minister called us wailing Jeremiahs and so forth. He told us we had lots of money in the bank; but when the people in Regina found that other people were getting relief they asked for all the relief they could get. People in other parts of Canada got work, but in our section of the country we did not have any lakes to dig or islands to build or bridges to construct over a dry stream at a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars, as they had in Regina; and we did not get any relief work. Speaking in the house last year on this very question of unemployment relief I urged that the work be started early enough, but they waited until the ground was frozen before they started it. I said at that time, get it going early, so that you can get a start on the work, but though the legislation was passed in August, they did not appoint the relief commission until the middle of October. By the time the commission got to work the ground was frozen up and there was nothing our people could do but take direct charity or starve during the winter.
There axe other matters. I came down here last fall and saw the Minister of Agriculture. I said to him, "My constituency is all underlain with coal. The people out there must have coal. Send an engineer from here or Regina, let him locate a few veins of coal and then let the people out there go in and dig their own coal. What you are doing at the present time is getting coal from Eetevan at S4.50 a ton or from Alberta at $7.50 a ton." I said that the minister should let the people dig their own coal right near home, as they could do if they had-someone to tell them how to go about it. I told him that these people needed the work, that they would be better physically and mentally for having something to do. "Well," said the minister, "we have a grant of $20,000 for farmers' timber for the mines." Anybody who knows anything about conditions out there knows that this $20,000 for timbers for the mines is just a dream. The farmers do not timber their mines. They do not know anything about it anyway. It is a surface proposition and there is no timber needed at all. But the minister said that he would look into it, and he is still looking into it as far as I know. Fifteen or twenty farmers 'did go out with scrapers and ploughs and dig their own coal. That was the hardworking, thrifty farmer who wanted to get out of debt, not the ne'er-do-well; and some of these men got fifteen or twenty tons of coal for the winter. That was fine, but no 
sooner had they got the coal in than the secretary of the municipality received a letter asking who had been digging coal around there. He wrote back that he did not know anything about it, and then the government officials sent circulars throughout all that district accusing these people of digging coal. Some fellows who were weak-kneed and thought there was no harm in digging the coal anyway told them: "Yes, I dug so much coal." "Ah," they said, "we have caught you now. You owe us 25 cents a ton royalty." That is the way they were going to help the man who was trying to help himself-by charging him 25 cents a ton royalty; but the fellow who did not care how he got his coal and was willing to sign a note which he was not going to paj' got his coal supplied by the government and it cost the government $4.50 to $7.50 a ton. Not only that, but the men who are digging that coal to merchandise it have to pay only 5 cents a ton royalty, while the farmer who was trying to help himself was charged 25 cents a ton royalty. Oh, this is a wonderful government with great executive ability 1 Is it a matter of surprise that the people in those areas are wondering what kind of government we have down here?
With regard to the officers who are handling this relief, the minister has told us how careful they were. They picked out three relief commissioners, he said, two men and a woman, and he contended that there was absolutely no politics in the matter. I do not know anything about these commissioners and their political faith, but I do know this, that the relief commissioners were mighty careful to see that the men they picked out were strong Tories, because in every town and every village that I know every one of them is a Tory heeler, nothing more nor less. Down in one of the little villages in my constituency we have five good Tories and over every little thing that is going to take place they go into a huddle just like a football team and discuss their next line of attack. These five are known as the Hungry Five. That is how much politics there is in it. The Hungry Five are always getting together to decide who is going to take the next bite. We know for certain that from one end of the country to the other there is politics, and nothing but politics, pure and simple, in this matter.
One thing that has been in the minds of westerners is the way in which this scheme has been dealt with. When the matter was before the house last session I spoke with reference to it and my remarks will be found at page 4431:

Farm Relief-Mr. McKenzie
This relief work should be handled by nonpartisan bodies. Let the municipal officers handle it, and in the local improvement districts, let it be handed over to the overseers.
This is the* one thing that the people in my district cannot understand. For two years our municipal officers had been handling relief fairly and squarely, and everybody was satisfied. When this year our municipal officers offered to take charge of all the relief work for nothing, why tvas it necessary for the government to hire an officer in each municipality at a cost something in the neighbourhood of S75 a month, plus expenses amounting to about $200? We find these men, who as I have said, are nothing but partisans, taking the place of the municipal officers. It is my opinion and the opinion of everybody in the west that the cost of handling this relief would be much lower had it been left to our municipal officers.
Referring to the resolution, I find that the people in the southern districts are not getting any of this five cents a bushel. It is very strange to us that when the Minister of Agriculture saw conditions in the southern part of the province he did not come back and say: "The people in the south are too proud to take charity, and my people in the north are too proud to take charity. They do not want the five cents a bushel. They would rather take a dollar an acre on their land sown to wheat." What he practically said was:	"My people will take all the
charity they can get, and ask for more." Not only that, but almost $300,000 worth of relief *work has been done right in the constituency of Melfort, where there has been a bountiful harvest running from 25 to 50 bushels an acre.
We believe that the amount of wheat grown on each quarter section is known to the grain commissioners, because they have the data before them, and we believe that the number of acres sowed in wheat can also be ascertained. Nothing remains, therefore, but the matter of adjustment. If the southern part of the province had been given a dollar an acre for all the land sown to wheat, very little relief would have been needed during the past year.
I do not wish to prolong the debate. I am supporting the resolution because I believe it will bring to all the farmers in western Canada a measure of relief on a fairer and a juster basis.
Mr. MeKENZIE (Assiniboia):	I might
say, Mr. Speaker, that in introducing this resolution I made it very clear that so far as I am concerned and those who were responsible
for the beginning of this "agitation", as some one called it, for a dollar an acre on the seeded acreage throughout the drought areas of the prairie provinces, it was not in any respect a political matter. I am sorry indeed that this resolution has been debated not only as a relief measure but as a political manoeuvre. It was not my intention to have politics enter into this proposal in any shape or form. We have a real problem in those dried-out areas. Our people are in earnest in regard to this matter, believing that they have a just cause which deserves the favourable consideration of this house. I think the relief measure could veiy well have been debated at some later date.
I was rather disappointed at the address of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir), because he talked of practically every other thing except getting right down to the basis of the resolution, and he resumed his seat without saying what consideration the government were going to give to it. He spent a good deal of time in explaining to the house just what led to the introduction of the legislation last session relating to a bonus on wheat. He stated that it was on his initiative that the bill was first mooted as a government measure, and that the relief was offered as a compensating adjustment on account of the incidence of the tariff on the farmers of western Canada. If it was intended as a compensating adjustment, why should not those farmers who did not reap any crop last year receive something in the way of compensation, as well as those who reaped a good crop? We aTe quite satisfied to give credit to the government for all that has been done in the way of relief, and we appreciate what has been done. We know they have had a big problem on their hands. One or two members on this side of the house opposed the application of a bonus under any consideration. I am not in favour of the bonus principle any more than they are, I do not think it is right. But if it is necessary to grant a bonus by way of compensation for the high tariff, then I say our farmers are entitled to such compensation as much as any other industry.
It is unfortunate that our farmers are compelled to sign notes for the relief granted to them. I do not think that the explanation given by the Minister of Agriculture will in any way satisfy the farmers who have been obliged to give those notes. Just because he met a few farmers in a fairly prosperous district in Manitoba who insisted on giving notes for the relief they received is no reason why all farmers should be obliged to sign notes.
Civil Service Act


Robert Weir: I said in Saskatchewan.


Mr. McKENZIE (Assiniboia):: I thought
the minister said in Manitoba. In some parts of the country that may be so.. I have not any reason to doubt his word. Bub if there were some farmers who wanted to sign notes, why was it necessary to compel all the other farmers to do so? Later on they could have paid back any money advanced without the necessity of signing notes at this time. If they are desirous of repaying the money they will do so in any case.
I leave the resolution in the judgment of the house.
Motion negatived on division.


CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION
[Stage Direction]
On the order to resume the adjourned debate on the motion of Mr. McGibbon:
That, in the opinion of this house, all outside appointments should be taken away from the Civil Service Commission and made upon the recommendation of the minister.
Hon. C. H. CAHAN (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, with the consent- of the house I ask that this motion stand for the present in order that when the next order on the paper is proceeded with, I may, with the consent of the house, bring forward a resolution deaL ing with both these orders as I previously suggested in this debate.
Motion stands.


CIVIL SERVICE ACT AMENDMENT
[Stage Direction]
Mr. ONESIME GAGNON (Dorchester) moved the second reading of Bill No. 14, to amend the Civil Service Act.
Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have an amendment to propose to the house in connection with the second reading of this bill.
I think it is well known to members of the house that throughout this capital city, and in fact throughout Canada, sinister reflections have been circulated concerning members of the Civil Service Commission which tend, if they are not answered, to discredit the competency, efficiency and reliability of that commission. The matter of appointments to the civil service, especially appointments to what is known as the outside service, also on several occasions has been under discussion in this chamber, but in such discussions neither mem-
bers of the Civil Service Commission nor officials or employees of the civil service of Canada have been able to participate.
Therefore it has appeared advisable that members of the Civil Service Commission and representatives of the civil service of Canada should have an opportunity to be heard before this house should adopt the pending resolution moved by the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) and before second reading is given Bill No. 14, which second reading has been moved this evening by the hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon).
It has seemed to me, as the nominal representative in this house of the Civil Service Commission, that such hearing could be best afforded by the appointment of a special committee of seven members of the house, representing all political parties in this house. It also has appeared advisable that the widest possible authority should be given such committee to inquire into and report generally upon the administration and operation of the Civil Service Act, with power to advise this house as such committee may deem advisable concerning the repeal or amendment of any of the existing provisions of the Civil Service Act, or the substitution therefor or addition thereto of other provisions which will tend to ensure the efficient administration of that act.
It is within the memory of older members of the house that a royal commission on the civil service was appointed in 1908 which made a very voluminous report. In 1919 a special committee of this house made an inquiry and report concerning the inside service. Subsequently, in 1923, a special committee of this house was appointed to inquire into and report upon the operation of the Civil Service Act, of which committee Hon. James Malcolm was chairman. This committee also made a very extensive inquiry and report. Again in 1924 a special committee of the Senate made an inquiry and report on the civil service. All these reports were printed and published, and I think are now available for the consideration of members of this house. Nevertheless, the committee which I am about to propose will necessarily undertake very onerous duties and responsibilities. Although I am to be a member of that committee, I certainly accept that duty with very great reluctance indeed.
With consent, I move, seconded by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Rhodes) that all the words in the motion be struck out and the following substituted therefor:
The* Bil' No. 14 ho not now read a second time but that it b" resolved that the further consideration of said bill and of the motion standing on the order paper in the name of the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. FEBRUARY 18, 1932
Civil Service Act
McGibbon) be deferred until after a report thereon is received from the special committee of the house which is hereinafter named; and
That the said bill and motion be referred to a special committee of this house, consisting of Messrs. Cahan, Chevrier, Laurin, Sterling, Stinson, Vallance and Woodsworth, with power to the said committee to inquire into and report upon the said bill and motion, and also with power to said committee to inquire into and report upon appointments to and the control and direction of the civil service of Canada, and. generally, upon the administration and operation of the Civil Service Act, and also to report concerning the repeal or amendment of any of the provisions of said act or the substitution therefor or addition thereto of other provisions, as the committee may deem advisable, with power to send for persons, papers and records and to report from time to time.


Mr. CASGRAIN:: I thought I heard the
name of the hon. member for Terrebonne (Mr. Parent) mentioned as a member of that committee. I think the names I gave were those of the hon. member for Ottawa (Mr. Chevrier) and the hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance).
Mr. CAHAN; Those were the names included.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I am afraid in view of
standing order 45 the proposed amendment is not in order. Forty-eight hours' notice is required of a motion for leave to present a bill, resolution or address, for the appointment of any committee, and this amendment includes the appointment of a committee.
Mr. CAHAN; I realized that difficulty, but I intended to ask for unanimous consent. I communicated with the leader of the official opposition and the leader of the third party in this house, and members of the committee were named by them. I understood that unanimous consent would be given to a motion of this kind. Of course if that is not the case my resolution will stand as a notice of motion. Do I have consent?


Mr. LAPOINTE:: So far as we are concerned there is no objection.
Mr. GARLAND (Bow River); I have no objection to the minister having the consent of the house to move this amendment, but I want to assure him that I have some objection to the amendment being adopted, and I propose to discuss the matter when the question is put.


Mr. C. G. POWER (Quebec South):: 1
have no objection, either, to giving unanimous consent to the appointment of a committee, but it seems to me that the usual procedure in this house has not been followed this evening. In the first place the order was
called for the resumption of the adjourned debate on the motion of the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) and I understood you, Mr. Speaker, to say the motion would stand. The next order was for the second reading of Bill No. 14, to amend the Civil Service Act. You were about to put the motion, and I understood that the proposer was about to speak to it. I do not wish to accuse the Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) of lack of courtesy towards one of the members on his own side of the house, but it seemed to me that he rose somewhat suddenly and cut off the debate.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: The debate is not cut off; the moving of the amendment does not prevent a debate upon the original motion as well as upon the amendment itself. There is no endeavour to cut off any debate. So far as the hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon) is concerned, he informed me that he had already discussed this bill and did not intend to make a speeoh on the motion for second reading.


Charles Gavan Power: In any case I am sure there are a number of members who would have been very glad to make certain observations.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Is the hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power) raising a point of order?


Charles Gavan Power: The first point I wish to submit to you, Mr. Speaker, is that we have not followed the usual .procedure in combining two motions or two orders and dealing with them by one motion. The second point is that even if that were allowed I doubt very much whether it is the custom and in accordance with the practice of this house to move, when the second reading of a bill has been proposed, that the bill be referred to a committee before any debate has taken place thereon.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for Quebec South (Mr. Power) has correctly stated what has taken place. The hon. member for Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon) moved the second reading of the bill and was about to speak when the hon. the Secretary of State intervened.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I beg your pardon, Mr. Speaker. May I be allowed to make a personal explanation? The hon. member for Dorchester told me that he did not intend to do more than move the motion, and therefore I was misled.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: As I have already pointed out, the resolution is not in order in that no notice has been given. It seeks to appoint
Civil Service Act

a committee and, I take it, it could foe regarded as in order only by the unanimous consent of the house.


Charles Gavan Power: So far as that is concerned, Mr. Speaker, I am willing to consent; but I am pointing 'out that there has been an irregularity in procedure.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: So far as the resolution refers to order No. 2 on the order paper, namely, the resuming of the adjourned debate on the motion of Mr. McGiibbon, that motion not being before the house, it is not open to amendment, and in that respect this resolution is also out of order.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: All I can say, Mr. Speaker, is this. When the motion of the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) came up, I said to the house that I should' like to have it stand until I could make a motion dealing with it and with the bill. That, I understood, was consented to by the house; I asked consent. And again, in giving notice of this motion, I asked the leaders of the parties in the house to consent to this. I asked that they appoint their own members to the committee, and if the right hon. the leader of the opposition were in the house I think he would say that it was understood that, so far as he was concerned-and, I was under the impression, so far as the other party was concerned-I should have the consent of the house to this course.


Charles Gavan Power: Again, on a point of order,
and with all due respect to the Secretary of State, to the leader of the opposition and to the leader of the other party, I submit that they cannot give consent to an irregular proceeding in this house. We have certain rules by which we must be governed. We can give consent when it is a matter of courtesy that such consent be given; but I contend that we cannot combine these two orders unless there has been a special proceeding in relation thereto. The first order was allowed to stand. If, after this first order had been moved, the Secretary of State had referred the matter to a committee, he could, when the second order was called and the second reading of the bill was moved, have also referred it to a committee. But to combine the two in one motion and still remain within the rules of the house is not possible and we cannot give consent thereto.


Hugh Guthrie: I was under the impression that
my hon. friend from Bow River (Mr. Garland) and my hon. friend from Quebec South (Mr. Power) were disposed to give consent-


Charles Gavan Power: Absolutely; we are.


Hugh Guthrie: -but desired an opportunity to discuss the bill on the second reading. The motion for the second reading is now before the house.


Mr. STEWART (Edmonton):: Second
reading of what?


Hugh Guthrie: Of the bill.


Charles A. Stewart: I understood the bill was to stand.


Hugh Guthrie: No; the motion is made that the bill be now read the second time.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver):: No one
has supported it yet.


Hugh Guthrie: The question has not
been put. But in amendment to that motion the Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) moved that the bill be not now read the second time but be referred. At this moment, therefore, both the motion for the second reading and the amendment are before the house and any hon. member who desires to discuss them has the fullest opportunity to do so. My hon. friend from Quebec South knows that we can override any rule by unanimous consent. If we have that consent, let us go on with the motion for second reading, and both the motion and the amendment can be discussed to the fullest extent. If we have not that consent, and under his honour's ruling, the motion will have to stand. I understood, however, that it had been arranged in all quarters of the house that the matter should be proceeded with as proposed by the Secretary of State.


Charles Gavan Power: I am willing to give consent, but I am pointing out that there has been an irregularity in procedure.


Hugh Guthrie: We admit that, and that is why consent is asked.


Charles Gavan Power: Yes; but it is an irregularity which requires not only consent but a special arrangement before we can proceed. I doubt very much whether, even with consent, we can combine the two orders and deal with them in one motion.


Hugh Guthrie: I have always been under the impression that by unanimous consent the house could do anything.


Charles Gavan Power: We can, but it is bad practice; let me put it that way.


Hugh Guthrie: One member can refuse
his consent, but with unanimous consent this house is all-powerful.


IS, 1932
[Stage Direction]
Civil Service Act
Charles Gavan Power: I am willing to give consent if that is all that is required, but I suggest that for our own sakes and for the sake of precedent the Secretary of State ought to proceed properly.


Mr. ROBERT GARDINER (Acadia):: I
rise to a question of privilege. From the remarks of the Secretary of State the house might be led to believe that the leaders of the parties on this side had given consent to these two questions being referred ho a special committee. Personally I have not been consulted in that regard. A few days ago the Secretary of State did ask me whether our group would select one of our members to be a member of the special committee of seven which would go into questions with reference to the Civil Service Commission, but he did not at that time say anything to me about referring this bill and the motion of the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario to the special committee. So far as I am concerned, I have no objection to giving consent on the understanding that, as regards Bill No. 14, it goes'to the committee without having received second reading, and therefore the principle of the bill is not accepted by the house, so that when the bill comes back we shall proceed with the second reading in the ordinary course.


Hugh Guthrie: That is right.


Mr. ROWE:: May I ask a question. In
view of the fact that the hon. member for Bow River spoke for his party, I should like to know, for my own information, who is the official leader of that party.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow Hiver):: Let me say to the hon. gentleman that either of us would probably make a better leader of any party than he would.


Mr. MANION:: That is very doubtful.


William Earl Rowe: Mr. Speaker-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I would direct the attention of the house to standing order 75, which reads:
Every public bill shall be read twice in the house before committal or amendment.
This is a motion for committal, and until the second reading has passed, the bill cannot be committed. I must rule that the amendment, so far, is out of order. The motion is for the second reading of the bill. Is the house ready for the question?


Charles A. Stewart: Explain.


Mr. GAGNON:: The hon. Secretary of State was right in saying that I had told him it was 41761-23
not my intention to speak at great length on the bill. Last year I had the honour to move a bill similar to Bill No. 14 which is now before the house, and I thought it was unnecessary for me to discuss the subject at any length or to repeat what I then stated. At that time a number of hon. members gave their views on the bill which was then under consideration. Certain doubt which has existed as to the attitude of the government towards this bill has been, removed. I welcome the inquiry which is to be held into the administration of the Civil Service Act, and I trust that it will be thorough and efficient. When the report of the committee is presented to the house I hope that such action will be taken as will satisfy public opinion.
When this bill was first introduced the trial of Bouchard and Chartrand was still in progress, and it would not have been proper to pass an opinion upon the matter at that time. The trial has disclosed many scandalous practices, and I contend that the Civil Service Commission stands now at the bar of public opinion. Not only in the province of Quebec but in other provinces a strong feeling exists that there ought to be an inquiry into the actions of this commission. When I spoke last year on this matter many important newspapers in Quebec such as the Montreal Gazette, the Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph and others agreed with the stand which I took at that time. A series of articles appeared some time ago in the Mail and Empire by Doctor Grant, principal of Upper Canada College, Toronto. During the debase on this bill in 1931 I referred to the opinion expressed by Doctor Grant in his articles. The first one appeared on December 25, 1930, and I would like to quote from a subsequent article in order to show that Doctor Grant believed that a strong feeling against the commission existed not only in Quebec but in other provinces as well. Doctor Grant said:
The whole idea of having three men to do such an executive job was wrong from the first. A commission is an admirable body to investigate and report; in an executive, unity of command is necessary. If the Canadian Pacific Railway ever wishes to go into bankruptcy, it could hardly find a better way than to put its general managership into commission and to give any two commissioners power to overrule the third. Any old-timer who remembers Sir William Van Horne will think with joy of the language that artist in profanity would have used to describe such a suggestion.
Not only did this eminent educationalist criticize the administration of the act but he considered as ridiculous and impracticable a commission where two members have the power to overrule the third.

Civil Service Act


Edward Joseph Garland: I happen to be familiar with the views held by Doctor Grant in this matter. I am sure the hon. member has no desire to mislead the house, but does he say that Doctor Grant at any time expressed an adverse opinion regarding the principles of the Civil Service Act?


Onésime Gagnon: To make a proper reply
to the hon. member I would have to read these three articles. I do not intend to take up the time of the house in doing that, but immediately after the debate is ended I will let my hon. friend have these extracts so that he can see for himself.


Edward Joseph Garland: My hon.
friend has not caught my point; I asked him if Doctor Grant had in a single line in his articles expressed an adverse opinion regarding the merit system, the principle underlying the Civil Service Act?


Onésime Gagnon: In order that my hon.
friend and the house may not be misled, I am prepared to put these articles in Hansard. I have no desire to misinterpret what Doctor Grant has said, but his articles speak for themselves. The first is entitled, "Would abolish commission in control of civil service." That cannot be misinterpreted. Another article is entitled, "Drastic reduction advocated in civil service of Canada." I am quite prepared to put these articles on Hansard.


Mr. POULIOT:: The hon. member should
have them stencilled and send a copy to all hon. members.


Mr. BELL (Hamilton):: Does not the hon. member read his Hansard?


Jean-François Pouliot: I read only the hon. member's speeches.


Leslie Gordon Bell: In English?


Jean-François Pouliot: The hon. member has
not made any this year.


Onésime Gagnon: This discussion probably
will tend to revive the question placed on the order paper by the hon. member (Mr. Pouliot) with reference to stenographers.


Jean-François Pouliot: That will come in due
course.


Onésime Gagnon: The placing of these
articles on Hansard would serve the same purpose as sending a letter dictated to my own stenographer.


Jean-François Pouliot: I object to their being
placed on Hansard.


Onésime Gagnon: I do not intend to repeat what I said last year. Many hon. members
[Mr. Gagnon.l
in this house expressed the view that a change should take place. I think the best change which could be adopted would be one recommended by a non-partisan body, and the findings of the committee of this house appointed to investigate this act will receive my humble support.
I do not pose as a reformer. I did not draft the amendments which appear in this bill; I embodied the recommendations of the Senate committee of 1924 and some of the recommendations of the Malcolm committee of 1923. Should my bill be amended, I will not object; I am striving only to arrive at the best method of remedying a situation.
I am not against the merit system, but I do contend that the Civil Service Commission in its administration of the act does not recognize that system. Only a few weeks ago applications were requested for the position of chief page in this house. I have been informed that the examination embodied an essay on the League of Nations. Last year the position of expert mechanic in the marine signal branch of the Department of Marine at Quebec was vacant. There was a large number of applicants for the job. Two or three young men took lessons from a professor of chemistry at Laval university in order to learn the different problems involved, because they felt that to be good mechanics in the signal department, they must be acquainted with the action of salt water on buoys and similar matters. The successful candidate was the janitor of St. Patrick's church in the city of Quebec, and I am told by some of the applicants who submitted to the examination that they were asked only three questions. First they were asked if they were married or single; second, "What salary do you want?" Third, "When will you be ready to 'take the job?" One man after having passed the written examination got 95 points, but after answering these three questions successfully he received only ninety points. Why should a man be deprived of five points after having answered successfully the three ridiculous questions that I have already quoted? I could cite numbers of examples like the above.
Let me point out another aspect of the matter. I have already complained that neither the three commissioners nor the inspector or examiner inquire into the qualifications and characters of the candidates. After they have sat for the written examination, all the papers are sent by the inspector to an employee in the department and this employee, after making certain ratings and gradings, sends a report to the Civil Service

Civil Service Act
Commission to the effect that candidate A should be first and candidate B should be second. Why, according to that so-called merit system, should the minister or the head of the department be deprived of the right of making an appointment, when the Civil Service Commission gives the power to a second-rate employee, who receives a salary of perhaps only $1,500 a year, to make an appointment in lieu of the minister?
The other day we read in the press that Mr. Renaud, who was an appointee from the province of Quebec in the Department of Justice and who has always been a good and efficient servant, died. The question arises as to who is to fill his place. Of course applications will be asked for throughout Canada and any lawyer who has practised his profession will be entitled to be a candidate. As regards Dr. Roche, who is a physician, Mr. Tremblay, who is a journalist, and Dr. Mac-Tavish, who is also a journalist, what are the qualifications of those three gentlemen to judge as to the respective merits of the lawyers who will be applicants for the position which Mr. Renaud formerly held in the Department of Justice? The civil service commissioners will do as they have done in the past; they will ask a lawyer from Ottawa or somewhere else to act for them; they will delegate their powers to him to find out who is the best lawyer to fill that vacant position in the Department of Justice. I consider legislation which deprives a minister of the right to make an appointment and empowers a lawyer who is not even an employee of the Department of Justice to fill a position in that department, is unwise, unsound and ought to be amended.
I could speak for hours and days giving examples like the one I have already mentioned, showing that this so-called merit system is not based on true merit. I assure hon. members opposite that I am not approaching this question in any partisan spirit, because while some bad nominations have been made under Liberal administrations, some bad nominations have also been made under Conservative administrations. I want to approach the question in a broad spirit. It is all very well to say: We do not want to return to the patronage system. We want the nominations to be aboveboard, but while we are desirous of having the merit system, let us find a scheme which will be based on true merit and let the true merit system prevail. Let us do away with that camouflage system which has produced such bad results and has given birth to complaints all over Canada.
41761-23J
I do not want to dwell at length on this question; I think I have made my point sufficiently clear, and I ask that this bill be now read a second time.


Edward Joseph Garland: Before the hon. member concludes his address on this particular bill, would he be good enough to explain to the house the reasons for the major change urged in 'the bill, namely, the exclusion of the outside service? That is an aspect of the bill he has not yet discussed.


Onésime Gagnon: I shall be pleased to
answer briefly the question put by the hon. member for Bow River. I have already stated that the three commissioners sitting at Ottawa cannot really be the best judges of the qualifications of all the different employees living outside the city. I have already pointed out that these three men cannot be an encyclopaedia of science. They are not properly qualified to ascertain the qualifications of a man who wants to be appointed caretaker of a customs house in Vancouver, or a postmaster in the Yukon or a customs officer in the port of Gaspe. Therefore I think in the best interests of the civil service itself, it is better that the three commissioners sitting in Ottawa should devote themselves to applications and nominations for positions in the inside service alone. They will find that a hard enough job, because in the inside service theTe are at least 18,000 employees. The appointment of a postmaster, for instance, in any part of Canada could be better made by the minister of the department than by the Civil Service Commission. I might point out to the hon. member for Bow River that on the twenty-fourth of June of last year the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) himself stated that in the legislation of 1918 they had gone too far in putting the postmasters throughout Canada under the jurisdiction of the Civil Service Commission. It is not necessary for me to speak any longer, but I think the public interest will be best served by taking the outside service out of the jurisdiction of the commission; or, if the committee which is to be formed prefers, by devising other ways and means of appointing candidates to the outside service.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: How does the hon. gentleman propose to appoint such outside candidates?


Onésime Gagnon: I do not think that at this stage of the proceedings it would be proper for me to answer all these questions, especially
Civil Service Act

in view of the fact that there will be ample opportunity to answer them in committee. I am pleased to see that my hon. friend is a member of the committee because I am sure he will have some very good suggestions to offer.


Edward Joseph Garland: I am astonished, but at the same time I am not surprised, that this evening we should have a proposal from the ranks of the Conservative party of a character that is calculated almost entirely to destroy the Civil Service Act which that party is responsible for putting on the statute book of this country.


Mr. MALONEY:: I rise to a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Is it not a fact that the previous speaker closed the debate?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for Bow River is quite in order in addressing the house.


Edward Joseph Garland: It is also interesting to note that until I asked him the question after he bad sat down the first time, the mover of the motion (Mr. Gagnon) did not give any explanation whatever of the most .sinister proposal in the bill, that of turning *over to the greediest of hordes the patronage [DOT]of the various constituencies throughout this 'dominion. The Secretary of State (Mr. Caban), when he spoke a few moments ago on an amendment that was ruled out of order, proposed that this bill and the resolution standing in the name of the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) should be referred to a special committee, and he gave two chief reasons for that. The first was that there were certain sinister reflections upon the present Civil Service Commission which in the public interest should be examined into and cleared up.


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: And concerning which they
should be heard.


Edward Joseph Garland: Yes. He said that neither the representatives of the Civil Service Commission nor those of the rank and file of the civil service had had an opportunity to defend themselves in connection with these allegations. The other reason he gave was that we might devise ways and means of improving on the Civil Service Act and its administration.
In regard to all these proposals of the Secretary of State, I, and I believe my colleagues are in complete accord. We think it advisable that there should be an examination into the actual conditions under which the administration of the civil service is being conducted to-day by the Civil Service Commission, and I will go so far as to agree with
fMr. Gagnon.]
my hon. friend from Dorchester (Mr. Gagnon) and join hands with him in a dismissal of the present civil service commissioners. I have no hesitation in saying that, from what meagre knowledge I have of what has been going on for some years and is now beginning to come out in the public press; but to destroy the merit principle-never. This country cannot afford to do that at this stage.
It is within a few minutes of eleven o'clock, Mr. Speaker, and as I wish to discuss the principle of this bill at some length, I ask you to call it eleven o'clock.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: If the hon. member wishes to bring the debate to a close he should move to adjourn the debate.


Hugh Guthrie: We can call it eleven o'clock, Mr. Speaker, if the house agrees.


Edward Joseph Garland: As I was saying a moment ago when the opposition with its usual courtesy declined me the privilege of having it called eleven o'clock-


An hon. MEMBER:: Not the opposition, the government.


Edward Joseph Garland: No, not the opposition. Strangely enough I think I have had more courtesy at the hands of the late government than I have had at the hands of this one.


Hugh Guthrie: I do not know what my hon. friend is talking about. I asked the Speaker to call it eleven o'clock and he declined.


Edward Joseph Garland: I did not hear my hon. friend. Will he please accept my sincere regrets.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I did not understand the Minister of Justice. If it is the desire of the house to call it eleven o'clock, it is eleven o'clock.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Friday, February 19, 1932