1932-03-09

Hon. W. A. GORDON (Minister of Labour) :: I desire, Mr. Speaker, to lay on the
table of the house the report under the Unemployment and Farm Relief Act, 1931, together with copies of the orders in council passed under the authority of the statute. 41761-60
I desire to move, seconded by Mr. Sauve:
That seven hundred copies in English and three hundred copies in French of this report be printed, and that rule 64 be suspended in relation thereto.


Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Quebec East):: Does that include the orders in
council which have been adopted under the provisions for "peace, order and good government," or are they documents by themselves?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The orders in council are
documents by themselves; they are not included in the printed report.


Ernest Lapointe: And will not be
printed?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I had not anticipated that there would be any necessity for printing the orders in council.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: Can the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) indicate when the report will be printed? I know that in the past it has been arranged sometimes to have the printing done a little in advance of the orders of the house.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I think it will be only a
day or two before the report is printed. I have asked the Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) to speed up the printing. I am sending the right hon. gentleman a copy now.


Mr. CAHAN:: The report is probably
printed by now.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. G. B. NICHOLSON (East Algoma) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 29, to amend the Railway Act.
He said:	Mr. Speaker, section 179 of the
Railway Act provides that in the event of a railway company deviating any of its lines or closing a terminal or a station, involving the necessity of its employees leaving their homes and moving to another point, they must first obtain the leave of the Board of Railway Commissioners, and the board may order such compensation to the employees as in their judgment the case warrants. I propose to amend this section by adding after the words "nor create a new divisional point" the following words:
Nor make any change in the routing of traffic, nor run crews through divisional points where their homes are established, nor make any other change.
And at the end of the section to add these words:
[Stage Direction]
Questions
[Stage Direction]
No such change shall be made or authorized without thirty days' notice of the intended change to the employees concerned.
Subsections 1 and 2 of section 250 arbitrarily prohibit any superstructure being erected over a line of railway that does not provide a fixed clearance of seven feet between the highest freight car used on the railway and the lowest beam of the structure. Subsection 5 however, grants the railway commission authority to give special permission in certain cases to change this arbitrary clearance. It is proposed to amend subsection 5 by adding the following words:
Provided that no exemption shall be made from the operation of this section nor any change made in the standards fixed by this section until due notice and hearing is first given to all parties interested.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. T. G. MURPHY (Minister of the Interior) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 30, to amend the Yukon Quartz Mining Act.
He said:	The regulations for the disposal
of quartz mining claims in the Northwest Territories were established by order in council under the authority of section 35 of the Dominion Lands Act, being chapter 113, of the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1927, while quartz mining claims in the Yukon territory are granted under the Yukon Quartz Mining Act, which does not permit of any amendments except by legislation.
The purposes of this bill are twofold:
1.	To make it. possible for the governor general in council to extend to holders of mineral claims in the Yukon territory the same measure of consideration as it is possible to extend to holders of mineral claims in the Northwest Territories in the matter of relief from representation work on mineral claims;
2.	To provide a penalty clause designed to prevent misrepresentation as to work claimed to have been done on a mineral claim, and to prevent removing or disturbing any legal post or stake marking a claim.
, Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

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

Mr. DUFF:: 1.	Has Felix Bartholomew LeBlanc been appointed to the position of customs officer at Arichat, Nova Scotia?
2.	If so, was said appointment made by the Civil Service Commission?
3.	Is the said incumbent a returned soldier?
4.	Is he a Canadian citizen?


Mr. CAHAN:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Yes.
3.	No.
4.	Yes.


GOVERNMENT ELEVATOR-PORT PRESCOTT, ONT.
Mr. ROSS:: 1.	How much: (a) wheat; (b) other grain or cereal has been received at government elevator, Port Prescott, since opening?
2.	How much: (a) wheat; (b) other grain or cereal has been received at the elevator at Little Cataraqui bay, since opening?


Mr. STEVENS:: 1. (a) Wheat-	Bushels
Canadian		.. .. 604,553
United States		.... 95,530
T otal		.... 700,083
(b) Other grain-	Bushels
Canadian		.. .. 737,722
Foreign corn		.. .. 548,135
Total		.... 1,285,857
2. (a) Wheat-	Bushels
Canadian		.. .. 5,399,162
United States		.... 3,364,301
Total		.... 8,763,463
(b) Other grain-	Bushels
Canadian		.. .. 2,640,492
United States		.. .. -
Total		.. .. 2,640,492


GEORGE FLETCHER
Mr. BOUCHARD:: 1.	Has a contract been let to George Fletcher to carry the mail from Bailieboro to Millbrook, Ontario, during the year 1932?
2.	Has Mr. Fletcher a wife and children dependent?
3.	Was R. J. Porter's tender lower than Mr. Fletcher's for this contract?
4.	If so, how much lower?
5.	Were any complaints ever received regarding Mr. R. J. Porter as a mail carrier during his twenty-six years of service as such?


Mr. SAUVE:: 1.	Yes.
2.	Department has no official information.

Questions as Orders for Returns
3 and 4. Yes. $11 lower, but owing to special representations made regarding the situation of tenderers, and also the war record of Mr. Fletcher, he was allowed to reduce his tender by this amount to the rate of the lowest.
5. No.
temporary EMPLOYEES-PUBLIC WORKS


Mr. FOURNIER:: 1.	How many letters were sent to temporary employees of the Department of Public Works advising them that their services would be no more required after the last of March, 1932?
2.	How many of said employees are native born?
3.	How many of said employees are French speaking?


Mr. STEWART (Leeds):: Stand as an order for return.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I should like to ask the Minister of Public Works just what is the reason for having this question stand as an order for return. It requires simply a word in answer to each of the questions.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I think somewhat more detailed information is required than my right hon. friend suggests in order to complete the answer to this question.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: The first question is:
How many letters were sent to temporary employees of the Department of Public Works advising them that their services would be no more required after the last of March, 1932?
Surely one word would answer that. The next question is:
How many of said employees are native born?
Surely one word would answer that. The next question is:
How many of said employees are French speaking?
Surely one word would answer that also, so why should this question be made an order for return?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: It will take some time to get this information, and I should think if it comes down as an order for return it will be as satisfactory as an immediate answer.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I certainly think these questions that can be answered briefly should not be made orders for returns. It may be different if questions require a great deal of research, but the letters here referred to have been recently issued and it should not take long to secure the information.
41761-60^


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I want to assure my right hon. friend that there is no desire on the part of the government to escape giving the information.


Mr. BENNETT:: Perhaps the question
might stand instead of being made an order for return.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Very well.
Question stands.


PENSION APPLICATIONS
Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver):: 1.	How many cases were referred for award to the proper authorities under the meritorious clause since the new machinery of pensions tribunals and appeal court was formed?
2.	How many such applications were granted?
3.	How many such applications are still awaiting decision?


Mr. MacLAREN:: 1.	Fifty-seven.
2.	One.
3.	Fifty-six.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. PORTEOUS:: What were the exports from Canada, and value thereof, of agricultural products, each year from 1929 to 1930, inclusive, of the following: (a) live stock and products thereof; (b) milk, cream and dairy products; (e) wheat; (d) total agricultural products except wheat?


Mr. STEVENS:: Stands as an order for
return, now tabled.


ROYAL CANADIAN AIR FORCE
Mr. AHEARN:: 1.	How many officers retained in the Royal Canadian Air Force are married men?
2.	How many of these married officers have not seen war service?
3.	How many wives and dependent children are affected by the release of married officers of the Royal Canadian Air Force?
4.	Is the government considering absorbing married officers of the Royal Canadian Air Force into other branches of the government service?
5.	How many non-permanent officers of the Royal Canadian Air Force, who were first advised that their services were no longer required, have since been reengaged?
6.	How many of such officers have war service ?
7.	How many of such officers are married?


PUBLIC WORKS EMPLOYEES
Mr. CHEVRIER:: What are the names, length of service, nature of work and number of dependents of each permanent employee of the maintenance
94b

Unopposed Motions for Papers
staff of the Department of Public Works, Ottawa, who have been notified that their services will not be required after the 31st of March?


TOBACCO EXPORTS AND IMPORTS
Mr. GOTT:: 1.	How much excise tax per pound is collected on domestic raw leaf tobacco when used in licensed factories in Canada, and how and when is the tax collected?
2.	What amount was collected for the fiscal years ending March 31, 1930, and 1931?
3.	What was the total amount of tobacco consumed in Canada each year from 1908 to 1931, inclusive?
4.	How much tobacco was grown in Canada during the years 1908 to 1931, inclusive? _
5. How much tobacco was imported into Canada in the above years, and from what source were the said imports?
6. How much tobacco was exported from Canada during the above years, and to what countries?
7.	What rebate of import duty is allowed on imported raw leaf when manufactured for export purposes?
8.	What bonding privileges are extended to licensed manufacturers when raw leaf tobacco is imported by them?
9.	How much imported raw leaf tobacco was used for export purposes during the years 1908 to 1931, inclusive?
10.	What were the average prices received by the tobacco growers of Canada: (a) for their 1929 crop; (b) 1930 crop; and (c) 1931 crop?
11.	How do the departmental officials arrive at the average price paid for tobacco in the United States?
12.	Does the Canadian government classify the different types of tobacco raised in Canada, imported into Canada and exported from Canada?
13.	If not, for what reason?


UNOPPOSED MOTIONS FOR PAPERS
Mr. FAFARD:: For a copy of all correspondence, reports, telegrams, petitions and other documents, in connection with the post office at L'lslet, Quebec, in 1931 and 1932.


BRITON COVE, N.S., POST OFFICE
Mr. VENIOT (for Mr. Duff):: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams, memorandums, investigations, reports and other documents, regarding the change in the Briton Cove post office in the province of Nova Scotia, and the reasons for the transfer of same from the previous location to the present location, between any member of the government and any official of the Post Office department at Ottawa and any person or persons in the province of Nova Scotia.


BIG BRAS D'OR PUBLIC WHARF
Peter John Veniot: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams, memorandums, reports and other
[Mr. Chevrier.l
documents, between any member of the government and any official of the Department of Public Works or the Labour department or any person in the province of Nova Scotia in respect to the Big Bras D'Or public wharf repairs during the summer and fall of 1931, with a copy of payrolls and amounts expended thereon; and particulars as to whether this work was performed by contract or days' work, and the present condition of said repairs.


MARGAREE, N.S., BREAKWATER
Peter John Veniot: For a copy of all correspondence, letters, telegrams, memorandums, reports and other documents, exchanged between any member of the government and any official of the Department of Public Works or the Labour department or any person in the province of Nova Scotia, with a copy of payrolls and amounts spent on the repair of breakwater and in harbour improvements, during the years 1930 and 1931, at Margaree, in the province of Nova Scotia.


MOTOR CAR BODIES
Mr. McGIBBON:: For a return showing:	(1) the amount of
lumber; (a) hardwood; (b) softwood, imported into Canada during the past year by the manufacturers of .motor cars and trucks; (2) the number of motor car or truck bodies or frames, either wholly or partly made of wood, imported into Canada during the past year, showing the rate of duty, the amount collected, the kind of wood and the prices f.o.b. at the mills.


Peter McGibbon: Dropped.
Motion dropped.


QUEBEC PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT WORKS
Mr. POWER:: For a copy of all correspondence, memoranda, contracts, conventions or agreements entered into during the months of October, November and December, 1931, between the government of the province of Quebec or any of its departments, and the government of the Dominion of Canada, in connection with the apportionment, distribution and administration of moneys _ contributed by the government of the Dominion of Canada to works carried on by the provincial government other than those under the control of municipalities.


ROMEO MARQUIS
Mr. BOUCHARD:: For a copy of all correspondence, telegrams, reports and other documents relating both to the dismissal of Romeo Marquis, St. Germain, county of Kamouraska, Quebec, as rural mail carrier and the appointment of his successor.


CLEMENT LEVESQUE
Joseph Georges Bouchard: For a copy of all correspondence, reports or other documents relating to the dismissal of Clement Levesque, postmaster at St. Pacome Station, Kamouraska county, Quebec; also copy

Motions for Papers
of all correspondence, reports or other documents in connection with an inquiry with reference to the charges brought ag-ainst the said Clement Levesque and the appointment of his successor.


DOUGLAS, 0NT.-POSTMASTER
Mr. BLAIR:: For a copy of all correspondence, applications, reports on applicants and all other documents relating to the appointment of a postmaster at Douglas, Ontario.


ALBERT HAMELIN
Mr. BUTCHER:: For a copy of all correspondence, telegrams, letters, recommendations, sworn statements, and all other evidence taken at any inquiry in connection with the dismissal of Albert Hamelin as postmaster at Jasmin, Saskatchewan.


MOTIONS FOR PAPERS
Mr. GEORGE SPOTTON (North Huron) moved:: For a return showing: (a) how many automobiles were purchased for the use of cabinet ministers during each of the fiscal years ending March 31, 1922, 1923, 1924. 1925, 1926, 1927, 1928 and 1929; (b) the make of car used by each minister and the price of each of the said cars; (c) the cost of maintenance of each of the said cars, showing in detail the salary of chauffeur, oil and gasoline, repairs, housing, depreciation and other charges.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: If the house is
interested in getting this information, as I have no doubt it is, it will be equally interested in getting like information for the years immediately preceding and immediately following those mentioned. Accordingly I would move that the motion be amended by adding in line 4, after the word "1929" the words "also the fiscal years ending March 31, 1930 and 1931, and the fiscal years ending March 31, 1919, 1920 and 1921."


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think we might shorten [DOT]this by accepting the amendment proposed.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Perhaps the mover of
the original motion will accept the amendment.


George Spotton: I think the right hon.
gentleman had better ask his own questions.


[Stage Direction]
Amendment agreed to.
Motion as amended agreed to.

Mr. THOMAS REID (New Westminster):: moved:
For a return showing the number of persons in the employ of the government in connection
-	J
with the commons chamber, the senate chamber and parliament building generally, with the various salaries paid.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: When this motion was
called previously I pointed out that there was no date mentioned.


Thomas Reid: With the consent of the house I will amend the motion by inserting the words "from March 1, 1931, to March 1, 1932."


Pierre Édouard Blondin: With the amendment,
shall the motion carry?
Motion as amended agreed to.


PUBLIC WORKS-QUEBEC
Charles Gavan Power: For a return showing list of all works carried on in the province of Quebec during the calendar year 1931 under the Unemployment Relief Act by the government of the Dominion of Canada out of its own moneys, and to which no contribution has been made either by the municipalities or by the government of the province of Quebec, together with copies of letters and correspondence indicating on whose recommendation said works were undertaken.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Mr. Speaker, the return tabled today covers the major part, if not all, of the information asked for in this motion. There may be letters and correspondence that do not appear in the return as tabled, but undoubtedly the rest of the information will be found in the return.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Is it understood that the minister will bring down what is not in the report?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Yes.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That is satisfactory.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Bedford Bennett: I promised the right hon. gentleman
(Mr. Mackenzie King) that I would inform him to-day with respect to the Easter recess. If it is acceptable, as I understand it is from what was said yesterday, it will be proposed to adjourn on the Wednesday evening preceding Good Friday and convene again on the succeeding Tuesday. I said Thursday, yesterday, but Thursday will be a holy day. This arrangement will allow us to sit on Wednesday, and, if the house thinks desirable, we might sit until eleven o'clock. At any rate, I will give notice in the ordinary way on the order paper.
Canada Shipping Act


William Lyon Mackenzie King: That would be wholly acceptable to the members on this side


Richard Bedford Bennett: We spoke to Mr. Gardiner and I understand he is satisfied.
DISARMAMENT CONFERENCE On the orders of the day:


Richard Bedford Bennett: The house will be interested in the
information which I have just received that our colleague the Hon. Maurice Dupre, Solicitor General, was to-day unanimously elected vice-president of the Naval Committee of the Disarmament Conference. The proposal was made by the Italian representatives, and in view of the unanimity with which it was received the ordinary rule of secret balloting was dispensed with.
CANADA SHIPPING ACT On the orders of the day:
Mr. ANGUS MacINN-IS (Vancouver South):	I would direct a question to the
Minister of Marine (Mr. Duranleau). In the speech from the throne it was announced that there would be amendments to the Canada Shipping Act, and I would ask the minister whether we may expect these amendments shortly.


Hon. ALFRED DURANLEAU (Minister of Marine):: I regret to say that I fear it will not be possible to lay before parliament at this session a bill to revise and consolidate the Canada Shipping Act. While the work of the officers of my department in this connection is well in hand, it is not yet sufficiently advanced to permit a bill being brought down. Anyone who has made a study of the present act will realize that the work of revising it is one of great magnitude and of no small importance. The present act contains eighteen separate parts, each dealing with a different subject, the whole comprising 950 sections. It was only last fall that the statute of Westminster was passed by the Imperial parliament, and the British Commonwealth Merchant Shipping Agreement was signed at London only on December 10, 1931. By this agreement the governments of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, the Irish Free State and Newfoundland undertook to propose any necessary legislation and to take such other steps as may be necessary for the purpose of giving full effect to the agreement. The revision of the Canada Shipping Act, when it is complete, will have to conform to the agreement, and after full and lengthy consideration the officers fMr. Bennett.]
of my department have proposed that the most desirable way to secure the legislative uniformity contemplated by the agreement is to have model sections of the law set up which would be embodied in the statutes of all those parts of the commonwealth which are signatories to the agreement. This matter is now engaging the attention of my department, but I may add that I intend to bring before the house this session such amendments to our coastal laws as are most urgent at the present time.


Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: Will opportunity be given
for all interested parties to present their points of view-shipping masters, the various labour unions, and others who are very keenly interested, such as the marine engineers?


Alfred Duranleau: I understand that
representations were made some time ago by the different associations interested. At any rate, the bill will be referred to the standing committee on marine and fisheries and any interested party will have an opportunity to present objections or offer suggestions.


Thomas Reid: Does the minister intend to bring down at this session legislation with respect to the inspection and enforcement of safety appliances on board ship while in dock?


Alfred Duranleau: I understand that the chief object of the amendments will be with respect to our coastal laws for the purpose of putting Canadian bottom owners on the same footing as the American. There may be other amendments, but I cannot say offhand whether the amendment suggested by my hon. friend will be embodied in the bill.


TRADE TREATIES
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. SAMUEL FACTOR (Toronto West Centre):: May I call the attention of the"
Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens) to the following despatch, diated March 8, and ask a question based upon it:
New Zealand Treaty Waits on Canada
Wellington, New Zealand, March 8.-"Unforeseen delay at the Canadian end" has temporarily held up progress on the trade treaty between Canada and New Zealand, Downie Stewart, finance minister, said to-night. The proposals negotiated between Mr. Stewart and H. H. Stevens, Canadian Minister of Trade and Commerce, at Honolulu, are ready, however, for submission to the New Zealand parliament. Mr. Stewart added he had been informed by Mr. Stevens that pressing political problems had precluded immediate submission of the proposals to the Canadian cabinet.

Unemployment Continuance Act
Will the minister say whether this despatch is correct, and what these political problems are.


Henry Herbert Stevens: The answer to the question is that in the course of a few days a statement will be made to the house regarding the Dominion government's position in connection with the New Zealand treaty.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: May I ask the
Minister of Trade and Commerce or the Prime Minister whether negotiations are proceeding with the government of France with respect to a treaty between Canada and France on trade matters. I ask this question because I believe despatches have come from France which would indicate that the French government is contemplating banning fresh fruits from Canada and putting a prohibitive duty of $1 a bushel on imports of grain as a consequence of the abrogation of the treaty we had.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No such information has reached
the government, nor have we received any communications since the last despatch was sent, indicating a willingness to resume discussions looking towards an amended treaty


MONTREAL POSTAL TERMINAL
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. Mr. RINFRET (Translation):: May I inquire from the Postmaster General whether his department has completed or will soon complete the purchase of the necessary land for the erection of a postal terminal, near the Bonaventure station, in Montreal, and when we may expect to see the work started.


Hon. Mr. SAUVE (Translation):: I think
that this question comes under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Stewart).


UNEMPLOYMENT AND FARM RELIEF
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, will the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) advise the house what members of the council are replacing, in their absence, the minister without portfolio (Sir George Perley) and the Solicitor General (Mr. Dupre) on the subcommittee for the administration of the unemployment relief act.


Richard Bedford Bennett: In view of the fact that no further new matters are being considered, no appointments
have been made. As occasion necessitates these appointments will be made, but at the moment there is no necessity. The members of council as a whole have considered such matters as require attention since the departure of the ministers referred to.


Ernest Lapointe: No Quebec men?


Richard Bedford Bennett: There are Quebec men on the council as a whole.



[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Tuesday, March 8, consideration of the motion of the Prime Minister that Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair for the house to resolve itself into com-mitte of the whole on the following resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to introduce a bill to amend chapter 58 of the statutes of Canada, 1931, striking out the word "March" in section 8, and substituting the word "May" therefor.
Mr. F. G. SANDERSON (South Perth):: Mr. Speaker, to my mind the resolution which has been introduced by the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) is one of the most important pieces of legislation brought before the house this session. It deals with unemployment and farm relief and affects not only tens of thousands of people; when the husbands and wives and children are taken into account it means that probably a million and a half or two million people are affected. The discussion thereon should receive the serious thought of every hon. member.
We have had in this country from time to time what have been known as hard times or depressions, and it must be said of the Canadian people as a whole that they face a crisis or anything which seems to be in the nature of a disaster with courage second to none. W'e have had depressions before, and in all probability as time goes on we will have others. They will occur when this government has passed on and perhaps when most, if not all, of the hon. members have left the scene. We had a depression which started in 1921 and extended into 1922 and 1923. I do not intend to deal in detail with the period of the great war, but for a moment I should like to go back to those days.
During the years from 1914 to 1918 the people of this country were under terrific stress and strain. They were keyed up from time to time with the news from the front; some of them were waiting anxiously for the cables announcing the causualty lists, and so

Unemployment Continuance Act
on, but their morale was sustained not only by their loyalty but because they were kept busy. There was no unemployment and, after all, the great tonic for idleness or for worry is activity and work. I might say that not only was every man and woman active in connection with the war, but there was also some profiteering, with which I do not intend to deal.
I desire to contrast that trying period from 1914 to 1918 with this depression, which in its magnitude and its ramifications is perhaps the greatest we have experienced. I am not unmindful of the efforts put forth by this government to grapple with the situation which confronted them when they took power in 1930 and which has continued down to the present day. I do not intend to hark back to the election campaign of 1930 other than to say that in the campaign the present Prime Minister, then the leader of the Conservative party, and all his candidates, made of unemployment a federal issue. Nothing was said in regard to the provinces taking part in this work, and very little in connection with the participation of municipalities. The then leader of the opposition made it a federal issue. He told the people of this country, not once but a dozen times, in so many words: If you elect me as Prime Minister and I form a government, with my bow and arrow I will kill and end unemployment in this country. That was the effect of the words he uttered. It is only fair to make a few observations in connection with the methods adopted by this government in regard to unemployment. As I said before, I am not unmindful of the efforts put forth, nor do I think the people of this country are unmindful of them; but I do think the majority of the people are of the opinion that 'whatever the efforts may have been, the results have fallen far short of expectations.
First of all, I should like to go back to the special session held in September, 1930. That session was called largely for the purpose of devising ways and means and passing legislation to end unemployment. The first method adopted by the government at that special session was the raising of the tariff to a point higher than any other government has ever attempted to raise it, and higher, I hope, than any government in the future will attempt to raise it. But this did not have the effect of curing unemployment; on the contrary, it made the unemployment greater, because people of moderate means had to pay more for the necessities of life. Therefore the increase of the tariff had no effect at all in the way of alleviating unemployment.

Then there was the measure under which an amount of $20,000,000 was voted to relieve or put an end to unemployment. I am not criticizing that in any way, nor did the opposition criticize it at the time it was brought in. They did have something to say as to the way- in which the money should be spent, and made certain suggestions which were not taken seriously or acted upon by the government; but the principle of asking for a vote of $20,000,000 was not opposed by hon. members on this side. As a matter of fact, the opposition would not at that time have criticized the granting of a larger sum, but the government thought $20,000,000 was the amount they should have to spend.
I want to speak of the mistakes the government, in my judgment, made at the time they had that amount voted. First of all, the government made a mistake even before the calling of the special session-and in the remarks I make I want it to be clearly understood that I am not in any way critical of the hon. gentleman who held the portfolio of Minister of Labour from the inception of this government until his resignation a few weeks ago. He is a capable man, a man of integrity, and one who, I think, has for many years kept in close touch with labour conditions in Canada. I am sorry, that the gentleman, as the Prime Minister pointed out not long ago, has become a casualty through being overworked and broken in health. But in that appointment to the portfolio of labour the mistake made by the government was this: if there is any place where a minister of labour should not have a seat, it is in the other chamber of this parliament. He was not close to the common people. He could not occupy a seat in this house in the special session of 1930 or in the session of 1931. Many questions were asked of the Department of Labour; sometimes they were answered and sometimes they were not. But in my opinion the results would have been far better for this country and for the people who are out of employment had the office of minister of labour been occupied by a member of the House of Commons.


Mr. MACDOUGALL:: When the Hon. Mr. Murdock was Minister of Labour in a Liberal government, had he a seat in the House of Commons?


Frederick George Sanderson: Yes, he had.


Isaac Duncan MacDougall: He was defeated
and was appointed to the Senate.


Frederick George Sanderson: He was not appointed to the Senate until years after he was minister of labour.

Unemployment Continuance Act


Isaac Duncan MacDougall: Not at all.


Frederick George Sanderson: I do not mind interruptions if they are relevant. I shall answer any question I can, but as regards the question of my friend, he is wrong in his facts, because the Hon. Mr. Murdock was never minister of labour while he sat in the Senate.
Another mistake that I think the government made was that they linked themselves up with the provinces and municipalities. If I may revert to some remarks I made a few moments ago, they made the issue that primarily the question of unemployment was a matter fo.r the federal parliament. Then they attempted to make some arrangement first with the provinces and through the provinces with the municipalities. The result is that the whole matter has been confused; there has not been either head or tail to it. There are two principals: the federal government and the provinces, with the municipalities as a side partner. The result is that if a member rises and asks a courteous, intelligent question in regard to the expenditure of federal money on unemployment relief, it is very difficult to secure an intelligent answer. I say that in no spirit of criticism. It would have been -far better if the federal government had assumed the whole responsibility for the payment of money in connection with unemployment relief and had in some degree worked in conjunction, if they wished to do so, with the provinces and the provinces with the municipalities, but there should have been some scheme worked out so that the responsibility in regard to the payment of these amounts could at least be put on someone's shoulders.


Peter McGibbon: What does the hon.
member suggest the federal government could have done instead of what they did do?


Frederick George Sanderson: That is a fair question, and I am prepared to answer it. As a matter of fact, I was coming to it. I would say:	follow the advice that the
leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) gave to the government the other day, namely, that it would have been far better if this relief work had been carried out by a commission rather than through any government. Such a course would have done away with a great deal of the difficulty, unrest and dissatisfaction that prevail to-day in this country in regard to the expenditure of the money.


Peter McGibbon: Would the hon. member eliminate the provinces and the municipalities in connection with this expenditure?


Frederick George Sanderson: I do not say that I
would do so, but I would suggest a responsible commission composed of responsible men, not politicians, either members of the government or members of the opposition.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh!


Frederick George Sanderson: Hon. members can
take that as a joke, but I mean it just the same. I would suggest a commission where no politics could creep in. If the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) will wait a moment or two, I shall endeavour to give my reasons for saying why I think the appointment of a commission would have been much better than the way in which the matter has been handled by the government since 1930.
These questions sometimes get me off the beaten path. I want to go back to the
820,000,000 voted at the special session of 1930. We find, according to the statements made from the government side, that out of the fund of $20,000,000 the sum of $17,372,000 was expended. The whole amount apparently was not required, or at least, if it was required, it was not spent. The $17,372,000 formed part of a total expenditure by the provinces and municipalities of approximately $70,000,-
000.	That proves, to my mind at least, that $3,000,000 was not used, so that there was lack of business ability, lack of coordination and lack of cooperation between the federal government, the provincial governments and the municipalities. But I do not blame the municipalities in that regard. I am endeavouring to establish merely that the whole scheme has been worked out in a very unbusinesslike way. I repeat, that the federal government should have been in control of the situation from the first, perhaps having a commission working for or under it to some degree. I do not think any member of this house will get up and say that the efforts put forth by this government in the special session of 1930 did very much to alleviate unemployment. Unfortunately-one does not like to say this, but we must face the facts as we see them-the unemployment situation has gradually been getting worse ever since this government came into power, despite the fact that it has had practically a free hand to grapple with the situation. My hon. friend from Muskoka-Ontario, as a medical man, knows that if he is prescribing for a patient who gradually gets worse under his treatment instead of better, and concludes that his treatment is not the right one for the case, he may consult with some other member of the profession or perhaps call in another doctor to prescribe for the patient.
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I am not insinuating at all that the opposition should be called in to deal with the present state of affairs, because they will be called in by the people of this country just as soon as they have an opportunity to speak their minds.


Mr. EMBURY:: We shall have to be a
whole lot sicker than we are now for that to happen.


Frederick George Sanderson: The whole management or mismanagement of the situation does not stand very much to the credit of the federal government or of some of the provincial governments, as I shall endeavour to explain in a moment or two.
I come to the session of 1931. At that session there was a long discussion of the unemployment question, and very late in the session, two or three days before the close, a measure was brought down by the government asking for what is commonly known now as a blank cheque in dealing with the unemployment situation. That blank cheque was given to them, although hon. members on this side opposed it, pointing out at the same time that if the government in their wisdom wished to ask for fifty or one hundred or one hundred and fifty million dollars, or any other stated amount, it would be voted without question. But no, the government must have a blank cheque and unlimited powers, and they got both. We do not know how much of the blank cheque has been handed over to the provinces, although figures have been given as to the amounts for 6ome of the provinces. I do not think, however, that any hon. member on the other side of the house will say that since the government was granted a blank cheque and unlimited powers in the session of 1931, unemployment has lessened. On the contrary, from 1931 down to the present day, just as from 1930 to 1931, the unemployment situation has been gradually getting worse; there are thousands more unemployed men and women in this country to-day than there were a year ago.
Now I come to at least a partial answer to the question asked by my hon. friend from Muskoka-Ontario about the commission and about the spending of this money. I do not charge the right hon. the Prime Minister, any member of his government, or the government as a whole, with having played politics in the expenditure of money voted for unemployment and farm relief. But I do say this, that either with or without knowledge, consciously or unconsciously, the federal authorities placed in the hands of the provincial governments something that most

of the provinces at all events have used for political purposes. I want to speak particularly of the province of Ontario.
Members from Nova Scotia and from Saskatchewan have pointed out in this house that politics did enter into the spending of the money voted for purposes of unemployment and farm relief. Speaking as a citizen of Ontario, and knowing something at least of politics in this province, I say that the fund has been used in Ontario for political purposes. I want to say a word or two about the political machine in the province of Ontario, and when I say the political machine I mean the provincial political machine. Of course, in a federal election the provincial political machine comes out to do duty for the federal party, but primarily it is a provincial political machine. Its chief architect and designer is a gentleman who now occupies a high position in London, England, but that machine is still in existence, and its ramifications are numerous indeed. It is surprising how this political machine is manned. It is manned by officials of the highways department of the province of Ontario; it is manned by the officials of the liquor control board of the province of Ontario, and when I say '[DOT]officials" I am not referring at all to the commissioners; it is manned by officials who have to do with old age pensions in the province of Ontario; it is manned by officials who have to do with mothers' allowances in the province of Ontario; it is manned by officials of that great public institution, the Ontario Hydro Electric Commission.


Mr. MANION:: Might I offer a suggestion to my hon. friend? Does he not think that in fairness, having made a general statement of that kind, he should give more details, rather than leave it in the form of a general statement? Those are pretty serious charges, and it seems to me that my hon. friend has said either too much or too little.


Frederick George Sanderson: In reply to my hon. friend the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion), I do not think I have said too much or too little, and if I have the time I may say a good deal more before I sit down.


Robert James Manion: There is plenty of time.


Frederick George Sanderson: In regard to the manning of the political machine by officials of the Ontario Hydro Electric Commission, let me say that part of the machine is not working true to form; for there has been to some extent a backfire from the gun they have been firing in that part of the political

Unemployment Continuance Act
machine. But I repeat, Mr. Speaker, in the province of Ontario the political machine is manned by officials of these different departments and commissions as I have stated here on my responsibility as a member of this house. They have built up that great political machine in the province of Ontario. I will not say that they have taken the money out of the treasury, but the fact that they have the spending of the money through their officials has resulted in their using it, if not directly at least indirectly for political purposes.
My friend the Minister of Railways thought I had said too much or too little. Well, I am going to tell him something more. During the last year and a half there have been several by-elections for the legislature of Ontario, and to rnv knowledge hundreds and hundreds of unemployed men were stopped outside the polling booths by Conservatives and warned that they had better be careful how they marked their ballots, because if it was found they had voted against the Queens Park candidate they could take it for granted that they would not get any work or relief from the unemployment fund. If that is not playing politics I do not know what is. So I repeat that in Ontario, unfortunately, the money received by the province under the Unemployment and Farm Relief Act has been used to further the purposes of the political machine.
I regret that the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) is not in his seat. He holds a very important portfolio. There is no doubt of his ability, nor of his integrity so far as I know; but I am a little doubtful of him in some other respects. I am told that his sponsor was the distinguished gentleman who now occupies such a prominent position in London, England, and that it was he who tutored the minister in the craft of politics. So we had an excellent combination-an apt pupil and a very clever teacher. On February 23 last the minister took part in the debate on unemployment, arising out of the amendment moved by the member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Heenan) on the motion to go into supply. One would naturally expect that in what was his maiden speech as Minister of Labour he would have at least said something in regard to the policy of the government or what he himself thought should be done to help dispel the dark clouds of unemployment and distress that hang over the country. I have read his speech carefully in Hansard of that date. He was not subject to the forty-minute rule and consequently spoke at length. In all kindness to him I would point out that he took up almost three-quarters of an hour in criticizing
the immigration policy of the former administration, and tried to argue that the policy was largely the cause of the present unemployment and distress. Well, the hon. gentleman came into this house after the elections of 1930, and I would refer him to a speech delivered on March 9, 1928, by the then hon. member for Vancouver North, Mr. McRae, who sat on this side as a member of the Conservative party and of the opposition. His fellow Conservatives applauded the scheme that he outlined for colonizing fifty million acres of land in the far west at a cost involving not millions but billions of dollars. If the then government had taken his advice and carried out that policy the country would now be bankrupt.
After attacking the immigration policy of the late administration, the minister launched an attack on the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River, who held the portfolio of labour in the late Liberal government. I hold no brief for the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River; he is well able to take care of himself and usually does, but I would say to the minister that if he puts as much energy into his work and gets as close to the labouring people of Canada as did his predecessor, he will have a record to be proud of when he retires from the Department of Labour. On that occasion he regaled the house with a vast amount of correspondence from people up in northern Ontario, from mayors, presidents of boards of trade and others, all throwing boquets at the administration. One would expect an hon. gentleman holding the very high and responsible position of Minister of Labour to maintain debate, especially during this trying period, on the high plane of national politics rather than descend to the low level of ward politics. But a perusal of the correspondence is sufficient to convince one that it could have no place even in the discussion of a village council.
Now, to come to the resolution itself:
That it is expedient to introduce a bill to amend chapter 58 of the statutes of Canada, 1931, striking out the word "March" in section 8, and substituting the word "May" therefor.
The Prime Minister is a very eminent lawyer, and I do not pretend to follow him in the citations he read to the house yesterday from a judgment delivered by the late Lord Chancellor Haldane, but it appears to me as a layman using ordinary common sense that he is attempting to resurrect something that is dead. He is trying to amend an act that became null and void on March 1 last. This resolution requires an undertaker to bury it, and when that is done the government should bring in some live act in its place.
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I should like to say a word or two with regard to farm relief as it pertains to the province of Ontario. Aft e have heard a great deal in regard to the money spent in Saskatchewan and the other provinces of the west for direct farm relief, but if this government does not take some steps to relieve the situation in this great province of Ontario, before long they will be confronted with a situation that will tax all the resources of the country. During the course of a debate the other day the Prime Minister stated, in reply to a question as to farm products and their prices, that the fanners of this country had better read the book written by the Duchess of Atholl. If that is all the relief the government is prepared to give the farmers of Ontario and of the other provinces, then it is a sorry day for the farmers and for the whole Dominion of Canada.
I want to repeat what has been often said in this house that if the basic industry of this country cannot prosper; if the farmers cannot find markets for what they produce, at prices which will at least give them some profit, that industry is doomed. This is the situation facing the farmers of Ontario to-day, as well as those of every province in this great dominion. I hope the house will not permit the Prime Minister to force through this blank cheque again. The right hon. gentleman likes to cite precedents from the mother of parliaments, as he calls it.


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


Peter McGibbon: Mr. Speaker, as one who has had
considerable relief work done in his constituency I can hardly let the statements just made by my hon. friend (Mr. Sanderson) go unchallenged. The hon. gentleman said this money was used for political purposes. I agree with the Minister of Railways (Mr. Manion) that if a man stands up in this house and makes a charge as serious as this, at least he should be prepared to give some proof.- The only proof suggested by the hon. member who just took his seat was that somewhere, at some time, some persons had been told by somebody that if they did not vote for a certain candidate in a certain by-election-which the hon. gentleman did not name-they would be deprived of relief work. The one outstanding thing that has struck me during this debate has been the lack of real criticism by the opposition. Perhaps they are performing what they think is a party act, but it does not take very much intelligence to understand that really there

is no enthusiasm behind what they are doing; their efforts are not well directed, and above all no alternative plan has been suggested. I defy any member of this house to go into the ridings where this money has been spent and successfully criticize the way it has been handled. I do not say there have been no mistakes; there have, but what undertaking of such magnitude ever was carried through without mistakes being made? The opposition have suggested no alternative. What would they have done with these tens of thousands of people, men, women and children, literally starving in this country? When I remember that notable speech of the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King), with the background it had-that speech that acted as one of the most powerful weapons in sweeping hon. gentleman opposite from the government benches to the opposite side of the house-I should think they would have left this subject alone.
We had unemployment then, Mr. Speaker; we still have it and everyone regrets it, but what would hon. gentlemen opposite have done? I asked the hon. member who just took his seat what he would have done, and what was his answer? He said he would have appointed a commission. Was that an alternative policy? I ask him now, as I ask any member opposite, what he would have done that the government did not do. Would they have started a dole?


Mr. MITCHELL:: You started it yourselves.


Peter McGibbon: The hon. gentleman
says we started it ourselves. I will do this; I will go into Hamilton at the next election and defend the labouring people there against him on this question.


Frederick George Sanderson: Did I understand the hon. member to say he will go into Hamilton and speak against the labour candidate?


Peter McGibbon: No, I said I would defend this legislation, and I think it can be defended successfully. Through this legislation seven million man-days of work were given the people of this country. Is that nothing to be proud of? Did it have no effect on the prosperity of the country? Perhaps it had not much effect, but I will tell you what it did right in my own riding; it had the effect of keeping body and soul together for a lot of those people who would have starved without it. There is no question about that. When this work started last fall a man came to me and said, "McGibbon, I have a wife and

Unemployment Continuance Act
eight children. I have nothing; I have only earned $63 in the last four months, and my prospects for the future are no better."


Mr. POULIOT:: There are 550,000 like
that.


Peter McGibbon: That is to be regretted, Mr. Speaker, but it only emphasizes the need for legislation of this kind, and the fact that it should not be stopped from the first of this month. Now what should we have done with these people? That is the question before the house and no doubt before the government. These people had nothing to eat and there were, in my opinion, only two things to be done, possibly three. You could hand them out a dole or you could put them to work. The government decided to do the latter, wisely, I think. Others may differ and they have just as good a right to their opinion as I have to mine, but I think it was a wise business, good business both from the man's standpoint and from the country's. It certainly saved the man's self respect when you gave him a job whereby he could earn his own living instead of being put on the dole. It was certainly in the interests of the country even if you got only forty or fifty or sixty per cent of value for the money you spent. And so the government decided, wisely, in my opinion, to go into the policy of road building. The Dominion government could not do otherwise: that goes without saying; and that was what I meant when I asked the last speaker what was his alternative policy. I am not a lawyer, but I do not know of anything they could have done except to hand out money, and they chose to save the selfrespect of the people of Canada by endeavouring to get some value for the money that was spent.


Frederick George Sanderson: The hon. gentleman
says he would hand out money, and the money has been handed out by the federal government. Is he in favour of, and does he endorse, the action of this government in handing out sums to the provinces without any check, without any audit on the expenditures, without any idea as to where the money is to go or who is to get it?


Peter McGibbon: I am not in favour
of that, but that has not been done.


Frederick George Sanderson: But it has been done.


Peter McGibbon: Not without an audit
and check; not at all. I think there is something to be said for the principle which has been announced and which I stated in this house ten or twelve years ago, namely, that the body responsible for raising money
through taxation of the people should be responsible for the spending of that money. There is a good deal to be said for that principle. But when you are faced with a national emergency, with humanity in one scale of the balance and legal quibbling and [DOT] technicalities in the other, then I say that the people of this country will not tolerate the overriding of humanity by technicalities.
How was the money spent? I happen to know a good deal about the way some of it was spent. I do not think we got as much value as we should have, and that is possibly inevitable in any undertaking of such magnitude. But I do know that we got value. The first thing that happened was this. I myself put an advertisement in every paper in my riding, asking all those out of work to register. That was the first thing. Then certain works were laid out to be undertaken and certain quotas of men drawn from every municipality. How was that done? The reeve and council of the municipality were asked to pick the men, and who could know the politics of the reeve in any township or municipality in the riding? That was the way it was done, and the money was spent through the officials of the provincial government. The hon. member says they are political heelers. I want to tell him that the principal official in the district of Muskoka was a Liberal, one of the worst Grits I think you could find in any county in the province of Ontario. He handled all that money and none of us objected.


An hon. MEMBER:: Was he a good Grit?


Peter McGibbon: You will have to define what that is before I can answer. However, when he wanted men he wrote to the reeve of the municipality and said, "Send me ten, twenty or thirty men," as the case might be. How could politics enter into a scheme of that kind? The men went on and did their work for a week or two and then they were let go and others were taken in their places, and not all from my riding by any means. I believe many came from the riding of the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat; many came from Oshawa; many came from Galt, an'd some from Preston. And they were selected in the identical way that those in Muskoka were selected. The reeve or the mayor of the municipality was asked to select those who were in want, and those who presumably were most in want were first sent to work. That was the way the work was carried on throughout the districts of Parry Sound, Muskoka and Haliburton, and from actual knowledge I can say that I do not know how some of these people would ever

Unemployment Continuance Act
have got through the winter had it not been for the work provided by this government and the provincial authorities.
I ask hon. members: Is it not fair, when a man rises in this house and claims that this money was used for political purposes, that he should at least give some proof? I know that in the north country it was not so used; politics never entered into it anywhere. I can say further that it has done a great amount of good for the poor people of these working districts in the north. If hon. gentlemen have any suggestion to offer, why do they not offer it? I am not advocating it, but I think it is a debatable point whether we should not distinguish between wages and relief. We had many complaints from farmers, when they paid $2.40 a day, that the wages were away beyond anything they could afford, and we had some complaints from industry along the same line. Of course there was this to be said, that the men were not given continuous work; they [DOT]were not expected to have continuous work. They had probably one week out of two or three. But I think it is a debatable point, if this is going to be done again, whether you should not build your camps, put in your cooks, and have every man who is in want go there and keep him and feed him. Let him do what he can but keep him continuously. The money would take care of a far larger number of people than it would under the past scheme. I do not know whether that would appeal to everyone, but what did appeal to me was this: that it was rather a hardship to put a man on for a week and then turn him off for two weeks or so. The demand, however, was so great that it was almost impossible for everyone to be taken on and kept on continuously. I say, therefore, taking into consideration the objections of the farmers, the manufacturers and so on, that it might be debatable whether there was not a better scheme than the one we employed. But the situation was largely similar to war conditions. There was nothing to guide us and we had to act as best we could and obtain the best results possible.
What I rose to say was this. As regards that part of the country with which I am concerned, where I had considerable intimate knowledge of the spending of the money, I can assure the house that politics never played any part in it for live minutes. I do not think politics had any effect at all. Undoubtedly mistakes were made that should not be made again, but I resent people getting up in this house and making accusations of a character so serious as those made this afternoon, without any proof whatever. rMr- McGibbon.l


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, there is no question of greater interest to the members in this corner of the house than that of the relief of unemployment, yet I must confess to an almost overbearing sense of futility in attempting once again to try to set forth our position with regard to such matters. While the hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Sanderson) was speaking I looked around the chamber and I noticed that there were only twenty-five members on the government side of the house, including two cabinet ministers, and only twenty-six or twenty-seven members on this side. It does not seem as if this question is of any vital importance to the membership of this house, and, more than that, it seems to be taken for granted that any discussion which takes place on the floor of this house will be of no great importance in modifying the views of the government. Some hon. member said the other day that to a very considerable extent we have degenerated into a debating society. If this is a debating society, I suppose the only thing we can do is to keep up the debate in the hope that some time we may get a break.
In his remarks when introducing this resolution the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) took a great deal of trouble to attempt to shift the responsibility from the federal government to the governments of the provinces. As has been pointed out, that was a great contrast to the attitude he took before the last elections. I should like to read two sentences only from tihe Prime Minister's speech delivered at Calgary on June 12, 1930. He said:
I say to you, my fellow citizens, my fellow Canadians, speaking to the larger audience, I am convinced this problem has now ceased to be local and provincial and has become national in its importance.
And a little later:
I propose that parliament shall formulate a definite plan for permanent relief, and that parliament, as representing the people, shall deal with this national problem and provide amelioration for the condition in order that next winter the Canadian people may not be facing the crisis which is upon us without having a remedy at hand.
As I have said, that was back in June, 1930. The next winter came, another winter came and we are well on into the spring and yet no permanent plan has been devised nor does it appear that the Prime Minister is making any effort to carry out his promise that a plan should be brought before parliament. He appears to be proposing to go on in the manner indicated by the hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon), that is,

Unemployment Continuance Act
drifting along and doing what at the moment seems to be best. It is against that kind of haphazard action that we protest.
I do not think there is any use worrying about whether or not this matter comes under provincial or federal authority. Even the Prime Minister had to admit that the provincial authorities, especially in the west, were almost bankrupt. No provincial government, especially those in the west, is going to protest against the Dominion government dealing with this question of unemployment. Only two days ago I received the following telegram from Premier Bracken:
Distribution seed grain through municipalities in Manitoba will burden financial resources of said municipalities far beyond their ability to undertake. Strongly urge that you use your best endeavours to have Dominion government undertake finance one-third of freight charges and assume one-third of any losses by municipalities resulting through distribution of seed grain. Provincial government has already undertaken to assume one-third in both instances.
A very serious crisis is facing the farmer in the west. The provincial governments are coming forward and making their proposals but apparently they can obtain no satisfaction whatever from the federal government. What is to be done? Under these circumstances we find the Prime Minister reading elaborate and lengthy extracts from some judicial decision in connection with the exact point at which federal and provincial jurisdiction may be doubtful. I do not think that is in keeping with the promises he made and the attitude he assumed before the elections.
Last evening we listened to a very brilliant speech by the hon. member for Hants-Kings (Mr. Ilsley). I agree with him to a large extent, especially when he states that there is great danger that parliamentary authority may' be abrogated by the taking of such action as we are now asked to take. The Prime Minister in attempting to meet this objection the other day, said:
. . . having regard to the gravity of the situation and the difficulty of dealing with it by any hard and fast rule, that this chamber will confer these powers upon this government. I would not deprive this parliament of its right to criticize freely and, if it thought desirable, destroy this administration for the improper discharge of its obligations, but I can conceive of no way in which this house can have larger powers conferred upon it than by the method I have suggested, so that in every instance it might have the fullest opportunity of dealing with these matters.
That sounds very well, it sounds as if parliament has authority but in actuality we know that the government has a majority of some thirty members and that on any vital
question it can count on the solid support of that majority. Even on minor matters the government seems to feel quite safe in relying on the support of its following, which means in effect that this parliament has little authority. It is all very well to say that in form, measures have to be submitted to parliament, but in actual practice it means that what the Prime Minister says goes. When the Prime Minister makes a statement he can count on the loyal support of every last member of his party, and therefore what we say here is of practically no value. I think we have had an almost unseen change in the character of our British institution. When parliament was first organized there was no political machine such as we have to-day and under those circumstances a speech in the house might have some weight and a proposal could be discussed on its merits and there might be some check enforced, but to-day there is very little check.
I would not object quite so strenuously to the dictatorship which is rapidly being developed if that dictatorship were in the interests of the great majority of the people, but I do not believe that is the case. As far as I can judge from the various measures presented to the house, this dictatorship is essentially in the interests of the financial groups of this country. As was pointed out by the hon. member for Hants-Kings, the only two illustrations that the Prime Minister gave of the power which he asked to be conferred upon the government with regard to peace, order and good government, were relative to financial measures. Mention was made, for example, of the export of gold. I was rather interested in a reply which was given by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Rhodes) to a question I asked the other day, to the effect that gold issued in redemption of Dominion of Canada notes from September 21 to October 19, 1931, the day of the passing of order in council P.C. 2617, to public bodies, banks, firms and individuals, amounted to $5,318,461.49. That means that certain individuals and firms were able to secure, in exchange for dominion notes, gold which, I am credibly informed, was then shipped to pay their debts in the United States. That may have been quite legal, but I urge that the ordinary man cannot get gold for that purpose. I know of a number of cases that have been brought to my attention where men have applied for gold and have been refused it. It is a most serious situation where certain preferred groups can secure gold and make their payments in the United States
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Unemployment Continuance Act
thus saving what one time was something like 25 per cent of a discount. That is a serious state of affairs.


Robert James Manion: May I point out to my hon. friend that no special groups got the privilege of exchanging Dominion of Canada notes for gold? The matter depended on the circumstances in each case, and each case was dealt with on its merits. I am sure my hon, friend does not wish to be unfair. There were people who were so unpatriotic as to desire to secure gold in order to make the premium on it, and those people had to be refused.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I should like to know what the difference is between making a premium on gold here and sending it to the United States and saving the discount there.


Robert James Manion: There were reasons for
holding the gold in Canada, so far as possible, unless there were better reasons for sending it to the United States.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not disputing the general policy, but friends of mine have gone to the banks and asked for gold, and while I think they were just as patriotic as the people to whom gold was given, they were refused.


Robert James Manion: That may have been for good reasons.


James Shaver Woodsworth: That is an arbitrary practice on the part of the government in that it depends entirely on them and comes under this relief measure as to whether certain people will be able to secure gold in exchange or not. The Minister of Finance, may I say to the Minister of Railways (Mr. Manion), said that this redemption of Dominion of Canada notes was as provided by law. I should like to ask the Minister of Railways why, if this redemption was as provided by law, some people secured gold whereas others were refused it.


Robert James Manion: Because, as I said, it all depended on the circumstances.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Then it is not law if it depends on circumstances, because this means in effect that the matter is left to the arbitrary jurisdiction of the government in power. That is my objection.
Further than that, may I point out another matter which comes very close to this. Recently the provincial savings bank of my province had to close its doors, and the accounts were transferred to the chartered banks. We have not yet been told just why that was done. If the Dominion government could

come to the rescue of certain individuals and, if necessary, supply gold, I should like to know why the dominion could not come to the rescue of the provincial savings bank of Manitoba.


Isaac Duncan MacDougall: Did they not do so? Mr. WOODSWORTH: No.


Robert James Manion: My hon. friend makes a
positive statement. When he says that they did not do so, he does not know the facts.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I should like to
have a full statement on that matter, because even such a paper as the Winnipeg Tribune, which is usually a staunch supporter of the government, charges in its editorials discrimination by the government against Manitoba. When public charges of that nature are made, especially by such a newspaper as that, it is high time for the government to give some sort of explanation of the matter. But my object in raising the question was simply this, that I say a dictatorship such as is developing in this country is particularly dangerous when it is used in the interest of financial groups rather than in that of the great majority of the people.
The Prime Minister has again and again objected to the dole. He has said that as long as he is Prime Minister he will not consent to the adoption of it. In my judgment, he and his government have adopted the worst kind of dole which I know. The so-called dole, or the unemployment insurance scheme in Great Britain, is infinitely preferable to the scheme that we have in this country. I admit there have been some abuses connected with the unemployment insurance scheme in Great Britain; there is no doubt of that, but I know men, irrespective of party in Great Britain, who say that they would not think of getting along there without the unemployment insurance scheme. What have we here? Simply a hand-out. That is all it means. We have no system whatever; we have no way of encouraging people to save; we have no way of stimulating people to work. We simply have the government giving when it has to do so and now apparently proposing to carry on the same practice. There seems to be no arrangement for any change whatever.
I should like to urge upon the members of the house that the present situation shows no sign of improvement. It is barely possible that the enormous amount of credit recently injected into the financial system of the United States may have some influence on the situation in this country. Some people are building their hopes on that. I am not at all sure

Unemployment Continuance Act
that will affect us very materially in Canada. I am inclined to think the international situation is much more serious than most of us imagine, and has a far greater effect even on this continent than most of us are willing to concede. In any case there is no immediate prospect of improvement in the situation, yet in spite of this the government have no plans. Several of the members have said that the government have actually provided relief for many people. That is true, and to that extent the government has to be commended. The hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) said that the government had helped many people in that it had helped them to keep body and soul together. I wonder why it is we should be content to keep tens of thousands, yes, hundreds of thousands of people in a condition where the best that can be said is that body and soul are being kept together. Is that anything of which to be proud? During a week-end recently I happened to take a stroll over the mountain in Montreal, and as I passed beautiful residences extending mile after mile-with here and there one boarded up, it may be said, because even in those high circles they are beginning to feel the effects of present conditions-I could not but be impressed by the fact that we still have enormous wealth in Canada. When there are people whose wealth is indicated by beautiful homes in Montreal, Toronto and other cities; by bank accounts, bank balances, investments which can be made in bonds as soon as such issues are put on the market, I cannot see why a large part of our population should be condemned to a condition under which they can do no more than keep body and soul together. There are people throughout the country who are still living in temporary shelters built on dumps and garbage heaps. People by the thousands are going in and out of missions where they are rapidly becoming demoralized by the whole atmosphere of charity which prevails. Men have to go to soup kitchens and take their places in bread queues. Is this the treatment that should be meted -out to citizens who have hitherto been regarded as respectable Canadians? In my own city, where I think we are taking as good care of the unemployed as anywhere in Canada, we have some five thousand odd families on relief. I wish hon. members could understand what it means for these families to be in receipt of charity week after week, month after month, and now year after year. Not only does it mean that the man is rapidly becoming incapable of work and that his wife is becoming discouraged, but it means that these people cannot pay their doctors and 41761-61
dentists' bills, that some are having to take their children out of school, and generally speaking that they are losing heart. It is all very well for the Prime Minister to say that the people of the west are optimistic. I know the .optimism of the people of the west, but I say that there are large numbers of the people of the west who are not now optimistic and have no right to be optimistic under the conditions that prevail to-day. They are losing heart.
In addition to those five thousand odd families on relief, there are some six thousand single men who are being fed daily in big dining halls. The hon. member for Mus-koka-Ontario rather boasted that the government had provided work, but the work actually provided amounts to a very small proportion of the relief given, and the government it is rumoured, is even now proposing that it will give up its scheme of providing public works and fall back on straight relief. It is pointed out that the providing of work is too expensive, and that it would be a great deal cheaper if the government simply handed out straight relief. I hope there is nothing in that rumour, because it is far better to keep the public works going and let men obtain work and maintain their self-respect than to go on with this idea of being indefinitely on the dole, for that is all it is- indefinitely on the dole.
The Prime Minister in a number of his references has, it seems to me, rather suggested that these unemployed people were blameworthy, had to be guarded against, and all that kind of thing. I want to urge very strongly to-day that unemployment under modern conditions is no crime whatever. It is undoubtedly still a crime to steal, but I would like to know whether any hon. member here would say that under no circumstances a man was justified in taking food when he was starving. That is the issue we shall have to face.


Robert James Manion: Would the hon. gentleman kindly tell the house where the Prime Minister ever said that these unemployed were blameworthy?


James Shaver Woodsworth: According to the
press, when he interviewed a delegation of the unemployed the other day, he came very near to saying that.


Robert James Manion: He did nothing of the
sort. He merely criticized their method of putting up a demand and the generally offensive method of the spokesman for the party.

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James Shaver Woodsworth: Their methods
may have been offensive, but again and again I have read accounts of the reception which the Prime Minister has given to the unemployed, and certainly one would think that he was dealing with a group of near criminals instead of with men in almost desperate straits. Possibly sometimes such men do not know the polite language to use and so do not use it under the desperate circumstances in which they find themselves.


Mr. BELL (Hamilton):: You should not
read those Grit papers.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I do not know
whether it was in Grit or Conservative newspapers.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I do.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I want to urge this, that the people who own property and wealth do so because of existing social arrangements, not necessarily because of their own virtue or their own abilities. I think of the way in which the natural resources of this country, the mines, the timberlands, the water powers and so on, have been alienated in the past. I do not think the fact that a man owns any of these things to-day is any indication that he has any more ability or is any more moral than those who are without them, and that is putting it veiy mildly in view of the large number of scandals we have had in this country in which graft has gone on in the securing of the public resources doubtless indicating a still more widespread practice along these lines. Whether the present owners have obtained these resources legally or not, they own them because of the legislation that exists at the present time.


An hon. MEMBER:: Beauharnois.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, Beauharnois is one example, but by no means the only one.
I would urge the same thing with regard to the people who own factories, and who to-day in many eases are laying their men off simply because the times are not such as to enable them to make profits. I would say that these people who own factories and who have made money in the past from them have done so simply because of the arrangements of society. Have we not sat here ever since confederation and handed out special privileges to the manufacturers? Of course we have, and they have made their money in that way, and yet some of these people who have made their money in that way would lecture the poor unemployed because they do not use polite language in making their requests of the government. Look at the big bond issues which have been 
over-subscribed sometimes within a few hours after being put on the market, and which bring to the holders as high a rate of interest as six or seven per cent. Does anyone mean to say that those who are in receipt of a steady income from sources such as these have any more right to enjoy life than the poor people who are going up and down the country seeking in vain for work? I think of the statements of the banks which are paying their usual dividends and in some cases giving premiums to their shareholders. How can they do so? It is because of the Bank Act which we put on the statute books of this country nine years ago. Is not that the reason? We know that the Canadian Bankers' Association spent $100,000 in lobbying here in order to get that Bank Act framed to suit their own convenience. They are able to pay these great dividends because of the arrangements of society. I think, too, of the insurance companies, some of them bolstered up, as was pointed out yesterday by the hon. member for Hants-Kings, at a critical time, in spite of the act. I think of the owners drawing their dividends because of our social arrangements.


Mr. NICHOLSON:: What about the policyholders?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, what about them?


George Brecken Nicholson: What about their dividends?


James Shaver Woodsworth: What about them? What does the hon. member mean?


George Brecken Nicholson: I would like my hon. friend to follow that through.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not following it through. My hon. friend evidently wants to talk about that. I say that the owners of these life insurance companies are drawing their dividends. What about the watered stock that we have in this country, and in connection with which, through the arrangements of high finance, a large number of our people have been bled? I say again that fortunes built up in this fashion are owing to the existing social arrangements and because of the legislation that we have on our statute books. And now these people who have built up their wealth by means of that legislation are telling us that the government must keep their hands off and must not give a few dollars to help the unemployed, that we have no money in this country with which to undertake relief work. I would point out that even papers like Toronto Saturday Night are saying to-day:

Unemployment Continuance Act
Despite all the striving of men after gold, its value in the last analysis is determined by the goods it will buy-the things we eat, wear and use in our everyday life.
And in the same way the real value of bonds is measured. In other words, the worth of a bond to its owner is measured by the goods which its interest and its principal, on repayment, will buy.
Measured by this standard, high-grade bonds now yield more than they have for many years. They present an opportunity for investment that comes only once or twice in a lifetime.
Again:
The income from $100 invested now in the 15-year bonds of the province of Ontario gives a yield of 8-43 per cent, as compared with 6-60 per cent in December, 1920. That is, the real yield of money is 1-83 per cent greater than in 1920.
And every thoughtful buyer is urged to invest in bonds now. Thus, as we have said again and again, owing to the change in the buying power of the dollar, money is simply rolling into the pockets of those who have had a better chance in life, of those who had a head start. Yet we do not seem to be able to get anything worth while for the relief of the unemployed, nothing in the way of setting up such schemes as will permanently bring those now unemployed a decent standard of living. I do not know how much longer the people of Canada will stand what we have been seeing lately, when the millionaire Prime Minister-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Shame!


James Shaver Woodsworth: Oh, no, there is no shame in that. When the millionaire Prime Minister of this country-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Shame! Order!


James Shaver Woodsworth: No, there is no
shame in that. When the millionaire Prime Minister of this country is surrounded by a heavy guard-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Shame!


James Shaver Woodsworth: Shame again! Even the Ottawa Journal thought that was a shame -surrounded by a heavy guard will actually undertake to lecture a few poor people because they are dubbed communists-who may be communists for all I know-and who come here almost in desperation, and' do not speak to him in the most polite language or do not prefer their requests in a parliamentary fashion. I say I do not much wonder that the people are becoming desperate across this country; I do not much wonder that our jails are beginning to fill with so-called "criminals," I do not much wonder that the Prime Minister and some others are having 41761-61J
to be attended by bodyguards; I do not much wonder at this because you cannot expect that hundreds of thousands of people are simply going to lie down and die or continue indefinitely to be mere hewers of wood and drawers of water on a pittance that, as the member for Muskoka-Ontario says, is sufficient merely to keep body and soul together.
I remember some years ago reading a story by Conan Doyle about a whaler. They had had rather hard luck, and in pursuit of whales they had got far to the north, but the captain persisted in maintaining his course. The season was becoming late, ice floes were gradually pressing in, and there were only one or two avenues of escape left. The crew became almost mutinous, and even the officers, who under the ordinary discipline that prevails are supposed to be very loyal to their captain, were getting dubious and urging that he should turn south while it was still possible to do so. Then one night at a late hour the ship's doctor, a young medical student, happened to be on deck, and unexpectedly he came upon the captain performing some mystic rites. All of a sudden the doctor realized that the captain was mad, that here they were in these far northern waters with every avenue of escape rapidly closing up and the ship commanded by a captain utterly irresponsible as a navigator.


An hon. MEMBER:: What is your illustration?


James Shaver Woodsworth: My illustration is
that the ship of state to-day is in command of a captain who seems to be so obsessed with his own ideas, so sure, I might say, of his own importance and of the impossibility of his making a mistake in judgment, that we are deliberately sailing on at a time when there might be some avenue of escape, and when, if I am rightly informed, even some of his own crew are beginning to get dubious of the successful outcome of his course.
Let me say, Mr. Speaker, that at the present time not only have we to deal with the ordinary type of unemployed; we have to do with a very large number of mechanics who had accumulated small savings while employed. Those savings are being rapidly depleted, and they will not be able to keep going much longer. Others have been drawing on their insurance, some of them have been mortgaging their homes, and in many instances they are in danger of losing their property. What is going to happen unless we have some policy that will start up public works and employ these men? I think I might 6peak to-day not merely of the so-called labouring
964	COMMONS
Unemployment Continuance Act
men but of our business men as well. In my own constituency and in other cities which I visit from time to time scores of businessmen come to me at their wits end what to do next.
There is no doubt, Mr. Speaker, that we are facing a crisis. As I see the matter, we have reached the stage when we cannot at the same time pay the dividends which are demanded and pay wages as well. I think, to put it in a nutshell, that is the situation in which we find ourselves to-day. Enormous indebtedness has been piled up and we are asked to pay interest on those debts and at the same time to provide hospitals and other public services of all kinds. We cannot do it. That is one of the inherent contradictions of the present system which is beginning to manifest itself.
What are we going to do? It would seem as if the government now in power, sensing somewhat the issue at stake, is determined at all costs to maintain the present system, to pay the dividends, to pay the interest on the bonds, no matter what happens to the people outside. I would suggest that before very long a new policy has to be adopted by which we will place the interests of the men, women and children of Canada before the interests of the bondholders and the financiers.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: "Order," says somebody. Yes, that is supposed to be a very dangerous doctrine. But I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that a new line-up is coming in this country. The old divisions between Liberals and Conservatives are not going to amount to very much in the near future- they do not amount to a great deal with the ordinary people to-day-and in the new lineup that is coming we shall find on the one hand the private interests of this country- which are linked inextricably with those of the United States'-and on the other the great masses of Canadians who have a right to live. We talk about our Canadian citizenship, but for many men to-day Canadian citizenship does not mean anything. All it amounts to at best, as the member for Muskoka-Ontario put it, is the possibility of keeping body and soul together.


Peter McGibbon: I rise, Mr. Speaker, to a point of order. I say the hon. member can draw no such conclusion from my remarks.


James Shaver Woodsworth: The hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario did say that he thought the government ought to receive our commendation because they had provided relief
l Mr. Woods worth.]
which at least had helped many men and women to keep body and soul together. I give them full commendation for that, but I say that is not the standard we should have in this dominion; we should have a higher standard than that. I should like to go back to the days of our fathers and our grandfathers when they settled in this country. I have come from two or three generations of Canadian stock, and I say that when our forefathers set up their homes in this country they were trying to work out a democracy in which every man would have a chance to live, and live decently.


An hon. MEMBER:: They worked.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Yes, they worked- and that is the point I do not like about hon. members opposite. They imply that people who are not working to-day do not want to work; which is a lie. The vast majority of the people who are out of work to-day would work if they had a chance, and it is that slander on the common people of this country that I do not like and against which I protest. The fact is that most of them want to work, and they are just as anxious to work as those pioneer people about whom I have been speaking.


Peter McGibbon: Mr. Speaker, I rise to
a point of order. The hon. member who is now speaking has said that hon. members of this house have stated that those who are out of work do not want' to work. I demand that he withdraw that statement.


James Shaver Woodsworth: That was not my
statement. I said that interjection of an hon. member opposite implied that a large number of those who were out of work did not want to work. If it did not imply that it did not mean anything.


Peter McGibbon: I dispute that; the hon. member did not say anything of the kind.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I think the remark of
the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth), that the inference to be drawn from the remarks of hon. members is a lie, is not parliamentary and should be withdrawn.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I said, Mr. Speaker,-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Withdraw.


James Shaver Woodsworth: No; I want to be clear on this matter.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: In parliamentary language it would be proper to say that it was

Unemployment Continuance Act
not correct. To say it is a lie is not parliamentary. and I ask the hon. member to withdraw that statement.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I ask
leave to make my statement. I said that the implication was that the majority of the people who were out of work did not want to work, and I said that, such a statement was a lie.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Which is not parliamentary, and I ask the hon. member to withdraw it.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I refuse to withdraw.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I think the hon. member
is too experienced a parliamentarian to disregard parliamentary practices.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I
did not accuse any hon. member here of telling a lie. I do not know whether you, sir, can catch what I am saying. I did not accuse any member here of uttering a lie; what I did say was this:	The hon. member who interjected that word "work" would seem to imply that the majority of the men out of work did not want to work and would not work. I said that a statement that most of the men unemployed to-day would not work was a lie, but I did not put that statement into the mouth of the minister. I merely said that would seem to be implied.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The minister did not
make any such statement; and the hon. member has not heard anyone else make any such statement.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Then I will make
it a hypothetical statement, if you like.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Then the hon. member's
statement is that if such a statement were made it would be a lie?


James Shaver Woodsworth: Quite so. I say
that if that was the implication, or if that statement was made, it would be a lie.
Mr. MeGIBBON:	Mr. Speaker, I think we
will find to-morrow, when we read Hansard, that the statement now made by the hon. gentleman is not correct.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for
Winnipeg North Centre has spoken for over forty minutes.
Mr. WOODSW'ORTH:	Mr. Speaker, I
would-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would point out- Some hon. MEMBERS: Order.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Except with the unanimous consent of the house the hon. member cannot continue.


James Shaver Woodsworth: All I would say, Mr. Speaker-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Sit down.


James Shaver Woodsworth: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: There is no question of privilege.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would say-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member has
spoken for more than forty minutes; his time is exhausted.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Speaker, for the last couple of days I have been listening to the debate that has been proceeding in the house. To use the ordinary words that we hear so often,
I did not intend to take any part in the discussion this afternoon, but a few statements have been made by two or three speakers with which I should like to deal.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth), who has just taken his seat, spent a little over forty minutes- because I noticed the time when he rose-in making a speech full of destructive criticism. I carefully listened to the hon. member in order to see whether, in his whole speech, he would offer one constructive suggestion, and I say without fear of contradiction that no matter how carefully his speech may be read to-morrow, not one word of constructive criticism will be found during the entire course of his remarks. The hon. member spoke at great length in criticism of the present government, and particularly of the Prime Minister; he said that all we were doing in regard to the unemployment situation was giving a hand-out, when as a matter of fact no one knows better than he that for a year and a half now we have been supplying employment, so far as we could and also so far as the financial condition of this country would permit, to those out of work. The figures have been placed on Hansard not once but many times; they have been published many times also, showing that over 300,000 men were given employment for a time at any rate. I do not know exactly the length of time, but I know that some 330,000 men have been given employment. Is that a hand-out? I do not think it is. There is no doubt that
r	COMMONS
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mistakes have been made by the present government in the handling of this very serious problem; no one will question that.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Robert James Manion: The hon. member who is the whip of the Liberal party says "hear, hear." If we have made any mistakes to compare with the blunder they made in denying unemployment, or with the blunder made by my hon. friend's leader when he said he would not give a five cent piece to any province for the relief of unemployment if that province had a Conservative government, I do not know what those possible blunders may be. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre, as usual, played the demagogue; he referred to the enormous wealth of this country.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I would ask your
opinion, Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, as to whether or not the word "demagogue" is parliamentary?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: To call another hon.
member a demagogue or to accuse him of playing the demagogue is not parliamentary.


Robert James Manion: I do not know another
word to take its place, Mr. Speaker, so I will withdraw it. After all "demagogue" is not such an ugly word to use; it simply means playing to the people, and if there is anyone in or out of this house who plays to the people more than the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre I do not know who he is. The hon. member also talked of bank balances and of the interest on loans. Again and again in this house I have heard him stand up and talk of the dividends that are paid, and ask why we do not take those dividends from the people and give them to the unemployed. The hon. member suggested at least, if he did not absolutely propose it, that we take the bank balances-


James Shaver Woodsworth: I must rise to a
point of order. I made no suggestion like that at all; I made no suggestion of that character whatever.


Robert James Manion: I am very glad the hon.
gentleman is not suggesting that, but if he was not doing so I really do not know what he was suggesting when he spoke of bank balances.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I
think I must have that statement withdrawn;
I made no such statement.


Robert James Manion: Mr. Speaker, when the
hon. gentleman talked of bank balances- [Mr. Manion.J


James Shaver Woodsworth: I made no statement, Mr. Speaker, such as that attributed to me by the Minister of Railways (Mr. Manion).


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member has
denied it; that is sufficient.


Robert James Manion: I do not know to what
the hon. gentleman was referring, then, when he spoke of the immense bank balances, the enormous wealth we have in this country, the dividends paid, the interest on loans and all that sort of thing. I should like to point out to him what is an absolute fact. The other day I made an inquiry as to the number of people in this country who have bought dominion bonds to the value of less than $2,000. I found that there were some 218,000 people in this country to-day holding bonds of the government of Canada to the amount of less than $2,000. These are poor people; they are certainly not the millionaires whom the hon. gentleman apparently likes to tilt at. They are ordinary working people who have shown that commendable quality of thrift, the practice of laying aside a part of their earnings to, provide for their old age. Yet the hon. gentleman suggests that they have no right to, and should not be permitted to keep, fairly-earned dividends which they receive from the bonds of this government, or from bonds of any other description, though as a matter of fact the figures I gave have reference to federal bonds.
Finally, without wasting much more time on the hon gentleman, may I say that he was most unfair to the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) as he usually is. He made a statement which I should say is false, but I cannot say it is false because I should be ruled out of order. But it is false just the same, whether I am ruled out of order or not.
Some hon MEMBERS: Take it back.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I submit that if the rules of the house are to be disregarded by a minister we may as well go home. The minister has accused me of making a false statement. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that he is not in order in making that statement.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I did not understand the
minister to accuse the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) of making a false statement.


An hon. MEMBER:: Yes, he did.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Yes.


James Shaver Woodsworth: If the hon. gentleman will say that he did not I shall be glad to accept his statement; but certainly, as my ears caught it, he accused me of having made a false statement.


Robert James Manion: I will make this statement, that the hon. gentleman made a statement which he knew was not according to the facts.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: That is certainly unparliamentary.


Robert James Manion: All right, I withdraw that
too; I will endeavour to save a little of my own time. So far as I can see, the hon. gentleman is much more touchy than rve are in regard to many of his own speeches. We have sat here and listened to speeches from him that contained statements that should have been contradicted forthwith, and this is one of them. The statement to which I refer he made with reference to the Prime Minister. He said that the Prime Minister went in surrounded by a heavy guard when he appeared before a group of unemployed. That is absolutely not so. I was present, as were also the ministers sitting around me to-day, when the Prime Minister appeared on the occasion in question and there was no guard whatsoever around him.


James Shaver Woodsworth: There were heavy
guards at the gates.


Robert James Manion: My hon. friend did not
say heavy guards at the gates; he made the statement that the Prime Minister was surrounded by a heavy guard. I say that the Prime Minister was not surrounded by any guard whatsoever. He went with the other members of the cabinet and met the group of unemployed, and there was no appearance whatever of any guard except a couple of policemen who ordinarily are stationed in front of the door.


Charles Gavan Power: What about the cavalry and the tanks all around the building?


Robert James Manion: I am not talking about
cavalry and tanks.


Charles Gavan Power: They surrounded the building, didn't they?


Robert James Manion: They may have surrounded the building but they did not surround the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister was not heavily guarded.


Charles Gavan Power: They weren't surrounding
us; we don't care.
Unemployment Continuance Act


Mr. CASGRAIN:: They were at every
gate; we could not get in.	.


Robert James Manion: Perhaps they should have
surrounded the hon. gentlemen. I have listened to the hon. gentleman (Mr. Woods-worth) for ten years, and I know of only one country of which he has ever had a good word to say. He came to this house in 1921 and I had been here some little time before that, and in all that time I have never heard him say a good word for any government in this country. He never had a good word to say for hon. gentlemen opposite when they were in power and he has never had a good word to say for us. He does not believe in the government of this country at all. That is the attitude he takes. The only country for which he has ever had a good word is Russia.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I
deny that and I ask that the hon. gentleman withdraw it.


Robert James Manion: I have the floor. That is a question of fact and the hon. gentleman can deny it if he wishes.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The Minister of Railways has the floor and, except on a point of order or on a question of privilege, he may not be interrupted even to be asked a question unless he consents.


Robert James Manion: Now, Mr. Speaker, I
admit that a stupendous experiment has been going on in Russia, and I admit that there is probably some good in that experiment. I admit that probably some good will come out of it.


Charles Gavan Power: Sure; you are imitating it here. The government is imitating it.


Robert James Manion: I also admit that our system, what is known as the capitalistic system, has made rather serious mistakes. That is the system which obtains in all countries outside Russia, and I admit that it is making mistakes; for it does not seem right that some of our warehouses should be full while there are hungry people not only in this land but in other countries where the same system prevails. I admit all that; anyone who has eyes in his head cannot but admit it. But to suggest that the experiment which is going on in Russia is superior to the system which now obtains in that country, and which has obtained for a hundred years or more, the capitalistic system, so-called, is in my opinion a long stretch of the imagina-

Unemployment Continuance Act
tion. It is a suggestion which can come only from one who is biased in the extreme in favour of the Russian experiment.
We must not forget-and this is a point which it is well to keep in mind at all times -that this Russia which is so much praised in the speeches of my hon. friend, is the same Russia that has done so much of which the world cannot but disapprove. I read one speech the hon. gentleman made the other day outside this house. He has spoken since his return from Russia, and his whole attitude towards that country and its form of government is much more friendly than his attitude towards the type of government which we carry on in Canada. I hold in my hand an extract from a speech of the hon. member reported in the Ottawa Citizen of February 25. This speech he delivered before the Gyro club. I do not intend to read it, but I may say that in it he praised the Russian civilization. Perhaps I might quote a sentence:
The people of Russia, while they have no incentive to work with the idea of saving vast sums of money or obtaining power by that means, are imbued with a lofty patriotism.
And then he goes on to praise it. But do not forget, when you compare Russia with this dominion, as I am comparing the two countries at the moment, that it was this same Russia, of which the hon. gentleman speaks so highly, that murdered the royal family. It is this same Russia that has been endeavouring, ever since the present group in power took charge, to wipe out the intelligentsia, to coerce the workers and in every way to compel them to labour practically as slaves. I have many quotations which I have not had the time to put into any sort of order, but which would show beyond any question the coercion of the workers in prison camps and so forth. It is this same Russia that has abolished religion. All of us, whether we be Catholics or Protestants, or whether we belong to any other religious denomination, have respect for some religion; but in Russia they have attempted to abolish religion. It is this same Russia, again, that has scorned the honour we bestow upon marriage and family life. It is this same Russia that has taken some three million people and not only sent them into exile but to a large extent murdered them, and for what crime? For the crime of seeking to be thrifty. I speak now of the kulaks. These people have met with this fate because they tried to save some money in order that they might take care of themselves in their old age-one of the most creditable qualities in human nature. One of the most commendable characteristics of a 
man is that he should look after himself and his children, and this is the crime for which these people have suffered. Let me quote for a moment from some articles on the kulaks. I have read many statements by observers in Russia and they agree that three million kulaks were driven into exile or murdered by the present Russian government. Here is a statement from the Toronto Globe, Associated Press cable:
It is estimated that there are some 3,000,000 kulaks in Russia at present. Recently it was discovered that many of them were pretending not to be kulaks and "were reaping rewards usually reserved for Soviet citizens in good standing. Investigators also reported that they were ensconcing themselves in governmental positions and taking every opportunity to commit sabotage.
Further on we read:
Probably there is no class in Russia more hated by the Soviets than the kulaks, who were prosperous peasant-farmers before the revolution. Most of them suffered confiscation of property and loss of citizenship, and thousands were exiled to the Arctic regions, where they work in lumber camps and on road construction, or do other menial labour. They are considered enemies of communism, and extermination of their class is looked upon by the government as one of its most important policies.
Then again:
Included with the kulaks among the outclassed in Russia, are the "nepmen," or former merchants and traders, and the "leshenitz," or priests, former ezarist officers, ministers of state and others of their class.
I should like to quote from an editorial which appeared some time ago in the Ottawa Journal, dealing with the experiences of Henry Wales, a correspondent of the Chicago Tribune. It states:
Mr. Wales wrote from Archangel, describes the living conditions of the kulaks who have been exiled to Siberia. (The kulaks were the prosperous peasant farmers who objected to confiscation). In two churches in Archangel they are housed under conditions that Mr. Wales describes as a charnel house. They are kept there, like cattle, until they begin their long tramp over the icy tundras and snow-covered trails to the distant regions to which they have been deported.
Mr. Wales visited one of these churches, saw hungry, starving, vermin-covered, ragged peasants herded in a way that shocked and revolted him. He writes:
Like wild beasts in the cages of a menagerie, they ^ sit with starving eyes, peering from emaciated faces, gray, brown, almost black from crusts of dirt. Their Withered hands and fingers look like claws and talons, and their great masses of matted hair, long, unkempt beards and moustaches have not seen shears or razors for months."
Mr. Wales then goes on to describe the abuse and practically torture meted out to

Unemployment Continuance Act
these kulaks. I have another article, which I shall not quote, which states that the government is still making the same drive on the kulaks. These men were successful peasant farmers and they are considered to be criminals. They are being treated worse than the czarists ever treated those whom they sent to Siberia. In those days when a man was found guilty of treason he was sent to Siberia but he was given some sort of living. In fact, many of the men who are to-day the leaders in Russia are men who had been sent to Siberia. The present government of Russia is not satisfied to treat the kulaks in this way; if they are not murdered they are driven into prison, they are starved and refused the rights of citizenship. This is the country which the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre praises on every possible occasion.


Mr. FRASER (Northumberland):: Will the hon. minister advise the house what all this has to do with the unemployment in Canada?


Robert James Manion: I will come to unemployment in Canada in a few moments. The hon. gentleman has been sitting in this house for some time and I do not remember his offering any suggestive criticism to help unemployment.	.
This is the same Russia that repudiated its debts to the other countries of the world; this is the Russia that is spreading propaganda throughout the world in an attempt to make all other governments of the same type. This is the autocracy such as my hon. friend describes us as being, but if he used the same forms of speech against the government of Russia they would soon send one of their
O.G.P.U, officers to him in the middle of the night and he would not be known any longer in Russia. This is the country which has wiped out absolutely freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of any kind -all forms of freedom of which the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre is in favour. The hon. gentleman has stated in this house, not once but many times, that he is no communist; he has stated that and I accept his statement, but I do say that if he were a communist he would talk exactly as he is talking.
I shall say a few words with regard to the remarks of the hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Sanderson). He spoke this afternoon for forty minutes; he made many generalities but offered no constructive criticism. I have listened to many hon. members on the other side who have taken part in this debate but
I have heard nothing constructive. They have been absolutely barren so far as anything helpful to us is concerned. The hon. member for South Perth to my mind adopted a most unfair attitude towards the different commissions of the province of Ontario. He mentioned the hydro electric commission, the liquor commission, the mother's allowance commission, the old age pensions commission and practically every provincial commission of Ontario. He stated that the officers of these commissions were playing politics with the people of Ontario, that they were taking part in politics on behalf of the Conservative government of that province. I interrupted the hon. gentleman and invited him to give more details. I pointed out that he had said either too much or too little. I say in all fairness that without giving more details than he gave, and he gave none, the hon. gentleman should not brand the whole group of commissions of the province of Ontario as players of politics without offering some proof. Generalities will not get the hon. member anywhere; they probably do no damage to the province of Ontario, but they belittle the parliamentary life of our country.


Frederick George Sanderson: I want to ask the hon. minister-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for
South Perth (Mr. Sanderson) has spoken already.


Robert James Manion: I have no objection to hearing anything of which the hon. member wishes to remind me.


Frederick George Sanderson: In my remarks this afternoon I did not refer to the members of the commission. I said the officials, and I stand behind that statement.


Robert James Manion: To make a general statement like that without giving any proof whatsoever only belittles the whole parliamentary life of our country.
Hon. members on the other side have criticized us severely because of what they call our lack of fair treatment of the unemployed. The number of unemployed has been given at 350,000 and other such figures, and the hon. gentleman himself I think, used the figure of 350,000. He mentioned also the name of a former organizer of the Liberal-Conservative party, General McRae. He criticized that gentleman for advocating the bringing in of people to the Peace river territory. General McRae was speaking for himself, and I will admit quite frankly that many of us spoke
970	COMMONS
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in past years in favour of immigration. My hon. friends criticized General McRae and those others who spoke in favour of immigration, but during their years in office-they were in power from 1921 to 1930-they showed no signs of a wisdom greater than ours in that regard. I have the figures showing the immigration into this country from 1926. to 1930, during the regime of my hon. friends. They are as follows:
1926	 136,000
1927	 159.000
1928	 167,000
1929..		 165,000
1930	 104,000
730,000
During 1930 this government was in power for five months, but we had no control over the immigration which occurred during that year. Under the regime of the present leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) 730,000 immigrants were brought into this country. That is just double the highest figure given for unemployed in the Dominion of Canada to-day, in fact, it is about three times the highest figure given by anyone who is at all dependable. How many immigrants were permitted to come into this country during 1931? The figure is, 27,500, a small number as compared with the vast number brought in during the regime of the previous government.
My hon. friend and his friends have abused us for what they say is our lack of policy in connection with unemployment, but I know of no sound policy carried out by them during the time they were in power. Unemployment was observable to everyone in 1929, but my hon. friend's leader denied at that time that there was any unemployment. In fact, he did not admit it until the elections were half over, and then he had to admit it because he had been nearly howled down by the unemployed in various sections of western Canada. I have no desire to hark back, but at that time the right hon. gentleman took the attitude that he would not give a five-cent piece towards the unemployed in any province governed by a Conservative administration. That was the attitude taken by his leader, and yet my hon. friend stands up in the house and belittles us because we have not solved a condition which is world-wide in extent. Neither he nor those in the cabinet of his leader at that time showed any particular foresight; they had no plan of any kind, and the only thing they did during their five years' regime was to boast of conditions over which they had absolutely no control. My hon. friends opposite have said that they
rMr. Manion.]
are ready to cooperate with us. Has anybody in the house seen any signs on their part of cooperation at any stage? They find fault with every move we make. The leader of the opposition yesterday, when he was criticizing my right hon. leader stood in his place and asked my right hon. leader:	Did
you not warn the western provinces they must economize? If my right hon. leader had said yes, the leader of the opposition was ready to berate him for that. But my right hon. leader said that he had not warned them at all. Then my right hon. friend went round three sides of the house and criticized my right hon. leader for not having warned them. That is the kind of cooperation we are receiving from my hon. friends opposite.
Even in regard to the loan that was raised, which was partly for use in connection with unemployment relief, the leader of the opposition, when he spoke in Halifax or some other maritime city, did not cooperate in the raising of that loan. Indeed, in the maritime provinces he spoke against the loan.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He did not.


Robert James Manion: I am sorry I have not
under my hand the right hon. gentleman's speech, but I remember very distinctly the right hon, gentleman's attitude at that time, and it was certainly not encouraging the people of this country to lend any money to the government.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I supported the loan very strongly. I took exception to the particular designation that was given to it.


Robert James Manion: My right hon. friend must have supported it under his breath, because none of us heard him doing so.
As regards the economic conference, when the leader of the opposition was Prime Minister, he and his Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) used to ask in a shocked manner: If the Conservatives were elected, whom could they possibly send to the economic conference? That was one of their stock arguments: "If this Bennett crowd should be elected, who can possibly go to the economic conference?" Not only did we send the present Prime Minister of Canada and his confreres to the conference, but they arranged matters so that another economic conference is to be held in this country, and in bringing that economic conference to Canada they achieved a success which has never before been equalled by anybody at such a conference.
Why, when the wheat bonus was given to the western farmers, not one of my hon.

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friends opposite praised us; they have been finding fault with us ever since for giving the five cent bonus on wheat. They have been talking again and again not only about our failing to relieve unemployment, but our failing to do anything that my right hon. leader promised when he went throughout the country.


Joseph Georges Bouchard: 
Mr. BRADETTE:: The hon. member is
calling us disloyal again.


Robert James Manion: Who used the word "disloyal"?


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: The hon. member is
mentioning the word now. It is the same old cry as before.


Robert James Manion: Why is my' hon. friend
bringing in the question of loyalty now?


Joseph-Arthur Bradette: The hon. member mentioned it.


Robert James Manion: I never mentioned loyalty at all. If the question of loyalty were at issue, I could discuss it quite readily with the hon. gentleman. I made no mention of loyalty except in passing, in implying that it would be a loyal attitude to take. I do not question the loyalty of my hon. friends opposite. I presume they are as good Canadians as we are. But I say they would be taking an attitude better for this country and for the world if, instead of this captious criticism in which they are and have been indulging during the whole session, they came forward and helped us during these trying times, leaving their able criticism-because they can give able criticism-to things which should be criticized. I have no doubt the government has performed some acts which are open to criticism, some acts which have nothing to do with the trial through which we are passing. My hon. friends opposite will find chances to criticize us as they always do, but at the present time they should stand shoulder to shoulder with us in an endeavour to help us solve this problem instead of doing everything they can to block us.


Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker,
I am grateful to my hon. friend the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion) for his friendly advice as to the attitude that I in common with my friends on this side of the house should take. Let me assure him that in the remarks which I shall make I shall try, first, to speak to the question before the chair, and secondly, to avoid the spirit of bitterness which he has displayed in the few words with which he has favoured us. Indeed the hon. gentleman has done very

well for one who said at the beginning of his remarks that he did not intend to address the house. I noticed, however, that he came well prepared with full quotations to give to my hon. friend from Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth).


Robert James Manion: I had them right in my drawer.


Ernest Lapointe: Let me say to my hon. friend about Russia, that Russia is attempting a great experiment. They are carrying on a government there in a way that I do not approve. They are doing it by means of a huge bureaucracy. In another part of Europe they are attempting another experiment on strictly opposed lines. There is a country in Europe where they have established a system of absolute autocracy. But in the British commonwealth of nations, and especially in Canada, we believe in representative government and in a democracy, and that is the reason why I am opposed to the resolution and to the policy of this government, which is trying to install autocracy in this Dominion of Canada. My right hon. friend is laughing.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am laughing at you.


Ernest Lapointe: Thank you very much. May I tell my hon. friend that he sometimes gives us cause to laugh and to smile. Otherwise we have only to pity the poor people who have to suffer on account of the deeds of hon. gentlemen opposite.


[Stage Direction]
At six o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Thursday, March 10, 1932