1933-03-02

Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker,
may I draw attention to a mistake which appears in Hansard. Although I imagine it is a typographical error I should like, if possible, to have it corrected. In answering a question yesterday regarding travelling and living expenses of persons attending meetings of the League of Nations, the Prime Minister in the statement given is reported to have indicated the expenses of myself and other members of the Prime Minister's office as follows:
League of Nations
1928-29, Fiftieth Council meeting, $9,317.37.
May I say I did not attend the fiftieth council meeting a.t all, so that obviously in that particular there is an error. However, a little farther down mention is made of the fifty-first and fifty-second council meetings and of the ninth assembly. The names following that item are, I believe, of persons who did not attend either the fifty-first or fifty-second council meetings. Personally I did attend both, and I also attended the ninth assembly. Therefore I believe the words "ninth assembly, fifty-first and fifty-second council meeting" ought to precede the statement relating to the expenses charged to my office. I may say those expenses include also some expenditures which were incidental to business connected with the Prime Minister's office as I was Prime Minister at the time.


Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, the information
which I laid upon the table of the house in answer to the questions which had been asked, was furnished to me by the continuing official who has been in charge of these matters in the Department of External Affairs for many years, and it is just possible in indicating the council meetings, in brackets-as I noticed it was on the return-that the Hansard printers have made a mistake in putting in "fiftieth" where it should have been "fifty-first" or vice versa. That may be so. But, so far as the figures are concerned I only inquired if they had been checked over and if they were accurate, and I was informed they were. The information was filed as I received it.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I am not taking, exception to the figures, so long as they are properly allocated to the fifty-first and fifty-second council meetings and to the ninth assembly of the League of Nations, and not put down simply as expenses arising out of the fiftieth council meeting, which I did not attend.



AGRICULTURE COMMITTEE

[Stage Direction]
Mr. M. C. SENN (Haldimand) presented the second report of the select standing committee on agriculture and colonization, and moved that the report be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Second report of the select standing committee on miscellaneous private bills.-Mr. Stinson.

Miss A. C. MACPHAIL (Southeast Grey):: Mr. Speaker, I beg leave to present a petition
signed by 6,696 farmers in the different counties of Ontario asking for government action which will result in the raising of the prices of farm produce.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Speaker, I suppose the
petition will be referred to the proper committee, but it is obvious from the prayer of the document that it seeks relief which only provincial legislatures can grant.


Mr. McINTOSH:: Out of court!


Mr. SPEAKER:: I direct the Hansard reporter not to report the reading of the petition; I did not realize at the time what was being read. This petition must receive the same treatment as other petitions filed in the house and be referred to the clerk of petitions. Therefore Hansard will not report the reading of it.



VISITING COMMONWEALTH FORCES

[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 40, respecting visiting forces of His Majesty and the exercise of command, discipline and attachments of commonwealth forces when serving together.
He said: In consequence of the passing of the Statute of Westminster it becomes essential that questions arising out of visiting of forces from one of His Majesty's dominions to another, or questions of command, discipline and attachments of, commonwealth forces when serving together, should be dealt with by separate legislation, that is legislation passed by the parliaments of each of the dominions and of the United Kingdom. Such legislation was agreed to and has been passed -I am not sure whether by all the other dominions and the United Kingdom or not. I will be able to furnish the house with that information in due course, but this legislation is similar to the legislation enacted by the other parts of the empire.
William Lyon Mackenzie King: What is meant
exactly by the expression "commonwealth forces"?


Richard Bedford Bennett: That will be explained
by the bill itself. The British commonwealth of nations-it means the forces belonging to the nations of the commonwealth.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



QUESTIONS

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

Mr. CASGRAIN:: 1.	Is General D. M. Ormond, superintendent of penitentiaries, in receipt of a pension?
2.	If so, what is the amount of such pension?
3.	For what reason does he receive such pension ?


Mr. GUTHRIE:: 1.	Yes.
2.	$2,890.80 per annum; of which $1,540.93 is paid to General Ormond at the present time in order to make his annual salary as Superintendent of Penitentiaries equal to the rate of pay and allowances of which he was in receipt at the time of his appointment as superintendent as provided by subsection 13 of section 4 of the Militia Pension Act.
3.	Long service.


ARMAMENT EXPORTS
Mr. MacINNIS:: 1.	Are any arms or armament material (munitions of war) manufactured in Canada for export?
2.	If so, what was the value of such arms or armament material exported from Canada for the year 1932, or if the figures for 1932 are not available, for the last year for which figures are available?
3.	If No. 1 is in the affirmative what was the name or names of the firm or firms exporting such arms or armament material, and the country or countries to which such arms or armament materials were exported?
4.	Is it necessary for firms exporting arms or armaments to have a permit from the government?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think the question in that form should be dropped. When it is asked "are any arms or armament material- munitions of war-manufactured in Canada for export" one cannot say with any degree
3. The average levels for Jan. Dec.
1863-1872	
1873-1882	
1883-1892	
1893-1902	
1903-1912	
1913-1922	
1923-1932	
Elevations are in feet above mean sea level.
of certainty to what use any country importing certain materials may put them. What might be used for purposes of war in one country might noit be in another. Unless there is something much more specific, the question could not be answered.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Dropped.


Mr. MacINNIS:: Is it understood that the whole of the question be dropped, or only the first part?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The question is not debatable. The question will be dropped for the time being, for revision. As pointed out by the Prime Minister it is not specific enough to be answered.


GREAT LAKES LEVELS
Mr. ARTHURS:: 1.	What is the lowest monthly mean level for each of the great lakes, Ontario, Erie, Huron and Superior, since records have been kept?
2.	What were the same levels for January, 1933?
3.	What were the average levels for each ten years ending January, 1873 to 1933?


Mr. DURANLEAU:: 1.	The lowest monthly mean level of the great lakes since records have been kept are:
Superior (April, 1926)	 599-99
Huron (February, 1926).. .. 577-44
Erie (February, 1926)	 569-73
Ontario (November, 1895). .. 243-34
2.	The levels for January, 1933, were:
Superior	 601-95
Huron	 577-70
Erie	 570-86
Ontario	 244-21
each ten yearsending January, 1873, to 1933, were:
Superior	Huron	Erie	Ontario602-23	581-37	572-97	246-35602-27	581-90	572-99	246-01601-94	581-87	573-00	246-47602-51	580-25	571-87	245-01602-28	580-53	572-28	246-05602-31	580-46	572-16	245-99601-84	579-2S	571-66	245-50


UNEMPLOYMENT RELIEF-ASBESTOS, QUE.
Mr. LAFLECHE:: What amount has the federal government contributed by way of direct relief since 1930, to the town of Asbestos, Richmond county?


Mr. GORDON:: 
PORT DANIEL EAST, QUEBEC-WHARF REPAIRS
[Stage Direction]
Mr. MARCH.:
1.	What amount was authorized in 1932-33 for repairs to the wharf at Port Daniel East, Bonaventure county, and how much has been paid to date?
2.	Out of what appropriation was this expenditure authorized ?
3.	Were tenders called for; if not, why?
Mr. DURANLEAU:: 1.	(a) $13,S20.53; (b) $13,110.13.
2.	Harbours and rivers generally, Quebec.
3.	(a) No; (b) To avoid delay which the calling of tenders and preparation of plans would entail before a very urgent work could be undertaken, and also because the work could be done more expeditiously and economically by day labour than by contract.


BONAVENTURE COUNTY RELIEF WORK
Mr. MARCIL:: 1.	Did the Minister of Public Works receive any request from Bonaventure county to alternate men employed so as to give the unemployed a chance to secure some work?
2.	If so, what answer was given to such request ?


Mr. STEWART (Leeds):: 1.	Requests have been received from persons applying for employment on works being carried out by the department. These applications were referred for consideration to the district engineer, who is under instructions to secure the best help available, giving preference to the heads of families or those with dependents.
2.	Answered by No. 1.


DISMISSAL OF G. N. PELLAND
Mr. CASGRAIN:: 1.	Has Mr. G. N. Pelland, chief herdsman at the experimental farm of Sainte-Anne de la Pocatiere, been dismissed?
2.	If so, what were the nature of the complaints lodged against him, and who lodged such complaints?
3.	Have these complaints been investigated?
4.	If not, why?


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Dropped.


GASPE-FEDERAL RELIEF GRANT
Mr. DUGUAY:: 1.	Did the federal government contribute to the $60,000 grant given to the needy people of Gaspe in December, 1932?
2.	If so, to what extent?


Wesley Ashton Gordon: 1 and 2. On February 27, 1933, a cheque was forwarded to the provincial authorities at Quebec in which was included an amount of $103.10 being payment of accounts received for direct relief distributed by the municipality of Grande Riviere Ouest, Gaspe county, during the month of December, 1932. The total expenditure in this connection amounted to $309.30, the dominion proportion being 33J per cent, the balance being divided equally between the province and the municipality.
In addition accounts were received from the province of Quebec on February 20, 1933, for direct relief distributed by the provincial authorities from October 1st, 1932, to January 30th, 1933, in the districts of Grand Pabos and Cannes des Roches, Gaspe county. The total expenditure in this regard amounts to $1,204.79 the dominion proportion being 50 per cent or $602.39. These accounts are now being audited and a cheque in payment thereof will be forwarded to the province within a few days.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. DUGUAY:: 1.	Has the federal government called upon the provincial government of Quebec to refund certain contributions for unemployment relief?
2.	If so, in what cases?
3.	For what reasons were such refunds requested ?



UNEMPLOYMENT RELIEF-GASPE

Mr. DUGUAY:: Has the Quebec government requested the federal government to grant relief to the needy people of Gaspe?



ABANDONMENT OF DIRECT RELIEF

Joseph Léonard Duguay: Has the Quebec government made any representations in favour of the abandonment of the system of direct relief and the reestablishment of the system of public works?



GERMAN SITUATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. S. FACTOR (Toronto West Centre):: May I ask the Prime Minister if the government has received any information concerning the very serious situation in Germany, and if so, whether the Prime Minister would make a statement to enlighten the house.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The answer is in the negative.


Samuel Factor: May I follow with another
question? There are Canadian citizens resid*
Trade Relations with Russia

ing in Germany or interested in property in Germany. I would like to know from the Prime Minister if the government is taking any steps to secure their safety and security?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The answer is, the government has no knowledge of the matter. The government has no representative in Germany. Any information received by the Canadian government would be through the British authorities. No such information has been received.



TRADE RELATIONS WITH RUSSIA

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. F. TOTZKE (Humboldt):: I would like to ask a question based on an article appearing in the Toronto Star of February 28, to the effect that western Conservative members of parliament have been told that an entirely new proposition has been made by the Serkau syndicate in connection with the proposed Russian barter deal. My question is: Has there been a new proposition, and if so will the Prime Minister make a statement in this regard?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am not responsible for gossip appearing in the Toronto Star newspaper. Neither is the government.


Mr. EULER:: But is it true?


Richard Bedford Bennett: As far as I know it is
not true. All I can say is that the hon. gentleman and his friends know perhaps far better than I what is taking place in connection with Mr. Serkau.



CATTLE SHIPMENTS TO BRITAIN

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. JOHN VALLANCE (South Battle-ford) :: I wonder if I will have any better luck than the hon. member for Humboldt (Mr. Totzke). I notice that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) is not in his place. I would like to ask the acting Minister of Agriculture, whoever he is, whether the statement that appeared in the press yesterday that in a recent shipment of cattle from Canada to the United Kingdom only forty head of them were fit for the Birkenhead or London market?


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is no acting Minister of Agriculture, owing to the fact that the minister's absence is not expected to be for any length of time; he is in the hospital in consequence of an infection of his eye. I have no knowledge of the matter to which the hon. gentleman refers, but so far as I know it has not been brought to the attention of the government.

I will see that any information available is furnished. Of course, when questions of this kind are asked without notice obviously they cannot be expected to be answered.



CANADIAN NATION AL-CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY BILL

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. A. MERCIER (Laurier-Outremont):: I should like to ask the Minister of Railways and Canals (Mr. Manion) when the second reading of Bill No. 37 will be proceeded with.


Hon. R. J. MANION (Minister of Railways and Canals):: At the moment it is intended that it will be proceeded with on Monday next.



NEW ZEALAND BUTTER

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. THOMAS REID (New Westminster):: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens):	Have any representations been
made to him by any dairymen's associations or other interests in British Columbia in connection with the increased sale of New Zealand butter at prices which it is claimed will be disastrous to the farmers of British Columbia? If so, what steps have been taken to protect the dairymen?


Hon. H. H. STEVENS (Minister of Trade and Commerce) :: I will take this as a notice of the question.



SOLDIER SETTLEMENT

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. CAMERON R. McINTOSH (North Battleford):	Shortly after parliament convened the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) stated that he would make a statement to parliament in connection with the soldier settlement policy of the government. I should like to ask the minister the approximate date when that statement will be forthcoming.
Wesley Ashton Gordon: At the moment I cannot give the
hon. member the exact day when any statement will be made, but the government has now under review legislation with respect to soldier settlers which will be introduced at this session of parliament, intended to give some assistance to those settlers.



TRADE TREATY WITH FRANCE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Joseph-Alexandre Mercier: I should like to ask the Secretary of State

Belief Act, 1933-Mr. Bradctte
(Mr. Cahan) when he will be in a position to report to the house in connection with the new treaty of commerce with France.


Hon. C. H. CAHAN (Secretary of State):: I do not expect to be in a position to make any report to the house. I have reported to the government and the report is in the hands of the Prime Minister.



JUDGE RUTHERFORD

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. VINCENT DUPUIS (Laprairie-Napier-ville):: Some time ago the radio commission
issued the following instruction:
Speeches of one Judge Rutherford, foreign anti-social agitator, must not be broadcast by Canadian stations until the continuity or records of same are submitted to the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission for approval.
Later this gentleman circulated throughout the country millions of leaflets similar to the one I now hold in my hand.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Does the hon. member
wish to ask a question?


Vincent Dupuis: Yes, I am just coming to
that. This is very important, and I believe every member of the house will be interested.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The matter must be
brought properly before the house. If the hon. gentleman wishes to ask a question I would ask him to proceed to do so.


Vincent Dupuis: It would be impossible for
me to put the question right away.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Question.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Order. If it is impossible the hon. member should not try to do it.


Vincent Dupuis: After that very wise conclusion I will put my question, I should like to ask the Postmaster General (Mr. Sauve) whether he has taken any steps to prevent such leaflets being distributed by the Post Office Department, because they contain a direct insult to the Anglican denomination, one of the most important in this country. In this leaflet-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Order.


Hon. ARTHUR SAUVE (Postmaster General) :: We are doing what it is possible to do.


Vincent Dupuis: I would be glad if the
minister would say what it has been possible to do. I should like an answer.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I would suggest that the hon. member put his question on the order paper.



UNEMPLOYMENT AND FARM RELIEF


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Friday, February 24, consideration of the motion of the Minister of Labour that Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair for the house to resolve itself into committee of the whole on the following resolution:
Resolved, that it is expedient to introduce a measure to continue in force the provisions of the Relief Act, 1932, until the 31st of March, 1934.
Mr. J. A. BRADETTE (North Timiskam-ing):: Before I proceed with my remarks, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the hon. members on this side of the house I should like to extend to the hon. member for South Winnipeg (Mr. Rogers) very many happy returns on his birthday.
When the debate adjourned last Friday I stated that so long as this government was spending public money on relief matters this was the time and place to bring to the notice of the government some of the results of the administration of these relief measures. I notice that my confrere, the provincial member for Cochrane North, Mr. A. V. Waters, put forward in the Ontario legislature two days ago some of the anomalies which I mentioned in this house last Friday evening. One of the matters I mentioned was the payment for medical services in our section of the country. I said at the time that the government responsible, whether provincial or federal, deserved to be complimented for the action they took, but I objected to the fact that medical men have been limited to the sum of $100 a month in all municipalities and towns. I am absolutely opposed to this limitation for the very good reason that in our section of the country at least the mining and industrial centres are surrounded by unorganized rural districts where it is impossible to maintain medical men. Take the doctor who practises at Cochrane or at Kapuskasing; he must look after the people in several adjoining localities, and when he is limited to the sum of $100 a month for medical services and any medicines he may supply it is absolutely impossible for the rural population to get the service they require.
I am bringing this matter particularly to the attention of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) because he is well acquainted with the situation existing in northern Ontario, and I hope this anomaly will be remedied at once. It has been said in this house that the primary duty of any government is to look after the welfare and health of the people, and in times such as these I think we would be well advised to devote a good deal of
Relief Act, 1983-Mr. Bradette

money to public health work. This applies particularly to unorganized districts in the north.
Last Friday evening I was speaking of the back to the land movement, and I might say once more that I am absolutely in favour of any movement that will help bring back to the land those people who wish to engage in agriculture.
In the fall of 1930 a back to the land movement originated from the Department of Labour. At that time I offered certain criticism, not of the movement itself but of the fact that the government was priding itself on having placed tens of thousands of people on the land without the expenditure of any moneys. I maintained then, as I maintain now, that it was absolutely impossible to secure any measure of success, if the federal and provincial governments contemplated bringing people from the urban centres back to the land, without spending money. I may say to the minister and the house that there is not an individual to be found anywhere in Canada who would criticize such expenditures.
I fully agree with the minister in the statement that the movement is helping to place people once again on the land. As he has said, for the last fifteen or twenty years people from the rural centres have been finding their way to the cities, and that movement was quite noticeable until two or three years ago. Now however, owing to the economic and financial situation, there has been a stop to that process and we see the spectacle of hundreds of thousands of people, who originally were on farms and found their way to the larger centres, now anxious to return to farm life. The situation to-day is the reverse of what it has been during the last twenty years, and more and more people are expressing a wish to return from the urban to the rural centres.
That situation did not come about overnight; it has been the result of extreme mechanization and overproduction, and to-day in the urban centres skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled labour find it impossible to obtain remunerative employment such as was available a few years ago. The result is that those people who to-day in the large centres of population are unable to obtain the means of subsistence and are being forced to accept public charity are looking over the walls of the city limits, ready to return to the land. I believe this government has taken a step in the right direction in accelerating that movement, and that brings us to the root of the present economic situation. If it is possible for the government to discover what is wrong with agriculture the problems of the present
TMr. Bradetle.]
depression will be solved at once, and that applies not only to this country but to the world at large. The moment we make it possible for the primary producers and the primary industry of this country to receive a reasonable return for their efforts we shall reach the root of the present problem.
If there is an anomaly in the industrial life of the world to-day, there is also an anomaly in agriculture, and we have the sad spectacle of the primary producer being in the same position as the unskilled and semi-skilled labourer in the larger centres. This condition of things is going to demand of the government, whether provincial or federal, considerable study, as well as the expenditure of large sums of money. I have no time to enter into a history of the economic life of the country during the last twenty years, but I think we all fully appreciate the fact that we have applied artificial aids to industry, in the way of higher tariffs, exemption from certain forms of taxation, more and more use of machinery and in other directions; and while we have been building up our factories and our industrial centres we have left agriculture to take care of itself. I think the government takes a step in the right direction when it goes into the urban centres and endeavours to encourage the surplus population there to find its way back to the land. But if we have applied artificial assistance to industry, to keep industry going, I contend that we should at least extend some governmental assistance to maintain our population on the land.
I think -that before the session is over, in dealing with this all-important question of unemployment, we shall find that the placing of a certain proportion of the urban population permanently on the land will have solved to a large extent the unemployment problem in the larger centres if the people can remain in that occupation. I am not going to single out individual cases in the back to the land movement and hold them up as examples of failure. The movement as a whole has been I believe a success, and the class of people chosen by the government, whether provncial or federal, is, I think, the proper class. There are in the urban centres tens of thousands of people who were brought up on farms, who know a good deal about agriculture, and who now find themselves without employment, and these people are ready to make the necessary sacrifice to go back to the land. I say sacrifice because in a good many instances the return to the land does involve sacrifice; these people are suddenly uprooted from their environment and transplanted to newer sections of the country where they do not have the facilities to be

Reliej Act, 1983-Mr. Heaps
found in the older and more settled parts -such as good roads, places of amusement, bright lights and so on. I repeat, we have in Canada to-day tens of thousands of people with a knowledge of agriculture who are ready to make the necessary sacrifice to start life anew in the rural centres. I suggest however that the minister must follow up more closely the fortunes of the men who are placed on the land. In northern Ontario we are doing a wonderful work and the government has tried to place the people as closely together as possible. That has been done in the Algorna, Cochrane and Kapuskasing districts. I do not think the population now being settled should be spread over any very considerable territory; they should be concentrated so that they may cultivate the community spirit. If you isolate them in the new sections, where a man has no friends near him, the people are likely to lose the pioneering spirit. I would urge on the government that this principle be given proper recognition. I have in mind new centres in the Hearst section of people coming from the Waterloo and Kitchener district. Here the people seem to be satisfied with their lot because they have all come from the same locality and they have now a proper community spirit.
I would ask the government to inaugurate the movement early in the spring, making it possible for the people to go on the land not later than the end of August. It is utterly unfair for men taken from industrial centres to be placed on the land in the fall or winter, because they are bound to be discouraged. So far as northern Ontario and the western prairies are concerned, most of the available land lies in the northern section of the country, where the climatic conditions are far more severe than in the sections from which the new population is coming. I know that the government realizes the importance of this, and I trust that the people will be placed not later than the end of .August. The best time of year to place prospective settlers on the land is during the months of March, April and May, because in those months they can remodel their buildings and put some land under cultivation, and they can also have a garden; in a word, if they are placed during those months, they can be to a large extent self-supporting. If they are put on the land late in the year however they are almost bound to lose heart, because, in northern Ontario at any rate, there is no use putting grain in the sod expecting it to mature unless it is planted before the middle of June; so that-


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


Mr. A. A. HEAPS (North Winnipeg):: Mr. Speaker, the seriousness of the present unemployment situation was indicated last week when the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) gave to the house some figures concerning those affected by the conditions now prevailing. In answer to a question he stated that there were over 1,300,000 men, women and children at present in receipt of relief from the Dominion of Canada. In addition it was also pointed out that there were approximately 800,000 people out of work. This number represents about one-third of the total employable population of Canada. Almost one out of seven of this country's population is in receipt of relief. This is not taking into consideration the vast number who are not in receipt of public relief but who are being maintained by their friends, relatives or other means. In my opinion, the unemployment problem should be considered from two angles. First, we have the care of those who require immediate relief and, second, we have the problem of unemployment which must be faced not only for the immediate future but for the jrears to come.
In rising this afternoon, I do so more particularly to answer some criticisms which have been levelled at the group in this corner by the right hon. the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King). While other opportunities of dealing with this unemployment question from our own point of view will no doubt present themselves, I intend to take advantage of the first opportunity to deal with some of the criticisms levelled at us by the leader of the Liberal party. The right hon. gentleman stated that as far as the Liberal party was concerned unemployment was one of the main problems which parliament has to face. He then went on to enunciate fourteen points by means of which the Liberal party was going to lead us out of the wilderness into the land of prosperity.
Of the fourteen points, seven might be classified as dealing with tariffs. The next five dealt with finance, such as the creation of a central bank, the establishment of an investment control 'board, the reduction of the burden of interest and taxation and the reduction of the cost of government. Another point deals with the abolition of section 98 of the criminal code and then we have the fourteenth point dealing with unemployment and unemployment insurance. Although I have mentioned this point last, it appeared first in the new platform of the Liberal party.
So far as tariffs as a means of relieving the unemployment situation are concerned, whilst I am in favour of a reduction in tariffs, whilst
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Heaps

I have always voted against the imposition of high tariffs, I must again reiterate that in my opinion tariffs are not the cause of unemployment either here or in other parts of the world. If tariffs really affected unemployment we would not have been faced with the conditions which followed subsequent to the debacle of 1929. In other parts of the world where low tariffs or practically free trade is in effect we find exaotly the same conditions prevailing as are now prevailing in the Dominion of Canada. If we are going to deal with the problem of unemployment we must get beyond tariffs and consider it in a more fundamental way.
I should like the leader of the opposition to have stated a little more fully just what he meant by a central bank. It was very difficult for me to follow his meaning because in one part of his speech he condemned public ownership and in another part he came out in favour of public ownership. When he refers to a central bank I am just wondering whether he means a central bank owned and controlled by the government or a central bank owned and controlled by the other banks in Canada. With a banking institution owned and controlled by the existing banks I am afraid we would be no better off and perhaps a little worse off than we are at the present time. An investment control board is of very little interest to the 800,000 unemployed and in dealing with the question of interest and taxation the leader of the opposition was not very explicit in stating how he was going to bring these things about. In criticizing the programs of those who sit in this comer of the house the right hon. gentleman always wants to know how things are going to be done and who is going to do them.
The right hon. gentleman nailed the flag of Gladstonian liberalism to the mast of the Liberal party of Canada, but I am just wondering whether the Liberal party of 1933 will care to fly the flag of Gladstonian liberalism of the last century. They may not be aware of the fact, but a great many things have happened during the past sixty or seventy years. No doubt liberalism has performed many important functions in history. It fought for liberty, for free speech and for freedom of assembly, all of which is to the credit of the Liberal party. But there are other factors in the life of this party which are not quite as creditable. During the development of the industrial life of Great Britain we find that such great leaders as Cobden and Bright fought many remedial measures brought forward to relieve the great masses of the people. I am just wondering whether that era of
[Mr. HeaDs.l
free competition and of the absolute liberty of the individual to be exploited to the very limit is to be considered as one of the ideals which the Liberal party is holding out to the people of Canada in the year 1933?
The leader of the opposition quoted extensively from Lord Morley'S Life of Gladstone, and he even went so far as to quote from the Earl of Oxford. When the right hon. gentleman spoke of the change of heart that was needed and coupled his remarks with the Earl of Oxford, I felt he was almost inclined to join the Oxford group. I should like to quote briefly from the history of liberalism, so far as Great Britain is concerned, and how it dealt with certain economic conditions. Perhaps I may be pardoned for making a brief quotation because it is very rarely that I quote the statements of anyone else. The following is from a book entitled " The Industrial Revolution of the Eighteenth Century in England" by Arnold Toynbee. I quote from a speech he made at Newcastle in 1882, as follows:
The new poor law was based upon a recognition of the principle that the poor had a right to relief from the state, a doctrine attacked by the radicals, but which others say has saved England from revolution; and our factory acts are also socialism. They interfere to protect the weak, and not only women and children but also men, regulating not only the sanitary conditions of factories but also the working hours.
Now, who really initiated these movements, and who opposed them? Robert Owen was the founder of cooperation, and let us be candid and confess that the radicals of that time derided it. The same was the fact as regards trades unions. The radicals had an exclusive belief in individual enterprise, and these movements they considered as infringements upon individual right. As an instance, Richard Cobden spoke very strongly against trades unions as likely to become tyrannous. These are his words: "Depend upon it, nothing can be got by fraternizing with trade unions."
I wonder if there is any difference in the liberalism of to-day? He continues:
"They are founded upon principles of brutal tyranny and monopoly. I would rather live under a Dey of Algiers than a trades committee! "
Doctor Arnold called them "gangs of conspirators"; but while some at home have thus condemned them as agents of revolution, foreign writers, like Lange and Brentano, have hailed them as averters of revolution.
I am pointing this out, so that when one is taking credit for past achievements, we may not forget that there is another side to the story, and that when the Liberal party here do follow liberal principles, they will be the best and not the worst.
The fifth clause in the fourteen points of the' leader of the opposition dealt with finding markets as a means of alleviating unemploy-

Relief Act, 1033-Mr. Heaps
ment. It is the easiest thing in the world to speak of finding markets as an outlet for our exportable surplus. But since the days of Gladstonian liberalism, a great change has come over the world. Every country in the world instead of being on an importing basis is practically on an exporting basis, and instead of encouraging importations, is creating trade barriers against other countries. So we find that we have reached more or less of a deadlock in world export trade, not so much on account of tariffs as on account of our ever-increasing productivity resulting from machine production and other methods of speeding up the industrial life of the community.
In order that we may get rid of our exportable surplus we must take into account not only the possibility of increasing our export trade, but the fact that we have in this country 800,000 people who are out of work, a vast potential consuming element in our community which has not at present the opportunity of consuming the goods which we now produce. As I have often before said in the house, if China, Japan, Germany, France or any other country in the world is unable to purchase the surplus commodities that we have in abundance, that is no excuse why our own .people should have to go without the essentials of life. There can be no real flow of commerce between nation and nation until we can establish the purchasing power of the great masses of our people.
May I deal with the reference made by the leader of the opposition to the reward of industry? In that connection he put industry into four categories: first, capital; second, labour; third, managerial ability, and, fourth, the community. I do not know whether I am putting them in exactly the order in which they were mentioned, but that is not important. There is a little confusion in the use of the terms:	labour community and
managerial ability; they are all part of the same thing. Is labour not part of the community and is managerial ability not also part of it? But capital is in an entirely different category from either labour, managerial ability or the community, because capital extracts something from the community, which I believe it has not the right to do, especially in the manner in which it is doing it at the present time. We are told of course that the rewards should go to those four elements that are part and parcel of the industrial life of the community. In what proportion we have not been told, whether capital should have the major portion or labour or managerial ability or the community should have it. In our industrial life there are really only two elements: first, capital,
and second labour, and labour represents the major proportion of the community. But when the leader of the opposition propounds the theory that those four elements must be maintained and particularly that capital must be upheld in all its present sacredness, then I am bound to take issue with him, because, under our existing economic conditions, there is to-day no security for either the individual or the community. The man who works has no security in life and even the man who owns capital has no security with regard to it. While the leader of the opposition was speaking the other day, I interjected that even today capital is disappearing. We find at present not through any agitation carried on by any particular individual or group, in this house or outside, capital is rapidly disappearing. When we observe the drop in the value of shares and stocks and when we further see that large blocks of property of one kind or another have ceased almost to have an exchange value, we realize how rapidly capital is at this time disappearing.
Then we were told about the reward of service. We are told that we can reward service only by dangling some kind of bait in front of the individual. If he will perform a useful function or work a little harder, he is to have a reward in the way of a little more money for his services. I have dealt with that on more than one occasion in the house. It is the old story of climbing to the top of the ladder where one obtains the reward, forgetting there may be a few hundred others , suffering on the lower rungs. We were told in school the -story of Napoleon, how every private carried a filed marshal's baton in his knapsack. I wonder, if everybody became a field marshal, where would be the privates to do the fighting?
But perhaps one of the most remarkable parts of the address, a very able one, by the way, of the leader of the opposition, was in regard to the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation taking advantage of the present unrest in this country. The right hon. gentleman is a student of history; I am sure he has read a great deal along that line and he must know as well as does any other hon. member that in times of unrest, and change, new movements come into being. The C.C.F. is no more responsible for present conditions in Canada 'than for the Chartist movement which came into being in Great Britain about a hundred years ago. A new movement has come into being in Canada not because the movement created the unrest, but because the unrest created the movement. It was conditions in Great Britain that created the Chartist movement and the Chartist move-
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Heaps

ment did not create the conditions. I can go back into British history and quote dozens and dozens of similar instances. It might be interesting if at this moment I referred to what the Chartists requested just about one hundred years ago in Great Britain. They requested: first, universal suffrage; second, equal electoral districts; third, vote by ballot; fourth, annual parliaments; fifth, no other qualification for member of parliament than choice of electors, and sixth, members of parliament to be paid for their services. A hundred years ago men were actually thrust into gaol for daring to demand or even request those conditions which I have just enumerated, and I presume fifty yeans from now the platform of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation will be quite as antiquated as that of the Chartist movement of ont? hundred years ago.
In the course of the remarks of the leader of the opposition in regard to the new liberalism in Canada, we were told that it stands for a more equal distribution of the wealth of the country. I am quite in accord with that sentiment.


Mr. GARLAND (Bow River):: What about the constitution?


Abraham Albert Heaps: The hon. member for Bow
River wants to know what about the constitution? I have not posed as a constitutional expert, but I presume we shall find ways and means, when the time arrives and people demand changes, of overcoming these constitutional difficulties.
But I should like to speak not of liberalism in .the abstract as enunciated by some hon. members, but of its actual practice in Canada, and to see what it did in 1927, 1928 and 1929, when it had an opportunity of bringing about a more equal distribution of wealth. In the years 1927 and 1928, when there were surpluses of revenue in Canada, what did hon. members to the right of me do? The first thing they did was to reduce the taxes of those who least required the reduction. In other words, in the years 1927, 1928 and 1929, when there was a large surplus revenue, and when we in this comer of the house along with other hon. members were requesting a minimum of S100 a month for able bodied men employed by the government, the income tax in Canada was reduced to a considerable extent. But when we asked for the minimum of $100 a month we were told that the government, could not possibly see its way clear to accept our suggestion. I should like to have seen that more equal distribution of wealth, about which we hear so much talk, brought about in the years 1927, 1928 and

1929, when there were surpluses in the dominion exchequer. I should like to know, further, how the Liberal party intends to bring a more equal distribution into being. I say, Mr. Speaker, that it cannot be done unless wealth is taken away from the people who have it. Unless we are prepared to take away part of the wealth which flo-ws. to the possession of 'the few in order to effect a more equal distribution, I do not see how it can possibly be done.
But the Liberal party still maintains that profits have to be made and dividends have to be paid in connection with all kinds of enteiprises, good and bad. If that is to be the case, I do not see how we will be able to bring about a better distribution of the wealth we produce. My right hon. friend was heartily in favour of cooperation; he believed i,t was a good thing. Yet he believes that private enterprises are worthy projects. I do not believe the two can go hand in hand; we have to accept either one or the other. As Lincoln said during the time of the Civil war, when there was an attempt to free the coloured population from chattel slavery, the United States could not exist half slave and half free. So at the present time we in Canada, or people in any other part of the world, cannot exist under a system half cooperative and half competitive. Ultimately we have to accept either one or the other.
I am in favour of cooperation, because I believe ultimately it will bring into being in Canada a cooperative commonwealth. There seems to be in the Liberal party a strong feeling in favour of unemployment insurance as one of the remedies to deal with unemployment. Mr. Speaker, nobody in this house has spoken more often than I have concerning unemployment insurance, and no hon. member has brought forward more resolutions dealing with this important matter. In 1926 the matter was dealt with; in 1927 I had a resolution on the order paper, again in 1928 and again in 1929. Even since the present government took office I have asked that a scheme of unemployment insurance be made part of the constitution of our dominion. And the Liberal party is again telling the people of Canada that they are in favour of an unemployment insurance plan.
Mr. Speaker, for the first time I put this claim before the house, although on other occasions and in other places, I have made similar statements, that at the present time within the confines of the existing capitalistic structure we cannot take care of our unemployed by a scheme of unemployment insurance. I believe it would be well for us to face the facts. An unemployment insurance scheme

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Heaps
to take care of 750,000 people out of work, on a basis of benefits for forty weeks in a year, at $7.50 a week, would cost $225,000,000 per year. While I wish to see the unemployed cared for, at this particular moment I have no desire to hold out any false hope that within the confines of the existing system we could possibly have a system of unemployment insurance which could take care of the three-quarters of a million people who are out of work at the present time.
I am anxious to see the beginning of a system of unemployment insurance; I am anxious to see one inaugurated. The question arises however, that if our present army of unemployed in Canada remains permanent, we must look beyond a scheme of unemployment insurance to take care of the situation. As I have said in this house on many previous occasions, one way effectively to deal with the unemployment problem is by effecting a more equal distribution of wealth produced, and in my view that distribution of wealth can be brought about in many ways. First of all I believe we ought to have a considerable reduction in the number of working hours. I believe there is sufficient labour obtainable in this country to maintain all its population at a fairly high standard of living, and if every able-bodied person were usefully employed all our requirements could be more than satisfied with, at the most, a thirty-hour week.
In order to solve our unemployment difficulties we must not be content with a dole of $7 or $8 a week. On the contrary we must provide work for the men out of employment, and to provide that work we must operate on a scientific basis. If we do it on a scientific basis, the only way we can act, so that we will not glut our market, is to provide each man with a five or six-hour day, and have all our population able to work, usefully and gainfully employed to satisfy the needs of our people. Then, secondly, there has to be some relation between what a man receives as a result of his labour and that which he produces. For, if to-day a man is working and receives only about twenty per cent of that which he produces, the balance, in one form of profits or another, goes somewhere else. Therefore we must have a reasonable balance between production and consumption. In order to have that we must have some form of regulated planning in the industrial life of the community which to-day we have not. To-day the industrial life of Canada is more or less stagnant. If we are to bring about the conditions I have outlined it means that to a much greater extent than it is now doing the state must regulate or control our industrial life.
It would appear that hon. members on both sides of the house are not so much afraid of such regulation, because within the past few days there has been introduced some legislation unique in its character. We are about to regulate one of the largest industries in the Dominion of Canada, representing an investment of about two billion dollars. In this instance we have the state stepping in and saying to the railways, " We will legislate in the interests of the railway situation of the Dominion of Canada." I am not for a moment stating that such legislation is of the right and proper kind-far be it from me to say so. What I am saying is, that parliament is stepping in and considering matters affecting one of the largest industrial establishments in Canada, and is saying, " You cannot run your business in a proper way; we have to step in in order to save your industry." If in the case of railways we can do that, is there any logical reason why the same action could not be taken with regard to any other portion of our industrial life?
I know that only a few days ago hon. members in this corner of the house were asked who was going to do the regulating, and who was going to run the industries. Of course I did not attach a great deal of importance to the question. I remember a somewhat similar question in 1930; we were asked who was going to the Imperial conference. To-day we are asked who would run the industrial life of the country, if those who advocate the policies of the group in this corner came into power. I would say that the very same men and women running the industries to-day would continue to run them, if we assumed control. The men would still go down in the mines and bring out the coal and other valuable mineral deposits, they would still be working on the farms, the cars would still run and the industrial life of the country 'would still go on, perhaps even better than at present, because the rewards for industry would be completely different. The men would be interested in industry, not only for what they put into it but also for what they got out of it as well. At present they get only a mere pittance. A man may have been working in a workshop or factory or mine for five or ten or twenty years, at the end what has he obtained? The results speak for themselves. At the present time we find some 800,000 men who have given valuable service to the community, walking the streets unable to find employment. And I can safely say that a fairly large percentage of those men will never be reabsorbed into industry or their former vocations. What are we going to do about it?
Reliej Act, 1933-Mr. Heaps

The answer I must say is not to be found in any of the fourteen points enunciated here on Monday last. It is not be found even in the policies of the government. We have to go much deeper to find a remedy for the existing conditions. Parliament has a very great responsibility. It is of no use for any hon. member to tell the people that they have got to undergo a change of heart before we can do anything. That is not much of a solution to offer to men and women out of work. That will not satisfy the 1,300,000 who to-day are on public relief. A change of heart is very good, is a fine sentiment, but I think in dealing with this question we have also to use our heads. We were sent to parliament to remedy these conditions. In 1930 the people sent the members back to this house because unemployment at that time was the most important question facing them. Since then it has greatly increased, I believe it is four times as serious to-day as it was in 1930. What are we doing about it? I observe the lack of interest shown by a great many hon. members, but when I think of the hundreds of thousands who to-day are looking to this parliament as a means of alleviating the prevailing conditions, I say we have a great responsibility resting upon us. We are here representing, each in our own way, our particular constituencies. To say that we can do nothing, that we have to wait until prosperity comes back is no way to deal with this great and very serious question. In my opinion there is only one body competent to deal with the unemployment problem in Canada in a comprehensive way, that is this Dominion parliament. I know that constitutional questions and difficulties arise, but I am satisfied that these difficulties can be overcome if there is the will to overcome them. As we overcame constitutional difficulties in regard to old age pensions in 1926 so we can overcome the constitutional difficulties in regard to unemployment.
If we are going to deal with this problem in a fundamental way there are two avenues of attack: first there has to be a radical reduction in hours of labour, we must get away from the eight hour day to a day of six or five hours; secondly a much larger share of the product of labour must go to those who toil. At present far too large a proportion of the wealth produced goes to those who neither toil nor spin, while the men and women who are performing useful service in the community have barely sufficient to eke out an ordinary existence. Therefore if I may in conclusion speak directly to the Minister of Labour on this question, while I appreciate the efforts the

government have made in dealing with direct relief, while I understand the difficulties they are bound to encounter in attempting to feed the vast numbers of people who to-day unfortunately are dependent on public relief, I would far rather see the government attempt to deal with the unemployment situation not only as a matter of alleviating immediate distress but from the point of view of getting rid of this canker in our midst so that we shall not have to come here another year and still have a million or a million and a half obtaining relief from the government. There is nothing more demoralizing to the individual, after a time, than for him to become the recipient of public relief. I hate to think that one out of seven of our population at present is unfortunately bound to accept such relief. If wre are going to maintain the moral fibre of our people and build up a strong manhood and womanhood, we have got to do away with this relief situation and put men and women to work in useful capacities so that they may become selfsupporting and useful citizens of this dominion.


Mr. J. P. HOWDEN (St. Boniface):: Mr. Speaker, the debate on this resolution has pretty well resolved itself into a debate on unemployment. There is no topic before the people of this country or of the American continent to-day which is of such absorbing interest as that of unemployment, and the various measures adopted for its relief. The present government was returned to offee on the undertaking of its leader to cure unemployment and thereby remove the evil which requires these extensive relief measures. I have not risen on this occasion to criticize the government. I would merely point out certain conditions with respect to the community which has honoured me with its confidence. One might say in passing, however, that so far from unemployment having been relieved, the evil has increased in this country so that from having a little over 100,000 unemployed in 1930 we now have more than
1,000,000. At the last session it was my privilege to make a speech on unemployment, and since my ideas have not changed in the interim I have no desire to repeat the remarks I made on that occasion. I only say that the measures instituted by the government to relieve unemployment have failed. In the last federal campaign the present government accepted responsibility for the cure of unemployment. On accepting office they instituted a three way responsibility, with the provinces and the various municipalities, for the relief

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Howaen
of the unemployed. Whether or not the provinces and municipalities were consulted they viewed this measure with a good [DOT] deal of dismay, and have now fallen down in some instances. I believe that the western provinces are not able to carry the burden of relief, and certainly the municipalities are in a much poorer condition. For this reason I have risen to point out the conditions which obtain in the municipality from which I come, that is the municipality of St. Boniface. It is not a very big city, but it dates back in its origin to the same time as the city of Winnipeg. Early in the last century about 1817, I think, a priest who afterwards became Monseigneur Provencher arrived on the east side of the Red river opposite Fort Garry. The city of St. Boniface, which is the centre of the constituency of St. Boniface, dates from that time.
The people of. this little city are in rather a bad situation at this time. Recently I have had several communications from them, and on their part I desire to place these communications on Hansard so that certainly they will be before the government and the house. I have in my hand a letter from the mayor of St. Boniface, Mr. F. H. Dowse. He says:
Dear Doctor:
I have noit up to this time, noon, received any reply to my telegram to you of the 15th nor to that directed to the Minister of Finance on the same date, a copy of which I annex hereto for your information.
I may state that if something is not done in the course of a few days towards assisting us for relief purposes we shall have to call upon the Manitoba government for police protection, as the merchants cannot possibly continue to advance further relief.
Since wiring you and the Minister of Finance, it is only through the cooperation of some of the wholesalers who have agreed to supply some of the retailers for a few days longer that we have been able to carry on.
As stated in my telegram to the Hon. Mr. Rhodes, we have exhausted every avenue to avoid the trouble that will surely arise immediately merchants discontinue to supply goods. I understand that the same situation exists in Tranecona, where trouble is expected any time now, but you will nlo doubt agree with me that it will be much more serious and difficult of control if it started here, by reason of our close proximity to Winnipeg. I, therefore, cannot too strongly urge you and, through you, the authorities in Ottawa to take cognizance of the very serious situation which confronts us and which in no time might develop and become beyond control even with the assistance of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Will you kindly, therefore, use your best endeavours to impress the authorities with the seriousness and urgency of our situation and wire result.
The telegram sent to the Minister of Finance reads as follows:
Hon. E. N. Rhodes,
Minister of Finance,
House of Commons,
Ottawa.
Following telegram from Hon. Mr. Gordon stating referred matter of relief loans to you have been in consultation with Banque Canadienne Nationale and provincial government. Require twenty-four thousand dollars over amounts due from Dominion government. Provincial government state necessary to pass enabling legislation and sell bonds before amount available. Bank will not advance funds unless Dominion government guarantee to pay same in case provincial government do not pay amount within two months. Only one merchant willing to supply goods for relief without cash payment and only for limited period. Have every reason to expect trouble unless relief can be continued. City council have done everything possible to postpone this. If Dominion government will give undertaking asked _ for by bank would ask you to advise me by wire and advise general manager of bank in Montreal.
F. H. Dowse,
Mayor of St. Boniface.
About the next day I received from Trans-cona, the only other community of any size in the constituency of St. Boniface, this telegram:
The unemployed of Transcona are desirous of bringing to your attention the deplorable conditions existing in Transcona for the unemployed scale of relief. Very inadequate clothing. No clothing for women, children, and very little for men. Quality very poor for sub-zero weather. Medical attention practically nil. Fuel poplar wood of very poor quality. Very unsuitable for winter use in Manitoba. We are drawing your attention to these conditions to bring before federal house if you deem it advisable.
I have been among these people within the last few months and to be honest I must say that I do not believe conditions are quite as bad as they are reported. I do believe, however, that they are far from good and that there is a great deal of suffering and destitution in those two localities as well as a great many others in the province of Manitoba. The point I want to make, however, and I think it is perfectly fair to state it in this way, it this: The Dominion government has assumed responsibility for the cure of unemployment. I think the Dominion government has made a very generous arrangement, but unfortunately it is not reaching the people; it is not getting home to them. I believe that the responsibility of this government is not fulfilled until it sees to it that these measures become fully effective. Steps should be taken to ascertain who is falling down on the job, and the matter should be taken in hand immediately. This situation should be

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Howden

cleared up so that relief measures may reach the people they are intended to help.
I need not labour that point at greater length. There has been some mention made of medical services, and some contradictory remarks have been advanced in this regard. I might say that the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario approved an order in council dated September 19, 1932, clause 9 of which reads:
The expression "direct relief" in this order in council means food, fuel, clothing including footwear, shelter, medical services and medical supplies.
That is to say, in their measures for relief the province of Ontario have included medical relief and medical supplies. Clause 11 of the order in council reads:
Payment for medical services shall not exceed one-half of the standard medical charges existing in the municipality or locality.
I mention this merely to show that the province of Ontario has included medical relief in its general relief measures.


Mr. COTNAM:: Is the hon. member aware that the province of Ontario assumes full responsibility for this medical attention? I understand that it pays the entire cost.


John Power Howden: I was not aware of that
fact, but clause 8 of this order in council reads:
In territory where no municipal government exists the minister may provide for the payment by the province of fifty per cent of the expenditures to be made by the province for direct relief, in addition to fifty per cent thereof to be paid by the dominion.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Would the hon. member
permit me an interjection? What the hon. member for North Renfrew (Mr. Cotnam) says is quite correct with respect to Ontario and the other provinces. Undoubtedly the province of Ontario did pass the order in council just referred to, but the province asumes the total cost of medical relief, and the dominion as yet has not taken any steps.


John Power Howden: I take it that the government of Ontario has assumed the entire burden of the relief measures in that province, because they have now seen fit to include medical relief among their other measures. However, I am not particularly concerned with what they have done in Ontario; I think it is very excellent action on their part. What I do rise to say is that the province of Manitoba has apparently not been able to go so far in its relief measures. May I here make this observation. For the last three sessions in this house there has been brought up a resolution with respect to medical relief

for the people. It was my privilege to initiate two of these resolutions, and I may tell you quite'frankly that on those occasions I was really thinking about the people who needed relief throughout the length and breadth of the country. It was then and still is my opinion that the people in the outlying districts have not been supplied with that medical attention to which they are entitled as citizens. I realized that so far as the cities were concerned the people in a good many instances were over-supplied with medical relief and that those who went to hospitals and what not received the best attention regularly. But there was another class, the middle class, who did not wish to accept ordinary ward hospital attention, charity if you like, and such people found the cost of medical service very heavy indeed, so much so that it was almost intolerable. That was the gist of my remarks on those former occasions.
To-day, however, I am not thinking quite so much about the people in the back districts or about the people generally; I am thinking about the medical men. I stand here and say without hesitation that a great many medical men in Manitoba-I cannot speak for the rest of Canada but I can for a great many of the medical men in that province- are in desperate straits. I say that without any hesitation at all. Perhaps I may be permitted to follow the course of events in Winnipeg and in that adjacent country with regard to this matter. In 1931 the medical men of Winnipeg, realizing that they were receiving very little in the way of fees and that times were getting quite bad, met and appointed a medical relief committee to consider this matter, the lack of fees and the smallness of revenue from their work. After a thorough discussion of the matter it was decided that they would not do anything for a few months or for a year or so and the matter was left in abeyance until 1932. In 1932, with the knowledge that the hon. the Minister of the Interior was going to be in Manitoba in December, the relief committee met and asked for permission to interview him. He gave them an audience on that occasion and they then presented their views.
There is nothing special about the claims they made. They pointed out that medical attendance had to be given; when a patient is sick and calls a medical man, that doctor is in honour and in duty bound to render attendance. May I just read one or two remarks in this connection:
Dr. Gunn pointed out that the province of Ontario had voluntarily brought forward a

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Roberge
scheme which had been accepted by the profession on a fee basis of fifty per cent of normal.
Dr. MacKenzie realized that health was the responsibility of the municipality, the city or the province, but the municipality having no money, the city having no money, and the provincial government having no money, to what authority were we to turn?
And so they were turning to the Dominion government. The minister on that occasion replied to them in these words:
The medical profession have taken a just pride in the noble traditions handed down by their profession from generation to generation, that the sick poor shall always be taken care of. At a time like this, when the country is in financial stress, when the country needs your help, is it too much to ask you gentlemen to each undertake three visits per day to the sick on relief, and would this not take care of the whole problem?
I may say that the Minister of the Interior had a very limited idea of the demands that are being made on medical men in that part of the country, if their work can be compared in the least to my own when I am at home, because I can assure you that I am called upon to make, not three relief calls a day but sometimes nearly twenty.


Ira Delbert Cotnam: Medical men are working
all day on relief.


John Power Howden: The hon. member has put it correctly. There are not many fees going these days, I can assure you of that. An hon. member near me says that they will have to put the physicians on direct relief. Well, I have no doubt at all that they will have to put a good many physicians on direct relief in Manitoba before very long, if some way is not found to come to their assistance in a reasonable and honourable manner.
I might further state that the profession met the premier of Manitoba in regard to this matter. I will not delay the house with the various aspects of the subject put forward; I will just recite what has to do with the premier of that province:
Mr. Bracken, having suggested he might divide bis government's surplus this year with the doctors, proceeded to compliment the speakers. He pointed out that the general policy followed in the last two or three years was that no one should make any profits from money spent by the government on relief. He instanced the central clothing depot. The state however should not expect any class of the community to contribute to its services. "Theoretically," he said, "you have a good case. Practically, we do not know where we get off at. The government is spending $2,000,000 per annum more than it is receiving, and if the province is to contribute the added million, the deficit is going to be $3,000,000. (The added million referred to is the difference in the amount of free work done by the profession in 1929 and the estimated figure for 1933.) This however does not absolve the government from 53719-167J
the responsibility of facing the problem. You are advocating state medicine. Have you a specific proposal?"
Dr. Moorhead answered that we had not, that we were endeavouring at this time to have the principle accepted, and, that accomplished. it should not be difficult to plan an acceptable scheme in detail.
The reason I bring this matter before the house at the present time is that these men have asked me to present it to the federal authorities because, as an hon. member to my right has said, if something is not done in the way of providing some reasonable compensation for the medical men of the city of Winnipeg and the province of Manitoba, they will be upon direct relief before very long. It would seem that this government has made a generous enough arrangement with the provinces and the municipalities but I do not know whether it has taken into consideration the fact that the provinces and the municipalities are very limited in their ability and right to collect taxes. With a population gradually being absorbed into the ranks of the unemployed, the possible revenue for the municipalities and the provinces is disappearing very rapidly. Since this government in the last federal campaign accepted the entire responsibility for curing unemployment, I submit it is up to them to see that measures are initiated by which relief will be provided to these various citizens whom I have mentioned this afternoon.


Mr. EUSEBE ROBERGE (Megantic) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, I have already, in the past, protested against the principle of granting to the government a blank cheque to spend the amounts it pleased where it thought proper and the way it judged best. Experience has taught us that such funds were not distributed equitably among the various provinces and stall less among our people. I shall prove to the house how true is my contention.
On November 4, 1932, I had the following questions placed on the order paper:
What amount has the federal government disbursed as direct relief without the provinces or municipalities making any contribution, during the years 1930, 1931, 1932, in:	(a)
Ontario; (b) Manitoba:	(c) Saskatchewan;
(d) Alberta; (e) the Yukon Territory; (f) New Brunswick; (g) Nova Scotia; (h) Prince Edward Island; (i) Quebec?
Three days later, on November 7, 1932, I received the following reply from the Minister of Labour:
(a) Ontario-$600 in 1931; (b) Manitoba- nil; (c) Saskatchewan-$3,451,408.19, from September 24, 1931 to June 30, 1932 for sections affected by drought in Saskatchewan; (d) Alberta-nil; (e) Yukon Territory-nil; (f) New Brunswick-nil; (g) Nova Scotia-nil; (h) Prince Edward Island-nil; (i) Quebec-[DOT] nil.

Relief Act, 1033-Mr. Roberge
As you see, sir, the funds expended as direct assistance without the assistance given by the provinces and municipalities was distributed unfairly and in a very provoking way for the provinces which were neglected. Because the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) hails from the west, he has no right to give everything to Saskatchewan to the detriment of the others. I am not opposed to helping destitute families of Saskatchewan, providing that Quebec and the other provinces receive their quota.
But, sir, in all provinces there are, to-day, towns and villages where destitute people are as much in need of direct assistance as the people of Saskatchewan.
According to the figures which I have just given the house, the government has distributed in direct assistance throughout Canada the sum of 84,051,408.48. Out of this amount $3,451,408.10 was expended in Saskatchewan; $600 in Ontario and nothing in Quebec. Moreover, the government granted a bonus of 5 cents per bushel of wheat exported, this means that the western provinces received a bonus for their wheat of $12,720,121, in addition to $3,451,408.10 as direct assistance taking no account of the assistance given by the provinces and municipalities, namely a total of $16,171,529.10 which one western province received.
The way direct assistance was given to Saskatchewan was unfair and very provoking to Manitoba and Alberta which are neighbouring provinces and must have had, at times, as many unemployed and farmers whose crops also failed.
Was the government more generous to this province in order to reward the Prime Minister of Saskatchewan for having suppressed French in a number of schools or again because it waged an unrelenting war upon the Catholic institutions teaching French in that province. The government did not distribute a cent as direct assistance in Quebec without the province or municipalities supplying their quota, as I have described.
A special grant was requested for maple sugar. You may rest assured, sir, that our farmers in Quebec had as much right to a bonus for their sugar as the people in the west for their wheat.
The western farmers can sell their wheat at the same price as the United States farmers can sell theirs, while our farmers cannot market their maple sugar at the same price as the United States farmers, because there is an 8 cents duty per pound, this means that the maple sugar makers in the United States are selling, this year, their sugar thrice the price of thait of the Quebec sugar makers. This proves that had the government wished

to be fair towards Quebec, it would have granted the bonus requested just as a similar bonus was granted to the west for their wheat.
Mr. Speaker, I think the house was wrong in not adopting the resolution moved recently by the hon. member for Antigonish-Guys-borough (Mr. Duff), requesting a reciprocal treaty with the United States, as proves the following dispatch which appeared in the Soleil in Quebec, on February 28, 1933:
Tariff Against Canadian Maple Sugar and Syrup Products Appealed for in the House
Washington, Feb. 27 (A.P.).-An appeal for a higher tariff on maple syrup and sugar to protect Vermont farmers from competition from Canada has been made in the United States House by representative Gibson, Republican, V ermont.
The principal competition, Gibson said, comes from Canada where sugar is produced at a cost much lower than is possible in this country. Importation from Canada has increased from about 2,000,000 pounds in 1923 to over
10,000,000 pounds annually and this has resulted in driving many farmers out of sugar producing. Less than 60 per cent of our maple trees are now in use and many splendid orchards have been sacrificed to lumber. Gibson blamed tobacco growers for the difficulties of the maple sugar producers in his state.
Gibson said it cost $1.21 to produce a gallon of maple syrup in Vermont while a gallon produced in Canada, with the tariff added, can sell in the United States for 88 cents.
Through the Vermont Maple Co-operative Inc. financing by local banks and the Federal Intermediate Credit Bank, Gibson said, the Vermont producers had kept the business on a sound financial basis, but he urged a concerted effort by maple sugar producers to restore the duty on their product. Tobacco companies and other parties interested in lowering maple sugar rates can take care of themselves, he said. The farmers cannot. Help to these farmers means help to agricultural interests of over 20 states and to a crop value that ordinary runs into millions of dollars.
As you can see, sir, the United States farmers, at present, sell their maple sugar thrice the price of that of the Quebec farmers. I think it would have been a boon for our farming classes if ithe resolution of the hon. member for Antigonish-Guysborough had been adopted.
A bonus was also requested on butter, the answer was the same:	No bonus for
butter, no bonus for maple sugar. Yet, the government is always ready to grant to the west, at the expense of the east, direct assistance, without the quota of the provinces or municipalities.
We also have a working class in Quebec which, at times, needs direct assistance.
May I mention a small town in my county, Black Lake, which according to the last

Relief Act, 1033-Mr. Pouliot
census, has still a population of 2,167 souls. In 1930, at the last election, Black Lake had a population of more than 3,000 people, out of that number 400 to 500 people worked in the mines. In July, 1930, during the campaign, the fine pledges of the Prime Minister were repeated there as well as elsewhere; that immediately after his party assumed power all workmen would be given work. What a disappointment for these honest people who, for the last 27 months have been without work.
All the mines in this beautiful little town have been closed since December, 1930. As it was the only industry there not a man has worked in the mines since that date.
Do you not think, sir, that these people had as much right to direct assistance, without the province or municipalities having to supply their quota, than the people in the west? The population of Black Lake had as much right to direct assistance as that of the west and this government did nothing for them. Moreover, the people of that town will be called upon to pay their quota of the money granted as direct assistance to the west, also their quota of taxes levied by the government. As Quebec, itself furnishes nearly one-third of our revenue, her quota for the direct help granted to Jhe west amounts to more than $5,000,000. That is how we are treated in Quebec by the government.
I have, sir, just described, as an instance, the conditions prevailing in a small town of my constituency; you can find almost similar cases in every constituency of Quebec and also throughout the other provinces.
On behalf of the constituents Whom I have the privilege of representing in the house, I request direct assistance, without the province or municipalities having to furnish their quota, not only for Black Lake but also for Thetford Mines. Since this government has assumed power work has decreased by 60 per cent and wages by 50 per cent. Consequently, the workmen draw about one-third the wages they earned under the Liberal regime.
As the dominion and provincial governments have encouraged the back to the land movement, in my county, a number of people have settled on new lands, but have not had any crop because they have not cleared sufficient land. If the western farmers have been granted direct assistance, without the help of the province or municipalities, because their crops have failed for a year or two, the new settlers have certainly as much right as them to direct assistance, because it takes three or four years to clear sufficient land to enable them to grow
any kind of crop. On their behalf, I therefore request the government to grant them direct assistance just as it was given to the West when their crops failed.
If direct assistance, without the quota of the province or municipalities is fair for one province, why is it not for all the other provinces, who have need of it? The Canadian people would appreciate such a policy.
Because of this injustice to my province and constituency I cannot support this measure,, unless the administration is entrusted to more competent men, who will solve the problem and be equally fair to all provinces.
This is, sir, the way the Megantic people have been dealt with, since the patronage was placed in the hands of J. T. Beaudoin, the defeated candidate at the last election, and, by the government since it has been in power.
We find in this morning's Ottawa Journal the following heading:
Canada's Need is Unity Says McGill Head, National Government is Favoured by : Sir Arthur Currie in Address
Such is the heading of a speech delivered-
The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Translation)'
It is contrary to the rules to read newspapei articles.


Mr. CASGRAIN (Translation):: Anothei ruling!


Eusèbe Roberge: When the first rumours of a National government spread in 1031,1 was against it, and, I am still against it.


Mr. JEAN FRANCOIS POULIOT (Temis-couata) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, the question of relief for the unemployed is certainly one of the most important, if not the most important, that has been submitted to the house. I am pleased to have an opportunity to express the views of my constituents in connection with the work carried out, up to this date, to relieve the unemployed in this country. I regret that the hon. Minister of Labour (Mr Gordon) was unable to submit his measure earlier in the session, because it is important that a decision be arrived at as soon as possible to improve the lot of the unemployed.
What strikes me, sir, in the blank cheque act, is the smoke screen with which the government has surrounded itself to conceal the ways and means to end the crisis. When we inquire from the government-I do not wish to seem more disrespectful towards the hon. minister who is piloting this measure than to his colleagues in the cabinet-we are struck with the fact that often the members of the

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Pouliot
government neglect to answer our questions, because they are themselves unaware of the policy they will adopt the next day.
For the last three years, the government has had no satisfactory results to show as regards their policy to relieve the unemployed. Within the last three years, the number of unemployed, instead of decreasing, has greatly increased. Why? Because, when the Prime Minister stated, at the last election, while he was leader of the opposition, that he would put an end to unemployment, he did not take himself seriously, because he was then speaking not as an ordinary mortal being, but as the Anti-Christ; or, if you wish, he was indulging in child's talk, and the people, to-day, regret of having been such dupes as to believe in his pledges.
Just imagine him, sir, proclaiming to the people that he would end unemployment, when the number of unemployed was then about 100,000, while to-day it amounts to 1,300,000, including men, women and children! These figures only refer to those who are receiving the dole. In fact, the number of unemployed is, to-day, in Canada, at least 3,000,000, one third of our population, a fantastic and fabulous figure. Who would have cast his vote in favour of the Conservative party, had he known that the one who promised, in 1930, to put an end to unemployment, has perhaps been indirectly responsible for the enormous increase in the number of unemployed, in such a short while?
May I, sir, for a third, fourth and fifth time, repeat to the hon. Minister of Labour a very simple and humble suggestion, which I made to him each year, and even many times each year:	that of classifying the unemployed.
How can we put an end to unemployment if we have no knowledege of the field of activities in which the unemployed of to-day previously worked? If we have no knowledge of the number of white shirt unemployed, of those who were railway men, farmers or employed in such and such an industry? As I then stated, it is important that such a classification be made not by federal or provincial government officials or even municipal employees, because each of these public bodies is taxed to relieve unemployment; it should be done by charitable societies such as the St. Vincent de Paul Society, the Salvation Army and the Red Cross. These societies, may at times, blunder, however, they are more impartial than many government employees, both federal and provincial, and even municipal employees.
I again sincerely request the Minister of Labour and beseech him to kindly have a *complete classification made, as soon as pos-

siblo, in order that we may know how many men, women and children there are in this fabulous number of 1,300,000, who depend at present on relief funds from the various governments. We must also know the number of unemployed who do not seek direct assistance from governments, but who are living on their small savings, which they were able to set aside during the years they were fortunate enough to work and earn their bread by the sweat of their brow.
The members would have to be furnished, each week during the session and every fortnight outside of session, with a complete statement of conditions prevailing. Such information is most important. Various interesting publications on agriculture and labour in general, are distributed in our midst, but they do not always contain enough precise and complete information. Members would have to be supplied, by the Labour department, at least every fortnight, with a complete and exact statement, indicating the number of unemployed in each class, whether they are married or not and the number of dependents. All this information is most important. At present, we are completely deprived of such information and were I to inquire from the minister of labour what the number of unemployed in white shirt is, he could no more answer this question this year than he did last year when I put that question to him and which was not impertinent but very pertinent. Were I to inquire from the hon. minister how many persons were employed, in previous years, as help on the farm and who, to-day, have no work, could he give me the information? W'ere I to inquire, for instance, how many carpenters, plumbers and others engaged in the building trade who are, to-day, without work, could he supply the information? Were I to inquire how many clerks there are without work, could he supply the information? How many store, brokers, office clerks have been let out since the crisis began? He would find it very hard to give such information.
Previous to broaching the subject in which I am particularly interested, may I refer, for a moment, to a speech recently delivered by the Prime Minister, at Toronto, in connection with the trans-Canada highway. The project is absurd! It is another absurd dream which one wishes to revive. In fact, what is the necessity for Canada to construct a highway through 700 or S00 miles of rock, where not a soul lives, and to have these poor unemployed work like convicts? It would probably be better to transfer our penitentiaries to those regions, and these convicts would have

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Pouliot
to work so hard in those remote parts that their ideas of revolting would be knocked out of them. Moreover, I think it absurd to waste the country's money in building this highway covering a stretch of 700 or 800 miles where no one would travel.
Before continuing my speech in French, I wish to say a few words in English to the minister of Labour as regards the classification of the unemployed which I have just advocated.
Before continuing my remarks in French, may I say a few words in English to the Minister of Labour in regard to the classification of the unemployed? Last year I asked him to classify the unemployed in order that the house might be well posted on the matter and might see to it that something was done for their relief. It is elementary that if we do not know their trade before they became unemployed, we cannot do anything for them. May I again insist upon that? For instance, in the first part of the session we were given figures relating to unemployment not of last year, but of the year before, as of June or July, 1931. Those figures were given to us in the fall of 1932, or more than a year later. Is it possible to do anything for the relief of the unemployed when no one knows what their trade was before they lost their positions?
I shall continue in English for the benefit of the Minister of Labojir who, I know, is sympathetically disposed, and I offer some very humble suggestions in order that he may take them into consideration and see to it, if he deems it wise, that something is done. Last fall I had the great honour to address an audience in the church of Riviere Bleue in my county. At that meeting were present His Lordship the Bishop of Rimouski and the Minister of Agriculture of the province of Quebec, Mr. Godbout. Agricultural policies were discussed by many speakers, one of the subjects being the back to the land movement. Is it back to the land? No, it is back to the paternal roof. Generally what happens is that many young men or women who have left the country to go to the city, return to the country in order to find shelter after they have lost their jobs in the city. Then the old father, the farmer, has to receive not only his children, but his daughters-in-law, his sons-in-law and his grandchildren. The country house is not large enough for all those people and, in addition, the father is not receiving a decent return for his farm products. This is why there is a very strong link between agriculture and unemployment; unemployment has an effect upon agriculture, because the agriculturist, the farmer, has to
support his relatives and friends who have lost work in the cities.
Last year very little was done by way of direct relief to assist nearly 800,000 unemployed. Each one was fed during one day, each one having three meals from the direct relief source, and one-half of them, or about
400,000,	were lodged during one night. The government did not do much for them. What was done for them was done by private charity and most of the people who are at present unemployed are supported, not by this government nor by the provincial governments, but by their own relatives in the rural districts or in the towns. The only good result of the back to the land policy is that it makes country people understand that they are better off living in rural centres than swelling the numbers of unemployed in the cities. That is the only practical result which this policy has brought about. At the Riviere Bleue meeting, in the presence of His Lordship the Bishop of Rimouski and the Minister of Agriculture for the province of Quebec, I submitted the following arguments:
First of all, lots should be classified. In the province of Quebec there are forestry reserves and farm lands. At times, and often, the farm lands are on forestry reserves. Since confederation the right classification between farm lands and forestry reserves has not been observed. Not only that, but some lumber merchants had the right to cut timber from undivided lots in the townships. Then, after the timber was cut a division was made. However, no timber, or very little of it, was left for the farmers who were going to settle at those points. Therefore my first argument is that before anything further is done by way of colonization the townships should be divided as to farm lands and forestry reserves. That division should be made by experts and reliable people.
Secondly, after that classification is made there should be a classification of the would-be settlers. Is it possible to take a man who has been a blacksmith all his life and make a farmer, of him? Can we take a clerk from a store, or any other white-collar employee and make a successful farmer of him. Is it possible to do so? To be a farmer one must first have the natural inclination added to which there must be experience. Without that inclination and experience a farmer cannot be successful. Then the settlers receive a sum of money paid jointly by the federal, provincial and municipal governments. They spend that money, and no more is to be given to them. The idea behind the back to the land scheme is that people should

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Pouliot
remain on their lands, that those lands should become a national asset, and should be available for the settlers, their children and their grandchildren. Then, first of all after a classification of townships is made we must bring first class farmers with natural inclination and experience to work the farm lands.
What is necessary, besides that? You know, Mr. Chairman, because you represent a rural constituency. We know that roads are necessary. Is it fair to bring settlers to good lots when there are no decent roads leading to them? It is most absurd.
Mr. MoINTOSH:	There are no railways
either.


Jean-François Pouliot: Certainly there are no
railways; those settlers are miles and miles from railways. They are there in the middle of the forests and have no roads to travel on. The scarcity of highways leads to exploitation of the timber. As the settlers have no good summer roads they make only winter roads, and on those winter roads they do not carry vegetables or products of the land but carry timber. As the price of timber has fallen, their receipts are very small.
In this connection I should like to outline an incident. Last December I was travelling from Quebec to Montreal by way of the Canadian Pacific railway. At Three Rivers I left the train to walk on the station platform. I saw a large crowd congregated. The station was jammed with people. I asked the conductor if there had been any trouble, and his reply was that there were two cars of settlers going to Abitibi or Timiskaming. On that occasion I spoke with those people. They seemed to be a pleasant type of people. Among them were old gentlemen, ladies and children, and I noticed because of their small means or poverty they were dressed in summer clothes. Other than that they seemed to be healthy, a good class of people. My interest was aroused, and I asked them where they were going. Their reply was they were going to Abitibi. I asked concerning their guide, and they told me where to find him. Meeting the guide I asked to what point he was taking the people. His reply was that he was taking them to such and such a township. I asked him if each one had a lot, and his reply was in the affirmative. I said, "Are their camps on those lots?" He said, "No." I said, "Are there roads leading to those lots?" His reply was in the negative. I said. "Do you not realize it is a crime to take those people to the middle of the forest when there are no roads leading to their lots?" He replied, "I admit it is a great mistake, but we expect to have roads by next spring." I told him 
in very plain French that in my view it was a shame-une honte-under the pretence of giving them lots, to take those poor people without work out to a wilderness where they would have no shelter except that afforded by an old shack. I was told afterwards that they were taken to what is called a hotel. Hon. members will probably realize the kind of hotel there would be in the middle of a forest.


Mr. MERCIER (St. Henri):: They were
taken to a hotel?


Jean-François Pouliot: I am not joking; I am
serious, and I am convinced this is a very sad case. This hotel to which I have referred is only a shack where large numbers of men women and children, most of whom are no! related, must live together under crowded conditions which are extremely undesirable.
This morning I read a dispatch in a Montreal newspaper from someone who had come from that district telling about the camps. Sir, it is a shame. It is a shame that these people who go out as settlers, in good faith, who go to the wilderness and have to live crowded together in shacks cannot be sure of the fact that next spring there will be roads leading to their lots. I strongly protest. Although to-day, I am not giving to the house the name of the guide to whom I spoke, if within ten days time he does not resign I shall avail myself of another opportunity to give his name to the house, and tell more about him. I give this warning to whom it may concern. In this connection I have no personal motives, but I must say the people whom I met at the station made a very marked impression upon me. It was the first time I had met them, and I will probably never see them again but I think of them a great deal because they seemed to be good Canadians. For that reason I want them to be given proper protection by the authorities.
An investigation has been carried on by that great Quebec paper l'Action Catholique, under the title of "Faut-il ruraliser notre societe." That particular publication has given much attention to the settlement problem. But what I found most astounding was that at the end of last year there was a meeting of l'Union Catholique des Cultivateurs at which many matters were discussed. At the time however they did not pay any attention to the great problem of colonization. I acquainted the secretary with the fact of that omission. I was very much surprised that this important body, 1'Union Catholique des Cultivateurs, did not pay any attention at its last meeting to that great and important problem of colonization. Lately I read in Le Devoir an interesting article by the president,

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Pouliot
out it seems that no person has the courage to tell the truth, namely, that the back to the land scheme is a failure. It has failed because there has been no organization, no foresight and no forethought. The result is that herds of people are sent to colonization districts to live indiscriminately massed together in the wilderness with no help other than the $600 given by the federal, provincial and municipal governments.
Can we expect for one moment that the people will remain on their lands after the money is expended? They must live like animals; in my own county of Temiscouata some settlers during the past summer had to eat grass and roots. Those people must be looked after. We cannot cure the evil simply by changing the points to which the settlers are to be sent.
If I have spoken on this subject to-day it is because I feel my responsibility as a member of parliament, because these people are my fellow countrymen; I love them and I want them to be as happy as Canadians can be. We say the people should remain in the country, and that those who live in the rural districts are fortunate. That may be all very well for people who have no debts, but it does not apply to the farmer who has to pay an instalment of $500 for interest, but who receives only ten cents a pound for his butter and receives only a few cents per bushel for his potatoes. This is no joke; a real problem confronts us and it has to be settled. If my hon. friend the Minister of Labour wants suggestions I am ready to give him some; everyone on this side of the house is ready to offer suggestions. They probably will not all be good, perhaps mine are all wrong, but he needs suggestions. When the Prime Minister says: We rule this country; we have the power to govern; we wrill do this and we will do that, it is a shame. Why? Because he must take advantage of everything constructive that is said to him by anyone. I will do my duty here as a member of parliament, as anyone does, not more but as much. And if I speak this way to-day in the House of Commons of Canada it is because an evil has to be remedied, and at once. The country cannot be ruled by words. In fact I pay no attention to my language. Language is useful to convey ideas. I offer ideas. Sometimes they are verv poorly clothed

not in metaphorical language, not in the king's English; they are plain ideas. I would like them not even to be clothed, I would like them to be naked, but it is a question of something that has to be done, and I offer them in all earnestness and sincerity.
The back to the land scheme is so important that, as I said, the great Quebec paper l'Action Catholique for over a month has published articles from the leading men of church and state in the province of Quebec about the matter. If you read the letter from His Lordship the Bishop of Gaspe, you will find he says that there is no system in the matter of colonization. I have not his exact words, but that is the meaning of what he said. There have been other articles, a very excellent one from the pen of my hon. friend the member lor Bedechasse (Mr. Boulanger); the hon. member for Quebec-Montmorency (Mr. Dorion) wrote an article, and people in every class of life have done the same. There was an article from Monseigneur Lapointe, former Vicar General of Chicoutimi. This is the important problem, with all its variations and changes in the different provinces, that has to be carefully studied with cooperation from all. If someone does something wrong, whoever he may be, he must be set -back without any pity, without any consideration, without any compassion for the person, because one must act for the public interest anc the public good.
Now, sir, may I suggest something else' It is that certain people who are advising the government in the province of Quebec have no qualification at all to do so. They have no experience whatever in colonization and agriculture. They are paid by the Quebec government or by some government to do something and they are not at all qualified to continue their work. As I have told you, I have the admission of one of the guides of those excursions that men and women and children were sent to camps remote in the wilderness, with no roads leading to them. He published a letter himself, after I interviewed him, saying that roads were badly needed for settlers, which is the plain truth. I wonder if those people will have more roads now. Mark you, Mr. Speaker, I do not put the blame for this on the Quebec government any more than I do on the Minister of Labour.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I have nothing whatever to do with where these people go.


Jean-François Pouliot: That is all right, but as the federal government subscribes $200 for the settler it is a matter of interest to the Canadian House of Commons and one that it should discuss. If the hon. gentleman says he has nothing to do with it-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: No, I said I had nothing whatever to do with the placing of these people on locations in the province of Quebec, or any other province. I have heretofore
Reliej Act, 1933-Mr. Pouliot

had a very high regard for those who are attending to the colonization work in the province of Quebec, and I am amazed at the statement being made.


Mr. LAPOINTE:: Are you amazed?


Jean-François Pouliot: Well the hon. minister is genial. I do not wish to be discourteous to him; I will tell him that in this matter we should all stick together in order to bring about some real relief. The minister cannot say he has nothing to do with that; if he has nothing to do with it as a minister his interest in it as a Canadian citizen should be equal to mine. I appeal more to the good Canadian citizen that is in him than to the minister. I do not wish to bewilder or amaze him, but I tell him plain fact and I do not put the responsibility upon anyone except those really responsible.
Now let me come back to what I have said already this session. In order to have a good settlement scheme in Quebec-I do not know how the other provinces might manage it-the matter should be left to the Trappist friary, the Clercs de Saint-Viateur and the Oblates. I am sure they would do very well. Wc are all agreed on the principle; people should go back to the land if they have the natural disposition and the agricultural experience, but they should not be placed on forest reserves; they should be given good farm land. .They should not have to find their way through stumps and underbrush; they should be provided with decent roads which they can use to transport their products. A chance should be given the young boys, also. This point was stressed by my hon. friend from Bellechasse, in l'Action Catholique, and I am under the impression that he spoke of it in the house last year. This is a very important point. I do not wish to hurt anyone, but when I speak as I have spoken to-day I do so as a representative of the people. I speak in the public interest and for the sake of my fellow citizens at large, with the hope that my words will be understood in the spirit in which they have been uttered.


Mr. MICHAEL LUCHKOVICH (Vegre-ville):: The point brought out by the last
speaker, in connection with putting men from the city on farms, is of interest to me. I agree with him to a certain extent; if those men have had previous experience it is all right, but I do not believe men without experience should be placed on farms. If this is done they will be reduced in a short time to that " ideal " state which the hon. mem-

ber mentioned, the garden of Eden, bereft of clothes and wearing apparel.
I did not rise, Mr. Speaker, to deal with the back to the land movement; I rose to put myself on record in connection with the unemployment problem. During the last two or three weeks I have received many letters not only from my own constituency but from other parts of Canada asking what is the policy of the present government with regard to farm relief and the unemployment situation. I have received just as many letters asking what is the policy of the new Cooperative Commonwealth Federation party with regard to these same problems. I think the efforts of the government by way of continuing the provisions of the present relief act are highly commendable, but if they expect to do this by a policy of drastic economy their efforts may meet with serious criticism. Last fall I was amazed when the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) told us that there were 800,000 men and women on relief, but just the other day he told us that at present we have 1,375,000 on relief. If this depression lasts much longer, at this rate the number of unemployed will be doubled, then trebled and finally quadrupled, and it will not be long until the great majority of Canadians are either receiving relief or applying for it.
With the situation as it now stands it will become increasingly difficult for the government to finance the relief, and the only solution we seem to have at present is that of drastic economy, in other words the laying off of more people, the reduction in salaries of civil servants and an increase in taxation, such as the sales tax, etc. Such a solution certainly has its limits, and in any case it does not get to the root of the present situation. What then is the remedy? For years this group has advocated substantial alterations in the Finance Act; they have advocated a bank of rediscount, monetary reform, planned economy and a managed currency. After all, the solution of the unemployment problem must be found in the solution of the financial problem, because men all over the world agree to-day that the present depression is due to the breakdown in our financial system.
For some days this house listened to a discussion of the pros and cons of the issue between capitalism and socialization, the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) taking the side of capitalism as against that of socialism. He believes the capitalistic system is all right; that all it needs is to be purged of some of its defects to bring about prosperity and make everything bright again. He considers greed a cause of the depression.

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Luchkovich
These are very fine words, but they would have been more effective had not the Liberal party succumbed to the greed of Beauhamois and the multiplicity of abuses involved therein. I do not think there is much use talking about greed unless you eliminate the causes of greed, that is, practice what one preaches.
I have suggested that there are two methods which may be adopted in order to solve this problem. One method is that being utilized by the government at the present time; the other is the method this group would apply. In all; my six years in this house, Mr. Speaker, I have not heard a debate that evoked such great interest and rapt attention as that which took place upon the resolution sponsored by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth). While at times the debate on that question smacked of blind hostility on the one hand and fawning adulation on the other, at no time could one detect a lull in the concentrated attention to that very important subject. Now I believe that if that debate had done nothing else than to waken the conscience of hon. members on both sides of the house to a realization that the resources of the country should be utilized for the benefit of the great majority and not for the benefit of the view, it would have done a great deal to alleviate the present situation in Canada. In all our proposals with regard to the depression and with regard to relief of unemployment this group has been likened by people outside to a bumble bee ensconced on the back of an ox, gloating over its performance in helping to plough the fields. I do not know whether that analogy is right or not, but if this group had done nothing else with their proposals than to prod the ox-like lethargy of government on to more action it would have done a great deal to alleviate the condition in Canada as it exists at the present time. If that analogy is true so far as this group is concerned, could not this group with equal justice say that the protagonists of the present system are very much like the polar bear perched on an iceberg that is gradually melting away as it approaches the equator? And possibly that is why many of the protagonists are so angry when reforms of the present system are mentioned, angry when that small piece of ice on which the polar bear is perched is in danger of disappearing beneath him.
I do not agree with members who say that we, in making these proposals, are trying to scuttle the ship. So far as I am concerned personally, I am not trying to scuttle the ship at all; all I am trying to do is to take part in the navigation policy of that ship. That is what I am doing now.
I agree with the remarks made by the hon. member for East Edmonton (Mr. Bury) when he said that a good deal of our troubles emanated from the last war. I believe he made the most effective speech on the other side of the house, so far as argument is concerned. I agree with him; I agree that a lot of our troubles are due to external causes. They are due to war debts, war reparations and the loss of equilibrium in regard to gold, and I also agree with him when he says that our troubles in Canada are due to external difficulties such as the intense economic nationalism that is so prevalent throughout Europe at the present time.
There is going to be an economic conference somewhere in Europe some time this year. I hope the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett), if he goes there, or if he sends some delegate' from Canada to Europe, will do everything in his power to bring about those proper relationships without which Europe cannot have a return to peace-and we cannot have prosperity until we have peace. The war no doubt is responsible for a good deal of the ills from which we suffer in Canada at the present time. But the question then naturally arises: Who started the war? And the inevitable answer no doubt is, trade competition which is an inseparable element of commercial and international capital. So that no matter which way we view the problem the causes can all be traced back to one source.
The hon. member for Weybum (Mr. Young) mentioned technocracy with reference to this group; he said that we advocated a four hour day and an annual salary of $20,000. I do not know where he gets the authority for that remark but I can assure him that so far as the farmers in my district are concerned, all they want is the right to work, even if it is from sunrise to sunset. But they want this to be in conformity with a decent standard of living and a reasonable price for their products. As regards the three wives he mentioned, one for breakfast, one for dinner and one for supper, that may be his idea of an economic paradise, but I assure him that the farmers in my district are content to have one wife cook all three meals. I wonder how he gets that way.


Mr. YOUNG:: From associating with you
fellows.


Michael Luchkovich: Even the Moslem
harems have been forced to reduce their personnel, and if things get worse they may be forced to give up their whole pulchritudinous concubinal flock, if not the three meals also.

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Luchkovich
Among some of the significant things said concerning this group have been objections on the part of hon. members in regard to the proposals put forward from this comer. We have been linked up with communists and socialists. Personally I believe in calling a spade a spade without any circuitous reference or allusions to instruments for purposes of excavating terra firma, or any other highfalutin rhetorics of that kind. I do not think it is necessary for me to-day to distinguish between communism on the one hand and on the other the proposition we have in mind. Enough has been said to prove that this group has absolutely nothing to do with the communistic movement. Even so strong a supporter of the present government as the Ottawa Journal has said that the leader of the C.C.F. group in this comer is not a communist but a socialist.
From the little study I have made of economics and history I have come to the conclusion that, judging from the trend of events and the comments of able minds throughout the world, the present harsh, avaricious, wasteful system that we aTe trying to employ at the present time to cure this cancer of unemployment must sooner or later give way to a more humane and constructive system of cooperation, without which I do not think we shall ever be able to solve either farm relief or the unemployment situation in Canada. I am quite right, I think, in my contention that what hon. members say on the floor of the house on grounds of political expediency and what they say outside in the lobbies are two different things. I have heard members speak about the dangers of competitive individualism, I have heard them speak about the dangers of socialism, but so far as I am concerned I believe that individualism and socialism will have to meet each other half way. If this depression is prolonged there is no doubt in my mind that within the next decade we will have a government or a system which will be neither capitalism or socialism, it will be some form of state socialism.
I hope hon. members will realize that everything I say upon this subject is said in all sincerity and comes from the depths of my heart. In referring to the lack of patriotism of some of the hon. members in this corner, another hon. gentleman a short time ago quoted some poetry. I believe in the sentiments of the poem he quoted, which was:
Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
I have, however, heard those words repeated by the sons and daughters of rich men,

the gilded youth of the land; I have heard [DOT]them repeated by college professors and I have heard them recited' in literary circles and by the smug, complacent self-satisfied citizen, but in times like this, when we are faced with the greatest depression in history, I doubt whether these words are uppermost in the minds of our youth of to-day. The lines that most likely run in the minds of the man on the street are as follows:
Breathes there the workless with soul so dead
Who never to themselves bath said,
When do we eat?
It may be all right for the men with large earning power, for the men with great acquisitiveness and the men of ability to uphold a system as it exists to-day, and of which they are the beneficiaries, but when the vast majority of red-blooded boys and girls of Canada are forced upon relief, I wonder who among us will be the gentleman? It may be all right for us ito claim that the so-called he-man who has got to the top of the heap, that so-called Tarzan of the north, the man who built our railroads and hewed our forests, that the man who started the wheels of industry humming, should advocate the present system, but in a world of vanishing credit and vanishing purchasing power, in a world of ever lengthening breadlines, I wonder how it is possible to do the things which they advocate. I believe that the extreme individualism with which we are trying to solve the problem of unemployment has within itself the germs of its own destruction. Extreme individualism is a product of the jungle, it is a case of dog eat dog, it is a process of mutual strangulation by means of which, as I have said already, the strongest remains on the top of the heap while the rest must wallow in the depths of degradation.
When we know that such is the case, why do we still continue to live in our fool's paradise, when we must realize how close many of us are to losing our rapidly vanishing pittance and swelling the ranks of the unemployed. I was much interested in the speech of the hon. member for Vancouver Centre (Mr. Mackenzie) and his reference to the banking system under which we in Canada not so many years ago had twenty-five different banks but, because of mergers, this number has now been reduced to nine or ten. In making that statement, either wittingly or unwittingly, he indicated the folly of the present system of individualism being utilized to solve unemployment. It was a virtual confession of failure on the part of those banks being merged, that is, the failure of competitive individualism.

Relief Act. 1933-Mr. Luchkovich


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member should confine his remarks to the resolution before the house and should not refer to a debate of this session upon another subject.


Michael Luchkovich: Mr. Speaker, at the beginning of my speech I said that the method being used to solve the present unemployment problem is one of drastic economy and that unemployment could not be solved by such a method; I stated that in order to solve this problem we must get at the root cause. That is the reason I make a comparison between the system with which the two major parties are attempting to solve the problem and the system with which the group in this corner intends not only to solve unemployment but to bring about prosperity in this dominion. As we are speaking on the principle of the resolution, I think I am adhering to the subject.
I have before me a short article which I think is very pertinent. It involves our flag wavers, the loud patriots. It reads:
All Velvet
The truth is that the only people on this continent who are profiting from the discount off our dollar in New York are a limited number of Canadians themselves. Hundreds, probably tens of thousands, of Canadians hold bonds-the bonds of Canadian municipalities like Calgary-that are payable in either Montreal or Toronto or New York. It is a matter of choice. If these Canadians elected to take payment in either Montreal or Toronto they would be paid in Canadian funds, and the municipality concerned would escape paying a premium. That, however, is not what is happening. What is happening is that the Canadian holders of these bonds are taking either their interest coupons or their maturing bonds to Canadian banks and asking them to send them down to New York to be paid in United States funds. In other words, they are taking the profit of the premium on the American dollar.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Michael Luchkovich: Mr. Speaker, before recess I was discussing the question of drastic economy as a method of approaching the problem of unemployment. I said that it did not go down to the root of the trouble and that it was therefore ineffective as a method of settling this cancerous growth with which we are to-day confronted in Canada. To settle this question we have to go down to root causes and to do something more fundamental than we are doing at present. Whilst my remarks may at times have bordered on irrelevancy, nevertheless I feel that to speak of
unemployment without taking into consideration matters of currency, is impossible. The two go hand in hand; you cannot discuss the one without discussing the other.
I read to the house a quotation in which something was said about Canadians asking that interest on bonds be paid to them in New York funds. If we are to launch out on a policy of drastic economy, nothing of that sort should be allowed in Canada. I think it was Lincoln Steffens who asked Albert Einstein, scientist and philosopher, how he had ever been able to discover anything new, and Mr. Einstein retorted that it was by challenging an axiom. I therefore feel that unless we do a little challenging, so far as our currency system is concerned, we shall not go far in the direction of settling our present ever-growing unemployment problem.
I have heard members mention certain palliatives, such as social legislation, old age pensions, mothers' allowances, unemployment insurance and so forth. These are only palliatives that merely touch the surface; they do not go down to the root of the trouble; by applying them one is merely putting money into one's pocket with one hand and taking it out with the other. I believe, however, in a graduated income tax. If we intend to stick to this policy of drastic economy, a graduated income tax would do a great deal towards increasing the public revenue and would therefore enable us more effectively to carry on unemployment relief. The most fundamental question with which we are faced is that of harmonizing production with distribution, and as we all know, the question of distribution is tied up with that of currency and finance. Just before recess I referred to the remark that greed was largely responsible for the situation in which we now find ourselves and that unless that greed were eliminated from our system, it was not likely we would make any progress, especially in the direction of unemployment relief.
(Most members predicate their opposition to the policy of this group with respect to unemployment relief, currency and other matters, on the ground that men's natural acquisitive motives cannot be subordinated to social motives, but I think they can by legislation. If it were not for the legislation we have on our statute books, men would be getting away with more murder and crimes. I see no reason why this house and the government cannot control a certain class of people better known as financial racketeers and make them pay their due share towards defraying the expense of the relief of unemployment and other measures. There is no reason why we cannot

Relief Act, 1938-Mr. Luchkovich
put on the statute books of this country legislation that will curb their activities. I have absolutely nothing against the industrialist,-he is a necessary person in Canada, -who by dint of perseverance, integrity and ability has built up an industry, but I certainly am opposed to <a certain class of financial racketeers, who neither weave nor spin nor labour, who by their manipulation of stocks enrich themselves at the expense of industry, yes, in many cases at the cost of the actual bankruptcy thereof. There is no reason why we cannot by legislation curb these individuals and make them pay more than they are paying at the present time towards the cost of unemployment relief.
My time is somewhat limited. I stated at the outset that we in this corner of the house have certain policies which we think would be effective in relieving the present depression and solving the problem of unemployment which now confronts us. There are many who think that we, through lack of homogeneity, are unable to bring about the reforms necessary to the creation of that happy condition I have mentioned. In spite of what has been said about us, we have that homogeneity. It is true we have a leader, the so-called leader of the United Farmers of Alberta, and there is a leader in this group, the leader of the Labour party, but in all essential matters we have the necessary homogeneity, the necessary unity. In all non-essentials we have liberty of action, and we are certainly trying to have charity towards not only each other but other members of the House of Commons. It is possibly true that we are as was pointed out by the member for Comox Alberni (Mr. Neill) like David, that Hebrew of old, who went to the cave of Adullam to escape the wrath of Saul. In those days David was an armour bearer and also a musician. His doings were extolled beyond those of his master, and this made Saul jealous. To escape Saul's jealousy and wrath, David hied to this so-called cave of Adullam. All the oppressed and heavy laden went there, and he formed the nucleus of an army four hundred strong. This grew into a very large army, through the instrumentality of which David was enabled to build up the greatest of the Hebrew kingdoms. Pushing this analogy to its logical conclusion and comparing it with the so-called cave of Adullam on this side of the house, you will agree with me that if we have as much success as David had in his cave of Adullam, it will not be long before this group is leading the way not only in this house but throughout the country.


Mr. NEILL:: It will be recalled that David was chosen of God. Is there any evidence that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre has a halo around him?


Michael Luchkovich: How can the hon.
member say that he is not the chosen of God?


Alan Webster Neill: I did not say that.


Michael Luchkovich: That is the tmly
answer I have for that. It is very hard to visualize the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre with a saxaphone under one arm and a cannon under the other, but if the analogy is, as I have already said, pushed to its logical conclusion, it may be that some day this group may be performing a very useful function not only in this house but throughout the country.
The question, as I have already indicated, is a financial one; the unemployment problem is connected with that of currency. In order to solve the problem of unemployment we must first solve the currency problem, and that is the one that we in this corner are endeavouring with all the energy we possess to solve.


Mr. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (East Hamilton):: Mr. Speaker, I want to make
just a few observations on the resolution before the house. This parliament is not unmindful of the fact that we are at present in the third and entering the fourth year of the most intense industrial depression in the history of this dominion. That brings to my mind a news item of recent date I saw in the Toronto Mail and Empire. , It is under the heading, Gloomy Picture by Chamberlain, followed by the expressions:
Says it will take ten years to appreciably reduce idle. Churchill shocked.
The text of the article is, in part, as follows:
Neville Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Exchequer, told the House of Commons to-night reduction of unemployment to comparatively small figures could not be anticipated within the next ten years . . . the Chancellor's remark that it would be ten years before unemployment would be reduced to any great extent drew from Winston Churchill, former Conservative Chancellor, a heated rejoinder that such a prospect was "ghastly" and that if this were the government's last word the outlook was very grave and lamentable.
I come from a city with a population of about 160,000. At the present time in that community there are 35,000 men, women and children on relief. I hold in my hand the

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Mitchell
report of the relief officer of that city for the week ending February 2, 1933, which reads as follows:
City Relief Department Relief granted during week ending January 28, 1933
Groceries (orders) .. ..	.. 3,932	$25,162 00Milk (pints)	.. 22,120	1,106 00(quarts)	. 26,549	2,389 41Bread (loaves)	.. 59.832	3,589 92Coal (orders)	.. 312	1,984 65Coke (orders)	. 1,768	8,398 00Wood (orders)	.. 37	193 10Shoes (pairs)	.. 1.100	2,774 50Single men's (pairs) ..	. . 147	421 85Shoe repairs	263 80Rentals (eases)	. . 51.6	4.182 50Gas (cases)	.. 175	257 45Lighting (cases)	.. 236	439 71

Summary
No. of	
families	Amount
1932	
4.099	$24,851 851933	
7,940	51,162 89Clothing Centre	Cost of clothing	1,502 19Lion's Club Kitchen	37,114 meals	2,969 12
J. H. McMeneny,
Relief Officer.
Since the issue of this report the figures have increased so that instead of 7,940 families on relief there are at least 8,000 families on relief at the present time.
At this point I should like to draw to the attention of the house a report concerning unemployment relief in Ontario from 1929 to 1932. This report was prepared under the auspices of the honorary chairman W. F. Nickle, K.C., who was at one time a member of this house, chairman E. D. MacPhee and secretary and director of research H. M. Cassidy, B.A., PhJD., assistant professor of social science at the university of Toronto. I recommend this report to the perusal of all members of parliament. In my view it is the most comprehensive study of unemployment relief and its effects on the population of the province that could be prepared. The report goes into many details. I think the most astounding feature of the report is that part which deals with the influence of unemployment upon the lives of men and women, and particularly children, in the province of Ontario.
After all is said and done, in my view there might be some excuse for the difficulties facing men and women, but there is no excuse for the very extreme difficulties facing the Canadians of to-morrow. These boys and
girls will have to take their places in industry and commerce and on the farms of our country. I remember that during the war Lloyd George, then Prime Minister of Great Britain, made the observation that you could not make an A-l army out of a C-3 nation. If the foundations for the report are true it is perfectly obvious to me that we cannot expect an A-l Canada if at least we do not take some steps to ameliorate the conditions under which many boys and girls in the province of Ontario are living. The following concluding paragraph shows the effect of unemployment on the general iife of the community:
Unemployment has also interfered with the normal mode of life of the unemployed in a dozen and one other ways. It has made for fewer marriages and fewer births, and probably for a greater proportion of illegitimate births; for a greater number of suicides, for wives working and husbands staying at home; for discontentment, unrest and the development of bad habits among boys and girls of the school-leaving age; for over crowding in the home, for family friction and disagreement; and for an increased number of deportations and the consequent disruption of the plans and aspirations of immigrant groups. It has induced attitudes of discontent, unrest and suspicion of established institutions in many people. The faot of drawing relief over long periods bids fair to develop in many an attitude of dependency. The effects of unemployment upon the unemployed and their families must be to make of them poorer citizens and poorer workers. Our most precious asset, the good quality of our population, is threatened with serious deterioration if unemployment continues.
May I make this observation: I am not unmindful of the onerous duties resting upon the shoulders of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon); indeed I believe they have reached such a proportion that the many portfolios under his charge might well be divided among a number of cabinet members. In my view the portfolio of immigration alone is of ample proportions to merit the direct supervision of one minister. Further, the general duties in connection with the Department of Labour and more particularly the direction of relief for the dominion are sufficient in themselves to occupy the whole time of one minister of the crown. Then of course we have the portfolio of mines added to that. In the course of his remarks he said that hard times have changed both the official and the public attitude towards the responsibilities of government. I agree with that. I think we have made great strides towards a realization of the obligations of the state to those 'who through no fault of their own are unable to provide for themselves. But may I make another quotation in connection with that observa-
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Mitchell

tion of the minister. This is from the report of the Ontario commission on unemployment in 1916, under the chairmanship of Sir John Willison. Referring to the need for vigorous public policy in regard to unemployment the commission said:
If the state wishes to secure the fullest loyalty and efficiency of its citizens, must it not assume a larger measure of leadership than in the past?
That was said in 1916, I believe it is equally true in 1933. This afternoon my colleague from North Winnipeg (Mr. Heaps), referring to unemployment insurance, said that possibly it is not practicable to introduce a scheme of unemployment insurance at this time. But I am of the opinion that steps should be taken immediately towards the introduction of a system of unemployment insurance in this dominion. Considerable preliminary study and investigation will have to be made with a view to developing a scheme to suit the peculiar needs of this country. I believe that a thorough study should be made of all systems of unemployment insurance now in existence in the world, and if necessary a committee or commission should go and meet the people charged with the administration of such systems, and who have made the necessary research for the introduction of such measures in the different countries. I believe that an unemployment insurance measure could be got under way even at the present time, though possibly it may have to be restricted in its coverage; but valuable information and experience could be gained through the necessary trial and error that would take place in its development. I leave that thought with the government, notwithstanding the fact that apparently no agreement could be reached on the matter at the recent interprovincial conference. We are going to have unemployment insurance in this country whether we like it or not. In my judgment it is a necessary part of the social machinery of any modem industrial state. We have deliberately set up an industrial structure alongside our agricultural structure. With the growth of industries it is the logical thing that we should meet the problems that other industrial nations have met. As twenty-nine other nations of the world have felt it absolutely necessary to have such insurance as part of their social machinery in connection with large scale industry, so in my judgment it is necessary that progress in that direction should be made here, and that at this time when the psychological conditions are favourable we should set ourselves to get such a system under way. We may pass out of this depression, have a few more years of, shal'

I say, normal times, and then enter into another period of depression without any machinery to meet the pressing problems of unemployment. However it may be in Great Britain, I question very much whether this country can stand ten years more of unemployment in its present proportions without the necessary machinery to deal with abnormal conditions.
I come from a city where not only the industrial workers but the so-called middle classes are sorely tried by the effects of this depression. Our problem has been intensified by the lack of the necessary machinery to deal with it. With the individualistic attitude oi the average man and woman in this country, the fact that they have had to go down to the relief office for relief has struck sorely at their pride-I mean genuine pride, pride that is necessary in any nation, notwithstanding opinions to the contrary. The recent imperial conference was to have brought about the millennium, and now the people of this country are to expect it from the world economic and monetary conference .that is to meet in London during the coming summer. Make no mistake, that will not be the way out of the difficulty. You have already, I understand, the official statement of the United States government that at that conference tariffs will not be discussed. You have the attitude of France, so keenly conscious of the necessity for security, a country which has not adopted the idea of mass production to the extent that we in Canada have and also of Great Britain, Germany and the United States. The people of Great Britain, are free traders at heart, notwithstanding that they have recently adopted a different policy. Then we have our own position. My colleague from North Winnipeg spoke about free trade and protection. Well, if free trade were the solution, the United States would be the most prosperous nation in the world to-day. They have almost unlimited possibilities for the attainment of a self-supporting condition, yet notwithstanding that you have there the largest unemployment problem in the world. So far as Canada is concerned, who is going to reduce these tariffs? Which side of the house will do it?
Mr. LaVERGNE: Which side of the world?


Humphrey Mitchell: The tariff is like a suit of clothes; you do not need the same suit in Florida as in Canada. But we must have some form of protection for the men and women of this country. It is a practical question. I have been to India; I know that

Reliej Act, 1933-Mr. Mitchell
in Bombay, as long as they have enough sense to keep their fingers ouit of the machinery, they can operate the most complicated machines, as in the textile industry to-day. You see these machines being operated by men and women in Bombay as efficiently as they are operated in Canada. With their wage rates what chance would our people have under a system of perfectly free trade?
I did intend to analyse the growth of industrialism in the Dominion of Canada, but I do not think I will have time now to do so. The tariff is the logical outcome of mass production. I sincerel}' believe that we are in for a lengthy period of economic nationalism, notwithstanding opinions to the contrary, and that we shall have to work out our own destiny, and solve our own problems, largely within our own borders. I believe that applies to almost every country in the world with the possible exception of Great Britain.
Last week when the minister introduced this resolution he spoke of the back to the land movement and said that a very definite start had been made. His words were:
A very definite start has been made, 1,651 families with 6,906 dependents have already been approved and placed on farms. This in my judgment warrants the belief that the whole quota of 6,923 families for whose settlement provision has been made will be placed on farms before March 31, 1934, at which date our agreement with the provinces expires.
Then the minister goes on to give the cost of what has been done. One thing is sure; this will not even make a dent in the problem of unemployment-the hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Garland) says even if it is successful. It would not make much difference in the unemployment problem in the city from which I come, which has 8,000 families on relief and 35,000 individuals being cared for by the city. I am not unmindful of the fact that some little relief may be given by this policy, but last week I met a man who had been a newspaper reporter and who went to northern Ontario because of the unemployment condition in the city in which he lived. He has been there for years; lately he has been cutting pulpwood and trading it for food. Last week end he came to the city on one of the cheap excursions and said it was absolutely necessary for him to get work in the city for a couple of weeks in order to get his wife back among the surroundings to which she was accustomed or she would go insane with loneliness.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Where was he?


Humphrey Mitchell: In northern Ontario,
north of North Bay.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: And he was a newspaper
reporter?


Humphrey Mitchell: Yes.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: He never should have gone up there.


Humphrey Mitchell: I quite agree.
Mr. LaVERGNE: What had his wife been?


Humphrey Mitchell: She was a human being. I should like to see the Deputy Speaker up in nothern Ontario cutting down trees; I wonder if he could stand the loneliness.
Mr. LaVERGNE: My ancestors have been there and so have I.


Humphrey Mitchell: I quote from the Hamilton Spectator of February 9, 1933. This article deals with a family who left northern Ontario and came back to the city; I believe they went north under one of the original schemes. The newspaper article contains these words:
The distressing situation arose from the fact that the family left the city for a few months last summer to try their hand at the land settlement scheme and when they returned this fall they found themselves not eligible for relief.
The article refers to another similar case as well. I know very well that the top six inches of the soil ahvays has been the escape when progress has been stayed in this and almost every other country, and in making these observations I do not want to belittle the efforts that have been made by the government in this direction. Even if they are able to settle only a thousand families on the land it will be at least some progress in the right direction.
The minister spoke of the disproportion of the urban and rural populations, and said the matter was debatable. I agree with him. In my opinion there has been a good deal of misinformation in connection with the drift from the farms to the city, and unsound views have been expressed with regard to it. The present modern city is a product of the machine age; boys and girls have been driven from the farms largely by the introduction of machinery on those farms. It is one of those things that is inescapable if the present drive towards increased mass production in agriculture and industry continues. There is also some logic to it. After all is said and done, the human stomach is not very elastic; there is some limit to the ability of a human being to consume the products of agriculture. In my opinion, however, there is no limit to the ability of the human being to consume the output of industry. This movement from the cities back to the farms is nothing new, but

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Mitchell
it is not a genuine back to the land movement. It is a movement that has come into being though the force of economic circumstances, and should good times return, in my judgment the drift the other way will be far greater. I question also the soundness of a policy that uses land as the scrap heap for industry.
The policy has two very obvious weaknesses: It will not lessen the tax burden and, more important still, I believe it will increase the surplus of farm commodities. I believe this policy is economically unsound. It has up against it science as expressed in mechanized farming. Take the case of wheat; we have the binder which has done away with a great deal of human labour, and recently the Rockefeller institute carried on experiments on farms in Montana by which the time necessary to produce a bushel of wheat was reduced from three hours by hand labour to three' minutes by the machine. The sooner the government makes up its mind that this is not a sound way to approach the problem the better it will be for the country and perhaps the quicker we may take steps to deal more adequately with unemployment.
I have analysed the work possibilities in the statement of the Minister of Labour. First we have the agricultural development which has found work for 1,691 heads of families. Then we have the Banff-Jasper highway in Alberta and British Columbia, which has resulted in 169,544 man days being worked. I should like to point out in that connection as well as in connection with the work being done with regard to landing fields that while perhaps under present conditions this is absolutely necessary I do not think it can be claimed that it is in any way a solution of the problem of unemployment. In the one case you have men working for twenty cents a day, while in the other they get only a few dollars a month. When these men leave the camps they will not have been able to save enough money to keep them from going on city relief almost as soon as they arrive home. Last week I had a communication from an organization in the city of Toronto, strongly objecting to some of these men in the camps who were taking away work from skilled mechanics. These men claim, and I think rightly, that these camps are operating in competition with free labour, and also that they have a tendency to lower the living standard of the district in which they are located.
Then the Department of Public Works, in cooperation with the provincial government, has completed a small work in connection with flood prevention on the Assiniboine river in Manitoba, to which the federal government

contributed $592. I figure that these men got $3 a day. That undertaking would have provided 1,697 days' work. Under the Department of National Defence no figures have been given as to provision of days' work. The small sum of $3,000 was expended through the Department of Agriculture, which made provision for some boats to assist in the better export of live cattle to Great Britain. I thought that possibly these men would be skilled workmen and would receive an average of $4 a day. Under that scheme 975 days' work was provided. The total days' -work provided under the schemes outlined by the minister was 172,216 days of eight hours a day. Expressed in weeks it would be 28,701 weeks on a basis of a six day week; so that you can see that all that was accomplished was steady employment for 28,701 weeks of one week for each man. When you figure out the steady employment which could be given individuals, you find that only 574 men could be employed during 50 weeks of the year, and that is the sole contribution of the Dominion government towards the relief of unemployment, as indicated by the minister in his speech the other evening.
Let me say this in conclusion. If you want the so-called capitalistic system to live you must try to get that system to function in such a way as to permit of the consumption of goods. That is a challenge which this government cannot ignore. I made this observation recently to some plant executives, and I think it is absolutely true with respect to the system: In the final analysis the existence of your system depends on the ability to provide men and women with work. It is a simple analysis, but in my judgment it is one that you cannot circumvent. Colonel Ayers of the Cleveland Trust Company recently made the statement that the only artificial stimulants that have been effective in the United States have been great wars. He might have added, new inventions. In my judgment the leadership will have to be taken over by the state. The state can do what neither individuals nor groups of individuals can do. It is master of its own affairs. It can expand or contract the supply of money. It is the creature of the men and women that constitute it and it reflects their point of view. It should also reflect their desires and their policies. It must therefore necessarily be responsible for their welfare.


Mr. G. G. COOTE (Macleod):: It is very much to be regretted that in the third year of office of the present government the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) is not able to tell us in his annual speech on the ques-

Relief Act, 1983-Mr. Coote
tion of unemployment that the government of which he is a member is taking definite steps to deal with the situation in a concrete way, namely, by creating employment in Canada. So far as I could gather from the speech made by the minister, the government has no intention of doing anything to create more employment for the people unless it is in connection with its scheme of putting more people on the land; and it is only by the greatest stretch of the imagination that I can call that a constructive proposal to create employment. It may create employment temporarily for those people, but the result I think will be very unfortunate for a great many of those who are being placed on the land. The majority of the farmers in Canada to-day are very hard put to it to make enough on their farms to provide for themselves and to pay taxes. That being the plight of the farmers already on the land, with equipment, what chance have these people who are being sent out now and placed on the land to take care of themselves with such equipment as will be purchased for them to the extent of $600? I think the move is doomed to failure. I hope the minister will be able to make it a success, but I do not see how it is possible.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: But it is a success; it
is proving so now.


George Gibson Coote: We have been told ever
since I came to this house that the soldier settlement scheme has been a success, but I cannot find very many returned soldiers who will admit that. The picture given to us by the minister was anything but a cheerful one. Last fall he told us that 800,000 people were in receipt of direct relief and in his speech the other day he said the number was 1,357,000. I would call the attention of the house to the fact that while the number in receipt of direct relief is increasing every month, the number of taxpayers in the municipalities is decreasing. How long can that process continue?
I consider, and I think it has been admitted in this house by the government themselves, that this is a national emergency, and a national emergency certainly demands national measures. In my opinion unemployment relief is, particularly at this time, a federal responsibility, from the very nature of the case, and in addition, because of the statements and promises made by the present Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) when he was carrying on his election campaign. All the economic policies in this country which determine whether men shall have employment or not are under the control of the federal
53719-168J
government-banking, finance, currency, the issuing of money; in fact, money in all its forms is under the control of the federal government:	tariffs, immigration, railway
rates and all economic policies which determine how much employment there is going to be in Canada-these are all under federal control. The municipalities and provinces are, in the very nature of things, not responsible for unemployment, and I regret to say that in some cases they are not financially able to cope with it. Under the present policy by which the municipalities are required to take the initiative and pay one-third of the relief either directly or indirectly, many of our municipalities are practically bankrupt; they are unable to-day, to find the necessary finance to carry on this work. As a result of this, relief is in many instances inadequate; another result is very often that men are drifting about from one municipality to another. The municipalities in an endeavour to protect themselves against the influx of the unemployed from other parts of the country, are very stringent in the regulations they make.	A man or his family
must have been	in a municipality a
certain length of time before he becomes eligible for relief. The result is that there are many people, particularly single men, transient labourers, who are still drifting around from one municipality to another. They cannot get relief in many municipalities because they are told that they have not been there long enough. They have to exist in a sort of no man's land and they drift from one municipality to another, obtaining a few meals here and there by begging. I think this condition has grown out of the present policy.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: To what part of Canada is the hon. member referring?


George Gibson Coote: I am referring to the province of Alberta, but I have been told that similar conditions exist in Ontario.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Our official reports from
there are exactly the opposite.


George Gibson Coote: When we get into committee I should like the minister to tell us whether any provision is being made to take care of the unemployed who have not been in any municipality for a certain specified time. I have heard of so many cases, both from transients and from the people who have fed them, that there must be many municipalities who will not take care of these men.
In order to show just how inadequate is the relief granted, I should like to quote the
2646	COMMONS
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Coote
scale of relief in force in some towns in Alberta. I secured these figures from the secretary of a municipality. The allowance for a man and wife is $12 per month, work being provided for five days per month at $2.40 per eight hour day. A man and his wife are supposed to live on $12 per month. For each dependent child an additional allowance of $2.40 per month is made, or one day's work. I should like hon. members to consider how they would feed a child on $2.40 per month. A few years ago we spent several weeks in this house discussing the question whether or not we should allow the children of Canada to have oleomargarine placed in front of them. I am quite satisfied that in many homes to-day the children do not have butter or even oleomargarine. I think hon. members will agree also that on an allowance of $2.40 per month, or eight cents per day, it would not be possible to provide milk for a child.
A slight additional allowance of $2.40 per month for each adult and $1.20 per month for each dependent child is provided for clothing, but work must be given in return. I do not object to the fact that work must be given in return for relief granted. I think these people should be provided with work, but I do not think a mother should be expected to clothe her child on $1.20 per month. It will mean that many of these children will not have proper clothing in which to attend school. In many cases these people have to provide themselves with some sort of house as well as with fuel and light. These and many other things they cannot get under such an inadequate scale of relief.
I think the trouble arises out of the financial position of the provinces and the municipalities-I speak more particularly of the western provinces, but the same conditions may exist in the east. The provinces and the municipalities find it almost impossible to borrow, and, as I said before, the number of taxpayers is growing smaller and smaller. I was told by a man who has made a study of these matters that during last summer in one western city ten new families were coming on the city for relief every day and a large percentage of those families had previously been taxpayers. I am led to believe that the condition existing in some parts of the east is not much betteT.
I have before me a bulletin published by the committee on social and economic research of the Montreal Presbytery of the United Church of Canada, which contains a number of extracts from Montreal newspapers. The first extract I should like to quote is from the

Montreal Star of January 26, reading as follows:
The urgent need for more accommodation for public patients was revealed when it was learned that upwards of 1,870 beds in public wards of seven of the biggest hospitals in Montreal are already filled and nearly every one of these institutions has a long waiting list.
The private wards in the Montreal general hospital are filled, but only fifty per cent of the beds in the private wards of the other hospitals are occupied.
"Due to hard times, the private wards are not very popular these days," one hospital official said. The result is overcrowding in the public wards.
The next extract is from the Montreal Star of January 26, "which reads:
Garbage Cans Searched for Family Food Man Tells Pitiful Story of Starving Children
Out of work for over two years, his wife and three small children piteously appealing to him for food, Albert Trottier, 5763 DesErables street, has been ransacking garbage cans in the residential sections of the city in a last desperate effort to provide the necessities of life for his starving family.
Emaciated and weak, his hollow cheeks mute witnesses of a semi-starving condition, Trottier told his pitiful story to Recorder Leblanc this morning after pleading guilty to a charge of foraging in garbage cans.
"I am going to let you go," Recorder Leblanc told Trottier. "Don't continue to take garbage. It is ,a very dangerous thing to do from a point of view of health."
The next is from the Montreal Gazette of February 1, and reads:
Eviction of Jobless Tenants
Montreal landlords are beginning eviction of jobless and rentless tenants. They are doing this to force upon the city administration their plight in being obliged to pay taxes, yet unable to secure from direct relief funds anything to bolster their falling, and in some cases, vanished rental revenues.
St. Edward ward witnessed four evictions Monday night; twenty more are in the offing, and some from night to night are threatened unless the public authorities make some arrangement whereby the landlord who shelters unemployed families shall receive a portion of direct relief allotments per family.
I want to protest again against the policy of the government in forcing municipalities to bear such a large share of the unemployment relief. I want to protest also against the policy of drifting and refusing to take some constructive action looking to bringing about the end of this terrible depression and the accompanying unemployment. We could create employment in Canada if we had the courage. I should like to quote one paragraph from the report of a committee of research experts appointed by President Hoover to study the significant contemporary social trends in the United 'States. It reads:
Unless there can be a more impressive integration of social skills and fusing of social

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Coote
purposes than is revealed by recent trends, there can be no assurance that these alternatives with their accomplishments of violent revolution, dark periods of serious repression of libertarian and democratic forms, the proscription and loss of many useful elements in the present productive system can be averted.
I know it is dangerous to use the word " revolution " in this house. I do not remember having used it before, but I know that hon. members who did use it were accused of being communists. I challenge any hon. member to accuse the gentleman whom I intend to quote of being a communist. I should like to quote the encyclical of Pope Pius XI with regard to civil power, as follows:
These ideas were not merely suggested, but stated in frank and open terms by our predecessor. We emphasize them with renewed insistence in this present encyclical; for unless serious attempts be made, with all energy and without delay to put them into practice, let nobody persuade himself that the peace and tranquility of human society can be effectively defended against the forces of revolution.
I wish I had time to quote more freely Tom this document, but at some future time 1 hope to have the opportunity of giving to the house more of the splendid things which Pope Pius has said in this encyclical.
I do not at present wish to deal at any great length with existing conditions except to suggest that we should take constructive steps to alleviate the distressed conditions from which we are suffering. The very worst feature of the present so-called depression is the condition of unemployment existing among our people, and their consequent poverty. There is one thing I would like this parliament to do-and I would like to see every parliament do it-and that is to abolish poverty. It is within the power of this House of Commons to abolish poverty, in the large sense, in Canada. We cannot deal with unemployment generally until we restore some purchasing power to agriculture. This is an agricultural country, and so long as the purchasing power of our agricultural population is as low as it is to-day, we are bound to have unemployment, falling revenues, increased expenditures for unemployment relief, and no government will be able to balance its budget. We cannot deal with the agricultural situation; we cannot restore its purchasing power without adopting a more sensible and sounder money policy than we have in Canada to-day. The present so-called "sound money" is bankrupting agriculture and ruining trade and commerce. Why under heaven anyone would call that sound money is more than I can understand; it is about as unsound as any money system could be. If we have the courage and wisdom to manage our money system so as to place our
currency on a proper level with sterling, this would put $200,000,000 more purchasing power into the hands of our agriculturists and others who are producing export commodities. That amount circulated throughout this country would put a large part of our population at work. I quite freely admit that it would not put them all at work. We have waited much too long to expect to deal with the whole question of unemployment in that way; conditions have become too bad and we must take other and perhaps more direct means if we are going to give our people, or even a considerable percentage of them, employment.
Perhaps at this time, before proceeding further, I might quote just one sentence from tlie remarks of Lord Melchett when he spoke in the House of Lords in support of a resolution which he moved. As the resolution is very short, I might be permitted to read it. This is the motion moved by him on December 15, 1932:
That, since under modern scientific conditions productive capacity is unlimited, and since the existence of indigence and unemployment throughout a large portion of the population demonstrates the fact that the present monetary system is obsolete and a hindrance to the efficient production and distribution of goods, in the opinion of this house the government should bring forward immediate proposals for the economic reforms necessary to enable the subjects of this realm to enjoy the benefits to which their present productive capacity entitles them.
A splendid resolution, one which perhaps should be presented to the house and the government asked to act on it. In support of it he said:
We have to realize that it is no good going on in an economic world with a financial system which is so hopeless, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted himself last night, that when America stops paying herself the whole system collapses. If you boil his speech down it comes to this, that the moment America stopped lending money to her debtors to repay her the whole system was in danger of, and did in fact, collapse. Why should we continue with these absurd follies? We have an infinite power of production in our hands. We have scientists with brains, and if we concentrated on almost any material problem in the world to-day it could probably be solved within ten or fifteen years. We have bountiful gifts at our disposal if we have only the courage to take them. We have to create a system which is capable of doing that.
We can deal with the problem in Canada just as easily as they can deal with it in Great Britain, perhaps more so, because we have no shortage of food. Canada is one of the greatest food producing countries in the world, and we have also immense natural re-
Reliej Act, 1933-Mr. Coote

sources such as Great Britain does not have within her own borders.
The time has come when we should adopt some definite measure to create employment for our people. Again I quote Lord Melchett, this time from memory. He said that discussing the question of unemployment without bringing in the question of currency was like discussing Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark. Undoubtedly the question of relief from unemployment is bound up with that of money, and, if you like, I shall go so far as to say that in Canada to-day it is bound up with the question of a moderate amount of inflation. Never in my life have I advocated anything like uncontrolled inflation; I want to make that very plain. I know the suggestion has been made in the house and out of it that some members in this corner advocate uncontrolled inflation. If any hon. member did advocate it, I never heard it and I have never done so myself. We may have uncontrolled inflation in the future, and if so, I do not want to be in any way blamed for it. I do want a certain degree of controlled inflation. Had we had a sensible money system, wo would not have had the deflation, but now that we have it, there is no way of dealing with the unemployment situation which does not include controlled inflation or reflation-call it what you will, but we want it under definite control and for a definite purpose, that of giving employment and putting purchasing power into the hands of the people so as to take the unemployed off the hands of the various governments and to restore the confidence of the Canadian people in their own institutions.
It seems to me that there is no more direct way of putting purchasing power where it is needed than by financing unemployment relief. Prom the point of view of economics there may not be very much difference whether this is done in the form of a dole or in the form of public works, but there is certainly a very great social difference and the community might very well enjoy some benefit from the labour of those whom it is financing. The usual objection to a program of construction of publio works is that somebody may make too much profit out of the material which must go into the creation of those works. May I say that my remarks on this particular point I have written out so that I may give them in the most concise manner possible. I do not think it is necessary to worry about such profits, if excess profits are properly restrained, and we can have that done through our system of taxation. Most of the money expended in the purchase of materials is paid out in wages

and enables contractors, manufacturers of construction machinery and other employers to maintain or to increase their staffs. Most of the public work that needs doing is in urban centres. Housing projects are needed to clean up slum areas such as may be found, for instance, in this city of Ottawa. More of them can be found in Toronto and even more in Montreal. Surely it would be a good idea to clean up slum areas and to build decent apartment houses or dwellings for the great mass of the people, the working class. In many cities we also need street widening, clinics, improvements to hospital facilities, and in fact, work of this type is plentiful. The ideal method of coping with this situation would be, first, to establish an unemployment relief commission to cooperate with the municipalities and to lay down a code of practice, as to the type of work which should be undertaken and, second, to appoint inspectors to supervise the purchasing of supplies and material, according to the policy of the commission. Substantial appropriations of money for these purposes could be secured by borrowings from a central bank. Of course we have not such a bank, but there is nothing to hinder its early establishment. Hon. members in this corner of the house have advocated such a bank for the last ten years. It is unfortunate it was not created in 1923, 1924, 1928 or even 1931. 'Had that been done we would now have the machinery through which to finance the work such as I have described.
The borrowings could be from a central bank, or even from the commercial banks, on treasury bills at low interest rates. Last fall $35,000,000 was secured in this way, and there is nothing to hinder our securing more money in the same way provided the money is paid out for useful work. Arrangements could be made with the municipalities for the repayment of these advances, such repayments to be spread over a term of, say, ten years, at a rate of interest which would cover the cost of administering these funds and paying for their collection. That would be a very low rate of interest compared with the rates municipalities are compelled to pay at the present time. It seems to me that the provinces might very well join the municipalities in arranging guarantees for expenditures of this nature. A certain amount of unemployment relief will be necessary, but as far as possible I think we should give work rather than direct relief. As I said in the house some time ago, we are crazy to .think we would bankrupt ourselves by putting unemployed people to work, because any unemployed man who is put to. work will

Relief Act, 1983-Mr. Coote
create real wealth. I believe it is Professor Soddy who says that the wealthiest nation is the nation which consumes most. In Canada we pride ourselves upon being a wealthy nation, and yet many of our people are living in poverty.
I have a suggestion to make to the Minister of Labour which I believe will meet with his private approval, whether or not he can get the cooperation of the cabinet. I have in mind a change in the Old Age Pensions Act which would extend pensions to men who have reached the age of sixty-five years. Let us retire some of those men who have worked faithfully to that time of their lives, and let some of the young men take their jobs.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Has the hon. member
worked out how much such a change would increase the burden of debt?


George Gibson Coote: No, I have not. I believe,
however, that to do as I propose would be economically sound.
There is one other suggestion I should like to make to the minister. I do not remember this being advanced in the house before, although it may have been. My proposal is that he should consider measures to assist the establishment of unemployed cooperatives. A great deal of this work has been done in the United States, I learn from the press that in the state of California more than 200,000 unemployed are obtaining the necessities of life by trading days' work for goods. In Seattle the unemployed have organized themselves so as to perform for one another such services as tailoring, shoemaking, baxbering and so on. They grow as much of their food as possible on vacant land, and exchange their labour on the farms for farm produce, the farmers being equally short of ready cash. A splendid account of the operation of this cooperative association in Seattle is given in Collier's magazine of a few months ago. I quote the following from Change:
One of the most ambitious and most successful of these self-help organizations -has been formed in the city of Minneapolis under the direction of Doctor George Mecklenburg of the Wesley Methodist Church. The local unemployed are listed according to occupation at the headquarters office, and forty-five crafts have been organized into craft guilds, through which work is distributed. Scrip money-which is of course of value for local circulation only-is the medium of payment. This novel organization is described in Zion's Herald:
"Just inside the door on the Grant street side we find the bank; for the organization has printed ita own money in denominations of five cents, ten cents, fifty cents, one dollar, five dollars and ten dollars. This scrip money
is hand-signed, copyrighted, and stamped with the seal of the Incorporated Organized Unemployed. Expert unemployed accountants set up the books. Everything is accounted for.
Next to the bank we find the large commissary store. Here come 1,500 people a day to make purchases with scrip. What can they buy? Anything that the members of the organization produce cooperatively. They can buy clothes, old or new; old shoes and some new shoes and rubbers; all kinds of vegetables grown in Minnesota, sugar, bread, flour, sauerkraut, and all kinds of canned fruits and vegetables.
Across the hall from the store we run on to the 'white-collar' restaurant. Here is a cafeteria with $7,900 worth of restaurant equipment which had been loaned to the organization. It was found that Minneapolis not only had idle men, but had idle store equipment, idle bakeries, idle shoe machinery, idle sewing-machines, idle trucks, idle everything. This movement has put idle men and idle things to work.
In the big room back of the restaurant we come to the barter and exchange department. Anyone may bring anything to this place and sell it for scrip. Furniture, beds, automobile tires, silverware, cooking utensils, stoves, shoes, clothes-anything of value is bought for scrip.
In the headquarters building a clothing factory has been set up where twenty-four rapid-power sewing machines make new clothes, mackinaws, overcoats, blazers, and all kinds of warm clothing. On a nearby street is a storehouse filled with potatoes, carrots, parsnips, onions, squash, and other vegetables. All of this produce was bought by trading the work of the unemployed for surplus farm products.
Not the least important feature of this novel plan is the new spirit of hope and confidence that it has given to thousands of people who feel that they are taking part in a new experiment in cooperative living.
In one of the districts of New York city a somewhat similar scheme has been organized by a group of prominent economists, engineers, lawyers and industrial experts, known as the Emergency Exchange Association. As in Minneapolis, the basic idea is to bring into working relationship the idle machines, raw materials, dwellings and farms with the idle men and women who are anxious to work and who are desperately in need of the necessities that they could provide for one another if the facilities were given them. The New York Association also makes use of scrip money in order to make exchange of goods and services possible. The reason for using token money rather than the existing currency is to provide for the eventual expansion of the system beyond the elementary exchange of services, to include production plants and farms. Thus will be created a balanced economic system which a central exchange, to be established by the association, will finance and control, operating from raw materials to ultimate consumer by means of the scrip."
I know some members will not approve of the suggestion contained in this article, but it might interest some to know that in the monthly bulletin published by the Nationa.' tity bank, which, I believe, is the second largest bank in the city of New York, a study
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Coote

of a book recently written by Professor Graham on this very subject is suggested. The article is headed: Remedy for Unemployment, and I recommend it to some hon. members who have not read it.
Mr. MacMIiLLAN: Does the hon. member-


George Gibson Coote: I recommend it to the hon. member for Saskatoon (Mr. MacMillan), who is so ready-


Mr.   MacMLLLAN@: Does the hon. member favour the banking system of the United States rather than our system?


George Gibson Coote: I am not discussing the banking system of the United States. I am suggesting to the minister, and to the hon. member for Saskatoon, that it would be a good idea to assist in the establishment of the unemployed in some of these cooperatives, so that they might take care of themselves, relieve the taxpayers, relieve the budget and, as the article I read stated, restore confidence to the unemployed themselves. I am also trying to tell him that even such a great institution as the National City bank of New York suggests in its monthly bulletin this book as one to study. The bulletin says regarding this suggestion :
The author's reasoning leads him in search of a plan whereby in times like the present, when wages and prices in terms of money are out of adjustment, resort may be had to the principle of banter, as a temporary expedient by which the otherwise unemployed may supply their own needs.
Surely that is a good suggestion.
His plan in brief is to have a National Emergency Corporation that would undertake production, presumably of goods for common consumption, by arrangements with owners of existing shop capacity and giving employment to workmen who would accept pay in "consumption certificates," which would represent proportionate shares in the product. The sole purpose would he to enable the unemployed to produce for themselves and each other during the period of derangement which has deprived them of regular jobs, and to thus mitigate the suffering of such periods.
The consumption certificates would he transferable, and presumably have a money value, hence a recipient might convert a portion of his earnings into cash. Presumably the money value of the wage would be less than the union wage, for avowedly it is an emergency plan to provide employment at times when union wages cannot be had for many would-be workers, hut there would be no profit on the labour.
Obviously the problem would be to get such a variety of production and services into the system as would enable it to supply at once employment and the essentials of life to the workers who joined it. Practically the scheme seems to contemplate a cooperative, auxiliary, system in connection with the existing system, but operating with a currency of its own.

I am suggesting, Mr. Speaker, that the minister seriously consider setting up an unemployment relief commission, and ask that commission to make a study of this very plan. I think it might be adopted in many of the larger municipalities, and if it were properly handled and given a little financial assistance at the start, it could be carried on by men who are now unemployed. Plenty of men who have held good executive positions, now unemployed, would be very glad to lend their services for the successful completion of a project of this kind.
Before I sit down I want again to urge that action be taken to see that the transients who have not been in a municipality long enough to comply with the residence requirements get relief from some source. I would again urge that the federal government assume a larger share of the cost of relief,, so that our municipalities may be enabled to increase the scale of relief, in cases where it is now inadequate, to what would seem to be the amount necessary to sustain a decent standard of living for people who would work if they had an opportunity, but for whom there is no work available at present.


Mr. ALFRED SPEARMAN (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, in considering this subject of unemployment and unemployment relief, perhaps one of the most important questions that we have to deal with at this time, it is vital, I think, that we should avoid confusion of thought and confusion of speech. The subject is of course, extremely complex in a superficial way, that is there are innumerable aspects from which it may be considered, and there are innumerable minor factors in the situation. But essentially there are two main approaches: the one temporary, the other fundamental. So I think it is of great importance to remember that unemployment, although undoubtedly an extremely complex problem, is not in itself a primary problem. That is it is an effect rather than a cause; a symptom rather than a disease. Any physician, confronted with a patient suffering from acute pain whose temperature has risen to an alarming height, would at once take measures to alleviate the pain and reduce the fever; but if he were a wise physician he would go further, he would endeavour to diagnose the disorder from which the patient is suffering and which had brought about the symptoms, and would prescribe such treatment as might remove the disorder and restore the patient to health. It is quite conceivable that part of that treatment might be a complete change of diet, and perhaps a complete

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Speakman
change in the sufferer's occupation and mode of living.
As to the first or the more temporary aspect 'of the problem, there is after all little difference of opinion in this house. There is difference in degree, but in the main the house is conversant with the situation that exists, and I am not going to stress that to-night. We are conversant with the fact that in recent years unemployment has steadily increased, until to-day, although we do not know exactly how many there are, we do know that not far from three quarters of a million people are unemployed who ought to be working, and that those receiving relief from the state in one form or another have increased in number in the last few months from some 800,000 to over 1,300,000. I think we are all in accord as to this, that this condition cannot continue indefinitely without leading to ultimate disaster and bankruptcy. It is obvious that under the system as we have it, with our small population, we cannot carry indefinitely the burden of relief for such a large proportion of the population, nor can we stand the heavy drain upon our resources, the steady wastage which is implied, in seven or eight hundred thousand people living in idleness who ought to be wealthy producers. To that extent we are agreed.
By the way, Mr. Speaker, may I request that you ask these gentlemen-I emphasize the word "gentlemen"-to conduct their conversation in a lower tone or behind the curtains?


Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER:: Order. The
hon. gentleman cannot hear himself speak.


Alfred Speakman: As I say, we are all in accord as to the nature and extent of the problem, and we are in agreement, that it is the responsibility of the state, of the people of the country, to provide for those who are in want the necessities of life which they are unable to earn by their own labour. Not only is that a matter of humanity; it is a matter of distinct responsibility, arid a matter of wisdom, particularly in respect of the children. Not only, sir, is there an appeal to those humane instincts found in the heart of every man and woman, that instinctive urge to protect and care for the young and the weak and the helpless of our race, that instinct which is in fact responsible for the preservation of the race; not only that, but I believe it is nothing short of criminal, it is high treason against the state-and that is looked upon as one of the worst of crimes-a crime against the future of this country and a menace to our civilization, if we allow these children who will be the future citizens, who must carry on our future
civilization and the business of this country, to enter upon their responsibilities with dwarfed or twisted bodies, physically incapable through malnutrition, or with minds undeveloped or misdeveloped, and with an outlook upon life distorted by suffering and lack of nourishment and wrong surroundings during their youthful and formative years. I look upon that, Mr. Speaker, as do we all, as being not only a tragedy, but a crime. On that point the only difference of opinion in any part of this house is as to what constitutes an adequate and decent standard of living. I doubt whether there is an hon. member in the house, including the minister, who believes that the amount provided at present will adequately care for any growing child.
Then we all agree, Mr. Speaker, that all other things being equal and if it were financially possible, it would be infinitely better both from the point of view of the morale of those concerned and as an investment for the state, to make provision for those requiring relief by way of work for which remuneration was given than to provide direct relief. There is a difference of opinion as to the work which might be done, and I am not going to dwell upon that because my colleague from Macleod (Mr. Coote), who immediately preceded me, gave very clearly and intelligently. I think, a long list of suggestions some of which might well be put in force. I am merely pointing out that we are all agreed on these questions and that the only factor which intervenes and the only reason direct relief is substituted for work is again the cost. Under the system as we have it that cost apparently is prohibitive.
1 have said that we are all agreed as to the duty of the state, but a question arises as to what particular agency of state should take the primary and chief responsibility. I believe in facing facts, and among those facts of course is our constitution and the division of authority and of responsibility therein outlined. After all, however, a constitution is not a fundamental but a superficial fact; it is a matter of convenience, and to my mind so long as the people of this country must carry [DOT] the burden and pay the cost it matters little through what agency that work is done so long as that agency is the most competent and effective for that purpose. I believe, and I think the belief is shared by many, that with the scope and magnitude of the present problem it has become more and more a national problem which must be dealt with by a centralized system of management. I do not say that provincial and municipal governments should not take their share of responsibility
2(552
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Speakman

and contribute their share towards the solution of the problem, but I do say that I am at one with the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) who stated that we should have some centralized body which would lay the plans and co-ordinate the work as between the federal, provincial and municipal governments and see that the work was done equally so that all would share alike. Further, so long as the causes of unemployment are wholly beyond the control of municipalities, and while the provinces have little to do with them; to the extent that any Canadian government is responsible, then it is federal responsibility and the federal government or the federal agency should assume the greater part of that burden. After all, they control immigration, which is one of the contributing factors; they control our trade and financial policies. The federal parliament controls almost every factor which, so far as it is national, enters into this problem of unemployment, and for that reason I again emphasize my belief that the federal government should not only direct the general work itself but should carry the greater part of the burden.
Last year I know the minister strained every nerve to cope with this problem, and may I say at once that I believe he has done all that a man in his position can do to overcome this situation. He has given his thought, his time, his efforts and his health, and among the other things he tried was the back to the land movement. I am not one of those who deprecate unduly all experiments-and this was an experiment. I do hold that no back to the land movement, on a large or a small scale, can go any distance in meeting this problem. It is of no use for us to deplore the fact that the tendency is for more and more people to dwell in our large centres, with fewer and fewer remaining in the country. That is something we cannot control; that is in line with the steady march forward of civilization, and to attempt to fight that flow or turn it aside would be as useless as was the gesture of old King Canute, who ordered back the rising sea. As the hon. member for Bast Hamilton (Mr. Mitchell) has said, almost every day sees some new industry developed, always one that is industrial in its character and carried on in some factory in some city. The percentage of people required to produce the food of the world is becoming smaller and smaller, inevitably and inexorably. Every scientific discovery and every mechanical improvement lessens the number of people required to produce food, but it does not increase the need for food or the size of men's stomachs. It drives men more and more to
(Mr. Speakman.l
the cities where the new industries are located and where every new invention not only has its birth but lives its life. I hardly need to mention the further fact that if a back to the land movement were carried on to such an extent as perceptibly to affect the problem of unemployment, it would simply increase the problem of agricultural distress which is now as great as the unemployment problem which is crushing this country.
I should like to pass for a little while now from the temporary phase of this question. I have said that in my opinion the minister and the government have been doing pretty well all they can do under the system as we have it. It comes to a question of dollars and cents, and again under the system as we have it those dollars and cents are limited. Perhaps the greatest indictment against the system as we have it is the fact that we have had in power, before 1930 and since 1930, able and sincere men who have done their best to meet the conditions that arose, and who shall say that they have failed so far as they could sucoeed? The fact that they have been unable to succeed; the fact that despite their utmost efforts unemployment and distress have increased and the number of people on relief has steadily grown and keeps on growing, is to my mind an indictment not of the members of the government but of a system which even those men, strong and capable though they may have been-and I will give them all the credit they may desire-have been unable to make it succeed.
I will turn to the question of causes, because after all the symptoms or the mere alleviation of suffering are not tlhe important things. The important thing for us to consider to-day is what has brought about imiemiployiment and what we cam do to remove those causes. There is a great deal more difference of opinion on this point; here the views of members of this house diverge to a far greater extent than they do in respect of the more temporary and superficial phases of the problem. During a debate which took place a short time ago upon another subject, to which by the rules of this house I am mot allowed1 to refer, a good deal was said as to systems old and new, and frequently we heard something said as to the folly, shall we say, of a small number of men in this comer of the house who held, according to others, that this system under which we live must be destroyed root and branch that it may serve as fertilizer for a new and better system. That at least was the inference I drew from what was said by some hon. members. Now, may I assure the house that in endeavouring to put forward some ideas held in this corner as to what might be done towards

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Speakmcin
meeting conditions which bring -about unemployment, I am not suggesting that we should tear down the building or uproot the tree, that we should make fertilizer out of all our cherished institutions. Not a.t all. I -aim suggesting merely this, that Where we find- an obvious weakness or an obvious flaw, that weakness should be eradicated and a newer and -batter piece of -machinery installed to function where the existing piece failed to function. And although I will suggest that if this process is -continued long enough, and each inadequate piece of machinery in turn is removed and replaced by -a more efficient piece of machinery, in the long run you may have an entirely new machine, -that is -a very different thing from destroying and then erecting. It is a matter of gradual evolution from the less satisfactory to the -more satisfactory, and- so w.e hope at some future time to -attain the perfect. That perfection will not come within my lifetime or yours, however.
What are the -chief causes of unemployment? Of -these I think, again, we have a very fair conception. There are two main causes, as I think we shall all -agree. One of these we describe as technological, and the other -is financial, and these two phases constitute the reason for almost all the u-nemipJ-oyment which we see in this -country and elsewhere

the technological and the financial causes. Let us take the technological first, because technology and technocrats and so on have become a popular subject of -conversation, or at least they were until a short time ago.
What is technological unemployment? It is simply the replacement of human labour by machinery; that is all, and there is no reason for me to emphasize or to offer illustrations of that great truth. Every one of us, whether living on the farm or in the city; whether conversant chiefly with urban or with rural life; whether our principal contacts have been with the farmer or with the mechanic in the cotton mills, in the shoe factories, in Oshawa or Windsor or Ford City, where they make automobiles, every one of us, I say, is conversant with that situation. We know that in every industry machinery improving year by year is gradually replacing human labour. That process, beginning as it did when steam power was first applied to production, has gone on with accelerating speed year by year until the present time. You will perhaps ask. as I have asked: If this is true, why have we had no unemployment on a large scale until within recent years, when this process has been going on so long? Again, I think, the answer is obvious. To counteract that process we have seen within our own lifetime
the emergence and development of new industries, beginning on a small scale, and producing luxuries almost unattainable except to the rich, until spreading and growing and rapidly developing, like the motor car, they have become at last necessities of life, demanded and if possible secured by every man in the community. The emergence into our industrial field of the motor car, the telephone, the gramophone, the radio, the flying machine and all these new industries, has meant that each in turn has been able to absorb the surplus labour thrown off from the basic industries. As they have replaced human labour with machinery, each new industry has in turn absorbed that discarded labour, thus putting off again and again the threatened time of widespread unemployment.
In 1914 the situation was growing acute and then the war broke out, and at once it took from the field of competitive labour 500,000 of our best men. This at once created an enormous artificial market for goods, and for a time the situation was saved from the point of view of employment. The war passed and again we were threatened with unemployment on a large scale, and again the sudden and widespread development of some of these machines of which I have spoken- the fact that numerous men were employed in building the very machines which eventually would displace them-was able to take up the slack. But remember that after each recurring era such as this we entered upon the next with a greatly increased load of debt, accumulating steadily, so that each time it woidd require a more powerful stimulant to take us forward another lap. There is the situation, and to-day apparently we have not in sight any new industry on a sufficiently wide scale to absorb the potential labour now idle.
I will not go into the estimates given time and again as to what the total production would be if we were to employ all our people. It has been estimated that a little over fifty per cent of the available working population, working eight hours a day, would to-day be able to supply all the needs of the country were we able to purchase all that was produced. Now, some people ask, why worry about technological unemployment? That is easily solved. Pass some law or statute and turn the eight hour day into a five hour, a four hour, a three hour, a two hour day; cut down the hours; divide and subdivide the work and you will have met the problem. Yes, if that were the end. But after all that is only the a. b, c of the matter, because behind that lies finance. The question will

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Speakman
be immediately asked: Yes; divide labour; shorten the hours; but will you pay these men the full eight hour day wage for four hours of work or will you halve the wages to meet the half time occupied? If the latter, then none will have enough to live on and you will have to relieve all. If the former, then you double the labour cost of the goods produced, and under the system as we have it, neither could capital obtain a profit nor could the farmer and those other producers who do not come under the wage scale be able to buy the goods produced and you would find yourself faced with the ultimate problem, that which I verily believe, as stated again and again from this corner, and emphasized and amply demonstrated by my friend from Macleod (Mr. Coote), is the stumbling block, the root cause, namely, finance or money. How will you get it? Then we come to that problem. I think it is fair to say that that is the main problem.
May I come back again to the medical metaphor, and I do so with hesitation because there are so many medical men in the house. But I suggest this to you because I know something of medicine, not as a practitioner but as a victim. One of the practices of the skilled physician in dealing with a patient who has some obscure disorder is to apply the logical method of elimination in making his diagnosis. He will test organ after organ to see whether this or that organ is sound and functioning properly, and gradually he eliminates one after another from the field of conjecture until he comes finally to the organ that is giving the trouble. I believe that is an apt metaphor in this connection.
Now, no one will deny that our public patient is suffering from some obscure ailment. The symptoms are obvious, for we are all suffering from it; 'the temperature is high, the pain is acute, and we are analyzing organ after organ.
Look at agriculture. Agriculture is absolutely sound as a producing body. It can produce goods in ample quantity and of excellent quality. In other words, it functions one hundred per cent. I do not say that it cannot be improved; all methods can be improved but I think it is efficient in performing its proper functions, which is to produce agricultural goods.
We come now to industry. You can examine factory after factory and you will find almost without exception that it is functioning efficiently and doing its work as it should be done, producing as a productive organization should. As you pass from one to the other I venture to say that in these days of keen competition you would find very few

that were not functioning to their height of efficiency in producing the goods for which they were created.
Then we come to distribution. When we examine our mechanical means of distribution such as our railways, our steamships, our trucks, our buses or other means of transportation, we find just as an efficient a system of transportation as any man could wish. Again, improvements are possible in economy and in efficiency but I venture to say that there is not an article produced in any part of this country that cannot be transported with speed, safety and celerity to any market on the globe.
Next we come to communication. Miracles are being performed with our systems of communication. In my home in Red Deer I am nearer to Washington, London, Peking, Moscow or, if you like, Ottawa, than I was to Calgary when I went west forty-three years ago. The moment a man speaks I am able to hear him over the radio. The Pope speaks in the ancient Vatican and followers by the millions throughout the world bow their heads when they hear his voice. The Prince of Wales launches a ship and the splash as it enters the Clyde resounds throughout the empire. The Prime Minister of Canada speaks and the listening multitudes raise their hats and shout "hurrah."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Alfred Speakman: If they don' t. I assume they should. The system of communication is perfect.
We come now to that organism the function of which, stripped of all verbiage, stripped of all the accumulations of legend, tradition and precedent, is to make possible the exchange of goods and services between one industry and another-finance. I do not intend to go into the intricacies of finance but I am going to ask this question: Judged from the point of view of a medium of exchange, is finance functioning as it should? I do not think there is an hon. member who has looked at what is going on, who has seen the accumulated wealth-money is not wealth, it is goods-who has observed the suffering of the people; I do not think there is anyone with the intelligence worthy of a member who will say that finance is functioning when considered from that point of view. At the moment I do not intend to go into why it is not functioning, I simply state that to my own satisfaction, and following the logical processes of elimination to which I have alluded, finance is the weak spot in our economic circle.

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Speakman
That being the case, what are we going to do? Why are we in this corner called radicals? It is because, faced with these facts as is every hon. member in this house, with the little knowledge of which we are possessed- we have not all the wisdom in the world, but just that of an ordinary, average man-we are prepared to say that if this thing is not functioning, all these precedents, all these accumulations of debt, of interest and of interests will not prevent us from saying: Cut loose from it, remedy the weakness and have a financial system which will achieve the purpose for which it was born and created. I do not care how good it is for piling up debts; I do not care how efficiently it functions in providing interest for bond investors; I do not care how skilfully the bankers or the financiers are functioning as wholesalers and retailers of a commodity termed money; I do not care how much it means to them and what hardships will be involved to these few men, if the system cannot do that for which it was created, then it must be changed.
Much will have to be done; this is not the end, it is but the beginning. We will do first that thing which comes first to our hand and which every logic and all experience points to as being the right thing to do-we will create a central bank. From that point we will spread out until the nation controls the credit of the nation. Why do I say that? I am not making a statement simply for the fun of making one. I make it for this reason : It has been admitted by many hon. members in this house, including the Prime Minister, that the basis of all credit, no matter whether it functions through banks or industrial companies or otherwise, is the wealth of the nation, the productive power of all the people. That fact was admitted when the power was sought to place behind the tottering financial institutions of this country the financial credit of the nation itself, as was done a year ago. The true basis of all credit is in the nation and in the people of the country. If the people of the country create the basis of our credit, if credit itself is the lifeblood of our country rather than a money-making proposition, rather than an industry in itself in which profit is considered indispensable, then I say that from both points of view the nation itself that made the credit should control it, not for the good of the few people to whom we have given it and from whom we can take it away, but for the good of all the people in this country.
I am not unmindful of the fact that this country does not live within itself. I am not one of those who believe that we should live by ourselves. I think we could do it if we had
to-we could cut down our production of wheat by four-fifths and produce only enough upon which to live-none of these things are impossible, but they are all extremely improbable and not very wise. We could live within ourselves, but it would be very foolish to do so. We would be attempting to sweep back the rising tide which is drawing the countries of the world together, and, I hope, gradually making of them a great commonwealth of nations. I am not unmindful of these facts; but surely a credit based upon the nation itself could be made just as available for intercourse with other countries as a credit based upon gold or upon the say so of a few financiers. Surely that is not impossible. It is an easy matter for those who disagree with us to say that it would be difficult. Of course it would be difficult, but nothing worth while in this world can be achieved without difficulty.
It will be difficult, but what is the alternative? What is the alternative to moving forward and attempting to tear out the roots of unemployment? Stay where we are. I am one of those who prefer to move forward, neither tolerating, on the one hand, turbulent violence and destructive anarchy, nor, on the other hand, accepting that passive inertia the end of which is death from dry rot. We cannot stay as we are; there is an inexorable law of nature which says that you must move forward or backward. At the moment we are steadily moving backward. Every additional unemployed, every additional man, woman or child that goes on relief, is a step backward, a step nearer disintegration. When we are told that the problem is difficult, we say: Yes, it is difficult, but not impossible, and surely it is better to go forward and meet and conquer difficulties than to stand still and die like a coward or a slave.
I am not in the habit of using strong language, but this is a serious subject and some of us feel rather strongly in regard to it. I am not one of those who say that we alone have seen what is going on around us or realize the suffering. All hon. members realize the suffering; I venture to say that every one of us feels as bitterly as I do about it. The only difference is that I am not bound-I am not talking about partyism now-by old precedent or to any ancient belief. I have been able with a tremendous effort to throw that off and am prepared to go forward as long as I am wholly certain that the- road along which I am moving is a sound one and that the objective which I seek to attain is also sound. What objective do we seek to attain? The elimination of unemployment? Yes, partly that, but seek also to attain something
265G

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Maclnms
else, something that we are bound to meet, something at which at some time we are bound to succeed. We are moving forward to the time when one simple thing will be accomplished, and that is When this world's wealth, which this system has enabled us to create, will be used for the benefit of those who created it. We have the key to unlock the door which opens into nature's great storehouse of plenty which science has made available to us.
Mr. ANGUS MaoINNIS (Vancouver South): Mr. Speaker, of all the depressing things that have cotme to my attention since the beginning of this depression, the most depressing was the speech of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) in presenting this resolution to the house on Friday last. It was bereft of hope; it was without plan or policy and even, I believe, bereft of any understanding of the fundamental causes of unemployment. The hon. member for Red Deer (Mr. Speakman), who has just preceded me, explained at some length the causes of unemployment, and though I may not entirely agree with him, yet I am in sufficient accord with him not to take any exception to what he has said. We can, however, put the causes of unemployment on a more simple and fundamental basis than the hon. member for Red Deer has done. Unemployment is really not something to be afraid of or that we should consider an evil. It is only when we have unemployment coupled with certain conditions that the fact of unemployment becomes undesirable.
Very early in my life I came across the fact that work was something that was given to man as a punishment. I noted that when Adam was driven out of the Garden of Eden, the punishment meted out to him because of his sin was that he would have to work. I notice also that when a judge wishes to be particularly nasty with anyone who comes before him, in rendering sentence he says: Five or ten years with hard labour. In my reading of history I have also noted that primitive man was not in the least afraid of being unemployed. When nature was kind to him and her fruits were plentiful and easy of attainment, he did not have to work so hard; he had more leisure and consequently was a great deal happier. In the next stage of human society, that is barbarism, the same thing occurred. When nature again was kind, man could get his living so much easier and consequently he had much leisure, or unemployment, if you like, and was much happier. It is only when we come to the present system, that of capitalism, under which the machinery of production is owned by one

class in the community and operated by another, that unemployment is undesirable, and it is only undesirable for a certain section of the community. It is not undesirable for those who own the machinery. They do not worry about not having to work; in fact, they greatly enjoy their good fortune. Because they have not to work, they go to the West Indies or some other warm country in the winter; they go to the lakes in the north in the summer and they have a good time living at the best hotels and having all the best things of life. It is only the working class- who produce the goods of the world, who feed these people who live in idleness,-who are afraid of unemployment. That being so, we find that unemployment arises because of the social relationships that exist in human society. Unemployment will not be cured so long as those social relationships continue. There is the cause of unemployment, very briefly and very fundamentally too. Maybe hon. members will not agree with me, but it does not make any difference whether they do or not. That is the cause and it will have to be realized before a solution for unemployment can be brought about.
The only hope the minister has to offer us is economy, that it is costing less to-day to deal with the unemployment situation than it did two or three years ago. When this government came into office we had a special session of parliament to deal with the question of unemployment, and I should like to read from the records a short paragraph to show how the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) at that time thought the unemployment situation should be dealt with and how he pointed out that economy was not the way to deal with it. On page 91 of Hansard of September 11, 1930, the Prime Minister, in order to indicate what would be the effect of the $20,000,000 that he was asking from parliament, had this to say:
That is, if a public work is undertaken in a community where there is considerable unemployment of one class, and that class thereby finds employment, then there will be a reaction of course, lor the benefit of other classes who are also unemployed. By reason of the fact that employment is given to the workers in class A, the workers in other classes will benefit from the result of that employment. In other words, moneys will circulate through the productive effort of those who are paid for their services, and enure to the benefit of other classes in the community, both men and women, whether they be clerks, of whom more will be required in offices, stenographers, of whom more will be required in the counting rooms, or those who work in restaurants, or those who provide food or clothing. That has been the experience of the world, and no one knows it better than the right hon. gentleman himself.

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Maclnnis
He was referring to the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King). What I wish to point out is this: that if the Prime Minister were correct in saying that with the spending of money further activity would accrue than that directly created by the expenditure itself, that reactions in other ways would be caused, then the reverse is also true; that if we economize here by a reduction of wages, there by a reduction of unemployment relief, that economy will have reactions through curtailment of economic activities in spheres altogether apart from where the actual economy has been put into effect. So that the more the Minister of Labour or this government economizes, the more unemployment will increase. That is a fundamental economic fact from which there is no need to try to get away. No doubt he expects to get away from it by putting people back on the land. Because in the last fifty years the urban population has increased from eighteen per cent to something like fifty per cent of the whole, he is convinced that such increase in urban population has been the cause of our economic difficulties. I do not believe that has been the cause.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: I said it was only one
of the causes.


Angus MacInnis: I do not wish to imply
that the minister said it was the whole cause. If he states it is only one cause, I shall accept his word. I do not believe, however, that it is even one cause.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Very few men in Canada
would agree with you.


Angus MacInnis: Possibly the rest of them are wrong.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: Likely.


Angus MacInnis: Both city and farm
workers to-day are engaged in agricultural production. The farmer who produces wheat for a world market is not alone in that production; he is merely taking part in its production. The man who lives in the city and helps to make a tractor, the man who lives in the city and helps to make a truck or a wagon, the trainmen, the seamen who transport the wheat-all are engaged in the production of wheat, as much as the farmer who does the work on the land. This is equally true of those who are engaged in the production of other agricultural products. If these products, were consumed on the farm where they are produced, then the original producer would be alone responsible. But they are produced for a world market, and their production is not complete until the ultimate
consumer is reached. Between the farmer in the field and the ultimate consumer there is a host of workers which takes as great a part in the production as does the farmer on the land.
I do not believe there is much use putting people back on the land when those who are there to-day cannot remain. They cannot make a living, and they cannot bring up their children. As a matter of fact, because of the difficulties they have to face, farmers are finding difficulty keeping their wives with them. In the Ottawa Citizen of February 14, there was a Canadian press item from Calgary wherein Charles Robertson, secretaiy of the Canadian Legion, Alberta division, declared that settlers who took up farms under settlement schemes were leaving the farms and coming into the cities because under present conditions they found it impossible to meet their obligations.
While I am on this point may I say that in my view a very serious principle is involved in the back to the land movement. The people being put on the land under these schemes go with the idea that they are to produce only for themselves, that they are to make only their own living, and at least at this time they will not come into competition with farmers already on the land. Such a movement, as a matter of fact, tends towards the creation of a peasantry in Canada, a peasantry which will eke out a precarious living from the land when there is nothing to be done in the city. That peasantry will form a labour reserve to be called upon at a time when working conditions in the cities improve. Such a condition will be dangerous to the people affected and dangerous to workers in the cities. Certainly Canadian people should look carefully into the movement before they give it the mark of approval. While we are dealing with unemployment-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: The Trades and Labour
Congress of Canada approves of the idea of settling people on Canadian lands.


Angus MacInnis: That may be quite so,
but it does not necessarily follow that everything of which the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada approves must be right. I take the liberty of differing from the congress any time I feel like doing so.
We should deal with the unemployment problem from two points of view. First of all, if it is a temporary problem and if it is only a matter of time until the workers will be back into industry, I would say that possibly the provisions the government are making would meet the situation. If a man
Relief Act, 1938-Mr. Maclnnis

knows he will be out of work only a few months or a year, but that at some certain time he will return to industry, then I believe the providing of assistance might meet the circumstances. But the abnormal situation has existed for so long that no one can say when, if ever, workers will return to industry. Not only oan wre say that, but everybody who has given intelligent consideration to the matter must realize that industry can never again absorb more than fifty per cent of workers mow unemployed. With that fact we must remember that throughout the world there are 30,000,000 people in that unfortunate position.
In this connection I should like to quote the words of Ramsay MacDonald, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, as delivered recently in the House of Commons upon the occasion of the opening of the session. He said:
Moreover, in the study of who the unemployed are, and what are the prospects of the unemployed in this country, even if normal trade were restored, we are faced with this tact and nobody can deny it.
We are faced with the fact that a large number could be reabsorbed into industry. If the coal trade improved, through hydrogenation or any other expedient, more miners would be employed. If iron and steel revived more iron and steel workers would be employed, but we are going to have in the future a larger production by the use of scientific methods than we have ever had before, and a very substantially lessened body of working men and women engaged in production.
What is to be done about the remainder? There is the problem, and this government is the first government to face the actual problem that when trade has become brisk, as anybody can naturally expect trade now to become for this country, we shall still have a residuum. We shall still have a population which, were they not human beings

Note this-
We shall still have a population which, were they not human beings, one would describe- merely for the sake of making quite clear what their position was-as scrap.
Hon. members will note that so far as the Prime Minister of Great Britain is concerned -and I shall quote other members of the British cabinet who hold a similar view-a great portion of the unemployed may be considered as mere scrap. The article continues:
Are we going to allow, is this nation going to allow, great bodies of men and women, perhaps even amounting to a couple of million, to be to all intents and purposes in our society superfluous scrap? The government, so far as they are concerned, say No! Therefore the problem of unemployment is not one of temporary relief.
Sir, we have come rto the stage where the problem of unemployment is not one of

temporary relief. There you have the view of the leader of the British House of Commons, the leader of the national government. May I quote again briefly from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Neville Chamberlain? He said:
They must recognize that, while schemes they put forward might perhaps provide employment for a few thousands here and there, they could not expect that in the immediate future anything which they dad would cut unemployment by. say, half. To deal with unemployment on a large scale, they have got to deal with the causes which brought it about and which were not confined to any one country but operated all over the world.
I do not wish to quote any more, but here are two genetlemen whose opinion I believe the Minister of Labour and' other members on both sides of the house wiil'1 consider to be of some value. Let .me say again that our problem of unemployment is, like the problem of unemployment in the old country, like the problem of unemployment in every country of the world, not a temporary but a permanent problem.
The minister takes great credit for the reduction of relief costs from $46,000,000, I 'believe, in 1931, to something like $25,000,000 in the current year, although he said the number on relief has greatly increased in the past year. I quite agree with him that the number on relief 'has greatly increased. In May of last year the number who were receiving direct relief from the Dominion government was only 718,000. Every month from May until January the number has continued to increase-


Wesley Ashton Gordon: That is not- correct.


Angus MacInnis: Every month except one. For September there was a reduction from August. I have the figures 'here, if the bon. gentleman would like me to read them. I got them from the Department of Labour.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: No, I have them here.


Angus MacInnis: I think the hon. gentleman will find I am correct. In so far as these savings that he speaks of have been effected by a lessening of political graft in the handling of unemployment, relief, it is all to the good, even if the unemployed do not benefit. But all the saving that has been made, with that exception, has been made at the expense of the unemployed, made at the co^t of ever lessening relief.


Wesley Ashton Gordon: That is not correct.


Angus MacInnis: It means a lowTer standard of living, more misery, slow starvation in the midst of plenty. And' may I say in regard to this matter of cost that we are merely counting

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Maclnnis
the cost in teems of money? Unemployed workers do not eat money, neither are they clothed in money. They eat food, the product of human labour, and if they are clothed at all they are ellothed with the products of human labour. And this has only been brought into being by those who are working now, or perhaps by some of 'those who are now unemployed. The money phase is only a bookkeeping procedure for the owning class in this country in order that they may know what disposal was made of their share of production.
As to the question of clothing for the unemployed, I understand that single unemployed men working in the camps-or in the camps, whether working or not-are being provided with clothing. But there are a great many on direct relief in the cities who are receiving no clothing at all. or for whom there is no provision in the relief schedules for clothing.	[DOT]


Mr. NICHOLSON:: What cities?


Angus MacInnis: In the city of Vancouver the number of families on relief on February 15 was 7,130. an increase of 306 in the preceding two weeks. For these 7,130 families there is no provision for clothing in the direct relief. I have here an item from the report of the Vancouver Welfare Federation, consisting of a number of societies formed for the purpose of looking after the needy. Mr. Willard Kitchen, one of the directors, reporting to their annual meeting on the question of clothing, said as follows:
Regarding the problem of clothing for the needy which the federation attempted to meet, with indifferent success by inclusion of a special fund for this purpose in the 1933 campaign, Mr. Kitchen stated that the directors had reached the conclusion that private charity cannot indefinitely meet this need and that the problem must sooner or later be faced by the governments of the city and province in conjunction with the dominion government.
I think that is proof enough that the clothing problem is not being cared for now in direct relief.
I have here another statement, an editorial from the Vancouver Province, when the usual appeal was made for discarded clothing. At that time-this was last November-the number of families on relief was some 6,000. The Province said:
They are drawing allowances for food, but nothing whatever for clothing, and as they are without work and without incomes they have no means of purchasing.
Then it goes on to say:
The lack of clothing falls with particular severity on the children. Without adequate clothing the little folk cannot go to school in the winter weather, and missing school ait this 53719-169
time means even more than missing a drilling in the three "R's." It means missing five or six hours a day in a warm and cheerful atmosphere. It means missing interesting contacts. It means extra hours in a home want-ridden and often gloomy.
And these were the homes that our friends opposite were afraid the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation might take away from people should they ever get into power!
The great need is for clothing for the children. But something must be done for the grown-ups too. There is an old saying to the effect that the coat makes the man. It is equally true that the lack of the coat unmakes him. And every woman, even if she has had no such unhappy experiences herself, can imagine the black despair which poverty can breed in the breast of an unfortunate sister.
I presume she can also realize the great pleasure it gives her to go out wearing some other woman's hat.
The minister in his speech made some reference to the destruction of individualism, and said that the individual himself would have to do something in order to meet the situation he was confronted with through this world wide depression. It is rather strange that the minister should take that position. The Prime Minister, and I believe most others on the government side of the house, tell us that the economic condition is a world wide one and that nothing can be done except by international action, yet the Minister of Labour says i't is up to the individual to do something. If the nation cannot do anything, surely it ought to be conceded that the individual cannot do anything that will be of any appreciable effect. The governments of the world, this country included, ought to realize .that the world is facing a situation such as it has never faced before. Economic changes we have had before; economic systems have given way and others have taken their place, but now we have a breakdown of an economic and social system with the world on an industrial basis, something we never had before. All other changes came about when world economy was much more simple, that is, when world economy was on an agricultural basis. In that case the individual was in close contact with his means of life, but now we are living in a state where, with our huge industrialized cities, we have millions of workers divorced from every contact with their means of life and if they are to live and work for their living that work must- be organized for them by some force outside of themselves. It is quite useless to tell the individual at the present time that he must do something for himself. As a matter of fact we must cooperate whether we like it or not, and let us not forget that

Relief Act, R)S3-Mr. Maclnnis

every step that has been made in human progress has been accomplished through cooperation. Now cooperation is necessary on a scale greater than was ever known or even thought of before, or back to the jungle we go. That does not mean at all that individualism will disappear, but under these conditions the individual can give the greatest expression to that individualism only through cooperation.
I do not think it is necessary to say anything to impress upon this house the seriousness of the unemployment situation and the great increase in the number of unemployed that is taking place. When the census was taken in June, 1931, it showed that Canada's wage and salaried workers numbered 2,564,879, of whom 8T39 per cent were working. Those not at work numbered 471,668, or 18-6 per cent. In that month the index of employment stood at 103-6, while last December it stood at 83-2, a decline of 19-7. Thus the number of people employed in December would be 2,093,211, which, less 19-7 per cent, would be 1,680,849. With the population increasing at the rate of 1-8 peT cent per year the number of employable salaried and wage earners in December would be 2,634,130. When the number employed in December is subtracted from this figure it will be seen that 957,281 were not at work, so we can see the enormous increase in unemployment, and there is no indication that in the near future there will be any let up. If we are going to deal with this question effectively we shall have to deal with it in a more comprehensive and fundamental way than we are doing at the present time. As as matter of fact now we are only adding to the depression instead of relieving it. Speaking on Friday evening last and referring to the lack of policy on the part of the government in respect to unemployment, the leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) said:
With respect to the first, the present government's policy is that of the dole, and, with respect to the second, they have no policy at all. Such policies as they have with respect to trade and the like, their fiscal policies are all of a nature to strangle trade instead of encouraging it, and more than anything else are responsible for unemployment in Canada reaching the proportions it has to-day.
It is rather strange how the Liberal party changes places with the Conservative party every once in a while. When the Prime Minister introduced his unemployment relief bill in 1930 he made the following statement:
Many of us who sit on this side of the chamber believe that the policies of a government in a new country with practically un-
'Mr. Maclnnis.]
touched resources is responsible for unemployment. Those who sit to your left, Mr. Chairman, are of the other view and believe that world wide conditions have brought about this result.
Now we have the leader of the opposition taking the position that the policies of the government are causing unemployment, while on the other hand the government takes the stand that their policies have nothing to do with it, that it arises out of world conditions over -which they have no control. However, whether world conditions are responsible or whether the policies of the government are to blame I believe we must have some policy in this country to deal with the unemployment situation regardless of what the rest of the world may do, either that or possibly go down to ruin with the rest of the world.
The leader of the opposition offers two proposals, one of a temporary nature and the other somewhat more permanent. The first is a national unemployment commission. I do not see that such a commision could accomplish a great deal. Possibly it could deal more effectively with what the government is doing at the present time, but certainly it could not initiate policies unless the government favoured that action being taken. The other proposition brought forward by the right hon. gentleman is unemployment insurance. While we in this corner of the house, particularly the labour members, always have been in favour of unemployment insurance, we never suggested it as a permanent cure for unemployment. It is a more scientific and better way to deal with the unemployment situation than anything we have at the present time, but where unemployment insurance is in effect the unemployment problem also exists and is just as crushing as it is here.
May I say in addition that while we would welcome unemployment insurance we quite realize that it is not the solution of the unemployment problem. Unemployment insurance, to have any particular effect, should have been put into operation some years ago. The time to take out an insurance policy on your life is not when you are on your death bed; the time to look after an insurance policy on your building is not when it is on fire, but that is what we are doing at present. There is practically no possibility of arriving at a satisfactory basis at the present time because with the increasing hazard a stable premium would be exceedingly hard to find. How can you make it contributory insurance when you have possibly 900,000 unemployed at the present time who cannot contribute and who have no employers to contribute for

Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Casgrain
them? If these men are to participate, a fund will have to be created by the government. For these reasons we feel that while we shall welcome unemployment insurance and while we hope the government will bring down the bill very quickly, it is not a solution to the problem. We feel that something more fundamental will have to be found.
The minister closed his speech with an expression of confidence in the future. I notice that last year, some time in May, he concluded on the very same note. He said, on February 24 of this year:
I have myself a confident belief that with the gradual turn towards other vocations than those which have afforded a certain sense of security to our people in the past, and better business conditions, it will not be too long delayed when the granting of direct relief to our citizens will disappear.
If the Minister of Labour has nothing to offer but a mere expression of confidence that something is going to happen at some time in the near future which will improve business conditions, then it is hardly worth mentioning. His prophecy in that direction last year was not fruitful of much result. All you have to do is to look at the trend of industry. The monthly index of Canadian business conditions, as worked out by McConnell & Ferguson Limited, shows the percentage of business at the lowest point it has reached since the beginning of this depression, and a falling off from a year ago which is very marked. Let us take the four basic factors, all of which have lost ground. In December, 1931, car loadings of revenue freight were 72-5 of normal; on the 1st of December, 1932, it was only 64-9. Construction contract awards, in December, 1931, showed the figure at 85-6, and in 1932 it was 65-1. As regards bank debits, on December 1, 1931, it was 88-6, and on December 1, 1932, 79-5. In electrical energy output, on December 1, 1931, the figure was 82-6, and on December 1, 1932, it was 76. Now, the unemployment figure given us shows the same thing-an ever-decreasing business and an ever-increasing unemployment, and I hope that before this session is over the government will bring forward something that will be of greater benefit to the unemployed than anything they have so far given us.


Mr. P. F. CASGRAIN (Charlevoix-Sague-nay):: We are asked by this resolution to endorse the principle that it is expedient to introduce a measure to continue in force the provisions of the Relief Act of 1932 until March 31, 1934. If I understand correctly, the purpose of the resolution is to revive and put into force for another year the same bill 53719-169^
brought down last year over which there was so much contention regarding the large powers given the government to solve the unemployment problem. The complaint made at that time by members on this side and by other members as well was that powers which were by far too wide were given the government in dealing with this matter. It was then contended that it was a usurpation of the powers of this house in view of the fact that the government had the right to do almost anything, that they had a blank cheque given them, which would surely result in trouble. We have had this afternoon an admission from the minister that these very results have ensued.
The contention was also made last year that the parliament of Canada, which under that measure was giving large sums of money towards the relief of unemployment, was being deprived of the control of that money by the persons who were to spend it. We argued then on this side of the house, and rightly so, and our leader (Mr. Mackenzie King) in his brilliant speech a few days ago in this house once more referred to the same thing which he advocated last year and the year before, that in order to solve this problem properly it would have been far better at the very outset of the present situation to organize a national commission which would be dominionwide, to deal with unemployment, having pretty much the powers given to the imperial purchasing commission during the war, and to other such bodies which were working under the direction of the federal government. That was the opinion of my right hon. leader, and it was shared by all those on this side of the house and by a considerable number of the people throughout the countiy. Had such a commission been appointed, the things that have occurred in the province of Quebec and in various other parts of the dominion would not have taken place-such things as were referred to in the house this afternoon by the hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot). I do not say that I would subscribe to everything that the hon. gentleman said but I do say that in what was put before the house this afternoon, when the situation was so clearly explained by that hon. member, we have in a nutshell the situation as it has existed not only in certain parts of the province of Quebec but elsewhere as well, under this very measure which we are now asked to enact again.
I 5vas surprised to hear the Minister of Labour (Mr. Gordon) say this afternoon that if there were reasons for complaint such as were indicated, and if the back to the land movement had not brought the results anti-
Relief Act, 1933-Mr. Casgrain

cipated, it was not the fault of the government but the fault of those administering the legislation in the various provinces, in this instance the province of Quebec. The minister expressed great satisfaction with the organization in the province of Quebec, but he washed his hands so far as objections were concerned with regard to the working of the relief measure, and he did so on this ground. He said, "We have no control of the matter. We have nothing to say as to where people are to be located, in what districts they are to be settled, because it is all done through the organization." Well, that brings me to the point which we emphasized last year and which my right hon. leader touched upon the other day, when he said that it would have been far better if a commission had been appointed to deal with the whole matter, so that this parliament of Canada, which is supreme and which is playing the leading part in the settlement of this problem, would have been in a position to control expenditures not only in the province of Quebec but throughout the country, and we should not have had the spectacle of the minister standing up today and telling us-quite honestly, I say to his credit-that the government were not responsible for what had taken place because they had no control over these things. I submit that this is one good reason for complaining about this legislation, because it deprives parliament, the representatives of the Canadian people, of any say in the matter, although we have to vote the money. It deprives parliament of any voice in regard to the distribution of the money. I do not think we can stress that point too strongly, because it is a complete vindication of the position we took on this side of the house last year, the position stated by my right hon. leader then and in the previous year, and which he referred to once more in his speech on Monday last.
Last year when similar legislation was before the house we stated that there might be certain cases where the provincial government, without intending to evade the law or without intending to do anything wrong, might find itself in a position similar to that outlined to the house this afternoon by the hon. member for Temisoouata. I do mot intend to traverse all the ground covered by the hon. member, but in view of what has been stated this afternoon I think the hon. minister owes it to himself, to this country, to his government and to his leader to see that in future we do not have such things as have been outlined to this house. In 1630 the govern-

ment said that it would settle the question of unemployment, but it has not done so. As has been suggested from this side of the house, the government should take this matter in hand and deal with it in such a way as finally to settle the question.
After all, the question of unemployment rests with this parliament. I remember hearing the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett), when sitting on this side of the house, state that this was a national question, that it was too big for the provinces and the municipalities. He said that the federal government ought to step in and take charge of the matter, and that if he were called upon to prescribe, he would settle the question. I submit that now is the time for the right hon. gentleman and his Minister of Labour to redeem the pledges made in 1930. When that is done we will not have to listen to such complaints as have been made this afternoon by hon. members on this side.
If I wanted to make a long speech and weary the house for many hours I could read into Hansard many reports made by officers of various departments of the government. These reports were prepared as returns to questions I put both this and last session. Instances are cited in my own county where relief work which should have gone to those in need was given to those who had plenty. Such facts back up the argument we have been advancing for the last three years to the effect that a national commission should be appointed to deal with these matters. Just the other day the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Stewart), when told of an instance of this character, stated that .an investigation would be made to ascertain the facts. It will be found that m many cases this relief money has not reached the people who were most in need of maintenance.
Up to the present time this legislation has not met the requirements of this situation. I am not opposed to the principle of the legislation, because I think a situation has developed where the government of the day must take the matter strongly in hand and deal with it in a proper way. We hear prominent people friendly to the administration saying that a national government is needed. When such a course is advocated it shows that there is dissatisfaction with the administration. This government has failed utterly to discharge its duties and implement the promises made in 1930. As has been said before, and as may be said now, we do not share the view that a national government is needed. We believe that what is needed is a change of

Penitentiary Act
government, because the present government instead of taking the country out of its distress is quickly piling it upon the rocks.
After three years in power all that the government has done, to quote the words of the Postmaster General (Mr. Sauve) this afternoon, is to do the best it could. Its best has not been very much, because the situation has not been improved. It is worse than it ever was; it is surely worse than it was in 1930 when the government came into power. The situation will not right itself even with the assistance of this measure. Unless the government is willing to put its ear to the ground to hear what is going on, it cannot meet the wishes of the people. This legislation is simply a last resort because the government has nothing else to offer. The only thing the government seems able to do is to renew legislation which has utterly failed to meet the needs of the country and to implement the promises made in 1930.
Would Your Honour call it eleven o'clock?


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Friday, March 3, 1933