1935-06-13

[Stage Direction]
Mr. F. W. TURNBULL (Regina) presented the fourth report of the select standing committee on industrial and international relations, as follows:
Your committe has considered the following resolution as amended which has been referred to it and which is in the following terms:
"Resolved, whereas great numbers of Canadian seamen on the Pacific coast of British Columbia are out of employment and in many cases destitute; and whereas owners of ships and vessels of Canadian registry on the Pacific coast of British Columbia give employment in large measure to seamen, cooks and engineers of Oriental origin; and whereas other countries give greater consideration to the employment of their own nationals on ships and vessels belonging to their own country; and whereas the Canadian government grant large sums of money to the owners of ships and vessels by way of subsidies; and whereas it is desirable that every encouragement be given for the employment of officers, seamen, cooks and

Pacific Coast Shipping
engineers of white Canadian citizenship in preference to those of Oriental origin on all Canadian owned and registered ships and vessels; therefore be it resolved that the question of employment of greater numbers of white Canadian citizens on all ships and vessels of Canadian ownership and registry, the owners of which receive grants of money from the public treasury of Canada, be referred to the standing committee on industrial and international relations."
No evidence was submitted to the committee to indicate the numbers of Canadian seamen on the Pacific coast of British Columbia who were out of employment or destitute nor with respect to the consideration given by other countries to the employment of their own nationals on ships and vessels belonging to their own country.
According to the evidence submitted to the committee, money is paid from the public treasury of Canada to owners of ships of Canadian ownership and registry in two ways -one by direct subsidy or grant and, second, for carriage of mails. Your committee is of opinion that the latter form of payment is pursuant to a contract for service and is not a grant and is therefore not within the terms of the reference.
Again, according to the evidence, there are ships engaged in coastwise trade and others plying between Canadian and Oriental ports, some carrying freight and some carrying passengers as well. Some of these ships carry mail for the Post Office Department as a condition of receiving a subsidy from the Department of Trade and Commerce and some receive a subsidy from the latter department and are paid an additional amount for their services to the post office.
With respect to subsidized trans-Pacific trade it appears from the evidence that there is no contract between any department of the government and the steamship lines engaged in such trade requiring the employment of any proportion of white Canadian citizens. It was represented by witnesses from the departments of government concerned that with respect to freight traffic, Canadian lumber is being carried into a highly competitive market in competition with subsidized American ships carrying American lumber, and that any change that might result in increased cost might endanger that portion of Canadian export trade; and that with respect to the passenger trade there is the additional difficulty in employment of white Canadian citizens where a substantial portion of the passengers are oriental.
The evidence submitted establishes that the ships engaged in the coastwise trade, the owners of which receive subsidies, are required by contract to employ British subjects to the extent of two-thirds of their full personnel but these British subjects are not required by the contract to be white Canadian citizens. This term of the contract is being fully carried out in all cases and as a matter of fact it appears that more than the required two-thirds are white as well as British. The evidence established to the committee that no change in the contracts with respect to employees has been made in recent years.
Your committee are of the opinion that while in view of economic conditions and the keen competition existing for international trade the carriage of freight and pasengers should
not be unduly hampered and while it appears from the evidence that owners of ships referred to are making reasonable efforts to comply not only with their contracts but with the spirit of the resolution referred to the committee, nevertheless the departments of government concerned should be urged to continue to keep close check on the operations of such ships so as to secure the employment of as many white Canadian citizens as is reasonably possible.
A copy of the minutes of proceedings and evidence is tabled herewith.

Mir. F. W. TURNBULL (Regina):: Mr. Speaker, I desire to move that the third report of the standing committee on industrial iand international relations 'be concurred in. That is the report in regard to pensions for the blind.


Mr. BENNETT:: Mr. Speaker, I ask that that motion stand.
Motion stands.



B.C. RELIEF CAMP STRIKERS BEQUEST FOR LEAVE TO MOVE ADJOURNMENT TO DISCUSS MATTER OF URGENT PUBLIC IMPORTANCE

Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave to move the adjournment of the house for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, the situation with regard to the relief camp strikers now marching 'towards Ottawa and, according to reports, to be stopped by orders from Ottawa.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Is there any discussion
of the motion?
Hon, HUGH GUTHRIE (Minister of Justice) : Mr. Speaker, I do not-


James Shaver Woodsworth: Mr. Speaker, I
think I have a right to discuss this motion unless there is an objection raised.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member may state the question but he cannot discuss the motion itself until after I have given my ruling whether it is in order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Quite right, Mr. Speaker, but I do not see h-ow the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) can discuss the motion.


Mr. GUTHRIE:: I am raising the point of order that the subject matteT of the motion is not such as should under the rules be brought into this house on a motion to adjourn. This is a continuing grievance, if I
B.C. Relief Camp Strikers

may use the expression. It has been going on in British Columbia, where it originated, since the beginning of April, and the difficulty is now moving eastward to a point in Saskatchewan at the city of Regina. If we are to discuss this question at each of the points where these marchers may determine to halt I think we would interfere seriously with the business of this house. It has been decided on a similar motion, when these men were in Vancouver, that it was not a question which could foe discussed on a motion to adjourn the house, and I submit that the arguments then used still prevail and that the matter should not now be discussed.


Hon. IAN MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: Mr. Speaker, on the point of order raised by the Minister of Justice (Mr. Guthrie) I would rather be inclined to agree with him if this were a general discussion. I did not hear the exact terms of my hon. friend's motion, but if the press dispatches are correct there have been recent developments, and on1 the orders of the day I intended to ask a question in regard to the specific matter which is of recent occurrence, affecting the employment of the Canadian Mounted Police and the question of jurisdiction as between the dominion and the province of Saskatchewan.


Hugh Guthrie: I expected that question and I was prepared to reply to it on the orders of the day.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: In that respect I think the motion would be in order, but I think generally speaking if there were no recent occurrence, it would not.


James Shaver Woodsworth: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker, of course every event is connected in some way with all previous events; there is nothing new under the sun, but I do submit that there are aspects of this situation which are quite new. When the matter was discussed some weeks ago the men were in Vancouver; to-day they are on march to Ottawa. It is a different situation, entirely different, even although many of the men may be the same individuals.
In order that a matter may be discussed on a motion to adjourn the house there are two requirements that must be met under the rules. First, the matter must be recent, and secondly it must foe urgent. I think that both those conditions are clearly fulfilled in my motion. First of all, the situation which has arisen within the last twenty-four hours is a very serious one, so serious that we have a protest from the premier of the
[Mr. Guthrie. |
province of Saskatchewan asking that the Prime Minister of this country, to use the premier's own words, "should keep his hands off the policing of the province." Surely a charge of that kind from the premier of a province against the Prime Minister is a matter that should receive the attention of this house now assembled. The premier goes that far and deliberately protests against the interference of this government, especially after the statement of our own Prime Minister that he would not interfere unless requested to do so by the province. I think that is a very anomalous situation.


Hugh Guthrie: Mr. Speaker, this is not a point of order. This is an argument of the case.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am discussing the point of order, Mr. Speaker. I say that whether or not this motion should come before this house depends aocording to our rule on whether the matter is of recent occurrence and is urgent in character, and the Minister of Justice suggested that this was a matter that had been taken up before, a continuing matter. I am suggesting that it is altogether a new situation that faces us.
In the next place, according to the papers-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Order. I do not think the hon. member should go into the facts other than what is necessary to state the question.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am trying to state why-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member cannot argue the motion. He must stick to the point of order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I am not arguing the motion, Mr. Speaker, I am stating the urgency. As a matter of fact these marchers are under guard. I would like to know under what authority these men are under arrest.


Hugh Guthrie: You can ask that on the orders of the day.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for , Winnipeg North Centre will agree that the statement he has just made is not on the point of order at all.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Surely Mr.Speaker-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: It is not in order for the hon. member to discuss the motion. The hon. member surely appreciates that fact. I am willing to give him every latitude in stating his case but he cannot argue the motion at this stage, or until he gets leave of the house to do so.

B.C. Relief Camp Strikers


Mr. WOODS WORTH:: I am arguing that this is of recent occurrence, that the liberty of the subject is violated, that these men are forcibly detained and under guard, so we are told by the press. Now that is a new matter, and we ought to have the fullest information in regard to it in order to present our case. If that is the policy that is going to be pursued there is bound to be a clash probably resulting in -bloodshed, and I submit that therefore the matter is urgent.


Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Quebec East):: Mr. Speaker, whatever our views may be as to the merits of the question and -the means that should be adopted to solve it, I think that the motion has the two elements which the rules^ require to permit it to be discussed at this time. First, it is of sufficient importance and, second, it is recent. The other day I voted reluctantly against the ruling of Your Honour but the question to-day is still more urgent and more important than that brought up the other day, especially in view of the apparent conflict which exists between this government and the provincial government of Saskatchewan and which should be settled immediately. I do not think that this House of Commons should be prevented from discussing this matter.
Mr. ANGUS MadINNIS (South Vancouver):	Mr. Speaker, there are three conditions precedent to a motion of this kind. First, it must be recent; second, it must be urgent and, third, it must be of public importance. What makes this an urgent matter of public importance is not the trek of the unemployed relief camp workers from British Columbia but the action of this government in stopping them at a certain point. If it is not urgent, why should the government give an order to stop the march? If it is not of public importance, why should the government give an order to stop the march? This order having been given, this matter then becomes a matter for discussion in the house and I contend that the question is perfectly in order.


Mr. JEAN FRANCOIS POULIOT (Temis-couata):: Mr. Speaker, I think the point has
been made abundantly clear. We should first define the subject matter of the discussion. Unemployment has been discussed already in the house but that is not the subject matter of this motion. The subject matter is the march of the unemployed and the fact that the government to-ok advantage of the peace, order and good government legislation to change its policies with regard to the unemployment camps. At first these camps
were only for single homeless men, but now they are being used for all the men marching to Ottawa. This second point has not been discussed in the house as yet.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: In the first place I want
to thank the hon. member for Winnipeg North -Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) for being good enough to draw my attention to the fact that he proposed making this motion when the house went into session this afternoon and thus giving me an opportunity of considering the matter. I should also like to express a pious wish that the day will soon arrive when the house will so amend rule 31 as to throw the responsibility upon the house and not upon the Speaker for decisions in connection with motions of this nature. However, as the rule now stands it is my duty to decide, subject to appeal to the house, whether or not this matter is one of such urgent public importance as to oom-e under the provisions of rule 31. I may say that I consider that I have already settled this matter, as has the house itself. On May 22 last, the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Ma-clnnis) moved the following motion, to be found on page 2970 of Hansard:
Mr. Speaker, I ask leave under standing order 31 to move the adjournment of the house to discuss a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, to call the attention of the house _ and' the government to the acute situation in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, due to the presence in that city of a large number of men from the unemployment relief camps who are destitute and for whom the city authorities can make no provision, creating a situation which endangers the peace.
The motion moved by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre reads:
I beg leave to move the adjournment of the house for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, the situation with regard to the relief camp strikers now marching towards Ottawa and according to reports to be stopped by orders from Ottawa.
I would point out that substantially the same people are referred to in the motion of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre as are referred to in the motion of the hon. member for Vancouver South. The situation concerning those involved is very much the same as existed at the time the hon-. member for Vancouver South moved his motion, the Scene of action having merely moved from Vancouver to Regina. Nothing has apparently arisen since May 22, the date upon which the hon. member for Vancouver South moved his motion, concerning the matters under discussion which would in my opinion warrant me in coming to a different conclusion than I did

B.C. Relief Camp Strikers

on the previous motion. In fact there are now even stronger reasons for ruling the present motion out of order. Three weeks have elapsed since the first motion was moved and there have been opportunities when the subject matter of this motion could have been discussed without recourse to the special provision of this standing order. If I were right on the former occasion, and I think I was, I have greater reason now to rule this motion our of order, which I accordingly do.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I regret very much to have to challenge Your Honour's ruling. It seems to me that possibly your ruling was written before you heard some of the arguments advanced this afternoon.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


James Shaver Woodsworth: I shall have to
challenge your ruling.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for
Winnipeg North Centre is quite right. The major portion of the ruling which I gave was written before I heard the argument but there was nothing in the argument which had not been considered before the memorandum was drawn up. I trust the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre intended no reflection upon the Speaker when he made the remark which he did.


James Shaver Woodsworth: There was no reflection intended. I thought there were one or two points advanced which were not mentioned in the written ruling.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The hon. member for
Winnipeg North Centre has moved the adjournment of the house, under standing order 31, for the purpose of discussing a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, the situation with regard to the relief camp strikers now marching towards Ottawa and according to reports to be stopped by orders from Ottawa. I have ruled this motion out of order and from that ruling the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre appeals.


Mr. CANTLEY:: I was paired with the hon. member for Richelieu (Mr. Cardin). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. CAHAN:: I was paired with the hon. member for :St. James (Mr. Rinfret). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. ROSS:: I was paired with the hon. member for Megantic (Mr. Roberge). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. TUMMON:: I was paired with the hon. member for Hochelaga (Mr. St.-Pere). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.
Mr. MaeDONALD (South Cape Breton): I was paired with the hon. member for Colchester (Mr. Urquhart). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. JOHNSTONE :: I was paired with the hon. member for Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. ROWE:: I was paired with the hon. member for Beauce (Mr. Lacroix). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. GEARY:: I was paired with the hon. member for Laurier-Outremont (Mr. Mercier) Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. BOYES:: I was paired with the hon. member for West Elgin (Mr. Mills). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mi. MOORE (Chateauguay-Huntingdon):: I was paired with the hon. member for Chicoutimi (Mr. Dubuc). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.
, Mr. STITT (Selkirk): I was paired with the hon. member for Macdonald (Mr. Weir). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. PETTIT:: I was paired with the hon. member for Kamouraska (Mr. Bouchard). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. BAKER:: I was paired with the hon. member for Prescott (Mr. Bertrand). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. BURNS:: I was paired with the hon. member for Last Mountain (Mr. Butcher). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. MURPHY:: I was paired with the hon. member for West Edmonton (Mr. Stewart). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. GARLAND (Carleton):: I was paired with the hon. member for Russell (Mr. Goulet). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: I was paired with the hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Veniot). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. MALCOLM:: I was paired with the hon. member for East Kootenay (Mr. Stevens). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.
Questions

Mr. Mc'INTOSH: I was paired with the hon. member for Winnipeg South Centre (Mr. Kennedy). Had I voted, I would have voted against your decision.
Mr. B'OTHWELL: I was paired with the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough (Mr. Embury). Had I voted, I would have voted against the ruling.


Mr. TOTZKE:: I was paired' with the hon. member for Fraser Valley (Mr. Barber). Had I voted, I would have voted against the ruling.


Mr. FACTOR:: I was paired with the hon. member for Halton (Mr. Anderson). Had I voted, I would have voted against the ruling.


Mr. HANSON (Skeena):: I was paired
with the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Stirling). Had I voted, I would have voted against the ruling.


Mr. CASSELMAN:: I was paired with the hon. member for Sherbrooke (Mr. Howard). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the ruling.


Mr. LAURIN (Translation):: I was paired with the hon. member for St. Hyacinthe-Rou-ville (Mr. Fontaine). Had I voted, I would have voted to sustain the Speaker's ruling.


Mr. BRADETTE (Translation):: I was
paired with the hon. member for Queens-Lunenburg (Mr. Ernst). Had I voted, I would have voted against the ruling.



EXCHANGE FUND

[Stage Direction]
Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister, for the Minister of Finance) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 101, respecting the establishment of an exchange fund.
Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Explain.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I mentioned a few days
ago that it be proposed to introduce permissive legislation with respect to this matter because it might be necessary in the interests of the country to utilize the surplus that would arise from the revaluation of gold for exchange fund purposes rather than to pay it into the consolidated fund. Provision is made in this bill accordingly. That provision will come into force on proclamation.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.
	,



SENATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
Bill No. 102, for the relief of Jean Taggart Harfield.-Mr. Vallance.
Bill No. 103, for the relief of Lily Usheroff Bruker.-Mr. Vallance.
Bill No. 104, for the relief of Hilda High de Boissiere.-Mr. Bell (St. Antoine).

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

Mr. REID:: According to a treaty entered into in 1846 between the United States of America and Her Majesty on behalf of Canada for the settlement of the Oregon boundary, in clause 2 thereof, iit wias expressly agreed that the Columbia river and its branches were to be kept open for the free use and navigation of all British subjects from the 49th parallel of north latitude to the Pacific ocean,-
1.	Is the government aware that the provisions of this clause have been violated?
2. If so, what steps have been taken to protect the interests of the Canadian people so as to keep inviolate the provisions of the treaty and particularly clause 2 of the agreement?
3.	If not, will steps be taken to see that the terms of the treaty are lived up to in every particular?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The question does not
quite correctly state tihe terms of the treaty of 1846 for the settlement of the Oregon boundary. The second clause of the treaty reads as follows:
From the point at which the 49th parallel of north latitude shall be found to intersect the great northern branch of the Columbia river, the navigation of the said branch shall be free and open to the Hudson's Bay Company, and to all British subjects trading with the same, to the point where the said branch meets the main stream of the Columbia, and thence down the said main stream to the ocean, with free access into and' through the said river or rivers; it being understood, that all the usual portages along the line thus described, shall in like manner be free and open.
The government is fully aware of the development which is taking place in the lower Columbia river, in the United States of America, and of the possible relation of that development to article II of the treaty. It would not be in accordance with public policy for the government to state at this stage whether or not they are of the opinion that the treaty has been violated or may be violated by the completion of the construction plans which are under way. The question will continue to receive the attention of the government.

Questions as Orders jor Returns


MONTREAL HARBOUR COMMISSION
Mr. ROBERGE:: 1.	Are some employees and foremen of the Montreal Harbour Commission not naturalized?
2.	If so, what are their names and since when have they been employed?


Mr. DURANLEAU:: The following information has been furnished by the harbour commissioners of Montreal:
1.	Not to our knowledge.
2.	Answered by No. 1.



Mr. ROBERGE:: 1.	Is Mr. Georges Gendron an employee of the Montreal Harbour Commission?
2.	If so, in what capacity?	_
3.	Has he been instructed to dismiss experienced men and to replace them by members of the Workmen Federation of Canada?
4.	If so (a) at whose request; (b) upon whose instructions; (c) how many experienced men were dismissed, and' (d) how many others were employed?


Alfred Duranleau: The following information has been furnished by the harbour commissioners of Montreal:
1.	Yes.
2.	Mechanical superintendent.
3.	No.
4.	Answered by No. 3.
FARMERS* CREDITORS ARRANGEMENT ACT


Mr. DONNELLY:: 1.	Is one Herman Warren of Weyburn, Saskatchewan, now employed by the dominion government in connection with the Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act?
2.	If so, when did his employment commence?
3.	What are his duties?
4.	What is his rate of remuneration?
5.	For what period has he been engaged?
6.	How many similar employees have recently been employed by the government in Saskatchewan?
7.	What are their names and addresses?
8.	Is it contemplated to engage further similar employees?


Sir GEORGE PERLEY:: 1. No.
2-8. Answered by No. 1.


FEDERAL PATRONAGE
Jean-François Pouliot: Who is at present in charge of federal patronage in the county of Temiscouata, and since when?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: There is no information
available.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. POULIOT:: 1.	Since 1931, was Mr. D. G. Gerahty director of Canadian trade and publicity in Great Britain and, if so, since when?
2.	From the date of his appointment until now, by what department was his salary paid and' to whom did he have to look for general authority in all matters pertaining to his office, including those relating to expenditures?
3.	From the date of his appointment until now, was Mr. Gerahty at any time an officer of the Canadian Department of External Affairs and, if so, for what period, mentioning the day, month and year?


HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR CANADA
Mr. POULIOT:: 1.	Referring to letter from the hon. Minister of Trade and Commerce to the hon. G. Howard Ferguson, High Commissioner for Canada in England, dated April 12, 1933, and contained in sessional paper No. 335 of May 20, 1935, was the amount of $100,000 therein referred to for publicity and .advertising in the United Kingdom and Europe all spent in the fiscal year 1933-34?
2.	If so, how much was spent (a) in the United Kingdom, and (b) in other countries of Europe, mentioning the said countries?
3.	Did the High Commissioner render a detailed account of such expenditure with attached vouchers to the Department of Trade and Commerce, and, if so, on what date?
4.	Did the High Commissioner get in touch with the Department of Trade and' Commerce for the administration of the above mentioned sum, and, if so, on what date or dates?
5.	Besides the above mentioned sum of $100,000, was there any other appropriation for publicity and advertising in the United Kingdom and Europe left to the High Commissioner's office, and, if so, how much?
6.	Were the amounts of money above referred to charged to the Department of Trade and Commerce?
7.	Did the High Commissioner for Canada in London ever belong to the Department of Trade and Commerce and was he ever under the supervision of the head or deputy head of that department for the expenditure of the above mentioned amounts?


MR. ACHILLE JOLICOEUR
Mr. THAUVETTE:: 1.	Were the services of Mr. Achille Jolicoeur, barrister, of Quebec City, retained from 1930 to date (a) for investigations respecting postmasters in Portneuf county and elsewhere; (b) for customs and excise cases; (c) for census purposes or preparation of voters' lists, or in connection with the revision of such lists?
2.	If so, for what period and at what remuneration in each case?
B.C. Relief Camp Strikers



B.C. RELIEF CAMP STRIKERS STATEMENT ON BEHALF OF GOVERNMENT OF ACTION TAKEN TO HALT MOVEMENT TOWARDS OTTAWA

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Ian Alistair Mackenzie: I wish to ask the Prime Minister
a question. Has he a further statement to make with reference to the situation regarding the unemployed men proceeding eastward, according to press dispatches?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The matter will be dealt with by the Minister of Justice.


Hugh Guthrie: As I had notice of this question, I have prepared a brief statement in regard to the matter as it now stands. From information which has come to the government, the government is satisfied that the present easterly march of so-called camp strikers from British Columbia, which has now reached Regina, has been organized' and is under the direction of certain communist elements throughout Canada and is a deliberate attempt to disturb the peace, order and1 good government of Canada by unlawful means.
The marchers since leaving Vancouver have been trespassers upon railway property and railway trains, both upon the Canadian Pacific railway and Canadian National railways and are continuing their march in open disregard of the provisions of section 443 of the Railway Act. This unlawful movement of the marchers, now estimated) at about 1,500, jeopardizes both the lives of travellers and the property of both railways. Both railway companies have intimated to the government that they are unable, through lack of sufficient railway police, to clear their trains of these marchers and have requested the assistance of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to enable them to clear trains, yards and railway property of these trespassers. I have been informed that both of the railways have made representations through their officials to the government of the province of Saskatchewan in regard to the situation and' have requested the cooperation of the provincial government in regard to the matter.
In the province of Saskatchewan, the Royal 'Canadian Mounted Police act as provincial police under the provisions of an agreement made between the dominion and provincial governments, under which agreement the mounted police act under the instructions of provincial law officers in regard to the enforcement of the criminal law of

Canada, but in these agreements there is a special reservation providing that the mounted police shall have full authority to enf orce the provisions of all dominion statutes, which would include the Railway Act of Canada, under the provisions of which act these marchers are now and have been since leaving Vancouver trespassers upon railway property. Both railways are apprehensive of serious consequences to their passengers, employees and property if a stop is not put to the further movement of these strikers.
The government has, therefore, decided to take such action as may be necessary, through the Royal 'Canadian Mounted Police or otherwise, to assist the railway constabulary of both roads in stopping at Regina the further trespassing upon railway property, and instructions have gone forward to this effect.
Upon arrival at Regina the men will be expressly warned through their leaders by officials of the railways that further trespassing upon railway property will be definitely prevented, and in other respects the marchers will be required to obey the laws of the country.
The government views the action of the marchers as a distinct menace to the peace, order and good government of Canada, and it also realizes that unless discontinued) it may ultimately produce serious damage to life and property upon the railways.
The government has, therefore, determined to utilize the forces at its disposal to assist in preventing further trespasses or other breaches of the law by the marchers and to maintain law and order.


Mr. E. J. GARLAND (Bow River):: Following up the statement just made by the Minister of Justice, may I ask a further question? Is he informed that, as I am given to understand is the case, during the period of the stay of the camp strikers in Calgary, soldiers wene moved in from the Sarcee camp to that city? I would like to know whether the minister has any information on that matter, if so, for what purpose the soldiers were placed there, by whom they were requested and who placed the order for their presence.


Hugh Guthrie: I have no information
whatever in regard to anything that transpired at Calgary.


Mr. A. A. HEAPS (North Winnipeg):: I
would like to ask the Prime Minister if he will give to a small group representing these men who are now on their way to Ottawa, facilities to come to the city so that they may interview 'him and lay their case before him.

Grain Board-Mr. Ralston


Richard Bedford Bennett: Since I have been Prime Minister
there never has been a time that the government has been unwilling to receive delegations from any body in this country, and we are prepared and ready to do so at any time that may be possible and convenient as to the hour.


James Shaver Woodsworth: May I ask the Minister of Justice
whether any definite charges have been laid against the men who are now being held under guard?


Hugh Guthrie: I am not aware that any men are being held under guard. There were not any this morning as reported to me and I have heard nothing since eleven o'clock.


Mr. ANGUS MacININIS (Vancouver South):: In view of the statement just read
by the Minister of Justice, how can he contend that this is not a matter of urgent public importance?


Mr. WILFRED HANBURY (Vancouver-Burrard):: May I address a question to the
Prime Minister in connection with the statement just read by the Minister of Justice? Have any arrangements been or are any being made or contemplated through either the provincial government of Saskatchewan or the city of Regina for the maintenance of these men until more permanent provision is made for them?


Hugh Guthrie: No arrangement of the
kind has been made as yet.


Franklin White Turnbull: Will the government consider the situation in Regina with a view to assisting the city to maintain these people who are being thrust into its midst and to help in protecting the lives and property of citizens there?


Hugh Guthrie: I have not before heard
any intimation on the part of anyone from the city of Regina that relief was at the time needed for these men. Should a request of that kind come, it will be very carefully considered, but so far none has been received.


Wilfred Hanbury: May I ask the Minister
of Justice a question arising out of his latest answer? Will it be necessary for the government of Saskatchewan to make the representations or must they come from the city of Regina, or will the government consider them only if they come from the city of Regina?


Hugh Guthrie: I will wait until they
come before I decide that.



FARNHAM, QUE., POST OFFICE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. H. A. STEWART (Minister of Public Works):: Yesterday the hon. member for Charlcvoix^Saguenay (Mr. Casgrain) addressed to me a question about tenders for the public building at Farnham and asked me to make a statement which I promised to do to-day. Public tenders were not invited for reasons that have been given in the house time and time again. In pursuance of the suggestion of many members on all sides of the house that in carrying out these public works, particularly those in smaller communities, all efforts possible should be made to see that the work be given to contractors in the locality rather than that the larger contractors should be permitted to secure all these works, tenders were invited from the following firms:
Stewart 'Construction Company Limited, Sherbrooke.
George N. Thompson, Sutton.
William Clark, Sutton.
N. L. Lussier, Farnham.
Ralph W. Wallace, Knowlton.
Four tenders were received in answer to this request, and I am pleased to be able to tell my hon. friend that the result of the tenders is very satisfactory; that we have competition and that the lowest tenderer offers to do the work for substantially below the architect's estimate.



ROYAL ASSENT

Pierre Édouard Blondin: I have the honour to inform the house that I have received the following letter:
Sir:-	Ottawa, June 13, 1935.
I have the honour to inform you that the deputy of His Excellency the Governor General will proceed to the Senate chamber this day at 5 p.m. for the purpose of giving the royal assent to certain bills.
F. L. C. Pereira,
Secretary.



CANADIAN GRAIN BOARD


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Wednesday, June 12, consideration of the motion of Right Hon. R. B. Bennett (Prime Minister) for the second reading of Bill No. 98, to provide for the constitution and powers of the Canadian grain board.
Hon. J. L. RALSTON (Shelbume-Yar-mouth):: When the house rose at six o'clock yesterday I was emphasizing the point that a major duty of any grain board appointed now will be to liquidate or get out of the
Grain Board-Mr. Ralston

way the tremendous carry-over, the amount of which was disclosed for the first time by the Prime Minister yesterday. And at the same time I submit that the board will have the equally important duty to seek to maintain a stabilized price structure so as to protect the Canadian wheat growers against a runaway market. I submit that it is the failure of the government to carry out that first duty which has produced the critical situation in which we find ourselves to-day. There has been too great a tendency, as I have pointed out in this house more than once, to bet on uncertainties in the hope of winning and making a reputation. The stakes were too big and the consequences have proved to be altogether too serious. In 1930 the government took over the job of marketing the -wheat crop. They took over
75,000,000 bushels, and instead of marketing that wheat the amount on hand has increased by about three times, so that as the Prime Minister intimated yesterday the carry-over to-day is between 220,000,000 and 228,000,000 bushels. I would think that by the end of the crop year probably that amount will not be reduced by more than perhaps ten or twelve million. Instead of paying the producer and selling the wheat and taking the loss if necessary, the policy of the government and its agency has been to try to make the customer pay the shot by holding wheat at prices out of line with the prices of our com- [DOT] petitors.
The Prime Minister put on Hansard yesterday some figures with regard to the exports of this country to Great Britain. I complained then and I reiterate that complaint, that he did not compare the exports of Canada with the exports of her competitors, showing that the competitors of Canada have outstripped us in the matter of exports. Following the point I have just made I say that what we have been doing is to try to hold our wheat at prices out of line with those of our competitors, with the result that our exports and opportunities for sale have gone down and the western farmer is facing loss of markets, and hostility between his customers and himself which is going to be difficult to overcome. To illustrate that point, I hold in my hand a statement showing the spread between the prices of Canadian wheat and Argentine wheat during the last few years. On that I have put the figures given by the Prime Minister yesterday showing the exports of Canada, I find that in the year 1927-28 the average of the spread between Argentine and Canada was 12| cents a bushel; that is Canadian wheat brought a price 12J 
cents per bushel higher than Argentine. In that year we exported 332,000,000 bushels.
In 1928-20 the spread was 11J cents, and in that year we marketed 407,000,000 bushels. In 1929-30 the spread was 17| cents. What happened to exports? The logical thing happened, namely, they went down, and we were unable to sell as much because the spread was greater.


Mr. KENNEDY (Peace River):: Would the hon. gentleman tell us what he means by that spread, is it the average or is it on certain grades?


James Layton Ralston: 
Richard Bedford Bennett: Only one guarantee each year.


James Layton Ralston: Well, that makes four
guarantees, anyway, that were given. There were several orders in council passed, and we have yet to see the guarantees that were given, when the bill is considered in committee. I assume the guarantee contains some restriction as to the number of bushels which Mr. McFarland could buy. Surely the government did not give a blank guarantee to Mr. McFarland permitting him to commit this country to any number of bushels he wished to take on. If that is so, then it seems to me that those figures should have been disclosed to the house. When the hon. member for Quebec East asked for the guarantees the information was that they varied from day to day. But the guarantee must have, or at least should have contained in it a definite figure indicating the number of bushels to which this country was willing to be committed, and respecting which this country was endorsing the note of the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited. We have no information about that, at all.
Then, each year the Minister of Finance (M,r. Rhodes) comes down with his budget and makes a laconic reference to the wheat situation. One year he said that probably if the wheat was sold at the price indicated we would come out square. Another year he gave us the illuminating information that the question as to whether or not we would lose on our wheat was dependent on the price for which we would sell it,-and perhaps in that he was not far out. This year all the information the house or country has received with regard to Canada's liability in connection with wiheat is that information contained in the budget speech, when it shows the guarantee to the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers as being an unstated amount. There was no information as to the bushelage, let alone as to the amount.
We should have information as to the actual cash which has been advanced by the banks for the purpose of purchasing direct from the farmers, for the purpose of putting up margins, if necessary and, further, we should have a statement with regard to the actual bushelage on hand. Then, if my right
Grain Board-Mr. Ralston

hon. friend can give it, or if anybody can give it, we should have information as to the prospective loss which this country might sustain if a policy of orderly marketing were carried out. I say my right hon. friend was not entitled, nor was he in a good position to ask for suggestions from this house, in view of the fact that his government has been so secretive about operations. They have carried on with a high hand; they have indicated that information was not to be given. As a matter of fact, there was no by-your-leave in any way. Certainly they have had warnings enough. In the press of Canada since 1933 their attention has constantly been called to it. Then, from time to time in this house we have pointed out the position in which this house and country have been placed because of the tremendous guarantees and unlimited liability under the order in council of January, 1931, and those following. But no information has been given. I do not think my right hon. friend could blame anybody for saying to him, "You have made this mess; get out of it."
That is noit the attitude I shall take, personally. I should like to make one or two suggestions of my own, if I may. They may be of some assistance, and I should like the Prime Minister to consider, them. In the first place I say this is an emergent situation. It is not a situation which should be covered by permanent legislation at this stage. This is not a time to evolve a policy. I repeat that this is an emergent situation because of the fact that this parliament, which is over five years old, has not a mandate from the people to take over our biggest industry, and make of it a government monopoly. It has no more mandate in connection with the wheat industry than it has a mandate to take over the fishing industry, the lumbering industry, the mining industry, or the marketing of butter, cattle, or milk. There is no mandate of any kind in this parliament to formulate at this late stage a policy revolutionary in its character, so far as this dominion is concerned. These facts, it seems to me, indicate that this is an emergent situation, because we are called upon to deal with it, notwithstanding the fact that we have not received from the .people a mandate to do so.
Secondly, this is an emergent situation 'because of the fact that we have only now had disclosed the amount of carry-overs and have only now been permitted to guess or to contemplate the possible liability of Canada. Can we possibly deal with this matter by way of a permanent policy with no more information than that? Can we deal with it when that

information has been brought down only at the last minute? We have no information about the advances this year to the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited. We know nothing about the cash liability to the bank. We know only that we have about
225,000,000 bushels of wheat on hand, some in the form of futures and some in the form of cash wheat. Can we deal with this matter by way of a settled policy? I say we cannot. I repeat that this is an emergent situation, and all that can be done at the present time is to pass some legislation which may bridge the gap, and give an opportunity at some later date to deal with the matter.
I say, thirdly, that this is an emergent situation because the government of Canada is in no small measure to blame for these carry-overs, and has no right to ask parliament to pass a statute to whitewash and cover up the transactions for which it has been responsible, to establish a board to take over the loss which has been created, and then have that board damned from the start by a liability which it has undertaken and for which the government is responsible. And so., under the circumstances again making my suggestion to the Prime Minister, in view of his invitation-and these are suggestions which he may or may not consider worth while-I say to him that so far as I am concerned I would1 assent to the principle of a Canadian grain board. That is the first thing. But, secondly, I would deal with the situation which really exists, namely, I would treat it as an emergent situation, or if you wish so to describe it, as a crisis, and not as a permanent situation for which at this time we can legislate.
Thirdly, I say I would set up a board for some limited period-say until the next parliament, or for a year-in order to indicate that what we are doing is that which the Prime Minister suggested yesterday, namely, that we are perpetuating the existing organization in the form of a board, and giving statutory sanction to the operations which previously have been carried on by the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited, such board having the benefit of the discussions which we will have in the house and committee as to the policy which might be followed later.
In his speech of yesterday the Prime Minister is reported at page 3577 of Hansard as follows:
The bill, the second reading of which I have moved, is one predicated upon the fact that the general manager of this company whose operations have enabled this end to be accomplished is not further able to discharge his

Grain Board-Mr. Ralston
normal duties. I have indicated, therefore, that a wheat board in name-because we have had one in reality during the last two years -that a wheat board in name and reality should be set up.
That does not sound like a permanent policy. Mr. McFarland was not operating permanently. He was in charge of the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited for the purpose of a limited job, and only in connection with the job of disposing of the 1930 wheat was he given power to go into the market and purchase wheat to stabilize thie price. Although my right hon. friend's speech of yesterday indicated that Mr. McFarland's work is being perpetuated by this bill it is possible it is not to be adopted as a permanent policy. I will take the Prime Minister at his word. I will believe that that is what he intended-that this is being done simply because of Mr. McFarland's illness and his inability longer to attend to these duties. Along that same line I would point out what the Prime Minister said) on the resolution itself, in order to indicate that this board is more or less a continuation of what has already been done, and in order to indicate also that it is no't intended to be a permanent thing, but to follow along the lines of the work Mr. McFarland has been doing. He says, speaking in this house on June 10, 1935, as reported at page 3460 of Hansard:
It would be highly improper for me to undertake to say what any government might or might not do in the future. It is contemplated that the government will he given the power to give such assistance to this board as may be necessary to enable it to function. Beyond that I feel I could not and should not go.
I say to my right hon. friend if that was the situation, and I take him at his word, then what is to be done here is not the determination of a permanent policy, but the creation of a board for a limited length of time, an'd in that same connection comes my next suggestion. I would strike out or eliminate the compulsory feature which is contained in this bill. Mr. McFarland has no compulsory power to make people sell their wheat to him, but this act by virtue of giving control over the elevators does create a situation whereby the whole grain trade is tied up and made subservient to this board. I say to the Prime Minister that I would eliminate that compulsory feature, taking him again at his word when he intimated that all we are doing is to carry on Mr. McFarland's work.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not all.


Franklin White Turnbull: I suggest that the hon. member move an amendment.


James Layton Ralston: My right hon. friend says that he did not say that that was all the board would do. I think it is quite clear that all he said was that we are going to have a board in name as well as in fact, but there was no suggestion that it was going to be anything more, and I suggest to my right hon. friend that the compulsory feature should come out of the bill.
I would give the board-here is another suggestion-ample power to liquidate and get the present dangerous overhang out of the way just as soon as it is possible to do it in orderly fashion. I would give them equally ample power at the same time to conduct stabilizing operations when necessary to protect the producer.
In connection with the whole matter, Mr. Speaker, I would recognize what I cannot say has been recognized by the government, that the board's operations are by way of assistance in a national emergency, and that if there is a loss the country pays it; but that gambling and speculating to minimize that loss is no part of the board's duties or functions.
I would recognize what I think has also been lost sight of, and that is that we still have to have customers if the wheat industry in the west is going to thrive, and while in this emergency there may have to be some spread between the price to the farmer and the world price, yet wheat is to sell and not to hold, and we are only stirring up trouble for ourselves if we try to exact more from the customer than we are entitled to by reason of the quality of our product. But that is the policy which has been followed, and which has contributed in no small degree to the serious situation in which we find ourselves to-day.


Mr. LOUGKS:: Does the hon. member
think that 75 or 80 cents a bushel at the head of the lakes is an extravagant price to the farmers?


Mr. STEWART (Edmonton):: Who ever
said so?


James Layton Ralston: I might just as well ask my hon. friend from Rosetown (Mr. Loucks) what he thinks about legal fees. I am not dealing with the matter in dollars and cents; I am dealing with the policy of the government. What I say is that the western farmer should get the best possible price for his product, and I am pointing out that at the present time the farmer is losing his market and is unable to get a fair price, and is faced with this tremendous overhang due to the action of this government.
I would recognize further that permanent action on this great question is not for a
Grain Board-Mr. Ralston

parliament which has outrun its allotted span of life, according to the usual constitutional practice, and faces dissolution almost hourly. I submit that that question is for a new parliament fresh from the people, and which can act in the light of full information in connection with the transactions of the past and have the benefit of the information which will be gained by the board as it operates this fall and winter. It is the action of that parliament, and not of this one, which it seems to me will exemplify the proper principles of representative government in expressing the will of the electorate of to-day rather than expressing as this parliament does the will of the electors of Canada of five years ago.
Lastly, Mr. Speaker, I want to assure you and to assure this house, if any assurance is needed, that the people in the east as well as in the west realize fully how vital it is for the wellbeing and! the success of the whole of 'Canada that there shall be prosperity among the producers of western Canada. Even though this government has delayed this matter until the dying days of the session we realize fully that this problem, which we have before us is not transcended in importance by any public or economic problem whidh is before the people of Canada today.
Somebody asked me a question last night as to what my position was in connection with this bill. I have endeavoured to make miy position clear in making some suggestions which the Prime Minister has invited regarding amendment, and I say to my right hon. friend that as far as I am concerned I shall support this bill going to a committee on the understanding which was made clear by the right hon. the Prime Minister and by my right hon. leader, that that is without prejudice to or commitment in the start that I wish to make on any of the provisions of the bill, and in approving of the second reading I also want to reserve the right which the Prime Minister expressly stated of moving or supporting any amendments which I may see fit notwithstanding that the bill has had its second reading.


Mr. ROBERT GARDINER (Acadia):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to continue the discussion on the motion of the Prime Minister for the second reading of Bill No. 98, it is not my purpose this afternoon to follow very closely the argument made by the hon. member for Shelbume-Yarmouth (Mr. Ralston) who has just taken his seat.
May I say at the beginning, Mr. Speaker, that I approve the principle of this legisla-

tion. There may be some features of the bill that might be strengthened to make it more effective, but I am sure that the special committee to which this bill is likely to be sent will be capable of attending to that matter. So far as the general principle of the bill is concerned I am in hearty accord with it.
Some doubt has been raised1 in this house as to whether the farmers of the west are in favour of this legislation. I must confess, Mr. Speaker, that so far as the western farmers are concerned, there is only one real avenue through which they can express tfheir opinion, and that is through their different organizations in the prairie provinces, and so far as the organization with which I am connected is concerned, the United Farmers of Alberta, we have for the last three years at our annual convention passed resolutions favouring the establishment of a Canada wheat board. These resolutions I am quite sure have been forwarded to the Prime Minister and his colleagues. Therefore as far as Alberta is concerned, and so far as the organized farmers are concerned', they are in favour of the principle of this legislation.
My hon. friend from Shelburne-Yarmouth has suggested that this legislation should be of only a temporary character, and he bolstered that idea with the argument that we had a surplus of wheat to the amount of 210,000,000 bushels which at the present time was a very great handicap in stabilizing the price of wheat, but until such time as it was possible for us to sell that wheat and reduce that surplus he was more or less in favour of this legislation, and for that particular purpose. I want to say this, Mr. Speaker, that so far as I am concerned, and I believe I am speaking for the organization of which I have the privilege of being a member, we not only believe a grain board is essential at the present time to take care of that situation which my hon. friend so well illustrated, but I am satisfied that the farmers of western Canada to-day have come to the point where they recognize that as individuals they are helpless in selling the product of their labour against the monopolies of this country. Therefore, instead of looking upon this board as being merely a temporary organization, I believe we must realize that it will be continued into the future.
It is over thirty-three years since I went to western Canada and I have been a farmer all that time. I know something of the demands and the desires of the farmers through all those years to secure a better system of marketing their grain. The first demand of the farmers was made largely in

Grain Board-Mr. Gardiner
the beginning of this century, some time during 1900. Before I proceed further with this particular matter, I should like to direct the attention of the house to this point: When charters were given to the railway companies to build railways in Canada, more particularly in the west, they proceeded to build the roads but when it came to providing warehouse accommodation for grain the companies found that it was almost impossible for them to handle the situation. The railway companies then leased sites to elevator companies, which companies built elevators and handled the grain. Those who are familiar with conditions in the west know that this method was copied very largely from that which existed in the United States. The elevator is a cheaper way of handling grain than a warehouse such as is supplied by the railways for other commodities. It is quite true that the railway companies did not give a monopoly to any particular elevator company but whatever elevator companies were in existence at that time had a virtual monopoly of the handling of grain by virtue of the fact that they possessed the only means by which grain could be put on the cars of the railway companies for transportation.
As I said, the first demand of the farmers in western Canada for improved marketing conditions took place in 1900. A commission was appointed by the government of that day to inquire into the situation and one of the results of the findings of that commission was that the farmer was granted the right to load his own grain over the platform into the car of the railway company. It might be noted that only those farmers who were located in close proximity to the railroads could take advantage of this new provision as a man living fifteen or twenty miles away could not haul in his grain quickly enough to load a car without keeping it on the siding for too long a time.
The farmers realizing that they were subject largely to the whims and policies of the elevator companies decided to organize an elevator company of their own. Many hon. members in this house will recall the hard times which were experienced during the winter of 1905 and I believe that these were responsible for the demand of the farmers for an improvement in the handling of grain. About the year 1908 the Grain Growers Grain Company was organized composed of farmer shareholders. This was an ordinary company incorporated like other companies but it was owned by the farmers and a limitation of eight per cent was placed upon the dividends which would be paid to the shareholder. This Grain Growers Grain Company did splendid work in eliminating many of the
abuses so prevalent at that time and it handled considerable grain for the farmers. As time went on the farmers felt that even this company was not all that they required and eventually there was organized in Saskatchewan what was known as the Cooperative Elevator Company of Saskatchewan. A similar company was organized in Alberta. The Saskatchewan company was very successful. The difference between the cooperative companies and the Grain Growers Grain Company was this: In both companies the dividends were limited tO' eight per cent but in the cooperatives provision was made that after proper reserves had been accumulated dividends could be paid to those who contributed business to the companies.
A few years later the Alberta Cooperative Elevator Company was amalgamated with the Grain Growers Grain Company, forming what w>as known as the United Grain Growers Grain Company. This organization filled the need for a time but when war conditions came along a few years after conditions were changed. Hon. members will remember the grain board of 1919. This board was not organized as a permanent institution, it was meant merely to take care of a situation which had developed because of war conditions. This board was very successful and when it went out of existence the farmers of the west fellt that they had lost something which was worth while. They immediately began to demand the reinstatement of this grain board for the purpose of handling their grain. Hon. members who were in the house during the sessions of 1922 and 1923 will remember the persistent demands which came from the west asking parliament to reorganize the grain board of 1919. Legislation was passed in 1922 and again in 1923 giving to the board to be created all the powers which this parliament possessed. The establishment of this board depended upon the provinces of the west passing complementary legislation giving to the board what powers the provinces possessed in connection with grain. The outcome of this legislation was the placing of the responsibility as to whether this board would come into operation mainly upon the governments of the three prairie provinces. Many conferences were held but the provincial governments failed to come to any agreement and as a consequence the formation of the grain board was not proceeded with.
After 'the farmers of the west realized that this board would not come into existence they began to devise ways and means to handle the situation in a different way, and the outcome of their deliberations was the
Grain Board-Mr. Gardiner

formation of the wheat pools. Alberta took the lead in creation of these wheat pools, I believe in 1923, and Saskatchewan and Manitoba followed in the next year. These pools were voluntary in character although a contract was signed by which the grain grower agreed to market his grain through ithe pool system. The pools eventually came into existence and functioned very efficiently until 1929, when economic conditions the world over put them in the position where they lost a great deal of money owing to the fact that they had fixed their interim payments on grain too high for 'that year. It is mot necessary to recount the difficulties which these pools met except to say this. Inasmuch as neither of the pools had 100 per cent membership in any of the three provinces, they could not meet the financial stress of 1929 and following years. Now that is a very rough and incomplete resume of the efforts of the farmers of western Canada to secure better marketing conditions. With the financial stress that was occasioned by the depression, the farmers of the west again looked for some better method of marketing; and, as I have already stated, the organized farmers of the west, at any rate so far as Alberta and Saskatchewan are concerned, have requested by resolutions at annual conventions that the government consider the possibility of bringing into existence a new grain board.
That brings us to the present bill. There is no question in my mind that this bill, in so far as interprovincial and export business is concerned, does give monopoly rights to this proposed grain board; there is no doubt about that. In so far as provincial business is concerned, that is outside the scope of this legislation and outside the scope of the constitutional powers of this parliament; but so far as the rights of this parliament are concerned, I think that in this piece of legislation the government has given the board all the rights which this parliament has within its jurisdiction. And it is true to state. I think, that it is practically a monopoly right in so far as the four western provinces are concerned. Someone might take exception to that; but as far as I can see I have no objection whatever to it because I recognize the fact that the days of free competition are gone forever, and that out of free competition has come monopoly, so that we cannot expect those who are at the present time organized as monopolies to deal very tenderly with those who believe in free competition and practise free competition. If the farmers of the west or in any other part of Canada are going to secure anything like an adequate [Mr. Gardiner.;
price for the product of their labour, I am satisfied that they cannot do it by selling that product in the markets of the world against each other. We have to meet monopoly with monopoly, and under these circumstances I believe that this bill does meet a very much needed requirement. I am quite sure, of course, that many farmers will object to it, but I am satisfied, on the other hand, that the great bulk of the farmers to-day, at least in the three prairie provinces, believe that this is the only possible method to pursue.
It is not necessary for me to take up much more of the time of the house except to make this observation. The farmers of the west object and have objected ever since I have been a resident of western Canada, to the speculator determining very largely the price that they will receive for their commodities. I quite realize that under the present method of handling our grain the speculator is a very essential part of the proceeding, simply because of the fact that he is the person to provide the money to hedge the grain when the elevator companies secure that grain in their possession. The Prime Minister explained that situation very well yesterday afternoon. As he said, these companies have not the liquid capital to buy all the grain offered to them; and we know that if the farmers of the west were in that position where they did not know whether the company was able to buy their wheat or not, it would create a tremendous problem, bearing in mind the long distances which they have to travel. Under the present method of handling our grain it is quite true that the speculator must provide the money to permit the companies to hedge. As the Prime Minister stated yesterday, the banks will not provide the funds for these elevator companies to speculate in wheat. They hedge the buying each day, and consequently, so far as the elevator companies are concerned, they reduce the speculative element to the very minimum. Under these circumstances someone must be in the market to provide the funds which will take up these hedges. The farmer objects to the speculative element being the force in the control of the price level of his product. It is quite true that the price level is largely determined by world prices, but nevertheless the farmers of the west feel that the time has come when the speculative element should be eliminated in the process of handling the grain grown in that part of Canada. That is a very important feature so far as the farmer is concerned. I feel sure that the farmers, when they realize this important

Grain Board-Mr- Stewart (Edmonton)
point, that the speculator under this legislation will be to all intents and purposes and in fact, I believe, absolutely eliminated, will welcome the legislation. And even if they do think they would like to have the liberty of selling grain wherever they like, I think they will take more kindly to the legislation under these circumstances. But so far as the majority are concerned, I believe they will be in complete accord in supporting the measure.
It is a most remarkable fact that the primary producers, those engaged in the creation of new wealth annually, have received at the hands of governments less consideration than has been shown those whom we call secondary producers. Probably it is because the primary producers have not the wherewithal to make proper representations to the government. The fact is, however, that the past history of this country shows very cleari'y that so far as the primary producers are concerned, the same consideration has not been given them as has been given those engaged in secondary industries; and I must confess that I am far more interested in the welfare of the primary producer than I am in the welfare of the secondary producer, not only because I happen to be a primary producer myself but because the primary producer is the most important person in production in this country, because he creates new wealth each year. He creates that wealth either by growing crops or digging the wealth from the soil in various forms. Therefore the primary producer, creating new wealth each year for this country, is as much entitled to consideration from this parliament as any other class of producers.
I support this legislation and I hope that it will be finally drawn up in the best possible manner to make it effective. Before I resume my seat, let me say this again. In my judgment we must give more consideration to the primary producer, to see to it that he gets a reasonable standard of living, one comparable with that of other classes of producers in this country. There is no reason why he should not get that reasonable standard of living, and I assure the house that regardless of whatever political party may be in power, I shall be only too happy to do anything I can to achieve that result.
Hon, CHARLES STEWART (West Edmonton) : I regret very much that I was not in the house yesterday as I note from the remarks of the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) that a challenge was thrown out to me to define my position on this particular bill. I thought my position in regard to bills of this character was very well! defined. It is
most remarkable that nearly every piece of legislation that has been introduced by the government this year has been along the lines of the well known policy of the Liberal party, and the most amazing thing is the attempt on the part of the government to make it appear that this is something they have just discovered, something new they are introducing, or, in other words, a new deal. The situation has become absolutely ridiculous, so ridiculous in the country that the only question one hears wherever one travels is: When is there going to be an election so that we may remove this moribund government from office and put in someone who will do some business? That is the only question one is asked on the highways.
The other day I listened to a conversation of a couple of members on the government side. They were congratulating themselves on the colourful performance of their leader and themselves. If that is a colourful performance, I do not know what the actual performance would be called. I know what I would call it, but we are not permitted to use that kind of language in parliamentary circles.
I should like to say to the Prime Minister, who does not happen to be in his seat just now, that he and I have been acquainted for a good many years, and I have always followed the habit of saying to his face what I have to say on any occasion. I want, for the idification of the Tory party and of the Prime Minister, to define very clearly where I stand on this grain board bill. I supported a grain board in 1922; I am prepared to support one now; I would have been prepared to support one in 1930 believing it was sound at that time to appoint a board. No one knows better than does the Prime Minister himself what happened in 1929. He knows quite well a mistake was made by the selling agents of the pools when they attempted to sell their own grain on British and foreign markets; he knows that because, on his return from London, he appointed Mr. McFarland to take charge of the selling agency. He made this appointment for no other purpose than to force the withdrawal of these selling agents and Mr. McFarland at once withdrew from foreign and British markets representatives of the Canadian pools. That was the inception of our difficulties. We had no difficulty between 1920 and 1930 in disposing of our grain. Let the members of the Conservative party just consider that fact.


William John Loucks: Will the hon. member permit a question?
3602	COMMONS
Grain Board-Mr. Stewart (Edmonton)


Charles A. Stewart: The hon.
member will have a chance to speak when I get through. I propose to say what I am going to say to him so that he will be under no misapprehension and not go into the back concessions and misrepresent Liberal members of this house.
That was the beginning of the difficulty, and John I. McFarland, one individual, was appointed as a selling agency for Canadian pool wheat. Later he was put into the market by this government for the purpose of stabilizing the market. Let me say at once that I have never on any occasion raised my voice in opposition to the action of the Prime Minister in that regard. I believe it was a wise one; I said repeatedly and I say now: If you are going to give to the secondary industries of this country the protection mentioned by the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner), you must of necessity give assistance to the agricultural interests; otherwise you are going to .penalize and ruin them, and that is just about what the government has done now. It has brought the farmers to the verge of ruin, and now it has discovered, in the dying days of this session and this parliament, that a grain board is needed. I am told that the Prime Minister was applauded tremendously yesterday because he came to this decision before he is to die, that is die politically,-the Lord knows, I hope he lives a long time because he is exactly the same age as I am and I hope he and I have a good many years to live. Let me say this to my hon. friends: In the dying days of this parliament you have suddenly discovered you are in a mess-and you are in a mess and you have brought it on your own heads; the Canadian people fully realize you have brought it upon yourselves-and you aie going to appoint a grain board with power to sell the grain production of western Canada. The wheat farmer is entitled to bonus when, by the excessive tariffs you have imposed upon him and other basic producers, you make him pay through the nose for every article he buys.
The hon. member for Acadia was kind enough to say: If we are going to have monopolies, let the farmers have a monopoly. I would say to my hon. friend that I am doubtful if that is the way in which we are going to get out of our difficulties. One thing we have to do is not tighten our belts, not reduce production and drive out of business a whole army of people who have established themselves as wheat farmers. Put them out of business, John I. McFarland has said, and so has the Prime Minister. The only solution 
they can think of is to reduce production. Canada has come to a pretty pass if that is the only solution the Tory party has for the troubles of the producer. I say here; I have said it on the hustings and I will continue to say: If you had inaugurated reasonable policies, paid your bonus, sold your wheat at whatever price you could get for it and got it off the market, you would not have been in the difficult situation you are in to-day. An hon. member pointed out that the farmer ought to have eighty cents a bushel at Fort William. Of course he should; if he is going to be able to buy more farm implements and machinery, then he will require more than eighty cents a bushel, and I speak very feelingly as one who has been farming all these years. If you do not bring the prices of primary and secondary products into conformity you are going to have difficulty. But what does this government do? They are the greatest copiers in the world. They have just witnessed what has happened in the United States, and now they start in to regiment secondary industry. My good friend the ex-Miinist.er of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens) stands by excessive tariffs and then he goes up and down the country complaining .about the results of that policy, sayis we have got to regiment these people, bring them into line by law, because th'ey are doing what? Taking advantage of the policies that he has placed upon the statute books of this country. We have regiment-tation of every sort. I do not know whether a man is going to be allowed to go out and plough without a licence soon, if this keeps on. Every activity is going to foe regimented. It seems to me that there is just one person that this Tory government forget when they are introducing legislation, that is the consumer.


Mr. CASGRAIN:: The forgotten man.


Charles A. Stewart: He pays through the nose every time. It has always been so when a Tory government has been in office, ever since 1892 the same thing has happened, the same difficulties have arisen, and then a group of Tories in Montreal and Toronto will start an agitation for a union government. As soon as they have made a bad failure of carrying on their business they want a union government; I have seen that suggestion at the end of every Tory regime. Now we have the additional one that the people should tighten their belts and live more sparingly.


Mr. MULLINS:: That is not correct.

The Royal Assent


Charles A. Stewart: It is. My hon. friend will have an opportunity to state his ease when I am finished, which will be very soon. I am going to reserve some remarks until after the report of the committee on this bill. Let me reiterate that the government have brought this upon their own shoulders, it is the result of a mistaken policy that they have pursued, and pursued even ruthlessly. No man can do business in this country after this unless he has a licence, even if he is doing business legitimately. The hon. member for Muskoka-Ontario (Mr. McGibbon) interrupts; perhaps they will regiment the doctors next, and I suppose my hon. friend will support it. Perhaps it would not be a bad thing to regiment a few of them.
My position is this. I would have supported the grain board in 1031. I believe if a grain board had been appointed then we should not have 210,000,000 bushels of carryover facing us at the end of this crop year with a prospect of a crop of another 400,000,000. Reports now indicate that we shall probably have that. It is a mighty unpleasant prospect. We cannot allow the basic producers of this country to be ruined as they have been in the past, because they have no reserves left. They have got to have relief, and I reiterate that as long as those policies of the present government are in effect I am in favour of a bonus to the farmer, not only for his wheat but for his other products. He is entitled to it. Moreover I want that wheat sold and that overhang got rid of in order that as the new crop comes on the market we have an opportunity to get the markets of the world stabilized. Every wheat purchasing country in the world knows exactly how much wheat Canada has.



THE ROYAL ASSENT

[Stage Direction]
A message was delivered by Major A. R. Thompson, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, as follows:
Mr. Speaker, His Honour, the deputy of His Excellency the Governor General, desires the immediate attendance of this honourable house in the chamber of the honourable the Senate.
Accordingly, the house went up to the Senate.
And having returned.
Mr. SPEAKER informed the house that the deputy of His Excellency the Governor General had been pleased to give in His Majesty's name the royal assent to the following bills:
An act to amend and consolidate the acts relating to patents of invention.
[Stage Direction]
An .act to amend the customs tariff.
An act for the relief of Ray Leitman ATonoff.
An act for the relief of Agnes Mabel Potter Brockweffil.
Am act for the relief o,f John Henry Ley.
An act for the relief of Emma Gelfman Goldman Stokolsky.
An laidt for the relief of A'lbertine Roberte Montpellier de Beaujeu.
An act for the relief of Mary Frances Isobell Brown Gauthier.
An act for the relief of Amy May Wells Gorman.
An act for the relief of Charles Michael McGuire.
An act for the relief of Isabelle Hume Sadlier Rice.
An Act for the relief of Nora Ellen Moore McCabe.
An act for the relief of Hildur Emilia Hill Souey.
An act for the relief oif Ethel Ellis Callow Randles.
An act to create employment by public works and undertakings throughout Canada and to authorize the guarantee of certain railway equipment securities.
Am iact to amend the Meat and Canned Foods Act.
An act to amend the Interpretation Act.
An act to amend the Special War Revenue Act.
An act to amend The Excise Act, 1934.
An act for granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the public service of the financial year ending the 31st March, 1936.


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration of the motion of Right Hon. R. B. Bennett (Prime Minister) for the second reading of Bill No. 98, to provide for the constitution and powers of the Canadian grain board.
Charles A. Stewart: Mr. Speaker, when His Majesty's officer interrupted] I had almost concluded my observations concerning this matter, because as I stated earlier I shall reserve further remarks until a discussion of the bill in committee of the whole house. However in order to be 'clear I should like to make one or two further observations, and to indicate the detrimental effect upon the milling industry of Canada the policy pursued by the stabilization board under Mr. McFarland has had. Instead of giving the miller his wheat at world prices this board insisted upon receiving for the grain the price they paid for it. Bear in mind, we are not complaining about that price. We 'believe the wheat producer should foe ibonused, and particularly when by way of excessive prices and tariffs granted to secondary industries he is mulcted for so much. So long as that condition exists, nothing else can happen. It is the result of a policy vicious in all its ramifications. I said I could have some

3604	COMMONS
Grain Board-Mr. Stewart (Edmonton)
sympathy with my good friend the ex-Minister of Trade and Commerce if at once he would announce the real trouble about which he is complaining. But no, he does not do that; he simply wishes to regiment everybody.
In the milling industry the miller has been forced to pay for his wheat 7 or 8 cents a bushel above the world price, and has found himself in the unfortunate position that he could not sell his product in markets ini which formerly he did business. From year to year the condition has been aggravated. To-day we have the spectacle of milled foreign wheat being sent into Canada as flour, something which has never happened before. I suppose hon. gentlemen opposite will applaud a condition of that kind. They are the ones who always want to shut out products competing with anything produced or made in Canada, and I say they had better do something about imported flour. Hon. members will observe how as a result of this government's policy the vicious circle has widened. I am reliably informed that unless something is done for it the milling industry in Canada will be forced into bankruptcy. What should be done? As I stated previously we should bonus the farmer. Then we should sell our wheat at the world price, and get rid of it. It is useless for the Prime Minister or any other person to state that we are unable to sell our wheat. Had they been willing to buy goods in exchange, they could have sold our wheat. I say they could have sold it at all times, but they refused to take goods in exchange, have adopted the policy followed by other countries and have said "We cannot do anything because of the action of other countries." They accuse us of sitting by between the years 1920 and 1930, and doing nothing. Well, I say to hon. members opposite that they were going to blast their way into the markets of the world; they said they were going to sell our agricultural products. Retribution must follow.
If the leader, whom the hon. member for Regina (Mr. Turnbull) follows, Chose to make a speech in that city at this time, in view of the 1,500 gentlemen deposited at that place he would have no difficulty in obtaining a few men with white buttons who would form a parade. He 'had some difficulty in 1930, but he wobld have no difficulty in gathering them up now. The hon. member seemed quite perturbed because the condition he described has developed in Regina. I say to him it is the result of the policy he has been supporting for the last five years and that policy which I have no doubt he will continue to support.

Let us sell our wheat, and get ridi of it. Let us pay a bonus commensurate with the bonus the secondary industries are obtaining. If that is the way you are going to run the country, then I am for it. I must say however that I believe I have a better plan. Let us have no more of this nonsense; let us get out, sell our goods, do business and1 not talk about reducing production and tightening our belts. That sort of thing makes me see red. If that is the state to which the Canadian people have come, then God help us. If that is the condition, then I say we are impotent and1 helpless. I say in all sincerity that I would not support over night any government which would make such proposals either to its followers or to the people throughout the country.
You are a pretty badly wrecked institution now, but I have begun to have some doubts about the Prime Minister-and I wish he were in his seat so that I might direct my observations to him. I have had all sorts of sympathy for him, but after his performance of yesterday I have begun to have some doubts. We have been sitting here, taking things quietly knowing you were going to annihilation, and feeling it was only a matter of time when you would declare for an election. We have had sympathy for you in your troubles-although you brought most of them on yourselves. However after the experience of yesterday and after the challenge thrown out, do not think that we are going to sit back and eat humble pie-because we are not. We have a better way, and as soon as we have the opportunity we will put it into effect and bring back to Canada that prosperity to which she is entitled. It will not be any belt-tightening process, nor any silly suggestion of that kind.


Mr. SPENCE:: Tell us how you will do
it.


Charles A. Stewart: We will tell you in good time. Get out, and make way for those who will do things; for heaven's sake give this country a chance. You have sat there long enough and your departure is well overdue. Your political death and funeral should have been over long before this. As I said before, Mr. Speaker, what remarks I have to make further I will make when we are discussing the bill in committee of the whole house.


Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, I desire to say a few words to explain the vote I am going to give on this measure, but before doing so I have a little account to settle with the right hon. the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett), who I am sorry is not in his seat at the moment. In

Grain Board-Mr. Lapointe
the course of his vigorous and rather bitter speech yesterday he spoke almost as if we were the authors of the difficult situation in which he is placed with regard to this wheat question, and without any justification whatever that I could see he referred to my humble self and spoke of the negotiations in connection with tlhe French treaty in 1922. I quote his words from page 3566 of yesterday's Hansard. I do not know what this had to do with his speech; nevertheless he uttered these words:
Mr. Bennett: Let me ask the hon. member this: Did he at any time when he was negotiating a treaty with France say a word about wheat at all, in any shape or form, when he was giving France preferences? Did he stipulate for anything then, when he might have done so with respect to wheat?	_
Mr. Lapointe: We were selling our wheat at the time.	.
Mr. Bennett: We were not; that is exactly the point. In any case it is the duty of a statesman to look a bit into the future in respect to these matters.
Tihe right hon. gentleman took the trouble to state quite frequently in the course of his speech yesterday that he was stating facts, not fancies or theories, but facts. Well, what are the facts about this statement of the right hon. gentleman?
Article 1 of the convention of commence between Canada and France in 1923 reads as follows:
The natural and manufactured products originating in and coming from Canada ennm-erated in schedule A to this convention shall enjoy ivhen imported into France, the French colonies, possessions and protectorates having the same customs tariff as France the benefit of the minimum tariff and of the lowest rates of duties as regards present import duties and taxes and as regards any such duties or taxes which France may hereafter establish and also as regards surtaxes, coefficients or other temporary increases that France may establish.
What is that schedule A? Schedule A is a list of Canadian products enjoying the benefit of the minimum tariff of France, and item 68 of that schedule is "wheat, spelt and meslin (grain, flour)." Item 69 is oats (grain, meal)item 70 is "barley (grain, meal) and item 71 is "rye (grain, meal)."
And in the right hon. gentleman's own speech he showed that in the following year when the treaty was in force the duty imposed by France was decreased to 11 cents a bushel. That was on January 7, 1924. In my right hon. friend's own list at this present time the rate is I believe 85 cents a bushel.


Mr. MANION:: Before your government
went out of power it was 85 cents a bushel.


Ernest Lapointe: Possibly.


Robert James Manion: Not possibly but positively.


Ernest Lapointe: But that was not at all the result of my not having said anything about wheat in the negotiations for the French treaty. We got from France the best treatment possible, the lowest tariff granted to any country on wheat, which is not what the Prime Minirter said yesterday. He said that we did not even use the word wheat in the negotiations. Well, if the rest of his speech is as true as that part I pity the western farmers in connection with this question.
Coming to the bill before the house let me say first that I approve of the creation of a board for the purpose of endeavouring to clear up the present mess because a mess does exist.
Second, my vote does not mean that I approve in any way the speculative elements of the policy of the government during the last few years.
Third, that this board is for the purpose of helping and assisting the western farmer in the present emergency, and is not to be considered as a permanent scheme, especially a scheme of compulsion under which any Canadian farmer could be sent to gaol for disposing as he wishes of the product of his labour, of what he has produced by the sweat of his brow. In that regard I will refer to what has been done in Australia. Certainly Australia is a good deal more socialistic than Canada in her policies, especially during the last few years. In Australia they bonus the production of wheat. The commonwealth government gave a bonus of three pence a bushel on wheat, and they loaned a certain amount of money to the various states for the purpose also of bon using the production of wheat. What was the procedure in Australia? First they appointed a royal commission to investigate the whole situation with regard to wheat, and what that commission said with regard to a compulsory marketing scheme for wheat I read in the Parliamentary Debates of the Commonwealth of Australia of March 13, 1935, at page nine. It is found in the speech of Doctor Page, who is the leader of the country party in Australia and who was acting prime minister at the time. He gives the recommendations of the royal commission upon which the Australian legislation was based, and the third recommendation of that royal commission reads as follows:
(iii) That, in any case, a compulsory marketing scheme for Australian wheat be adopted, provided that the majority of wheat farmers of each of three wheat-exporting states express their approval of such a scheme, and that the principles upon which the compulsory marketing scheme is based shall be those recommended in paragraph 273 of subsection 6 of section Y of this report.
Grain Board-Mr. Lapointe

Even in Australia the commonwealth made it a condition of the enactment of a compulsory marketing scheme for wheat that it must first receive the approval of the majority of the wheat farmers in three of the wheatexporting states of the commonwealth.
Fourthly, in connection with this bill, there should not be any price-fixing for a particular class of Canadian production. My hon. friend from West Edmonton (Mr. Stewart) says, "You bonus the manufacturers, the secondary industries. Well, if you continue to do that you must bonus the farmer as well." But, Mr. Speaker, if you enter into that sort of thing you have to bonus all the farmers, and not only those who specialize in one particular form of agriculture. If you bonus the wheat farmers I do not see how you can explain to the satisfaction of those who produce butter or potatoes or any other farm product in my province or in other provinces why their products should not be bonused as well. And, fifth, I vote for this as a temporary emergenoy measure and not as a permanent scheme of socialistic government operations in connection with the production and distribution of wheat, especially since it is introduced in the dying days of a moribund government.


Mr. JOHN VALLANCE (South Battle-ford) :: Mr. Speaker, I have listened with a great deal of interest to the discussion which has taken place on this very important bill and with what has been said on this side of the house I am pretty much in agreement. When addressing the house this afternoon the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) said in effect that a permanent policy with regard to the marketing of wheat was absolutely necessary and that he was inclined to believe that the policy outlined in this bill was of a type which he could support. I suggest to the hon. member for Acadia that before he commits himself to that extent he observe what our greatest competitors in the world markets are doing and compare this legislation with what they have had in effect for quite a number of years. One thing this bill has proved to me is that the policy of this government as carried out through John I. McFarland for the last four years has not been right, and they admit that now. I propose to approach this subject by directing attention to what our greatest competitors have been doing to solve the same problem which prevails in their countries to a lesser extent. In my opinion the condition of the wheat grower in western Canada has never been worse than it is to-day. I do not care what government may be in power at this
"Mr. Lapointe.]
time, it would have to take some action similar to that set out in this bill. It is essential that the wheat grower be assisted by some means. When addressing the house yesterday, the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) said:
As I proceed this afternoon I shall endeavour to point out what has been done during the last four years. I shall offer this record to the house without apology or excuse and with some sense of justifiable pride for the results which have been obtained. I look back upon this record with some degree of pride as paying some part of the debt which I owe to western Canada.
At the beginning of his speech the Prime Minister stated that he had been in western Canada for thirty-seven or thirty-eight years. I am entering upon my thirty-eighth year, but unlike the Prime Minister I have spent those years in the growing of wheat. Like the Prime Minister I say that I hope the part I shall play in this matter will pay part of the debt which I owe to western Canada. The Prime Minister continued:
I intend to put upon the records of this house figures which will tell their own story, figures which will indicate just as clearly as figures can the history of the dealings in wheat during the last four or five years.
I read those figures, and there is a great mess of them, but in my opinion they do not reveal the true picture. There is not one iota of evidence in the speech of the Prime Minister as to the monetary interests which Canada has in the wheat handled by John I. McFarland. Perhaps the Prime Minister thought that it was not the proper time to reveal this, since the bill may be sent to a committee of the house where it will be possible for all interested in the matter to appear. I am hoping that either Mr. McFarland or the Prime Minister will make a statement before that committee. I think this should be done, in view of the statement made by the Prime Minister in western Canada that the policy adopted by this government had placed some $200,000,000 more in the pockets of the wheat growers than they otherwise would have obtained. An opportunity should be given to the Prime Minister to state to the committee just how that $200,000,000 was put in the farmers' pockets. I think we should go back and look at the task which the Prime Minister imposed upon himself in 1930. I do not intend to go over all the promises made, but I should like to recite at least two. Speaking in Saskatoon on June 19, 1930, he said:
There is only one way we can get the moneys of England for Canadian wheat rather than Russia and the Argentine, and how is that?

Grain Board-Mr. Vallance
By providing our wheat cheaper than the others. Is that not so? And how are we going to do it? That is what we are promising to do at any rate.
Speaking in Regina on June 11, he said:
I trust you will realize that one of the reasons we are not selling wheat to England is because others are selling there, and another reason is trade conditions with the Argentine, and 'another may be Russia. We must deal with this problem on behalf of Canada and not in terms of any other country.
I propose to show just what is our position to-day in [DOT] the only market which the Prime Minister said would be of any use to the Canadian wheat grower. I intend to give a true picture of the imports of wheat into Great Britain from Canada, from 1921, the year of the general election following the union government, down to the present time. For the information of the house I might say that these statistics are furnished by the bureau of statistics.
In the fiscal year 1921 we exported to the British market only 29 million bushels of wheat, in round figures. In 1922 we reversed those figures, our exports being 92 million bushels. In 1923 we went up to 166 million bushels and in 1924 we -had a further increase to 173 million bushels. In 1925 we dropped down to 142 million -bushels while in 1926 our exports increased to 186 million bushels; in 1927 they were 179 million -bushels and in 1928, 186 million bushels. In spite of all that has been said about the British market having been lost before the present government came into power, in 1929 we exported 229 million bushels of wheat. Through the policies inaugurated -by the late government we increased our exports of wheat to Great Britain from 29 million bushels in 1921 to 229 million bushels in 1929, an increase o-f 200 million -bushels. It must be remembered that these are not my figures; they come from the bureau of statistics. Let us see what happened from 1929 on. The elections were in July, 1930, and in that year our exports dropped to 113 million bushels. In 1931 they were up to 131 million bushels; in 1922 they were 110 million bushels; in 1933, 150 million bushels and in 1934 they had dropped to 112 million bushels. The bureau of statistics furnished me with the values of these exports, but as I propose to try to finish by six o'clock I shall not give them. For the eleven .months ended February 28, 1934, our exports amounted to 105 million bushels, and for the same period in 1935 they were 108 million bushels. It will be seen from these figures that the British market has taken the least wheat since this government came into being. Someone will ask-Where has it
gone? I propose to deal with that question. The ex-Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) has dealt to some extent with the situation in Australia, and I will discuss it more extensively, touching also the situation in the Argentine. Let us take -exports from Canada into some of the ports of -Great Britain-and I wan-t the Prime Minister -to mark this. This is taken from -the -Commercial Intelligence Journal of February 23, 1935. It is a publication put out by the Minister of Trade and Commerce and therefore I take it that the statements it contains are authentic. At any rate, I have accepted them as such:
The inevitable sequel to the British government wheat subsidy was reduced importations. In 1934 the quantity of wheat brought in- 102,-652,387 cwts.-was some 9 per cent less than in 1933. As price generally governs movements of wheat, it was to be expected that Argentina should have been a strong factor in the market. The increase ascribed to that country, however, which amounted' to about 42 per cent over the twelve months, is nevertheless remarkable. Imports from the dominion fell	to	35,715,748 cwts. from
45,570,487 cwts. in 1933.
The Argentine followed- out what the Prime Minister suggested in his speech at Regina. Because they -were selling wheat in the world market, at a price which happened at that time to be, as it still is, cheaper than the price Canada is demanding for wheat, and which is all out of line with world prices, that country was able to capture the market at that time. Let us see what we have done with regard to flour. I quote from another issue of the Commercial Intelligence Journal- I will- mot go through them all-to indicate where our business is going. I take the issue of March 2, 1935:
Bristol, February 7, 1935.

At the end of 1934 the west of England market for Canadian flour was at as low an ebb as it has ever been. Furthermore, the market had been decreasing, and had- been quiet for a longer period than the oldest importer can remember. Often in previous years months might have been expected to elapse when price differences would not permit of sales of Canadian flour, but compared with the present position such periods were definitely short.
During 1934 French flour was imported into the west of England in more than appreciable quantities, and at the end of the year this flour was being offered, but less freely, at 19s. Flour from Germany was not imported at all into the west of England during 1934. In the past some importation from Germany has been found possible, -but 1933 saw the end of this trade. The French flour being imported has had some effect on the retail flour trade of the English millers as considerable quantities of it have -been imported for the purpose of manufacturing self-raising flour. In South Wales a new trade has been started with the importation of French flour which, after processing, is packed in 1 pound' paper bags for the
*3608
Grain Board-Mr. Vallance


Hon. W. R. MOTHERWELL (Melville):: Mr. Speaker, it would not seem to be necessary to spend very much time on this bill, having regard to the fact that everyone seems to ibe desirous of sending it to a committee. So possibly the proper time to speak would be after the findings of the committee are brought before the house. Nevertheless a number of suggestions were made this afternoon that might be helpful to the committee, and I might possibly be fortunate enough to contribute some more. I am going to try to keep away from the tone of my right hon. friend the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) yesterday. Of course we feel entirely forgiving towards him because it shows he has been able to stage his come-back, as it is called. I hope he does not overdo it; we are all very
anxious about his health. As the leader of one of the great parties we want to see him in good condition when he lines up for battle.
It gives us more freedom in discussion, and besides we do not like to see any hon. gentleman of his standing and capacity only half well. I hope however not to continue the somewhat meat-axe style of discussion with which he challenged this side of the house yesterday.
I am going to run over briefly some of the government's blundering record in dealing with wheat. I am not going to be harsh, but they have developed a penchant that when they put their hands into the wheat problem they usuallv put their foot in it at the same time. That was quite manifest when the government first endeavoured to give a bonus of 5 cents per bushel. They attempted to give a much needed five cent bonus to the farmers of the west, and first proposed to distribute it through the medium of the railways, somehow absorbing it in their freight rates. The next proposition was to give it through the exporters. Some of us could not see how it would ever reach the farmer through that medium, and as it was ostensibly meant for him we made some candid criticisms of the method. Finally the government brought on Mr. Ramsay and he made a plan of distributing this five cent bonus based on the same policy as the 1919 wheat board adopted. That should have been known to the government, but apparently the then Minister of Trade and Commerce had forgotten the old method. We have been roundly blamed for opposing that bonus, and blamed no doubt in connection with the bonuses given since, simply because we criticized and showed how it could be done to better advantage and more effectively.	.
The next government move was the Sir Josiah Stamp commission dealing with wheat futures, although the preceding government had bah an investigation into wheat futures by Mr. Justice Turgeon who dealt with that same question very completely and came to much the same conclusion as did Sir Josiah Stamp and his commission. But the government could not get even that simple thing done without putting their foot in it, and they did so by inserting what was called appendix 12. I do not know how it got in-, inadvertently, it was said. I have a good guess how it got in, but I am not sure. At that time the government did not seem to be quite as friendly with the wheat pool as they are now, because this appendix 12 certainly gave the pool and their general organization a jab in the short ribs that they felt. How-
Grain Board,-Mr. Motherwell

ever after some discussion on the subject the government decided to call in all those wheat future reports about a thousand I think, and have that offending appendix removed. I think if we knew all the story about that distorted appendix it would take half an hour to tell it.
Then we had the Prime Minister going over to London in 1930 to try out his blasting methods of selling farm produce. We do not need very long to deal with that; he came home empty handed and the conference was adjourned to Ottawa at a subsequent date. It was to be within a year but it proved to be nearly two. I shall not dwell on that incident except to recite very briefly the great expectations that were aroused in the west as the Prime Minister came home. He arrived in this city; he was not banqueted if I remember rightly, because that was the occasion on which he came back empty handed, but the newspapers had him paged at every divisional point between here and Regina; a telegram went forward that the Prime Minister was one day's journey nearer the prairies, where he was going to give a message of great encouragement to the expectant farmers. Rut that was the greatest frost in which the Prime Minister ever figured; he had nothing to tell them, and he told it well.
Then we had the Ottawa conference of 1932, right in this building, and the famous six cent preference which was not meant to give us any more money for our wheat; it was to hit the other fellow. I do not think much of that way of doing business; hitting the other fellow does not do us much good. We do not hear much about that now, except that the foreigner with his depleted currency seems to have got the inside track of us. They have been hit and they thought we in Canada were responsible. The Prime Minister indicated on more than one occasion that the intention was not to make the mother country pay six cents more for our wheat but to give us a sheltered market. Is it a sheltered market now? From what? Not the Argentine, we rather are sheltering the Argentine.
Then there came the international wheat sonference; that was another dud. I think oerhaps the government meant well, but there vas some preliminary spade work that, in my estimation, required to be done before they could ever hope to have a successful international wheat conference that could reach any conclusions that would be binding. We had grossly offended Russia, a great country starting out on its own line of government, which they had a right to do no matter what we might think of it. This 
federal government took authority at the very first session, and exercised it the second session, to embargo six or seven of Russia's major export commodities. At one time that would have been a sufficient international offence to cause war, but our government did not seem to have any hesitation in engaging in that kind of dangerous heroics. This international wheat conference was the aftermath of a great international conference that met in London in 1933, and not having accomplished much, this subsidiary conference was called, with our Prime Minister as chairman, of some twenty or twenty-one countries which import or export wheat. From that kind of setting how could one expect anything worth while? Argentina is blamed for breaking away from the quota agreement arrived at there. Russia never did sign the agreement so far as the quota was concerned. I do not see how we can blame Argentina very much when we never had this agreement submitted to this parliament for its approval. It never got the formal endorsation of this parliament, so any other country could well hide behind that well known fact and make it an excuse for defaulting. However, this international wheat committee has still a continuing committee, bumming around and drawing their salaries and affording some excuse for the government hanging on to another of their marketing illusions until after the election. Mr. Andy Cairns, the great statistician, and the gentleman who is credited with advising the wheat pool wrongly regarding the withholding of the full measure of grain sales which _ might have been made in 1929 and 1930, is Canada's representative on the international continuing wheat committee. So that that is another dud exploded. It has become a habit with hon. members oipposite to make blunders in connection with the disposing of wheat and dealing with wheat problems.
We come now to the wheat debacle of 1929 and 1930. It will be recalled that in February, 1930, or therabouts, the three provincial governments guaranteed the banks against, loss on wheat pool operations. They had the misfortune of making their initial payments too large. I hope the government will take cognizance of that fact and will not indulge in that procedure when this wheat board is in operation, unless it is intended to bonus that way. The fact developed that the three western wheat pools had paid out to contract signers over $22,000,000 more than was coming to them. It was impossible to get that large amount back so they entered into a statutory agreement with the Saskatchewan government to have the loan paid back in

Grain Board-Mr. Motherwell
nineteen equal annual instalments. Up to this date I am pleased to report that all payments have been met on due dates. Apparently at that time the banks did not have much confidence in the wheat pool situation, and because of that they wanted further security and obtained it from this government.
At this point Mr. McFarland entered) into the picture. I have a lot of sympathy for him because he took on an impossible job. When the Prime Minister introduced the resolution in March of this year I do not know how he knew that Mr. McFarland was going to be sick. However if the account of his speech which I read1 in the Ottawa Journal was correct and from what I heard of it mySelf I would gather that this bill is predicated upon the assumption that Mr. McFarland is too ill further to give his sendees to the country as chairman of the selling agency. How did the Prime Minister know at the time he introduced the resolution three months ago that Mr. McFarland was going to be sick? He could not have known. Mr. McFarland has delivered at least two outstanding addresses, one in Winnipeg in April and another in Regina in May, since the resolution was brought down, and showed himself in good form.
I should be interested to learn whether or not the Prime Minister has acquired the art of foretelling and foreseeing other people's health. He does not answer. I think that was just a little fairy tale; he forgot himself. He must have forgotten his resolution forecasting this bill, and he gave the only reason he could think of at the time, namely that Mr. McFarland was in poor health and would not be in a condition to carry on further stabilization operations, hence this bill. I believe it is a compliment to the Prime Minister to observe that he cannot think up a better fairy tale than that one, and it shows that he is not an adept at telling yams. Therefore I shall con- -elude my remarks on this phase of the matter by complimenting him. He would ten times rather tell the truth than quibble even a little bit. However, he forgot himself, he forgot the resolution was on the order paper at least three months before the bill was introduced, and at a time when Mr. McFarland's health was good enough to enable him to give good public addresses.
I have said that when Mr. McFarland was asked by .means of stabilization to give to the farmers a much needed bonus on their wheat prices, he was asked to do an impossible task as sales would drop off if such bonus were passed on to our overseas customers. It was proposed by the Prime Minister that the
bonus which could be given under the stabilization policy would equal the five cent original bonus that was cancelled at the end of 1931. I believe the house will recall that the Prime Minister indicated one would almost equal the other. It would appear to me that at times the stabilization operations exceeded the five cent bonus and was appreciated accordingly.
Speaking at Moose Jaw in February last before the Saskatchewan school trustees' association Air. McFarland gave the story of his appointment, and told why he was working without salary. Part of his speech is as follows:
He was wholly in accord with my action. I was offered any reasonable salary

I presume by the pool or by the government, I do not know which.
-I cared to name, but I refused to accept the position on a salary basis-
Matk you.
-because it was a national emergency, and I was well aware that the greatly overexpanded world production of wheat was such that no man could accomplish or expect to accomplish that necessary perceptible measure of success as would warrant a salary.
He admitted he was not able to do this job of giving a bonus to the farmers on top of the normal wheat price, and at the same time sell wheat to the world in competition with comparable wheats of other countries. What did he do? He put up the price and sold it to our complaining customers across the seas at prices frequently running from eight to twelve or more cents higher than the usual premium accorded our wheat. In other words, through the stabilizing agency, by giving a bonus, and making the customers abroad pay for it, the Canadian government were making good fellows of themselves with the farmers. They did that, instead of taking that money out of the coffers of the country and paying it direct, as they did when they paid the five cent bonus of 1931. They thought they were devising a cute way of doing things; they were playing a cheap racket and paying bonuses, but making our customers on the other side of the ocean pay enhanced prices. That is the story. No wonder Mr. McFarland said he would not undertake such a task and that he could not give value for a salary. As I am not corrected in any of these details I assume I am stating the accepted facts. Mr. McFarland admitted beforehand that the task he had been given was an impossible one. The government has found it so, and that is the reason this bill is before us.
Grain Board-Mr. Motherwell

Same bon. members on this side of the house have been represented as being opposed to bonuses. I believe most people would like to get away from them, but when you have the secondary classes in a community with their feet in the trough, what are you going to do with the others? Can you keep them out? No, you cannot play favorites in a crisis such as this. I have always felt some disappointment in the secrecy and furtiveness with which the government's stabilization policy has been surrounded. If the Prime Minister feels justified in complaining about a whispering campaign, why during all these years has he withheld the information from us and left the public to guess the wheat holdings of Mr. McFarland, and other important details? Why didn't he come out and tell us the facts and then the people would not have had to do any guessing? I have for at least two years right in this parliament objected to this star chamber method of handling the greatest export commodity of the country. There is no justification for it under the sun, and either it shows a disposition to want to cover up something or they did not know enough about the business to know that other wheat-bonusing countries were revealing the facts of their sales month by month. As I recall, in the United States the late Alexander Legge made no bones about what was going on in the United States, and he very soon got from under.
May I refer to the Commercial Intelligence Journal issued under the authority of the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Hanson) and his deputy minister, Mr. Parmelee. Under date of January 12, 1935, the Commercial Intelligence Journal at page 50 carries an article by Mr. Scott, a Canadian trade commissioner, on Board of Control for Cereals in Argentina. It is an amazing thing, Mr. Speaker, that the government will hand out all this information without any hesitation not only in this issue of the Commercial Intelligence Journal 'but in another publication to which I shall refer in a moment, telling all and sundry what is being done in the Argentine and then refrain for four and a half years from telling us anything about the Canadian situation except what was told us last night as to the volume of wheat in the selling agencies' hands. Here is the statement on page 50:
Following the announcement that the same basic prices would be continued for the coming season, a separate statement has subsequently been issued reporting on the operations of the grain board between December 4, 1933, and

November 26, 1934. The statement shows that the operations of the grain board during the above-mentioned period have been carried on at a total loss of around 8,815,000 paper pesos.
A peso is about 53 cents, so that amounts to about 14,000,000:
The loss sustained by the grain board in maintaining minimum prices has, however, been fully covered by the profits made by the government in the buying and selling of foreign exchange.
The Argentine is also giving bonuses to their farmers. The Argentine people go further into the business and gamble in foreign exchange, and they put up their profits on that against their losses on wheat sales. But our government wants to make our [DOT]customers pay for the bonuses to farmers, thus driving them elsewhere for their wheat supplies. They have something to learn yet, and I think this committee could do a whole lot of good if we had the time to do it, but Mr. McFarland is in hospital and we had the Prime Minister in effect telling us last March in the resolution that Mr. McFarland was going >to be sick today, and possibly could not come down here to give evidence. I hope That the committee will assemble in a very different spirit from that in which the Prime Minister addressed the house last night, and I am glad that I have sufficient self-control not to follow suit in the meat ax fashion that he then adopted.
Referring again to the Commercial Intelligence Journal, here is a table giving the monthly purchases, sales, cancellations, and stocks for the different months of the year; for instance, purchases for the month pf December amounted in round figures to 571,000; sale$, 28,000; cancellations, 3,000; stocks, 540,000, and so on. The figures are given for every month of the year. But not a word from this government. They have been as silent as the grave. Of course, they knew they were approaching their political graves and perhaps that suggested the silence. But is that the way to do business? This government that preaches ethics in business violates every decency of ethics in connection with our wheat business, and there is no one who does it more than the ex-Minister of Trade and Commerce. We will get around to him later on perhaps.
Here is a note about these cancellations, and those of us who have conscientious scruples about the compulsory features will note this:
The figures given under the heading of cancellations represent sales made to the board which were subsequently cancelled by the seller when able to dispose of bis grain more advantageously elsewhere.

Grain Board-Mr. Motherwell
I support my hon. friend fronm South Battleford (Mr. Vallance) in the remark he made just before six o'clock when he recommended, as I recommend, that the Argentine policy of handling their wheat sales be studied carefully by the committee so far as time will permit, and this know-all government will find something to learn there. The people of the Argentine have learned how to bonus their farmers and yet sell their wheat,-something not yet learned by Canada.
Here is a very interesting document which is gotten out every month by this government, by the Department of Trade and Commerce, called the Monthly Review of the Wheat Situation. We can get all kinds of information about the Argentine. Just see what they say on page 25 of the issue for March, 1935:
The correspondent of the Dominion Bureau of Statistics in the Argentine has forwarded' the following report under date of March 4, 1935.
That is the correspondent of the Dominion Bureau of Statistics in the Argentine. I would presume they have a resident correspondent there. I do not know whether he is a special correspondent or not. At any rate he is the correspondent of this government, whether an employee I do not know, but I would expect not. He says:
One of the features of the market during the month has been the brisk demand for Barusso wheat from Bahia Blanca territory. Of the various types of Argentine wheat this is the one which most nearly approximates that of Canada. Hence it is much in demand by millers as a substitute for Canadian wheat now that that is being practically held off the market by the high prices asked for it, and buyers are quite willing to pay a premium over the prices of other Argentine types, even the Rosafe which was formerly the leader here.
There is this correspondent making this admission in this document issued by the government, and I presume it is correct, that now that Canadian wheat is largely off the market because of high prices the people of the Argentine are selling their wheat quite freely in place of ours. I think it was no wonder Mr. McFarland got sick, carrying such a load of anxiety and responsibility in the attempt to do the impossible, as previously indicated.
Another issue of the Monthly Review of the Wheat Situation published by the Minister of Trade and Commerce says on page 11 under the heading, Grain Control Board:
Just as the month of November closed, the ministry of agriculture gave publicity to the long-expected statement as to the operations of the grain control board in respect of wheat.
They were anxious to hear about it, and apparently the information had been delayed
for a few months. What if it had been delayed for four and a half years? The article continues:
Up to November 28 the official board has sold 138,756,000 bushels, having still on hand a remnant of 6,142,000 bushels.
That is all they had over.
The total expenses of the board amounted to 8,814,942 paper pesos of which 5,881,756 represents the loss on the grain sold; 2,455,000 interest money borrowed for the purpose of its operations-
And so forth. No trouble about getting information about other parts of the world, but we who supply the line of credit could not get a peep out of this government until last night, and then only a meagre statement of what we knew already, that there was approximately 200,000,000 bushels of wheat futures in the hands of Mr. McFarland. The country all along knew it. The grain men on the exchange day by day can make an estimate of how much the government or, aa it is called, the pool agency, holds, so why the secrecy? Why has the government tried to keep this a secret? They must have had some object in mind but they cannot put it over on us by saying it was for the public interest-it was for their own interest, otherwise they would never have dared the criticism of the public for doing business in the clandestine way they have been doing it for the last four years and a half. There is nothing else but to send this bill to the committee and make the best of a bad business of losing markets in these dying days of a dying government. I am in favour of referring this bill to a committee for possible improvement, and I shall reserve my further remarks to a discussion of the findings of that committee.
Farmers were faced not only with the difficulty of having their wheat down to the lowest price it had been for four hundred years but they also had to compete with a monetary system where the currency of the Argentine was away down below ours. Those of us who sold five bushels of No. 1 northern for $1 and less at the point of shipment in December, 1932, know the crucifixion we had to go through; I sometimes wish the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) and his colleagues were personally aware of that so they would know the agonies the farmers had to suffer. What the government should have done was to go off the gold standard at the time Great Britain went off and not continue to crucify us on our export sales with a low British pound which had to be converted into high Canadian dollars.
It will be remembered that about this time last year I tried for four months to get a
Grain Board-Mr. Motherwell

copy of a report made by Sir Herbert Marler, Canada's representative in Tokyo, Japan. I was jockeyed back and forth from the Prime Minister to the then Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens), from him to the Secretary of State (Mr. Cahan) and so on. I finally got a little huffy over it and the Prime Minister told me he would not give it to me anyhow as it was confidential. I did not think anything of it at the time but developments since have made me wonder whether the Minister of Trade and Commerce had been authorized to do what he did in preparing a summary of Sir Herbert Marler's report. If the Prime Minister will say that the former Minister of Trade and Commerce had no authority to give me this summary, I shall not read it.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I never heard of it.


William Richard Motherwell: If he had authority, there is no reason why he should not have given it to me. After I had got a little cross, in order to appease me Mr. Stevens came across the floor and handed me this summary. He told me it was for me alone but I told him that would not be much good to me. It was marked "private" and was not signed but frequently memoranda are not signed. I told him I would take it and look over it. This occurred on Friday night and on the following Tuesday I made an appointment to see him at his office. I told him that I thought he was giving me more information than he had anticipated and he had better take it back. He took it back and blotted out the "private." I then said, "How about signing it?" He then wrote and signed the following note:
Dear Mr. Motherwell:
I trust the attached memorandum will be useful and helpful.
H. H. Stevens.
I am trying to make it that now. I shall read only extracts as I have not the time to read it all. However, I will put it on Hansard if hon. members desire. When hon. members hear this synopsis I think they will realize what the original report was like. This reads in part:
In 1931 Mr. Marler visited Canada and interviewed the Minister of Trade and Commerce and various Canadian producers and exporters of products saleable in the far east. On his return to Tokyo, he commenced an analysis of Canadian trade with the far east in an attempt to discover the fundamental causes of the lack of progress of Canadian trade with these markets.
As a result of these studies, Mr. Marler drafted a plan to coordinate trade promotion work in the far east. This provided for the

concentration of effort on a few major products, such as wheat and flour, which it was known Canada could export successfully. Believing that the chief difficulty in the way of expanding trade in wheat and flour lay in Canada, Mr. Marler recommended that a commission composed of representatives of grain exporters, flour millers, dominion government departments and the governments of the western provinces should be sent to the far east to investigate the whole situation.
Nothing was done. Instead the government agreed to the views expressed by the grain exchange and the Canadian millers' association. The summary continues:
Mr. Marler again urged the desirability of sending a commission to study the wheat and flour situation in the far east; failing that, an expert flour representative and a thoroughly qualified representative of one of the government departments should be sent.
Again nothing was done. The summary continues :
The difficulty here arose that the trades concerned did not view with favour the proposal to send a commission to the far east to investigate the possibilities for the sale of Canadian wheat and flour. They also did not agree with many of the views put forward by Mr. Marler.
What is the use of Canada having a representative in Japan if every Tom, Dick and Harry can stand up and say to the government, "I do not want Mr. Marler to do this or that?" Andi again:
The last mentioned point would depend largely on the stimulation of the demand for high grade flour, so that the Minister of Trade and Commerce endeavoured to explore the possibility of finding a suitable flour expert who could be sent to the far east to undertake the task outlined. On consulting the industry, however, little support was forthcoming for this proposal, both the grain trade and, the mills _ considering that through the medium of their representatives they already have a complete knowledge of the situation in the far east.
I always knew this government was pretty close to the grain trade and the milling industry of this country, but it did not do any kindness to the mills by making them pay so much for their wheat that they were brought to the point of bankruptcy. However, the government took their advice instead of that of Sir Herbert Marler, who we all know is well qualified to discuss and advise on market conditions in China and Japan. These markets have been disappearing year after year. This government, with its recent wheathoarding policy has about come to the end of its tether. There is an accumulation of 225 million bushels of unsold stabilized wheat and the Prime Minister tried to carry the secrecy on this account a little further when he would

Grain Board-Mr. Loucks
not at first give us the sales figure for 193435. He finally did give us the estimated percentage, but I have them officially up to May 1, at 132 million bushels.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


William Richard Motherwell: Even if we shipped 40 million bushels more this grain year it will only make 162 million bushels, very much less than the year before, and that in the face of so much crop disaster last year. Mr. McFarland has had1 the bull by the tail now for nearly five years and he apparently cannot either let go or carry on; hence this belated bill.


William John Loucks: Mr. Speaker, I had not intended to take part in this debate but I finally decided to say a few words. Before I start I want to compliment the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) upon the bill now before us, and when I say that I think I voice the views of the wheat growers in my province and more particularly in my constituency. I cannot understand the argument of the former Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell), nor can I understand the arguments of other hon. members who are growing wheat in my province. Reference was made this afternoon to the wheat pool, and I think I am right when I say-the former Minister of Agriculture can correct me if I am wrong-that he was in favour of the wheat pool. I believe the hon. member for South Battleford (Mr. Vallance) was also in favour of this pool. I think they will agree with me when I say that the object in the first place was the orderly marketing of wheat. I will not go back to conditions as they existed prior to the time we organized the pools, but I can remember very well that the wheat growers sent down a deputation -in fact more than one deputation-when hon. gentlemen now in opposition were in power, about the year 1922, asking them to reinstate the wheat board. And I can infer from the fact that they did not do so that the farmers of western Canada found it necessary to organize the pools. We were very anxious to have the old board reinstated because we felt that it was to the advantage of the farmers to have this done, and when it was not done it was decided to organize the pools. Hon. gentlemen who are now criticizing this bill so severely should bear in mind that they refused to give us the wheat board, and therefore there was nothing for us to do but to organize the pools. I believe that Alberta took that step in 1923 and we followed in 1924. We went into that business for the express purpose of having the grain marketed in an orderly way;
that was the object in organizing the pools.
I challenge hon. gentlemen opposite to say that the policy of the government in the last three or four years, or under Mr. McFarland, if you will, has not been for that same purpose, namely, to provide orderly marketing. What else is it? It amazes me to hear hon. gentlemen advocating the dumping of our wheat on the markets of the world, to the extent that they have suggested to-day.
I do not wonder so much when I hear that proposal coming from the hon. gentleman who has been acting as critic for the opposition, because he is a lawyer; but I am surprised to hear farmers from western Canada advocating it. They know very well that round about 1923 or 1924 we found it absolutely necessary to take the action we did then, and I am borne out in this by what the Prime Minister said yesterday. When wheat production began to go up, increasing to hundreds of millions of bushels, what else could we have done? I have been thirty years growing wheat in the west and I can remember when our exports amounted to less than one hundred million bushels. But when they got up to three and four hundred million bushels, the farmers of western Canada deoided that the time had come for a change of policy so far as the grain exchange was concerned, because they could not save the situation. The volume had increased to such an extent that we were obliged to make our own market, and that is why we went in for orderly marketing.
The hon. member for West Edmonton (Mr. Stewart) this afternoon condemned the wheat pools; this attitude is characteristic of him. But I want to put on Hansard a few figures to show that the pools themselves did not have the carryover which the trade had for a period of four years. The total carryover for 1929 was 127,000,000 bushels, and the pool's proportion of that was 52,000,000 bushels. In other words, the western pools carried forty per cent of the carryover while the trade carried sixty per cent.


Mr. YOUNG:: How much did the trade
have?


William John Loucks: The pools had 52,000,000
bushels; that was their proportion of the carryover.


Edward James Young: And the trade?


William John Loucks: The trade had the rest of
it. At any rate, the percentage carried by the pools was 40-40-9, to be exact. For the four years from 1926 to 1929, inclusive, the total of deliveries was 755.719,373, the proportion for which the pools were responsible being 51-9 per cent. The total carryover for the four
Grain Board-Mr. Loucks

years was 402,000,000 bushels, the carryover by the pools being 170,000,000 bushels or 42-3 per cent. The hon. gentleman, however, still contends that the pools were the guilty parties with respect to the carryover. I cannot understand why he should take this view when, as I say, the pools were responsible for forty per cent only of the carryover in the last four years. In other words, they sold wheat whenever they got an opportunity.
I have known the ex-Minister of Agriculture for years and I have great respect for him. He is well qualified to discuss a subject such as this and he took his full forty minutes; I am sure he could have used another forty minutes if he had been allowed to do so. But surely, knowing conditions in the west as he knows them'-and having been once Minister of Agriculture, he knows them probably better than most other hon. gentlemen-he must realize that his attitude to-night is unjustified in suggesting that we1 should have dumped the wheat on the market.


William Richard Motherwell: I did not say anything of the kind.


William John Loucks: Well, I took it that his
policy was that the wheat should have been dumped on the market instead of there being a carryover of 200,000,000 bushels.


William Richard Motherwell: I never said anything about dumping it on the market.


William John Loucks: How would you have got
rid of it? I call it dumping; perhaps that is not the right term to use, but that is what we call it.


William Richard Motherwell: I showed the hon. gentleman what the Argentine did.
Mr. LOUCKS1: Since he has mentioned the Argentine, may I point out that he did not give us any statistics as to their exports. I challenge him or any other member to deny that our exports in the last four years have been greater than those of the Argentine. We exported some 400,000,000 bushels, and what did they export? About 100,000,000.


William Richard Motherwell: May I ask the hon. gentleman a question? Is there anything in this bill about stabilization?


William John Loucks: 
Wilfred Hanbury: Who paid for that?


William John Loucks: The European buyers paid for that, and they have been glad to pay us eighty and eighty-two cents a bushel; that is what we are getting for our wheat now.
Let me give another quotation. Mr. McFarland has been quoted here to-night from speeches made in several places. What did he say? He said that a certain gentleman representing a great milling firm in Great Britain came to Canada for the purpose of buying 10,000,000 bushels of wheat not through the grain exchange but through him as agent for the pools. Mr. McFarland asked him what he was willing to pay. What was the quotation? If my memory serves me aright, the quotation was forty-five cents a bushel.


An hon. MEMBER:: Forty cents.


William John Loucks: Perhaps I am wrong. An hon. member says forty cents. My recollection is forty-five cents for 10,000,000 bushels. What was Mr. McFarland's reply? He said:
" Have you no bowels of compassion for the farmers of western Canada when you offer that price?" I am quoting Fort William prices, not those on the farm. Does that not show at what price the millers of Great Britain or any other country-and I would not exclude the Canadian millers-would take our wheat from us? Then, because the government pegged the price for us and said to those people: You cannot have this wheat for less than seventy-five cents a bushel, I hear this ridicule coming from hon. members to the left of the Speaker. I say shame! Is it any wonder that as a member of this house I say that this is cheap party politics? What else can it be? It is not in the interests of the wheat growers when an hon. member will ridicule a government because it has made it possible for us to get seventy-five, eighty and eighty-two cents a bushel for our wheat, when it is well known that otherwise we would not have got more than thirty for it.
Let us take the case of wheat at forty-five cents if you like. I believe an hon. member said that that is more than the price quoted, but let us take it at forty-five cents. What does that mean? It costs twenty-two cents a hundred pounds from my station to the terminal elevator, three-quarters of a cent for handling charges, one cent to put it through the exchange; or in other words it means scarcely thirty cents a bushel to me for that wheat. Do you think for a minute if I, a grower of wheat, were sitting to the left of the Speaker, I would rise in my place and ridicule the policy of the government, knowing it has made it possible for me to get more than sixty cents for my wheat? I would gladly sit over there, take my medicine, and say yes to the policy of the government. I do not take much stock of that sort of thing from professional men and others of that class, but when actual farmers begin to ridicule the government, that is more than I can understand.
I can well remember when we got the idea we were going to organize a wheat pool. The hon. member for South Battleford I think was with me one hundred per cent in putting that over. He can contradict me if he likes, but I do not think he will. We went out together to try to have the situation and to bring about an orderly market for the farmer.


Wilfred Hanbury: Why did you not do it?


William John Loucks: We did do it. I gave the figures to show how much better we did than the trade did. Our carryover was about forty
Grain Board-Mr. Loucks

per cent while that of the trade was about sixty per cent. We carried out our plan. What happened to us? Who were the ones who were fighting us? The big interests were the ones who were fighting us. We knew what we were up against; we knew we were up against the grain exchange, the big interests, and 1 want to say to-night that the government is up against the same thing. When I hear some hon. members saying that the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) is for the big interests, I want to ask the house to-night: Who is he up against now if it is not the big interests, the big milling companies and so forth when he is taking the stand he is for the farmers of western Canada?


Mr YALLANCE:: He is up against the wall.


William John Loucks: No he is not. I would like to see the ex-Minister of Agriculture making before the Rosetown farmers a speech like the one he made here to-night; he would not have a chance to stay in my constituency very long. Every move that has been' made along these lines has been opposed by hon. members opposite. It was the same with the marketing bill. I admit we were defeated with our egg and poultry pool, but what did I find when I went home? Some of the men who voted against it were selling their eggs at eight cents a dozen at Easter. Who were the 'chief opponents? I suppose the packing houses at Montreal, and now they will get the eggs and sell them later on at about forty cents. If hon. members opposite, more particularly those from the prairies, think that the farmers of western Canada are going to endorse the attitude they take in connection with this grain bill, I say they are missing their guess. Why do I say that? In my own constituency we voted eighty-eight per cent for the marketing scheme in connection with our eggs and poultry so I think that the cooperative spirit is still there.
Then we have hon. members objecting that this is compulsion, and oh, what a terrible thing! When we put over the wheat pool, what did we do as farmers? We were not forced to so so but we signed a contract penalizing ourselves twenty-five cents a bushel for breach of the agreement, because we knew that some would be foolish enough to bootleg wheat. If we were satisfied with the grain exchange, why would eighty per cent of the farmers sign a contract with the pool which carried a penalty ,of twenty-five cents a bushel? We knew the condition and we were willing to do it. Yet we hear hon. members saying that this is compulsion and

an awful thing. The farmers were told this poultry scheme was compulsion-Don't be forced into anything." Well, I do not know how they fieel now, when they are taking around eight cents a dozen for their eggs.


An hon. MEMBER:: They are lucky.


William John Loucks: Who said lucky? Imagine a farmer saying -they are lucky to foe getting eight cents a dozen for eggs.


Edward James Young: I did not say anything.


William John Loucks: The hon. member is more concerned with politics than with the plight of the poor farmers.


Edward James Young: I told my hon. friend I-did not say anything.


William John Loucks: They were told it was compulsion, that they must not do it with eggs, and now they have learned their lesson; when it comes to signing up again you will see a different attitude as far as our part of the country is concerned. The day after I reached Saskatoon during the recess my wife said to me: "I sold a crate of eggs at eight cents a dozen. They were quoted in the stores in Saskatoon at two dozen for thirty-five cents or eighteen' cents a dozen straight." Is that justice to the farmer, I ask my hon. friend from Weyrbum (Mr. Young), who said "lucky"?


Edward James Young: Mr. Speaker, may I tell my hon. friend-


An hon. MEMBER:: You have got him on toast.


Edward James Young: Once more I would like to tell my .hon. friend that I did not make that remark.


William John Loucks: Well, I am glad the hon. member did not say that; however someone over there said it. But that is the story. Then when there is a measure brought in to deal with the problem, the great argument is: It is compulsion for a small minority. Let me say, with all respect for farmers-for I have been one all my life and I know them- that the farmers are their own cutthroats and always have been, and it appears to me now that the argument and policy of the opposition is that they must continue to be cutthroats for another generation. What do I mean by cutthroats? I mean one farmer competing against the 'Other, and that has been going on all my life and I am over sixty. When we have a government with vision who bring in reform measures and say: "We can take care of this thing and make conditions such that you will not be cut-

Grain Board-Mr. Coote
throats any longer," what do we hear from the opposition? Oh, that compulsion again!
I know who said that when we wanted a one hundred per cent wheat pool. I know that the grain exchange was very active in warning the farmers. The attitude of the opposition is just about the same. Quite a number from the grain exchange are down here at the present time; they are worrying, and no wonder. In Winnipeg walking about the streets I see their homes and I know we have not got such homes as some of these fellows have who have been buying our wheat the last number of years. I wonder if hon. members realize that it matters not as far as the exchange is concerned what wheat sells for. Twenty cent wheat is just as good to them as wheat at fifty or eighty cents; they get the same commission-volume is what counts with them. But that does not help the poor farmer. So I say there is only one hope for western Canada, and that is the action that is being taken by this government at this time.
The ex-Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell) said that the Prime Minister must have known that Mr. McFarland was going to be ill. Then he attempted to make something out of the statistics not having been brought down long ago giving the number of bushels of carryover, and I suppose he wanted the dollars and cents as well. Well, my memory tells me that he was one of the members of the committee when Mr. McFarland was here and I think he was one of those who said that if it was going to be dangerous to the interests of the farmers to divulge it, by all means do not do so. I congratulate him on that. But he has changed his attitude, and so has the hon. member for South Battle-ford (Mr. Vallance). There is an election coming on, so it does not matter whether it is injurious to the farmers. Is that the attitude now?


John Vallance: Sure.


William John Loucks: Cheap politics again, that is all I can say. There is an election coming on, so we must know just how much money is involved in this, whether it ruins the farmers or not.


John Vallance: It will ruin this government.


William John Loucks: I am glad to say this bill will go over, and when it gets in committee, as has been said by some hon. members of the opposition, we shall have a further chance to discuss it. I am well pleased with the bill and I am here to support it.


Mr. G. G. COOTE (Macleod):: The bill
now before the house to establish a grain board is a measure which I think a majority of the farmers of western Canada have looked forward to for a number of years. Wheat has now become distinctly a national problem, and I do not think it can be dealt with effectively except through a national agency. In fact wheat is not only a national problem, it is an international problem. Most of the nations of the world have gathered together in conference several times in recent years to discuss it. It may be these conferences have not been successful, but the very fact that all these countries thought it necessary to hold such conferences and take part in them should impress upon us the gravity of the problem.
No country in the world is more concerned in the wheat problem than Canada. As the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) pointed out yesterday, we have been the largest exporter of wheat in the world. The importance of the industry to Canada was so well stated by the Prime Minister yesterday 'that there is no necessity for me to do more than mention it. Wheat is not only a national problem but the wheat problem has now become a national responsibility. I should like to take a few minutes to try to prove that fact to the house. I say it is a national responsibility, first because of the national immigration policy which has been in force in Canada from 1896 until 1913, with the exception of the war period. The policy has been to bring as many farmers as possible to Canada, to settle them on the western prairies and to push the wheat acreage as far north as possible. In the period between 1922 and 1929, particularly, the organized farmers of western Canada protested against this policy, and I remember that in 1923 I stated in this house that the greatest danger facing western Canada was that of overproduction, or producing more than we could, sell at a profit. I remember being questioned in the lobby by one of the Conservative members, and being asked whether or not I was sincere in that statement. He thought I was only talking for political effect, and when I assured him I was sincere he simply laughed and said, "You're crazy." The time seems to have arrived when we have produced more than we can sell at a profit. As a matter of fact that time arrived a few years ago. Between pre-war years and 1933 the wheat acreage in Canada increased by 161 per cent. We had a percentage of increase in wheat acreage greater than that of any other country. Surely the nation cannot

Grain Board-Mr. Coote

disclaim responsibility for this; it was a direct result of government policy. There was the policy of immigration coupled with that of the development of new wheats so that the wheat acreage could be pushed farther north.
I remember a few years ago the former Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Motherwell), who preceded me to-night with an excellent speech, stated he looked forward to the time when Canada would produce a billion bushels of wheat.


William Richard Motherwell: I think not.


George Gibson Coote: I believe the statement is in Hansard. However if the hon. member states he did not make it I shall withdraw my observation.


William Richard Motherwell: It has been made by others.


George Gibson Coote: The statement has been made, anyway. The extension of the wheat area and the increase in acreage was responsible for the increased volume of production, and that was the outcome of a distinctly national policy.
The present problem of the farmer is one of price, and to some extent at least price is the result of another national policy. I now refer to the problem of the exchange value of Canadian money, a point which I believe was raised this evening by the hon. member for Melville (Mr. Motherwell). Our chief competitors, as is well known, are the Argentine and Australia. Our difficulty in connection with the price of wheat has arisen in the last five years. Prior to that time we did not have much difficulty, with the exception of some odd years, in obtaining a fair price. The internal price, namely, the price to the producers in Canada, during most of the time- perhaps not during the last year-has been lower than the price paid to our competitors in their own countries and in their own currency. The internal price to our producers is dependent largely on the amount of Canadian funds we have been able to secure for foreign funds for which our wheat was eventually sold. Late in the year 1929, by government action, the Argentine abandoned the gold standard and devalued or depreciated their currency, thereby raising to the Argentine producer the price of wheat as expressed in paper pesos. Their internal currency is the currency in which their debts are expressed, and the currency with which they buy their requirements in the Argentine. In January, 1930, about a year later, Australia abandoned gold redemption and devalued her currency

in the same way. The fact is that it depreciated very rapidly. For the past five years the pound sterling has been at a premium of twenty-five to thirty per cent in Australia; most of the time I believe it has stood at twenty-five per cent. Hon. members will recall that in the fall of 1932, when wheat was at its lowest point in Canada, the pound sterling in Canada was worth about $3.70 to $3,75. At the same time the pound sterling was at a premium of twenty-five per cent or was worth approximately $6 in Australia. At that time the Australian competitor had a sixty per cent exchange advantage over the Canadian producer. Had our currency then been at par with Australian wheat, on the worst day in 1932, instead of being worth 38J cents I believe our wheat would have been worth at least 60 cents Fort William, in Canadian currency. That would have happened without any change in the world gold price for wheat.
I have not the figures to indicate the exact exchange situation in the Argentine at that particular time, but since January, 1930, their currency has been at least as low as and sometimes lower than it has been in Australia. At the moment I am not placing the blame for this policy on any persons. It is sufficient for my purpose to state that on many occasions hon. members in this corner of the chamber have urged that our currency be brought down to the level of Australian currency. On those occasions we received very little support from either the government or the opposition. In the fall of 1932 the opposition did support us in a proposal that the pound sterling be brought up to a parity in Canada. With that exception however I cannot remember having received any support from either side of the house, nor did we receive any from the financial authorities in Canada, namely, the heads of banks and other large financial institutions.
The point I wish to make clear is that it was the national policy of Canada to. keep our currency at a high value in New York, and keeping our currency at that high value had the effect of forcing down the value of the British pound in terms of Canadian currency until, as I have said, in the fall of 1932 it was at one time as low as $3.70. That was the result of a national policy. I have indicated that by our policies of immigration, the development of Wheat areas in western Canada and our stand on monetary matters we have in the last few years created a problem for the wheat grower. I believe the

Grain Board-Mr. Coote
nation must assume the responsibility fox dealing with it.
Mosit of the increase in wheat prices we have at the present time is due to the depreciation of the pound sterling in terms of gold, coupled with the fall of our dollar to the level of the pound. This latter factor, namely the fall of our dollar, was due to a change in the money policy of the United States. I should like again to emphasize the point that we should take whatever action is necessary to give the farmer a reasonable price for his wheat, and that the nation should assume whatever financial risk may be involved in meeting the problem. For the benefit of the house may I point out that the agitation for a wheat board in western Canada has gone on for many years, dating back to the wheat board which operated during the last year of the war. In 1922 or 1923 legislation passed this chamber to establish a wheat board, but the action was taken very late in the season and as we were told it was found impossible to get. proper management the matter was allowed to drop. As long as I have been in western Chnada there has been a feeling that the selling of our wheat on the grain exchange was not the best method of disposing of it. I believe in response to feeling whibh had developed in western Canada, in 1931 the so-called stamp commission was appointed to inquire into the question of selling our wheat on the grain exchange. The report indicated an approval of the present system, but inside of eighteen months the system had absolutely broken down and wheat reached its lowest level of 38| cents. Not long after the Stamp commission had reported, Mr. Richardson of the Winnipeg grain exchange was before our agriculture committee advocating that the government should support the market. The government has been supporting the market for the last few years, and experience has proven that it is very difficult and expensive. We have not only had to support the legitimate hedges of the elevator companies to cover deliveries at country elevators, but we have also had to protect the market against the short selling of .millions of bushels of futures. We understand this short selling came from the United States, and dear knows where else. We do not really know where it all came from, but I have heard that in one day alone orders for as much as ten million bushels of short sales came on the Winnipeg market and had to be taken care of or the market would have broken, and many farmers would have had to let their wheat go at a very low price indeed. There were at all times speculators who were willing to break the market if they thought they could do it, but 92582-2304
the speculator that we depended upon to support the hedges seems to have disappeared. As one man in western Canada said to me, he has become almost as extinct as the dinosaur, and because there is no speculative interest to take up these hedges I feel that it is imperative that a wheat board should be set up.
It seems to me that under the old system it was no one's particular business to sell our wheat. We always seemed to take it for granted that Canadian wheat would sell itself. I have been told that the grain trade looked after that. The grain trade are largely interested in the elevator business; so long as their elevators were filled with wheat they were sure of storage charges, and I never could believe that they were desperately keen to get all this wheat sold and shipped out because once the wheat was shipped out the storage charges, and of course their earnings, would cease.
I repeat, I am in favour of this bill to establish a grain board, but I would also like to make it clear to the house that the board must have the financial, assistance from the nation which will enable it to pay a fair price to the producer even if it has to sell the wheat to the world at a lower price. I believe that in the national sense it would pay us to guarantee to our producers a price covering the cost of production and to sell the wheat at the best price we can obtain. In this connection I would like to draw the attention of the members to the example that has been set by the Argentine. I quote from the Monthly Commercial Letter issued by the Canadian Bank of Commerce for the month of May, 1935. With reference to the operations of the Argentine grain board it says:
In November, 1933, the Argentine government set up a grain marketing board to assist producers. Its chief functions were to set a basic price for -wheat, flaxsed and corn, to purchase such grain at the fixed price and to sell it for export only at the prevailing world price. As the world price was lower than the basic price the government would have had to absorb a possible heavy loss. This difficulty was overcome, with the cooperation of the exchange control board, by lovrering the rate at which the peso was pegged (it was already at a discount of about 40 per cent below its gold parity) and utilizing the resulting exchange profits to cover any loss on the grain board's operations. The board calculated at the outset that it might incur a loss of fifty million pesos, which would have to be recovered from exchange profits. A rise in prices_consequent on the drought last year in the United States, however, reduced the subsidy per bushel to a relatively small sum, and to the end of Sep-fember. 1934, a substantial net profit was realized on the whole operation, which it was
Grain Board-Mr. Coote

planned to use in financing the next season's crops. It is important to note that the board claims that in buying grain as it was offered, and regulating its sales to demand, it avoided breaking the world market with abrupt offerings of Argentine grain.
Apart from the success which it achieved in disposing of all but a very small carryover of the large 1933-34 crop at a price satisfactory to growers and at no loss to itself, the grain board has undertaken to mitigate, and hopes eventually to remove, the two disabilities under which the Argentine grain trade is still operating, namely, the production of a large volume of certain varieties of wheat not readily acceptable by importers, and lack of elevator and storage space.
I would like to commend this method of financing the operations of the board to the study of the committee which I understand is to consider this grain board bill. I also wish to quote the concluding paragraph of the Monthly Letter of the Canadian Bank erf Commerce dealing with the Argentine's method of handling wheat. It says:
We can no longer blind ourselves to the intensity of the competition Canadian wheat is meeting from Argentine, nor can we dismiss it as a temporary phenomenon. Argentina is now the world's leading exporter of grains, and is making every effort to consolidate her position. She has met and overcome difficulties just as great as those with which Canada now contends, and provides an example of enterprise and resolution in dealing with them.
In conclusion, I hope that we may show ;he same enterprise and resolution in dealing with the problem of marketing Canada's wheat. I trust that when this bill goes to the committee which I understand is to consider it, it will be dealt with expeditiously and thoroughly and that a plan may be evolved under which the Canadian producer may be guaranteed at least the cost of production for his crop, and that the very best possible methods may be provided for the sale of our wheat to all the buyers we can find anywhere in the world.


Mr. T. F. DONNELLY (Willow Bunch):: Mr. Speaker, I have taken a great deal of interest in this bill ever since it was introduced because I have been growing wheat in Canada for the last thirty years, and of necessity anything in connection with wheat is of great interest to me. As I sat here and listened to different members talking about wheat my mind went back to 1930, to the time of the election, and I thought of the way Conservative speakers throughout the country spoke on every platform at that time and told us of the wonderful prices we were going to get for agricultural products of all kinds if they were elected. Butter, why that was spread over every platform. Wheat, why it was then at one dollar a bushel, and we were 
told that we were going to get $1.50 a bushel at least. We were told that just as soon as the Conservative party got into power the price of wheat was going to rise in ten days by ten cents a ibushel at least. But no sooner had the Conservative party got into power than wheat began to go down, and it went down and down until we thought i.t would never stop.
As I listened to the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) yesterday I thought of what was said on almost every platform in 1930 in connection with' wheat. Quoting the Liberal Minister of Trade and Commerce, Conservative speakers said:
The Department of Trade and Commerce is not exercised over the sale of such commodities as wheat because those commodities find their own markets.
That was the statement made by the Liberal Minister of Trade and Commerce in those days, and it was repeated from practically every platform in western Canada. Now in those days we never thought of finding a market for our wheat. As my hon. friend from MacLeod (Mir. Coote) has just said, we believed in those days that wheat would find its own .market all over the world. And it was finding its market. I would ask the Prime Minister now what he would have done a/t-that time when we had ia carryover of only
127,000,000 fousheiLs, which was nothing at aill compared with the carryover we have had for the last four years? Would he have recommended that the government take it over and sell it? He would not have recommended anything of the kind. They used that as a sort of argument to throw up as a screen. Every step taken by this government in connection with wheat has 'been a mistake. They have made one error after another and there is not one move they have made in connection with wheat which has been, right. Shortly after the Prime Minister was elected he went over to London. He returned and came out to Regina .and the word went over the western prairies that the Prime Minister had a story to tell us. The Premier of Saskatchewan sat on the platform with him to introduce him to his audience, and the rest of us were listening at our radios to hear his message. What did he tell us? He told us he had a market in France, but where is that market? I am surprised that there is such a carryover. What has become of the market he claimed he had found? AVe do not hear anything about that market now. Have we lost it? Then he told us that at that moment the ambassador to Japan was on his way to China to find a market for our wheat in that country. Where has that market gone to? Apparently

Grain Board-Mr. Donnelly
the Chinaman has gone back to eating rice altogether. These are some of the things this government has done.
What next? What happened after those faux pas? He then started the five cent wheat bonus. As the hon. member for Melville (Mr. Motherwell) has said1, the Prime Minister was first going to pay this bonus on export wheat; then it was to be paid on the freight on wheat; then he brought the grain commissioner to Ottawa to talk things over and he decided to pay it to the growers of wheat when they brought in their wheat for sale. What did that mean? It meant that the man who had wheat received a bonus of five cents per bushel while the man who had none had to pay more for his flour and bread. We in the southern part of the province got nothing; we did not get one of the nickels he was talking about. The man who had the wheat got more while the man who had no wheat got less, even that which he had was taken away. The man who was hailed out, the man who was frozen out, the man who was dried out and the man who was eaten out by the grasshoppers got nothing, but the man who had a crop received five cents a bushel. This was done to stimulate production and urge the farmers to grow more wheat. That was a mistake.
What was the next thing? The next thing was to bring a man over here to look into the grain trade. Something was wrong with that trade and it had to be straightened out. Sir Josiah Stamp was brought over and he stamped everything. He told us the grain exchange was all right and that it should be kept up as a means of marketing our wheat. Now the Prime Minister turns around and presents a bill to do away with the exchange. Did you ever see such a series of contradictions? Ohe thing right after another. Sir Josiah Stamp said that we needed the grain exchange; the Prime Minister brings a great economist over here to tell him that and then he turns around and says we do not need it and he presents a bill in order to do away with it. The government is going out of power and they will not be here to see this bill put into effect. The government will be lucky to be the official opposition after the next election. They know that they will not be here to see that this bill is Carried out and so they are going to put it through.
What next did1 they do? The next thing was the Ottawa agreements. We were told that these would settle all our difficulties, that we would get into the English market without having to pay any duty on our wheat
while the Argentine and other countries outside the empire would have to pay six cents a bushel. I can still hear the Prime Minister telling us about these agreements. He told us that there would be two ships lying side by side at the quay of one of the ports of old England, one from Canada and the other from some other country. The wheat in the ship from Canada would go in free while the other ship would not be permitted to unload its wheat until it had paid six cents a bushel. One would have imagined that all the wheat consumed in England would be going there from Canada and Australia, but what do we find? In 1932 the Argentine sold 19-5 million bushels of wheat; in 1933 they sold 21-9 million bushels and in 1934 they sold 34-2 million bushels. In two years there was a gain of 15 million bushels. What about Canada? Perhaps I had better give these figures under my breath. In 1932 we sold 44-4 million bushels of wheat to England; in 1933 we sold only 40-6 million bushels and in 1934 only 34-7 million bushels. Our sales have dropped 10 million bushels. We were given an advantage of six cents a bushel; this was a sheltered market which was going to solve all the difficulties of the wheat growers of western Canada.
Then when they saw that that was not going to work, they went to Rome to try to reach an agreement. They consulted with France fault France replied that she was willing to reduce her duties and her restrictions against our wheat if we told her what we would buy from her. Was any one sent from here to try and make an agreement with France whereby we would take something in exchange for our wheat? No; nothing was done.
They then adjourned to London and a lawyer was sent from the prairies to sell- our wheat. He went over there with all expenses paid and then we were told that the only thing to do was to put on a quota. We were told we would have to cut down our acreage as we were growing too much wheat. Can you imagine going down into the southern part of Saskatchewan where they have not had a crop for six years and telling the farmers they are growing too much wheat? The former Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) made reference to the program of recovery in the United 'States under the NRA and its system of codes. Instead of a blue eagle he suggested to the government that they should adopt the grasshopper as their emblem. The grasshopper will cut down the acreage and get rid of a lot of wheat. The drought and the hail will get rid of a lot of wheat.
Grain Board-Mr. Donnelly

No one kept these quotas, and in fact our government loaned part of our quota to the Argentine. We are wondering when we will get that back. It is all just a faroe because no one is adhering to the quota. This is just something else put through in an effort to deceive the farmer. The party opposite have done nothing else but try to deceive the farmers in one way or another ever since they got into power, and even before. That is the way they got in and that is the way they are going to slide out; make no mistake about that.
Now, having done all these things and having done them all wrong, and having made mistakes in everything, they said, "The thing to do is to stabilize the price; you have to get a man there." And so they put in this man McFarland to stabilize the price. In season and out of season for the last four years, both in the committee and in the house, I have tried to find out something of their activities, but I have not been able to discover anything. The first bit of information which we got was given us the other night by the Prime Minister, namely, that we have 200,000,000 or 226,000,000 of a carryover, held by Mr. John I. McFarland for Cooperative Wheat Producers, Limited. But what it has or has not cost the country we do not know.
I have said before, and I say again tonight, that this government is gambling in wheat. That is denied. When they buy futures, that is not gambling-oh, no; that is only supporting the market. But when I buy futures, or when anyone else buys futures, it is gambling, it is speculating. Listen to this from the former Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens), who talks so glibly about trade ethics and all that kind of thing:
The hon. member who took his seat a few minutes ago said that this government was guilty of gambling in wheat, and that we had lost $30,000,000. No statement could have been further from the fact than that. This government is not either directly or indirectly gambling in wheat.
Note that-not either directly or indirectly gambling in wheat; yet we have 225,000,000 bushels.


An hon. MEMBER:: What is the date?


Thomas F. Donnelly: This is from Hansard of February 13, 1934. He goes on:
The hon. member for Melville made the same statement the other night. What this government has done is this. It has supported Mr. McFarland, who was chosen as their manager by the pool selling agency for the three western pools. The government has stood behind that

selling agency, controlled by Mr. McFarland', in taking care of wheat futures on the Winnipeg market. What does that mean?...
Anybody who knows anything about business knows that if a government were to disclose its hand day by day in regard to these things, it would have ruined the 'wheat market.
He does not mean the wheat market; he means the government. And surely it would ruin the government, because if they told the public that they were gambling in wheat, they know what the result would be. And what do we find on top of that? The hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmouth (Mr. Ralston), discussing this question the other night, told us that in that year 1933 Mr. McFarland sold something like 20,000,000 or 30,000,000 bushels, and it was being sold then in the neighbourhood of 80 or 90 cents. Later on he bought back all the wheat he had sold1-I wonder why. The Prime Minister said that the only reason Mr. McFarland bought it back was that prices had not been maintained. Let me quote from Hansard of March 13, 1934, page 1545, what the right hon. gentleman said:
Prices have not been maintained at a fixed level but rather they were supported, particularly during the season of the year when farmers were, from necessity, forced sellers of their production in order to meet the demands and needs of their creditors.
This was in July, but no farmer was selling his wheat at that time to meet the demands of his creditors; it was not done for that purpose at all. During that year we sold
372.000.	000 bushels-that is, in October for the crop year 1932-33-and the average price for the eleven months was 51f cents. That was the average for the eleven months beginning the first of August, 1932, to the first of July, 1933. We had sold 359,000,000 bushels at an average price of 51J cents, and then during the month of July the price went up and it averaged 83 cents a bushel. And that was the very time, when the price went up, that Mr. McFarland stepped in and sold. It went as high as 94 cents, and when he saw it coming down again he bought back the
20.000.	000 bushels he had sold. Why? Was that gambling? Of course it was. He thought it would go up to $1; that was rumoured all over the country. He was buying, thinking he would get an extra price; but the 20,000,000 bushels he had sold he bought back. He bought back every bushel he sold, and all the wheat that came in from the country during that month of July was 13,000,000 bushels. Why was he doing that? He was doing it for no other purpose than to speculate; he was gambling in wheat. We are told that it was a matter of supporting the market. Well, when you buy anything you are supporting the market; anyone knows that who

Grain Board-Mr. Donnelly
has anything to do with wheat. When you are buying you are speculating and you are supporting the market. But the Prime Minister knew that he was doing that; he knew that Mr. McFarland was gambling in wheat. He must have known it because before the banking and commerce committee Mr. McFarland was questioned and he said, as reported at page 236 of the evidence:
Mr. Bennett knew what was being done from time to time; he had the reports. The banks reported to him the position from time to time.
The Prime Minister knew that Mr. McFarland was gambling in wheat; there is no doubt about it. The next point I wish to refer to with regard to this gambling process is this, and it shows how many contradictions there are in the minds of members of the government. One of the things the Prime Minister said was that he would never set a price. I have sat in this house and listened to members opposite condemning the wheat pool just because, as they said, they had lost the market by setting the price higher than it should be. I have listened to member after member discussing the pool and pointing out how they had held the price up. Listen to what the former Minister of Trade and Commerce said, as reported at page 1742 of Hansard of May 14, 1931:
In the fall of 1929-30 a condition arose in Europe which was really an attitude of resentment rightly or wrongly, against the North American continent in regard to wheat. Rightly or wrongly they conceived the idea that to their detriment we were attempting unduly to advance the price of wheat. Hearing that rumour the European buyers turned their purchases in other directions. For instance, the Argentine got a very distinct advantage, and further we found that many of the flour mills in the consuming countries of Europe-Holland', Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, and X think, France-had changed or readjusted their screens so as to mill the Argentine wheat instead of ours. Then this year we found that millers in those countries were very reluctant to change their screens back again.
And use the old screens so that they could use Canadian wheat. The hon. member said at the same time:
In the meantime recognizing that situation we have been doing our best to carry it and to disabuse the minds of the European people of the thought we had any intention of cornering the wheat market.
Referring to nobody but the western pools; that they were the ones that had lost our markets and that they had done wrong in trying to uphold the price. Then the Prime Minister himself,, as reported on page 782 of Hansard of April 21, 1931, said this:
Practically one-half of that wheat was held by the pools of the country.
This government got behind those pools and said it would assist the orderly marketing of the wheat crop of western Canada. That assistance and support had, of course, the same effect upon non-pool wheat. That was what the government did. It did not peg the price; no government of which I ,am the head ever will.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear.


Thomas F. Donnelly: Did hon. members hear that "hear, hear"? I wonder what Mr. McFarland has done if he has not pegged the price. The Prime Minister continued:
I have seen artificial prices placed upon commodities and whether that commodity be wheat or anything else, it matters not, I know the inevitable result. It cannot advantageously be done; it will not succeed. It may Cause a temporary advantage but that disappears. Look at the situation in the United States to-day. Mr. Legge, with all his vast experience, with all the millions and hundreds of millions of dollars that he had behind him, declared that the principle of artificial pricefixing was unsound, and it has been abandoned. We did not adopt it, so we did have to abandon it.
Speak about contradictions! It has been just one contradiction after another. As regards everything they have attempted to put over, they have turned around, changed their minds and done something else. As the former Minister of Agriculture said, they have stepped into every hale from Vancouver to Halifax; there is no doubt about that. Now they are beginning to take great credit to themselves because they have set the price. The hon. member for Rosetown (Mr. Loucks) spoke of thirty cents a bushel as having been saved. Some of them say that 1100,000,000 has been saved to western Canada and some of them have mentioned as high as $200,000,000. By the time of the election it will be up to $500,000,000; it is growing day by day and by leaps and bounds. I say: Go back to western Canada; stand up on the platforms there and ask the farmers to put their hands into their pockets and feel that thirty cents a bushel, that $100,000,000, that $200,000,000, you people have saved for them and you will be sure to get their votes; do not make any mistake about that! In my opinion, if hon. members opposite are depending upon that to get the votes 'Of the western producers, they are depending upon a broken reed, a rotten stick.
Consider what this policy has done for the people of western Canada, especially those in the southern part where I come from. We have had no crop whatever for six years. The government say that they have kept the price up; some hon. members mentioned thirty cents a bushel, and the result has been
Grain Board-Mr. Donnelly

that we have lost our markets; iwe are not selling our wheat. Every other country in the world has sold its wheat, but we are left holding the bag. The Argentine has got rid of all its wheat; Australia has got rid of all hers and so has the United States; we are the only country with any surplus of any account. We are holding the bag. Our people, thanks to Providence, expect to get a crop this year; weather conditions are good and they believe they will have a crop. The only thing this government has done for them in the past is to make them pay more for their seed, more for their flour, more for their feed, because if what my hon. friends opposite say is right-and I presume it is- they have kept the price up. Now our people have around their necks a millstone of
200,000,000 bushels of wheat preventing them from getting a price for their crop when they see one in sight this year. That is a great help to them. Let my hon. friends visit the southern part of Saskatchewan and tell the farmers there these stories as well as the others.
I say this: If you want to keep up the price and to bonus wheat, all well and good. You have bonused all kinds of industries in this country. We do not believe in bonuses; we do not think any industry or any article should be bonused; but if you are going to bonus all the industries, the farming industry should be bonused also. But I say. Sell the wheat; get rid of it; clear out our bins and let us get a world price. When this government goes out of power, as it will as soon as the election comes along, and we put proper policies into effect in this country, the farmers will be able to sell their wheat, but at the present time I believe a board is necessary. A board should have been appointed long ago, one that would tell us from day to day, from week to week or from month to month what is being done. We were not complaining when they were bonus-ing the farmers, when they were bonusing everything else; we were not condemning the wheat pools or anything else, but we were condemning the way in which the government was acting, this clandestine secret way of doing things, with no one knowing what was being done, and then the government expecting us to support it when no one knew what it was he was supporting. Is it any wonder we want to know now what the government activities are, how much it is out of pocket now, how much this policy is going to cost us? Now the government comes along and brings us this wheat board. What for? To bury the old corpse; that is all;

to bury its mistakes in regard to its stabilized wheat policy. The government found itself with 220,000,000 bushels of wheat that will cost us we do not know how much and it wants to bury this in the new board. That is what the government expects to do, and that is why it is coming now in the dying days of the session with this kind of bill, this kind of proposition. It wants to appoint a board to bury this corpse, this doctor's mistake it has made.
So far as I am concerned I welcome this board if for no other reason than that it will bring about publicity. I do not think it will be necessary to have it for more than a year; I think it should be appointed only from year to year. We want to get away from it as soon as possible because it is only a false, a mistaken way of doing things. It may be necessary in order to clean up this mistake. What is the government going to do with this 220,000,000 bushels of wheat? How is it going to handle it, sell it, if not through a board? Of course the government has to have a board to sell that quantity of wheat. Why leave it to one man? Is it any wonder he is sick in bed to-day trying to carry a load of this kind, trying to market all this wheat, taking all the load upon himself, then trying to sell this wheat, make a profit and get away with it? We would never have heard a word about the matter if there had been a short crop this year. The government talks about excessive crops. Since the government came into power we have never had a crop that was more than an ordinarily fair crop; 1933 was the only year we had anything but half a crop in western Canada. This year we might likely have a crop of
600,000,000 bushels. What is the government going to do with it? When it sees this ahead of it and knows it is coming, it brings in this board and makes it carry the load.
I intend to support the principle of this bill; I support the principle of a board, a board to handle it instead of one man. Whether the bill when it comes from the committee is amended in such form that I can support it on third reading remains to be seen.


Mr. B. M. STITT (Nelson):: I listened with a great deal of interest to the speaker who has just taken his seat (Mr. Donnelly). He is a little bolder than hon. members who preceded him; he at least told us he is going to support the bill. As for the hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmouth (Mr. Ralston) and the other wheat experts over there, like the hon. member for Quebec East (Mr. Lapointe), we

Grain Board-Mr. Stitt (Nelson)
did not know when they sat down whether they were going to oppose or support it. It is very interesting to sit here and hear these experts discuss wheat. I am not a wheat expert, but I have lived in western Canada thirty-five years and have taken part in almost everything in the daily life out there, have rubbed shoulders with the farmers, and I think I know at least as much about wheat as the hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmouth or the hon. member for Quebec East. I wonder why the right hon. leader of the opposition (Mr. Mackenzie King) did not rise and discuss this bill. I understand he intends to oppose it along with the rest of his party. I think the only answer to that question is that he represents a western constituency and he does not dare to stand up and oppose it. If he does I know what is going to happen, and it is going to happen to every hon. member on the other side who has courage enough to oppose it. In one breath they tell us they are not in favour of it, and in the next that they are going to support it. It is hard to know where they are at. I hope that on the third reading a vote is called for; I want to see how many of those hon. members will stay in the house and cast their votes. I predict that most of them will run out.


Olof Hanson: We don't do that on this side.


Bernard Munroe Stitt: They do, quite often. We heard the official mouthpiece of St. James street, Montreal, speaking for the people who are largely if not wholly responsible for many of the ills from which this country is suffering, discuss this wheat bill to-day. When he got through with his diatribe I did not know whether he was going to support or oppose it. However, I hazard the guess that he will not be in his seat when the vote is taken on third reading.


James Malcolm: Don't bet any money on it. He will be here.


Bernard Munroe Stitt: Well, he might if I bet too much money. Lawyers do not usually overlook money if they see a chance to get their hands on it.' The hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmouth is living in Montreal; he has a large law practice there-I believe he is one of the most prominent corporation lawyers in Montreal. I have a great deal of respect for him; I like him, but the very atmosphere in which he lives would naturally cause him to take the attitude he does. He makes his money from the large financial interests in Montreal. He has opposed every reform bill that has been brought to the house.
I congratulate the government upon bringing in this bill. I think the man who brought in this bill knows more about wheat marketing than any man in this house.


Edward James Young: He ought to.


Bernard Munroe Stitt: It certainly is a revolutionary bill. I think it is pure socialism, if I understand socialism. It is one of the boldest strokes that has ever been seen in this temple of the people. The magnitude of this bill is such that it has got all hon. members on the other side in a dizzy spin. Why? Because they have been going from one end of Canada to the other telling people on the hustings that Right Hon. R. B. Bennett is a big interests man. But there is no other man in this dominion with the courage and capacity to bring in this bill. Certainly the right hon. leader of the opposition would not have the nerve to do it. He dare not do it because if he did he would not get the support he is getting now from certain interests.


Edward James Young: He would never have got us into this fix.


Bernard Munroe Stitt: After hearing from the opposition a man does not need to speculate as to the source from which the Liberal party expect to receive their campaign funds. But the question which we as members of this house must consider when this bill comes up for third reading is, are we going to sacrifice seven hundred thousand farmers to greed and exploitation? That is what has been going on in this country the last fifty years. I hold that as representatives of the people we cannot sit by and let this thing go on any longer; if we do we fail in our duty to the people who sent us here. That is the way I feel at any rate, and I represent a very large farming constituency. As to the grain exchange in Winnipeg, it is just too bad we are going to sacrifice that. When I drive around Wellington Crescent and down by the river and see the great mansions there, all taken out of the sweat and blood of the farmer, as far as I am concerned I find very little difficulty in deciding on which side I am going to line up. I am going to support this bill with all that I have.
The hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmouth said he did not think anyone in western Canada was in favour of this bill. I wonder if he heard the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) today, the president of the United Farmers of Alberta. I wonder if he read the remarks of the Premier of Alberta in yesterday's Journal. He quoted from that paper yes-

Grain Board-Mr. Stitt (Nelson)
fcerday, but possibly he did not see that little statement by Mr. Reid in which he said the farmers would welcome the bill. He laid great stress on the fact that Argentina is selling more wheat than Canada, and also Australia. That statement was applauded by hon. members opposite; they seemed to be pleased to hear it. What are the facts in connection with Argentine wheat? It is produced at very low cost, it is soft wheat, very inferior to Canadian wheat, and they can afford to sell it at 20 to 25 cents a bushel less. It is not worth within 25 cents of what Canadian wheat is. The same thing is true of Australia, and in addition to that, Australia has inflated money; the pound in British money is worth a pound and a half in Australia. The hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Coote) explained that to-night. Australia was able to inflate because they are not a debtor nation as we are. They owe money, but they owe it to their own people and so inflation does not cause them any trouble. If we did not have these enormous obligations to meet in New York and elsewhere abroad, we might be able to sell more wheat. We have got to meet our obligations in the terms of the agreement, in gold.
Then the hon. member for Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly) said: Where is that great market in France that the Prime Minister referred to? Surely the hon. member if he reads must know that France has wheat to sell, that France exported wheat last year. More than that, they grew more wheat than Canada last year, so what is the use of asking where is that great market in France? Then he talked of gambling in wheat. Well, if I can interpret gambling-and I have done a little of it on the races once in a while- when I put some money say on a horse race, I expect to make a profit. I do not think it has ever been in the mind of the Prime Minister of this country or of Mr. McFarland1 to make a profit on that wheat. All this government did was to step in and strengthen the market in order to maintain prices. We have no desire to make a profit, to gamble; that was never the intention of the government. We would be happy indeed to get out on an even keel, but if we have to take a loss, we feel the sacrifice will be worth the cost. During the darkest days we have ever experienced, we have maintained one of the greatest industries in Canada. Western Canada would have been bankrupt to-day-heaven knows it is bad enough-had the government not taken action; the whole country would have been in the hands of receivers. There is no question 
about that; hon. gentlemen opposite know it, if they would just forget politics long enough to admit it.
The hon. member for Willow Bunch took some time in an effort to prove that from time to time the Prime Minister has contradicted himself. My only reply to that would be that when a man ceases to change his opinions and develop new and better tastes, the jungle forces of cynicism, doubt and reaction set in. There is no crime in a man's changing his opinion in a world changing so rapidly-no crime at all. If that is the best case hon. members opposite can make out against Right Hon. R. B. Bennett, the Conservative party has very little to worry about in the next election. If what hon. members opposite have been saying against this 'bill is the best case they can make out, then I pity them when they go to their people.
It is true that I have received telegrams from western Ganada opposing the bill. I do not know whom they were from; I would not know the senders from a load of hay, nor do I want to know them. I have received no telegrams from my own constituents, and those are the only people to whom I will pay attention. They appear to be satisfied. My constituency was one of the few in Manitoba to support the egg and poultry .pool. They had intelligence enough to do that, and they will have intelligence enough to recognize the merit in this measure. So far as I am concerned they may continue to wire me all they like. My belief is that those telegrams were inspired by people opposed to the bill and who would like to continue to fleece the farmer .as thejr have been doing for the last fifty years without any regard to his position.


Mr. W. G. WEIR (Macdonald):: Mr. Speaker, I hesitate to continue the debate at this late hour of the evening, but there are a few observations I should like to make before the bill is given second reading. I do not believe it is necessary to cover the early history of the efforts of western farmers to improve their marketing methods. That was ably done by the hon. member for Acadia (Mr. Gardiner) this afternoon. The early efforts towards the organization of farmer's movements in western Canada culminated in she years 1923 and 1924 in the establishment of the three wheat pools. So far as their marketing operations were concerned those organizations were successful to the point of controlling roughly fifty per cent of the grain produced by the three western provinces.
In that connection may I digress for a moment. The three pool organizations,

Grain Board-Mr. Weir (Macdonald)
namely Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, were separate units so far as the gathering of grain was concerned. They were collective units, however, with respect to the sale of grain in that they joined together in what is known as the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited. They were also united, as I recall it, in .their financial arrangements. That is to say, the financial arrangement made with the banks was made with the central selling agency, which body, in turn, loaned the money to the .provincial pools. In establishing themselves the pools made arrangements whereby voluntary contracts were signed by the growers in which the agreement was made to deliver all the wheat grown or acquired by each grower, except such quantities as might be used for seed and feed, to the provincial pool organization for a period of five years. It was on the strength of those contracts that the pool organizations were able to finance. The banks loaned money on the strength of the contract and the whole organization was established on that basis. However when it came to the actual purchasing of the grain, beoause they did not have share capital as ordinary companies have, the pools were obliged to adopt the policy of paying initial payments to the growers and then, as the grain was sold, to advance the full amounts of money. As I recall it, the arrangements made with the banks with respect to the financing of pool operations were that the pool was required to maintain with the banks a margin of reserve of fifteen per cent.
At that time it was considered that the financial arrangement by that procedure was quite safe and sound. In making financial arrangements with the banks at the beginning of each year, of necessity the pools had to consult with the banks as to what the initial payments should be. We come to the 1928-29 crop year and the 1929-30 crop year. The financial arrangements for those crops were made by the central selling agency, and an initial payment of $1 per bushel, at Fort William, was agreed upon by the banks. Unfortunately in the fall of 1929 the market broke sharply, and the pool found difficulty in maintaining its margin. Early in the spring of 1930, shortly after the new year in fact, the margin of security which the pools had with the banks in the form of grain and collateral became jeopardized to the extent that the banks were alarmed. It was then that the pools went to their respective provincial governments, as separate units, and asked for assistance. That assistance was granted, and what took place from then on has been told on different occasions. The
banks were given a guarantee to provide for the respective shares of the different provincial organizations. In the fall of 1930 the Prime Minister went to the old country to attend an imperial conference, and he took with him the late A. J. McPhail who was then the president of the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited. The pool's financial difficulties were still of some considerable proportion. Upon Mr. MoPhail's return to this country, however, Mr. McFarland was appointed' general manager of the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited. The point I make is this, that from the appointment of Mr. McFarland until yesterday no statement has been made with respect to the pool's operations under his control, and at the same time there has been all kinds of confusion as to what the position actually was, for whom he was working and from whom he was taking his orders. It was generally understood that the government was guaranteeing his operations and endorsing what he was doing. However, as I have stated, until yesterday no definite statement was made.
So far as I am concerned, and I think so far as the general public is concerned, I be-'ieve no serious exception has been taken to the government coming to the assistance of the pool, and little criticism has been offered. I would be one of the last to offer any criticism for the government's coming to the assistance of the pools, because by so doing not only did it help the pools out of a difficult situation, but it helped the market for the non-pool farmers as well. I would state, further, that no government at that time could have afforded to act otherwise. Since the bill has been introduced considerable discussion has hinged around the 1929 carryover and the situation which has existed since that time. The Prime Minister even went so far as to twit the Liberal Minister of Trade and Commerce, (Mr. Malcolm), with respect to the statement he made in 1929, in regard to wheat when he said that the dominion government was not exercised over the sale of such commodities as wheat because such commodities found their own market. I do not know why the Prime Minister and others bring that up; I do not understand what they mean by so doing. It may be a nice political catch phrase, but I submit that the facts were that you had the pools controlling roughly fifty per cent of the grain crop of western Canada and you had the trade with practically an equal amount, each no doubt vying with the other in respect to price to a certain extent. The banks had already endorsed the pool's initial
3630	COMMONS
Grain Board-Mr. Weir (Macdonald)
payment and were acquainted with their activities and with the activities that the trade was carrying on. Everybody was bullish at that time, and the question that always comes to my mind when that statement is repeated is, what would the Prime Minister have done under those circumstances? Would he have gone to the pool or to tlhe grain trade or to the banks or to others interested in the grain market and said: Boys, you will have to reduce your price, change your policy and sell your wheat? Even had he done so, these were private companies operating on their own, and I doubt if they would have graciously accepted any advice from an outsider. I doubt if the suggestion would have been obeyed in any respect even if it had been given.
I hesitate to refer to the statements that have been made so often by other speakers with respect to what the Prime Minister has said on previous occasions about the wheat market. I shall not do so to-night, but I should like to give one extract from an old country newspaper with respect to the preference on Canadian wheat of six cents a bushel contained in the Ottawa agreement. I quote from the Daily Herald:
The suggestion that the Ottawa tariff preference of 2s. per quarter accorded by Britain to Canadian wheat should be forfeited, on the grounds that Canada has not complied with Article 4 of the agreement, was made yesterday in the annual report of the Liverpool Corn Trade Association.
The agreement provided that the preference "may be removed if at any time empire producers ... are unable or unwilling to offer___
at prices not exceeding the world prices."
The report mentions that a deputation of British millers recently waited on the Dominion Secretary and represented that the high price asked for Canadian wheat as compared with Argentine, as a result of the Canadian government's holding policy, was in breach of this stipulation.
The report states that while the article was not-perhaps intentionally- drafted with too much precision, yet taken from one angle Canada should' have forfeited her preference long before now.
I think it is important to keep that in mind in view of the statement which has been made with respect to the marketing of wheat from this country.
Let me proceed a little further. I shall not refer to the other statements that I had in mind. Yesterday when the Prime Minister spoke he put about five acres of figures on Hansard, which to my mind confused the issue extremely. The figures went back over such a long period of time that I am afraid even my right hon. friend's friends will have difficulty in digesting them when the occasion arises. I have some figures which I have been

successful in securing, not of 1921 but as of May 17, 1935, and I should like to quote them, keeping in mind the general sales policy with respect to wheat. They are taken from the Monthly Review of the Wheat Situation dated May 17, 1935, and supplied by the Department of Trade and Commerce:
Since the commencement of the present cereal year the Argentine has shipped 149 million bushels as compared with 101 million bushels during the corresponding period of 1933-34. Since August 1, 1934, Australian shipments have amounted to 91 million bushels as compared with 70 million bushels cleared during the same period in the previous crop year. Shipments from North America are sharply lower during the present crop year as compared with a year ago. From August 1, 1934, to May 13, 1935, North American shipments amounted to 127 million bushels as compared with 178 million bushels during the corresponding period of the previous crop year.
Right under that I read this:
In Liverpool, C.I.F. quotations for all classes of wheat are on about the same level as a month ago with Canadian No. 2 Northern (Atlantic shipment) now being quoted at approximately 96 cents a bushel, Argentine Rosafe at 74 cents a bushel and Australian wheat at 82 cents a bushel.
In other words, there was a spread between the Argentine and the Canadian price of 22 cents a bushel. I find an equally interesting statement on the next page:
During the present crop year the Argentine has shipped 149 million bushels of wheat as compared with 99 million bushels during the corresponding period of 1933-34. On May 12, 1935, the Argentine had 114 million bushels of wheat available for export and carry-over as compared with 167 million bushels a year ago, a reduction of 53 million bushels. If an allowance for a normal carry-over of 80 million bushels is made, the Argentine has 34 million bushels still available for export during the balance of the crop year.
Then with respect to Australia:
From August 1, 1934, to May 12, 1935, Australian "shipments amounted to 91 million bushels compared with 69 million bushels during the same period of 1933-34. On May 12, 1935, Australia had a balance of 64 million bushels available for export and carry-over as compared with 111 million bushels on the same date a year ago. If the Australian carry-over on July 31, 1935, is placed at 50 million bushels, a balance of 14 million bushels remains for export during the remaining months of the present crop year.
Then turning to the last page I find figures which are very largely the same as those quoted by the Prime Minister last night. The balance of Canadian wheat for export and carryover in 1934 is estimated at
253,960,000,	and for 1934-35, 230,499,000. But then this significant statement is made:
April exports of wheat and wheat flour were slightly larger than those of the same month

Grain Board-Mr. Weir (Macdonald)
in 1934. In the nine months, August-April, however, the export movement has been 5-7 million bushels lower than that of the same months of 1933-34.
At May 1, 1935, supplies for export or carry-over were 230-5 million bushels.
That is very close to the figure which the Prime Minister gave. At the rate our present shipments are moving that would indicate that our carryover is going to be in the neighbourhood of 170,000,000 to 185,000,000 bushels. I just happened! to notice last night that for the week ended June 7, 1935, there left Canada 1,315,000 bushels of wheat; in June, 1934, 18,000,000 bushels went out; June, 1933, 16,000,000; June, 1932, 15,000,000; June, 1931, 20,000,000; June, 1930, 18,000,000. That compares with 1,315,000 for the week ending June 7, 1935. Multiply that by four and you have a little over five million bushels going out during the month of June, 1935. You would have to multiply your shipments per week by ten in order to compare with previous year's shipments for the month of June.
The Prime Minister went to considerable trouble to place on record' different figures. I think he would have been fairer if he had given the position with respect to Australia and the Argentine. He put on record that Russia's production had reached over one billion bushels in one year and that the United States average yearly production exceeded 800 million bushels. In checking over the figures it will be noticeable that in one year only Russia exceeded a billion bushels. In the case of the United1 States while it is true that the average over a long period of years has been more than 800 million bushels, for 1933 their crop was 528 million bushels and for 1934, only 496 million bushels. For these last two years they have had practically only half a crop and Canada has been in much the same position. Our position in the world with respect to grain movements should be better than it is.
Australia and the Argentine have adopted an aggressive selling policy with the result that their bins are empty, whereas considerable wheat has been left on the north American continent. Both the United States and Canada have had two short -crops but we are holding the bag as far -as the carryover is concerned. We regret to think of other countries having severe drought conditions but the fact remains that it has been a blessing to us that the United States had the misfortune of losing most of her crop last year and the year before. The net result is that most of the wheat carryover is in Canada.
One might ask the reason for this discrepancy in the sales of Canadian and Australian wheat. There is no doubt that our price relationship has been out of line. This afternoon the hon. member for Shelburne-Yarmoutlh put on record certain figures with regard to the price discrepancies between Argentine, Australian and Canadian wheat. I shall not repeat these figures in full but I should like to give them with respect to the fall months during which we do our heaviest shipping. The average premium of Canadian No. 2 northern ex Atlantic c.i.f. Liverpool, for the four months September 1 to December 31, over Argentine and Australian wheat was as follows:
Australian Argentine
1931		 8| cents over
1932	
1	cent	under	lj	cents	over1933	
3	cents	over	12|	cents	over1934	
14|	cents	over	22|	cents	over
To me these figures are significant, particularly when one considers that the logical time for wheat to move into export position in large quantities is in the fall months. Some (Observations have been made with respect to the selling policy for this country, and I would direct attention to the statement made recently by the former Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Stevens). That statement was put on record this afternoon and I shall not repeat it in full. This is one matter which should be looked into very carefully, the rumour that a prejudice is growing up against Canadian wheat in the importing countries, particularly Great Britain. I do not know whether these rumours are correct but I think they should be investigated. Another reason for the advantage of the Argentine in the selling of wheat is the condition to which the hon. member for Macleod (Mr. Coote) referred this afternoon, the difference in exchange. The policy in the Argentine with respect to wheat has been such that they have been able consistently to sell their wheat in the world market and at the same time give a price to their farmers which has allowed them a greater purchasing power in their own country than is given to the farmers in this country. There is another matter to be considered, one to which the Prime Minister alluded the other evening. There is a growing disposition among countries to want to trade goods for goods. The sooner this method of trading is appreciated by this and other countries of the world, the sooner we will arrive at a reasonable basis of doing business.
I should like to deal now with the bill itself. If this bill is to be put into effect

Grain Board-Mr. Weir (Macdonald)
I suggest to the Prime Minister that he include a provision whereby the board will be required to make a report to some responsible body. As :I see it, there is nothing in this bill to require this board to report to anyone. In this connection I should like to refer to the grain control board of the Argentine and quote from a publication of the Dominion Bureau of Statistics, as follows:
Just as the month of November closed, the ministry of agriculture gave publicity to the long expected statement as to the operations of the grain control board in respect of wheat.
I notice th'at this board has made a very detailed report with respect to its operations. For instance, it gives the monthly purchases, sales and cancellations and shows the stocks on hand at the end of each month. It then lists the expenses of the board, which are more than covered by the profits. It was originally estimated that there would be a loss of 50 million pesos on the operations of the board, but this did not occur. There is a final announcement by the Minister of Agriculture that the board will be in operation for another year. If the country is going to foot the bills for this board it has a right to expect some kind of report. I would also direct the attention of the Prime Minister to section 7 of the bill, which reads:
(b) to buy and sell wheat and, without restricting the generality of. such powers, to acquire from the Canadian Cooperative Wheat Producers Limited upon terms to be approved by the governor in council, all wheat or contracts to purchase or take delivery of wheat-
I submit that we have a right to know what obligations are to be taken over by this organization. I believe hon. members will remember the representations which I made with respect to certain operations in wheat in Manitoba. Personally I feel that this section cannot be allowed to pass without our receiving detailed information. I am not going to burden the house with full details, but I believe the Prime Minister will recall that representations were made with respect to the durum wheat handled by the Manitoba pool and then taken over by the central selling agency. In 1030-31 the pool accepted durum and common wheat from the growers at different prices. An initial payment was made of 70 cents per bushel for No. 1 northern and 64 cents per bushel for No. 1 durum. These prices were later reduced to 50 cents for No. 1 northern and 49 cents for No. 1 durum, but most of the wheat was accepted at 54 cents a bushel. The point in connection with it is this, that the durum wheat of that crop year was practically all sold at a substantial profit. It was estimated that it

brought in the neighbourhood of 67 cents a bushel, so that these people feel that they have a just claim against someone, and it is in this arrangement now that Mr. McFarland has been directing.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. gentleman
should be corrected at once. It is a matter between the organization of 1930-31 pool and the sellers; the government has nothing to do with it, directly or indirectly, remotely or near.


William Gilbert Weir: That may be.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not may be; it is so.


William Gilbert Weir: The situation at any rate is one which has not been cleaned up, and unless the pool organization or someone is going to make a statement which, will satisfy these people, I hope the Prime Minister will not be averse to having representations made with respect to it.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They were made last year and are on the record, in the journals of the house.


William Gilbert Weir: I do not wish to delay the house, but I wild say this. If I were criticizing the government at this time with respect to this legislation my severest criticism would be for bringing it in so late in the session. The farmers have already sown their crop. They sowed their crop feeling that the government was going to continue to peg the price. There is nothing in the bill to indicate that the government is going to do so.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The government did not peg the price.


William Gilbert Weir: The Prime Minister .may make the distinction, but I can hardly do so.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It was made in the committee last year, clearly.


William Gilbert Weir: I do submit, however, that the bill should have been introduced earlier in the session. The situation to-day is this. The farmers thought they had sold their last year's crop, and though it is true that they disposed .of it, they now find that there is about 200,000,000 bushels of it still in this country in competition with the crop they have just sown. There is prospect of a crop of 400,000,000 bushels this year, and we are glad that conditions have changed somewhat to make that possible. Under existing circumstances, and in view of the fact that the government is interested

Grain Board-Mr. Mackenzie King
in the wheat already on hand and that that wheat is going to be a factor in the marketing of next year's crop, I frankly do not see how any government could get away from establishing some organization in the form of a board or whatever you may call it to meet the present emergency. At the same time I would hesitate very much to endorse a proposition whereby, at this stage of the game, a permanent compulsory pool 'Organization or board should be established and set in motion to conduct the wheat marketing affairs of the country for years to oome.
I dislike to see the government go into the grain marketing business. I doubt if it is sound in principle and I hate to see it established. We had an effort on the part of the pool organizations in the west, to which I referred earlier, to establish a one hundred per cent pool which would have been a compulsory organization. The effort failed. We had also an attempt to establish voluntarily a coarse grain pool, but that was not successful. And recently we had a vote taken in connection with the poultry plebiscite, which certainly was not a very satisfactory vote, so far as compulsory pooling in Manitoba at any rate was concerned.
The whole situation is involved to such an extent that I doubt very much whether you will find1 the rank and file of the farmers very enthusiastic about being committed to a compulsory grain marketing organization. That I judge to be true of Manitoba at least. There is one other feature which perhaps should1 not be mentioned, but it is a fact nevertheless. A good many farmers in Manitoba consider that they have an advantage in marketing grain in that their harvesting period is usually earlier, thus allowing them to sell on an earlier, which is often a stronger, market. That may' be selfishness, but it is nevertheless a fact to be taken into consideration when judging human nature. With respect to coarse grains, that would affect mostly Manitoba. Over half the barley is normally produced in Manitoba, so that a coarse grain pool would be of considerable interest there. Again I say that past experience has shown that the initial payments on these grains are so small as to make it impossible under existing conditions for people to carry on, and I am afraid' there will not be much enthusiasm for a coarse grain pool. It did not work when tried before. My feeling at the moment is that if we could establish a grain board which would be in a position to take offers when the market fell below a certain point, and when the market was above that figure for everyone interested in the handling of grain to be free to market
in whatever way they saw fit, we would have the most satisfactory arrangement.
I confess that I cannot see that this organization as proposed at the present time will meet with very general favour in Manitoba. From the reports I have been receiving I am inclined to think there is a good deal of opposition to it. At the same time everyone knows that the situation at present cannot continue with any degree of satisfaction or certainly without some governmental assistance. And so I would vote for the second reading of the bill on the ground that the Prime Minister has indicated that it will go to a special committee where we can look into all the questions affecting the marketing of grain, and probably from that committee there would emerge a measure that would be satisfactory to all concerned. It is too important to become a mere political issue.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: Before the Prime Minister concludes the debate, I wish to make perfectly sure that- we have a correct understanding of the situation. I believe it is understood that the bill will, after second reading, go to a committee and that the Prime Minister when he speaks will indicate whether it will be a special committee or one of the select standing committees of the house. In supporting the second reading to this end, it is understood that the opposition is not thereby committed to any of the provisions of the bill, beyond the establishment of a grain board, with such powers as may be agreed upon. In other words, we support the second reading on the understanding that we reserve our right to propose without prejudice any amendment in committee. Especially do we reserve our right to regard this measure as one to deal with a pre'sent situation, an emergency situation, and not as necessarily establishing a permanent policy. Further, we reserve our right with respect to any compulsory features of the measure, our final approval with respect thereto to Ibe indicated only after the bill comes back from the committee.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is just possible there may be some other members who wish to speak. If I speak now I close the debate.


The Acting SPEAKER (Mr. Smith, Cumberland) :: I would direct the attention of hon. members to the fact that if the Prime Minister speaks now he doses the debate,


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is eleven o'clock.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Dominion Elections Act
[Stage Direction]
Friday, June 14, 1935