1935-05-21

Mr. JOHN VALLANCE (South Battle-ford) moved:: That the petition of Dora Eleanor Mathieson Campbell, of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, praying for a bill of divorce from James Oliver Clair Campbell, of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, together with the report of the clerk of petitions thereon, be referred to the standing committee on standing orders for the purpose of considering the suspension of standing orders 92 and 93 (3) (a) and (c) in relation thereto.
Motion agreed to on division.



PRIVILEGE-MR. SPENCE

[Stage Direction]
On the order for motions:
Mr. DAVID SPENCE (Parkdale):: Mr
Speaker, I rise to a question of privilege. Yesterday the hon. member for North Wellington (Mr. Blair), in making his protest against the spending of $1,000,000 for the construction of the tunnel under the western channel of the harbour of Toronto, talked about everything under the sun. In fact he talked about-

Santo Domingo Tariff


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Will the hon. member be good enough to state the question of privilege?


David Spence: I wish to correct a statement the hon. gentleman made about the hon. member for Parkdale; I assume I am the person to whom he was referring. He said that in 1930 he had been in Toronto and had seen some parades of the unemployed, and that he found these men wearing buttons and ribbons bought by the hon. member for Parkdale. I just wish to make the statement that I never bought a button or a ribbon. I never had anything to do with parades of agitators; I am not an agitator myself. I have never had to resort to mean tactics of that kind to defeat my opponent. If I cannot do it fairly I do not want to do it at all. For the last four or five elections my opponents in the constituency of Parkdale have been gentlemen, and I do not like to have a man come to this house and make statements of this kind.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I think the hon. gentleman has stated the question of privilege.



QUEBEC HARBOUR COMMISSION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. PIERRE-F. CASGRAIN ('Charlevoix-Montmorency) (Translation):	Mr. Speaker,
may I enquire from the hon. Minister of Marine (Mr. Duranleau) as to when I may expect the return promised by him in answer to certain questions appearing on the Order Paper of February 13 last? At that time the hon. Minister of Marine made the following statement:
I think the question should stand as an order for return and I shall table the information received from the harbour commission.
The questions referred to were in connection with the Quebec Harbour Commission. When I enquired as to that return, on the 5th of April, I was given the following reply by the hon. Minister of Marine:
Mr. Speaker, I shall inquire from the officials of my department; I hope to be able to bring down the return in a few days.
Hon. ALFRED DURANLEAU (Minister of Marine) (Translation):: Mr. Speaker, I
do not recollect whether we received the * papers before the adjournment of the house, in April last. I do not think so. However, I can promise my hon. friend that I shall make it a point to secure them between now and the end of the week, and that they shall be brought down.



SANTO DOMINGO TARIFF

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. R. B. HANSON (Minister of Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, at yesterday's sitting of the house, I promised the hon. member for Antigonish-Guysborough (Mr. Duff) that I would inquire into the position respecting the increased duties on Canadian and other products imported into Santo Domingo, and that I should give the house the exact position of this matter.
I would first of all like to make an explanation in regard to one statement which I made yesterday. I mentioned that long previous to the time he had brought this matter to the attention of the government in this house representations had been received in regard to it from exporters in Nova Scotia. I find on looking into the position that the matter was first brought to my attention in a telegram which I received from a firm in Halifax on March 12. The hon. member for Antigonish-Guysborough first brought this matter to the attention of the house in a question which he asked on March 13.
The position with respect to Santo Domingo is that in consequence of a revision of internal taxes in that republic made on March 13, 1935, by-law No. 854, known officially as "Taxes on goods for sale, use and consumption," additional duties are now being imposed which are particularly severe on certain Canadian products which have comprised our chief exports to Santo Domingo.
Dried and salted fish, formerly subject to the ordinary customs tariff of 2i cents per kilogram-about one cent per pound-


Mr. DUFF:: Two and a quarter cents,-not "one-quarter."


Richard Burpee Hanson: I said "two and a quarter cents per kilogram"-is subjected to a new internal tax of fifteen cents per kilogram-about seven cents per pound-making the combined duties eight cents per pound. There has also been an increase in the total duties on potatoes from 55 cents to $1.38 per bushel, and an increased duty on onions from 91 cents to S2.27 per 100 pounds. The department received strong representations from exporters in the maritime provinces, and a communication was addressed to the British minister at Santo Domingo with the request that efforts should be made to secure relief from the burdensome duties imposed on those products which Canada has chiefly been exporting to Santo Domingo. We are still awaiting a reply to these representations.
Santo Domingo Tariff


William Duff: Mr. Speaker, I do not know if
I may answer the minister, but I believe I may refer to it as a question of privilege. I appreciate the fact that he made the explanation he did make a few moments ago. I notice, however, that in his statement he said-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: The matter is not the
subject of debate. If the hon. member would like to ask a further question, he may do so, but I must observe the point is not a matter of argument at the present time; nor does any question of privilege arise.


William Duff: It seems to me there is a
question of privilege in connection with the statement I made yesterday and those made yesterday and to-day by the Minister of Trade and Commerce. To-day the minister states he received a telegram on March 12 from Pickford and Black. If hon. members would look at Hansard! for March 13, page 1663, they would find that the minister stated on that day:
I would say that a telegram was received this morning-

March 13-
-from Pickford and Black, but no other communications so far as I am aware have been received.
Consequently either the minister or his official was wrong, or there is something wrong with his statement made to-day.


Richard Burpee Hanson: There is
nothing wrong with the statement. The telegram came on March 12 and I did not see it until March 13.


William Duff: But the minister said " a telegram was received this morning -not that it came on the twelfth.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Received
by me.


William Duff: There is no question in my
mind that the minister got his telegram when I received mine which was about twelve o'clock noon on March 13. The minister has tried to give himself the credit, and has tried to place himself in a position which would indicate that he received the telegram before I did, in fact he stated yesterday he had received representations long previous to my bringing it before the house. He now admits he did not state the facts.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


William Duff: I can understand hon. members yelling " order," but I will not let the minister put this over, because I am in closer touch with the Santo Domingo situation than he or any other member of the government has been or is.



DUTY ON SALTED FISH

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Burpee Hanson: Mr. Speaker, yesterday the
hon. member for Bonaventure (Mr. Marcil) asked a question respecting the Italian duty on salt fish, and I should like to make the following answer:
Dried codfish, of which exports to Italy were about one-half million dollars in each of the calendar years 1933 and 1934, had been entering Italy free of duty up to September 24, 1931. On that date a special new duty of 15 per cent ad valorem was introduced and applied to imports in general, including codfish. There has been no change in the Italian tariff on codfish since that date.
An Italian royal decree law, effective on February 19, 1935, instituted an import licence system affecting practically all imports into Italy. The purpose of the system was officially

British Columbia Relief Camps
stated to be the maintenance of the value of Italian currency by reducing a rising adverse trade balance.
Import control is exercised by allowing the importation of fixed percentages of what was imported during the corresponding period in the year 1934. The percentage limits vary for different products and range from 10 per cent to 35 per cent, the percentage for codfish being fixed at 20 per cent. The quotas are fixed with reference to total imports into Italy, regardless of the country of origin and without discrimination against any particular supplying country. There is a provision, however, that imports may be increased from countries which agree to purchase Italian exports either by means of clearing agreements between the exporting country and Italy or by barter agreements between individual Italian and foreign firms.
Provision is further made for modifying these quota restrictions by means of trade agreements effected between Italy and other countries. In such case a larger quota may be allotted for the country concluding an agreement with Italy based also on a percentage of previous total imports. Shortly after the Italian quota restrictions came into force steps were taken to enter into negotiations with Italy for the conclusion of an agreement which would result in larger quotas being accorded to Canadian products. In this regard an offer has been submitted to Italy and we are now awaiting the outcome of the discussions which have taken place.



UNEMPLOYMENT RELIEF CAMPS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. ANGUS MacINNIS (Vancouver South):: I would like to direct a question to the Prime Minister in reference to the situation in Vancouver because of the presence there of a number of men from the unemployment relief camps. In this morning's paper-
I have the Ottawa Journal before me-there is the report of a statement made by the mayor of Vancouver when meeting a number of representatives of the men yesterday, and I should like to quote very briefly from the statement of the mayor, and then base my question upon what I have read. The mayor, in a telephone conversation I believe with the hon. Minister of National Defence (Mr. Stirling) said:
A condition exists which justifies the national government intervening to bring about a settlement which would avoid any clash betw'een the strikers, their sympathizers and
the police. Although I got no encouragement from Mr. Stirling that the national government would cooperate, he finally agreed to submit the proposal to Prime Minister Bennett.
I would ask the Prime Minister if this matter has been drawn to his attention and if he has any statement to make to the house.


Right Hon. R. B. BENNETT (Prime Minister) :: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. gentleman had been good enough to give me some intimation that he proposed to ask the question I would have brought with me papers that would have enabled me to deal with the matter in more detail. I shall be glad, however, to make a statement now subject to any corrections that may be necessary, relying entirely as I do upon my memory for the present statement.
In the early part of this year, as well as last year, representations were made by the provinces that they were unable to care for their unemployed without assistance from the federal government. The federal government did make contributions in money to enable the provinces to care for the unemployed, as is their constitutional duty.
Another question, however, arose with respect to transients, single unemployed men, and with respect to them the provinces other than Prince Edward Island urged that steps be taken by the federal government to provide entirely, so long as they remained in the camps, for the upkeep of these men-. The federal government acceded to that request and camps were established in every one of the provinces except Prince Edward Island for single unemployed men. These men were supplied with food, with shelter, with clothing, and a small per diem allowance for incidentals. There has been no trouble of any importance in any of the provinces except British Columbia.
The conditions under which these camps were maintained were three : First, that there should be the power of rejection with respect to applicants who were known to be of a troublesome character and whose introduction into the camps was solely for the purpose of making trouble. Secondly, there were no disciplinary measures contemplated or provided for. Thirdly, whenever an opportunity for work offered, any person who was in these camps might avail himself of that opportunity for work. In addition to that steps were taken where regular employment was offering to point out to those in the camps that the opportunity was afforded to them to find employment.
Last year the premier of British Columbia and his attorney general represented to this

British Columbia Relief Camps
government that they were experiencing great difficulties in connection with logging operations in that province through the activities of agitating communists. They had no hesitation in saying that that was so. In the month of April this year we were advised that a strike might be imminent in the camps in British Columbia, and the British Columbia authorities were advised accordingly. Might I state here what must be known to every member of this house, that the federal government under our constitution cannot take any steps towards the preservation of law and order or the administration of criminal law in any province of this confederation except at the request of the provincial authorities. We therefore cannot do any legal act with respect to those who are themselves engaged in illegal transactions except such action be taken at the request of the province.
Owing to the agitation that took place, owing to the action of the agitators in the camps of British Columbia, large numbers of the men left their camps and went into the city of Vancouver. The result was that there was a large number of unemployed single men from these camps who claimed that the province should supply them with sustenance. The province, of course, could very properly reply that they did have sustenance provided for them in the camps, but the men would not go back to the camps and have not gone back to them. In the meantime, for reasons that are best known to themselves, the provincial authorities have intimated that a duty was cast upon the federal government to expand its currency by a species of inflation and provide work and wages in that manner for those who had left the camps and gone to the city.
I have not yet sent a communication to the premier of British Columbia except in general terms when last night a message was dispatched to the mayor of Vancouver and a copy sent to him, for there is no medium of contact between the municipalities and the dominion with respect to matters of law and order. The province, and the province alone, is the competent authority with which the dominion deals, and can only deal so far as our constitution is concerned until it is amended from its present form. I have drafted a communication to the premier of British Columbia in which I have endeavoured to point out that if the province fails in its duty to prevent a condition of chaos and anarchy arising, if they fail in their duty to maintain law and order in the province of British Columbia, it will only be because they have not availed themselves of

the opportunity of requesting the federal government to lend them such assistance as may be required for that purpose, for until that is done any action on the part of this dominion would be wholly illegal and would be a compromising of our own position with those who may themselves be violating the law. Ever since there was the first intimation that in the province of British Columbia there was dissatisfaction it has always been maintained by the federal government that they are ready and prepared to discuss with the provincial government the situation in all its details. We have again repeated that position. But I do assert, and I believe I represent the considered opinion of every thoughtful man in this dominion, that as long as there are incentives being given to men to maintain a chaotic and anarchic condition in the city of Vancouver or elsewhere in the province of British Columbia, there can be no adjustment of differences or difficulties. The differences and difficulties, whatever they may be, the federal government will be glad to consider with the provincial government, but it is a condition precedent to any such action that law and order be maintained by those who are responsible for it, and if they are unable to do so that they call upon the federal government for such assistance as will enable them to do so. There can be no trifling with anarchy, there can be no playing with chaos, and so far as this government is concerned it proposes within the ambit of its power to be always ready and willing to assist those who are charged with that responsibility if they find themselves unable so to do themselves. But mob violence, mob threats, mob law will not be the means by which to deal with matters of this kind between the province of British Columbia and the Dominion of Canada.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Leader of the Opposition):: May I ask the
Prime Minister if I were right in understanding him to say that the only assistance asked by British Columbia was in the nature of inflation of the currency by the federal government?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No. I said involving inflation of the currency, providing work and wages, which is a favorite panacea suggested by the premier of British Columbia and the mayor of Vancouver for dealing with this problem.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Is that the
only form in which the request was made?

Loan Flotation


Richard Bedford Bennett: There may have been
other requests added to that. I have simply reviewed the facts as carefully as I could, speaking from memory and in view of the limited time at my disposal since I returned, but that is the fact as I read it from the communications that have come to the federal authority.



UNEMPLOYMENT BELIEF CAMPS-QUEBEC

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.
Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Quebec East):: With regard to these unemployment relief camps, may I ask a question of the Minister of National Defence. I was informed during the recess that at one of the camps in Quebec people from outside are engaged in masonry and other work and are receiving the full pay of their trades while the boys in the camps who are doing the same work are only receiving twenty cents a day. Is that to be the policy of the department in connection with these camps?


Hon. GROTE STIRLING (Minister of National Defence):: Would the hon. member be good enough to give me the name of the camp to which he is referring?


Ernest Lapointe: Valcartier.


Grote Stirling: In general terms, tradesmen are employed in small numbers. A certain number of carpenters, plumbers, masons and so on are employed but the balance of the work is done by the men receiving the ordinary allowance.



CANADIAN FARM LOAN BOARD

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.
Ernest Lapointe: Mr. Speaker, during the recess a new farm loan board was appointed and a change was made in the executive officers in the various provinces. I think the house is entitled to know what changes have been made and the reasons for the changes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The question of the hon. member for Quebec East (Mr. Lapointe) will be treated as a notice. In the absence of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Rhodes) I shall endeavour to have a statement prepared to be presented to-morrow. If that is not possible, it will be given later.
I snould like to supplement what I said a moment ago with respect to British Columbia. The premier of British Columbia asked for some additional mounted police assistance and I believe some eighty additional men were supplied for the purpose of maintaining law and order.



LOAN FLOTATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Bedford Bennett: 

CONVERSION OF LOANS

[Stage Direction]
Hon. W. D- EULER (North Waterloo): In view of the fact that a recent loan has been taken up at such favourable rates of interest I should like to ask the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) if it would not be worth while to refund the balance of the Canadian debt upon which we are now paying such high rates of interest.
Richard Bedford Bennett: No one should know better than the hon. member for North Waterloo (Mr. Euler) the difficulties attendant upon the conversion of loans as large as those of the Canadian government and the Canadian National Railways.


Mr. EULER:: I was not speaking of the
Canadian National Railways.


Richard Bedford Bennett: 
Mr. HOWARD:: Will the minister give us the callable features on the loan which has just been put out?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not have them before me.



PRIVILEGE-MR. DUBOIS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. LUCIEN DUBOIS (Nicolet) (Translation) :: Mr. Speaker, at the inquiry held
by the Board of Railway Commissioners at Victoriaville, on May 16, 1935, and at Nicolet on the following day, the 75,000 citizens that the subject-matter of the inquiry interested, as well as myself, were insulted by a public official.
The facts are as follows:
At the opening of the inquiry, Mr. Rand, the Canadian National Railways' advocate, gave evidence in English. We did not contest his right to do so. He was answered likewise in English by Mr. Wilfrid Gariepy, a lawyer from Three Rivers.
When the latter had finished testifying, I humbly submitted to the chairman, Mr. Napoleon Garceau, that inasmuch as the interested parties were all French Canadians and that the evidence given would have to be translated into English for the final hearing of the case, the inquiry should be continued in French.
Mr. Garceau cavalierly refused to grant my request and ordered the third witness to testify in English, on the ground that it was important, for the purposes of the case, to make a good impression on the Englishspeaking commissioners, and therefore it was better to use the English language.
This unfortunate remark-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: Might I ask ithe hon. member if he is asking a question?


Lucien Dubois: Yes.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I regret I cannot follow the bom. member and wonder if it would be possible to have the question in English.


Lucien Dubois: -implied
that the witnesses who testified in French did not serve the cause of the interested parties as well as those who gave evidence in English.
I strongly protested because the citizens of the Province of Quebec had to submit to such treatment-


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I understand that the hon. member states that 'he was insulted by a government official at am inquiry held under authority of the railway commission. That is not a matter of privilege dm this house. The horn, .member is out of order.. The incident to which he nefers occurred outside the house; it is not a matter of privilege.

Aemilius Jarvis Case



AEMILIUS JARVIS CASE

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. HUGH GUTHRIE (Minister of Justice):: I wish to bring up a question of privilege in regard to a press dispatch which appeared in the Ottawa newspapers of yesterday afternoon, amid which was brought to my attention by friends last night, in which a charge is mode, among other things, that the Minister of Justice was guilty of a gross breach of faith ini regard to an incident described in the newspaper article. The dispatch comes from Toronto, dated May 20, and is as follows:
Toronto, May 20.-(C.P.)-Hon. A. W. Roebuck, Ontario attorney-general, to-day started his inquiry into the case of Aemilius Jarvis, former Toronto broker, to determine if he will recommend to Hon. Hugh Guthrie, federal Minister of Justice, that Jarvis be granted a new trial.
In October, 1924, Jarvis, along with the late Peter Smith, provincial treasurer in the former Drury government, was convicted on a conspiracy charge. Smith was sentenced to three years in penitentiary and a joint fine of $600,000 with Jarvis. Jarvis was sent to county jail for six months. On appealing his sentence Jarvis' fine was reduced to $60,000 and in addition he was forced to make restitution of $140,000 profit allegedly made on a bond deal with the Ontario government.
Efforts to obtain a new trial were unsuccessful. When he renewed his plea, the government of Premier Hepburn instructed Mr. Roebuck to inquire into the case.
Criticism was voiced by Mr. Sedgwick, of the Ontario attorney-general's department against the Minister of Justice for turning over to Jarvis' lawyers "a private and confidential document" prepared by the attorney-general's department on the case after petitions had been presented to the federal minister asking a new trial.
"Unless I am mistaken, it is a gross breach of faith to hand over a private and confidential document to the party about whom it is written," declared Mr. Sedgwick.
"If the attorney-general's statements in the document are true, I don't see why it should be private and confidential," retorted Mr. Hayden.
"We are not trying the good faith of the minister at Ottawa," Mr. Roebuck interjected.
Two of my friends last night informed me that the amticle specifically charged me with being guilty .of a gross breach .of faith, and I have no doubt the public may consider it as a direct reference to myself-and as this dispatch has received very wide circulation throughout the province, of Ontario and probably throughout .the Dominion of Canada, I desire to enter a formal denial.
The incident referred to in this article* occurred in the month of December, 1928, nearly two years before I became Minister of 92582-186
Justice; but while speaking in my own defence, I think I may also join with myself my predecessor in that office and speak for him as well, because there is no foundation in fact, and nothing in the circumstances, to warrant such a statement being made by an official of (the Attorney General's department in Toronto either against myself or my predecessor. The incident was simply this. In 1928 application was made to my predecessor for .a new trial, and a communication' had been received by the Minister of Justice from the Attorney General' of Ontario in regard to the Jarvis case. Jarvis was represented, in the application for a new trial, by Mr. Aime Geoffriom, K.C., and Mr. A. G. Slaght, K.C., of Toronto. They asked- to see the communication received by the Minister of Justice from the Attorney General of Ontario, but as -is the rule in the department, all such communications -are considered private and privileged and they were informed that the document could not be handed to them. However, they said .that .they would like to see it in1 order .that they might be able to answer it, and the Minister .of Justice, the hon. member for Quebec East (Mr. Lapointe), instructed an official -of the department to communicate with the Attorney General of Ontario 'and obtain his view on the matter, as to whether the document should be handed over or not. Accordingly, on December 13, 1928, a .telegram was sent to thie Attorney General of Ontario by M. F. Gallagher of the remissions branch, which deals with questions of this kind. A reply was received the following day. While I have not the reply before me, I have the letter confirming it and I will* read it .to ithe house. It is dajted Toronto, December 15, 1928, and reads:
My Dear Mr. Gallagher:-
I confirm as follows telegram sent you yesterday,-
"M. F. Gallagher,
Chief Remissions Branch,
Dept, of Justice, Ottawa, Ont.
Re Aemilius Jarvis
The attorney-general for Ontario has no objection to the Minister of Justice submitting copies of his letter and enclosed memorandum to Mr. Geoffrion or others having the same interest. Writing.
E. Bayly."
As this was, I believe, all you wanted, I do not think it is necessary to make any further explanation.
Yours faithfully,
E. Bayly,
Deputy Attorney-General.
M. F. Gallagher, Esq.,
Chief of the Remissions Branch,
Department of Justice,
Ottawa, Ont.

Business oj the House

That is the whole incident, and on that a departmental official in the attorney general's department in Toronto states that the Minister of Justice has been guilty of a gross breach of faith, without naming the Minister of Justice and without giving the date of the incident. I bring it to the attention of the house because the article is thoroughly unfounded in fact and unwarranted in the circumstances.


Ernest Lapointe: I may say that as far as my memory serves me the facts of this matter are exactly as related by the Minister of Justice.



CANSO BAIT FREEZER

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. A. E. MacLEAN (Prince):: I wish to bring to the attention of the acting Minister of Fisheries the following press dispatch:
Ottawa, May 19.-Following representations from the Fishermen's Co-operative Unions to Hon. E. N. Rhodes, Minister of Finance, the dominion government has agreed to assist in establishing a modern bait freezer at Canso, N.S. The bait freezer will be an adjunct to the fish reduction plant already established there and a cold storage plant will also be provided.
May I ask the minister under what vote this allocation of money has been made to Canso, and whether similar consideration will be given other points in the maritimes.


Grote Stirling: I was not able to follow closely the question asked by the hon. gentleman. I shall be glad to read it in Hansard and give an answer.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Bedford Bennett: Yesterday reference was made to the question whether the house should sit on May 24. The government is entirely in the hands of the house and the wishes of the house will be respected, if hon. members have any wishes at all in the matter. I desire to make it clear that if they desire the house to sit it will sit; if not, it will not. Perhaps hon. members might think about the matter until to-morrow, when we will arrive at an official conclusion.



FURTHER LEGISLATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Richard Bedford Bennett: The leader of the opposition yesterday asked as to further legislation. Notices of five

measures are being placed on the order paper to-day, arising out of the price spreads commission's report. There are two or three other bills that arise out of that. There is the housing committee report on which legislation will be framed and a bill will be introduced to confer upon the government power to deal with the problems of what are called clearing house agreements and the sale of commodities through the use of exchange arising from the sale in our market of commodities of other countries. There may be some further departmental measures, but beyond those I know of nothing else. I think it well to say this to the right hon. gentleman and as soon as I have fuller information I shall furnish it to the house.
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING
(Leader of the Opposition): I thank the Prime Minister for the information he has just given to the house.
In regard to sitting on the twenty-fourth day of May, may I say at once that whatever the government decides will be wholly acceptable to this side of the house.



FRENCH TRANSLATION OF REPORTS OF COMMITTEES

Mr. E. R. E. CHEVRIER (Ottawa):: May I ask the Secretary of State when we may expect the French translation of the reports of the price spreads committee, the British North America Act committee and the housing committee?


Hon. G. H. CAHAN (Secretary of State):: In regard to the price spreads commission report, the translation was completed on Saturday last and the final pages of translation were sent to the king's printer, who has been at -work upon the printing of those pages yesterday and to-day. This may take another day. I cannot give a definite statement as to the exact number of hours required to complete the work.


Edgar-Rodolphe-Eugène Chevrier: What about the reports of the British North America Act committee and the housing committee?


Charles Hazlitt Cahan: I have no personal knowledge of those being before the bureau for translations, but I shall make inquiries.


Mr. TURNBULL:: The British North
America Act committee has not yet reported.



CANADIAN GRAIN BOARD

John Vallance: I would like to ask the Prime Minister if he can indicate to the house when we may

Public Works Program
expect to deal with the resolution now standing in his name proposing to set up a wheat board or at least a grain board?


Richard Bedford Bennett: When other business more pressing is disposed of that will be dealt with in due course.



PENSIONS FOE THE BLIND

[Stage Direction]
Mr. J. s. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre): When may we expect to have the report of the industrial and international relations committee dealing with the question of pensions for the blind?
Richard Bedford Bennett: It will be dealt with in due course on the order paper as I suppose the hon. gentleman knows.



PUBLIC WORKS PROGRAM


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Monday, May 20, consideration in committee of Bill No. 63, to create employment by public works and undertakings throughout Canada and to authorize the guarantee of certain railway equipment securities-Mr. Stewart (Leeds)- Mr. Morand in the chair.
On section 2-Authority to execute and complete works.
Mr. ELLIOTT:: When the house rose last night, I was answering some of the criticisms that .had been made of the attitude of hon. gentlemen on this side in regard to this bill. Since that time I have had an opoprtunity of seeing the order in council that was passed in 1913. One of the claims made and urged very strongly by my hon. friends opposite was that this was a compliance with an agreement that had been entered into at that time. I do not know that that is an altogether incorrect statement, but may I point out that so far as I am able to ascertain, no agreement was ever entered into between the government and the harbour commission. What took place was that an order in council was passed providing for the expenditure by the government of an amount that /was then estimated, including the bridges that have been referred to in this discussion, at $6,400,000. As regards the bascule bridge as a substitute for which the tunnel is now proposed, the estimate for that bridge has been referred to by some hon. gentlemen opposite as being $800,000. On looking at the order in council I find that the estimate for the two bridges, that is two bascule bridges, one over the 92582-1861
eastern entrance and the other over the western entrance to the harbour, is $800,000. One of those bridges is not now being asked for, and the western1 bascule bridge, as I understand the matter, would not cost any such amount as the $800,000 that has been mentioned. Those items may not be very material, but when my hon. friends opposite criticize the objections made to this bill and rather suggest that some hon. members on this side are objecting to this on the ground that it is wrong, I think they are not being quite fair to the committee. The fact is that whereas the estimate of the expenditure to be made by the government at that time was $6,400,000, the statement handed to me by the Minister of Public Works and read to the house last night shows that since that time the government have expended $9,542,459 in connection with the harbour of Toronto. Therefore it is quite apparent that the amount already paid is about one and a half times as much as the amount that was contemplated in the original order in council.
It is not the question of that difference that prompts me to take the objection that I have felt bound to take to this item. I realize how anxious members on both sides for that district are to have every expenditure possible made there, but there are many other districts that are not being given any expenditures at all at the present time. Further, as regards the airport which was given as the reason for building this tunnel, the plans of the airport as they appear at the present time seem to be dated at a time about April 25 and May 2, 1935, so that so far as the portion dated May 2 is concerned, the plans were made after this matter had been brought up in the house. We adjourned on April 17, so that those plans were prepared since this bill was introduced into the house with the suggestion that we should have only until six o'clock on the evening of April 18 in committee to consider whether the bill should go through as introduced.
Perhaps I have said everything that I can say in regard to the bill. I still feel at a time like this, that this is not the way in which public money should be spent. There are several other matters, as I and other hon. members on this side have intimated, upon which money could be more advantageously spent at the present time.
I do not know that I can add anything further; I do not want to take up more of the time of the committee, but I do think it my duty to direct attention to the fact that already about one and a half times the amount agreed upon, if you call the passing of the
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order in council an agreement-and I am not quarrelling particularly with that-has been spent.


David Spence: Then why mention it?


John Campbell Elliott: I mention it just to show my hon. friend that we are not bound by an agreement to go on and do this work, that there never was an agreement. There was an order in council; the amount contemplated in that order in council has been expended, and fifty per cent more than that amount has been spent up to the present time. I think that is a pretty complete answer to the agreement question. So far as the airport is concerned, that matter has been dealt with already. Of course no one contends that the airport was in contemplation when the order in council of 1913 was passed.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: Mr. Chairman, it
seems rather difficult for the ordinary member to determine, from what has been said in this discussion, just what really were the terms of the agreement. If it is an agreement I suppose we must go through with it, but I would join with others in urging that unless this is an iron clad agreement there are other ways in which this money might very well be spent to greater advantage. I suppose we cannot discuss railway crossings, housing and so on under this item-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Yes, we can.


James Shaver Woodsworth: We are trying to
adhere to some extent to the particular clauses under discussion, and under those circumstances I do not want to go into these other matters. I would urge, however, that the housing needs of this country in cities like Toronto, Montreal, my own city of Winnipeg, and Vancouver are of very much greater importance than a matter of this character. In addition, the hon. member for St. Boniface (Mr. Howden) pointed out that some of our cities have other very urgent needs. In my own city, for instance, there is the sewer scheme that is now hanging fire because of the difficulty of financing it. As I have listened to the discussion it has seemed to me that to provide a tunnel as part of a harbour scheme is stretching things just a little bit; it would seem as though this is a little aside from what we ordinarily consider to be definitely connected with harbour developments. I find a further difficulty in knowing whether we ought in any way to submit these matters to the city of Toronto or the authorities of that city. The Prime Minister has taken the stand that this federal government cannot deal with individual municipalities. If that

be the case, in this matter it is difficult for us to deal with any other body than the province of Ontario.
I think I should submit to the committee a telegram I have just received from the mayor of the city of Toronto which indicates the viewpoint at least of the civic authorities and which may help clarify the issue so far as that point is concerned. It is dated May 21, and reads as follows:
Anything less than the whole of the million dollars for a tunnel from Toronto's mainland to Hanlan's point of Toronto island will be regarded as discrimination against Toronto in the light of its needs and its importance, and opposition to this project does not represent views of majority of city council, board of trade and labour men generally. This fact should 'be made clear to the members of the House of Commons.
That is signed by Mayor James Simpson. I read this telegram, as indicating the point of view of the city of Toronto itself, but the telegram does not alter my view that whatever may be thought by the city of Toronto with regard to this particular expenditure of money, on the whole there are other ways in which the money could be expended at this time to very much greater advantage.


Mr. CHURCH:: Does the former Minister of Public Works propose to make a Scrap of paper out of this agreement of 1913, under which the city of Toronto has spent about 88,000,000, the federal government $8,000,000, and the harbour commission some $28,600,000? I was in the office formerly occupied by the ex-minister when Mr. Rogers was Minister of Public Works, and at that time Mr. Rogers insisted that the work should go on under this agreement at once. He wanted the city to put a spade in the ground first, and we did so. He insisted on a new harbour, starting with the breakwater just beyond Queen's wharf, and that work has been completed with the exception of the work in connection with these two bridges. So I say this is a contract. As the hon. member for West Middlesex (Mr. Elliott) has said, it is true that a tunnel is not mentioned in that agreement, but two bridges to cost $400,000 each are, and at the present estimate one of these bridges will cost about $1,000,000; so it does not make any difference which is built, so far as cost is concerned. The cost of labour and material has gone up, and it is estimated that it will take in the neighbourhood of $1,000,000 to build one of these two bridges. In addition, a bridge is not a modern means of transportation in connection with waterways.

As a member from the city of Toronto, which has spent all this money in good faith, I feel it my duty to say something about what were nothing less than misstatements of fact. I do not wish to use that term, 'but I must say hon. gentlemen opposite did not know the facts. Yesterday it was stated that there were only two or three hundred people on the island, interested in this project. I wonder if hon. gentlemen opposite know how many people visit the island annually. Last year nearly two million passengers were carried to the island by the ferry boats. I should like to read two or three short sentences from the report concerning the operation of the ferries:
The island ferries, now owned by the city, were transferred to the management of the Toronto transportation commission in February, 1927. The fleet comprises six ferry boats and three freight craft, operating between the city mainland and the group of islands, part of the city, situated about two miles off shore. Ferry and freight service is provided between the mainland and three island points-Centre island, Hanlan's point and Ward's island. The oneway trip to any of these points is made in about fifteen minutes.
The ferry service was formerly operated by a private concern; then it became part of a system known as the Toronto Ferry Company. One of the principal directors of that company was Mt. Beatty, father of the president of the 'Canadian Pacific Railway, who was interested in this company from the time it was started. That company never made any money; it simply provided a service to the people of Toronto. I should like to say a word also with regard to some misstatements that have been made concerning Toronto harbour. In 1911 an act was passed relating to Toronto harbour. That was the constitution under which the harbour was developed, and I contend that Toronto harbour is purely a federal undertaking. The western entrance is owned by the government; the land covered by water is government property, and the eastern entrance is also owned by the government. Until recently even the life saving stations were government property. The turning basin at Ash-bridge's bay and all these points referred to in this bill are federal property as well. The Toronto harbour commission sends the Minister of Public Works and the Department of Marine the very same government reports that are sent by the other eighteen harbours under the control of this government.
The ferry service has become out of date; it is a relic of the ox cart days. There is a ferry boat called the Luella, taken off this spring which was built in 1880 and used to
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be the judges' boat in the days when there were boat races when Edward Hanlan rowed Wallace Ross of Halifax on Toronto bay for the single sculls championship of the world. I have before me the shipping list, and on the list I find the Trillium which, I believe, is their best boat, and which was built in 1910. The Bluebell was built in 1906, and the remainder are boats which are relics of the ox cart days.
I will tell you that the ferries cannot carry the crowd. It is a wonder to me there have not been some accidents. The two entrances to the harbour are under the control of the government; and some government docks are under the control of the government. The proposed tunnel will be the property of the parliament of Canada, the King represented by the Minister of Public Works. They will own the tunnel,-not the city of Toronto or the harbour commissioners, and they will place rights of user in it in the city and harbour board. It as proposed that the tunnel will cross the channel at the western entrance. All the property surrounding the entrance to Toronto harbour is under the control of the Department of Public Works and the Department of Marine and Fisheries. The harbour board has to make a return to the government. This tunnel when built, will cross a navigable stream, the western channel and would be subject to all federal harbour laws. It will come under the Navigable Waters Protection Act.
Last night an hon. member suggested the money should be spent on housing. May I remind the house that housing is receiving special attention, and that a discussion of a housing scheme is at this time out of order under the anticipation rule. I admit Canada up to the present time has done nothing with the problem of housing, and that proper housing is badly needed. Undoubtedly that condition applies in the city from which I come. I sat as a member of the committee investigating the housing problem. The statement was made last night that some of the million dollars must be spent in slum clearing. May I say that I do not know of any city which has done more to remove level crossings than has the city of Toronto. The city has spent $8,000,000 for the building of viaducts to eliminate level crossings along the waterfront. In the present year Toronto has in its estimates a vote of a million dollars to be spent in the elimination of level crossings. That sum wall be paid out of direct revenue or income and twenty per cent will be borne by and will come from the taxpayers of the city.
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Last evening one hon. member from Wellington spoke about St. John's ward. The condition in St. John's ward has been greatly improved. For the information of hon. members may I say that this particular ward is an old section of the city bounded by University avenue, Yonge street, Bloor street and Queen street. It comprises two-thirds of the district back of the city hall, running up to College street and including the new hospital, some buildings owned by the T. Eaton Company and some other large buildings. Two-thirds of that section has been cleaned out and only a small part remains to be improved.
Last evening I stated that the board of trade had passed a resolution endorsing the scheme. May I observe that I referred to the board of trade, and not to the council and board of control of the city. May I say to the hon. member for West Middlesex that I think the present harbour board were badly advised when they did not choose first to go before the city council, as I used to do when I was a harbour commissioner. In that way I informed the city council as to what we were going to do. No doubt a mistake was made when that was not done, and I hope it will not happen again. I must say however that the city council has not yet met to pass judgment on the building of the tunnel. It was almost unanimous in approving the erection of bridges, as were ratepayers' associations and other public bodies.
I can tell the committee why the bridges were not built; it was simply because the city and the harbour board wanted to have finished the $8,000,000 breakwater first from Bathurst street to the Humber. As chairman of the commission I attended a conference with the late minister, who gave us every assistance. Upon that occasion we asked to have the bridges included. I believe the hon. member for Parkdale was with me, and he will remember that we were told we would get one of these things. We were asked by some of the harbour people, and by some others to allow the matter to stand until the next year in order to obtain the necessary amount of money to finish the breakwater and the improvements at Sunny-side.
The city of Toronto has a large investment in Toronto island. It is not correct to state that only 200 or 300 people would be affected. I say there are more than a million people in the Toronto district interested in this matter; they are keenly interested in having the island used by more people all of the time rather than

by few people some of the time. Who are the 75 per cent of the island people whom the hon. member for West Middlesex described as being opposed to the building of the tunnel? Where do they come from? Are they ratepayers in the city of Toronto? I think he is referring to the two or three hundred people who live on the island and are opposed. There are at Ward's island about two hundred cottages. Centre island has lots of cottages, and Hanlon's island also forms a park larger than exhibition, park. The park at Centre island consists of 331 acres, and part of the remaining area is a lagoon. In addition to that, the city has millions of dollars invested in water service intake pipes, pumping stations, water tunnels, and a filtration plant on the island. There is a sick children's hospital established by the late John Ross Robertson, a man of great heart. This institution has been established on Toronto island to take care of the smaller children of that wonderful institution during the summer months. Then, in addition there is the Royal Canadian Yacht club and many other aquatic clubs. There is a regatta course, and the additional attraction of a Coney Island at Hanlan's point. These are places which attract great numbers of people during the summer months. Ten times more would go, however, were it not for the difficulty of reaching the island by ferry. If any hon. member would care to go down to the foot of Bay street next Friday, May 24, he would see women struggling with small children, trying to get off street cars. Then they would have a long walk to reach the ferry boat, and a long walk after they got off the ferries, and would have a long stop-over at Hanlan's point. If hon. members could see the discomfort and inconvenience these people are caused they would not oppose changing the plans from the building of a bridge to the building of a tunnel. If a tunnel were built street cars would go through, and in about three or four minutes passengers boarding the cars in the city could be taken to the western end of the island. Undoubtedly the original harbour scheme received support in 1911 because of the inclusion of the provision for the building of bridges so that people would be able to get to the island and use it.
Only a very small percentage of the people of Toronto visit the island. In the city there are about 700,000 people and another three or four hundred thousand in the immediate vicinity. Many more of those people would use the island, if it were more easily reached. In addition to that picnics would come from five or six townships nearest the city. The corporation owns the radials and the buses, and

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even at the present time picnics come to Toronto from points as distant as Hamilton and the section of the country north of that city. Even now some of them use the ferries to go to the island on a picnic, and I say that if we had the tunnel our buses and other forms of transportation would -be able to handle the crowds.
Last night we heard the hon. member for North York (Mr. Mulock). Something was said also about works for the general advantage of Canada. Some time ago we used to hear that the Newmarket canal would be a work for the general advantage of Canada. Now, if you please, the town of Newmarket has forgotten all about the general advantage of Canada and the celebrated canal. They have relegated those things to the ox cart days. Approaching the town of Newmarket on the main entrance to the town proper, we behold a sign in letters the size of that clock, and what do we see? We read nothing about the Newmarket canal or the general advantage of Canada. No,-what is on it? "Newmarket, the home of the Newmarket junior O.H.A. champion memo-rial cup holders (Dominion champions".) That is the advertising done by the town of Newmarket,-now, they do not even talk about the famous canal.
Then many other matters are mentioned as not being for the general advantage of Canada. The hon. member for Halifax had something to say about it last night. May I say he was in my riding of East Toronto, and I was glad to see him down there. In Toronto harbour we have several boats which came with cargoes from Halifax. I have before me an interesting harbour booklet which contains illustrations showing crowds of people at the island-not 200 people, as we have been told. Here we see an illustration of the lagoon, and here are a dozen war canoes in a race and regatta. We have an illustration of a Dominion day regatta with crowds three times the size of those attending the Canadian Henley, or the Canadian Canoe Association Annual regatta. This book has a picture of a boat from Halifax, the Moyra, unloading sugar in Toronto harbour. Look at these pictures of the ships in the harbour, and the elevators, and the oil tankers. The tonnage using Toronto harbour has gone up from 200,000 to nearly 3,000,000 tons. Look at all these new steamers and the development that has taken place all over the harbour. And the taxpayers of Toronto have paid S28,000,000 for these improvements. Toronto harbour is not like Montreal harbour or Quebec harbour, which do not pay their interest, but the taxpayers of Toronto have to pay for the upkeep of their harbour, and they have contributed the
annual deficits also. This book gives the history of the western entrance and of Toronto island. This western entrance was a work for the general advantage of Canada. It goes back to 1804 as set out in John Ross Robertson's Landmarks of Toronto, away back in the fifties and sixties. It goes back to 1804, and the war of 1812, when this western entrance stood right beside the old fort which was captured by the Americans in 1812. As I say, this book gives the history of the western entrance and of Toronto island. Toronto island is nothing but a huge sand bar acting as a breakwater to protect Toronto harbour.
My hon. friend from Shelbume-Yarmouth (Mr. Ralston) wants a bridge built to Sable island, where he says there are one hundred fishermen. I can tell him that Toronto is going to send some people down to represent Toronto at Halifax next summer. We are going to send down two or three "eights" from the Argonaut Rowing Club, and if my hon. friend is in the city of Halifax at that time these visitors from Toronto may be able to tell him what kind of a harbour we have. Our harbour is fifty per cent beautification and fifty per cent industrial development. My hon. friend has been more or less of a free trader. Does he want this bridge built to Sable island for one hundred fishermen according to the laws of supply and demand? The Liberal party in the maritime provinces has opposed subventions and bonuses and subsidies for coal, and very little coal was moved under their administration, but under the policy of the Conservative government 2,800,000 tons of coal has been moved to the head of the lakes. There are nearly 400,000 tons of coal to-day on boats in this ship channel shown in this book, as compared with 10,000 tons not so many years ago.
Here is shown Hanlan's Point where the old baseball park was, and as many as 150,000 people would go over there to watch the ball games, and to the three islands on a holiday, going across the bay on the old ferries.
So far as this tunnel project is concerned, let me say that the city of Toronto has done nothing but pay, pay, pay all the time. We have a life-saving station which has cost the city taxpayers nearly 880,000 a year with equipment, and we provide a life-saving service for the whole of lake Ontario, for the Georgian bay district, and the Muskoka district. Whenever an accident happens on the water they phone for Toronto's life-saving equipment, and it is sent all over the province at no cost to this government at all.
The hon. member for St. James (Mr. Rin-fret) says that Toronto -harbour cannot be compared with Montreal habour. Of course
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Mr. FACTOR:: I should like to ask the minister one or two questions. How long will it take to complete the proposed tunnel? How much work will be done in 1935 and will the work be carried out under the supervision of the Department of Public Works?


Mr. STEWART (Leeds):: I will answer the questions in the reverse order to which they have been put. Upon a review of the history of this proposition it will be found that the matter was presented to council through the Department of Public Works. Any work which has been done in Toronto harbour by the dominion government has been done through that department. This bill contains a provision, to which I referred last night, that any work to be done under it will be assigned by the governor in council to such department as is thought -best under the circumstances. In view of the history of this project, one would expect that the Department of Public Works will be in charge. I hope so as that department is familiar with everything which has been done. As to when the work will be completed, that will depend upon the terms of the contract. The preparation of plans and specifications will not be difficult and I would think that a very substantial- part of the work could be done
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during 1935. This work is not seasonal and could be carried on through the winter. I cannot speak definitely as to how much work will be completed during 1935, but it should be a substantial part.
There were one or two other matters which were mentioned. The former Minister of Public Works (Mr. El'liott) gave an estimate of the cost of these two bridges. The amount he stated is the amount in the order in council but he should remember that that was passed back in 1912 or 1913. As he knows, the cost of construction has almost doubled since that time, so that while the estimates were probably correct at that time they are not applicable to the present day. My hon. friend is correct in saying that there was no formal agreement but the effect of the provisions of the order in council is to make it an agreement. The order in council provides what each is to do and gives further details. There is no time specified during which the work shall be done. My hon. friend referred to certain work which had been done since but the terms of the agreement are not specific and the fact that an agreement was made with regard to certain developments does not prevent a contribution being made by the dominion government toward the construction of other works.


Mr. RALSTON:: The hon. member for
East Toronto (Mr. Church) made a remark with regard to what I had an opportunity of saying last night respecting assistance in providing facilities for connecting the mainland of Nova Scotia with Cape Sable island. I want to correct the hon. gentleman's geography. I was not talking about Sable island but about Cape Sable island, which is a very different place. I was speaking about the possibility of helping to provide communication across the sheet of water known as Barrington passage to Cape Sable island, where there are, not one hundred fishermen as my hon. friend suggests but between three and four hundred, and where the dealers live who serve that whole area in the collection of fish and the sale of it in foreign and Canadian markets. Apparently my hon. friend did not get the gist of what I was trying to propose, but I suggested that work under this particular act should be work which, if possible, should make people self-dependent, and provide needed facilities for better transportation between the mainland and Cape Sable island, on which there is the thriving town of Clark's Harbour, with a population of a thousand or twelve hundred citizens; and a surrounding community of probably eight hundred more. I suggested

that if we are providing relief works we could well help to provide communication between the mainland and that island so as to enable these people to get their product off to market under proper conditions and at cheaper cost than are possible under the present system. In doing that, it seemed to me, we should be helping people to help themselves; we should be providing employment in connection with the work to be done. It seems to me that such a facility would assist these people in earning a living. Now I am not in the slightest measure setting up Nova Scotia as against Toronto; I am simply comparing the benefits of the work I suggest in connection with Cape Sable island with what my hon. friend has said regarding the benefits which would result from the Toronto project. The hon. gentleman said quite plainly that this tunnel is for the purpose of providing communication between the city of Toronto and this holiday place, this picnic place, this summer place, whatever it may be-and I do not use these terms in any offensive or facetious sense- where people, may enjoy themselves. He said that the purpose was to provide such communication so that people might get to the island cheaply and easily. Now that is not helping people to make a living; it is merely helping them to enjoy themselves. It is providing cheaper transportation, I grant. But if we attempt out of the dominion treasury to provide for cheaper transportation to the people in the different cities on their tramways or in connection with their ferries or their bus services, then it strikes me that whatever funds we may have at our disposal will soon be exhausted. I am trying to impress on the committee and on my hon. friend from Toronto the fact that such is not the object of the sort of expenditures which are being made under this bill. We could find many places where we could contribute towards the people's comfort and happiness and at the same time fail to carry out the principle of this special public works legislation. These public works are being built as relief works, to provide employment, and in the second place they are being built for useful purposes to produce revenue and to assist people in making a living. But this tunnel does not fulfil that second requisite. My hon. friend is quite frank when he says that we do not realize the possibilities to all the people of Toronto which this tunnel will afford. Let me tell him that we do realize them; but we submit with deference that there are many other projects which will better carry out the objects of legislation of this kind.

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My hon. friend has based his contention on the ground that a promise was made. I submit to this committee that if for twenty-two years our friends on the other side have permitted their consciences to be so elastic that they did not feel called upon to fulfil this promise, then they might at least leave the matter another year or more and feel that they are not wounding their moral sensibilities very much. No one I have heard has answered the strong point that has been made, that this matter has been allowed to stand for twenty-two years. If it could stand for that length of time why can we not wait another year until financial conditions are better? But apart from that the former Minister of Public Works has pointed out that, if we are talking about promises, the promise or understanding or undertaking set out in that order in council was that the dominion government should spend $6,400,000. That undertaking, according to the figures given by my hon. friend, has been more than carried out.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: They were to spend that amount on certain specific projects.


James Layton Ralston: My hon. friend points out that it was for certain specific projects; but whether it was for certain specific projects or not, the government has spent, as a matter of fact, not $6,400,000 but over $9,000,000 in connection with works relating to the harbour of Toronto. So that I do not think it behooves anyone to throw it in our faces that we are repudiating our obligations to the city of Toronto or the Toronto harbour commission when we have spent nearly fifty per cent more than the amount involved in the original order in council. I really feel that that is the weakest ground on which the Minister of Public Works could possibly base his case, because no one can justify rushing in in 1935 to implement a promise that has been allowed to lie dormant for twenty-two years. As I have pointed out there are promises made by my hon. friends opposite which need to be implemented much more urgently than this old promise. There was the promise of old age pensions to Nova Scotia-one hundred per cent was to be paid. For the last five years Nova Scotia has been paying twenty-five per cent which the Prime Minister promised in 1930 would be paid by the dominion. Why not fulfil that promise, if the treasury is full enough to be able to provide for these other things. Then there is the Halifax-Dartmouth bridge, which was promised in the 1925 election. I remember
that celebrated circular, "Vote for Black and Quinn and get the Dartmouth bridge," or something to that effect. Why not fulfil that promise? And without extending the record, there are a good many promises made by my hon. friends which are more urgent than this twenty-two year old one, and I repeat that the obligations of the dominion under that order in council were fairly well carried out by the expenditure of over $9,000,000 instead of the $6,400,000 mentioned in the order in council. I remind you also, Mr. Chairman, that the hon. member for Toronto gave us the real reason why the bridge was not built. He said it was because the harbour commission would rather have the money spent in extending the breakwater. But now the Minister of Public Works proposes that although as desired by the commission we spent the money in connection with the breakwater instead of the bridge we should now provide twice the cost of the bridge by building a tunnel. As the former Minister of Public Works points out, the bridge would have cost $400,000. The present Minister of Public Works thinks that is below the amount it would cost to-day in view of the difference in the value of money. Well, let us say $600,000, and even then it does not come up to the $1,000,000 proposed for this tunnel.
Mr. Chairman, the last reason is one in which I am myself most interested, and that is that this tunnel should be built to assist in the establishment of an airport for Toronto. That involves a larger question than this committee is called upon to deal with under the terms of this vote. That involves the question whether the federal government shall change the policy which it has followed ever since airports have been established, which is, that municipalities shall pay for the airport and what the federal government shall do, is, as I said last night, to provide the lighting-and I find that the federal government provide only about one-half the cost of lighting-and some of the accessories. If it is felt that the dominion government ought to change that policy and that for some reason or another the city of Toronto, on account of its national importance-it is frequently called the queen city of Canada- and on account of its situation and the potential traffic is entitled to special consideration, then everyone in this committee is prepared to consider representations along that line. But until those representations are made and that matter of policy is before the committee with the reasons given for it and properly discussed, I submit that the rule followed in connection with Vancouver
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Mr. GOTT:: The hon. member will use
that much in hot air if he keeps on.


James Layton Ralston: My hon. friend certainly knows as much about hot air as anybody.
Item 7 of schedule agreed to.
On item 8-Buildings and improvements, Department of Agriculture, $500,000.


Mr. CASGRAIN:: Might we ask the Minister of Agriculture to give us some details regarding this item of $500,000 which is described as buildings and improvements to be carried on under the direction of the Department of Agriculture?


Hon. ROBERT WEIR (Minister of Agriculture) :: The main item is a building to be
erected on the experimental farm at Ottawa combining not only a number of different divisions of the experimental farm system but also a number of other branches in the Department of Agriculture. It will be a combined building dealing chiefly with the different divisions in biology. That will release some other space that is badly needed, for instance, in connection with work undertaken in regard to poultry, and it will also leave free some very old buildings that we feel are no longer suitable for the work done in them. In addition to this there will be smaller buildings built on practically all the experimental farms throughout the dominion. A very extensive building is contemplated in Fredericton in connection with the experimental farm there to provide more adequate facilities for the research work that has been carried on there and that it is hoped to extend in connection with potato diseases and so forth. As regards the experimental farm at Ste. Anne de la Pocatiere, there are to be buildings erected for the housing of live stock and a new residence will have to be built to replace the one that was destroyed very recently by fire. The other buildings are all of a smaller nature than the ones I have outlined and will be distributed throughout practically every experimental farm in the system with the exception of one or two which under this vote have no provision for any buildings on them.


Charles Benjamin Howard: Mr. Chairman, this is the eighth item on this list, and I should like to ask the minister if anything is included in the item for the experimental farm at Sherbrooke.


Robert Weir: Which experimental farm does the hon. member mean?


Charles Benjamin Howard: The Lennoxville farm.


Robert Weir: Yes, there is a horse barn at an estimated cost of $5,000, and some smaller buildings.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: I should like to ask the minister if any amount of money has been appropriated for the construction of buildings at St-Joachim, in the county of Montmorency, where part of the farm is under the control of the federal government.


Robert Weir: That is the horse farm?


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Yes.


Robert Weir: So far as I know
there are no -buildings to be constructed there this year. My understanding is that no further buildings are required to carry on the work.


Mr. DONNELLY:: Is any of this money
to ibe used for the construction of buildings on any of the experimental farms in the province of Saskatchewan?


Robert Weir: Yes, on practically all those farms.


James J. Donnelly: Could the minister let us know what they are?


Robert Weir: At Swift Current
there will be an extension to the office and laboratory for the study, particularly, of soil drifting and for drought investigations on a larger scale, and an entomological laboratory is also included at an estimated cost of $25,000. At Scott there will be a new poultry building, which will cost approximately $600. At Indian Head some smaller buildings will be erected. At Melfort a granary and a seed cleaning plant will be erected, as well as a herdman's house and an implement shed.


John Campbell Elliott: What are the respective
costs?


Robert Weir: The estimated cost is $3,000 for the first, $2,000 for the second and $2,000 for the third.


Mr. MOTHERWELL:: On former occasions I felt it my duty to criticise my hon. friend for cutting and chiselling into his own estimates. From what I can gather at this distance I would conclude that most of this $500,000 is to be spent on the various experimental farms throughout Canada. I wonder if I am correct in my understanding that a portion of this money is to be spent for an administration building at the central experimental farm here at Ottawa. I think an appropriation was made last year for that work. If it is a fact that part of this money
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will be used to start and possibly finish that new administration building, I have nothing but commendation for the minister. There is, however, a significance about the spending of all this money at this time. Apparently my good friend has been saving up his money for the last four years in order to make a final splurge this year. I hope I am not doing him any injustice when I make that statement; it may be only a coincidence. I hope he will not suffer any great disappointment if the anticipated political advantages do not materialize. I think the people affected will appreciate the proper expenditure of the money, but whether it will have any particular effect on the major coming event that is in our minds just now is another question. The experience of past years, especially of the provincial elections of last year, would seem to show that large expenditures made for no particular purpose except to throw money around have not had a very desirable result so far as the government has been concerned, so I am warning my hon. friend not to expect too much in a political way from these expenditures. However, I commend him for doing this on behalf of agriculture, so long as it is for a practical purpose that will produce revenue or perform some useful service. I am bound to commend the expenditure from that angle, if not from the other standpoint already alluded to.
I do not like the thought of squandering the people's money, especially when it is for no good purpose. Look at what we have been discussing for the past two days, a tunnel to connect Toronto with Hanlan's Point. Does anyone think that is going to bring in any revenue to the state or help agriculture or industry or business in Canada? Not at all; no revenue can come from any such expenditure, nor does it perform any particular necessary service. To the extent that this item differs from the preceding item I feel like commending it, supplementing my words with a further warning to the minister not to expect too much politically from such last hour expenditures as these.


John Campbell Elliott: Might I ask the minister
as to the distribution of this money in Ontario, other than at Ottawa?


Robert Weir: Before answering
that question I should like to refer to the point raised by the hon. member for Melville. The larger biological building, which I mentioned before, is a new building; that has nothing to do with the administration building, for which an appropriation was made last year. This is in addition to that building.

With reference to Ontario, at St. Catharines a new laboratory is to be constructed, at an estimated cost of $5,000, and some smaller buildings. At Harrow, Ontario, a new tobacco barn is needed, due to the extension of the work, which is estimated to cost $3,000, together with some smaller buildings. At Delhi a new building is to be constructed, a flue cured kiln, estimated to cost $500.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: I should like to ask the minister whether he is going to have the direction and supervision of the letting of the contracts for these works.


Robert Weir: Yes.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Are the plans being
prepared by officials of his own department or by officials of the Department of Public Works?
Mr- WEIR (Melfort): By officials of the Department of Agriculture.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: So the minister is going to become a contractor?


Robert Weir: No, there will be
no difference in that respect.


James Layton Ralston: Is that so? The minister says there will be no difference in that respect. Generally speaking, as I understand it, the Department of Public Works has acted as the contractor or builder, or if the minister will permit me to use the expression, the mechanic, for the other departments. Is it the practice now for each department to have its own architectural staff, its own engineering staff and its own staff for the purpose of considering tenders and inspecting work?


Robert Weir: I believe the custom, in the past, and the present custom, has been that with reference to the central experimental farm at Ottawa the architectural work and supervision is looked after by the Department of Public Works, but that on the farms outside of Ottawa it is done by the experimental farms branch.


James Layton Ralston: Has the minister a staff
of architects or engineers?


Robert Weir: There is one
architect, and I think he has an assistant. That has been the practice in the past.


James Layton Ralston: Is the inspection carried
on by local engineers or architects?


Robert Weir: I do not know if
I am in a position to answer that. The buildings are on the experimental farm plan, and consist chiefly of standard buildings, and they are supervised by the department.

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James Layton Ralston: Perhaps the minister does not understand my question. I assume that some day we will see an advertisement in the paper signed by the minister or his deputy calling for tenders to do certain work. Tenders will be received and will be inspected by his deputy minister, and an award will be made. Then some person will have to see that the contractor carries out the work. Someone will have to be the engineer under the contract to inspect the work. Will that be a permanent official of the Department of Agriculture, or will it be a local engineer employed for that special purpose?


Robert Weir: An official of the
department in some instances.


James Layton Ralston: Will that official be an
architect? Will he be called upon to go around to those different places and inspect?


Robert Weir: It is exactly the
same system as has been followed in the past. It would not be necessary to have an architect go from the city of Ottawa to inspect the building of a residence or the building of these granaries and plants I have mentioned. Of course a good deal of the work will be done by day labour but it will be supervised as it has been in the past.


James Layton Ralston: The minister uses the
expression "as it has been in the past"; what does he mean?


Robert Weir: By officials of the
department.


James Layton Ralston: I am trying to find out
what officials the department have who could check up and ascertain whether or not a contractor has complied with the plans and specifications with regard to material, mixtures, design and a hundred and one other things mentioned in the specifications for a building.


Mr.   AVEIR@Melfort: For instance, in
connection with the building at St. Catharines specifications are drawn up for the building which it is contemplated to erect there.


James Layton Ralston: Drawn up by whom?


Robert Weir: By our architects.
The plans are all prepared by the architect in Ottawa. A building such as that, unless there is need for special supervision, will be supervised by the man in charge of the station. In that connection I would say he would be quite capable of doing it.


James Layton Ralston: That is, the superintendent of the farm?


Robert Weir: Yes, or perhaps
some one under him specially interested in the work.


James Layton Ralston: The minister is satisfied
that that is sufficient?


Mr.   AVEIR@Melfort: Quite, in connection with buildings like that.


James Layton Ralston: I do not think any
private concern would be satisfied, if it were done that way.


Charles Benjamin Howard: Will public tenders be
called in connection with the erection of the proposed building at Sherbrooke?


Mr.   AVEIR@Melfort: I would say it
would be done by day labour under the supervision of the farm officials.


Charles Benjamin Howard: Has the minister any
further information in connection with a question I asked earlier in the session? Has he any further report regarding twenty-five farms which were practically destroyed?


Robert Weir: I cannot recall having been asked that question.


Charles Benjamin Howard: I asked thie question under a vote in the estimates. These farms were destroyed by acid from the copper mines. They lie along the Massaurippi river, and are almost adjoining the Lenmoxville experimental farm.


Mr.   AVEIR@Melfort: I have not that information.


James J. Donnelly: In the western press of a few days ago I notioed that the federal government was supposed to have purchased an experimental farm seven miles west of Gravelbourg. I assume that is a misstatement. Possibly the government has taken over an administration station or an experimental station, or something of that kind. Could the minister tell us about that?


Robert Weir: Nob having seen the article to which the hon. member has referred I cannot make a definite answer. Illustration stations have been selected in that vicinity, and contracts have been entered into with the owners of farms. There has also been, an investigation, which is not yet completed, to decide as to whether or mot that area would provide a suitable township in connection with 'the drought scheme. If the bon. member would permit me to see the news item I should be glad to give him the inf ormation.


James J. Donnelly: I thought the article was wrong, when I read it.


Robert Weir: There is no experimental farm at that point.


James J. Donnelly: It was just an experimental station. I understand the minister has taken a trip through the dried out area,

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and. is considering the erection of contain dams. Could he tell us about these dams, or where he expects to build them?
Mr. WEI'R (Melfort): The committee to deal with that matter, known as the water committee, has been appointed. They met and sat in conference in the city of Regina for two days. All applications we have received in the department have been placed before them. They are investigating applications, and we purpose calling another meeting of the committee to obtain a report of their findings. The decisions will not rest entirely in the hands of the water committee. Experts who will be in a position to give expert advice on the cost and the extent of benefits which might be derived will sit on the committee. The chairman of the committee, being an agriculturist, will indicate whether or not he feels certain work should be done, from an agricultural standpoint. As soon as the committee meets and reports a decision will be made and an announcement given. I believe it is safe to say that we have had applications from all sections of the drought area, and that each application is being examined on its merits.


James J. Donnelly: Who are the members of the committee?


Robert Weir: The members of the water committee are:
L. B. Thomson, Chairman, Dominion Range Experimental Station, Lethbridge.
W. H. Fairfield, Superintendent, Dominion Experimental Station, Lethbridge.
L. C. Charlesworth, Chairman of the Irrigation Council, Alberta.
C. J. McGavin, Chief Water Engineer, Department of Natural Resources, Regina.
C. H. Atwood, Chief Engineer, Department of Natural Resources, Winnipeg.
V.	Meek, Hydrometric and Water Power Branch, Ottawa.
Dr. R. T. D. Wickenden, Geological Survey, Ottawa.
A. Griffin, Department of Natural Resources, Canadian Pacific Railway Company, Calgary.
T. C. Main, Assistant Engineer of Water Supply, Canadian National Railways, Winnipeg.
W.	L. Jacobson, Irrigation Specialist, Experimental Station, Lethbridge.


Mr. GARDINER:: What effort has been made to let people in the drought area know to where applications should be sent with regard to these proposed dams? So far as I am concerned I must confess I have seen no statement in the press, nor have I received any information indicating where applications should be sent. I believe it would be only fair to the drought area to have that information given out before an official decision as to the location of the dams is made by the committee.


Robert Weir: The first announcement was made in the house, and afterwards when discussions took place a good deal of publicity was given to the matter, particularly in western Canada. This was evidenced by the number of applications received from the drought area. I believe thousands of applications have been received, tabulated and carefully investigated. However the suggestion of the hon. member for Acadia is one to which we will give immediate attention, and we will make an announcement in that connection. In view of the applications however it was not felt necessary to give any publicity further than that which had been given in the press.


Robert Gardiner: Does it make any difference whether the applications come from private individuals, municipal councils or other bodies of that description?


Robert Weir: It does not make any difference. Applications may come directly to the department or to myself, and from individuals or groups of individuals. In each case I have passed them on to the director of experimental farms. After that they are tabulated and all information is set out in the shortest possible form. Every application which has been received and considered worthy of consideration-and I know of none which has been cancelled-will come before the water committee for investigation.


Robert Gardiner: Will the committee which has charge of the applications investigate the sites of the proposed dams?


Robert Weir: Either the committee itself or some person appointed by the committee. It might be that the officials of the experimental farm system might be able to give whatever information was required and recommend as to the advisability or otherwise of further investigation.


Robert Gardiner: I happen to know that last fall the engineers of the provincial government looked into the possibilities of these dams so far as my own territory is concerned. They were expert men who knew their business. Is it proposed that this committee shall engage the services of engineers to go thoroughly into the possibilities of these dams? It is quite possible that the dams will not serve the useful purpose they might serve unless proper engineering skill is employed in laying them out.


Robert Weir: I am glad the hon. member has mentioned that but there is a representative on the committee from each of the provincial governments. The repre-

sentative from Alberta is Mr. Charlesworth. All the information that has been gathered by the engineers and all the information in the department in Alberta will be made available through Mr. Charlesworth to the water committee, and similarly with the other provinces. Even in connection with the small dams on individual farms or groups of farms, dams that may not cost over S100, engineering advice will be given where to locate the dam and how best to construct it so that it will be of the maximum benefit.


James J. Donnelly: Is there a limit to the size of these dams which decides whether it is a local, provincial or dominion matter? The minister no doubt knows that for the last year or two a great number of these dams have been built in the dried out areas, where several farmers would get together, secure advice from the provincial government, and with the aid of engineers lay out a community dam, which to my way of thinking is far more useful than these larger dams. It is of great benefit in providing communities with water where it has been possible for the inhabitants for some time past to get water. What I want to know is whether the federal government is looking after only the larger dams or the larger and the smaller dams as well, and is there any dividing line drawn between the two?


Robert Weir: No, we are looking after all the dams, and preference is given, and a very decided preference, as the hon. member has himself suggested, to the smaller dams. There is no division as to local, provincial or federal concern. The machinery is representative of all, but the chief consideration, if I might use that term, is given to the smaller dams rather than to the larger ones. The province has its provincial representative who is thoroughly versed in all the proceedings that are necessary from the provincial standpoint to expedite the building of these dams. In the past, I do not know about all the provinces, but in some of the provinces there has been a good deal of delay in the average farmer, or in a small community, getting water rights and having the inspection made according to the regulations of the province. We hope to overcome that delay by having a joint committee such as we have at the present time.


James J. Donnelly: Is it the intention to buy the land for the site of the dam, or how are you going to acquire the property?


Robert Weir: 
James J. Donnelly: But in many cases it will be necessary to acquire property. I have in mind a case where the dam itself would cost only 81,500 or 82,000 but where the water that was dammed would spread back twelve or fifteen square miles of land, covering a large area. This land would have to be acquired in some way or the dam could not be built.


Robert Weir: Before a dam is built, a thorough inspection will have to be made as to the damages that would result from the building of the dam. That is one of the factors in connection with the Estevan dam. There has been an estimate made as to what the damage will amount to, but whether the land itself will be acquired or damages paid on a basis to be agreed upon is a matter for consideration.


Robert Gardiner: The question that has been raised by the hon. member f*r Willow Bunch (Mr. Donnelly), namely, the title to the land on which these dams are built, is a very important one. One question that arises in my mind is just what percentage of these dams will be public property to which the people of the district will have access to water their stock, and what percentage will be privately owned and therefore useful only to the farmer upon whose land the dam is built.
May I make this recommendation to the minister? In my judgment more money should be spent on public dams so as to give the public access to the water to take care of their stock, because on many farms the wells are going dry and if there was a public dam in the district with the title vested in the federal or provincial government-that is a matter to be decided between the two authorities-the people in the district would have access to the water to water their stock as often as they wished so long as the water was available. In my judgment these public

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dams will be more beneficial to the people in the dried out areas than dams privately owned and situated on private property.


John Campbell Elliott: With regard to the buildings that are proposed, what proportion of the contracts will be let by public tender, what by invited tender, if any, are to be let in that way, and what will be done by day labour?


Robert Weir: I am sorry I cannot give that information. The whole work will be in the hands of the officials of the department, and if they feel that it might be better in a certain situation to let contracts-although with one or two exceptions none of the buildings are expensive-tenders wil be called for. On the other hand, if it is felt that it would be cheaper to do the work by day labour, it will 'be done that way. I am not in a position to state the percentage, but the usual practice will be followed.


John Campbell Elliott: Which of the officials of the department will decide, for instance, whether a contract is to be let by tender after public advertisement, or by private tender, or the work done by day labour?


Robert Weir: The director of the experimental farms with the advice of his staff.


John Campbell Elliott: Is there no consultation with the minister in regard to that?


Robert Weir: There might be in some cases, but in the majority I would say that it would not be necessary, and I would be guided very much, if not entirely, by the advice they gave me.


John Campbell Elliott: As a general rule this
official of the department, the director of experimental farms, will decide whether tenders will be asked for by public advertisement, whether invitations will be sent out to a certain number to tender, or whether the work will be done by day labour; is that correct?


Robert Weir: I am not sure that I have the hon. member's question correctly. This has been a matter of routine. Eor example, assume they wish to build an implement shed on a certain experimental farm; if the director feels it to be of sufficient importance he may submit the matter to the deputy minister of agriculture, but in many instances they go ahead in the ordinary way with the building. They would be guided largely by past experience as to what would be the cheapest and most satisfactory manner of constructing the building.


John Campbell Elliott: Could the minister tell
me what was the practice in connection with the buildings constructed under the provisions of the act of last year? Could he give us a list of the contracts which were let by invitation, those let through public advertisement, and the works that were constructed by day labour?


Robert Weir: I have not that
information before me, but I shall be glad to get it.


John Campbell Elliott: I assume that this committee will be sitting long enough to enable the minister to let us have that information.
Mr. CASGRAIN1:	If the minister is to
supervise the construction of the buildings necessary for the experimental farms, why should not the Postmaster 'General (Mr. SauvS) be in charge of the construction of post offices? This is a reform bill; why should not the Postmaster General be entrusted with the supervision of the construction of post offices?


Robert Weir: There has been no
change in the procedure so far as the experimental farms are concerned.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Item 9.-Harbours and rivers generally, $2,500,000-.
Mr. CAMPBELL:: Could the minister give us particulars as to where this money is to be spent?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: This item is
similar to the one which appeared in the act of last year. As yet no list has been prepared as to where the expenditures will be made. The expenditures last year were -made largely in repairs, extensions and improvements to wharves, breakwaters and harbours, and we are getting reports on what is needed this year in that connection. Last year considerable work was required in the harbours on the St. Lawrence river and the great lakes due to the low water. I cannot give my hon. friend detailed particulars of the expenditures last year but he will remember that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Weir) laid upon the table of the house a very bulky statement containing the expenditures made under the provisions of that act. There would be several thousand items ranging from $100 up to several thousands. The total expenditures by provinces were as follows:

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Nova Scotia	$	406,263 89Prince Edward Island.. .	99,733	31New Brunswick	
244,993	69Quebec	
664,067	19Ontario	
505,820	64Manitoba	
30,260	00Saskatchewan	
6,196	13Alberta	
6,900	00
Northwest and Yukon
Territories	
2,606	15British Columbia	
171,522	27Generally	
85,395	32Total	
$2,224,118 59
A program is being drafted by the engineers based upon the reports which have been made. I might mention that the suggestions and requests received up to date would require a much larger sum than that being asked for and it is our intention to take care of the most urgent works and what seem to be most justified in view of the smaller appropriation.


Milton Neil Campbell: I have no doubt that the requests received would require the expenditure of a much larger amount, but I would ask the minister to note that under item 10 it is proposed to do a great deal of harbour work.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: That item covers public buildings.


Milton Neil Campbell: Yes, I know but there happen to be a number of commitments against item 10 in connection with harbour work. If the engineers have been able to supply details in connection with the 82,224,000 spent last year I think we are entitled to a similar statement in connection with the $2,500,000 asked for this year. We should not be asked to vote a blanket amount to be spent at the discretion of whatever minister may be appointed to spend it.


Mr. STEWART:: (Leeds): I could give my hon. friend the list of requests.


Milton Neil Campbell: It seems to me that we are entitled to know what decision has been made. The minister has had over a month since this bill was first brought forward.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: We have not decided the places at which expenditures will be made or the amounts to be expended; we are going to meet the emergencies as they arise.


Charles A. Stewart: Are these all emergencies?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: This vote is far repairs and similar work and will be used in the same way as the vote last year was used.


Charles A. Stewart: I hope the minister will not take offence when I tell him 92582-1871
that this is just a huge joke. The same joke is perpetrated every year. Almost every item in this schedule could have been placed in the main estimates where we would have had a chance to discuss it. However, this seems to be the method this government adopts of doing business and I do not suppose there is much use worrying about it. The only saving element about the whole thing is the fact that the government does not spend all the money. Last year we voted $30,000,000 and the government spent only $9,000,000, for which perhaps it can be commended. When a minister stands up and states seriously that the government is going to find some place, somewhere, some time for the spending of this money, it looks to me just like a piece of camouflage. Why responsible ministers cannot estimate what they are going to have to spend and bring it down in the ordinary way is beyond me. When the minister was on this side he was not so easily satisfied, and it is really amusing to watch the assurance with which he stands up and tells us that it is impossible to find out until some time in the future where this expenditure will be made.


Ernest Lapointe: Will any dredging be done?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Yes; "harbours
and rivers generally" involves dredging where required.


Ernest Lapointe: Will most of the work
be dredging?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I would not say that; I would say, a considerable part of it, as shown by the statement which was placed on the table of the house.


Milton Neil Campbell: I cannot see why the
minister should make such a statement. He has an efficient staff of engineers and he must have recommendations from all the divisional engineers and probably from the engineers in the Marine department. I think we should hold the vote over until a statement can be furnished.


William Richard Motherwell: I want to ask the
minister a question but he need not answer it unless he likes. Would this expenditure of $2,500,000 be contemplated and provided if this were not an election year?


Ernest Lapointe: He doesn't like to answer that.


William Richard Motherwell: He doesn't need to.


James Layton Ralston: Are any new works to be done, to be provided out of this $2,500,000?
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Hugh Alexander Stewart: There will probably be some extensions to breakwaters and wharves which might be considered new works. I have some for my hon. friend which would come within that class.


James Layton Ralston: That is music to my
ears. I may say to my hon. friend, without putting it on the record again, that I will submit to him a list which I presented to the Prime Minister last year. If I remember correctly he was piloting this bill last year and we pointed out to him certain urgent works in the various constituencies. Perhaps I need only remind the minister of the list because I have endeavoured to bring these works to his attention before. I would ask him not merely to give them consideration but to provide the facilities which are absolutely required in order that the fishermen in the particular constituency I represent may be able to carry on their calling.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: My hon. friend
will agree that some works of that description were done last year.


James Layton Ralston: Only a few.


Ernest Lapointe: Will these works be
carried on under the supervision and control of the minister? My reason for asking this question is that under the act of last year some extensive public works in the harbour of Quebec were carried on under the Minister of Marine, and really I should have more confidence in the spirit of fairness and the impartiality of the Minister of Public Works if it comes to that. I should like to know. Will not my friend come and supervise his work there?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: All I can say is that last year this vote was $2,500,000, and of that amount the sum allotted to the Department of Public Works was S2,465,000, so that practically all the work under that vote was done under the control of the Public Works department. My hon. friend has in mind certain other specific items which were set forth in the schedule to the bill of last year and which were assigned to the Minister of Marine for execution.


Ernest Lapointe: Why?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Under this vote it was practically all done under the Department of Public Works.


Ernest Lapointe: But why should not
my hon. friend look after the works in Quebec? I would rather have him than the Minister of Marine, I admit freely.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: My hon. friend
is very kind, but it will be admitted that this was a fairly substantial program last year, and it was decided in the interests of efficiency that it should be divided without overtaxing the staffs of the different departments. All through the years there has been what may appear to be an inconsistency in the carrying on of public works. We have in the Public Works department engineers and a staff and we have some dredges. We do some dredging with the departmental plant and we let contracts for dredging. But notwithstanding that, the ship channel in the St. Lawrence has been for all these years under the Marine department and work of a similar sort has been earned on by the Public Works department.


Ernest Lapointe: Not wharves


Hugh Alexander Stewart: They have wharves and harbour improvements, and I understand that this was set up years ago, apparently for very good reasons. It looks like a duplication but it was decided to be the proper way to do the work and it has been carried on all these years in that way. It was thought that the works last year, being of a special kind, and the Marine department having equipment and having charge of harbours, should be so carried on. The administration of the different harbour commissions is largely if not entirely under the control of the Marine department, and that is the underlying reason why these works were carried on in that way.


Ernest Lapointe: I understand that the
works in the channel of the St. Lawrence have always been under the Marine department, and possibly it is better that it should be so. But what about the wharves in Quebec, for instance? They have not been erected by the harbour commission but with money provided by loans from this pariiament, and some of them were built by the Public Works department. Why make that difference with regard to work which was carried on under the act of last year? If the harbour commission were in charge of the work, very well. But I do not see why the Marine department should come there and control this work. I am sure that if my hon. friend had been in charge and had thought it better, instead of asking for public tenders, to ask for tenders from a certain number of contractors, he would have included a few other firms than those that were asked to send in tenders. Apart from that he would not have felt compelled in addition to the engineers of his own department and those of the harbour commission to bring down an engineer from the city of Montreal to be in charge of everything, at a very high fee indeed.

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John Campbell Elliott: How much of this vote
is it estimated will be required to complete contracts already in existence-or will any of it be required for that purpose?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: 
John Campbell Elliott: Do I understand from
the minister that practically all of this will be for new work or for repairs?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Not new work
perhaps in the sense that they will be new structures or anything of that kind, but it is for work not yet undertaken.


John Campbell Elliott: Not contracted for?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Not contracted
for.


John Campbell Elliott: Could the minister tell
us how this amount has been arrived at? If I understood him correctly, I was rather surprised that he was not able to mention any of the particular works he intended to carry out under this vote. If he cannot, how does he arrive at this amount?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: We believe this amount is sufficient to take care for this coming year of improvements of the kind I have described. It may not all be required, but the trouble is that last year we were called upon to do considerable work that we did not foresee at the beginning of the year. This was, as I have said, on account of low water and damage to wharves. We find that a number of old wharves that were constructed years ago are not now sufficient to carry the traffic owing to the heavy trucks that are going over them. As roads are opened up and traffic develops to a certain wharf, from time to time we find that it requires an extension or strengthening to meet existing conditions. It is to take care of that sort of thing and of damage that takes place from time to time by storms that this vote is required.


John Campbell Elliott: Am I correct in understanding that this is largely repairs and work of that kind?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: In some cases
it is entirely repairs. In one case it may be cheaper to extend a wharf than to do some dredging; in another it may be cheaper to do dredging to give the added accommodation. It is a combination of all these.


Milton Neil Campbell: There might be some
new work in this vote?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: To extend a
wharf might be considered new work, or a breakwater for the protection of a fishing harbour might be considered new work.


John Campbell Elliott: Do I understand from
the minister that part of this may be used on entirely new projects?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Yes.


John Campbell Elliott: Could he give the committee any idea of what proportion of it would be allotted for those purposes?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I could not
because, as I say, we have not made up a program of works that would cover that. We do not know how much will be required for needed repairs, and certainly we are not going to take money that is needed for repairs and extensions, and for small quantities of dredging, and put it into new works.


John Campbell Elliott: I am afraid the minister
did not understand my question. I asked him whether he could not give the committee some idea of the proportion of this vote that would be required for new works. I do not mean to tie the amount down within a few thousand dollars, but I am surprised at his answer that he cannot give any idea. That seems to be a remarkable statement to make to the committee.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I did not say I could not give any idea; I said that I could not tell what amount would be required because I did not know. But I do say that very much the larger portion of this vote will be required for repairs such as I have described, and we do not propose to embark upon any large or extensive program of new works under it.


John Campbell Elliott: Can the minister inform us as to any new works contemplated that will come out of this amount or any part of
it? Can he name any of the new projects that are proposed?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I cannot tell my hon. friend any new work we have now definitely decided to do.
Public Works Program


John Campbell Elliott: Could he give us any details then of substantial amounts of repair work so that we may have some information as to where this money is to be expended?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: It is to be expended on every wharf that is found to be out of repair, that is not suited to modem conditions, that will not carry the traffic it has to bear. It will be spent in dredging approaches to wharves where the water is not sufficiently deep for the steamers that are coming there, and on repairs.


John Campbell Elliott: That adds not one syllable to what the minister gave us a few minutes ago; it gives us no information whatever. He is simply saying that generally the money will be used where it is needed. That is not sufficient information for this committee.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: That is all that has ever been given in connection with a general vote of this kind.


John Campbell Elliott: The minister is quite incorrect when he makes that statement, because nearly every year there has been given to the committee a statement of certain works that are intended to be included in any sum similar to this that is voted.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: In the bill of last year, as my hon. friend will recall, there was a schedule setting forth specific works which it was proposed to undertake. In addition there was a vote just like this to do the kind of work that we are doing. During the last few years, my hon. friend knows, our estimates have been curtailed; repairs to wharves have been restricted and maintenance has been deferred. We are now endeavouring to bring these wharves up to a reasonable state of efficiency to meet conditions that have arisen. This amount is for that purpose.


John Campbell Elliott: That is not, if I may say, an accurate statement of what has occurred. The practice has been to appropriate certain amounts to new docks, wharves, breakwaters and that sort of thing. Then there was a lump sum and usually an estimate was given of what would be required to carry out the works in connection with a definite list of places. I am surprised that the minister has no list of places recommended by the officials of the department where at least a substantial part of this money is to be expended.
Ai six o'clock the speaker resumed the chair and the house took recess.

After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.



PRIVATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
'Bill No. 64, for the relief of Frances Goldberg Joseph-Mr. Garland (Carleton).
Motion for second reading agreed to on division.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Tuesday, April 16, 1935, consideration of the motion of Mr. Ernst that the house go into committee on Bill No. 43, for the relief of Clarence MacGregor Roberts.
Mr. MICHAEL LUCHKOVIGH (Vegre-ville):: Mr. Speaker, before the Easter recess
I made the remark that connivance, condonation or collusion were grounds for rejection; in other words, that they were defences, so far as the respondent was concerned, against the granting of a divorce to the petitioner. The hon. member for Queens-Lunenburg (Mr. Ernst) asked me this question:
Will the hon. member permit a question? Will he indicate where in the evidence there is shown to be any connivance with respect to the particular act on which this petition is based?
I do not intend to speak at any great length on this matter to-night, because I realize that there are other more important matters awaiting the consideration of the members of this house. Therefore my remaining remarks in this regard will be very brief. The evidence shows that Mr. Roberts obtained for Mrs. Roberts a pass to Reno. He had no objection whatever to her proceeding to Reno; indeed, he did everything to make it possible for her to go there in order to get a divorce. To my way of thinking that certainly was an act of connivance; there must have 'been some incentive, otherwise the petitioner would not have done that. In summing up the evidence before the private bills committee the solicitor for the petitioner, Mr. Ker, stated that Mrs. Roberts was using this Reno divorce as a cloak to cover up her relations with the corespondent, Mr. Jenkins. I think that argument could be used both ways. If it was a cloak with which Mrs. Roberts covered up her relations with this corespondent it might be said just as easily that it was a cloak which was used to cover up the relations of the petitioner with this so called Miss X.
In his memorandum to the members of the House of Commons, Mr. Roberts makes

Clarence MacGregor Roberts
much of the fact that prior to this case being heard by the private bills committee a memorandum was sent to the members of that committee by the respondent, but Mr. Roberts is doing the same thing when he sends his memorandum not only to the members of the committee 'but to every member of this chamber. In other words he regards as a sin what has been done by his wife but as a virtue what he has done himself, in sending this memorandum to all the members of the house. When Mr. Roberts says the members of the private bills committee have been misled and deceived might I remind him that the circulation of this memorandum certainly has not done anything to shed any new light on the situation. If anything the petitioner has hurt his case rather than helped it. The first paragraph of this memorandum reads as follows:
Before the senate committee the act of adultery was proven definitely by three reliable witnesses whose evidence was unshaken in cross-examination and accepted by the senate. The evidence of respondent and corespondent in denial is valueless. The record shows various instances where they have directly contradicted themselves when confronted with sworn statements made in the Montreal courts, and' the fact that they deceived petitioner by going to Maine and living in the same house for two weeks is conclusive as to their relationship.
Might I remind the house that these three gentlemen mentioned by the petitioner were unemployed at the time and were hired by the petitioner to get evidence against Mrs. Roberts, the respondent. The evidence they secured was of a very dubious and suspicious character. It seems to me that the evidence was made too convenient for these three so-called detectives; the stage was set too perfectly for them, as is shown in the evidence. This Mrs. Roberts, the respondent, and this Mr. Jenkins, the corespondent, were charged with committing the offence upon which this petition was based in the living room, with all the blinds up, with a bridge lamp and a ceiling light burning and with an uncle washing dishes in the adjacent kitchen. While this alleged offence was being committed these three detectives-tomcats I might call them-were upon the roof of an adjacent building opposite, fifteen feet away. These tomcats with the microscopic eyes were up on that roof when they should have been down in the lane below rummaging among the tin cans and the refuse contained therein. They were prowling about under the starlight and the radiant beams of a midnight moon when they should have been announcing their presence to the respondent from the back gate or the back fence. Instead of that they made their way-pussyfooted, as it were-into this respondent's boudoir. I do not attach very much credence to the evidence of these so-called detectives.
As I have already said, the evidence is of too suspicious and too dubious a nature for any hon. member to believe. So far as the main incident to which reference is made in paragraph 1 of the memorandum is concerned, I say Mr. Roberts, the petitioner, might have given us an account of the three weeks' journey with the so-called Madam X. He describes the relations of Mrs. Roberts, his wife, with Mr. Jenkins, the corespondent, as flagrant misconduct. In other words according to his view it is a sin for his wife to run around with another man but it was a virtue for him to run around with Madam X. I do not know why he has called her Madam X, unless it be that there was a long string of women whom he designated 'by letters of the alphabet and that at this time he had reached the letter X. Probably Madam X had had the most recent claim to his affections.


Mr. JACOBS:: May I remind the hon. gentleman that X is the unknown quantity.


Michael Luchkovich: Yes; certainly it is an unknown quantity, so far as this case is concerned. I believe the principle was established two years ago in the private bills committee that unless a petitioner came before that committee with clean hands he would not be granted a divorce. Does the hon. member for Queens-Lunenburg wish to upset that principle? If he has his way in this chamber undoubtedly he will ask for a vote to-day, but I would say the proper procedure would be to send the matter back to the committee for reconsideration, and have it dealt with as on previous occasions other matters have been considered.
So far as the attempt by the solicitor for the petitioner is concerned to blacken the character of the respondent by attempting to show that upon occasions she threw ash trays at her husband, I should like to ask whether there is a woman anywhere who is so virtuous that at some time or another during her life she has not thrown something at her husband, especially when he came home at an ungodly hour with the hiccoughs, whether it be an ash tray, a poker, a broom, a wash pail or possibly an axe handle. I say the arguments in this connection hold no water.
Members of the House of Commons committee have been accused of being too sentimental and humane in these matters, and the suggestion is made that we have not adhered to the strict letter of the law. It is true that

Clarence MacGregor Roberts
I have chosett to take the humane view rather than that of adhering to the strict letter of the law. I have before me the paragraph on which I based my reasons for my vote when the matter was before the private bills committee. At page 628 of Bourinot we find the following:
... for the decisions of the House of Lords on bills of divorce have not the weight that attaches to the regular legal tribunals. The majority determines, and in a minority on a vote may be found men of learning, wisdom and experience, expressing opinions adverse to the determination, more in accordance with the eternal principles of truth and justice.
The evidence was heard by the senate committee, and that committee passed the bill by a vote of four to three. In view of that small majority it would seem that there must have been some grave doubts in the mind's of the members of that committee. In other words there were at least three men in the committee who cast their votes on the grounds I have quoted, namely in accordance with "the eternal principles of truth and justice." So far as I am concerned I have considered the custody of the children and the fact that so far as the offences charged in the divorce proceedings are concerned both husband and wife might have been equally guilty. With that in mind we decided not to pass the preamble to the bill.


Mr. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (East Hamilton):: Mr. Speaker, I shall not detain the house very long. In my view the whole affair, apart altogether from the justice of the application, must bring clearly before this chamber the insane policy of adjudicating upon matters of this description. The matter having been dealt with by the senate committee and by a committee of the house-and in passing it may be fair to say that probably ninety per cent of the members of this chamber have not read the evidence-we are asked to make a decision simply because one of the members of the committee has felt the matter should be carried to the floor of the house. I believe this should be an object lesson to indicate the necessity for bringing about the adoption throughout the whole dominion of a policy already followed in some provinces under which cases of this description are not considered by parliament. When a committee is sitting we see members walking in and out as the evidence proceeds. Many of the members do not attend. I wonder what the complaint would be if members of a jury acted in the same manner. We should be frank and in the interests of British justice and fair play admit it would be far better if cases of this type were decided in the courts in a

dignified manner rather than in the atmosphere which sometimes prevails in committees charged with dealing with divorce cases.
I have always taken the view that the first consideration in these matters should be that of the children; secondly would come the woman and then the man. We make no provision whatsoever for the children nor do we make any provision for the wife. I believe conditions would be more satisfactory if the courts were given the responsibility of deciding the right and wrong in these matters and in the present instance I suggest the house should accept the decision of its committee. After the evidence had been presented I decided that there had been connivance that they were both guilty that they had both agreed to have the Reno divorce, and that when the husband thought he would get his fingers burned he jumped out and she went ahead to get the divorce. I have maintained that when we have circumstances such as have been described it is better not to enter into a discussion. I believe it would be in the best interests of the children and of the other parties concerned if the decision of the committee were carried out. It should be noted that the vote in the committee was almost two to one against granting the divorce. We listened to the pleadings of counsel on both sides counsel for the petitioner admitting that there had been connivance in the matter. I think under the circumstances the house would be well advised not to listen to the pleadings of one member of the committee, although of course he is merely exercising his right as a member of the House of Commons in seeking to have the decision of the committee reversed. The hon. member is probably a brilliant lawyer, but a man may be a brilliant lawyer and a university man with many degrees and still lack judgment, and I would rather accept the next to unanimous view of the committee than the judgment of simply one individual member of that committee.
In conclusion I reiterate, Mr. Speaker, what I got on my feet primarily to put before the house. I am not going into the details of this unhappy case at all. Personally I would not believe the word of a private detective, having some knowledge of them in connection with labour disputes, if he stood on a pile of bibles as high as this House of Commons. I feel that I have made a contribution in putting before this house the plea that cases of this kind should be passed upon by the courts rather than by committees of the Senate and House of Commons. I hope that the house in its

Clarence MacGregor Roberts
judgment will agree with the overwhelming opinion expressed by the committee that this divorce be not granted.


Mr. E. A. PECK (West Peterborough):: Mr. Speaker, as a member of the private bills committee and having heard the evidence and argument before that committee, I should like to say a few words in opposition to the motion which is before the chair.
I think we ought to consider very seriously this motion as it might affect the life of one of our citizens, and that citizen a woman. If the motion carries, the respondent in this case is going to be charged with what is possibly in the minds of some people the worst offence of which a woman can be guilty, disloyalty to her husband; and not only would it brand her with that disloyalty but in all probability it would have the effect of separating her from her children and depriving her of the support of her husband. It is a very serious matter. This woman has strenuously opposed the charge which has been made against her. She has fought this case as hard as she could before the senate committee. The seven members of that committee were unable to agree, after hearing the testimony, that she was guilty of the charge against her. The senate committee divided with a very narrow majority of four to three. Then the case came before the private bills committee of the house, where we considered the testimony and heard the argument and voted on the question, and the committee to which this case had been referred by this house came to the conclusion by a majority of over two to one-I think the vote stood at 21 to 9-that the woman was not guilty and that the petition should be dismissed. Then the matter came before the house by way of report from the chairman of the committee, and the report was adopted. Now at this late stage we are asked to reopen the whole matter, and the question is brought up through a form of procedure that as far as my experience in this house goes has never before been attempted. I have sat in this house for ten years and I have never heard of any report of the private bills committee being upset, certainly not any report dealing with a matrimonial case. I do think that this is a most unusual proceeding and that it should not be permitted to establish a precedent in this house for the future.
I refrain from dealing with the testimony. I quite agree with the hon. member for Lisgar (Mr. Brown) that we should not in an open sitting of this house deal with matters of this kind. We are dealing with a question of fact. We are sitting here either as jury or as judges,
and whichever way you look at it we are not properly constituted to be a court of appeal because we have not before us the litigants nor have the litigants the opportunity of appearing before us through their counsel. It seems to me a most unwise proceeding for us sitting here as members of the house to undertake to deal with this question, which after all is a question of fact. I submit, therefore, that if there is any doubt in the minds of any of the members and they feel that this matter should be further considered, it should be done by a reference back to the private bills committee, or by a reference of the case to a special committee, or by reference to a judge. The case might be dealt with in any one of these ways, but I do submit that we should not at this stage undertake to reverse the decision of a tribunal appointed by this house which has given this matter the fullest consideration. I submit, Mr. Speaker, that the motion should be negatived.


Mr. SAMUEL GOBEIL (Compton):: Mr. Speaker, it has been stated that we of the Catholic church would in any event vote against divorce on account of our religious principles. That is true, but I wish to remind the house that where there is no dissent, as there is in this case, we always refrain from expressing our opinion. But in this particular case I do not want to vote without making a few remarks. I do not wish to repeat what has been said on a previous occasion and again to-night, but I do not think there can be any doubt that there has been connivance between the petitioner and the respondent. I am not quite sure that it has been mentioned here that the husband provided his wife with a pass to Reno so that she could obtain a divorce. It is quite true that the pass was not used when the petitioner found that a divorce in Reno would not help him in Canada. There are other facts that clearly establish connivance between the petitioner and the respondent.
There is this other angle. It seems to me that a petitioner when he asks for a divorce should come before the senate committee with clean hands. While I have not read the whole of the evidence there is not a doubt in my mind that the petitioner is not in that situation. I will not say that the petitioner is worse than the respondent, but I say that he certainly did not come before the committee with clean hands.
Another reason why I cannot vote in favour of this motion is that the respondent is a mother who from the start seems to' have cared for her children. In the letter that was read before the committee by the hon. mem-
Clarence MacGregor Roberts

ber for Queens-Lunenburg (Mr. Ernst), and which will be found at page 106 of the evidence, I find these two paragraphs:
You wanted a divorce at one time, Greg, and made me feel for nearly a year I was in the way. Only the good God above knows what I suffered during that time and for a long time after-I am sure you can't know what a blow it can mean to a wife and mother to know there is someone else who is taking her place.
Later on in the letter she writes:
I had begun to think you had other reasons besides the one you gave me-and worried through sleepless nights if you would not stick to your word about the children either. You promised them to me, Greg, I doubt if I would have come out as soon as I did if we had not talked this affair over and you wished me to get away as soon as possible.
The respondent apparently has always cared for her children as should a respectable mother. The care of the children will probably be affected by the decision of this house. A case is now pending in the courts to decide whether the wife or husband shall have the care of the children, and there is no doubt that if this divorce is granted the children will not be given to the mother. The wife is asking for a certain amount of money for the care of the children and for her own needs, and that question will probably be affected by the decision of this house. I have no desire to prevent a vote on this question but I do want to state my reasons for voting against the motion.
Mr. LESLIE G. BELL (St. Antoine): Mr. Speaker, before entering the chamber this evening I had no intention of speaking on this bill. The hon. member for Compton (Mr. Gobeil) belongs to a different faith from that to which I belong, but my faith is also opposed to divorce. Aside from these questions there is the responsibility of a member of parliament in connection with questions of this sort which at times must be aired in the house. The demands of this humble petitioner should receive justice.
What are the facts of this case? A man and a woman are married and they cannot agree. Rightly or wrongly there is connivance, or whatever you wish to call it, and the woman proceeds to Reno and obtains an American divorce. It is all right for the hon. member to ask about the children, but did this woman think about her children when she went to Reno and obtained an American divorce? Not at all. After getting her divorce she comes back to Montreal, but does she want to live as a divorced woman? No, she wants to live as a married woman. Why? Because she will then be able to obtain alimony from her husband in the courts of the province of

Quebec. Either this woman is right or she is wrong; either she wants a divorce or she does not want a divorce. This parliament is her last court of appeal. When the husband came to the senate committee to ask for a divorce, what haippens? He proved adultery against this woman. That evidence was submitted to the senate committee and he was granted a divorce.


William Duff: What about him?


Mr. BELL (St. Antoine):: What about him?


William Duff: Yes.


Leslie Gordon Bell: My hon. friend
says, "What about him?" Has anything been proved against him?


William Duff: He admits it.


Leslie Gordon Bell: He admits what? He has never admitted anything. It has never been proved that this man has done a wrong thing.


William Duff: What about Miss X?


Leslie Gordon Bell: Nothing has been proved against Miss X, not a thing. Unfortunately the hon. member has been charmed by the good looks of this woman and he claims that this man has acted as wrongly as his wife.


William Duff: The hon. member for St.
Antoine (Mr. Bell) should be the last man to accuse me of being charmed by a woman. I have been a member of this house for twenty years, and there is no one can cast reflections upon me.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I withdraw that remark.


William Duff: You had better, and quickly. Otherwise I will tell the hon. member something he would not want to hear.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I am ready to hear anything the hon. member wishes to say.


William Duff: All right, I will give it to you.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I think the hon. member will admit that nothing has been proved against the petitioner to provide grounds for divorce. I am ready to take my seat if the hon. member wants to make a statement in that regard.


Samuel William Jacobs: Why was it that the private bills committee of the House of Commons voted the way it did, 18 to 8?


David Spence: Because they were lobbied, that is why.

Clarence MacGregor Roberts


Leslie Gordon Bell: Are we going to recognize the Reno divorce which was granted to this woman and consider her as unmarried, or are we going to grant the petition of this petitioner? Are we going to say that we in Canada will or will not give a divorce? It is a question of American or Canadian jurisprudence. Is a woman to be permitted to obtain a divorce in the United States and then come back to Quebec and say to her husband, "I am' not divorced, I demand alimony"? This petitioner is only a poor clerk, and he is being bled to death by a woman who wants a divorce and still does not want one. Is he going to be granted justice?


Michael Luchkovich: He was using her money to pay for the divorce in Reno.


Leslie Gordon Bell: He was not using her money because she never had any. She got all the money she ever had from her husband.


Samuel William Jacobs: That is wrong; the hon. member should read the evidence.


William Duff: You had better read the evidence.


Mr. IRVINE:: Let us have a vote.


Leslie Gordon Bell: My hon. friends have decided that I am wrong in my facts.


William Duff: Of course you are.


Leslie Gordon Bell: I am giving my personal point of view. This woman comes back to Canada and she says, "No, I do not want a divorce;. I want a separation, and I want this man to pay me alimony." The husband then comes to the senate committee and obtains a divorce. Then we come from the senate committee to the House of Commons divorce committee and decide that the senate is all wrong and that we should not grant this man the divorce. Personally, I am going to vote in favour of giving the petitioner a divorce.


Samuel William Jacobs: I have only a few words to offer in this debate. Everything I have to say was better expressed by my hon. friend from West Peterborough (Mr. Peck), but I have taken some interest in the matter and I want to put before the house, in as short a time as possible, any observations I have to make. The first is this. My hon. friend from St. Antoine (Mr. Bell) said that the Senate granted the divorce. He is mistaken; the Senate does not grant divorces-the Senate and the House of Commons do so. We are now before the House of Commons. Both houses must pass upon the matter; that is the law.
The bill before the house has come up in a somewhat surprising, I would not say irregular, way. The rule is that bills of this kind shall be sent to the committee known as the miscellaneous private bills committee, and this bill went there. It was disposed of by a vote of 18 to 7 or 8. That is to say, there were 18 members opposed to granting the divorce and 7 or 8 in favour of granting it. My hon. friend from St. Antoine pooh-poohs this; he says they really had no right to deal with it at all. I say that that is the proper tribunal to deal with the matter, because if we were to open the door by allowing this motion to pass it would mean that practically every bill which now comes before the miscellaneous private bills committee in matters of divorce would find its way into this house for revision. Do we or do we not want that? To recognize a proceeding of this kind is to add another terror to public life.


Leslie Gordon Bell: Will the hon. member answer me this? Allowing for the fact that women have every right to change their minds, why is it that this woman went to Reno to get a divorce, then came back here and decided she was opposed when her husband got it?


Samuel William Jacobs: The evidence is clear; it indicates that my hon. friend is going on facts he does not know anything about. He has not read the record. Her husband sent her down with her own money to Reno to obtain a divorce and she came back armed with this divorce, but he had been told in the interim that the divorce was worthless, as it was. He should have found that out before, but he did find it out when she came back with the divorce. It was not a divorce.


Mr. ERNST:: He found it out before and
took the pass from her.


Samuel William Jacobs: At any rate, both parties agreed that the divorce was to be obtained. Now my hon. friend knows as well as anyone in this house does, inasmuch as he is an eminent lawyer, that a divorce obtained by connivance is worthless. It is worthless in Quebec; that is understood. So that when my hon. friend from St. Antoine talks about her going to Reno and getting a divorce, she did so at the instigation of her husband.


Leslie Gordon Bell: You are wrong.


Samuel William Jacobs: Excuse me; the evidence is there. Unfortunately I have read the evidence and so I know a little more about it than my hon. friend from St. Antoine.
Clarence MacGregor Roberts


Leslie Gordon Bell: He did not make her get the divorce in Reno; she was there for weeks alone.


Samuel William Jacobs: It does not make any difference whether she was there for weeks alone or with anyone else; she went for the express purpose of getting the divorce. Then she came back and was told by her husband that he had been advised by counsel that the divorce was worthless. Then the curtain rises in Ottawa. The husband appears before the senate committee as the complaining party. The wife had done her duty in Reno and had come back with a divorce which was no good, and he thought he would try to obtain one himself. The senate, by a vote of 4 to 3, decided in his favour; it decided by a bare majority of one. Why was that? Apparently the evidence did not justify it so far as three of them were concerned, but I believe the reason was that the senate committee decided or discovered as a fact that there had been connivance on the part of both parties; and consequently, under the laws and regulations governing divorce in this dominion, no valid divorce could be granted. My hon. friend cannot get away from these facts.
The case came before the private bills committee of the commons, as it had to do; indeed, it could not be disposed of in any other way. That committee decided by a large majority that the husband was not entitled to the divorce on the ground that there had been connivance both on his part and on the part of the woman, to obtain the divorce. That divorce was absolutely worthless and they so decided, and the report was made to the house here recommending that there should not be a divorce. It was reported against. Then one quiet evening at eight o'clock we were astonished when my hon. friend from Queens-Lunenburg (Mr. Ernst) rose in his place and moved that, notwithstanding the decision of the private bills committee the committee of the whole house should hear this case.


William Gordon Ernst: It was not a quiet evening
and it was not at eight o'clock but at three o'clock.


Ernest Lapointe: In the full light of day.


Samuel William Jacobs: I stand corrected. It was
three o'clock, and my hon. friend can take any comfort he likes in the change of hour; he is entitled to it.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Was there evidence of adultery after the lady came back from Reno?


Samuel William Jacobs: No; the evidence was that it was before that period.


William Gordon Ernst: No.


Samuel William Jacobs: Yes.


Richard Burpee Hanson: That is
a very material fact.


William Gordon Ernst: It was after she got the
Reno divorce.


Samuel William Jacobs: I am not certain about that; it all went back to the time prior to the Reno days, or so I understand. The Renovation took place after the visit to Reno. Now on principle are we going to open the door to a revision before this house of decisions arrived at by the private bills committee in the matter of divorce? A principle is involved and it is for that that we are striving. The door must not be opened for purposes of that kind. I remember very well a motion that was made last year by my hon. friend from Ottawa that a certain divorce should, notwithstanding the decision of the private bills committee, be considered by the whole house. We voted against it on the ground that we should not leave the door open for abuses of that kind to creep in under our regulations. With all these matters before the house, I ask hon. members whether in their opinion the cause of justice is being served by the house deciding on this question without having read the evidence, as my hon. friend from St. Antoine has not. Twenty-six members of the house sat in committee on this matter and heard the evidence.


David Spence: They did not hear the
evidence. The committee was packed.


Samuel William Jacobs: What does my hon. friend
mean when he says that the committee was packed. I think he owes it to the members of the committee to withdraw that remark.


David Spence: I do not have to withdraw the remark because I say that the committee on private bills did not go over the evidence.


Samuel William Jacobs: They heard the evidence;
they heard the parties.


William Gordon Ernst: No.


Samuel William Jacobs: Excuse me; they heard the lady and gentleman.


William Gordon Ernst: No.


Samuel William Jacobs: The evidence was before
them.


William Gordon Ernst: It was the senate committee that saw the parties.

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Samuel William Jacobs: In view of these facts, the private bills committee, numbering twenty-six members, sitting and listening to the evidence or having the case put before them by counsel for the parties, having decided on this question as they did, are we justified so far as the private bills committee is concerned in deciding on this matter and by a mere wave of the hand turning to naught the considered decision which was arrived at by that committee? It is an affront to the members of the private bills committee to declare that what they decided after due consideration should be set aside by a body of people who have not heard the evidence at all, and never heard of the case until it came up in the house. We are not justified in doing that, and speaking for myself I certainly intend to vote against the committee of the whole now dealing with this bill, should it attempt to disturb the decision of the private bills committee.
Mitchell
Motherwell
Munn
Peck
Perras
Porteous
Reid
Rennie
Rheaume
Ross
Sanderson
Sauve
Seguin
Shaver
Smith
(Victor! a-Carleton) Smith (Cumberland) Spencer Spotton Sproule Stinson Sutherland Thompson (Lanark) Verville
Weir (Macdonald) White (London) Woodsworth-65.


Pierre Édouard Blondin: I declare the motion lost. The time for the consideration of private and public bills having expired, the house will revert to the consideration of government orders.



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William Gordon Ernst: Have I the right to reply? Mr. SPEAKER: No.


William Gordon Ernst: I regret I cannot reply to the arguments that have been advanced.



CREATE EMPLOYMENT

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed consideration in committee of Bill No. 63, to create employment by public works and undertakings throughout Canada and to authorize the guarantee of certain railway equipment securities-Mr. Stewart (Leeds)-Mr. Morand in the chair.
On schedule A, item 9'-Harbours and rivers generally, §2,500,000.
Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: When the Minister of Public Works was discussing this bill before the adjournment he gave certain explanations with regard to the work that would be carried on with this amount of money, which to my mind did not carry conviction. He said one of the reasons for voting this money was to take care of emergency cases where work was absolutely necessary, and that this had been done in the past, especially last year, following certain severe storms on the Atlantic seaboard and along the north shore of the St. Lawrence river. I have before me, Mr. Chairman, a number of instances in which on many occasions during the past few years the attention of the department has been directed to certain public works which were absolutely necessary in various municipalities in my district. In 1932 and 1933, whenever the public works estimates were under consideration, I took the opportunity to make the necessary representations in order that the government might fully understand the needs of the people I have the honour to represent in this house. That was the case even more so last year. I have before me a copy of the orders of the day of May 21, 1934, in which I put the following question to the government :
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1.	Has the government reconsidered requests
already made since the year 1930 with respect to dredging work to be undertaken at Pentecote river (Riverin river) on the north shore of the St. Lawrence river?	_
2.	If so, will the government comply with such requests this year?
If I remember correctly, at that time the government said the matter was under consideration. Another question was with regard to certain necessary works at Aux Coudres island and Mutton bay. A further question had to do with the construction of protective works and a wharf at Moisie, in the county of Saguenay. Then, I asked a question concerning the construction of a wharf at a place called Magpie, and the construction of a breakwater at a place called Longue Pointe de Mingan. There was a question concerning the enlargement of the wharf at Harrington harbour on the Canadian Labrador, and another question about the wharf at Hamilton cove in the county of Saguenay. At the same time requests were made for improvements to the wharf at that place.
In connection with the enlargement of the wharf at Dolbeau, it would be only fair to say that according to a report tabled a few days ago it would appear that certain work has been done at that point, although not all the work recommended in the reports of engineers for the district of Quebec has been done. Then, questions were asked concerning works at Betsiamites, Beaupre, Rochers bay, Petites Bergeronnes, Pointe-au-Boisvert, Point Lebel, Port-au-Persil, Port-au-Saumon, Riviere-aux-Vases, River Blondelle and St. Anne de Beaupre. As regards this last item it would be but fair to say that certain works were being carried on last summer. I do not believe however that all the works which were considered necessary were done at the point. At St-Jean river on the north shore of the river St. Lawrence certain retaining walls were recommended by officials of the department. At a place called St-Margaret- river certain retaining walls were recommended a good many years ago, but those recommendations were not carried out.
I wish to draw especially to the attention of the committee the question concerning the construction of a post office at Pointe-au-Pic. I believe during the election campaign of 1930 there was talk of having a post office built at that point, and since that time I have continued to urge the construction. Then, requests were made in connection with a wharf at St-Simeon on the Riviere Noire. At that point some small amount of work was carried on last year and the year before, but only those repairs which were absolutely necessary

were done. There was also a request for the reconstruction of the wharf at St-Irenee.
I now reach another item, Mr. Chairman, namely the enlargement of the wharf at Petite Riviere St-Francois, which is a settlement of fishermen in Charlevoix county. The wharf at that point was built many years ago and should be enlarged. Representations and requests have been made but nothing has been done. At a place called Sheldrake on the north shore of the St. Lawrence a breakwater was needed and I believe a recommendation was made by an official of the department. Last year at Baie St-Paul on the Gouffre river work was carried on which was begun about ten years ago in order to prevent the river from flooding part of the village.
There are two other points to which I wish to draw the attention of the Minister of Public Works. Last fall, during the big storms to which the minister referred before six o'clock, the wharf at Seven Islands was entirely dismantled, with the result that to-day the vessels which ply between the south and north shores have no access to that place. It is a small fishing village, and a wharf is required. I wrote the minister, and also his department, but I did not see in the main entimates or in this measure any expenditure for work at this point, I should like the minister to tell me whether or not out of the vote of $2,500,000 a certain amount will be set aside for work at the wharf at that point. I believe it would cost about $150,000, and is quite necessary. As regards the wharf at Havre St. Pierre I find that in the main estimates there is an appropriation of $75,000 for wharf reconstruction. I am pleased to note the government has come to realize the necessity for this work, because last year when I visited that part of the district on the north shore of the river St. Lawrence I found that the wharf was in a most precarious and dangerous condition. I do not know whether or not at the present time tenders have been called for that work. The navigation season is now open, and each week the vessels are making their regular calls. They are going up and down the river St, Lawrence, and I believe it would be well to have the work done as quickly as possible and with the least possible delay.
All the works of which mention has been made are of importance. Last year when a similar bill was before the house I indicated that these works were required. Some of them were recommended a good many years ago, but of course all of them could not be carried out. My hon. friend may say, "Why did you not have these works done while you were in office?" Well, the minister should

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know that every year there are great amounts of work to be done in various parts of the country, and it is impossible to have it all done at once. Surely however in the last five years when there has been distress and necessity, and when in these villages there has been a great deal of unemployment, the work could have been done. The fishermen along the north shore of the river St. Lawrence could not earn a living, and I think it would have been only fair and just to give them a chance to earn a certain amount of money and at the same time to carry out the construction of the necessary works, all of which have been approved by officials of the department. If the work had been carried out it would have helped the population by way of giving relief, and would have given to those communities facilities and communications which were greatly needed.
I do not criticize the minister unduly, but I would urge upon him the necessity for carrying out more especially the work at Seven Islands, that at Havre St. iPierre and some other	works	which have	been	mentioned and	which	have been	before	the
department for some time. I hope the minister will pardon me if I insist upon having the work done. I should like him to tell me how many of these works the people of my district may depend upon having done out of this vote for $2,500,000. These works are necessary from the point of view of communication, and would help relieve the conditions in the communities affected.
Mr. STEWART	(Leeds):	I	realize	theconstituency	of the	hon. member	is one	having a very long coast line.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Eight hundred and
eighty-five miles.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Yes, over 800
miles of coast line, along which numerous harbours and wharves are required. He has spoken about the work required at Seven Islands, and in that connection his observations are quite correct. A report received by our department indicates that either repairs should be done or a new wharf should be built in a location which might give better service. That feature of the matter is under consideration by the engineering department. To illustrate the difficulty of dealing in advance with matters of this kind, may I say that in the constituency represented by the hon. member nineteen works were carried on last year. The amount spent totalled $80,472. Only one other constituency in the province of Quebec had a larger number of works upon which expenditures were made, or had a larger total expenditure. All the requests
of the hon. member have been noted, referred to the chief engineer and through him to the engineer in the district. This information is being assembled, and when that work is done we will know which ones should be proceeded with in the present year and which ones we cannot undertake at this time. I can assure the hon. member I appreciate the difficulty existing in his constituency, in view of the long coast line.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Could the minister tell me the other district which he has mentioned which has more coast line, and has received more public works expenditures than has the one I represent?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Gaspe.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: In the province of
Quebec?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Gaspe.


John Campbell Elliott: I wonder if the minister can give us an idea of how this $2,500,000 is distributed among the different provinces and in what sections of each province?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I thought I had made it very clear before the adjournment, Mr. Chairman, that it would be impossible for me to give my hon. friend that information, much as I should like to do so. I think he will agree that whenever it has been possible for this department, either under his administration or under the present administration, to furnish information it has been cheerfully given. I hope the department has established a record in that respect. I just want, however, to point out to my hon. friend something that I have learned during the recess in reviewing the expenditures under a similar vote last year. I asked the officials to furnish me with a list, which I have had time to run over hurriedly, and I find that there were 549 different projects upon which expenditures were made out of a vote similar to this: in Nova Scotia, 141; Prince Edward Island, 10; New Brunswick, 48; Quebec, 170; Ontario, 94; Manitoba, 5; Saskatchewan, 1; Alberta, 2; Northwest Territories, 2; British Columbia, 176. So there is no allocation by provinces and no allocation by districts. It is just a question of what expenditures we find necessary to make out of this general vote from day to day and from month to month. It is for that purpose that the vote is provided. I think my hon. friend will recall that in the main estimates where a general vote of this kind is taken it has been found impossible in the past to give details as to where the money will be spent. I am sorry that I cannot comply with my hon.
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friend's request for information but I think he will agree that the statement I have made is a reasonable one and clearly and accurately sets forth the difficulty in giving the information.


John Campbell Elliott: In regard to what happened under the vote of last year I understood the minister to say before the house rose at six o'clock that he would while the committee was sitting give us the disposition of the $2,500,000 last year.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I gave the expenditures by provinces before the committee rose.


John Campbell Elliott: Oh yes, but my question had reference to the different works on which it was spent.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: That would involve a very long and detailed statement, information as to which has already been laid on the table in the statement furnished by the Minister of Finance. As I say, there were 549 different works ranging from $100 and even less up to thousands of dollars. I do not know that it would help the committee in any way to relate what was done last year to what should be done out of the vote this year. I do wish to say, however, in connection with this public works program that more information has been given to the house than in connection with any other estimates that have ever been before us, both through the statement that has been laid on the table by the Minister of Finance, and through the fact that every order in council passed under the act has been laid on the table. In view of the fact that we have left open two or three items of our regular estimates for the furnishing of any information which hon. gentlemen may require in addition to or even in duplication of what has already been given, I do suggest to my hon. friend, with a view to getting on with this bill and getting the funds available for work, that he reserve his request for specific information and I submit that it would not help very much to give in detail the expenditures on practically 550 different projects. The program this year will be along the same lines as last year.


John Campbell Elliott: I want to express my appreciation of the manner in which the minister has given considerable information with regard to the works that were let by tender after public advertisement, by invited tender, and the works done by day labour. My recollection is that the statement of the Minister of Finance to which he refers, and I speak subject to correction, covers only the period up

to the last of February. I think that was the latest date up to which the Minister of Finance provided us with a statement of what had been expended and of the places to which it had been allotted. With respect to the balance of the expenditure of the vote last year we shall expect to have, before these items are disposed of, information as to those expenditures similar to the details that have already been given.
As to the amount of $2,500,000 that appears in this schedule, the minister is not quite fair to the committee. I say that with some reluctance, but I am bound to say it. The minister is not quite fair to the committee when he says he cannot tell us where any of that money is to be expended except that generally it will be expended on improvements and repairs. He knows perfectly well that an estimate is given to him by the local engineers in the different districts, passed upon by the chief engineer, and also by the local architects, approved by the chief architect, in connection with buildings, showing where expenditures are needed and are likely to be made. This vote of course refers to harbours and rivers. We have nine provinces and the people of those different provinces have a right I think to know how much is to be expended, and where it is to be expended. They have a right to be given at least some idea in regard to that expenditure. But what the minister has said with regard to this $2,500,000 makes it impossible for anyone to understand how he could have arrived at that figure or at any amount if he did not know at least some of the places where the money was going to be expended. I do not expect him to give the full details, but we are now past the middle of May, pretty well on to the beginning of June, and this is the time that the work should be going on. Does the minister say in all seriousness that he has at the present time no recommendations at all from the engineers with regard to the expenditure of at least a substantial portion of this vote? If that is so then it is the first time it has happened in the department. I think we advance the interests of the department, of the minister and of everyone charged with the responsibility of getting these estimates through in a reasonable time when we make as full a disclosure as possible with regard to where the moneys are to be expended. When the minister states on May 21 that he cannot tell where any portion of this $2,500,000 is going to -be expended, I do not think he expects us to take his statement seriously.

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Mr. STElWAiRT (Leeds)-: In view of the information I have given the house on every occasion I am surprised at the attitude of my hon. friend who suggests that I am attempting to deal in a way other than fairly with this committee. I resent such a suggestion. In connection with the regular estimates, what he has said is perfectly true; we do have the reports of the engineers. Where we have such information the necessary items are placed in the regular estimates. In the Public Works Construction Act of last year we had a long list of specific items in connection with wharves and wharf repairs, but we also had a general vote similar to this item. Neither my hon. friend nor any other hon. member of the house took the position last year which he has taken now, that with respect to this general vote of $2,500,000 for unforeseen repairs and improvements we should be expected to give particulars of the expenditures. I have given to the committee all the information available, and I regret I cannot comply more fully with my hon. friend's request. I think he will agree that he is asking more this year than he did last year in connection with a similar vote. In the absence of any allocation of expenditures it is impossible to give the information for which he asks.


John Campbell Elliott: I just want to say to my hon. friend that if by not pressing this matter last year as diligently and as strenuously as it should have been pressed we have established a precedent, we will endeavour not to take a similar course at this session. I recall that last year the Public Works Construction Act was brought down immediately before adjournment, and it was run through in a very short time. It was intended that this bill should be put through in the same way, but in view of what took place last- year and in view of the attempt which was made before the recess to put through these items within thirty-six hours of when we first saw the list, I do not think it is the disposition of the committee at the present time to allow this bill to go through.
My hon. friend states that he got away last year without giving details, and apparently he thought he could do the same this year. I do not think such an argument helps him. I may say that in connection with an expenditure of S39,000,000 provided for by the Public Works Construction Act of last year there were 185 items, while this year, in connection with an expenditure of $17,940,000, there are only 14 items. Following that line of reasoning, if it should1 be possible for this government to be in office next year and be putting through another Public Works Construction 92582-188
Act-I do not think anyone believes that that is reasonably possible-we will probably have just one item. Within a year they have cut the number of items from 185 to 14, and we might expect that they would make a further cut from 14 to one. They would probably be asking for a lump sum of $17,940,000 for public works generally. Actually that would not be much worse than what we have here. My hon. friend says that he cannot give us any details in connection with this item of $2,500,000 outside of stating that it will be used in improving harbours, repairing wharves and doing other necessary work. If he cannot give us any more information, what is the object of this committee sitting? Apparently it is just to give carte blanche to the government to spend this money without disclosing to the committee where it is to be expended. My hon. friend says that he cannot say where any of this $2,500,000 is to be expended, except that it is to be spent generally on repairs and improvements.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: In Canada.


John Campbell Elliott: We did expect that it
would be spent in Canada, but we also expected more details. I do not want the minister to misunderstand me; I appreciate the manner in which he has provided information. In that connection he is more worthy of congratulation than those who represent other departments in charge of work being done under the Public Works Construction Act. However, this department is the main spending department in connection with works of this kind and I do not think the minister is serious when he tells us that his officials cannot say where any part of this $2,500,000 is to be spent. There must be a list in the possession of the chief engineer made up from lists received from the district engineers which would indicate where all of this money or a very substantial part of it is to be spent. The list may not be conclusive, as the orders in council have not yet been passed, but I do not think the minister should expect us to pass this item before receiving information as to the places where this money is to be spent. I have no doubt the minister has a list of the things recommended by the engineers.	.


Ernest Lapointe: Let us have that list.


John Campbell Elliott: Let us have the list of
the things which have been recommended.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: What is most necessary?


John Campbell Elliott: The minister did not jump at the sum of $2,500,000 without making some calculations. Let us have that list.

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Hugh Alexander Stewart: The position is exactly the same as it was last year in connection with works of this kind. When we came down to the house last year with the Public Works Construction Act, Bill No. 113, we did not have a list of the works that we proposed to undertake with respect to the general vote. We went on and did such repairs as we found to be necessary. We found that last year the expenditure in connection with these 549 items totalled the amount I have mentioned, approximately the whole of the vote. We believe that conditions will be the same during this year, and basing our conclusions upon the experience of last year and the necessary work that was done, the work which we expect will be necessary this year being similar, we say that a similar amount is required, and that is the way in which we have arived at the amount that has been inserted for this item. With respect to the general item that has appeared in the estimates from year to year for similar works on a similar scale, details have not been available when the item has been submitted to the house and they are not available now. We have, as I have said, a very long list of requests and suggestions, but there has been no selection from these of what will be done, and it is to take care of the most necessary and desirable of these that this item is provided. It will be made sufficiently elastic to take care of the requirements from time to time.


Charles A. Stewart: There is nothing new about the statement the minister makes with respect to this or any other vote which the government undertake with their majority to press through the house. We simply do not get the information. True, the same complaint cannot be lodged against the Minister of Public Works with respect to his estimates; he does provide information. But -and this is not the first time it has happened -the moment they want more money, it matters not under what department it is, they begin to secure it under the guise of relief. This has been occurring too often and we are tired of this method of voting public money for the government to use as they please, spending it wherever they take the notion to spend it. When the minister says, "We are doing the same as we did last year," of course he is. They were going to put this vote through in twenty-four hours owing to the necessity of the occasion. Now they had a very considerable sum unexpended, money voted last year, which must have kept them going nicely, and I say to the minister, after 
looking at these votes rather carefully, that with the exception of one or two they will provide mighty little employment for the people who really need it. The minister does not say for a single moment, surely, that it will be spent where employment is necessary. It will be spent on wharves and harbours in connection with which in many instances they will have to import labour. So that it is pretty nearly time the government were checked up good and short with respect to the manner in which they treat the House of Commons in connection with this vote and many others. In former days bon. gentlemen when they sat on this side insisted on full particulars; but now they have come down every year under the guise of relief and voted more than one half their capital expenditure. I do not know about the members who support the government, but so far as the members of the opposition are concerned, they have to be content with the assurance that in the good judgment of the government hon. gentlemen opposite will place this money where required. May I point out that that is hardly the way in which public business should be conducted or be allowed to be conducted. We are supposed to have been sent here to find out something about the expenditure of public money, where it is being spent, and so on, but this is the kind of information we get every time we inquire with regard to these matters.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Let me point out to my hon. friend again that in no department of the government, with respect to the regular estimates from year to year, has the same amount of information been given to the house and to the committee regarding the way in which the money has been spent or how it is proposed to be spent as has been given in connection with the work conducted under the Public Works Construction Act. As I have said, the Minister of Finance comes in and lays on the table a detailed statement, and every day orders in council passed are tabled. There is no desire to conceal anything or to withhold from the house any information that is available, and if I could give the information which he asks for I would give it cheerfully. But I have explained the situation. I think the position taken is reasonable. It is the only one we can take under the circumstances and I am prepared to accept the judgment of the committee in that regard.


Charles A. Stewart: I would point out to the minister that not only in the relief vote but in the general estimates there has been a tendency from year to year to bulk

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the estimates under one number. It runs all through the estimates, and every year we get more meagre information. All I can say is that when the hon. gentleman sits over here, as I suppose he will, he will have to be satisfied with far less information than he demanded in the past-and he was not slow to demand information. I have a vivid recollection of the hon. gentleman sitting over here and insisting upon having the fullest information, and he cannot -wonder at our amazement when we find that he is a party to curtailing information both in the estimates themselves and in items that appear under the guise of a relief vote.


Mr. POWER:: I am rather relieved to hear from the minister in the course of this discussion that he does not know just where he will spend the money which he is asking us to vote. If he does not know now where he will spend it he could not have known five or six weeks ago, so that during the interval between April 17 and this time it would not have been possible for him to put these public works into motion. Shortly before the recess I heard the Minister of Railways say that we had to take the responsibility if we stopped this public works bill from going through. The implication was that there were a lot of starving people throughout the country who would blame us if we did not hustle up and pass this bill. But what good would it have done these starving people if the minister did not know where he was going to spend the money? He does not know now and he could not have known then, so that he would have had nothing to do for five weeks except to find out where he would spend it. Some hon. members on the other side were in a tearing, roaring mood, wanting to hurry the bill through. The minister is always very quiet and polite, but my good friend the Minister of Railways looked at us with blood in his eye and said, "You must take the responsibility for it if this money is not voted before the recess." Really I was somewhat anxious.


Mr. MANION:: Does the hon. member
think we should have spent it in the recess although it was not voted?


Charles Gavan Power: Not at all.


Robert James Manion: What is he complaining
about?


Charles Gavan Power: I do not think the Minister of Railways misunderstood me.


Robert James Manion: I understand the hon.
member very well.
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Charles Gavan Power: The minister was in a terrible hurry to spend it. Surely, if he was in such a hurry, he must have known where he was going to spend it, and yet to-day, five weeks after, he cannot tell us.


Robert James Manion: There was no use in looking into methods to spend it until he could spend it. Until the money is voted, he cannot look into where he is going to spend it.


Charles Gavan Power: Do I gather from the minister that it is never the custom to know, before the money is voted, where it is to go?


Robert James Manion: Sometimes.


Charles Gavan Power: The minister comes before
the house and says: I want so much money for the Trent VaJley canal. Then, when we ask him for the details, he tells us how he is going to spend it. I am sure he could even give us the details of the expenditure for the Toronto tunnel. Yet here we are, five weeks after the date when the minister was in such a hurry, and even now he cannot tell us just where it is to be spent. I am not blaming the Minister of Railways, but my conscience is relieved. I have not on my conscience the feeling that some poor devil did not get a job during those five weeks. The newspapers throughout the country have, since the recess started, been spreading it broadcast that the Liberal opposition held up the public works bill and kept labour from being employed throughout the country.


Robert James Manion: They are holding it up
yet.


Charles Gavan Power: Since the house reassembled, I doubt very much in so far as the proceeding up to the present is concerned, whether that accusation would be true about this side of the house. Most of the time yesterday was spent in eloquent speeches by hon. members opposite describing the beauties and glory of Hanlan's island and the city of Toronto. I do not blame them. If the committee will pardon me I am rather reminded of a time some years ago when the party -which is sitting on this side of the house was sitting opposite on the government benches. They were putting through a vote of some 813,000,000 or 814,000,000 for grade crossings, I think it was, and some hon. members supporting the then government, with perhaps a greater show of independence than have members who support the present administration, were rather opposing this vote. One hon. member who afterwards became Solicitor General suggested to the house that perhaps it would be a good thing to vote this money provided that one would be able to go right through Toronto
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without stopping. To this my good friend the late Billy Maclean, who was sitting in the very seat I am at this moment occupying, said that he hoped that would be the case if the hon. gentleman were on the train. May I suggest that a similar method would have been the best way to get through the Toronto vote that we have been discussing for the last two days; if somebody had had the same wit and brevity of speech as that possessed by the late Billy Maclean, I have no doubt the Toronto vote would have gone through in half the time.
As regards this item, we are entitled to get the information. We have asked for it politely; we have asked for it energetically and we are not getting it. May I suggest to the minister that in all this there is a good deal of what is vulgarly called bluff; that really this public works bill and last year's public works bill are nothing but bluff to fool the electorate. All we are doing is trying to catch up the slack of normal public works which we did not carry on during the years 1930-31, 1931-32, 1932-33 and 193334. This is just employing the same tactics as were used by my hon. friends opposite in connection with relief in 1930, the first year they came into power. If my memory serves me aright, under the estimates of 1930-31 there was something like $32,000,000 voted for public works. In March of 1931 we found that the amount expended was $8,000,000 less than the amount which had been voted. Yet this government proclaimed throughout the country: We will relieve unemployment by having a public works program and voting $20,000,000. In 1930 we voted $20,000,000 and prior to March 31, 1931, we expended only $4,000,000. Therefore although they stated that with this $20,000,000 they were going to help the struggling people of this country to get jobs and to relieve unemployment, as a matter of fact they saved $2,000,000, if not 83,000,000 for the public exchequer.
That same line has been followed ever since. Last year the public works estimates, those for harbours and rivers and public works generally, the ordinary normal public works that are usually carried on, were reduced. This year there is again the same situation. Nevertheless, they are trying to get some credit from the country in two ways, one in being able to say: We have a balanced budget, telling the people that the revenues are equal to the expenditures and pointing to their public works estimates as being the usual means of finding out how much money they are spending on public works. That is one advantage they gain by

telling the people they are saving money. Then they bring down a bill such as this and say: We have spent S33,000,000 in this case and there was 840,000,000 last year, which by the way was not all expended. But a large proportion of the items included in these bills are simply such as would have entered into the ordinary public works estimates in normal times. In other words, by a bill such as this we are making up for the almost criminal neglect of the government in not having provided the ordinary normal service of public works throughout the other years during which they were in power. I think by a close examination and analysis of the estimates it will be found that that is a true statement of fact; that if you take all the years since 1930 when this government came into power and take the average of expenditures on harbours and rivers for four or five years before, you will find it will not take long to make up the S2,500,000 now proposed to be voted on harbours and rivers. On that ground I say that the government have no right to take any very great credit to themselves for having proposed to *expend this money on what they call a public works program. It is only an ordinary everyday program that the Minister of Public Works normally should have carried out in the four years he has been in power. I do not believe there is any necessity to get excited over this matter, to cheer the government for its action. The only thing I can blame the minister for is that under the circumstances now, instead of giving a detailed estimate as he would normally have done, he takes the money in a 82,500,000 vote which he can spend where it is most needed when the proper time comes.


An hon. MEMBER:: The government will need it.


Charles Gavan Power: That is what this public
works bill amounts to; it is a political bill. I do not blame the government for having a political bill, but do not let them be hypocritical. This is intended to do good to the party during the election, and on that understanding with my hon. friends opposite, that they agree that that is the case, I am quite willing to help them out, because, as has been said by an hon. member, they will need the money.


Robert James Manion: My hon. friend is so honest, I would like to ask him a question.


Charles Gavan Power: I am not honest; I am just like the hon. member.


Robert James Manion: I know his friend the hon. member for West Middlesex (Mr. Elliott)

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will not be able to answer the question because he was in power during the time the estimates went through, so he probably would not know anything about them.


John Campbell Elliott: My hon. friend is speaking of railways.


Robert James Manion: I am speaking now of public works about which I do not know anything, but I think I know as much as my hon. friend did when he was minister. This item is $2,500,000, and the hon. member for West Middlesex, who was formerly Minister of Public Works, has been making a great fuss about the matter. While he was talking in that indignant tone about the present minister not giving details, I was looking through the estimates for dredging alone in 1930, also a pre-election year like this one. The hon. member for Quebec South admitted that sometimes governments put through bills for the purpose of getting votes, or something to that effect; at least I thought that was what he implied, and I must confess that I resent that suggestion. However, I see an item in the estimates of 1930 to which I should like to refer. At that time the hon. member for West Middlesex was Minister of Public Works. I hope he will not be defeated for the next few years; I like to see him here as a member. Item No. 141 of that year, however, provided $1,750,000 for dredging alone, and I am going to give the committee all the details that are given in the item.


Charles Gavan Power: What year?


Robert James Manion: In 1930, when my hon. friends were in power.


Charles Gavan Power: What item?


Robert James Manion: Item 141, at page 44. That was a pre-election year. Before I deal with this item, I notice that in the estimates for that pre-election year there were pages and pages dealing with dredging here, there and everywhere, but just in case they did not have enough to spread around among their friends they threw in this item of $1,750,000. The details were as follows:
Dredging-
Maritime provinces, $650,000.
Ontario and Quebec, $600,000.
Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, $125,000.
British Columbia, $375,000.
That makes a total of $1,750,000.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: That is given by provinces, which is more than we have here.


Robert James Manion: I imagine my hon. friend
the minister could guess at the provinces, if he wanted to.


William Duff: That was for government
dredging. My hon. friend does not know what this is all about.


Robert James Manion: It was probably for
government support rather than government dredging. However, I do not intend to delay the item.


William Duff: No, don't, because you are
only making it worse.


Robert James Manion: The Minister of Public
works tells me it was for both government and contract dredging. The point I am making is that under this one item, without any details except the mere mention of the provinces in passing, $1,750,000 was voted for dredging alone, not for harbours and rivers generally but for dredging alone. I have no particular complaint to make, but I remember how quietly I sat on the other side when my hon. friends passed that item. I am sure I did not utter a word of complaint about it. My hon. friends were not quite as honest as we have been. We bring down our estimates at the beginning of the session and give all the details as we go along. My hon. friends preferred to wait until the last night of the session and then run through $40,000,000 or $50,000,000 in the last half hour. There were no details of any kind given, but we were all so tired of the session and of hon. gentlemen as a government that we were glad to let them get through without giving the details.


William Duff: Does my hon. friend forget
April 17?


Robert James Manion: I do not know what my
hon. friend is talking about. I repeat that hon. gentlemen opposite have very little to complain about when we ask only $2,500,000 for harbours and rivers generally throughout the country, when they put through $1,750,000 for dredging after devoting page after page to items dealing with dredging and similar work, in the same estimates.


Mr. GRAY:: I would not have risen had
it not been for the remarks of the Minister of Railways. I recall very vividly that when this bill was before the house on Tuesday, April 16, the first item called for $1,000,000 for grade crossings. In reply to a question asked by the ex-Minister of Public Works the Minister of Railways said, " Oh, I cannot possibly give the details because these grade crossings come under the board of railway commissioners, and I cannot say where they are located." Then we passed on to the second or third item, and I remember how anxious hon. gentlemen opposite were to get this bill through before we adjourned on Wednesday night. They knew that item No.
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7, concerning the Toronto tunnel, was coming along; if only they could escape any discussion in connection with that item how happy they would be. At that time the Minister of Railways said, "Just ask us anything; just ask us where any of this money will be spent and we will tell you. We are not trying to hide anything; we are not like the government that we succeeded." He made the same statement he has made to-night; he had the same old bluebook before him.


Robert James Manion: My hon. friend is making it up as he goes along, but that is all right.


Ross Wilfred Gray: It is all on the record. My
hon. friend produced from his desk the same bluebook he produced to-night, and he said to the committee, " Look what the King government did. They voted these huge amounts of $1,000,000, $2,000,000 or whatever it was, but they did not give any details."


Robert James Manion: One item included $10,-
000,000, without details.


Ross Wilfred Gray: All right, make it S10,000,000. Then the minister said, "We are not like the King government. Just ask us and we will tell you." Now when the ex-Minister of Public Works and others ask for a detailed statement in connection with this amount of 12,500,000 the Minister of Railways comes along and says, "Oh, you did the same thing." That is at least some excuse, but the Minister of Public Works says, "I do not know; I cannot tell you where the money will be spent." During the recess we have been accused-and perhaps the Minister of Railways has been the most ambitious of all-of having held up this bill.


Robert James Manion: I made only one speech.


Ross Wilfred Gray: My hon. friend boasted of it
before the recess. He met a committee of men representing the railway shop workers and said, "I do not know what we are going to be able to do, by reason of this Liberal opposition. Perhaps we will have to revise our whole scheme; perhaps we will not be able to include this vote at all." To-night he comes along and says, "We are doing exactly what you did." Surely if year after year we are going to spend the time of this house and of the country in considering these estimates we are entitled to know where the money is to be expended. Surely after all these months since this amount of 82,500,000 for harbours and rivers generally was placed in the estimates, we are entitled to know where this money is to be spent. If the government are not prepared to say where it will be spent certainly this item should be removed from the bill.


Mr. SANDERSON:: I was very much interested in the remarks of the Minister of Railways and Canals. I have a very clear recollection of a speech made last session, I think it was, by my hon. friend on railway matters in general, during which he charged the King government with rolling the pork barrel from the Atlantic to the Pacific.


Robert James Manion: And back again.


Frederick George Sanderson: And back again; I
am not sure that he did not say it went over the country two or three times. Some time during the month of March the Minister of Railways went back to his home town of Fort William, I think to receive his nomination, and I am very glad he was nominated again. The day before the nomination, however, a news item was sent from Fort William to Toronto-I am sorry I have not the paper under my hand; I think it is upstairs in my room-purporting to contain an interview with the minister, during the course of which he said, "We are going to get a lot of money for dredging in Fort William. We now have an estimate of $150,000." Remember, this was the day before his nomination. He went on to say, "After a while I will get you a whole lot more." I should be interested in asking the Minister of Public Works if he could give the estimates for Fort William One of the minister's colleagues would have the information. Would the Minister of Public Works give the appropriation for Fort William?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I would hasten to say there is no appropriation in this vote for Fort William.


Frederick George Sanderson: Was the Minister of Railways and Canals not correct when he said $150,000 had already been arranged?


Robert James Manion: Perhaps the Minister of Railways and Canals could answer that question himself.


Frederick George Sanderson: All right; in a moment I shall be pleased to have the minister answer. Rut, to get back to railway equipment may I say that I have in my hand a copy of the Free Press Prairie Farmer of Winnipeg, dated May 8, 1935, and from it I read the following:
Ottawa may revise big railway scheme.
Following that heading the article continues :
Ottawa, May 2.-Representations made to Hon. R. J. Manion, Minister of Railways, by Mayor John Queen, of Winnipeg, with respect to the proposed expenditure of $15,000,000 on new railway equipment and on repairs to existing equipment elicited the answer that this program may have to be revised.
Owing to the intractability-

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That is a pretty good word-
-of the Liberal party in preventing the enactment of the legislation prior to the Easter recess it may not be possible to carry through the original program of expenditure.
Then the article proceeds to state:
Mr. Manion pointed this out to Mr. Queen, but promised that he would do his best to obtain a fair share of whatever moneys are to be spent for the three railway shops in the Winnipeg area.
The word "intractability" to my mind means that the Liberal party were out of control, and that they were not doing their duty. If on those dates, April 15 and 16, any party was out of control, certainly it was the government party. There was full control on this side of the house, and yet we find the Minister of Railways and Canals trying to blame the Liberal party, and stating that the vote of $15,000,000 may not be spent at all because the opposition blocked it.


Robert James Manion: So they did.


Frederick George Sanderson: In what way? I will say to the minister that not a single member of the Liberal party criticized the vote of $15,000,000, $8,000,000 going to the Canadian National Railways and $7,000,000 to the Canadian Pacific Railway-not one member.


Robert James Manion: They blocked the whole bill, that is all.


Frederick George Sanderson: No, they did not. I take issue with the minister when he makes that statement. He is wrong when he says that, and he is deceiving the people of Canada when he tries to get that propaganda over.


Robert James Manion: Surely I do not understand English if I do not know what happened. Hon. members opposite held up the bill on the Wednesday the house adjourned. They tied it up, and prevented not only the giving of railway equipment orders, but the passage of the remainder of the bill. Is that not correct?


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: We had only one day to
discuss it.


Robert James Manion: It was discussed three days -one day on the resolution and two days on the bill. My hon. friends opposite devoted their time to blocking the bill, and succeeded in blocking it. They blocked it; they held it up and they must take the responsibility so far for having held it up. Had it passed, equipment orders would have been under way almost a month ago. Not only equipment orders but a good deal of other work for which provision was made in the bill could have been proceeded with. None of the work
could get under way however until the measure passed. My hon. friend now talks as though the Minister of Public Works could have gone ahead with something which had not passed this chamber. I say the Minister of Public Works has no right to spend money or to call for tenders until this house has authorized the expenditure. The money was not passed because hon. members opposite blocked the bill. The hon. member for South Perth (Mr. Sanderson) helped to block it; he talked as much as anybody else. He gets up and talks a great deal about railway shops; he talks about the work which would have beeen given to the railway shops in Stratford. He held up the work which would have gone to those railway shops in Stratford.


Frederick George Sanderson: That is not correct.


Robert James Manion: The hon. member who has just taken his seat held up the work which would have been given to his own railway shops, and he did that by blocking the bill. That was the policy adopted by the opposition when it proceeded to block the bill, and they are blocking it just as much right now. The bill has not passed, and until it does none of the money can be spent. Until the bill passes I say the opposition must take the responsibility for delaying the work and failing to relieve unemployment.


Ernest Lapointe: Just one word: If there is one gentleman who is blocking this measure, it is the gentleman who is abusing hon. members on this side because they ask for information.


Frederick George Sanderson: I must take issue with the Minister of Railways and Canals when he states that other hon. members and myself have blocked the vote for the equipment. I say that statement is untrue. It is only bluff on the part of the Minister of Railways. Of course the Minister of Railways is very genial, very nice and very fine, but he is the biggest bluffer we have ever had in this House of Commons.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Frederick George Sanderson: I wish to say this to the minister: He states that the Liberal party-


An hon. MEMBER:: You are a bluffer.


Frederick George Sanderson: Get up on your feet; I will take care of you a little later on. I want to ask the Minister of Railways and Canals one question. He states that on April 16 or April 17 the Liberal party blocked the vote for railway equipment. I would remind him of something which he must
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know very well, namely that from January 17, the first day this house met, I proceeded to ask him questions concerning railway equipment. Following that date I repeated my question on four occasions, and he replied that he did not know anything about it. He said the matter had never been considered.


Robert James Manion: I did not say any such thing. I said the very reverse of what the hon. member has just credited me with saying. As a matter of fact I said it was being considered. Of course, that is about as close to being correct as the hon. member ever gets.


Frederick George Sanderson: The minister may have said that it was being considered on the fifth occasion I asked him the question, but on the four preceding occasions he said it was not being considered.


Robert James Manion: I did not say that on any occasion.


Frederick George Sanderson: To-night the minister states that because I brought the matter up I blocked the vote for equipment, and that consequently the railway men have not received work. That is untrue; it is absolutely untrue. If my remarks are unparliamentary the chairman may call me to order, but I do not propose to let the minister get away with a bluff of that kind.


Robert James Manion: There is no bluff in anything I have said; it is merely a question of fact. Because the hon. member gets up and states that something I have said is untrue it does not necessarily follow that my statement has been untrue. The reason the hon. member is so hurt is that it is true. He is Deginning to get worried about the railway shops in Stratford.


Frederick George Sanderson: The responsibility is with the minister.


Robert James Manion: He is probably getting a good deal of riding from his own railway men because he blocked the bill and prevented men from getting work. He is just about as useful to the men up there in the railway shops as he is in connection with other matters in this house.


Ernest Lapointe: That is very polite on your part.


Robert James Manion: What is the matter with the hon. member?


Ernest Lapointe: That is very polite.


Robert James Manion: I do not need any lessons in politeness from the big member from Quebec East.


Ernest Lapointe: You are the most impolite member in the house.


Robert James Manion: The race from which the hon. member for Quebec East comes is usually very polite; he is the exception.


Ernest Lapointe: That is why I am a good judge of politeness.


Robert James Manion: We brought in a bill having in mind the intention of relieving unemployment. Hon. members opposite held it up for three days before the house adjourned. They held it up, blocked it, kept it from going through. Since then we have had two days' debate. They spent all day yesterday and most of to-day talking about a tunnel for the city of Toronto, and yet we hear the hon. member for South Perth saying that they are not blocking it. They are certainly holding it up. If the bill goes through, the work goes on. Until the bill is passed the work cannot be begun; no part of it can be done. I do not understand how any hon. member opposite could stand up and say the opposition is not holding up the work when as a matter of fact they are holding up the bill. That is a statement of fact. Until the bill is passed no work arising from it can be done. So long as hon. members opposite continue to obstruct, the work cannot possibly go on.


Frederick George Sanderson: I want to remind the minister that on January 22, 193S, on the orders of the day, I put this question to the Minister of Railways:
Mr. F. B. Sanderson (South Perth): Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Minister of Railways (Mr. Manion) based on a telegram I received this morning from the city of Stratford. It is as follows.
I shall not read the telegram, which is in regard to new equipment for the Canadian National Railways, but here is the answer of the Minister of Railways:
Hon. R. J. Manion (Minister of Railways and Canals): Well, Mr, Speaker, I do not think there is any answer coming to the hon. gentleman. The government, if it makes a decision on this question, will submit it to the house at the proper time.


Robert James Manion: That is correct.


Frederick George Sanderson: Yes, and they left that proper time until the day before the adjournment. I want to say this to the minister, and I say it with all respect, and I know what I am talking about. He says that I am getting a good deal of criticism from the railway men in the city of Stratford. No, I am not. But if there ever was a public man criticized in the city of Stratford by the employees of the railway it is the Minister of Railways, and I

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would not want to repeat that criticism; I could not because it would not be parliamentary.


William Duff: But that is only part of the story, Mr. Chairman. The Minister of Railways was very much worried about the moneys which were voted for dredging. I interrupted him, and perhaps I should have begged his pardon for doing so, but I was trying to convey to him that the amount which he mentioned for the maritimes and other provinces was for the employment of government dredges. If the minister will take the estimates for this year -and this is in addition to the 82,500,000 for harbours and rivers under the special bill of last year, and in addition to the $2,500,000 which the minister now asks us to vote in blank for harbours and rivers-he will find that this year we have passed without any criticism for harbours and rivers generally in Nova Scotia, in addition to the other votes for Nova Scotia, the sum of 8250,000 for harbours and rivers generally in that province-that is for the same purpose as this 82,500,000-and $50,000 for Prince Edward Island. So last year and this we are voting for harbours and rivers generally, 85,000,000, plus $250,000 for Nova Scotia, plus $50,000 for Prince Edward Island. Surely if the Public Works department is efficient, if the engineers, whether it is the chief engineer at Ottawa or the other officials, are efficient, they should have been able to tell the Minister of Public Works before this house met in January exactly what they wanted by way of special votes during the year 1935. We had $2,500,000 in the special vote of $40,000,000 and three months ago we voted $250,000 for Nova Scotia, $50,000 for Prince Edward Island, and $100,000 for New Brunswick for harbours and rivers generally. These votes were for the same purpose for which we are being asked to-night to vote another $2,500,000. I should like to impress these figures upon the Minister of Railways and Canals. We voted $400,000 for Quebec, $200,000 for Ontario, $50,000 for Saskatchewan and Alberta and $100,000 for British Columbia. The Minister of Public Works, the deputy minister, the chief engineer, the secretary and the engineers in every province of this dominion were not satisfied; they thought that that was not enough and they put in another $25,000, making a total of $1,400,000. That is the amount voted three months ago to look after our harbours and rivers generally, yet the Minister of Railways and Canals now comes along and says we are blocking this bill. We voted $2,500,000 last year in the special vote of $40,000,000, and the minister has not seen fit to account for this expenditure. Three months ago we voted $1,400,000 in the general estimates, and because we have, according to the Minister of Railways, the audacity and

temerity respectfully to request the Minister of Public Works to account for this 82,500,000, the Minister of Railways and Canals gets up and says that we are blocking this bill and the money cannot be spent. Does the minister know that out of the $40,000,000 voted last year the government spent only $10,000,000? He can go and buy railway equipment if he wants to under peace, order and good government. Two years ago he ordered 50,000 tons of steel rails and they have not been used yet.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Oh, yes,
they have.


William Duff: Where?


Mir. MacDONALD (Cape-Breton):: They have all been taken out.


William Duff: I know they have been taken from Sydney, but I am saying that they have not been used on the railroad.


Richard Burpee Hanson: They have been used all over the system.


William Duff: Where were they used?


Finlay MacDonald: On the Canadian National Railways.


William Duff: When these 50,000 tons of
rails were ordered I stated that they were not necessary, and that was a fact. The minister should be the last person to complain because we are criticizing this vote for $2,500,000 because this bill provides for the expenditure of $8,000,000 for the Canadian National Railways.


Finlay MacDonald: I know my hon. friend wants to be fair. Of the 50,000 ton rail order nearly 40,000 tons have delivered and are now being laid on the lines of the Canadian National Railways west of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.


William Duff: Part of those rails came from
Saullt Ste. Marie.


Finlay MacDonald: There were two orders.


William Duff: That makes it all the worse.
There have been practically none of that 50,000-ton order used. The order was given simply to create employment ini the steel mills of Sydney and Sault Ste. Marie. I do not blame the government for that; I simply say that the Minister of Railways should not get up and criticize us when we ask for information in connection with expenditures. We passed an order for 50,000 tons of rails which were not required at the moment. If the Liberal party was in power there would be

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sufficient business to make these rails necessary. The Intercolonial and Canadian National railways would both be busy but at present because of the policies of the Tory government these railways have practically no traffic. What my hon. friend should do is to run as a Liberal candidate in the next elections.
Mr. M'acDONALD (Cape Breton): That is a compliment.


William Duff: My hon. friend is a decent
fellow and I have no objection to him personally, outside of his adhering to the wrong party. I do not see why he should associate as a party man with the hon. member for York-Sunbury, the Minister of Trade and Commerce (Mr. Hanson).
The Minister of Railways has asserted that the Liberal party is holding up this legislation. Let me say to him that the people of this country know exactly who is holding up this and other legislation. If the minister has that red blooded Canadianism of which he has boasted so often let him go to-morrow to his leader and say, "Let us go to the country. The Liberal party is holding up this legislation for $33,000,000; they do not want to vote $8,000,000 for Canadian National railway shops and they do not want to vote $7,000,000 for Canadian Pacific railway shops. They do not want to vote $2,500,000 for harbours and rivers generally and they do not want to vote $4,000,000 for public works and repairs to public works. Let us dissolve parliament and go to the country and let the people decide whether the Liberal party are to blame for holding up this legislation." We are ready to call my hon. friends' bluff. The people of this country will decide who is to rule Canada for the next four or five years. We believe in trusting the people. They realize that this government has fallen down on the job. The people know that because of the policies of the present government trade in Canada is stagnant, making it necessary to vote SI,- 000,000 to build a tunnel in Toronto in order to provide employment. Is it any wonder that we have to vote $40,000,000 in order-[DOT] God save the mark-to provide work for the people? Is it any wonder that there is no work for the Canadian National or Canadian. Pacific shops? There is not sufficient business in the country because of the policies of this government; longshoremen, railway employees, labourers, wharfingers and everyone else are out of employment. Let the Minister of Railways go to the Prime Minister (Mr. Bennett) while he is in fairly good health and have him call an election on June 26. The
people of this country will then show the members of this government that they are not willing that the Minister of Public Works should sit in his seat and ask us to vote $2,250,000 for rivers and harbours generally without any explanation when we have already voted $1,400,000 for that purpose this year, and $2,500,000 last year.


Robert James Manion: You boasted just as hard
in 1930 as you are boasting now.


William Duff: As usual my hon. friend is
wrong. We did not boast in 1930; it was my hon. friend who boasted; that is the time he talked about red blooded Canadianism.


Robert James Manion: It got us in power.


William Duff: Yes, but you are going out
quicker than you came in. All I ask my hon. friend to do-is to call an election immediately. We are willing to be guided by the desires of the people of this country. My hon. friends are afraid to trust the people; they are hanging on until the last minute. They were elected in 1930 and they held a special session in September of that year in order to satisfy their big interest friends by raising the duty on a lot of items by almost 100 per cent.


David Spence: We did something else.


William Duff: What did you do? Tell me
one thing you did.


Mr. MACDOUGALL:: We voted $20,000,-
000.


William Duff: The hon. member for Inverness (Mr. Macdougall) says they voted $20,000,000, but let me say that was the greatest mistake the Tory government ever made. They put the people on the dole.


David Spence: You put them out of work.


William Duff: That is exactly what you did. They were put on the dole by the Tory party in spite of the fact that the Prime Minister went all over the country in the election and said, "King promises you conferences but I promise you work." The statement was made that in three days they would stop unemployment, and my hon. friend was at the meeting and applauded that with all his might. Wihat is the position in Toronto to-day? After four years what have my hon. friends opposite done? Are there more people unemployed to-day in Toronto or less than there were in 1030? Five times as many. What influence has the hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Spence) had on this government? None. He has done nothing to help to relieve unemployment. We are still paying the dole-why? Because, owing to the policies of this govern-
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meat, the business of the country has been restricted. Over two months ago I called the attention of the Minister of Trade and Commerce to the fact that the fishermen of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island had received, through the tariff duties of Santo Domingo, a slap in the face so that no business could be done with that country. What did the minister say yesterday in answer to my question? What does he say to-day? Did this government try to get business for the country? No; they do not want business; they are inside their shell and they do not know what it is all about. I say, let us go to the country and have the people decide whether they are satisfied with the policies which this government has carried out. Let the people decide whether they want to return to this parliament the member for Parkdale or the member for York-Sunbury. But the government have kept on for five years until the eleventh month and the eleventh day and the eleventh hour and the fifty-ninth minute. It is all right for the hon. member for Fort William to go about boasting about what the government has not done, but let him go to cabinet council to-morrow and say, "Mr. Bennett, we want an election; let the people decide who is to govern the country." No; they want to hang on to the last minute. They know that when the time comes and the people have a chance to vote, this government will be swept out of power. The Minister of Public Works sits there with all the reports from the different provinces-engineers' reports, and God knows they cost enough money. The engineers were told last November to go over the different districts and report to the minister, to the deputy minister, to the secretary and to all the officials as to what was required for this year.


Charles Gavan Power: There are reports also from the members as to where they need work for votes.


William Duff: Yes, Conservative members, and he does not even tell us about those. If he were fair to the people's representatives, if he would tell us something about the reports he has received either from the members or from the engineers, there would be something to go on. But the Minister of Public Works, in spite of the fact that we voted $2,500,000 for these harbours and rivers generally last year, cannot tell us what was done with that money. He cannot tell us what the department will do with the $1,140,000.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I know that my hon. friend does not wish to have an inaccurate statement go on the record. I have

told the house what has been done in every province with this $2,500,000. I gave the commitments by provinces and showed the amount unencumbered, and it has been practically all spent. I gave the particulars.


Charles Gavan Power: Of this vote?


Hugh Alexander Stewart: He says I have not given an account of the $2,500,000 of last year.


William Duff: The minister made a general statement, but we are not going to accept general statements from the Minister of Public Works or any other minister. The taxpayers demand that we be given specific statements.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: The Minister of Finance laid on the table a most complete and detailed statement covering the bulk of these expenditures.


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Last year's.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: How could we
spend this year's vote before we have received it?


William Duff: I am not interested in what the Minister of Finance has done; in fact the Minister of Finance has made a splendid budget statement under the deplorable circumstances. But the Minister of Public Works is directly responsible for the expenditure in his department and I am asking him, not the Minister of Finance, who does not happen to be here. It is not fair for the Minister of Public Works to throw this on the Minister of Finance. The Minister of Finance is from Nova Scotia and I will not allow the Minister of Public Works to throw anything on him. I am asking the hon. gentleman how this $2,500,000 voted last year was spent. In addition to that $2,500,000 blanket vote, which was in the $40,000,000 last year, we voted a number of other items. Let me tell you what they were. Will somebody please get a pencil and add them up; I am busy. I can understand my hon. friend from North Huron (Mr. Spotton) laughing; he is a jolly soul and appreciates what I am saying, and if there were a secret ballot taken in the house he would vote with me. In addition to the $2,500,000 under this blanket vote of $40,000,000 you will find that we voted for harbours and rivers generally, in 1934, in addition to 1935, for Nova Scotia, $50,000; for New Brunswick, $75,000; for Quebec, $300,000; for Ontario, $100,000; for Manitoba $40,000; for Saskatchewan and Alberta, $10,000; for British Columbia, $75,000. We voted nearly $1,000,000 in the last session of

Public Works Program
1934. We voted another 82,500,000 and we voted $1,140,000 two months ago for harbours and rivers generally. And now we are asked to vote another 82,500,000. These are very large amounts, and the ordinary taxpayer is wondering what this government is doing with all this money. And the end is not yet. That is only part of the expenditure which the Minister of Public Works is trying to put over.
Now let me take your memory back to the year 1929-30, when the present Minister of Public Works was a humble member of the opposition and when, for instance, the Post Office vote was under consideration. Perhaps virtue has received its reward or otherwise, but you will remember that in 1929-30 the Minister of Public Works kept this house for three weeks, associated of course with my hon. friend from Port William and some other hon. members-my hon. friend from Digby-Annapolis (Mr. Short), who I hope is going to the Senate soon. I wish to God I were going there myself. But those hon. gentlemen helped the present Minister of Public Works to hold up the Post Office estimates in 1929 and 1930. We did not then hear the present Minister of Railways in stentorian red blooded Canadian tones talk about the Liberal party or any party holding up a vote. That was all right in 1929 and 1930 when the present Minister of Railways tried to make capital against the Liberal party at that time; but a similar situation is a terrible one now. It does not make any difference whether we spend 830,000.000 or $70,000,000, the joke is that the situation is like that of a man who is bankrupt, because that is what this government is. It has almost brought the country to bankruptcy and it does not care how much it spends-


Joseph Philippe Baby Casgrain: Drunken sailors.


William Duff: No, it is not like a drunken sailor. A drunken sailor wakes up the next morning with a headache, but the government does not know whether it has & headache or not. The present government will not have to deal with the situation; it is the Liberal party that will be elected in July or September or whenever the time comes. When we came into power in 1921 we had almost the same static condition we have now, and when this party came in, what did they do?


David Spence: They made things worse.


William Duff: Worse for Toronto, because ten or fifteen Tories were elected in Toronto, and that is the reason why we are voting against Toronto to-day, because of a Tory Toronto.
We are for Canada. My hon. friend talks about what we did. I say that when we were in power and the present government were in opposition in 1930, the latter blocked every estimate, and the Tory members from Toronto were the ringleaders. They criticized the government of that day, and we have a perfect right to criticize the government of this day when they want to spend money and when they cannot explain to us what they are going to spend it for. Before this estimate goes through, the Minister of Public Works should tell us what he is going to do with most of the money. I understand that he can have a few hundred thousand dollars for extraordinary repairs, but he should tell the committee exactly what he is going to do with most of the money before he asks us to vote it.


Ernest Lapointe: I desire to read to the Minister of Public Works just a word or two of his on April 16 when this bill was before the house. As reported on page 2812 of Hansard, he had this to say:
Mr. Stewart (Leeds): My hon. friend complains about information not being given. In the estimates of the department for years no details are given-just specific amounts. If hon. members desire information in regard to these items it will be cheerfully given, but we ask to have an opportunity of giving it before we are condemned for not giving it.
Further on he said:
Mr. Stewart (Leeds): With regard to any of these items upon which information is desired 1 can only say that so far as they come under the control of the Department of Public Works we are prepared to give information.
And further on, on the same page, he said:
We are prepared to give all the information that the committee desires, and as much as we give in connection with the regular estimates when they are submitted to the house.
That is only what we are asking my hon. friend to do to-night, and I submit very respectfully even to the Minister of Railways that we deserve no abuse for doing that.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: In view of the
progress we have made, I move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Unemployment Relief Camps
[Stage Direction]
Wednesday, May 22, 1935