1937-03-31

ROYAL ASSENT

Mr. SPEAKER:: I have the honour to inform the house that I have received the following letter:
Ottawa, March 30, 1937.
Sir,-I have the honour to inform you that the Right Honourable Sir Lyman P. Duff, Chief Justice of Canada, acting as deputy of His Excellency the Governor General, will proceed to the Senate Chamber on Wednesday, the 31st of March, at 5.45 p.m., for the purpose of giving the royal assent to certain bills.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
F. L. C. Pereira,
Assistant Secretary to the Governor General.



QUESTIONS

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

Mr. PELLETIER:: What amount is owing to or has been paid to the Bank of Canada for interest in respect of loans to the dominion government, the provinces and the municipalities, since the last day of February, 1935?


Mr. DUNNING:: Information as to the payment of interest to the Bank of Canada by the dominion government is being tabled to-day in a return to an order moved by the member for Rosthern (Mr. Tucker). No information in regard to the payment of interest by the provinces to the Bank of Canada is in the possession of the government. The Bank of Canada Act does not empower the bank to deal with municipalities.


NATURALIZATION OP ORIENTALS
Mr. REID:: 1.	In what year and at what date did Canada decide not to grant certificate of naturalization to orientals or Japanese subjects otherwise qualified, unless Japan agreed to their expatriation?
2.	How many Japanese subjects applied for naturalization as British subjects during the ten years preceding such date?
3.	How many certificates of naturalization were granted during the ten said years?
4.	How' many Japanese subjects applied for naturalization as British subjects following said date?
5.	How many certificates of naturalization w'ere granted during the said ten years?
6.	Since the regulations were changed, how many Japanese in this country has Japan agreed to expatriate and so allow them to become citizens of Canada?


Mr. RINFRET:: 1.	1931, June 17.
2.	Records of naturalization are kept only in respect to the issue of certificates and not in respect to applications received.
3.	602, to Japanese.
4.	Same as in reply to question 2.
5.	109 certificates were issued to Japanese from June 17, 1931, to December 31, 1936.
6.	Statistics not available.


INTEREST ON HOUSING LOANS
Mr. MUTCH:: 1.	What was the rate of interest charged the province of Manitoba by the federal government of the day on housing loans in each of the following years: 1919, 1920 and 1921?
2.	Has the federal government in any instance reduced interest rate to any of the provinces on any of these housing loans?
3.	If so, what provinces and what percentage of interest reduction in each case?


Mr. DUNNING:: 1.	5 per cent.
2.	No.
3.	Answered by No. 2.

Unemployment and Agricidtural Distress


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
Mr. LAWSON:: 1.	What contract or contracts, if any, were entered into by any department of the government of Canada with A. Stirling MacMillan, contractor, Halifax, Nova Scotia, during the years 1925 to 1936 inclusive, and what was the amount of each contract?
2.	What contract or contracts, if any, were entered into by any department of the government of Canada with the MacMillan Construction and Lumber Company, Halifax, Nova Scotia, during the years 1925 to 1936 inclusive, and what was the amount of each contract?
3.	What sums of money were paid to A. Stirling MacMillan, Halifax, Nova Scotia, in connection with each of the contracts mentioned in question No. 1?
4.	What sums of money were paid to the MacMillan Construction and Lumber Company, Halifax, Nova Scotia, in connection with each of the contracts mentioned in question No. 2?
5.	WThat contract or contracts were entered into by the Canadian National Railways with: (a) A. Stirling MacMillan, Halifax, Nova Scotia, and/or (b) the MacMillan Construction and Lumber Company, Halifax, Nova Scotia, between 1925 and 1936 inclusive, and what was the amount of each contract?
6.	What sums of money were paid to: (a) A. Stirling MacMillan and/or (b) the MacMillan Construction and Lumber Company in connection with each of the contract or contracts mentioned in question No. 5?


MOTION FOR PAPERS
Mr. MacNEIL (for Mr. Coldwell):: For a copy of all letters, telegrams, correspondence and other documents in the possession of the Post Office Department, relative to the McDonald Hills-Dysart mail route, from October 14, 1935, to March 15, 1936?


UNEMPLOYMENT
[Stage Direction]
Hon. NORMAN McL. ROGERS (Minister of Labour) moved the second reading of Bill No. 80, to assist in the alleviation of unemployment and agricultural distress.
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
On section 1-Short title.
Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview):: Is the minister in a position to reply to the question I asked the other night with regard to
the larger municipalities? These agreements are only with the provinces; the municipalities are receiving nothing. The province of Quebec got $2,750,000, some of which was spent on roads but ninety-five per cent of which was expended inside of the cities, towns and municipalities. I would like an answer to my question. Does the government propose to give some recognition to the appeal of the municipalities, cities and towns, who carry so heavy a burden through taxes on real estate? I think the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) should give an answer as to what has been done with regard to the application of the city of Toronto for four million dollars, and similarly with other cities. We are entitled to the courtesy of a reply. I do not come here for fun; I come here to speak for the municipalities I represent, and I am not going to accept such an answer as "See No. I" which I got the other day from the Minister of Transport. It seems to me that in connection with this large vote the government should consider the point I raised the other evening on behalf of a city in which there is so much unemployment and such a heavy burden on the taxpayer for relief. There should be an amendment that agreements may be made with other large municipal units beside the provinces. Four of the provinces are in a state of bankruptcy; what is the use of municipalities going to them? The dominion has to pay the shot anyway. I ask, will the government extend the provisions of the act of last session so that the dominion can deal with large cities like London, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver and Halifax? I am entitled to a reply, and the bill will not pass until I get a reply.


Mr. ROGERS:: The question raised by the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church) is one of a number which I had undertaken to answer when the bill was before the house in committee. The question he has raised is quite a proper one from his point of view. I would remind him, however, that under the present as under the previous administration, the dominion government in dealing with unemployment and relief matters has negotiated agreements with the provincial governments. I do not think I need emphasize the fact that, though it is physically possible to deal with nine provinces in this matter, it would be physically impossible to deal with some 3,000 municipalities. I take it that the matter in which the hon. member is really interested is the measures that can be taken in municipalities to provide joint works which will assist
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Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
in relieving unemployment. There is no reason why in our agreements with the provinces arrangements may not be made, as they have been made in some cases, to provide works within cities and towns. In general that has been done upon the basis of contributions from municipality and province and dominion; it has not been done, to my knowledge, on the basis of the dominion making an outright contribution for works to be done within a particular municipality. I can only assure him that in our negotiations with the provinces with respect to unemployment and relief I shall bear in mind what he has said with regard to the importance of having more work done -within our larger cities for the relief of unemployment.


Thomas Langton Church: I do not wish to detain the committee, but may I say that that was the same reply we got on Bill 62 last March. Surely the time has come when the government can see the futility of expending this money by handing it to a province. I can tell the minister that Toronto has not had one red cent towards relief works from the province of Ontario. The financial affairs of Toronto represent four times the turnover of the province. The city is willing to give a third for relief works, yet it is asked to apply to the province, which has already taken so much by way of income tax from the city that now, when anyone is considering the purchase of real estate, he finds that the taxes are a rent in themselves. Look at the favourable treatment which Saskatchewan got yesterday. The time will come when the municipalities will have to obtain some federal aid. either under this or under some other bill. The present act is unfair. When a deputation from Toronto came to interview the minister he was, unfortunately, sick from overwork and they saw the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) and the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe), both of whom, I may remark, receive with respect and deal patiently with every deputation which has occasion to visit them; the same can be said of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning). But I think the Toronto deputation was entitled to better treatment than to be -told to go over and see Mr. Purvis. When they saw Mr. Purvis, after he had addressed the Canadian Club and told them how many thousands of men had been taken off the pay-rolls, they were told to go up and see the government at Queen's Park. I do not wish to discuss or interfere with provincial affairs and have never done so. I recognize that in the province another government deals with

provincial business and that ours here is a federal jurisdiction, but I would point out that if we are voting these moneys to the province we should have something to say as to where they shall be spent.
I can tell the minister how this relief money is now being spent. In Quebec, municipalities get government aid for court houses, sewers, street widening and pavements-right within the four corners of the municipalities -and the same thing is done in other provinces. The federal government hands money to the province of Ontario, and how is it spent? On a road program, for which, under the British North America Act, the province is financially responsible. Not by the widest stretch of the imagination can one of these roads be regarded as a federal work. But as I have said, -the federal minister last fall could not see his way to discuss the matter with the Toronto board of control, and told the deputation to see Mr. Purvis; he in turn told them to go to Queen's Park; and there probably, if the bill should pass in its present form, they will be told to go and see the man in the moon.


An hon. MEMBER:: Or Santa Claus.


Thomas Langton Church: Or the minister who answers questions by "See answer to No. 1." I wish to protest against this kind of thing. We have got literally no value for these federal funds. They are handed over to people who spend them sometimes for political not economic purposes. As I said yesterday, the roads they are constructing are uneconomic. The hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Spence), who is present to-day, can tell the house how the deputation I have mentioned was received, because he was present and knows what happened. If the present system goes on unchecked we may look for the disappearance of the municipalities. The provinces will have to take over the municipalities, and finally the federal government will be required to step in and take over the provinces.
Where do the cities stand in relation to this vote? We shall have to make returns by the end of next month in respect to income taxes, and Toronto will pay nearly thirty million dollars income tax and contribute ninety million dollars to the federal field, yet Toronto cannot get one cent for relief. Thousands upon thousands of our workers are out of employment and have lost their equities in their homes. I am here to protest against the present system of relief distribution, and I tell the minister that it may be good politics but it is bad pre-otice to hand all the money over to the

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
provinces. The government of the day had some experience in 1919 of the results of paying money direct to the municipalities. At that time 325,000,000 was voted for housing reconstruction, and the municipalities to whom it was loaned handed back every dollar excepting five per cent. Has Saskatchewan paid back what it received? Has any other province paid back its loans from the dominion? None that I know of. Yet in this bill we have preserved the same bad principle which appeared in the bill of last year.
I look around me and see on both sides of the house men who have come up from the municipalities; they know the burden that the folks back home are carrying, in trying to balance the tax rate. Surely they will agree with me that a clause should be added to the bill enabling agreements to be made with the municipalities where necessary. People could telephone Mr. Gordon, the exminister of labour, and get relief "over the telephone," because the minister wanted to provide relief where it was needed.
The unemployed cannot go up to Queen's Park to see the provincial government: if they went there they would soon be put out. The unemployed are flocking to the town hall every day asking questions, and throughout the country they are beseiging all the town halls. I do not wish to criticize the minister personally; I have never done so and I do not intend to do so now; but I believe the time has come when some permanent measure should be adopted to deal with and to solve the unemployment problem. The mayors of Canada from coast to coast were here about ten days ago, Liberals and Conservatives alike, to present the facts to the government. They know what the condition is. I do not know of anyone in this house who to-day is really anxious to own real estate, for federal and provincial taxation is getting higher all the time. Something ought to be done to deal with this problem in a fundamental way.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I share the hon. member's regret that I was unable to meet the deputation from Toronto. The deputation wished to interview a number of ministers at that time, and I did not feel that my own inability to be present was sufficient warrant to postpone the meeting. Had I not been ill I most certainly would have been in my office, and I think I can assure the hon. gentleman that I would have tried to give that courteous hearing to the deputation which it deserved. I wish to repeat, however, that in our dealing with unemployment and relief we cannot do otherwise than 31111-148
deal directly with the provincial governments. After all, the provincial governments are in a better position to know the relief needs of the various municipalities than is the dominion government. Not only that, but the municipalities are in a very real sense the creation of the provinces; and while, as I have stated before, there is no reason why certain moneys may not be available for works to be performed in the municipalities, I am still of the opinion that in any arrangements made towards that end we must deal with the provincial government and not separately with the municipalities.


Mr. BENNETT:: There is one comment
to be made in that respect. Why should not the government in the agreements provide specifically for the earmarking of certain funds for the municipalities? I am bound to say that the situation in some instances beggars description. The truth is, the municipalities have exhausted themselves in paying relief for those who have come in from the country, and a little employment would do something to relieve the strain. As a matter of fact, in our time, it was done specifically by providing that certain sums of money advanced to the province should be applied to work in, say, municipality A for the purpose of defraying half or one-third or whatever proportion of the cost might be determined. It is true that the government can make agreements only with the provinces, inasmuch as the municipalities are really and truly the creation of the provincial authority. On the other hand, to overlook the claims of the municipalities would be a great mistake in view of the burden they are carrying, a burden which is really not theirs; it is a burden imposed upon them by reason of the fact that they are municipalities to which people flock from all sections of the country. That is true of Vancouver, of Calgary and Edmonton, and it is certainly true of Winnipeg. We did make an agreement there in connection with the sewer, which was a highly necessary work having regard to what had occurred in the river, and that work relieved them of a portion of the burden. It provided employment, to which the dominion made a real contribution. The same thing happened in Montreal and, as the minister knows, in Kingston and in various other communities throughout the country in the last few years.
While I agree entirely with the view that you cannot make bargains with the municipalities, I would urge that in connection with these matters the minister should see that certain moneys that are appropriated for this

2338	COMMONS
Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
branch of relief shall be earmarked for the municipalities in the agreement made with the provinces.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am impressed with the
importance of carrying out such a measure as is suggested by the leader of the opposition. That was emphasized quite strongly at the mayors' conference which met in Ottawa a short time ago. It will be understood, however, that in this matter we cannot proceed unless the two governments are agreed. We contribute fifty per cent and the province contributes fifty per cent, and it is necessary to secure an agreement between the two governments with respect to a particular program of works that is to be carried out. I assume myself that the provincial governments would be impressed with the importance of having some work performed in the larger cities, and I can assure the committee that this aspect of the question will be given serious consideration when we meet with the provincial governments.


Mr. HEAPS:: The bill was allowed to get
its second reading without any discussion whatever and now that it is before the committee I suggest that the minister ought to give us some idea of what the government intends to do to cope with the unemployment situation in a broad and general way as well as in matters of detail. The other day when the minister spoke he told us about half a million unemployed in the country. We ought to know what the government intends to do not only to alleviate the conditions that prevail to-day but to deal with the unemployment problem in such a way as to bring about a permanent solution of it. The house and the country as a whole will be getting tired of handing out relief in the form of occasional public works. I do not know whether I am asking too much when I ask the minister to tell us what the government's policy is. We have usually discussed this subject at great length in other years, and at this stage of the bill it would not be out of place for the minister to give us the information I ask for. I have no doubt that the government has been working hard at the problem during the past twelve months, and a commission has been at work for several months delving into various aspects of it. I would ask the minister to be good enough to tell us what the government's policy is in dealing with the problem in an effective and permanent way.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The hon. member made a similar suggestion when the resolution was before the committee. At that time I proposed to him that it might meet the convenience 
of the house if, .when the supplementary estimates were under consideration at a later date, I made a statement with respect to each item. Having regard to the discursive debate we had when the resolution was before the committee I have been confirmed in that opinion. It does seem to me that there would be a decided advantage in having our criticism focused upon some particular measure which is being discussed with respect to unemployment and relief. In the estimates of the Department of Labour as given in the special supplementary estimates there will be found a number of distinct items of expenditure which will be authorized by parliament in connection with unemployment and relief. I would suggest to my hon. friend therefore that we are more likely to get a reasonable and intelligent discussion of the whole subject if that course is followed. In other words when each of these items is called I propose to make a statement as to the progress made in respect to each measure as it is repeated in the estimates of this year, and also to indicate what reasonable expectations we may have as to the progress that may be made under a new or similar measure during the coming year.


Mr. LAWSON:: When the minister refers to items does he mean items in the estimates?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes. This bill is really an instrument under which we work, under which agreements may be made with the provinces to carry out measures with respect to unemployment and relief. The special supplementary estimates will provide the means by which those measures can be realized. Therefore the special supplementary estimates will indicate definitely the measures which will be taken by the present administration with respect to unemployment and relief during the coming fiscal year.


Abraham Albert Heaps: In the supplementary estimates there are probably two classes of provision being made; provision for certain public works, and provision for relief. Beyond that has the government any intention of taking any other action?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There are some half dozen items each relating to measures being taken to deal with particular aspects of the problem of unemployment and relief.


Mr. MacINNIS:: In what respect, if any, does this measure differ from the one of last year?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There are very slight changes in this bill as compared with the Unemployment Relief and Assistance Act of last year.

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
As I mentioned a moment ago. the act is an instrument under which we make agreements with the provinces with respect to particular measures to deal with unemployment and relief. There are some minor changes, and I shall indicate these as we proceed with the various clauses of the bill.


Angus MacInnis: The minister suggested, in answer to a question asked by the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Heaps), that it would be better to leave detailed discussion of this measure until we come to the estimates provided for relief and unemployment. It seems to me that if we cannot have a discussion on relief and unemployment under this measure, the Unemployment and Agricultural Assistance Act, 1937, we cannot have a real discussion on the matter at all. When the minister last year introduced the resolution to create the National Employment Commission he said that commission was necessary in order that we might get a general policy in regard to unemployment and employment and associated questions. This is the seventh consecutive year that we have had a measure of this kind before us. This year's bill is not greatly different from the acts of other years. Yet we have had this National Employment Commission for a whole year to do what the minister suggested must be done before a policy on unemployment and relief could be developed. I should like to refer briefly to the minister's own words as found in Hansard for March 19, 1936, at page 1257:
Mr. Rogers: As the resolution indicates, the purpose of the legislation which is to follow is to create an agency which will facilitate cooperation between the federal government, provincial governments, municipalities, industrial corporations, labour organizations and social welfare agencies in dealing constructively with the problem of unemployment and relief.
If that was the purpose for which the National Employment Commission was appointed, a commission which has now been in existence for a year, surely we should have something more than the same bill that we have had for the past seven years.
Then I quote from the Prime Minister, speaking on the same date and on the same subject, as reported at page 1259:
Mr. Mackenzie King: May I say to the hon. member-
He was replying, I think, to the member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol).
-that the late government tried to deal with unemployment in the manner he has described, namely, through the agency of the Department of Labour and the minister at its head. In each of five consecutive years they found that they could not by that means obtain satisfactory results. Obviously it cannot be done, because 31111-1484
the Department of Labour like other government departments is formed to carry on the business of normal times, not to deal with such abnormal and exceptional conditions as the unemployment problem in Canada has presented. If this method of dealing with an extraordinary condition had been followed five years ago there might not have been the necessity for this legislation.
And here we have the same old bill again, the same old treatment for the unemployed, the same old treatment for those on relief, as we had in those other years. Why then appoint a costly national employment commission? I have here sessional paper No. 128, tabled on February 3. I have looked through it and I am satisfied that there is nothing in that report from the National Employment Commission that could not have been had by the Department of Labour by merely writing to the municipalities and asking for it. It is merely a tabulation of those on relief in various categories, and the information was received from the municipalities. Nothing new has been brought out. In every year since 1931 when this question of unemployment relief was brought up we had a great deal of discussion. I have before me an excerpt from the speech made by the present Prime Minister, then the leader of the opposition, as reported in Hansard of February 24, 1933, at page 2472. He said:
Dealing with the question of unemployment, there are two natural main divisions, one which concerns temporary unemployment due to an emergent situation, and measures necessary to meet it, and the other which concerns unemployment as an inevitable incident of industry and the permanent measures essential to meet a situation which unavoidably arises in connection with modern industrial organization. With respect to the first, the present government's policy is that of the dole-
Has that been changed?

and, with respect to the second, they have no policy at all. Such policies as they have rvith respect to trade and the like, their fiscal policies, are all of a nature to strangle trade instead of encouraging it, and more than anything else are responsible for unemployment in Canada reaching the proportions it has to-day.
After such a statement I thought that when the present Prime Minister came into office the first thing he would do would be to put into effect a policy to deal with the emergent situation, and then he would bring forward a policy to deal with what hg termed "unemployment as an inevitable incident of industry and the permanent measures essential to meet a situation which unavoidably arises in connection with modem industrial organization." But in the two sessions that we have had there has been no attempt to deal with either the emergency situation or the other, differing from the way the
2340	COMMONS
Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
old government dealt with them; and there is certainly nothing before us now that deals with what the Prime Minister rightly called at that time unemployment as " an inevitable incident of industry .... which unavoidably arises in connection with modern industrial organization." Now that is the question before this house, and until we face that question, and realize that we have passed from one stage of industrial development to another, and that the methods and means of the past will not suffice for to-day, we shall not make any progress in dealing with this matter.
The other evening the Minister of Labour referred to the improvement that had taken place, that is, to the smaller number of unemployed and the smaller number on relief this year as compared with last year. If one looks at the record appearing in the Labour Gazette for each year it will be seen that the change this year has not been materially greater than the change in other years. There may be a slight change for the better, but the difference is very small. Let us take the index number of employment as at March 1 of each year, as given in this report which is published by the Department of Labour, as follows:
1937	 102-8
1936	 98-9
1935	 96-4
1934	 92-7
1933	 76-9
So we find that each year since 1933 there has been a gradual increase in employment, and that increase has not changed materially from year to year. This year the improvement is very little greater than it has been in other years. As I have already said, again this year we have the same bill that has been brought forward every year since 1931, and the minister cannot give this house any information as to what the government is going to do during the coming year to ease this burden which is becoming intolerable to an increasing number of our people.
Mr. JAMES J. McCANN (Renfrew South): I am glad the Minister of Labour is remaining firmly behind the policy of the government of dealing with the provincial governments directly as against dealing with the municipalities. I can readily understand that there may be peculiar difficulties in some cities, in Toronto perhaps in particular, but I see no reason why Toronto should be dealt with differently from any other municipality throughout Ontario. They may have some special projects in mind for relief purposes, but if they have none better than the project suggested a few years ago, that of constructing a tunnel from Toronto to an island out in lake Ontario, perhaps they are not entitled

to any special consideration. I have no doubt that if the hon. member for Broadview and the controllers and city council of Toronto would approach the provincial government at Queens Park, certain projects would be commenced in that city which would help relieve the situation there.
A few moments ago the right hon. leader of the opposition made reference to the fact that a great many unemployed flock from the rural municipalities to the large centres, where they become a heavy burden. The policy of the federal government initiated last year in conjunction with the provincial government in connection with road building should help meet that very situation. If that policy is continued this year I am sure it will be a very important factor in providing work in rural sections and helping to alleviate the condition of which the right hon. gentleman has complained.
With reference to projects that might be carried on in municipalities other than large cities, I have in mind one or two undertakings which I should like to bring to the attention of the government for consideration. I refer particularly to rural schools. Everyone in this house knows that throughout Ontario and the other provinces the rural schools are in a very serious state of dilapidation, and the municipalities are not financially able to undertake the reconstruction of these buildings. I suggest to the government that they might well consider granting to the provinces a million dollars a year for the next five years, pro rata to their population, and earmark that money for the reconstruction of rural schools. We are all concerned about education. We all know the rundown condition of these schools and the poor facilities they offer the youth of Canada. We have heard a good deal with reference to the necessity of doing something for the youth of Canada, and I respectfully suggest to the Minister of Labour that he could do nothing better for them than to provide modern schools, with up to date lighting, heating and ventilation. These are the buildings in which our young people spend a great part of their time until they are fourteen or sixteen years of age, and in their present condition these buildings are a disgrace to the country. If we are looking for constructive work I cannot suggest anything which should be given greater consideration or which would be more to the public good.
Then if we go to the Postmaster General (Mr. Elliott) in order to have a new public building constructed in a small place we are told, "Well, the revenue from that municipality is not sufficient to warrant the con-

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
struction of a public building there.'' That policy has been in effect in this country for thirty or forty years, and it is high time to bring it up to date. Twenty-five or thirty years ago it may have been considered that a municipality of eight hundred or a thousand people did not produce revenue sufficient to warrant the construction of a public building, but that policy should not be followed indefinitely. I submit that a great many of these small communities need modern public buildings costing anywhere from $8,000 to $10,000. Those buildings will be there as long as this country remains, and at least those communities are the centres of agricultural districts. I think we could well afford to change the policy of the government in that regard and put up many of these small public buildings throughout the country.
I hope the government will give consideration to these two suggestions, and that the policy put into effect last year of constructing feeder roads to the Transcontinental railway will be followed again this year. The policy of road building probably is not fully appreciated by those in the cities, but let me say that it is doing very much more for the newer parts of Ontario than appears at first sight. For instance, we have a city tell us that it must have a public building costing half a million or a million dollars. After that building is completed how much employment does it give? It may require a janitor, a stoker and two or three elevator men, which means that there may be five or six people employed in a building costing perhaps a million dollars. When we open a road into a country, and particularly into a mining country, and that country makes good, we probably add hundreds of millions of dollars to the wealth of the dominion, give employment to thousands of people, create building projects, build towns and bring into that community hundreds of people who will carry on business in all its ramifications. All the work, and the benefits accruing therefrom, in connection with the opening of a new country by means of a road, are incalculable at the time it is undertaken. But in the north country it has been proven over and over again that the wealth, the number of people and the amount of business carried on in newly developed regions have repaid many times over the initial cost of road building.
In the older part of Ontario, and particularly in the upper Ottawa valley, money has been spent in road building. That expenditure has not onlj' helped to relieve the unemployment situation but has opened an avenue for tourists, of which we have had a great many in these last few summers, due to our road
building policy. I suggest that the Minister of Labour continue to follow the policy in that regard which he has already inaugurated, but I would urge that he take particular care to earmark some of the money for particular purposes. When we are paying fifty per cent of relief expenditures, it should be the privilege of the federal authority to have some say in earmarking some of the money and designating some of the works which should be done in the way of relief. If that is done we will relieve unemployment in rural districts and stop the rural people from going to the cities, thereby indirectly relieving the condition in the more congested municipalities.


Mr. J. S. WOODSWORTH (Winnipeg North Centre):: With the latter part of the speech of the hon. member for Renfrew South (Mr. McCann) I heartily agree, but it seemed to me that in the first part of his speech there was some little confusion with regard to what is involved in the present policy of the government. In the latter part of his speech the hon. member suggested certain kinds of work which might be undertaken. among others the building of schools. Of course education is entirely a provincial matter, and yet the hon. member quite rightly suggested that some of the relief moneys might go towards improving school buildings. He suggested further that certain sums should be ear-marked for definite, needy works. With that statement I quite agree. But I do not think that is the point at issue.
Most of us would be willing to agree that the government should deal with the provinces rather than directly with the municipalities, but the point at issue is that to a large extent the present policy of the government is to hold the provinces financially responsible. Then in turn the provinces hold the municipalities financially responsible. It is that policy to which I personally object. We say to the provinces, "We will give fifty per cent if you will give fifty per cent." Then the provinces go to the municipalities and they say, "We will give a certain percentage if you will become responsible for a certain percentage." Whatever may be true in Ontario and Quebec, it is pretty generally known that a number of the western provinces are almost on the verge of bankruptcy. It is well known that a number of the municipalities are in a similar position.
Under these conditions the present arrangement is not at all satisfactory and fails to meet the needs. What is the good of going out to ask a province, such as my own province, to increase its public works? It cannot be done. What is the good of my province going
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to the rural municipalities and asking them to do something to give relief? It cannot be done. What is the good of going even to my own city of Winnipeg and asking the authorities to care for the unemployed, when in that city the problem has been so great in past years that the municipal administration has been staggering under the weight? The same could be said of Saskatchewan, and perhaps even with greater force.
The fact is that to-day -we face a national emergency. Under the present set-up the federal government has access to financial resources which are denied the provinces and municipalities. That fact is so generally recognized that the government is appointing a royal commission to go into the matter with a view, I take it, of relieving to a certain extent the provinces and the municipalities of some of their financial burdens. Under those conditions it seems to me absurd that the federal government should follow the same old practice of holding the municipalities and provinces primarily responsible for the relief of unemployment. It simply cannot be done.
Meantime the provinces and municipalities are sinking further into debt, rendering a crisis almost inevitable. What is much more important, we are imperilling the social security of our communities, because of the growth of a great many evils which inevitably attend unemployment. I was very sorry indeed when yesterday the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lapointe) towards the close of his speech almost entirely undid what he had said in the earlier part of his observations. He referred to the facilities of the dominion government to keep down unrest. That is what we are being forced into. We are asked to accept a bill to create a reserve to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and yet all this time by our dilatoriness we are producing the very unrest which afterward^ we must try to repress.
For many years the party in office has taken the ground that unemployment is primarily a municipal or provincial matter. It was because of its insistence on that stand that the Liberal party was thrown out of office.


Mr. MACKENZIE KING:: It has not been ;he Liberal party only; all governments have ;aken the same view.


James Shaver Woodsworth: When the other government took office it did proceed to take a great deal more responsibility. I agree, as I have said on former occasions in the house, that it failed fully to meet its responsibilities.
I believe for purely academic reasons the Liberal party has been insistent that this is 
primarily a provincial or even a municipal problem. I utterly repudiate that contention. In the earlier days unemployment was due to local causes such as improvidence, drunkenness and that sort of thing. Naturally the local people might be expected to look after it. But to-day no one can say that that is true. Every person must admit that the unemployment we have had in the last six or seven years is due to great economic causes which are not merely dominion-wide but which are world-wide. Why then reiterate the old slogan about this being a local problem and about our having to hold the municipalities and provinces responsible?
The fact is that if we propose to deal at all adequately with the matter, it must be a dominion problem, and the finances to a great extent will have to come from sources open to taxation by the dominion. Let us consider one practical question which has come up again and again-I mentioned it the other day-the care of transients. In the governmental scheme where do they come in? It is all very well for the government to say, "Well, let the provinces look after them,'' and then for the provinces to turn around and say, "Let the municipalities look after them." As a matter of fact this country has been built up largely through the efforts of the great body of transient unskilled labour which was available. Our railroads were built with this class of labour. Our mining districts have been developed with this class of labour. Our western cities were built largely with this class of labour. In the past it was comparatively easy for this transient labour to go back and forth across the international boundary. Some hon. members will recall that a few years ago we used to have these labourers following the seasons. They would start in the southern states and gradually work up northward until they reached the wheat fields of western Canada. Until the combine came into general use, as well as other modern machinery, the western farmers were almost dependent upon transient labour. Most hon. members will recall the time when we used to have 10,000 or 20.000 young men come to the western provinces from Ontario, Quebec and the martimes, some of them returning home after the harvest was over. It will be recalled that our immigration policy was based largely upon the idea of introducing unskilled labour into this country. As I say, it was this class of labour which was to no small extent responsible for the founding and development of Canada.
Now that the depression has come on, where are these people? The majority of them have not been able to establish any fixed abodes.

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
Most of them have not resided long enough in any one place to become what would technically be called established residents. They have drifted about from place to place. Last year I met personally hundreds of these men in the city of Winnipeg. I had many of them in my home where I talked with them and got their stories. Of the number I interviewed, I do not think more than three or four had been born in Winnipeg or Manitoba. Most of them had been born in Ontario; some had been bom in Quebec and others in the maritimes. Many of these men had been working in the logging camps in British Columbia and at various odd jobs about the cities. Some of them had been engaged for part of the year in the harvest fields of Alberta, for another part in Saskatchewan and for another part in Manitoba. They were stranded in Winnipeg. For several years there have been about 5,000 of these men in the city of Winnipeg.
Where do they belong? I would say that nearly fifty per cent of the group I saw in the city of Winnipeg would be almost unemployable. Many of these men have suffered almost as many disabilities as those who went through the great war. They have endured great hardships in carrying out their work and the result is that they are practically unemployable. It is certain they could not do the hard day's work they would be required to do if they went out on the farms. Many of these men have not been trained in any way and they cannot establish a residence anywhere.
What is to be done for them? I think the citizens of Winnipeg have been as generous as the citizens of any other municipality, but they are overloaded with responsibilities. They say that these people do not belong to them, that they belong to the province. We had hundreds of these men camped in front of the provincial parliament buildings urging their case upon the provincial government. But they do not belong to the provincial government. We cannot very well deport them to the provinces from which they came. It would require more mounted police than we have at the present time to keep these men off our railroads and our highways. They tend to shift from place to place; they drift from town to town, they get a meal or two here and then move on to the next town. Their wanderings know no provincial boundaries.
Only the other day, I discussed this matter with a number of this class of men from Ontario. If I am not misinformed, the minister was good enough to hear a deputation made up of some of the men who had been
to see me. How are these men to get anything like a decent livelihood? They are not the responsibility of the municipalities, they are not the responsibility of the province, because they are here one day and away to-morrow. There are tens .of thousands of these people, and who has a good word to say for them? Undoubtedly a number of them are becoming tramps and undoubtedly a certain proportion of them will become criminals. Society has not done the fair thing by them, and I think it is almost too much to hope that they will do the fair thing by society. It is this class of people who I feel are in a particularly difficult position in that under present conditions they cannot establish residence.
I come now to another class, the people who have drifted into the cities from the outlying country because the cities had organized charities. Many of the rural municipalities had no organized charity whatever and hundreds of these families, whose residence was technically in the outlying districts, have drifted into the cities. If the cities say, "Go back to the county from which you came," it would seem an almost heartless attitude to take, but I believe that attitude is being taken by some Ontario cities. The fact remains that many cities are finding themselves hard pressed. Many of the rural municipalities are practically bankrupt. These families moved into the cities because they were actually starving and they hoped to get enough to keep body and soul together. What is the use of sending them back to bankrupt municipalities where they would have no hope at all? I have often said that there seem to be too many lawyers in this house, and in addition too many members look at things from the purely legal aspect. Technically it may be said that these people belong to the different rural municipalities, but in reality that is not so.
Only the other day someone called my attention to a passage in Carlyle. I have not looked it up recently, but it referred to the earlier days in Great Britain when the poor laws were being rigidly enforced. An old woman came into a village and asked for help which was refused. It was during a time when smallpox was epidemic and as this woman had the disease, after she had stayed around the village for a few days she managed to infect a number of the residents. As Carlyle put it, this was to show that she really did belong. I think that thought ought to sink into the minds of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Labour. I am sure they do think about it, but it ought to produce action. As ministers they are the ones we have to hold

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
responsible. These neglected people will bring crime and trouble upon us just to show that they do belong. Technically they do not, but in reality they do and we are responsible for them.
What is the government proposing to do in the matter? Precious little. It came into office pledged to do something. First of all we had an employment commission set up. The minister said he could not act intelligently unless he knew the facts. As my colleague said a few minutes ago, I do not know that we are in possession of more facts to-day than we were then. We then had the general picture before us and what facts we have since obtained have not come to us because of the appointment of this expensive commission. We have been able to obtain facts that might have been obtained through the efforts of the departmental officials.
It is not facts that we need so much as it is some policy based upon those facts. Such a policy has not been brought forward by the government. In fact, in recent days we have had confusion worse confounded. We have had "the passing of the buck," to use a slang phrase, from dominion to province, from province to municipalities, and from municipalities to private charities, and then back again. In addition we now have this "fifth wheel," if you like to call it such, of the employment commission. It does not report to this house; we cannot tell in detail what it is doing; we do not know what its suggestions are; we are not informed, at least officially, whether those suggestions are being acted upon. The minister on his part takes more or less the attitude, "Wait till we get further recommendations from the employment commission." That is not good enough in view of the situation which has obtained for the last seven years. We now find statements even in some of the financial papers that it is understood that the government is not going to do anything this year. Why? Because, forsooth, the government will have to wait until a royal commission is appointed and has reported on the respective jurisdictions of the dominion and the provinces. It is the old game of wait, wait, wait-wait and see, in the hope that something will turn up; or, as my colleague very well puts it, wait and do nothing. The minister may say, here are the estimates. But let me point out that these estimates are essentially the reflection of the old policy and they do not adequately meet the situation.
The hon. member for Renfrew South made a very good suggestion when he pointed out that there are a great many community institutions which might usefully be developed.

In my judgment that would be a far better development than the erection of great "white-elephant" federal buildings. There are many other things that might be done. Take the housing question. I want to make this as a constructive suggestion, though of course it is nothing new. I notice, in the Free Press of March 29:
Utterly disgraceful housing conditions exist at the present time in Winnipeg and in every other large Canadian city. They are very injurious to the health of the people who are crammed into congested quarters, and they lead to rapid moral decline. These are slum conditions, and the world knows their extremely harmful effect. It has striven to replace them by housing of a much better character. The United States is doing so, Great Britain has been doing so for years, and so has practically every other country in Europe. Canada alone has lagged behind. She has neglected this basically important health and social problem and has done virtually nothing. Are Canadians really so helpless or callous that they cannot improve on this record and end the interminable delay in providing decent housing accommodation for an unfortunate class in the urban centres?
Not only is a vigorous attack on the housing problem long overdue in this country, but there never was a time when the employment that would thus be created was more needed. It is an idea! means of providing employment, since about 85 per cent of the expenditure on house construction goes to workers in the building trades and to workers in the industries producing the building materials. And there are thousands of men waiting for jobs in all the larger centres -where the better housing is so urgently needed.
And still further:
This cannot be done without the active interest and financial cooperation of the federal government. In all the other countries, the national governments have played a large part in the slum-clearing programs. The present government at Ottawa has shown that it is aware of the problem and apparently it has good intentions. But good intentions do not always lead in the right direction, and in this ease they have led nowhere. With the end of the session in sight at Ottawa, there has been no evidence that the government feels the necessity of doing anything in this matter now.
And then the editorial, written by one who has been a strong supporter of the present administration, goes on to point out that something better might be expected because of the promises given by the Prime Minister and other members of the government. This is what the Prime Minister said during the election campaign of 1935:
What I believe the country would welcome above all else would be a comprehensive scheme of urban and rural improvements. Such a scheme would appropriately include the clearance of slum areas, housing programs,
And so on. The Minister of Labour made a somewhat similar statement when he spoke in Winnipeg not long after his return to Canada.

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
According to reports, he suggested that next summer something might be done. Mr. Purvis, apparently, is in favour of a national housing program. In a recent broadcast he referred to the disgraceful housing conditions in the large cities, and the great advantages of a house-building program in providing employment. It is true that a measure has been brought down this session which provides for loans to people to help in reconditioning their own homes, but that is a mere bagatelle; it does not touch the problem to which I have immediate reference. That problem yet lies before us; and let me repeat, you cannot expect, Mr. Speaker, that that kind of work will be done by our municipalities-in the west, at least; nor can you expect that the provincial authorities can undertake it. If it is to be done at all it must be done by the federal authority.
To the Prime Minister and the Minister of Labour let me say that I feel confident-if they will permit me to put it this way-that no better political move could be made on their part than to provide work and at the same time supply decent housing for the tens of thousands of our citizens who are living to-day under what are virtually slum conditions. Why not? The only answer we can get is that we must wait until the royal commission decides the respective jurisdictions of dominion and province. I do not think that kind of an answer will satisfy the Canadian people at this time. It is positively ridiculous that after seven years of this great problem we should now be asked to pass a bill that provides for what is virtually the same policy as we have had for years past. I suppose we shall have to vote for the bill, clause by clause. What else can we do? But before doing so I am glad to have had at least this opportunity of voicing a protest against the inadequacy of the provision that is being made, and of urging upon the government, even at this stage, that they take another point of view and deal in a constructive fashion with this problem, which is bound to be with us for years to come.


Mr. J. J. KINLEY (Queens-Lunenburg):: I think it is a sound principle that if you have something you want done you should secure somebody who has local knowledge of conditions. In respect to the matter under consideration there is no body with better knowledge of requirements, especially in the rural districts, than the municipal council. It is true that these councils may tend to be too skimpy, but they are dealing with a dangerous matter, something which may well give rise eventually to difficult conditions for the municipality. As regards the municipalities I represent, we ha1' relief as such.
There has been some cooperation in the building of roads and in other public works; and I think it is correct to say that the government should be guided by the principle that there should be no payment of money for relief unless, if possible, work is done to pay for it. With regard to the cities the opposite is true, and there is considerable merit in the suggestion of the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church). It may be that the government should deal directly with the cities, where of late unemployment has been so prevalent that a city council can be maintained by the vote of the inefficient people in the community. For that reason, as this is a national problem, it may be that the government should take this attitude with regard to the cities, with their artificial civilization and special conditions, "We are not going to let this originate with the municipality, but we are going to direct it from above, in the interests of the general welfare of the people of this country."
In my riding there is very little unemployment, but our industries are so depressed that our people cannot earn enough to make a decent living. You naturally ask, what is the reason? The government told us that they have extended foreign trade and relieved unemployment. Let me tell the house that if the conditions would enable our fishermen to get the American market for our fish it would be of great advantage to the industry. We do not need any government help if we can have our export markets. Restore our market in Santo Domingo. We have lost that market, and have not bought a dollar's worth last year from that rich island. But European countries are dealing with the islanders, selling them various products, because they have made trade treaties with them. The island of Cuba is a potentially rich country producing goods that we could use in Canada. It exports natural products that we could make use of here, and it is a good market for our fish. To-day we are putting a dumping duty on sugar coming into Canada, imperilling one of our very best markets, because we are buying from Cuba less than fifty per cent in value of what we sell to them. The problem is to restore to the fisherman the export markets that he has lost. Some of the particular competing countries that sell their fish products in those markets are not in a position to make as satisfactory reciprocal agreements as Canada can, because they have not the same consuming capacity.
This bill speaks of the distress in the farming industry. Well, there is no better way of making an industry prosperous than by providing a market for it. Provide a market
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for the fishing industry in Nova Scotia and you will provide a market for the farmer. If fishing is prosperous the farmer in the back country is able to sell his produce to the fishermen, those engaged in the timber business can sell their timber for the building of vessels; in other words, the man on the soil has a local market, which is the best market he can possibly have. Activity in our section of the province depends upon the primary industry of fishing. There is a splendid farming community in my riding; the valley of the La Have river and the Caledonia back country form a splendid agricultural area, but these farmers do not produce enough and are not sufficiently organized to enter world markets except in a few commodities such as potatoes, apples and one or two other things. The local market is important for them. If the primary industry of fishing is successful, then the little industries that produce the things which the fishermen require can also be kept going, thus sustaining the life of the community. I say therefore that the export trade in fish is the best thing we can possibly have for Nova Scotia.
I do not see very much in this bill for fishing but there is some provision for public works. The opinion is sometimes expressed here that money spent on public works is often wasted. It is not so in Nova Scotia, because the fishermen who live along the coast are in a depressed condition, and while they are not unemployed they do not earn enough to make a decent living. Supplement what the fisherman earns by his fishing, give him some work on roads or on public works which are necessary, and you will improve his lot. You will thereby give him enough money to get by in hard times. For that reason I believe that public works are eminently desirable in Nova Scotia. Let me impress upon the Minister of Public Works (Mr. Cardin) that the people down there do not believe that they should get something for nothing; they want to work for whatever they get, and they are satisfied with very little. So that public works there are clearly needed. We have not drawn upon the treasury of Canada for relief as some other parts of the country have done, not because we are not in need but because the people there try to live within their means and are content if they are able to make a decent living. I trust therefore that the government will give serious consideration to the question of restoring the lost markets to our fishermen. We should have reciprocal trade relations in which our fishermen should be given adequate consideration. I never

could understand why pickled and salt fish were not acceptable to the United States under our trade agreement, because they do not produce these commodities. I suggest that there is a possibility in this direction which the government should pursue. Let us not forget that Cuba and Porto Rico consume more salt fish than the whole of Canada exports. Ten years ago the county I represent exported twice as much salted codfish as the whole of Canada exports to-day. Other countries have expanded their trade by means of treaties and the adoption of modern methods. Why should we be left out of the picture? Some of our members have hardly ever been to the seashore. Do not let us forget that after all the boundaries of Canada are on the sea, and even from the point of view of national defence it is important that we should sustain on our shores a virile prosperous population. Moreover, the people along the shores contribute to the general prosperity of the country.
I have said that other countries are stimulating their export trade. For instance, the republic of France gives a two-dollar export bounty on codfish; and even the island of Newfoundland, whose government some time ago got into financial difficulties, gave thirty dollars a ton towards the building of vessels. That island last year absorbed a part of the loss incurred in deep sea fishing. They produce about one million quintals of fish as compared with 225,000 in Canada. Newfoundland cannot make any independent treaties but under the wing of the British government, who have assumed the responsibility for the island's affairs, Newfoundland benefits in some instances by trade treaties made by Great Britain. France, Norway and other countries have stimulated their export trade. Why should we not also adopt modern methods? I say to the government, cooperate with those who know the business. If there are people down there who know the fishing business, people who have been successful in it, cooperate with them and help them to install modern machinery and to follow modern ideas. They are willing enough to do this but they have not the capital. They are not looking for a dole; they are simply asking for credit. Let us enable them to borrow cheaply and they will do the rest. Give them some encouragement, help them financially, and they will be eminently successful.
The fishermen should get a fair share of the consumer's dollar. In Nova Scotia the buying of fish is becoming centralized. I have under my hand the reports from vessels in which I am interested. These men are not getting their fair share of the consumer's

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
dollar. The duty on fish going into the United States is only one cent a pound. Over half the fish from Nova Scotia goes to the United States. A lot of it is hauled by rail to Detroit and goes in that way. I read in the papers the prices paid in Boston to the fishermen; I see haddock at seven or eight cents a pound when the Nova Scotia fisherman gets two cents a pound. If he could get three cents or two and a half, remember that the extra is all profit;. it means that much more for the fisherman. The United States fisherman with the same amount of fish shares about three times as much as a fisherman in Nova Scotia; I have the statements here of individual vessels which I may put on Hansard some time when opportunity offers. I do not know just how we are going to get this fair price for the fisherman. Some people talk of a minimum price, but it is dangerous because it is apt to be considered the fair price, the price that should be paid. Furthermore the fish business is hazardous because of the perishable nature of the article. So that may not be the best way to deal with the matter. At the same time there should be some control over the price paid to the fishermen in this country in order that they [DOT] may have their fair share of the consumer's dollar and make a decent living.
Now we have been here two years, and while we try to keep the interests of our industry before the government in an orderly and fair way, the provision that has been made for fishing, in comparison with other industries, has not been adequate. For instance the fisherman is not conceded a loan on floating property It is of no use to provide for loans to fishermen on real estate; the fisherman's estate is upon the sea. He may have a humble cottage; suppose you lend him money on his cottage, and some day he loses his boat. He has borrowed money on his cottage, so he loses his cottage as well and his last condition is worse than the first. There is legitimate need, and it is good business to lend money to certain branches of the fishing industry on floating property. It is being done now, but the resources of private industry have been depleted and they cannot continue doing it. The fisherman with real estate of value does not need to come to the government for money. He can get it elsewhere. He may have $5,000 in his boat and nets and equipment, and his house may be worth only $300 or $400. I think that the act introduced some years ago providing for loans to fishermen on real estate should be amended so that loans up to $2,000 or $3,000 could be made on floating property. It can be insured. Do it through the banks; allow the banks the
fifteen per cent margin that you allow them on home improvements. The banks know to whom money should be lent; they are good auditors for this purpose. The fishing industry deserves capital to extend its operations.
With regard to relief money, I hope our people will still keep their individualism and their independence so that they will rather be poor than come to the public for money. I am told that in my riding only a few loans have been made under the farm loan board. The Farmers' Creditors Relief Act is hardly a benefit. It tends to destroy the credit of ninety-five good farmers in order to give five farmers who are not so good some relief from their obligations.
I hope the government will recognize that in taking the time of the committee at this hour for the benefit of the people I represent I regard it as necessary to the fulfilment of my duty to them.


Mr. DAVID SPENCE (Parkdale):: It is not my purpose to criticize the Minister of Labour severely for not eliminating unemployment. I realize that no government can do that hurriedly. But they can at least govern the country in a way that will save considerable money, and spend money where it is most necessary and will create the most employment. I criticized the appointment of the National Employment Commission, and I think my contentions have been proved right. However I shall not press that feature, for no doubt the minister thought he was going in the right direction, although I think it has proven unsatisfactory both to the government and to the people. What we need to-day is a policy of "Do something." If the attempt to do it one way does not succeed, try another. The hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) has been talking about the same old bill and the same conditions that have prevailed over the last few years. We hear so much about prosperity and increased employment but we have not heard yet from the minister what he proposes to do to eliminate unemployment. We should like to hear something of that.
Just a word in connection with the remarks of the hon. member for Renfrew South (Mr. McCann). I appreciate and agree with most of what ho said regarding public buildings. I realize that public buildings are of little consequence so far as relief is concerned; they do not give much employment in construction and do not make much after they are finished. They just create a sore spot during the time of construction for the member in whose riding they are built. There are better ways of spending money than that. Building good roads is one way of eliminating unemployment,
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because a large proportion of the money goes to labour, unless too much up to date roadmaking machinery is introduced. Nothing pays this country better than good roads, because tourists follow the good roads, and we all realize that tourists bring a greater revenue to this country than any other industry. We cannot give too much encouragement in the way of good roads to that great revenue-producing industry.
Another suggestion made by the hon. member for Renfrew South was in connection with schools all over the country. I think money could be spent wisely in making schools habitable and putting them in good condition as to light, heating, ventilation and so on. I suggest that for the minister's consideration. The hon. member for Renfrew South touched one point on which I do not agree with him. He said that in Toronto we thought that when we got the measure through to build a tunnel under the western gap it would create no employment. I differ from him; $750,000 out of the $1,000,000 would have been spent on labour. However this government very unwisely cancelled the contract, and I think it cost them $150,000 to settle with the contractor, who probably had not done $50,000 worth of work, so that it was a waste of at least $100,000. We have a committee in Toronto trying to advise the city council where we should have an airport, or whether we should have two. It is known, I think, beyond a doubt that the airport will be built on the island, at Hanlan's Point. This tunnel would not lead from the city to the lake but from the city under western channel and then to the island, where this airport will be located. I do not think anyone in this house would suggest that the city of Toronto should be isolated as far as that airport is concerned. Some day that construction will be carried out, and some day this government, the city of Toronto or some other body will still have to construct this tunnel, because there will be no other means of providing access to the airport unless a bridge should be constructed, and a bridge would cost just as much as a tunnel. So I think you can make up your minds that you wasted that $150,000 when the previous contract was cancelled, because the tunnel will have to be built some time, and no doubt it will cost more than it would have if the project had been carried out some years ago. We could have had a really cheap job done at that time.


Mr. POULIOT:: Why not build an underground terminal?


David Spence: All right; anything my hon. friend suggests will be all right with me. I

think it was the greatest mistake in the world to cancel the contract for the construction of the tunnel.


Mr. McLEAN (Melfort):: Why not build the airport where you can get at it?


David Spence: We will be able to get at it if the tunnel is built, and some day hon. members sitting on the other side will be glad to vote for the construction of a tunnel there. You cannot turn Toronto down all the time; you are getting too much revenue from that city. You can no longer vent your spleen because you do not get any Grit members from Toronto; you have two members from that city now, and you should pay some attention to them. If you do not give us something you will not get any Grit members at all from there the next time, because you are antagonizing the people of that city. All the time we are told to go to the provincial government. Let me tell you that this year the city of Toronto prepared a program calling for the expenditure of some $4,000,000. We were told, and we believed, that we would get at least fifty per cent of that amount from the federal and provincial governments. The money was to be spent in the widening of roads in Toronto. As hon. members are aware, the streets of that city are narrow; they were laid out when horses and wagons and buggies were on the streets. To-day the roads have become dangerous, and this money could have been spent usefully in making the streets of Toronto safe for motor traffic. The city was willing to spend at least fifty per cent of the money, and probably a good deal of employment would have resulted, but nothing has been done as yet.
I think the contentions of the hon. member for Broadview are perfectly sound and that this government should give special consideration to large centres such as Toronto and Montreal, to which the unemployed flock by the thousands. We have been feeding them for years at our own expense, and today the taxpayer is about broke. As the hon. member for Broadview said, no one wants to own property in Toronto to-day, beyond one's own home; everyone is trying to get out from under the burden of carrying either vacant land or other property.
I do not wish to prolong the debate or hold up the bill, but really it is a bad thing for a government to adopt a laissez faire policy and do nothing. I am not condemning this government for not entirely eliminating unemployment, but something should be done at once and the minister should say definitely what policy he intends to pursue. Let us know

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something about it, because everyone is asking what is going to be done by the federal government. And if the minister has any influence with his good friends in the Ontario house I hope he will use it to see that the provincial government is a little kinder to the city of Toronto, because I do not think we are going to get a square deal otherwise. The harbour board has been looking for some S400.000 from this government for the improvement of Toronto harbour. So far no such sum has appeared in the estimates. I hope when the supple-mentaries come down they will include an amount of S400.000 for that work, or at least as much as the government can possibly give, because if that is not done the citizens of Toronto will have to find the money themselves, and to-day they are pretty well broke.


Mr. J. A. MacKINNON (Edmonton West):: Mr. Chairman, I do not think sufficient stress can be laid on the position in which the cities of the country find themselves in connection with the matter of unemployment and relief. No doubt our positions and our views are bound to be coloured considerably by the different parts of the country we represent in this house, but I should like to take this opportunity of saying here what I have already said elsewhere with regard to the peculiar situation of -the city of Edmonton, part of which I have the honour to represent.
Possibly because of the lure of the prospective dividends in the province of Alberta, and possibly for other reasons, there has been a very great increase in the population of that city. Formerly it ran second in size to Calgary, but recently dt forged ahead of that city, and during the last year or two of the depression period its population increased by several thousand. To become eligible for relief in Edmonton a residence of twelve months is required. People are going on relief in large numbers every day. They come to Edmonton from the rural portions of Alberta and from other provinces; they are maintained by friends and charitable organizations for the necessary period, and then they obtain unemployment relief. The situation is very serious, and sound thinking people of that city have been actually considering a tax strike. To own property, even one's own home, in that city means that one pays a sizable rental by way of taxes, and that situation cannot continue indefinitely. The city of Edmonton cannot expect to receive a reasonable and proper share of the money that is given to the provincial government; I might as well be frank in making that statement. So I should
like to impress upon the minister that in providing money for the province of Alberta some effort should be made to designate or earmark a certain portion of that money for relief in the city of Edmonton.


Mr. J. R. MacNICOL (Davenport):: In various manufacturing journals I have read that the riding which I represent contains perhaps more manufacturing establishments than any other riding in Canada and consequently has a larger number of what are known as ordinary factory workers than any other riding. I am convinced therefore that unemployment among factory workers there is as great as, if not greater than, similar unemployment in any other riding, and I am very sorry to have to make that statement. I want to do what I can to assist the minister and to help him provide work; this is not a time for us to quibble over what should be done and who should do it. I have been thinking that while no doubt cooperation already exists, if there were greater cooperation between the Department of Labour, the Department of Public Works and the marine department so that works could be planned by all three in harmony, a great deal of worth while employment might be provided that at the same time would add to the national wealth.
For instance, the Department of Public Works has alreadv asked for a vote to cover the dredging of the St. Lawrence river, the harbour of Montreal and so on. That is a yearly expenditure amounting to anywhere from $2,000,000 to $5,000,000. Many eminent engineers say that money is really wasted, that while it may remove temporary obstructions in the channel it does no permanent good. What is the cure? How can it be cured? The Montreal harbour and the St. Lawrence river have to have more water. Constant dredging of the river merely lets the water run so much faster. I am convinced that government engineers are qualified to produce plans to ensure a regular flow of water into the St. Lawrence river which would obviate much of the annual work done there-something in the nature of an annual pork barrel-and the money thus saved could be spent more advantageously elsewhere.
Flowing past this city we have undoubtedly one of the greatest rivers of the world so far as the possibilities of conservation of water are concerned. I have made a personal survey of most of the river, and I believe it has great opportunities for the creation of reservoirs on land which at this time is nonproductive and to a great extent not occupied.
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That would permit the storing of water to provide the necessary increase for St. Lawrence navigation. I maintain a great many thousands of men could be put to work on a project of that kind.
I could deal with the matter at length, but time will not permit me to do so. In the long run the work they would do would cost the country nothing because it would be adding to the national wealth. Hon. members will have noticed what is now proposed by the United States government as the result of the Ohio flood. Those floods, according to a conservative estimate, have meant a loss of at least half a billion dollars. The government is voting many hundreds of millions of dollars to compensate those who suffered as the result of the floods, and are initiating works to the extent of over $800,000,000 to give to the people along the Ohio river the defence afforded those along the Tennessee river, as a result of the great works undertaken on the latter river. Can we not do a similar work in Canada? I had hoped that in the bill we could find some useful work indicated, perhaps something in connection with flood control, a field with which the Minister of Transport (Mr. Howe), an expert; engineer, would be thoroughly familiar. He would be competent to discuss matters of that kind. The Minister of Public Works (Mr. Cardin) would be in a similar position. Throughout the country flood control projects are necessary. On a former occasion I mentioned the rivers in question and gave an estimate of the cost, using the figures of United States army engineers in connection with their work on flood control in the state of Wisconsin. I also indicated to the house the numbers of thousands of men who could be employed on works on five rivers in Ontario.
May I point out to the minister that that is a field which the Canadian public would endorse, because eventually it would cost the country nothing and in the interim would give a vast amount of employment to Canadian workmen. I must confess that when I go home and meet many young men, representative of thousands of others, who are asking for something to do, I find it most depressing. No doubt the minister and other hon. members have been in the same position. I sympathize with the minister in the problem he is facing. A young man who about the beginning of the depression in 1930 was thirteen years of age, one of thousands such, is now twenty years of age. From the age of sixteen his search for work has not been satisfied; for four years he has not done a tap of work.

Then there is the other side of the question to consider: while out of work, what is he doing? He is not learning anything. He is not studying any useful vocation; he is not being trained technically. I am convinced that the country would support a vote which had for its purpose the training of young men to fill useful positions. It is being done in England, where training schools have been set up to train such young men as I have in mind.
A day or two ago I said that to my knowledge scores of expert machinists and tool makers, the need for whom is great to-day, are returning to England. Those men could be used advantageously in the training of the younger men here. The returns show that about 10,023, mostly workmen, returned to England last year, and many of those workmen were experts in their line. On the other hand the young man is not learning anything because no opportunity is afforded him. The result will be that when these expert workmen are needed, those who should be available to design and make the necessary equipment will not be at hand, with the result that the country will not be in a position to compete. I believe these observations indicate another field in which the government might spend money.
The jmung man who in 1930 was eighteen years of age is now twenty-five, and the probability is that he has not done a tap of work. On the other hand, many who found they could not obtain relief as single men were married so as to get it. As married men they are now on relief and, when there are families, the situation is made even worse. That is a tragedy; it is a situation for which I should like to have seen the bill offer a remedy. The federal government could put these young men to work, but the provincial governments cannot.
On the other hand there is the tragedy of the man who was forty or fifty years of age when the depression came. Meantime many have lost their homes, and now find that they cannot get employment. Why is that so? Thoroughly organized industry has planned insurance schemes. If there were a government scheme of unemployment insurance, perhaps the conditions I am about to describe would not be as serious as they are. Owing to the insurance rates applicable to such industrial schemes, industry with insurance schemes cannot take a man on after he has reached the age of thirty-five. Just imagine a man of only thirty-five years being barred

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
from obtaining employment! That is a side of the question which I am afraid is not being fully considered,
I shall conclude my observations in a minute or two, because I have no desire to hold up the bill.
At one o'clock the committee took recess.
The committee resumed at three o'clock.


John Ritchie MacNicol: 
Mr. H. G. CLARKE (Rosedale):: I wish
to say a few words with reference to unem-ploymenit in Toronto. The district I represent
[Mr. MacNicol.J
has, I believe, as large a number of unemployed as any area of the same size in Canada, and therefore I urge upon the Minister of Transport (Mr. Howe) consideration of the construction of an airport in Toronto. Toronto is the centre of one of the most thickly populated sections in the dominion; it has an observatory which furnishes weather reports; there is a good natural location for an airport, and it is the centre to which most of the mining operators of northern Ontario come for their requirements. In this connection I may quote from an article by Captain Boyd, an eminent flyer, and a contributor to the Toronto Weekly Star, in that newspaper of Saturday last. He says in part:
This time, nobody is fooling about Toronto's new airport; it's coining this year; it's going to cost about $1,550,000, and it is going to be finished before the end of 1937-I wonder how long the gullible public will listen to these fairy tales.
Certainly it is becoming absolutely necessary that a real airport be established in Toronto. The government is now expending large sums of money in Trenton on a project of *this kind, and it seems to me, considering how much Toronto contributes to the federal treasury, we are entitled to favourable consideration of the construction of one of the finest airports in the country. Later in the article Captain Boyd says:
Airports cannot be built in a day. As a pilot who has flown 800,500 miles, I feel com petent to state that one of the finest airports in the world can be built here with far less expenditure than it would cost other cities of the same size. And it could be within ten minutes of the business section of the city.
He also states:
AVe read about building an airport on the waterfront and an emergency field up north of the city. Why not let us do one thing at a time? All this talk about not being able to land on the bayfront in fog is the bunk.
According to the rate we are going, by the time the airport is ready, landing fast' commercial aeroplanes in a fog will be an everyday occurrence.
I suggest that this deserves action by the Minister of Transport in cooperation with the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers). Also there is a real need at the foot of Parliament street for the construction of a commercial dock. The work could be done at no very heavy expense, and it is a necessary improvement to the harbour of Toronto. I should have thought that these matters would deserve favourable consideration, but, looking through the estimates as well as the supplementary estimates I cannot find that any amount has been set apart for expenditure of any kind in the city of Toronto.

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress


Mr. McIVOR:: I would submit two suggestions to the Department of Labour. In our youth we were taught to set our own house in order, and I would say that in the best interests of this house, including those who sit in the galleries, this chamber should be properly wired so that every man can hear what is going on without having to move from his seat. That would give som* employment to the unemployed electricians of Ottawa. Another suggestion I would make, looking forward to the opening up of the great centre of Canada, is that the St. Lawrence waterway be started as soon as possible. I think it would be in the national interest to begin work immediately, and I may add that I have great hopes of action by the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers), because I found last year that, as far as our constituency was concerned, he did more than he said he would do.


James Earl Lawson: This morning, in reply to the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Heaps), the Minister of Labour suggested that discussion in detail of expenditures should remain over as there were several items included in the special supplementary estimates whereby the total expenditures to be authorized by this bill were broken down. May I ask the minister, preparatory to something else I have to say, if he referred to items 301 to 311 inclusive of the special supplementary estimates?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Those were the ones that I had in mind. In other words, each of these items refers to an expenditure contemplated to deal with some particular means of attacking the unemployment problem, and my suggestion was that it would contribute to a more concentrated discussion or criticism if, before each of these items were called, I should make a brief statement of what had been done under a similar item, if one existed, during the past year and also explain our reasons for inserting any new item under those supplementary estimates.


James Earl Lawson: Then, with a view to getting information in order that I may relate it to these items, I would ask the minister to inform the committee now with respect to a subject matter over which there seems to be a good deal of controversy. When one makes a statement as to the number of unemployed now as compared with some given date in the past, there always seems to be some contention about it-that it is not accurate, or that it is accurate. What are the total numbers of unemployed in Canada as of the last date for which there is a return, and 31111-149
what is the date of that return? Do those figures reflect the actual number of unemployed, or the number of unemployed after adjustment for seasonal unemployment? I should like to have the corresponding figures for the same date of 1936 and 1935 so that we may have something for comparison to see where we are going.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am not sure whether the hon. member was present when the resolution was before us, but on that occasion I tried to do the very thing he is now asking.


James Earl Lawson: Are the figures on Hansard?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes. We have not what might be described as actual figures of unemployment in Canada, but we have an estimate which is issued from time to time by the bureau of statistics and which does not purport to be more than an estimate.


James Earl Lawson: But it is an estimate based on the returns of some nine thousand firms.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes, and on a number of other factors. That information is set out in Hansard.


James Earl Lawson: As of what date do the figures in Hansard reflect the situation?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They are for January or February, or both, of 1937 as compared with 1936, and I believe I gave some figures for previous years. I did take special pains to point out that if we were to obtain an accurate understanding of the situation in a country of seasonal occupations the only way to proceed was to take precisely the same months over a period of years.


Mr. COLDWELL:: Are the men under the farm placement and forestry projects included in these figures or will that information be brought down later?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They were not included in the direct relief figures nor were the number of thosd in relief camps included in the figures given last year. The figures I give as representing an improvement in the situation are correct as far as direct relief recipients are concerned, inasmuch as comparability is established.


Major James William Coldwell: How about New Brunswick?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The figures sent to us by New Brunswick are included in the totals I gave for February of this year.


Charles Grant MacNeil: What is the total number of those now under the farm placement scheme?

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Unemployment and Agricultural Distress


Norman McLeod Rogers: The number of placements made according to the most recent report is around 46,000 or 47,000. That does not mean necessarily that all of that 47,000 can now be said to be located on farms. Our information is that possibly there has been a turnover of 20 per cent, so that it would be at least reasonable to conclude that on the basis of the information given to us by the provinces about SO per cent of the total of 47,961 would now be located on farms.


Charles Grant MacNeil: How many are engaged in the forestry projects in British Columbia?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Under forestry projects in British Columbia there are 4,147. That figure is not confined wholly to forestry projects; there is also a supplementary plan of public works that can be continued during the winter months. All these projects are designed to meet the situation created by the concentration of transients and single unemployed in the larger cities. I am sorry that the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Woodsworth) is not here because I had intended making some observations upon certain statements he made this morning. I shall reserve them for another occasion. This figure for British Columbia is in addition to the number of farm placements.


Charles Grant MacNeil: Will the minister give the number of those engaged in similar projects in all the provinces-that is in addition to farm placements?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Under the supplementary
plans designed to provide employment for single unemploj^ed the latest figures are: Manitoba, 1,128; Alberta, 1,509; British Columbia, 4,147.


Charles Grant MacNeil: Not included in the general figures?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Not included in farm
placements.


James Earl Lawson: Does the farm placement
figure of 46,000 reflect the total number of placements since the scheme has been in operation, or only for a particular period? I understand that this act has been in effect for three years.


Norman McLeod Rogers: No. This particular arrangement has been in operation since October of last year. It has succeeded and is based upon an earlier scheme known as the farm placement scheme.


James Earl Lawson: Does the figure of 46,000
include those placed under the similar scheme?


Norman McLeod Rogers: No, only those placed during the past few months beginning in October.


Mr. DOUGLAS:: How many are actually
placed on farms now?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The provinces inform us
that there were 46,575 actually on farms at the end of February.
Mr. MaeINNIS: Did the minister say that these were not included in the figures given representing direct relief?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They were not included this year or in other years, so that the figures I gave as indicating an improvement in respect of the number of those receiving direct relief were accurate in that the comparability was established.
Mr. MaeINNIS:	I have here the figures
put on Hansard by the minister last year. He gave them on March 30. We have the number of homeless persons cared for in federally operated camps and by the western provinces, then the number cared for by farm placement. The numbers are given for each year.


Norman McLeod Rogers: That was in a statement
I made in the house dealing with all aspects of the unemployment problem.
Mr. MaeINNIS:	That statement gives the
total number for 1935 as 1.310,423. Do the figures given this year include the categories I have just read?


Norman McLeod Rogers: In the figures I gave when the resolution was before the house, which indicated a very definite improvement in the number of direct relief recipients in February of this year as compared with February of last year, the categories which the hon. member has just referred to were not included. There is a clear comparability between the two totals I gave as indicating an improvement in the situation.
Mr. MaeINNIS:	The two sets of figures
would not be the same.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There has been a difficulty
for the very reason mentioned by the hon. member who has just taken his seat. Surely we are entitled to know what factors are considered in reaching the totals stated to this house. The other evening the minister said that some are not included, and I am going to make a statement which will clear that up. What I want to know, and think we have a right to know, is, how many unemployed there are according to the records of the department. I would like to know the factors that constitute that category. Certainly the figures we have been getting lately are not the figures we used to get; I can say that frankly. There are some not included in the total

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
that used to be included; and it is the same with respect to relief. Surely the minister -can say, we have a record of the unemployed in this country.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Only an estimate.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, an estimate made by the bureau of statistics. I will tell the committee -the reasons why we did not have any record prior to 1931. We might as well clear that up now. In 1930 we estimated the unemployed at 117,000. The number was much larger but it was estimated at 11 <,000 for one reason only, that being the number that reporting trades unions and firms sent to the bureau of statistics as compared with the numbers that had been employed.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver):: In 1930.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, showing 117,000, before the government of that time went out of office, as perhaps the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Mackenzie) will recollect. Then came the census of 1931 and from that census we were able to secure a reasonably fair indication of the number of people actually unemployed, because a column was added to the schedules to provide for that. I think all those above a given age were recorded, the exact age being, I believe, eighteen.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Probably sixteen.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think it was not sixteen, but the minister can obtain that information.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I will find that out.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Based on that census the bureau of statistics worked out a formula which they have applied ever since to obtain the estimated number of unemployed. They have -the births and deaths and ages and matters of that kind, on which they work out a computation, which is the computation we had in 1932, 1933, 1934, 1935, 1936 and I assume 1937. The other day the minister said the number of unemployed as estimated by the bureau of statistics was 500,000. It is true that is only an estimate, but it is an estimate worked out-or should be; I assume it is, but I should like to know whether it is or not-by the bureau on the same factors and applying the same rules as they did in the years between 1932 and 1936.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Surely the leader of the opposition is not suggesting that the bureau of statistics either by its own volition or by instruction would change the factors on which that figure is based.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I said I should like to know, and factors have been changed so frequently in this country in determining this question -that I have a right to make that statement.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Let me assure my right hon. friend that there have been no instructions of that kind.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I did not suggest that there were instructions, but I did suggest that factors entering into indices -and matters of that kind have been changed. And the change has been stated. I want to know whether the same factors are applied in arriving at the figures for 1937 as in preceding years. The minister says the factors are the same. That means that 500,000 is the estimate of -the number of unemployed in February, 1937.


Norman McLeod Rogers: As against 556,000 in the previous year.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite so; that is the position. We have no estimate later than that. Now we come to the question of relief, how many are on relief? We asked the other day whether in making up that number the minister had included those who had formerly been in camps and were treated as being on relief, but who are now dispersed and in some instances in camps in the provinces and in other instances have been placed on farms and cared for in other ways. We wanted to know what was the corresponding total relief number and how that total was arrived at. The minister said the information had been placed upon Hansard. I confess that I heard him make the statement that he would give the details, but I did not know he had placed it on Hansard, because it was not on Hansard the other day.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I think in answer to the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lawson) I said I had put upon Hansard the unemployment estimates for the same months of two successive years, and also the relief figures.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That very question was raised the other day. When we asked how that number was arrived at and whether or not it included certain categories the minister's answer was: "I am not in a position to answer that at the moment."


Norman McLeod Rogers: I answered that question a moment ago.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I was trying to follow what the factors are that enter into the relief totals. Perhaps the minister will state that, and whether or not the farm placements are included, and whether all the others who have
2356	COMMONS
Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
been cared for, who used to be in the camps, are also included. That information is what we desire to secure if possible, because the minister said twice the other day that he was not in a position to give it. Therefore I was waiting for the information which a moment ago he said he gave. Frankly I was not able to catch what he said, but I want to make sure that the information we were to secure is made available.


Norman McLeod Rogers: In the first place I am advised that the figures of direct relief recipients as given this year are on precisely the same basis as those given from time to time in the annual reports of the Department of Labour.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They could not be, because in other years unemployed men were in the camps, and now the camps have been abolished.


Norman McLeod Rogers: They are compiled in precisely the same way. The point is the number of direct relief recipients in other years did not include those who were in the camps.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But it did.


Norman McLeod Rogers: They were a separate classification.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But they were included in the total.


Norman McLeod Rogers: They were included in the section called "other than direct relief." I was speaking of direct relief recipients.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But when we were asked how many people were receiving relief for some part of a day, a short or a long time, the figures given included those in the camps, because they were treated as being on relief; they were called relief camps. When we stated the number of people to whom the Dominion of Canada was affording relief, in making up that number we included those in the camps. Now the camps are abolished, therefore those who were being cared for in camps no longer enter into the aggregate of those receiving relief from the Dominion of Canada.
Mr. JEAN-FRANQOIS POULIOT (Temis-couata): This question is not merely a matter of tweedledum and tweedledee; it is more serious than that. It is not only a matter of figures; it is mostly a matter of facts. The figures we know; the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) and the provincial governments can tell what amount has been spent for unemployment relief in each province. This is known, so let us drop it. The main question, the most important question, is to

secure facts about the unemployed. I remember distinctly when we were on the other side of the house and when the right hon. gentleman was prime minister and when he had as minister of labour the dumb Mr. Gordon, it was impossible to get any information about unemployment. Moreover I say that the order given by the government of the day was to refuse to members of parliament any information about unemployment and only to give information about employment, in order to deceive the public and the country. Not only that, sir, but false utterances were put in the mouth of the governor general in each speech from the throne and each prorogation speech, stating that conditions were always better and better when they were worse and worse all the time. And as one who has been deeply interested in the unemployed, because I consider them all as my brothers, in spite of the fact that they are not millionaires and do not belong to the Rideau Club, I say that they deserve some consideration from this government and the provincial governments. I took the trouble to classify them. I did not go to the bureau of statistics for information because they had only partial and very incomplete information resulting from the census. The only way to secure proper information with regard to the unemployed is through the municipalities themselves, and this was done by a member whose name I shall not mention because I do not like to say "I" too often. But what the right hon. member for West Calgary said he would do he did not do, and what I do not boast of having done I have done. This is the difference between us. The right hon. gentleman was always talking of ending unemployment when his silly policies were the cause of unemployment throughout the country. This is the fact; everybody knows it, and I am sorry that the only one to ignore it is the right hon. gentleman himself.
Not only that, sir, but at the time I blamed the director of relief, Mr. Hereford; I said we could not get any information from that department. Later I acknowledged my mistake. It was not his fault; he is a very able man, as I have since said in the house. Mr. Houston, of the same department, is also a very able man, and the best forms for the securing of information with regard to relief were drafted under the supervision of the present Minister of Labour with the assistance of Mr. Hereford and Mr. Houston. Why did they do nothing previously? Because under the former government the order was to give no information at all to members of the house or to the country as to

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
the degree of unemployment throughout this country, and for that reason these able men were misjudged. Now they are getting along fairly well.
I am not strongly in favour of the employment commission; I do not believe in it, but I believe the staff of the Labour department under the very able minister could accomplish marvellous results first by devising a way to obtain proper information with regard to the unemployed and then by advising the minister correctly in the formation of a sane, practical policy with regard to unemployment. We are sincere in that. W'hy is it that the one most responsible for unemployment in this country is the one who says, "You do not give proper figures"? Has he no memory? Is he suffering from amnesia? Does he remember when I was in the corner of the chamber asking him for information? He could not answer me at all, and his minister was just as dumb as a stone. Once he said, "We are doing our best to get the information," and later I supplied him, as I supplied all my colleagues, with a full report on the classification of the unemployed on relief in half of the largest cities of Canada from coast to coast. That was done once; it could be done again, and it is the only way a proper policy for the relief of unemployment can be drafted.
We have been discussing only the unemployed on relief, but that is just one part of the problem. There are those who are employed part time but who are not paid sufficient to enable them to live properly, to feed themselves adequately, to clothe themselves and their families and to provide proper shelter, even with all the advantages of the home improvement plan. Something must be done in regard to those who are employed only part time. In addition, how many fathers and mothers are anxious about the future of their children, not knowing what will happen to them? The parents can do no more for their children, but those people are not considered at all. It is impossible to get complete information with regard to those employed part time, and it is impossible to get any information concerning those who are unemployed but who are not on relief. It is time we considered these classes, and the only way we can get that information is from the municipalities, through the provinces. In turn, the only way this government can force the provinces to obtain that information from the municipalities and pass it on to the federal Department of Labour is to say, " If you do not give us the information for which we ask we will not contribute a cent towards the cost of relief in your province." Then the information will come forward right away. I suggest to the minister, who is an able man, that he have an iron hand in a velvet glove, and not be afraid to use very strong language to Mr. Aberhart, Mr. Duplessis and any other premier, as well as the treasurers of the provinces; who will say to them that if they do not give the federal government the proper information there will be no federal contribution towards the cost of relief, could obtain quite readily the necessary information. May I add that the minister will not have to use such strong language with the province of Ontario because they have already made the classification of all unemployed who are on relief in the province, according to their trades and occupations.
In addition to that we should have a proper classification of the unemployed. I do not mean only a registration in order to ascertain the actual amount disbursed for relief, but a classification which will show exactly who are Jim the unemployed and Tom the unemployed, where they are from and what they can do. We would save a good deal of money through the fact that duplication in relief would disappear; the same man would not receive two cheques, and relief payments would be made only to those who are in need of them. This is quite clear. Moreover, by that means the government would save more than enough to cover the cost of having such a classification made. Are we to continue in the footsteps of the right hon. member for Calgary West without showing more ability than he showed, when he was Prime Minister, in relieving unemployment? Something courageous must be done, without fear or favour. It is not a matter of discussing this comma, that semicolon or that period and saying, " Well, the balance sheet of the unemployed is not in the condition I should like to see it, with my great knowledge of finance and business." It is not that at all. You must know Jim, the unemployed; you must know Tom, the unemployed; you must know their children. You must know the children of Joe, who has a job but whose sons are more than twenty years of age and without work. This was done in the United States, with great success. The idea was to not only look at the figures showing millions of people in distress but to take them one by one and see what could be done to relieve them. This work takes a long time, but the dominion government is not alone; it must rely on the help of the provinces, if the provinces are sincere in their desire to assist the unemployed. The municipalities should cooperate also.
It takes a very long time to hammer an idea into the head of a stubborn fellow, according to my own experience. Very often my
2358	COMMONS
Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
speeches would have been cut short but for that fact. My experience in this house is that an idea must be repeated, expressed in different ways, brought forward time and time again in order to direct the attention of hon. members to important matters. Then, after the idea has been repeated many times, hon. gentlemen start to think about it. And, sir, there is no greater triumph than the triumph of an idea. When a humble man finds that one of his ideas is successful and can be adopted with advantage to the country, he can say that he is satisfied that he has done something. I have won some cases at the bar, but when the Minister of Labour told me that the government would adopt a policy of classification of the unemployed I was satisfied with myself, because it was a policy entirely different from the one followed by the right hon. member for Calgary West and his dumb Minister of Labour, Mr. Gordon. We must have progressive ideas. Those who have been responsible for hard times must realize their responsibility in the matter, and instead of making petty criticisms should offer constructive suggestions.
The idea of the bureau of statistics being a well of information may be all right, but the hon. member for Calgary West did not use that information when he made his famous speech on social insurance. I told him that, and I repeat it, in order to hammer it into his head. It is strenuous work, but I am sure I will succeed, because I will show great stubbornness in the matter. The bureau of statistics is all right for certain matters; it supplies information about money, trade, and matters like that, but when it comes to unemployment we must have information from the unemployed themselves, through the municipalities and the provinces, in order that we may know what will be done with them afterwards, and in order that they may be taken from the lists of unemployed and placed in the lists of employed. That cannot be done only by the dominion government; it cannot be done only by a provincial government, nor can it be done by only a municipal government. But it can be done by all working together, with confidence restored by a sane and progressive policy. The people of Canada will realize sooner or later that collectively they can do more than can any government or a combination of all of them.


The CHAIRMAN:: Shall the section carry?


David Spence: Mr. Chairman, I wish to say a word or two. I object strenuously to the hon. member for Temiscouata-


Frederick George Sanderson: The minister has the
floor.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am quite willing to give place to the hon. member, but I am obliged to leave the house early this afternoon and I wished to make a brief statement before going.


David Spence: Does the minister object to my making a statement now?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Certainly not.


David Spence: One would think the hon.
member for Temiscouata would control himself a little bit, and not harass the house with such statements as he has been making. He has been selected as one of the delegates to attend the coronation, and a man of that calibre should be more courteous than he has been.


Jean-François Pouliot: I am uncrowning your
leader, that is all.


David Spence: We appreciate his entertainment at times, but sometimes it goes too far. We cannot let it go on all the time. The hon. member used a word he had no right to use-if it is parliamentary, I am not aware of it.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Of course it is not.


David Spence: The hon. member referred
to the ex-Minister of Labour as the dumb Mr. Gordon, and repeated it two or three times.


Jean-François Pouliot: He did not answer my
questions at that time, and therefore he was dumb.


David Spence: I want to say that Mr. Gordon was not dumb when he sat in the house. He was one of the brightest lights in the house, and probably had more friends than the hon. member for Temiscouata. If the hon. member's language was not unparliamentary, at least it was ungentlemanly and should not have been used.


Jean-François Pouliot: I rise to a question of
privilege. The hon. member for Parkdale has no right to say that I used ungentlemanly language, and therefore I ask him to withdraw.


David Spence: You are doing it all the
time.


Norman McLeod Rogers: In order to relieve any
uncertainty regarding the figures, I believe I should place on Hansard those for the month of February in the years 1936 and 1937, under the headings which I am informed have been followed from 1932 to the present time, without alteration whatsoever. I am quite sure the leader of the opposition will recognize

Unemployment and Agricultural Distress
that certainly I would not be a party to any change in the manner of presenting the figures, in order to produce a result which did not actually exist.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I would not even suggest it.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am quite sure of that.
Then, we will follow through the various headings for the month of February, 1936. The first broad classification is that of direct relief. Direct relief figures have always been kept separate from figures connected with "other relief projects." I deal first with direct relief. Under that heading, in the division which is exclusive of the drought area, I find the following figures for February, 1936.
Heads of families	 253,376
Dependents	 904,764
Individual cases	 53,989
Total	 1,212,129
I now come to the division headed "dried out areas," and for the same month I find the following:
Heads of families	 28,908
Dependents	 122,018i
Individual cases	 3,234
154,160
The figures give a grand total under the heading of "direct relief" of 1,366,289. I now come to the division described as " other relief projects."


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does that include the dried
out areas?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The total includes the dried out areas. These are the further headings and figures for February, 1936:
Single homeless	 39,470
Provincial works	 1,897
Trans-Canada	 3,871
Municipal works	 1,895
Farm placement	 -13.287
Federal works	 799
Relief settlement	 18,586
Total	 79,805
The figure 79,805 for other relief projects added to the direct relief total of 1,366,289 gives the grand total of 1,446,094.
I now come to comparable figures under the same headings for February, 1937, as reported by the provinces. In that month, under the division " not including dried out areas," we find these figures:
Heads of families	 209,978
Dependents	 755,494
Individual cases	 56,143
Total	 1,021,615
That is the figure, exclusive of the dried out areas. Then, for the dried out areas we have
the following:
Heads of families	 31,992
Dependents	 125,603
Individual cases	 4,880
Total	 162,475
This gives a grand total under direct relief of 1,184,090 this year, as compared with 1,366,289 in February of last year. I am sure those are the figures I placed on Hansard the other day.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister said the other day, " I have not that information before me, but I am prepared to answer the question when the bill is before the house."


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am speaking of the totals. Then, under the heading "other relief projects," in February, 1937, we find these figures:
Single homeless	 5,689
Provincial works	 10,128
Trans-Canada	 265
Municipal works	 418
Farm placements	 46,575
Federal works (at date of reporting)	 nil
Movement and assistance of settlers. 426 Relief settlement	 18,334
Total	 81,835
The figure 81,835 for "other relief projects" added to that of 1,184,090 for "direct relief " gives a grand total for February, 1937, of 1,265,925, as compared with 1,446.094 in February, 1936. That again bears out the percentage of decreases I indicated to the house the other day, and which I had previously given in a public statement. That is to say, if we consider only the direct relief recipients, excluding the drought areas, there is an improvement of about sixteen per cent over last year, including the drought areas there is a decrease of over thirteen per cent. Taking all the figures, which would include farm placements and other projects, there is an improvement of about twelve per cent compared with February last year.
If I may ask the indulgence of the committee, I am obliged to leave the chamber early and would therefore move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again.
Progress reported.
2360	COMMONS
Royal Canadian Mminted Police


ROYAL CANADIAN MOUNTED POLICE
[Stage Direction]
Hod. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice) moved that the house go into committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to amend the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act to provide for the appointment, calling up for training and duty, and payment of a certain number of men as reserve constables, to be known as the "Royal Canadian Mounted Police Reserve," and for the appointment from among such constables of reserve non-commissioned officers; to provide also that time served in the permanent forces of Canada may be included in the term of service of an officer or a constable for pension purposes; and to provide further that any person who ceases to be a constable shall have the right to continue the payment of instalments for pension purposes or the right of withdrawal of all such contributions.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
Mr. LAPOINTE (Quebec East):: Mr. Chairman, the bill which will be introduced after this resolution has been agreed to by the committee will relate mainly to a force to be known as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police reserve. There is already a provision in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act providing for the creation of a Royal Canadian Mounted Police reserve. Under the provisions of that act this reserve was composed of former members of the force, and because of the age of the men who would be qualified as members, it has never been acted upon. The object of the proposed amendment is to replace section 28 of the old act with a new section to authorize the creation of a reserve of men between the ages of eighteen and forty years. This reserve will be trained each year for a period not exceeding three months. The intention is to have the training period extend for two months in the first year, and for only one month in the following year. It is suggested that a reserve of 300 men be created, at a cost of $80,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Per annum.


Ernest Lapointe: For the first year, and possibly a little less for the other years. If these 300 men were placed on the permanent force the cost would be over $500,000 per year. It will be recalled that when there was a need for more men in the force two or three years ago because of conditions then existing, it was found necessary to add 200 men to the strength. These 
men were kept on and have been absorbed into the force. The policy has been to retire those who could be retired in order to create positions for those who were engaged at a time of emergency. With this reserve we would have a number of well qualified men upon whom we could call in cases of emergency and not make it necessary to add to the permanent force. This reserve would offer trained recruits for the permanent force when vacancies occur.
I believe this reserve force is necessary and in the long run I think it will prove economical. I might mention that last year, because of the reduction in our estimates, it was found necessary to decrease the strength of the permanent force by fifty men.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No governor general's warrants?


Ernest Lapointe: Apparently those do not circulate when it comes to the Roj'al Canadian Mounted Police. The result is that there are no reserve officers and the permanent force has been overworked because of this decrease.
The other features of the bill are purely matters of routine and perhaps it would be better to wait until the bill is before the house before explanations are given.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Mr. Chairman, I do not think the minister has given sufficient reasons for increasing the strength of this force. He has told us that because of a reduction in the estimates the force was decreased by fifty men last year. If the strength of the permanent force is not sufficient, the logical thing to do would be to increase the estimates in order that the permanent force may be maintained at its full strength. Apparently the minister does not want to do that. He is now asking for an additional 300 men to form a reserve force. The only reason the minister has given for creating this reserve force is that some emergency may arise. He has not been good enough to inform the committee what that emergency may be. I know the minister knows what I have in mind, and I know what he has in mind, but he has not been frank enough to state it. When he referred to an emergency which occurred a few years ago, we all know he referred to the Regina situation. There were not sufficient police to take care of that situation. Whether it was handled as it should have been handled is quite another matter, but there was considerable criticism from the opposition benches, upon which the present minister was sitting, of the way in which the situation was handled.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Another reason why I object strongly to this resolution is the fact that only a few weeks ago the home defence force of this country was increased considerably. If the home defence force was increased, what logical reason is there for increasing the mounted police force?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is not correct. It was not increased.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I think it is quite correct, Mr. Chairman.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: No.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Then I do not know what the increase of several million dollars in the estimates of the defence force was for if it was not to add to the home defence force of Canada. My recollection is that when the estimates were before this chamber it was stated that they were for home defence purposes, and I believe that, should any emergency arise in this country, when the increased estimates have been utilized for the purpose for which they were passed, there will be a greatly increased force to be called upon for that purpose. The defence force already in existence is capable of taking care of any condition which may arise, and why we are asked to provide for three hundred men as a reserve force of the mounted police is beyond my comprehension. If it is to be employed against subversive elements, I would repeat what the Minister of Justice said in the house yesterday, that there are other ways of dealing with unrest than by a show of force on the part of the government. Let them get at the root cause1 of that unrest. If it arises from unemployment, then let the causes of unemployment be examined, and when remedies are found and applied much of the existing unrest will disappear. We are sometimes regaled in this house by references to what may be called the communist bogey -for to a large extent it is a bogey. To some extent communism exists in Canada, and possibly there is no part of the country where the communist element is stronger than in the constituency I have the honour to represent. Outside of Winnipeg and a very few other constituencies there is hardly any communist sentiment in this country, but it seems to serve at times as a very convenient bogey or excuse for bringing in legislation of the kind suggested in the resolution which is now before the committee.
I repeat that I cannot understand why these three hundred men are to be added to the mounted police force. I am satisfied that the ordinary good sense of the people of this country, as the Minister of Justice suggested
yesterday when he referred to the case at Sudbury, can be relied upon to deal with situations of that kind. Even the small minority of communists of whom some people seem to be so much afraid may be more mild-mannered than is sometimes supposed. Within the past few days the one communist who sits for a Manitoba constituency in the legislature of that province was invited to a social function given by the lieutenant governor. He gracefully and willingly accepted; with his wife he attended the function, and no one would have recognized, I think, any difference between him and any other person present.


Ernest Lapointe: That is no new thing.


Abraham Albert Heaps: If the minister has in mind any reason for expecting that there will occur in the immediate future some event in connection with which the services of these men will be needed, I shall be glad to hear from him. Up to the present all he has referred to is something that occurred in Regina; he spoke of that as an emergency which arose a few years ago. Can he tell me of any other emergency? I doubt if he had any other in mind. It is my conviction that if the government desire to do away with the possibility of such situations they can do so by bringing in social legislation of the right kind. There would then be no necessity to provide estimates for additional police.


Ernest Lapointe: My hon. friend referred to what I stated yesterday. I have not a word to change.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I referred to the Sudbury incident.


Ernest Lapointe: I adhere to what I said; but if my hon. friend will read my remarks he will see that, having made the statement to which he referred, I said that order will be maintained in Canada and that all necessary steps must be taken to ensure our continuing to live as we have done so far. The hon. member says that we are increasing the force by three hundred men; that is not so. He said, if you reduced the force last year by fifty men, why not reappoint those fifty; but if we did that jt would cost over $100,000, or a good deal more than the pay of these reserve men will amount to while they are in training. It is to avoid an increase of the regular force that we are proposing to take the action that is now recommended.
The hon. member seems to think that the mounted police have no other purpose than to deal with riots or disorder. The mounted

Royal Canadian Mounted Police
police have to see that all the federal laws, the rules and regulations of every department of the government, are observed; every day they are receiving from various departments of governments instructions to act for the purpose of enforcing federal laws in all parts of the country; and the hon. member knows that the business of the dominion government and its departments, so far from decreasing, is increasing all the time. I do not know what else I can tell my hon. friend. He says that I have not given enough explanations. He asks me what emergency I have in mind. But emergencies, unfortunately, are usually unforeseen; they happen when we do not know that they will happen. It is hard for me to tell the hon. member what may or may not occur. I hope that no emergency will arise which will require any additional force, but if it should come, as the one who is in charge of the Department of Justice, and in that capacity controls the Royal Canadian Mounted Police force, I shall take the responsibility of asking parliament to add to the force such reserves as are needed.


Charles Grant MacNeil: In spite of the explanation made by the minister, I am still at a loss to understand why the government should take this indirect method of increasing the personnel of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I quite admit the force of the minister's remarks. I have carefully studied the report of the activities of the force, and much may be said by way of commendation of their activities, particularly with regard to dealing with the drug trade, the marine section, the patrol work, the work in the Northwest Territories; in fact the sum total of their activities is quite impressive. But great uneasiness will be caused throughout the country by the explanation made by the minister that the force is to be increased by what may be described as more or less of a subterfuge in order to deal with some imaginary emergency. Immediately we have the right to assume that that emergency is one arising from industrial unrest.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, no.


Charles Grant MacNeil: Thus this reserve presents itself as a sort of federally-authorized committee of vigilantes, men whose standing may be indefinite until that emergency arises, and then, at the call of the commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, they are to be brought into action to suppress any disorder arising from industrial struggles. That will cause grave uneasiness.
I plead with the minister that if an addition to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police

is required, he should take the frank and straightforward method of increasing the force. The duties of the force are clearly outlined with regard to ordinary activities-the agreements with the various provincial governments, the work in the northern part of the dominion, the suppression of the traffic in narcotics, and patrol work on the coast. Surely the requirements of all this work can now be definitely estimated, and if it is necessary to increase the personnel of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, let estimates be submitted providing for such increase; I do not think that parliament would be reluctant to deal with the ordinary requirements of the force in that regard. But to suggest, as the minister has done in his remarks, that in the event of industrial unrest, men who are half trained, men with regard to whom we cannot be certain that they are under the control and discipline of the force, may be called out in a time of emergency to deal with such conditions, implies a radical departure from the methods hitherto employed in policing the dominion, and instead of increasing the prestige of the force, will certainly lay it open to even graver criticism than has been levelled against it in the past.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: The Minister of Justice
said that his reason for not accepting the suggestion of the hon. member for Winnipeg North, to the effect that those men who have been removed because of lack of money should be reenlisted, is that it would cost over $100,000. The estimates show that the vote for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police this year has been increased $400,000 I have before me the estimates for the past few years, and though there was a cut last year it has been more than made up by the increase this year.


Ernest Lapointe: It is for
other purposes. I will give the particulars when the estimates are before us.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: The figures are:
1934-	35	
$5,745,5951935-	36	
5,905,5951936-	37	
5.594,8001937-	38	
6,017,000
It would not be difficult to find another $100,000 in order to reenlist fifty men who have been displaced. If the minister intends to come to the house later on and ask for an increase of S400.000 in the estimates it should not be difficult for him to persuade the house to make it $500,000 so as to enlist these extra fifty men. Instead of that he is establishing a dangerous precedent in setting up in Canada what will amount to a group

Royal Canadian Mounted Police
of storm troops or reserves whose exact relationship to the state is not clearly defined. It seems to us that the sane and sensible thing to do would be to increase the legitimate force.


Thomas Langton Church: It is apparent to everyone that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police has been a credit to the parliament of Canada from the time it was established. There is undoubtedly a certain amount of overlapping between one force and another-the civilian police, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, th' immigration police, the Canadian National and the Canadian Pacific police. Taking all these forces together we have a considerable organization in Canada. I was chairman of a board of police commissioners for seven years in a time when there was a great deal of trouble in the country and I can speak with some knowledge of their efficiency. I believe that the act should be amended to provide that in any emergency the permanent militia in Canada might be called upon to serve as reserve mounted police officers. If a riot breaks out the mayor or the sheriff must appeal to the minister and to the general officer commanding the district in order to have the police called out. That is the procedure under the criminal code and a great deal of time is lost.
As regards any suggestion of giving away the secrets of the force, obviously that is something that cannot be contemplated for a moment. The police cannot be expected to lay their cards on the table; their secrets are vital to life and property in the country, and the minister's department should not be called upon to divulge anything. Did anybody ever hear of a civilian police force going around with a brass band broadcasting all its secrets?
The fault I have to find is that the number provided for here is not large enough; instead of three hundred the minister should make it five hundred or one thousand, and take in some of the returned men who are out of work. Some of the finest policemen in the larger municipalities are graduates of our universities. I have in mind two young men, graduates of Queen's who made short work of the panhandlers in Toronto. I know of another recruit, also a graduate of Queen's, who was taken from north Toronto to clean up the panhandlers there near the union station. The inspector had him placed in charge of that work and he made a good job of it; many of the men were thieves and pickpockets, and there were even some bandits in the gang that he got rid of.
This is one of the most important departments of government. In one sense it is the most important, because the protection of all life and property in the country depends upon it. It operates in every part of Canada from coast to coast. I wonder what the minister thinks of further coordination among the various forces. I would direct his attention to certain striking remarks of Major General MacBrien the other day in Toronto in an address to university of Toronto graduates at their annual dinner, in which he said that the time had come . when the federal authority should take over the provincial police system. I believe there is something to be said for that suggestion. At the Union station in Toronto, at the station in Hamilton and in other large cities one can see representatives of the various police forces of the country- immigration police, mounted police, railway police and others. In my opinion some of the work done by the immigration officers could be taken over by this department. The time has come for coordination. I suggest to the minister that young men from our high schools, out of work for some time, and returned men might be taken into the force; they would make excellent policemen. In Canada we have been fortunate so far in our freedom from the terrors of the kidnapper, but kidnapping is not altogether unknown even in this country. The more we can do, therefore, in the way of coordinating our various forces and strengthening a common police organization for the dominion as a whole the better it will be for Canadians. Representatives of the chief constables associations, both federal and provincial, are unanimous in commending the work done by this department, and I believe that the force should be given increased powers all along the line. At any rate there should be an adequate force available as a reserve in every military district in Canada. I would commend to hon. members the report of the proceedings of the chief constables association, who have advocated greater cooperation, though I must admit that there is a good deal of cooperation at the present time. But the work should be extended, and I hope when the minister is in the old country, he and the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition-they have always been good friends of the police-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Thomas Langton Church: Well they have been
good friends of all our police systems and eager to help them. I hope something may be done along the lines of Major General Mac-Brien's suggestion. I believe there is considerable overlapping of the different systems, five
2364	COMMONS
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
different departments looking after police work and bandits and kidnappers. We found a few years ago on two or three occasions in Toronto that there was no cooperation, there was not the coordination there should be between the county and provincial and city police and the mounted police, although they were all there but they cooperate now very well.


Charles Grant MacNeil: Will the minister inform the committee of the number on the reserve of the force, if any, under the existing provision of the act?


Ernest Lapointe: There is none. The existing provision says that the governor in council may from time to time authorize the commissioner to appoint by warrant under his hand such officers and men who have served in the force as a reserve to be known as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Reserve. My information is that that provision has never been acted upon. One of the main reasons is that ex-members of the force are rather of an age which would not permit them to render the services required.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Can the minister give the numbers in the mounted police force from the time they were amalgamated with the provincial services?


Ernest Lapointe: I shall try to get the figures for my hon. friend when the bill is in committee. I can tell him that today the effective strength of the force is 2,550 men.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think some of my
friends to the left are labouring under a misapprehension. The vote for the mounted police pays for the whole police, but we get a substantial sum from the various provinces with which we have an agreement under which we discharge police services within their area. The total we vote does not indicate what we as a dominion spend on the service, because part is reimbursed by some of the provinces, six in all I think. The minister might have pointed out also that the police discharge the very onerous task of looking after the enforcement of the customs act and the excise act, dealing with smuggling and matters of that kind.


Charles Avery Dunning: Narcotics particularly.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I was going to speak of that separately. These duties were especially onerous during the time of the operation of the prohibition law in the neighbouring republic, because liquors were brought to our

shores-but that need not be discussed now. I understand that the present strength is 2,550. The late government increased the force, for reasons which were misunderstood by many; the principal reason was that by agreement with the provinces the Royal Canadian Mounted Police was to discharge certain duties for the provinces. Certainly the method which the minister proposes to adopt is far better than adding 300 men permanently, when they might not be required. This merely creates a body of 300 men between the ages of eighteen and forty-I thought the age was thirty-five-


Ernest Lapointe: No, forty.


Richard Bedford Bennett: These 300 men will be selected in the same way as recruits for the force, but they will not be in uniform and will not be paid. They will get training, the reserve will be partially trained men who, united with fully trained men, will be able to discharge the duties, if I have followed the minister aright. I think that instead of adding to the financial burden, as apparently my friends think, it will lessen the financial burden by creating a reserve which will be available if necessity arises, without making a permanent addition to the force. Instead of making it 2.850 it leaves it at 2.550. Possibly it would be better to wait now until one sees the bill, but that is what I understand will be the effect. In two years these reserve men will get three months' training, two months the first year and one the second. Are they to go into uniform at once and be attached to the depots?


Ernest Lapointe: No.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There are two other principles involved in the resolution to which I did not refer. With one of them I am not at the moment in accord, but I reserve my right to express my views at a later stage.


Ernest Lapointe: Which
one?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The final one, the question of making the force a continuing insurance company. I have some doubt about that.
Resolution reported, read the first and second time and concurred in. Mr. Lapointe (Quebec East) thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 83, to amend the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

Supreme Court Act



SUPREME COURT ACT


[Stage Direction]
Hon. ERNEST LAPOINTE (Minister of Justice) moved the second reading of Bill No. 78 to amend the Supreme Court Act.
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
On section 1.
Richard Bedford Bennett: It is the whole bill. Perhaps the minister will make a statement.


Ernest Lapointe: Section 37, which is to be amended, is the section of the Supreme Court Act which deals with per saltum appeals. The other sections deal with appeals de piano. When in 1930 the section was amended the intention was that the leave of the court of final resort in the province should be required, as well as the consent of the parties, precedent to an appeal being permitted without going to the court of appeal of the province. But the language of the section does not express the intention as clearly as it should have been expressed. Perhaps I had better read the present section 37:
Where the amount or value of the matter in controversy in the appeal exceeds the sum of two thousand dollars, subject to section thirty-eight, an appeal shall lie directly to the supreme court from any final judgment of a provincial court, whether of appellate or original jurisdiction, other than the highest court of final resort in the province, pronounced in a judicial proceeding, which is not one of those specifically excepted in section thirty-six,
(a)	by leave of the highest court of final resort having jurisdiction in the province in which the proceedings were originally instituted; and
(b)	by consent in writing of the parties, or their solicitors, verified by affidavit and filed with the registrar of the supreme court and with the registrar, clerk or prothonotary of the court to be appealed from-
This amendment was made in 1930 at the request of the judges of the supreme court themselves, and the intention was that the two conditions should be fulfilled, namely, the consent of the parties, plus the leave of the court of final resort; but apparently it has been considered by some that it was in the alternative rather than that both conditions were required, and cases have come to the supreme court here. Although the supreme court have maintained that it was intended that both conditions should be required, it is thought better to clarify the situation so that no ambiguity might continue to exist.
The purpose of the amendment is-and this time it is expressed very clearly; the judges of the supreme court had a hand in its preparation-first, that no suitor who has obtained judgment in his favour in a provincial court should, without his consent, be brought by way of appeal before the supreme court without the opportunity of having judgment pronounced upon his case by the court of last resort in the province; second, that on public grounds the consent of the parties should not in itself be sufficient to entitle either of them to come before the supreme court per saltum, but that such consent should be supplemented by leave of the provincial court of final resort; third, that there should be no right of appeal per saltum except upon some question of law, for it seems obvious that questions of fact before coming to the supreme court should be pronounced upon by the court of last resort in the province; and fourth, that there should be no appeal per saltum from provincial tribunals presided over by persons appointed by authority of the provincial legislature. Such tribunals as a rule are mainly concerned with controversies relating to matters which are solely administrative in their character. Of course, this applies only to appeals per saltum and not to appeals de piano, when there is a final judgment by the court of last resort in the province.
The main purpose is to provide that when there is no appeal to the court of final resort in the province there should not be an appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. There should not be leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada when, under the statute that exists, there is no appeal to the court of last resort in the province. I think this is merely to clarify the situation that already exists, and which has created some difficulties and been the cause of some litigation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There has been a great deal of controversy about the section, as the minister knows, and the registrar of the supreme court has held that there must be both the consent of the parties and the leave of the court of last resort in the province before an appeal would lie per saltum. Personally I have another view with respect to the last two clauses, which go beyond anything we have thus far done. The first reads:
No such leave shall be granted by the highest court of final resort unless an appeal would lie to such court of final resort and also to the supreme court from the judgment of such court pronounced in such appeal.
Inasmuch as this applies only to cases in which over $2,000 is involved, it follows that the right of appeal is the right of the litigant
Supreme Court Act

as far as that last section is concerned, and also " to the supreme court from the judgment of such court pronounced in such appeal," for the first words of line 10 are:
-where the amount or value of the matter in controversy in the appeal exceeds the sum of two thousand dollars-
This brings it within the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of Canada, and I find much difficulty in understanding the additions at line 23. The third subsection certainly is a somewhat restrictive clause as compared with what has prevailed heretofore. It states:
-no appeal shall lie to the supreme court except from the highest court of final resort having jurisdiction in the province m which the proceedings were originally instituted.
That is the law at the moment; and why it should be expressed again in those restrictive terms, having regard to the fact that an appeal lies as of right, as the minister says, where there is over $2,000 in controversy-and this section only applies to cases in which the amount involved is over $2,000 and therefore the jurisdiction of the court attaches-I cannot quite follow.


Ernest Lapointe: I think the first two lines of the subsection are the most important for they indicate the purpose. The rest of the subsection merely says that it must, as well, be appealable to the court of final resort.


Richard Bedford Bennett: To the supreme court; that is the one I am directing attention to.


Ernest Lapointe: It would be appealable in any case.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite so, if it came within the provisions of the section at all. I had a note about the matter the other day which I have not before me at the moment. If the minister would move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again this day, it would give me an opportunity to look at the note, and third reading could be given this evening. I had a communication from a member of the profession; I looked up the matter and made a note, and I should like to make sure that I have correctly stated the objections to the statute as indicated by the communication I received. The legislation will not be delayed, because third reading can be given to-night.


Ernest Lapointe: Very well. I move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again this day.


Richard Bedford Bennett: In the meantime the section may be carried. If it is necessary to speak to the matter again I can do so.
[Mr. Bennett. J


Ernest Lapointe: If the section is carried, should not the bill be reported?


Richard Bedford Bennett: No, the committee can ask leave to sit again this day.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. L. ILSLEY (Minister of National Revenue) moved the second reading of Bill No. 55, to amend the Department of National Revenue Act.
Some hon. MEMBERS:: Explain.


Mr. ILSLEY:: I do not know that I need add very much to the explanation I gave on the first reading of the bill, but perhaps I might go into it a little further. The provision which it is sought to repeal was enacted in 1928, and reads:
Whenever any officer in the service of the department may be granted a period of leave of absence with pay on his retirement from the service, he shall, in lieu of such leave of absence with pay, be paid out of the consolidated revenue fund, a gratuity equal to the amount of pay which he would have received if he had been granted such leave of absence, and the position occupied by him shall become vacant as from the date of such payment.
Of necessity the practice under the section is that just before an officer of the Department of National Revenue reaches the age of sixty-five years, instead of being given leave of absence with pay to which he is entitled, he is retired from the service and paid a gratuity equal to the amount of pay he would have received had he been granted such leave of absence. But it will be noted that his position becomes vacant when he retires from the service, and superannuation begins from the time of the vacancy. The result is that he is being paid a gratuity in lieu of his ordinary remuneration for the same period for which he is receiving a pension.
That practice does not prevail in any other department of the service, and it is to remove such discrimination that the bill is introduced. It could be done in another way, namely, by extending the rule to all other departments of the service; but there does not seem to be any good ground for making such extension. It seems to be in accordance with fairness and justice to pay a civil servant until his service expires and then-and only then-place him upon a pension. That is what will be done.

Customs Act-Drawbacks
The objection may be raised that on occasions it is desirable to render a position vacant and to make a new appointment immediately.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That can be done.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes, that can be done by order in council. In other departments of the government where it is found desirable to do that, orders in council are passed on recommendation of the treasury board, by which positions are rendered vacant and then filled.


Richard Bedford Bennett: And the man retired gets six months gratuity, with his pension.


James Lorimer Ilsley: The civil servant retiring under those circumstances gets his pension, plus a gratuity equal to the difference between his pay and his pension for that period. That is just, and will be the position in the present instance, hereafter.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, considered in committee, reported, read the third time and passed.


[Stage Direction]
Hon. .L L. ILSLEY (Minister of National Revenue) moved that the house go into committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to introduce a measure to amend the Customs Act to provide for certain conditions in estimating the value for duty of goods imported into Canada, also for the ratification and confirmation of certain values for duties heretofore fixed, and further to provide for drawbacks in respect of consumable materials and for drawbacks in the ease of certain exported goods.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
James Lorimer Ilsley: I think it would be more convenient for everyone if the bill were before the house before much discussion were to take place on the subject matter of the resolution. The bill contains a variety of amendments to the Customs Act, some of which might not and some of which might be described as important. It is impossible to give any comprehensive idea of the subject matter of the bill without dealing with each section in detail. I am willing to answer any questions at this time, but I do suggest that if the bill were before the house it might be more properly dealt with.


James Earl Lawson: The difficulty in following the minister's suggestion is that very frequently one desires either to seek information or to look up a previous statute or correlated information, and if we wait until the bill is before the house there is no time to do that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister is asking only for first reading, and will leave second reading until a later time.


James Earl Lawson: Oh, I understand. The minister has said some of the provisions are not important, while others are. Would he indicate the amendments which he considers important, and which in any way change the principle upon which valuations have previously been made, or the method of making them?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Mr. Chairman, there is a section of the act authorizing the fixing of values of fruits and vegetables in certain areas of Canada. That was the practice followed by the late administration and by the present one; and questions having been raised as to its legality, it is the desire of the government to place the matter beyond doubt. I believe that amendment is of some importance.
Another section of the bill deals with the legality and regularity of certain values which have been fixed in times past by ministers of national revenue. I believe those values relate entirely to fruits and vegetables. Certain importers who are seeking refunds from the department allege that values fixed by the last administration in one way or another have been faulty, because certain technicalities have not been complied with.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The practice has been continued by the present administration.


James Lorimer Ilsley: But the petitions of right which have been filed, and the refunds claims, are based entirely upon alleged irregularities under the last administration; I say that only as a matter of information. It may be that under the present administration the same practice has to some extent been followed; but as a matter of fact, I believe all the complaints relate to administration by previous ministers.


James Earl Lawson: Does the present bill propose to validate the steps which were taken?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Section 3 of the bill proposes to validate those steps and the collection of duties thereunder, exempting, however, petitions of right which are now outstanding.
There are a few miscellaneous amendments, including a provision whereby collectors or examiners need not examine one package in ten, which practice has been found impossible of performance. Further, there is a change in the section relating to the pay-
2368	COMMONS
Customs Act-Drawbacks
ment of drawbacks, but the change merely makes the section conform to the practice and is not of vital importance. There are two or three minor amendments which it is not necessary to mention.
Then there is a somewhat important amendment relating to the exportation and importation of arms and munitions and other articles that may be used in war. This amendment provides for the repeal of the two sections of the Customs Act which relate to that matter. It has been carefully drafted to meet what are thought to be the requirements of the present day.


Thomas Langton Church: When the Canada-United Kingdom trade agreement was being considered some questions were asked in connection with items 427 and 427a, covering machinery. Certain classes of machinery when imported for use in mining come in duty free, but when imported by small manufacturers they pay a duty of from 15 to 35 per cent, plus an eight per cent sales tax and a three per cent excise tax. Will the minister consider what was said in connection with these items, as reported ait page 2068 of Hansard, when he deals with the bill to be based on this resolution? The Minister of Finance promised to bring it to his attention.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I will do that.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in. Mr. Ilsley thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 84, to amend the Customs Act.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time. BUSINESS PROFITS WAR TAX ACT



AMENDMENT RESPECTING PROCEDURE IN DEALING WITH APPEALS

[Stage Direction]
Hon. CHARLES A. DUNNING (Minister of Finance) moved that the house go into committee to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to revive and amend the Business Profits War Tax Act, 1916, to validate any actions which may have been taken since the coming into force of the revised statutes of Canada, 1927, and to provide that the procedure for dealing with appeals from assessments under the said act shall be similar to the procedure for dealing with appeals under the Income War Tax Act.
Motion agreed to and the house went into committee, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
James Lorimer Ilsley: Mr. Chairman, at the request of my colleague the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning), I am making a brief explanation of this bill.

The Business Profits War Tax Act was enacted in 1916 and was in force in respect of accounting periods ending in the years 1915 to 1920, both inclusive. By chapter 10 of the statutes of 1924 it was enacted that all taxes, interest and penalties payable under the said act should remain a tax owing to His Majesty until fully paid and satisfied. This was the situation up to the time when the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1927, came into force and effect on February 1, 1928, by proclamation. The effect of the coming into force of the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1927, is set forth in chapter 65 of the statutes of 1924, being an act respecting the Revised Statutes of Canada. The said chapter 65 of 1924, after providing for a certified roll of the acts or parts of acts which are to be included in the Revised Statutes of Canada, provides in section 2 for a schedule of repealed enactments as follows:
2. There shall be appended to the said roll a schedule A similar in form to schedule A appended to the Revised Statutes of Canada of 1906: and the commissioners may include in the said schedule all acts and parts of acts which though not expressly repealed, are superseded by the acts so consolidated, or are inconsistent therewith, and all acts and parts ot acts which were for a temporary purpose, the force of which is spent.
Then by subsection 2 of section 5 of the said chapter 65 of 1924 there is a provision for the repeal of the enactments contained in the said schedule A on, from and after the date when the Revised Statutes of Canada are proclaimed to have come into effect. Subsection 2 of the said section 5 provides:
5. (2) On, from and after such day, all the enactments in the several acts and parts of acts in schedule A abovementioned shall stand and be repealed to the extent mentioned in the third column of the said schedule A.
In the said schedule A appended to the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1927, the Business Profits War Tax Act, 1916, and all the amendments thereto are noted as " spent " in the third column of the said schedule. Other acts dealing with other subjects which were not repealed or consolidated are noted in the said column of schedule A as "not repealed or consolidated." Other acts which are included in the Revised Statutes of Canada are noted in the said third column as being consolidated. Still other acts which were repealed by enactments of parliament prior to the coming into force of the revised statutes are noted as being repealed by the chapter number of the year of such repeal.
In no case, however, is an act such as the Business Profits War Tax Act, 1916, the force of which was spent in so far as current years

Business Profits War Tax
assessments were concerned at the time the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1927, came into force, noted as being repealed in the third column of the said schedule A; but by reason of the provisions of subsection 2 of section 5 of chapter 65 of the 1924 statutes, referred to above, an act which is noted as being " spent " in the said third column is deemed to be repealed and as no longer having any force or effect. I may say that there is some doubt whether an act which is merely described as being " spent " is really repealed, but my own opinion is that it is repealed by being so described in that column.
Apparently it was the intention of parliament, at least in 1924, to enact that taxes which actually fell due between 1915 and 1920 should remain taxes and be paid. I suggest that it was never contemplated in 1927 that the mere inclusion of this measure in the " spent " column meant that a person who owed taxes due in the period between 1915 and 1920 should not thereafter have to pay those taxes. This act revives the Business Profits War Tax Act of 1916 in so far as taxes which fell due during the period between 1915 and 1920 are concerned.
There are two other provisions which relate to those parts of the Business Profits War Tax Act giving a right of appeal to the taxpayer. The procedure for appeal under the Business Profits War Tax Act is very cumbersome. If a matter is at all complicated, as certain matters which will have to be dealt with under the Business Profits War Tax Act, 1916, may be, appeals will prove very expensive. The provision in the Business Profits War Tax Act with reference to appeals is for the appointment of a board of referees. Then there are appeals from the decision of that board.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It followed the English practice, unfortunately.


James Lorimer Ilsley: The provisions for appeal
in the Income War Tax Act are much more direct and much cheaper, both for the crown and for the appellant, and it was deemed advisable to get rid of +his board of referees provision. The referees, I might mention, are appointed by the government. To conduct an appeal under those provisions the government has first to appoint a board of referees, who will have to be paid, and they would have to select, I suppose, counsel, who might work for months in conducting the appeal, only to find at the end that there would be another appeal. So this act that I am introducing substitutes the appeal procedure in the Income War Tax Act for the appeal procedure in the Business Profits War Tax Act.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They can get to the exchequer court quicker, if they so desire.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.	.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Going to the minister
and then to the court; is that it?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Only one point arises
which involves a question of principle, and that is the effect upon the law of indicating as an appendix to the Revised Statutes of Canada that the operation of the act was spent. That is the whole issue as far as the first part is concerned. I would construe that to mean that it was spent for the purposes of imposing taxation; but for the purpose of the lien of the crown for taxes I should think it is still in force and effect, because the right of the crown in any event to claim a lien is one of its prerogatives, apart from every other consideration. I do not think we should even take time in discussing it, because it is desirable to remove any doubt that there may be upon that point.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: If there is any doubt,
then remove it by a short statement, by an enactment in appropriate words, indicating that doubts have arisen and it is desirable to resolve them; and that is all there is to it. So far as the second point is concerned, I do not think that anybody who might be interested would have any doubt as to this being a better method.


James Lorimer Ilsley: No.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I suppose that as a practical matter this arises from what we have seen in the press about the textile industry?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I assumed so, because I
remembered the agitation that took place on more than one occasion to have a time limit fixed beyond which taxpayers could not again be harassed in connection with business taxes. I thought that some time before 1930 an amendment was made fixing a date behind which you could not go, but I realized that it had no application to this particular act, because the period of time during which the old business profits war tax operated was 1915 to 1920. and I do not think it was extended beyond 1920.


James Lorimer Ilsley: There were certain enactments-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, but that is another thing.
revised edition
Business Profits War Tax


James Lorimer Ilsley: -but the tax itself died in 1920.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I should not think there would be any difficulty about the act being speedily passed.


James Earl Lawson: I take it that the act which the minister proposed to introduce is sufficiently broad in terms that, even although the assessment had not been made against some one alleged to be liable to be taxed under the Business Profits War Tax Act, he could now go back and make the assessment.


James Lorimer Ilsley: Oh yes.


James Earl Lawson: Or will it merely revive the old act in so far as assessments which had been made and in respect of which money was owing?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Assessments may be made at any time for the tax that arose that is payable for that period.


James Earl Lawson: Then you are going to revive the right of assessment?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Oh yes.
Resolution reported, read the second time and concurred in. Mr. Ilsley thereupon moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 85, to revive and amend the Business Profits War Tax Act, 1916.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



TRANS-CANADA AIR LINES ARRANGEMENT WITH CORPORATION RESPECTING LINES AND SERVICES FOR TRANSPORT OF PASSENGERS, GOODS AND MAILS

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Thursday, March 25, consideration in committee of Bill No. 74, to establish a corporation to be known as Trans-Canada Air Lines-Mr. Howe-Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
On section 1-Short title.
Richard Bedford Bennett: I suppose the minister is well aware that the bill of which he moved the second reading the other day, and the bill that is now before the house, are entirely different. He said that the printed bill did not express what the government proposed as its policy. It is now clear that the proposal is that the Canadian National shall own fifty-one per cent of this enterprise. As the bill originally appeared it was not in that form, but the minister indicated that that change was proposed, and the reprinted bill indicates that it is the purpose of the administration.
(Mr. Bennett.]
I cannot think it is probable that the fortynine per cent will be subscribed by the companies that are operating air lines in this country. It is just possible, of course, that it will be. I had suggested that in view of the present position and of the observations made the other day as to the close relationship between the railways and air services, the Canadian National Railway and the Canadian Pacific Railway might own the enterprise, and might follow the course that was adopted in the southern hemisphere. It is a course well worthy of consideration, where you have two enterprises owning the same interest in an enterprise of a public character, that each should elect an equal number of directors and that those directors should select the fifth or the seventh director, or as the case may be. If there were four directors, two would be elected by one group and two by the other group; and the fifth would be elected by those four. The result in practice, I was told, was that you secured the services of excellent business men, who devoted themselves to the enterprise and secured an even and equitable distribution of whatever you may be pleased to call it, between the two groups that owned the enterprise.
In this case, supposing fifty per cent were owned by the Canadian National Railways and fifty per cent by the Canadian Pacific Railway company, and that there were seven directors; three would be elected by the Canadian National Railway group, three by the Canadian Pacific group, and those six would elect the seventh, and that seventh man would necessarily be a person of outstanding qualifications or he would not be selected. I am told that in practice the arrangement has proved eminently satisfactory. I endeavoured to speak to the minister afterwards, and I mentioned the matter to his deputy, who, I think, told him of it, but the minister advised, I understand, that I should be informed that nothing came of the negotiations which were carried on looking to some ownership arrangement betwen the two railway companies; so the matter stands in the form in which it is at present, and there are no suggestions before the minister that will enable any other view to be taken than that which is expressed here.
Perhaps the minister will give us some idea of the situation. I confess that I cannot contemplate it without some concern, because, I repeat, if fifty-one per cent of the enterprise is owned by the Canadian National Railways, it is not probable that any of the air lines will desire to become proprietors of the other forty-nine per cent. It therefore follows that

Trans-Canada Air Lines
the government will find itself the owner of the whole, because it is really the government's money which is involved.
The minister has met the difficulty I mentioned the other day by providing that guaranteed securities may be issued by the railway company for the purpose of acquiring the whole of the shares, namely, those having par value amounting to $5,000,000; and thus becoming owners of them, they are authorized to sell 49 per cent. It is not probable that they would be acquired by the air line but would remain with the crown; for after all the Canadian National, where we are finding the money on our guarantee, as we do, really means the crown. The question which I suggested the other day is therefore whether or not, under the circumstances, it would be desirable for us to retain ownership of the whole. There is no purpose served by dealing with it in the way proposed except that we divest ourselves of the direction, while at the same time we are responsible for the financial operations, both by the guarantee of the money, which is the capital, and of the deficits for a period of two years.
I seriously suggest that the minister should consider whether it is not desirable under these circumstances that he should recast his bill and retain control in the crown, provided that he make arrangements for the operation of the property by the appointment of a commission, if he deems that desirable, or by some other method or in any other manner that may be appropriate, in the same way as we provided for the operation of our railways. For if we are to hand over the company to the railway, it is clearly an instrumentality of the crown inasmuch as the crown is finding the money. Might it not therefore be desirable-I simply put it in that way to the minister-for us to retain complete and absolute control of the whole, rather than place ourselves in the position we shall be in if we contemplate the possibility of 49 per cent being sold to other interests, whether they be air line companies or whatever they may be. I gather that some discussion has taken place in connection with the other line of railway, though nothing has come out of it. Therefore, so far as we are concerned, we must contemplate the Air Lines as an enterprise that will be wholly owned by the Canadian National, which as I say is an instrumentality of the crown because we find the money, or by the Canadian National and other shareholders who ijiay be willing to subscribe stock in an enterprise as to which in the very nature of things they will have nothing to say either as to direction or as to policy.
31111-150J
I really think that the matter is of so serious a character that it would be desirable for us to have an opportunity to consider it before a committee. I felt that at first, though I hesitated to press the view because of the lateness of the session. But frankly, this measure should not be put through the house in this way, without an opportunity being afforded for the hearing of evidence before one of our committees so that the whole situation might be carefully canvassed. The minister sees that, after all, it places upon the taxpayers of the country the burden of finding capital amounting to $5,000,000; that is number one. Number two is the question of the deficit; number three, contracts for carriage of mail, and undoubtedly the linking up of our system with Imperial Airways.
Imperial Airways is a joint venture of the crown or government of Great Britain and private shareholders. I suppose it is not too much to say that one hears a great deal about this matter and has done so for years, for their plans have not been secret in a general sense. I have no authority for the statement, but judging from discussions I have heard from time to time in England I do not believe that they contemplated that this was to be a publicly owned airways service so far as we are concerned. I say that frankly to the minister. The only reason I urge that it should be a publicly owned enterprise is that, after all, the public are finding the money. We cannot get away from that; they are finding the money, and inasmuch as they are putting it up, it seems to me that we had better hold the shares. Then we still have the difficulty of overcoming the problem of administration and operation. Though the Prime Minister must be convinced of the anxiety of all of us to assist him in closing the house, nevertheless this is a measure which I cannot help thinking is of first-rate importance, and I say with all candour that it should be considered by a committee. In my opinion a standing committee of this house should have an opportunity to hear witnesses.
One leading airman who used to be associated with one of our air companies was here the other day and I had some discussion with him about the situation. It had not to do with this particular bill, for I did not know then what the bill was going to be, but I could see that he had views which I thought might be useful. We have a number of airmen of such transcendent worth and merit that expressions of opinion from them would be quite useful in connection with operation; and the experience that has been gained by our friends to the south is also
Trans-Canada Air Lines

important. Recent accidents that have happened there indicate that certain difficulties will have to be overcome in connection with provision for safety and many other problems of the first rank.
I have made inquiries, as naturally the minister would expect I should, with regard to this matter in years past, because it is not something new; it is not as though the subject arose yesterday. I do repeat to the Prime Minister and the minister himself my earnest wish that it were possible to have a committee hearing so that an opportunity might be afforded to secure the views of those who are certainly much better able than most of us in this house to pronounce upon the matters involved. I know the minister has given a good deal of attention to the subject, and he is an engineer; but this is a very special form of engineering, a special form of transport, and the problems involved not only affect the mere carriage of freight and mails and passengers but are of vital import to the life of the nation as a whole. We have spent a good deal of money putting up beacons. In days when my friends opposite were over here, and when we were subject to great criticism, the unemployed prepared excellent landing fields, which were a great surprise to the Minister of National Defence when he saw w'hat had been done under the direction of that particular department in the days to which I refer.
Without further trespassing upon the time of the committee, I will simply say this. I cannot say that I approve of the measure, because I do not; but I shall be convinced if it can be shown that it is the only method that can be pursued. But, alas, there is no method by which members of this committee can secure the requisite information except through a special committee; and if we pass this bill and send it to another place, they may desire, as they have frequently done in connection with other matters, to have a committee deal with this whole question. In that event we should be deprived, except by reading, of much of the information which this commons house should have before embarking upon a policy that will have very far-reaching consequences with respect not only to air transport but to the very existence of the country itself.
Aerial transportation is of primary importance in connection with defence and allied questions, and it is for that reason I think a committee of the house should consider it. If the minister thinks that is out of the question, I can only place my views before this committee as strongly as I can, and leave it at that.


Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Transport):: As my right hon. friend has intimated, we expected almost until the day when we introduced this bill that our two principal railway coimpanies would be shareholders in the enterprise. We learned at the last moment that the directors of one large company decided not to take up the enterprise, and therefore we had to make a very quick change in the bill. I have always been of the opinion that the railways were the proper bodies to lend stability to this enterprise.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite.


Clarence Decatur Howe: As I said before, they are in the transportation business, and it would be a tremendous advantage to the enterprise to have the use of their facilities in selling tickets and in various other ways that I have already mentioned. At the same time we certainly want the very best aviation experience available in this country, and therefore in my opinion it is important for us to have ownership representation of companies now performing aviation service in Canada.
I am unable to share my right hon. friend's doubts about aviation companies taking up 49 per cent of the stock. I have had a number of telephone calls since this bill was brought down, saying that they are most anxious to discuss the matter; in fact, I have had to be rather rude to two or three of them because I did not care to discuss it until the bill was finally disposed of. I think there is nothing to fear about that feature.
As to putting the bill before a committee and hearing all the interests which might appear, I feel that nothing of great importance would come of that; I have been in a committee for months now, listening to every one who cared to make representations. I came to the conclusion that the corporation must be set up before we can deal with the aviation companies. I found them most unreasonable in maintaining a position against other companies in the same field, and until we are able to deal with a definite set-up, so that we can say to them: Now this is the company; what part do you like and what have you to offer?-until we can get all those facts I do not think we are going to be in a position to deal with the individual aviation companies. I am satisfied that this is the best way to go about the matter. True, we must have a board of directors for this corporation, and I think that the board should represent the ownership of the corporation. The government is entitled to representation because the government has a very great responsibility to ensure that this company is

Trans-Canada Air Lines
operated efficiently. I think that the railways should be represented in the ownership, and I believe that the other interests should also be represented.
In regard to having the best technical advice that we can get, I have explored that field very thoroughly. I have told companies with American interests that they could not participate. But they tell me frankly that one of their great interests in this line is that it shall be efficiently operated. They point out that a crash in Canada is just as serious to them as a crash in the United States, and they have offered to put all their technical advice at our service; they have offered to send officers here and give me the benefit of their organization in order to get this off to a proper start. That assurance I have. But before making use of that, we must have a company with a board of directors; we must know the extent to which we have technical assistance available in Canada. After that, we can decide what technical advice we require from the United States or elsewhere. I am satisfied that the first step is to set up a corporation, and have a substantial underwriter. My right hon. friend says it is the government itself, and I will not quarrel with that view; but notwithstanding that, it is the agency of the government that specializes in transportation and I think that they, rather than the government, are the proper people to do this underwriting.
As to whether this legislation should go through at this session or be held over, I think it is most important to pass the bill at this session. Our air fields are ready and finished; the whole organization is set up from Winnipeg west. Before this summer is over we expect that the entire system from coast to coast will be ready for operation as far as the main line is concerned. We are under pressure from Imperial Airways, if you like, or the government of Great Britain, and the government of the Irish Free State, in the matter of a connecting service with flights that they are starting almost immediately across the north Atlantic. I have undertaken informally with them to be ready to take the mails as they deliver them on the east coast, and to carry them across to the west coast. It is important that the service be conducted through Canada rather than across the United States-


Richard Bedford Bennett: Hear, hear.


Clarence Decatur Howe: -because once the service is established it is difficult to change the route. We should be ready to meet that need and obtain that business for Canada. I regret that the lateness of the session does not
seem to admit of the submission of this bill to a committee, but I am satisfied from my own experience that very little would be gained by bringing in the very numerous aviation companies in Canada to appear before a committee and give their views. I am satisfied that those views would be exceedingly conflicting, and that in the end the committee would find it necessary to do what I have to do, form my own opinion.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister will observe that I was very careful not to suggest that the bill should not be proceeded with this session; I did not even hint that. But I think I have a just right, as has every hon. member of the House of Commons, to complain that this bill should be submitted so late.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Quite.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I recall the wheat bill.
We sat here until July, and the government yielded to the view then suggested that it should be sent to a committee, and we sat during the long hot days of early July and the committee heard witnesses on the bill- on the bill, not on the general question. The only question that is at issue is whether or not it would be possible to submit the bill to a committee. That is what was done in that ease. I think, in a matter of such very great importance-not to traverse the ground again-this measure might have been submitted to the house earlier. I know that if we had undertaken to submit a bill of this importance so late in a session which is necessarily brief, we would have been very strongly and vigorously denounced in language that, if it were to emulate some we hear, would certainly be that of the gutter and not of this house; but that is not a matter of importance, I suppose, at this time. I do suggest, however, that as apparently we cannot deal with it by a committee, and as there is an acute difference of opinion with respect to some of these clauses, we might proceed now to get rid of the clauses about which there should not be any difficulty, and then, either later this afternoon or tomorrow, we could proceed to discuss the clauses about which I fancy there must be considerable difference of opinion in the house.


Charles Avery Dunning: Mr. Chairman, we expect the Black Rod in a moment to summon us to the senate, and I believe the Speaker wishes to make some announcement from the chair, so I would move that the committee rise, report progress and ask leave to sit again this day.
Section stands.
Progress reported.
The Royal Assent



THE ROYAL ASSENT

[Stage Direction]
A message was delivered by Major A. R. Thompson, Gentleman Usher of the Black Rod, as follows:
Mr. Speaker, His Honour, the Deputy of His Excellency the Governor General, desires the immediate attendance of this honourable house in the chamber of the honourable the Senate.
Accordingly, the house went up to the Senate,
And having returned,
Mr. SPEAKER informed the house that the Deputy of His Excellency the Governor General had been pleased to give in His Majesty's name the royal assent to the following bills:
An Act respecting alteration in the law touching the Succession to the Throne.
An Act to amend The Canadian and British Insurance Companies Act, 1932.
An Act to amend the Militia Pension Act.
An Act to amend The Dominion Franchise Act.
An Act to amend the Dairy Industry Act.
An Act to provide for Appeal to the Court of Appeal of the Province of British Columbia in Divorce and Matrimonial Causes.
An Act to amend the Weights and Measures Act.
An Act to increase Employment by encouraging the Repair of rural and urban Homes.
An Act to amend The Canadian Red Cross Society Act.
An Act to amend The Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act.
An Act for the relief of Joseph Neilson Blaeklock.
An Act for the relief of Francis Hector Walker.
An Act for the relief of William Edward Connor.
An Act for the relief of Annie Nemchek Cohen.
An Act for the relief of James Gordon Ross.
An	Act	for	the	relief	of	Florence Anna
Iverson Salberg.
An	Act	for	the	relief	of	Charles Marsh
Doxsey.
An Act for the relief of Phyllis Stanners Kitchin, otherwise known as Judith Stanners Ivitchin.
An Act for the relief of Ivy Jackson Beaulne.
An	Act	for	the	relief	of	Charlotte Opal
Moore Norton.
An Act for the relief of Mildred Tannenbaum Sufrin.
An Act to incorporate Federal Fire Insurance Company of Canada.
An Act to incorporate Gore District Mutual Fire Insurance Company.
An	Act	to incorporate	Sterling Insurance
Company of Canada.
An Act to incorporate Toronto General Insurance Company.
An Act to incorporate the Sons of Scotland Benevolent Association.
An Act to amend the Government Harbours and Piers Act.
An Act to amend the Old Age Pensions Act.
An Act respecting a certain Trade Agreement between Canada and the United Kingdom.

An Act to incorporate Wellington Fire Insurance Company.
An Act respecting the appointment of Auditors for National Railways.
An Act to amend the Precious Metals Marking Act, 1928.
An Act to authorize the provision of moneys to meet certain expenditures made and indebtedness incurred by the Canadian National Railways during the calendar year 1937, and to authorize the guarantee by His Majesty of certain securities to be issued by the Canadian National Railways.
An Act for granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the public service of the financial year ending the 31st March, 1938.
An Act for granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the public service of the financial year ending the 31st March, 1937.
At ax o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock. SUPPLY
The house in committee of supply, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.

[Stage Direction]
Harbours and rivers, Quebec-Under contract-
Boucherville-protection work, $7,009.
Cape Cove (Anse du Cap)-wharf reconstruction, $9,000.
Dune du Sud, M.I.-breakwater, $6,200.
Havre Aubert, M.I.-strengthening and widening wharf, $13,000.
Hull-protection work, $5,000.
Isle aux Grues-extension to north wharf, $12,500.
L'lslet-w-harf reconstruction, $13,000.
Little River St. Lambert-dredging-the provincial government to contribute a like amount, $4,000.
Manicouagan-wharf extension and repairs- one-third of cost to be contributed by the Ontario Paper Co., Ltd., $27,400.
Riviere Cachee-dredging-the provincial government to contribute a like amount, $4,000.
Riviere du Loup-wharf enlargement, $16,800.
Riviere Laguerre-contribution towards completion of improvement, the provincial government to bear a like amount, $15,000.
Sept lies-wharf repairs and extension, $7,000.
Harbours and rivers generally-for maintenance of services, no new wmrks to be undertaken, $300,000.
Richard Bedford Bennett: These are all presently under contract?


Hon. P. J. A. CARDIN (Minister of Public Works):: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Supply-Public Works
Saskatchewan, Alberta and Northwest Territories- harbours and rivers generally - for maintenance of services, no new works to be undertaken, $15,900.
John Ritchie MacNicol: Could the minister tell us where there are any harbours in Saskatchewan?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This vote is to cover improvements in the rivers.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It says harbours, and I was wondering where they were.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: That is the general description applied to all these votes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Dredging-maritime provinces, $300,000.
Dredging-Ontario and Quebec, $320,000.
Dredging-Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, $96,000.
Dredging-British Columbia, $185,000.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Would the minister give some particulars of the dredging to be done in the maritime provinces?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This amount of $300,000 for the maritime provinces is required to carry out dredging operations in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island by contract, day labour, and departmental plant, and to provide for the repair and maintenance of this plant during the fiscal year 1937-38.
This is a regular annual appropriation, and the expenditures chargeable to this are mainly for works which can be more economically charged to this vote, and any larger works which require to be done by contract where no departmental plant is available and for which there is no special appropriation. A tentative program covering the season's operations is made out for each dredge from the list of works requested, according to the locality in which the plant is located, but very often this program cannot be carried out on account of the necessity arising during the season for some other urgent work to be performed first.
The plant we propose to operate this year consists of dredge No. 5, Northumberland, $50,000; dredge No. 9, Montague, tug Fredericton and plant, 845,000; dredge No. 2, $25,000; dredge No.	13,	tug Lisgar and	plant, $50,000;dredge No.	14,	$6,000;	dredge	No.	15,	$8,000;dredge No.	16,	$7,500;	dredge	No.	17,	$8,000;dredge No.	18,	$5,000;	dredge	No.	19,	$5,000;
contingencies and travelling expenses, $4,500.
The plant which will not be operated this year but which will require a certain amount of maintenance consists of dredge No. 1, dredge No. 4, dredge No. 115 and the tug
Canso. It is proposed to build ten pontoons for dredge No. 5 at a cost of $27,000. These items make up the total vote.


John Ritchie MacNicol: The next part of the item covers dredging for Ontario and Quebec. How much will be spent in Ontario and how much in Quebec?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Under this vote it is proposed to put six dredges into operation, which will leave three not in operation this year. We propose to build a new steel scow for dredge No. 117. I have not the division of the amount as between Ontario and Quebec. If the hon. member desires that information I shall have to give him a list of the places in Ontario and Quebec where it is proposed to use these dredges. I can venture the statement that the amount is generally divided equally between'the two provinces.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is the dredging under this item correlated with the dredging under item 72 on page 27 of the estimates-dredging in Montreal harbour and the St. Lawrence river.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: There is no relation between the two items.


Angus MacInnis: Where will the appropriation under the item for British Columbia be spent?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is on the Fraser river that the grant will be expended.


Angus MacInnis: All of it?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: All of it, yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Roads and Bridges
Burlington channel bridge-maintenance and repairs, $15,000.
Calumet-Bryson bridge-improvements and repairs, $11,500.
Dominion roads and bridges-generally, $5,000.
Kingston wharves and bridges-maintenance and repairs, $10,100.
Ottawa-maintenance and repairs to bridges and approaches, $7,100.
Matapedia bridge-repairs and improvements, $13,400.
Perley bridge over Ottawa river at Hawkes-bury, $6,700.
North Temiskaming bridge-improvements, $3,500.
Portage du Fort bridge-improvements and repairs, $4,600.
Selkirk bridge-maintenance and repairs, $3,500.
Delta-repairs to bridge, $3,000.
Mr. BARBER:: What is the policy of the department with regard to construction and maintenance of bridges? Is it confined to int-r-provincial bridges?
Supply-Public Works


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Interprovincial and international.


Harry James Barber: The reason I asked is that we have under construction at Westminster a very fine bridge, costing a considerable sum of money, and the people understand that the federal government has been approached for a grant of two million dollars towards that bridge. If that grant was made it would perhaps eliminate the necessity for tolls, and the residents of the immediate neighbourhood would benefit considerably. Has the minister any information to give about this matter?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is true that representations have been made to the government with a view to obtaining some assistance towards the construction of that bridge, but a decision has not yet been reached.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is the Calumet-Bryson
bridge, from .the mainland over to the island, am interprovincial bridge? It may be for all I know.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Of course, there is always an exception to any rule. This bridge, I am informed, is very old; and during the last ten or fifteen years, bridges here and there have been built in whole or in part with the assistance of a federal grant. In only a very few cases, however, has the federal government undertaken to put up bridges within a province or to contribute to their construction. The rule that we do not contribute except to an international or interprovincial bridge has been pretty consistently followed by the department and the government for many years.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Well, is the Matapedia bridge an interprovincial one?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


John Ritchie MacNicol: How is it interprovincial? Is it from Quebec to New Brunswick?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is between Quebec and New Brunswick.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Saskatchewan and Alberta - Saskatchewan and Alberta telegraph and telephone lines

repairs and improvements, $24,000.
John Ritchie MacNicol: What has the federal government to do with telephones in Saskatchewan and Alberta?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This service was established by the federal government before the provinces were organized, at a time when there was no possibility of inducing private companies to establish either a telephone or telegraph system in that country, and it has since been kept up by the government in many
fMr. Barber.]
cases, I might say, because we could not dispose of the services. We could find nobody willing to accept the responsibility of operating a telegraph line in a locality where there was not very much business to be expected.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is there any business?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, some business, but not enough to meet the expenditures.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Miscellaneous
Architectural branch-salaries of architects, clerks of works, inspectors, draftsmen, clerks and messengers of outside service, $72,000.
Engineering branch-salaries of engineers, clerks, etc., of outside service, $396,000.
For operation and maintenance of inspection boats, $11,460.
Maintenance and operation of water storage dams on Ottawa river and tributaries, $35,000.
National Gallery of Canada, $75,000.
National monument on Connaught place,
[Stage Direction]
Surveys and inspections, $65,000.
Balance of expenditure for works already authorized, provided amount for any one work does not exceed $200, $5,000.
Miscellaneous works not otherwise provided for, not more than $3,000 to be expended upon any one work, $50,000.
Mr. STIRLING:: What progress can the
minister give account of for the national monument on Connaught place?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The monument is ready to be put in place, but there are so many conflicting ideas as to the site upon which it should be erected that up to the present time the government has been unable to decide. We shall have to make up our minds one way or the other pretty soon, because the monument must be erected during the summer.


Grote Stirling: Where is it now?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Stored, the last I knew about it.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I am informed that the figures are in England at present.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Where are the water storage dams located on the Ottawa river and its tributaries, and for what purpose are they now used?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: There is the Temiskaming dam and the Quinze dam on the Ottawa river. The object of these dams is to store the spring floods and augment the low water flow, thus equalizing the run-off in the Ottawa valley throughout the year.

Supply-Public Works


Mr. GRAYDON:: Referring to the item for surveys and inspections, does the aggregate include anything with respect to Port Credit harbour, in the county of Peel?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, the amount that might be necessary for the survey my hon. friend mentions could be taken out of that vote.


Gordon Graydon: May I point out to the minister, as I have done on occasion before, that in view of the importance of this some money should be spent to improve its facilities. I will give the minister plenty of time to consider the proposal. He will not be pressed for time between now and next session, and I urge upon him once more the importance of carrying on the undertaking which was begun through a vote in 1935 for harbour improvement facilities at Port Credit. I know that the far-famed courtesy and consideration of the minister assures that my proposal will receive some kind of favourable attention when the next estimates are brought down.


Mr. GLADSTONE:: I trust the minister
will permit me to make a few observations without considering them in any degree critical of the department; nor would I have my remarks construed as critical of the former Minister of Public Works. It seems to me there is great need for more coordination of effort in meeting the demands of other departments upon the Department of Public Works for public buildings and other works. There should be more cooperation between the Post Office Department, for example, and the Department of National Revenue. There is one instance of the need of cooperation. I think the officials of the Department of Public Works can in many respects be absolved of blame, because they have a great task in trying to satisfy what are perhaps unreasonable demands by other departments -demands far in excess of the immediate requirements, providing as they do for cities of three and four times the present population.
There is room for improvement in the construction of buildings. I suggest that buildings in the majority of cases should be erected on lots deep enough and constructed so as to allow for extension when greater accommodation is needed. In many buildings, too, the lighting system is defective; in some post offices the lights are not well placed to serve properly those who sort and distribute the mail. One cannot help criticizing also the type of doors found in some of these buildings. Some doors are so massive and heavy that it is impossible for a frail woman to open them, and when she stands on the step trying to pull one of these
doors open some able-bodied man may be pushing the door open violently from inside. If there have been no accidents from that cause there certainly will be.
I strongly recommend that an effort be made to keep the space provided more nearly in line with the requirements. There is great opportunity for saving money in this direction. In my contacts with the Department of Public Works I have found that the officials have been giving these matters careful consideration, but unfortunately they find themselves up against a stone wall in the form of demands made upon them by other departments.


Mr. MALLETTE (Translation):: Is the hon. minister of Public Works in a position to tell me whether the item of 875,000 for the National Gallery of Canada is to provide only for the upkeep of the gallery or whether there is also included therein an amount for the purchase of paintings?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I understand that part of the amount is to provide for the purchase of paintings.


Joseph Léon Vital Mallette: Does the minister know how much has been spent for that purpose in 1937?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I am not in a position to give 'the information asked for by the hon. member, because I have not got it before me, but if he would like to have it, I shall give it to him to-morrow.


Mr. STEWART:: What is the total amount of the main estimates for public works last year, the total of supplementary estimates for public works, and the corresponding figures for this year?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The main estimates for 1936-37 amounted to $13,411,570; the special supplementaries, $14,956,585; the regular supplementary estimates-that is to say, the supplementary estimates in addition to the main estimates-$2,835,700, or a total of $31,203,855. For the present year the main estimates amount to $12,504,420; the special supplementaries, $12,550,000; or a total of $25,054,420. That represents a decrease of $6,149,435.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: What are the figures for the previous year?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: In 1935-36 the main estimates amounted to $14,530,320; the supplementary estimates, $2,906,150; further supplementary estimates, $2,000,000; and special estimates, what was required under the Public Works' Construction Act, $7,992,243.
Supply-Public Works


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I gather from what the minister said when these estimates were up before, that practically all the undertakings under the two Public Works' Construction Acts have been completed and that none of them appears in these estimates. Is that correct?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: There are only three items that have not been put through-the Cobalt public building, the Guelph public building, and the Toronto tunnel. All the other undertakings have been carried out.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Guelph public building;
that is not the new public building, is it?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No, that is the installation of an elevator in the old building, for $15,000.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Approximately what
would be the total of those items?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: For Guelph, $15,000; Cobalt, $53,000; and the Toronto tunnel, $1,000,000.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Apparently those have
been dropped.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: They are not provided
for anywhere in these estimates?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Have any representations been made recently in connection with the tunnel at Toronto? The airport question seems to be very much alive there now.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No representations have
been made to the department recently.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Graving Docks
Champlain graving dock, $72,000.
Esquimalt graving dock, $90,400.
Lorne graving dock, $48,400.
Selkirk-repair slip, $4,300.
Hugh Alexander Stewart: There seem to be some increases there; they are not large. Is it just a matter of maintenance, or some extensions or additions? If there are no extensions, if it is just an increase in maintenance-


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, it is only maintenance and operation.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Public Buildings-Nova Scotia
Halifax-new public building, $45,000.
Halifax-ordnance buildings, $200,000.
Halifax-Rockhead hospital - reconditioning and improvements, $30,000.
Lunenburg public building-repairs and improvements, $7,500.

Louisburg-public building, $20,000.
Mulgrave-public building, $26,000.
Springhill public building-alterations and improvements, $3,500.
Stewiacke

public building, $14,500.
Sydney Mines public building - addition, $13,500.
Trenton-public building, $20,000.
Wolfville-purchase of land adjacent to public building, $1,500.
Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Possibly it may appear to hon. gentlemen opposite that the list of these supplementary estimates is long. There are a number of pages of different items, but I am sure my hon. friend the ex-Minister of Public Works (Mr. Stewart) understands exactly the position the department is in when called upon to prepare the main estimates. There is always a large number of reports which have not been made by the different engineering branches all over Canada, and after we have prepared the main estimates we always receive many requests from the engineers and from different constituencies in Canada.
There is nothing exceptional so far as the number of items is concerned; I think there are fewer items in these supplementary estimates than I had in last year's list. They all relate to the same class of work and undertakings covered by the main estimates; the repair or reconstruction of a wharf or pier, or a certain amount of dredging here and there; and I venture to say that these expenditures, which do not amount to very much in all compared with the whole expenditure of the country, are to a large extent incurred in practically the same regions. It is easy to understand that, because ports and rivers are not as numerous in some provinces of Canada as in others.
For example, the number of requests received from Ontario, Quebec, and the maritime provinces for the development of little harbours which might help commerce generally or the fishermen is larger than from other provinces, which accounts for the large number of items found in these supplementary estimates. I am doing what my predecessor did and what his predecessor did in the old days in that regard. It has been the practice in our country since confederation to give as much help as possible to these small places where fishermen are earning their living by the hard work of fishing; governments have always been inclined to come to their help even when in certain cases there was not a very strong justification from a purely business point of view. The sentimental element has always entered into the consideration of the requests made by these localities for aid from the federal treasury. So in reality I

Supply-Public Works
am simply following in the footsteps of those who preceded me and continuing what has been the practice in Canada since confederation.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I can understand the
position of the minister owing to the fact that the session started rather early this year, which perhaps accounts for the comparatively small number of items in the main estimates and the larger number in the supple-mentaries. The minister said that he is following in the footsteps of his predecessor, but I hardly recognize my tracks. It seems to me he is blazing a new trail in some directions. He says there are many demands; I can understand that, and I venture to think that even with the considerably extended list he has not met all the demands for public works that have been made upon him.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There are forty constituencies he overlooked.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: It might be interesting to know the particular constituencies where the minister's tracks may now be found, to say nothing of those of the former minister. I venture to think they are not in just the same constituencies.
I notice that the largest public building item is at Halifax; ordnance building, $200.000. Would the minister explain that item? I thought those buildings were in fairly good shape.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This amount of $200,000 is required towards the construction of the following ordnance buildings at Halifax: stores building, a work shop, and two buildings for vacant stores. The estimated cost of the stores building, a five-storey brick structure, is $277,000. The work shop, a one-storey building, is to cost $78,780. The vacant stores buildings are to cost $55,000 and $22,000 respectively. Fittings for the stores building are estimated at $41,800; overhead crane in work shop, $1,100, and supervision and contingencies, $23,858. This has been requested by the Department of National Defence.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-New Brunswick
Minto-public building, $24,700.
North Head-public building, $31,000.
Rogersville-public building, $11,000.
St. Stephen-building for customs and immigration purposes, $110,000.
Mr. BROOKS:: I notice this vote provides for a public building at Minto, New Brunswick. I should like to ask the minister if that building is for use as a post office.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The building will be used for postal purposes.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Has the site been selected yet?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Nothing has been decided as yet; the site has not been acquired.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I understand one 6ite under consideration is in Sunbury county. Minto, as the minister may not know, is a town located in both Sunbury and Queens counties. The post office has always been considered to belong in Queens county, and when the question of the site is under consideration, I presume by the Post Office Department, I hope they will consider the most central location to serve the needs of the people in that town, located as I say in two constituencies.
The people in that section are quite concerned over a rumour that the proposed site is near the liquor store in Minto, and for that reason a good many of the citizens are opposed to that location. I am sure my hon. friend from York-Sunbury, who is noted as a very strong temperance man, will use his best endeavours to see that a site near the liquor store is not chosen. I am also satisfied that he will endeavour to see that the building is located in the centre of the village, where it will serve most of the people to the greatest advantage. If he does that, I am satisfied that the site chosen will be in the constituency of Royal, and not in the constituency of York-Sunbury.


Mr. CLARK (York-Sunbury):: This public building in Minto, which is in Sunbury county-


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I beg the hon. gentleman's pardon; it is not in Sunbury county. It is not an incorporated town at all, but the main stores and business places are in Queens county. I am surprised the hon. member does not know more about that end of his constituency.


William George Clark: Minto is a mining town in Sunbury county, and this vote is very much appreciated because it will mean the first dominion public building to be erected in the county of Sunbury.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Has the site been decided upon?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: May I ask a question?


Frederick George Sanderson: The hon. member may ask a question if the hon. gentleman who has the floor permits him to do so.
23S0
Supply-Public Works


Alfred Johnson Brooks: My hon. friend says this will be the first public building to be erected in Sunbury county, and I should like to ask him if the site for that building has been selected. I understood the Minister of Public Works to say it had not yet been chosen.


William George Clark: I have no doubt that is correct; the site has not been chosen, but when it is selected, certainly it will be in Sunbury county.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I should like a little additional information with regard to the St. Stephen building for customs and immigration purposes. Has the site of that building been definitely determined as yet? As I recall it, there was some question as to the exact location of a bridge there.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I am informed that the building has been completed, and that this amount of $110,000 covers the estimated cost of a concrete retaining wall, rough granite facing, balance of purchase of property, foundations for customs warehouse, superstructure for customs warehouse, grading and fencing, supervision and contingencies.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: As I recall it, there is pretty heavy traffic at that point. Will this provide complete equipment for that building?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes; that is my information.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-Quebec
Amos-public building, $55,000.
Farnham-public building, $10,500.
Hull-armoury, $100,000.
L'Assomption-public building, $34,000.
Montreal-armoury for Le Regiment de Maisonneuve, $100,000.
Montreal, Point St. Charles-armoury, $15,000.
Montreal public building-addition and alterations, $147,000.
North Hatley-public building, $12,000.
Perce-public building, $10,000.
Point Claire-public building, $23,500.
Pointe au Pic-public building, $36,000.
Quebec

postal terminal building, $300,000.
Quebec quarantine facilities-improvements, $25,000.
Quebec West-public building. $12,500.
St. Andrews East-public building, $14,000.
Ste. Anne de Bellevue military hospital-improvements and alterations, $25,000.
Ste. Anne de la Pocatiere-public building,
[Stage Direction]
St. Johns-customs building, $38,000.
St. Charles de Bellechasse-public building, $13,500.
Scotstown-public building, $15,000.
Temiskammg-public building, $20,000.
Weedon-purchase of building for postal purposes, $12,000.
Hugh Alexander Stewart: I should like some information with regard to one or two items in this list. I notice that several armouries are included; I will pass those by, but there is an
[The Chairman.]
expenditure of $300,000 for a postal terminal building at Quebec. Would the minister give us some explanation of that item?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The accommodation that is to be provided in Quebec will be of the same type that has been provided in Montreal, for example, and Ottawa. It is to be a central building where mail will be handled right from the train. It is proposed to erect this building in the vicinity of the station.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: The last item provides for the purchase of a building at Weedon for a building for postal purposes; would the minister explain that?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This $12,000 provides for the purchase of a building for postal purposes. The estimated cost of the property is $10,100, and the repairs that will have to be made include repairs to the roof, chimneys and porches; improved heating, plumbing and wiring systems and so on, at a cost of $1,900. In view of the report made to us and the study made by the architect it was thought advisable to buy this building, which is very suitable, rather than begin a new construction. The building is in the centre of the locality and we expect to get it at a favourable price, because not many people around there are in the market to buy property of that value.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-Ontario
Arthur-public building, $12,000.
Bobcaygeon-public building, $12,000.
Burlington-public building, $6,500.
Cobourg public building-addition and alterations, $25,000.
Cornwall-armoury, $100,000.
Havelock-public building. $12,000.
Kingston-machine shop, $45,500.
Lucknow-public building, $15,000.
Mildmay-public building, $3,000.
Nipigon-public building, $15,000.
North Bay public building-addition, $30,000.
Ottawa post office-removal and replacement, inclusive of site, $250,000.
Ottawa-new departmental building, $250,000.
Ottawa-building for supreme court, $250,000.
Ottawa - Confederation buildings - improvements to Wellington street, $100,000.
Ottawa-buildings for Department of Mines and Resources, $260,000.
Ottawa

improvements to Plaza, $250,000.
Ottawa-parliament building, $70,000.
Ottawa:-record storage building, $489,000.
Ottawa-Royal Canadian Mint. $22,000.
Ottawa-Justice building, $45,000.
Oakville-public building, $30,000.
Renfrew public building

addition and alterations. $22,000.
Simcoe public building-addition, $17,000.
Sioux Lookout-public building, $39,500.
Toronto postal station "F"-alterations and improvements, $15,000.
Toronto-postal station "K", $11,500.
Tweed-public building, $15,000.
Vankleek Hill-public building, $12,000.

Supply-Public Works
John Ritchie MacNicol: What kind of machine shop is to be erected at Kingston? A machine shop costing $45,500 would be an extensive plant. Out of the $2,424,000 provided for Ontario I notice the city of Toronto is to get the magnificent sum of $26,500. Is there any need for the first item in the list, the public building at Arthur? It has been rumoured that if the proposal of the hon. member for Wellington North (Mr. Blair) had carried, a lethal chamber might have been erected in that village. However, since no action is to be taken on his proposal the lethal chamber will not be required, and the expenditure on a public building at Arthur seems unnecessary.


David Spence: Let us have some information about the building at Kingston.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The sum of $45,500 is provided for the erection of a machine shop requested by the Deputy Minister of National Defence. He says the machine shop is necessary for making major repairs and overhauling guns and other militia equipment. A plant capable of undertaking and maintaining a repair service for the R.C.A. and other local units should have about 10,000 square feet floor area, and the necessary equipment should be adjacent to the premises in which the guns are stored. The request has come from the Department of National Defence.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Does it include the machinery for the repair of the guns?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Why is the term "machine shop" used?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I understand the Department of National Defence will place their old machines in it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is just a storehouse.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Gordon Graydon: I notice provision made for a public building at Arthur, another at Burlington, and another at Oakville. Can the minister tell the committee what kind of buildings they are. Will they be post office buildings?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


John Ritchie MacNicol: A lethal chamber at Arthur.


Gordon Graydon: They are post office buildings?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Not a place to store guns?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No.


Gordon Graydon: All three places I mentioned, Arthur, Oakville, and Burlington, are close to the boundaries of the county of Peel. I was wondering if coming events are casting their shadows before, and that we might expect something within the next year or so in the constituency of Peel.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Philanthropy stops at the county boundary.


Harry Gladstone Clarke: Mr. Chairman, I should like to make an inquiry in connection with the total amount of expenditures in the province of Ontario. It would seem from the vote that Ottawa receives a fairly substantial amount of the expenditures for this province. As a matter of fact, out of a total vote for Ontario of $2,424,000, expenditures in Otttawa will amount to $1,986,000. That leaves for the remainder of Ontario the large sum of $438,000, to be distributed in the different places mentioned, Burlington, and so on, and for the expenditure on the odd revolving door mentioned by the hon. member for Broadview. That is very good! They are taking good care of Toronto!-Toronto which is supplying a great part of the dominion's revenues. I am indeed thankful for the great expenditures and the consideration the government is giving to Toronto! While on my feet may I say that politically I do not think the government is playing the game. Toronto is and has been for many years known as Tory Toronto.


John Ritchie MacNicol: And will be so known.


Harry Gladstone Clarke: I will discuss that later. The fact is, as the last election returns show, that the Liberal party scored one hundred per cent in that city in returning Liberal members to parliament, but I warn the government to take care and to pay some attention to Toronto in giving favours, or else it will send back a solid Tory representation.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It will do that anyway.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: In the item I notice these words: "Ottawa post office-removal and replacement, inclusive of site." Could the minister give some information in connection with that item?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The item covers the proposal to replace the Ottawa city post office, when the present building is demolished. We have not yet reached any conclusion as to the site or the class of building to be erected to meet the requirements of post office service in Ottawa.
Supply-Public Works

Several proposals have been made, and among others that we develop the Langevin block along Elgin street. There is another suggestion that we erect a separate building elsewhere in the city. The proposal forms part of the general scheme of beautifying the city by the development of the park where the monument is to be placed. Before reaching a decision we wish to consider all representations as to the best way of meeting the exigencies of Ottawa, and at the same time to adopt a plan which will have the effect of beautifying the capital city of our country. The item provides for whatever moneys may be required in connection with the building of a new post office for Ottawa. However, nothing definite has so far been done and I am free to say that I welcome all suggestions hon. members may have to present. This is a matter which is above politics. We have no intention of controlling the whole matter, and are ready to listen to any representations made to us, before reaching a final decision.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I notice an expenditure
of 8250,000 for a new departmental building in Ottawa. I assume this will be another unit on Wellington street adjacent to the one recently completed, known as the Justice building?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: What is the' total
estimated cost of this unit?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Between 85,000,000 and
$6,000,000. This proposed building is shown in the model layout now located in the building here. I am informed that there is no immediate necessity of erecting this building in its entirety, and we could proceed with the construction of only a part. The whole building in any event could not be completed in the one year.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I assume the site has
not been selected?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No, but it will be part
of the general program.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Would the minister explain this item of $260,000 for the Department of Mines and Resources?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is to cover the erection
of a building and the acquisition of additional property, as requested by the deputy minister of mines. He states that he has discussed with his minister the extension of the Booth street plant and is prepared to ask the Department of Public Works to prepare for consideration by the government a proposal for the appropriation of funds for this purpose. This vote is divided as follows:

Acquisition of lot 134 to the north of the Booth street site, $30,000.
Erection on lot 134 of an industrial minerals laboratory, $135,000'.
Erection of an ore dressing laboratory building, $75,000.
Construction of additional storage at the fuel research building, $20,000.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Is any revenue obtained
by this department in connection with any of these activities?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I am not in a position to say.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: The next item for records storage building, $489,000, also requires some explanation. This project has been under way for some time.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This building is under
contract.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Where is it being erected?
Mr. CARDIN; On the experimental farm property.	.


Robert William Gladstone: Mr. Chairman, we are about to pass a vote of $2,424,000 after only a few minutes consideration. I am sure hon. members will agree that the present form of presenting estimates for all departments is totally inadequate. They are not presented in such form as to afford due consideration of the justification for and wisdom of the expenditure. While I do not intend to enlarge upon this matter at this time. I think it would be helpful to place on record some comments which appeared in the Sunday Times of London, England, of March 14, 1937. This article appeared on the editorial page:
It is most important that the responsibility of ministers should remain unimpaired; and to give the House of Commons the right to propose new expenditure would open the door to endless abuse and destroy the stability of government, which is the chief advantage of our own system as compared with the French. The cabinet must continue to govern-not parliament. But it would be an immense gain to the efficiency of parliamentary criticism if it were allowed some nearer approach to the problems that are now settled by discussion between the ministers and their departments.
It is one of the paradoxes of parliamentary procedure that its control of estimates should be so perfunctory. There is endless reiteration of debate on how the bill should be defrayed, but the amount of the bill, which is more important, is fixed in the estimates and these may, theoretically, indeed, be rejected or reduced, but in practice cannot be without defeating the government and, if the matter is important enough, risking its resignation and compromising dozens of other interests which the house may have near to its heart.
There will never be effectual control over finance until a finance committee of the commons has some insight into the estimates before they are in shape and can present an independent report on the issues of policy involved.

Supply-Public Works
That would make for sounder criticism, a better appreciation of the points that matter, and a control closer to the events. It would also be a valuable training-ground for able men who now eat their heart out for lack of opportunity. Too much importance is attached to the act of speaking on the floor of the house. The sort of work that most needs doing at Westminster is the deliberation of a board meeting; nor need the extension of this work impair the responsibility of ministers.


David Spence: Mr. Chairman, I should
like to have some information about the item of $39,500 for a public building at Sioux Lookout. I am utterly opposed to making large expenditures in these small places. Probably $10,000 would purchase a public building adequate to the needs of Sioux Lookout. The construction of these buildings does not provide much labour. A few mechanics are given jobs for a few weeks, and that is all. We should be going on with the construction of something that provides work for thousands of labourers. The erection of many of these public buildings is an absolute waste and I think even the minister will agree with me in that.
We find a considerable amount being voted for Quebec, which no doubt contributes something to the revenue of this country, but I ask hon. members to look at the expenditures for Ontario. It is all to be spent in Ottawa. We realize that Ontario is the milch cow of the dominion, and Toronto the milch cow of the province. The government should be ashamed of the way that city is being treated. We are not asking for public buildings. At one time we thought we should have a large general post office, but we decided that substations would fill the bill. Some of these public buildings that are put up are nothing but a shame and a crime. The government is spending $14,000 or $15,000 to erect public buildings in towns containing only 500 to 1,500 people. I hope the minister will give some consideration to this practice and see that it is not continued in the future. I admit it has been done before but that is no reason why it should be continued.
Also I would suggest that these buildings should be of concrete instead of using expensive steel as they do now. Such a building would be just as strong and durable, and just as easy to keep clean, and it would cost much less than the present type of construction. I should like a little information about the Sioux Lookout building for $39,500.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: In reply to my hon. friend, the fact that S39.500 is provided in the estimates does not preclude the minister when deciding upon the building from authorizing a less expensive structure than the full amount of the
estimate would provide. I am not compelled to expend the whole amount that is voted, and I frankly say that to a large extent I agree with the remarks of the hon. member for Park-dale (Mr. Spence). There is no justification for putting up very expensive buildings in small localities where the revenue is not very large. Naturally we need public buildings even in the smaller places, but the building should be in proportion to the population and the revenues that are being derived from customs or post office. The postal revenue for Sioux Lookout for 1934-35 was $11,195; that is a pretty good revenue for that locality.


David Spence: Was that the net or gross revenue?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: That is the gross revenue. I repeat, I have much sympathy with the observation that my hon. friend has made, that we should be careful to proportion our expenditures to the importance of the localities and the revenues derived therefrom.


An hon. MEMBER:: We are spending far too much on public buildings.


Harry James Barber: Will the minister explain this vote of a quarter of a million dollars for the improvement of the Plaza?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This is for the widening of the bridge over the railway tracks in front of the present post office building in Ottawa. The development that has been contemplated for the park where the monument is to be placed will necessitate if the plan is not changed, the widening of the bridge. It covers the larger portion of the railway tracks going south and the development of that section into a park, as it is partly developed at present. That is what we contemplate with the proposed expenditure.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Just one other item, "Parliament building, $70,000." What does that cover?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This amount is divided into the following: to provide for continuance of the works of carving-as my hon. friend knows, there is a lot more carving to be done in this building before it is completed-


David Spence: You ought to forget about it.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: And each year a certain amount has been spent for carving in the building. Other items are: painting iron sash and window frames, repairs to roof and flashing, redecorating halls and rooms, repointing stone work, repairs to marble floors, refinishing library floor-


Hugh Alexander Stewart: It is just general repairs?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Just general repairs,.yes.
Supply-Public Works


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I thought it might be something in the east block.


David Spence: Was there not a large item for the same thing in the estimates last year? Are we never to be through carving stones in this building?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: There was a similar item.


David Spence: Just destroying the building, that is what you are doing-wasting money.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The same amount was voted last year.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-Saskatchewan
Eastend-purchase of and alterations to building for postal purposes, $10,500.
Foam Lake-public building, $10,000.
Meadow Lake-public building, $15,000.
Moose Jaw armoury-reconstruction, $75,000.
Regina-new public building, $12,000.
Wadena-public building, $12,000.
Mr. PERLEY (Qu'Appelle):: I think this is one time where Saskatchewan and Manitoba, those two banner provinces, have been discriminated against a little. I am rather surprised at this, considering that on the government side there is almost a solid bloc from those provinces. In my opinion $134,000 is a very small amount to spend on public buildings in Saskatchewan, when Quebec is being granted over a million dollars, Ontario over two million dollars and the city of Ottawa over a million and three quarter dollars.


David Spence: And all that is taken out of Ontario.


Ernest Edward Perley: There are also the other expenditures on public works of the nature of improvements to harbours and rivers and so on. Saskatchewan and Manitoba are not faring very well. However, would the minister give us some information with respect to the purchase of a building for the postal service at Eastend? What is the character of the building they are purchasing there?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is the Royal bank building.


Ernest Edward Perley: What amount is to be spent for improvements and alterations of the building?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: For the building and land the provision is $6,500; for fittings $3,500; for general repairs $300; and contingencies $200. As regards the complaint made by the hon. member, I noticed, for my sight is good, that he was smiling when he made the comparison between the small amounts that are being granted to the western provinces and the large amounts allocated to Ontario and Que-

bee. Of course, if he runs through the list of all expenditures made by the government he may find that a balance is pretty well established as between the provinces.


Ernest Edward Perley: It is not often that out in Saskatchewan we have the chance to smile over anything. I assume that the buildings at Foam Lake, Meadow Lake and Wadena are for post offices, are they not?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Ernest Edward Perley: I assume also that the item for Moose Jaw is for the repairing of the building that was burnt.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Ernest Edward Perley: Rebuilding
and repairing. Was there any provisional estimate made of the amount that would be required, or was the estimate $75,000? What is the contract price?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The amount we are providing is supposed to be what is required to make the repairs to the building.


Ernest Edward Perley: Has any contract been let?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: May I inform the hon. member that the contract price was $105,973, and the expenditure since construction began is $37,674.


Major James William Coldwell: I should like to support the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley) in his criticism. I have noticed that in the last several years the western provinces have not received very much for rural improvements. Of course, they have received considerable assistance for rural relief. I well remember that when the minister introduced his main estimates in January he made the statement-I think I remember his words- that there was something very dear to his heart, and that was that he thought that along with the back-to-the-land movement we should endeavour to do something for rural communities. Now in western Canada there are a number of good towns. I might say- and other members represent localities with the same sort of towns-that in my own constituency we have two larger towns, Rose-town and Biggar. Rosetown particularly is situate in one of the best agricultural areas of the province and Biggar is an important railroad point. In years gone by these places have been overlooked.
I am glad to see that some buildings are going into three or four places in the rural areas of Saskatchewan, but I do think the minister is right when he says that the people who beautify such towns are entitled to some

Supply-Public Works
consideration in the way of public buildings. I raised the question generally on the main estimates. I was hoping that when the supple-mentaries came down, even if I did not see anything for the places I had mentioned specifically, at least there would be a larger provision for public buildings that are necessary in some of the well established areas in the western provinces. I am somewhat disappointed. I support what the hon. member for Qu'Appelle has said in that regard.
On a former occasion I pointed out that owing to the way in which we were paying for some of these buildings-armouries, for example-it might prejudice the situation, and the minister's remark that on the whole the western provinces were receiving some consideration would seem to imply that after all there is something in the feeling I had then, namely, that the payment for a building like the Regina armouries, spread over twenty years and requiring an appropriation of $30,000 a year, does prejudice smaller places. I should like to see such public buildings as the Regina armouries removed from public works and placed under militia, so that the amount may not prejudice other desirable estimates for western rural undertakings. We may not be getting much this year, but I hope that another year the minister will remember the communities that are near his heart-and there are a number of them in western Canada.


David Spence: When the member for
Qu'Appelle was speaking about the small sum spent in Saskatchewan I made no complaint about the expenditure in Ontario. As a matter of fact, only $434,000 is going to Ontario, so that all the money is not being spent in that province.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-Alberta
Calgary barracks-guard room, meter building and airplane hangar, $140,000.
Cardston-public building, $42,000.
Fort McMurray public building-addition, $2,500.	_ _
Innisfree-purchase of building for postal purposes, $3,000.
St. Paul-public building, $12,000.
Mr. FAIR:: Will the minister give us the
break-down of the $140,000 for Calgary city?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: To complete the contract
for the hangar, $123,698; roadways and grading $3,000; supervision, $3,000; contingencies, $10,202;


Robert Fair: Has the building at Innisfree
been purchased?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The $3,000 is for the purchase of a building for postal purposes in the 31111-151
town of Innisfree, Alberta. The building is of brick construction, built about ten years ago, and has a frontage of 30 feet on First street and 26 feet on First street west. It is equipped with hot air furnace, fireproof roof and concrete vault.


Robert Fair: From whom has it been purchased?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I do not know at the
moment but I will get that information.


Robert Fair: There is an old saying that
an Irishman is allowed to speak twice, and believing that saying I think the hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Spence) ought to speak again, in justice to eastern and western Canada. I suggest that instead of comparing the central provinces, including the city of Toronto, to a milch cow, he should reverse the simile and make the eastern and western provinces the cow and the central provinces the calf; because, looking at these estimates, I think that is about the size of it. The sort of milk cow the hon. gentleman has in mind is represented by the maritimes and the west, and where the milkers are not farmers they are getting all the cream.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Public Buildings-British Columbia
Creston-public building, $25,500.
Esquimalt-HM.C. dockyard office building, $37,000.
New Westminster public building-addition,
[Stage Direction]
Vancouver examining warehouse-alterations, improvements and repairs, $17,000.
Vancouver-public building, $125,000.
Vancouver, winch building-alterations, improvements and repairs. $9,500.
Victoria public building-restoration, $46,000.
Mr. GREEN:: Which is the building
referred to as the Vancouver public building?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: That is the new building
under construction designed as a federal building.


Howard Charles Green: It is to be known as
the federal building.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Mr. TOLMIE:: What is the condition of
the dockyard office building at Esquimalt?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The amount provided contemplates the erection of a new office building to replace the existing structure, which is antiquated and beyond repair. This is a request from the Department of National Defence.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: Is the item "Victoria Public Building-restoration" to replace the post office that was destroyed?

Supply-Public Works


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: Has work been, started on
it yet?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No.


Simon Fraser Tolmie: When will it begin?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: We are now preparing
plans.


Mr. NEILL:: Last year and the year before a requisition was put in for a small public building at Tofino. I did not press the matter then because I knew the finances of the country would not stand it, but now my attention is called to the vote before us and I find that there are five buildings in British Columbia that are to be placed in districts represented by members of the opposition. That is all to the credit of the government, but I notice that some of the members concerned have asked where these buildings are and what purpose they are to serve, so that it does not look as if the need is outstanding. I notice also that the totals for these five buildings is $216,500. or 35 per cent of the vote. The total vote for British Columbia is $678,000, practically three-quarters of a million. Does not the minister think that out of that large vote, and in the circumstances I have indicated, there may be some hope of getting the building I have asked for at Tofino, when the final supplementary estimates are brought down"


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I must admit that my hon. friend has been pressing for a public building at that point, buit so* far I have not been able to convince myself that we should go on with it. Possibly I have not all the information but I am prepared to look into the matter and give it my best consideration.


Harry James Barber: There is an item here "New Westminster public building-addition." New Westminster is a very important port in our province, and I was in hopes that instead of an addition we would have a new building. Is it the intention to repair the old building to the extent of $100,000, or to construct a new one?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It is to build an addition to the building they already have. It is proposed to erect a one-storey addition, 130 by 65 feet on Clarkson street, and 50 by 22 feet on Columbia street.


Harry James Barber: Is that for postal purposes?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Harbours and Rivers-Nova Scotia
Annapolis Royal-dredging, $7,800.
Apple Tree Cove (Cherry Hill)-wharf and skidway, $4,200.
[Mr. Tolmie.)
Ariehat

wharf repairs, $12,000.
Arisaig

breakwater extension, $8,300.
Bay St. Lawrence-extension to breakwater and retaining wall, $8,500.
Brooklyn-breakwater repairs and improvements, $75,000.
Burkey's Cove-breakwater extension, $3,300.
Cape St. Mary's-breakwater reconstruction, $13,500.
Carr's Brook-wharf extension, $5,900.
Cow Bay (Port Morien)-breakwater extension, $6,000.
Digby-harbour improvements, $25,000.
Fourchu-dredging, $25,000.
Friar's Head-breakwater extension, $4,000.
Glace Bay-dredging, $12,000.
Hillside (Green's Point)-wharf, $4,200.
Little Cove-breakwater and skidway, $4,800.
Little Judique Ponds-extension to protection work, $13,200.
Loekeport-breakwaters, $51,900.
Louis Head-breakwater, $4,200.
Lower Woods Harbour-wharf extension, $3,500.
Lunenburg-dredging, $14,800.
Main a Dieu-dredging, $15,000.
Merigomish-wharf repairs, $2,500.
Middle Point Cove-breakwater, $3,200.
Neil's Harbour-breakwater repairs, extension and dredging, $27,000.
Noel

wharf extension, $7,000.
Paul's Point-protection work, $3,400.
Pictou Landing-breakwater, $4,900.
Pictou Landing-wharf improvements, $31,500.
Port Hood-closing northern entrance, $40,000.
St. Mary's River-dredging, $50,000.
Seal Island-breakwater, $11,000.
Skinner's Cove-partial reconstruction of pier, $11,000.
South Ingonish-dredging, $17,000.
South Side (Donald's Head)-breakwater replacement, $22,500.
Sydney-wharf extension and warehouse, $74,000.
Terrance Bay-wharf extension, $12,000.
Turpentine Island-to purchase and extend wharf, $3,600.
Upper Port Latour-wharf repairs, $5,000.
Wedgepoint-wharf, $3,500.
Westport (South)-breakwater, $17,000.
Willow Cove-breakwater extension and repairs, $5,000.
Yarmouth harbour-dredging, $60,000.
Mr. BAKER:: Does the minister think that we really get fair value, or any fair percentage of value, for this expenditure of $733,000?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I guess we get fair value from that, not in the form of cash revenue to the customs or post office, but by helping to develop the facilities in all these places in the maritime provinces, and in Nova Scotia particularly, we help the trade of our country. To-day we are practically all in favour of the new plan for the improvement of houses by individuals; we induce home owners to make repairs and betterments, by guaranteeing a certain part of what they borrow from the bank-


Richard Langton Baker: That has nothing to do with this.

Supply-Public Works
Mr. CARDIN': -with a view to providing employment, and by developing harbours and rivers and all facilities for trade, the country is doing practically the same thing. It provides employment for the people residing in these localities, and gives them opportunity to develop.


Richard Langton Baker: Does the minister really think, in connection with the item of $60,000 for dredging Yarmouth harbour, that we get $60,000 worth of work there?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The tourist service there is very great.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is not what was asked.


John James Kinley: More people come into Yarmouth than any other port in Canada!


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Mr. WALSH:: I notice that in the special supplementary estimates last year this amount read $275,300. This year it is $733,200. In the regular estimates the amounts are almost the same, so we can disregard them. Can the minister give any reason for such a radical increase in the amount to be expended in that province this year?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I think the figures given by my hon. friend are not correct. The amount we are providing this year is about the same as that provided last year for Nova Scotia. It is even a little less than last year.


William Allen Walsh: I have in my hand the special supplementary estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1937, and I find in it, harbours and rivers, Nova Scotia, $275,300. This year the amount is $733,200.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I have not before me last year's estimates but I remember very well when the estimates were presented to me I observed that the amount was practically the same as that provided last year. It may be we had less last year in the supplementary estimates, but the amount in the main estimates was larger. Taking the two together I think the amount we propose to spend this year in Nova Scotia is about the same, or a little less than the amount spent last year.


William Allen Walsh: I have the main estimates here also, and the amount in the main estimates looked to me to be very much the same. I may be confusing the items. The point I want to make is this: is there any connection between this tremendous increase this year and the prospective provincial election in Nova Scotia?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Frederick George Sanderson: Is the item carried?


William Allen Walsh: No, Mr. Chairman. I ask this question seriously. I do not object to this expenditure in Nova Scotia, particularly when my own constituency gets nothing, although as the minister himself knows it deserves consideration; but due to the peculiar report of a subordinate officer in the Post Office Department at Montreal we get nothing. I do not object to Nova Scotia getting this increased grant if it is warranted, but the question is: Is it warranted under the circumstances, when the government could not afford to spend in my constituency an amount of thirty or forty thousand dollars, yet could so radically increase the amount to be spent in Nova Scotia? To me it looks a little suspicious.


An hon. MEMBER:: That shows a suspicious nature.


William Allen Walsh: Being of a suspicious frame of mind I draw it to the attention of the minister to see whether there is any foundation for the suspicion.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I think my hon. friend is not fair to himself when he says he is of a suspicious mind; I know him better than that. I say sincerely that there is no connection at all between these estimates and the possibility of a provincial election in Nova Scotia, and the proof of it is what I said a moment ago, that the amount is not larger this year than last year. That is a complete answer to the argument of my hon. friend.


David Spence: We have been spending money on breakwaters in and around Nova Scotia for the last fifteen or twenty years, and every year there seem to be the same items. Do these breakwaters all fall down each year? We must have built enough breakwaters there to cover the whole shore line. I have said before and I still think that we are building breakwaters at summer resorts and private homes. For instance, you have an item of $25,000 for harbour improvements at Digby, and there is no harbour there. One boat runs from Saint John every other day; that is probably all. There is $75,000 for a breakwater at Brooklyn; what kind of a place is Brooklyn?


John James Kinley: The only public works in my county since I have represented it are those in operation at the time of the last federal election; ever since they have been finishing them up. As to Brooklyn, it is near Liverpool in Queens county, where the only paper mill in Nova Scotia is situated. I never heard that they were friends of mine, but they get the biggest item in the whole
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county, $75,000, to repair the breakwater, which was carried away by a storm. It had to be repaired because there is a fleet of steamers running from there carrying paper to New York, and it was absolutely necessary. I am in favour of it; I think it is eminently in the public interest.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Prince Edward Island
Basin Head-boat harbour, $31,000.
Southport-wharf repairs, $4,000.
Victoria-wharf repairs, $2,300.
Wood Islands-harbour, $200,000.
Hugh Alexander Stewart: Could we have some particulars with regard to this item of $200,000 for a harbour at Wood Islands?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This amount of $200,000 is to be devoted to the cost of creating a boat harbour at Wood Islands, Prince Edward Island, to permit the operation of a ferry service between this place and a point in Nova Scotia. This harbour would also serve as a place of refuge for some seventy fishing boats. I am informed that a resolution has been passed by the provincial legislature requesting this expenditure.	[DOT]


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Could the minister say where it is located?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: My information is that the present ferry service at Borden, at the west end of the island, provides the only entrance to and exit from the island, and that in the eastern portion they have to contend with inadequate transportation facilities for the marketing of their products in Nova Scotia. The distance is practically doubled, with a corresponding increase in railroad rates. The value of the traffic to be served by the proposed development is estimated at $200,000 annually, consisting of exports of live stock and farm produce, totalling $110,000 and imports of coal and general merchandise, $90,000. Wood Islands is situated at the southernmost point of Queens county on the Northumberland straits coast of Prince Edward Island. The establishment of this ferry service will enable the government to dispense with the subsidies now given in connection with the steamship service on the Charlottetown-Pictou route, amounting to $30,000, and also the service between Sydney and Bras d'Or lake ports on the west coast of Cape Breton, amounting to $22,500.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Who will supply the ferry for the new harbour?
Mr. CARDIN Probably it will be a private enterprise. We are preparing the harbour.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does the minister mean to say there is a possibility of that being done and the subsidies being dispensed with, down in the maritime provinces?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: That has been represented to me.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There is a $30,000 subsidy now in connection with the service between Charlottetown and Pictou, and a subsidy of $22,500 for the service from Cape Breton to Prince Edward Island. Now we are to build a $200,000 harbour where there was no harbour before, and establish a ferry service, and the minister says there will be no subsidy. Will they ask the railway to build the ferry? This seems to be the beginning of an expenditure that may run to half a million dollars. All who have been there know that Prince Edward Island has a great many harbours and a population of about eighty thousand. Now we are going to start a new harbour that will involve annual expenditures but will do away with the necessity of spending money cm the Pictou route and the Cape Breton island route. I suppose they will call this new harbour Cardin, and on the Nova Scotia side I suppose the port will be called Hope's Desire. I should like to know how this ferry is going to be maintained.


Mr. SINCLAIR:: I should like to say a word in regard to this Wood Islands ferry. The right hon. leader of the opposition has spoken about it, but when he made his tour in the last election he forgot Prince Edward Island entirely.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, we put the present ferry there and put through a road to Charlottetown.


John Ewen Sinclair: We are establishing a national park on the island this year, something that was not thought of by the previous government, and we felt that the ferry at Wood Islands would take care of the congestion of freight at Borden. There is one thing I should like to bring out in this connection. At the time of confederation we were promised continuous communication with the mainland, but to-day a person wishing to leave the island with a truck-load of produce is unable to do so. This Wood Islands ferry would give us communication with the mainland, particularly with the mining districts of Nova Scotia, where we could ship our produce.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Who is to maintain the ferry?


John Ewen Sinclair: Well, it is going to be a private enterprise. We are going to subsidize it, and private enterprise will run the ferry.

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Richard Langton Baker: May I ask what is the population of Wood Islands?


John Ewen Sinclair: Wood Islands is only a rural community.


Richard Langton Baker: What is its population that it is to be accommodated at this tremendous expenditure?


John Ewen Sinclair: It is the entire eastern end of the province.


Richard Langton Baker: But the population of the whole island is only eighty thousand.


John Ewen Sinclair: Yes, but they are real people, you know. Section 10 of the imperial order in council under the British North America Act stated that we should have an efficient steam service for the conveyance of mails and passengers between the island and the mainland winter and summer, thus placing the island in continuous communication with the railway system of the dominion. That has been carried out to a certain extent, but I wish to direct the attention of the committee to section 12, which says:
And such other changes as may be incident to, and connected with, the services by which the British North America Act, 1867, appertain to the general government, and as are or may be allowed to the other provinces.
We have not the privileges that have been given to the other provinces, where you can go from one border to the other without difficulty. If we want to take a truckload of produce from Prince Edward Island, we have to load the truck on a flat car, and it costs $12 or $14 to take it across. This new ferry will give us direct communication with our trucks. The car ferry has not the capacity to take them. That is what we are looking for to-day, and that is why we want this ferry between Wood Islands and the mainland.


Richard Bedford Bennett: How many miles across would it be?


John Ewen Sinclair: Fourteen miles.


John Ritchie MacNicol: This vote has to do with Wood Islands harbour, and that is what we want some information about.


John Ewen Sinclair: Wood Islands is the eastern end of the province.


John Ritchie MacNicol: The whole eastern end of it?


John Ewen Sinclair: It takes in the whole eastern half of it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is out in the ocean somewhere?


John Ewen Sinclair: No, it is not; it is the eastern end of the province. People in the
maritimes go down to Sackville, turn off and go down to Tormentine and to the Cape Breton national park. Then they take a run through the Annapolis valley, and that is the only way we can establish any tourist traffic in Prince Edward Island. We have been voting millions of dollars for the west and other places; now we are looking for something for Prince Edward Island, and this is what we want. If this is established in Prince Edward Island we will have something which will bring tourist traffic. That is what we want to see.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Would the hon. member be good enough to tell us from what part on the mainland the ferry will run?


John Ewen Sinclair: From Wood Islands to Pictou Island.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is fourteen miles.


John Ewen Sinclair: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The hon. member says the ferry is to be operated by private enterprise. What is the cost of it?


John Ewen Sinclair: I do not know the cost of it; it is a private enterprise. But we are going to build it here, and-


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have frequently been in Pictou harbour, but the point is that the ferry must cost a large sum of money, because on the ferry we have now, running from Borden, we spent something in the vicinity of a million dollars or more. Then we had to provide that the old ferry be repaired so that there would be continuous operation of the new one. This ferry, which will carry trucks and passenger cars cannot be built for less than a million dollars, if it is to run in the winter. I do not know whether or not it is to run in the winter.


John Ewen Sinclair: No, just in the summer months.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then it will be an inexpensive ferry costing perhaps $100,000 or $150,000. The hon. member said the landing place was Pictou Island. I would point out that Pictou Island is not on the mainland, so there would have to be a ferry from the east coast of Prince Edward Island to Pictou Island. Now, how are you going to get from Pictou Island to the mainland?


John Ewen Sinclair: I may have made a mistake there; it is Pictou landing.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Oh yes, that is different; it is on the mainland. The hon. member said something about a subsidy to maintain the ferry; what does he mean by that?
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John Ewen Sinclair: I would like to inform the leader of the opposition that the idea is that, instead of a boat running from Pietou to Charlottetown, as at present, it will run from Pietou to Wood Islands and so far as I know, the subsidy will be given to this boat.


Richard Bedford Bennett: 
John Ewen Sinclair: I am glad the leader of
the opposition has got up and told us about the sympathy he has for Prince Edward Island. But I want to tell him that there is one thing we are glad of, and that is the tourist traffic.	While the leader of the
opposition may not think Prince Edward Island is on the map at all, we are looking for tourist traffic down there this year in connection with the national park. We have a ferry running from Borden to Tormentine which cannot carry all the traffic. Last year on occasions there were from twenty-eight to thirty cars left on the island, which could not go across to the mainland because of the congested traffic. This other service will be the means of getting away from that difficulty. As I said before, they are going around to the Cape Breton national park.
Some people down on the island were asking for a new car ferry at Borden, but this will do away with the necessity for that ferry. However, I am glad that the leader of the opposition has put himself on record to-night against having any interest in Prince Edward Island.

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Richard Bedford Bennett: Now, Mr. Chairman, that is the sort of cheap politics which meets any criticism made on a fair basis with respect to a public expenditure. The hon. member for Wellington South (Mr. Gladstone) directed attention to a matter which has had the consideration of this house on more than one occasion, namely, the question of pork barrel estimates. The hon. member for Queens (Mr. Sinclair) says I do not know where Prince Edward Island is. Well, the late administration provided a highway from Borden to Charlottetown. It also made provision for a road to reach the sea. It made large expenditures on highways on the island, because the soil is very rich and they have no stone or gravel with which to build roads. They received extensive assistance for that purpose.
My colleague directs my attention to the fact that there is an expenditure of about S36.000 to be made at Pictou landing. There is your next start. Just look at the sequence of events. This matter, if properly considered by the committee, would at least involve some thought as to what the ultimate end will be. There is (1) $200,000 for Wood Islands; that is the start, an expenditure for the piers; then there is (2) a ferry, which is to be subsidized to the extent of at least $30,000 per year; (3) repairs totalling about $36,000 to the wharf at Pictou landing-and I do not know what number 4 will be. Because I direct attention to it I am said to be the enemy of Prince Edward Island.
That province has a population of 80,000 people, and it was represented in this parliament by eight members. That action was taken in days gone by; their representation in the House of Commons could not be less than that in the Senate. When they came into confederation they were given four representatives in the Senate, two being taken away from New Brunswick and two from Nova Scotia. Under these circumstances it ill becomes the hon. member to say that when one draws attention to certain facts he is an enemy of the province.
That is exactly the trouble with our democracy in Canada at the present time. That is what is cursing this country. Let me tell the committee what they did in Australia when they discovered that a similar condition existed. Any estimates over a certain amount cannot be expended until a committee investigates the necessity for the expenditure. The committee hears the evidence of engineers and other people affected, and then makes a report.


Alan Webster Neill: A committee of the house?


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, of all the parties. The secretary of that committee happens to
be a gentleman who has been attached to the prime minister's office since the days of the first prime minister, Mr. Barton. I had the privilege of having him with me for a period of six weeks, and I learned a great deal of the conditions under which they operate government. I was struck with this fact. Due to the depression, all capital expenditures were suspended and the committee did not meet, but while I was there they were discussing whether or not it should not be set up again.
I have asked the minister, but what has he told me as to whether or not he is warranted in pledging the credit of this country for thousands of dollars in connection with expenditures on Wood Islands harbour? The minister says that the subsidy is to be abandoned, but the member says they are relying upon getting this money. I am not unmindful of what will be said everywhere, that Bennett is the enemy of Prince Edward Island.


An hon. MEMBER:: Hear, hear.


Richard Bedford Bennett: An hon. member says " hear, hear," which shows the national outlook he has upon a question of fact. Can we afford it? We have been denied the right to spend money in many places where it is needed badly; we have been told we cannot afford it; yet we are starting here with a quarter of a million dollars and not knowing where it is going to end. A total of $200,000 is asked for this harbour, and $36,000 is being asked for Pictou Landing. As the minister says, this is the first appropriation. The hon. member tells us that this is for the piers. I say quite frankly that we have no intelligent appreciation of the necessity for these expenditures.
I wonder if the hon. member took the trouble to look at the figures to see what it is liable to cost us to manage this ferry? We lost over $300,000 in operating the other ferry. The prices for handling traffic were reduced during the time of the previous government, so that it would be less costly to carry automobiles across and there were heavy expenditures to construct a road up to Charlottetown. The people of Prince Edward Island insisted that we separate the ferry from the railway in order that they might have a clear understanding of the situation. So they were separated, and any losses are now borne by the people of Canada as a whole.


John Ewen Sinclair: Should that not be?


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am only pointing out the facts. I am not complaining, as we yielded to the requests which the province made. The hon. member has stated that he has been successful in inducing the government to make these present and future expenditures,
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but because I dare to suggest that the matter might be considered, he says that I am the enemy of the people of Prince Edward Island.


Mr. BOULANGER:: He did not say that.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is what he said. There is the record of what has been done during the last seven years, not by one government but by successive governments. If the minister had had a clear appreciation of what is involved in this, I am sure he would not have done it. I have crossed to Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, on the Hochelaga on more than one occasion. I know the situation. That vessel carries very little traffic, and a fourteen mile ferry is a long ferry.


John Ewen Sinclair: It is in a different section of the province.


Richard Bedford Bennett: It is at the eastern end. In my judgment a fourteen mile ferry will require a better boat and better facilities if it is going to carry loaded trucks in any number.
I mention these things not in any sense of hostility, but because I believe they should be mentioned in fairness to everyone who desires to understand the situation This is something that touches the very life of the country. This is one of the difficulties with which we are faced at the present moment. I am not saying for one moment that one government is any different from another; I only say that this is one of the troubles of our institution) at the presemt time.
The hon. member talks about the extent to which Prince Edward Island is used as a tourist resort. The present ferry involved the building of complete terminals at Borden and the construction of a hard-surfaced road to Charlottetown. We have a large investment in the hotel at Charlottetown, upon which we lost a lot of money last year. That is what was done in order that the people might be able to get their traffic to the sea. These people were producers of new wealth agriculturally, but the total population at the present time on the farms of Prince Edward Island is less than 65,000.


Mr. DUPUIS:: They deserve to be considered.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Surely the hon. member does not mean that seriously. They are not only being considered; they are being provided with every facility. What I am saying is that when we ask questions in order to ascertain why the country should be involved in future expenditures, we are charged with a lack of consideration for the people of this province. We know of many people in this country who have to do without the things they would like to have. Prince Edward Is-

land is fairly well to do. In my judgment it is one of the best areas in this country in point of material wealth and in having those things that go to make people happy. It is true it is an island-and I suppose the previous government is responsible for that? It is true that the distance across the Northumberland straits is fairly long

and I suppose the late government is to blame for that?
I have stated the practice in Australia and what would be done there in a case similar to this. I know that in many cases, although provision had been made in the estimates for certain works, they declined to proceed with them after the committee had visited the spot and heard the evidence of engineers and others, on the ground that the expenditure could not be justified under the conditions existing or as being necessary for the peace, happiness and prosperity of the people. There are many things the people in the west would like to have; there are many things the people in the east would like to have; but we cannot have everything.
I suggest that the minister has given no adequate explanation why we should embark on this enterprise at this time, especially in view of the fresh knowledge we have obtained. There is a variance between himself and the hon. member representing that district as to how this thing is to be carried on. The Hochelaga is to lose its subsidy, and that news will be received with glee. That subsidy is to be transferred to this new private enterprise, the details of which we do not know as yet. However, I have no doubt in due season we will know if we faint not.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Mr. Chairman, I hope the right hon. leader of the opposition does not think I attributed any motives to him because of the observations he made. It is not very often a Minister of Public Works is placed in the position in which I find myself in connection with this item. It is not very often, when proposing an expenditure in the house, that one can support the item with a resolution of the government of the province where the expenditure is to be made.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does the minister know of any time that he could not?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: In the present case we have representations by the legislature of Prince Edward Island. I have under my hand a long resolution which very strongly requests the federal government to undertake that expenditure, and establishes, at least from their point of view, that it would be very beneficial.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Are they contributing?

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Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No. But there are many undertakings all over Canada to which provincial governments do not contribute, although the importance of the expenditure is very strongly pressed upon us.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Oh yes.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: In this case, as I have pointed out, the legislature has passed a strong resolution requesting that the expenditure be made.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Has the Department of Public Works undertaken an investigation of the subject-matter of this proposed expenditure?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, we have a report from the engineers as to the cost.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Not the cost-the necessity.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: As to the necessity, we have been largely governed by the representations made to the government by the legis-'ature of Prince Edward Island.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Any province would urge that.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: We have investigated the cost of the proposal, and according to information supplied to me by the departmental engineers, it will cost $240,000 to establish the harbour at Wood Islands. I think we should give some consideration to representations based on the fact that this ferry will help very materially tourist traffic; it is going to be more convenient to reach the park, and a larger number of tourists is expected on account of the better facilities that will be provided by the new ferry. Besides, I do not think anybody can successfully deny that at the present time the farmers of the island are poorly provided with facilities to sell their produce on the mainland. The present ferry is far from being adequate; it costs them more than it should cost, and there is a long delay, so that most of them cannot advantageously visit the mainland to dispose of their products. But with this new ferry, according to representations received by the department, there will be much better facilities for the farmers of Prince Edward Island to dispose by means of their own trucks, of their produce on the mainland. In my opinion we are justified in asking parliament to vote this expenditure to meet the request made by the provincial legislature, based on these two particular considerations, namely, helping to develop a greater tourist traffic on the island, and giving greater facilities to its farmers to dispose of their products over in Nova Scotia.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Would the minister tell us the tonnage of the boat that will serve as the ferry?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: That has not been considered yet. All we have been asked for is to provide a place where the boat can dock. In this estimate we are not providing for the boat itself.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Do that later!


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: We are only providing a landing place for the boat. I can assure the house that the expenditure will not be undertaken unless the province or a private company undertakes seriously to establish a ferry which will be satisfactory and will meet the requirements. It is not our intention to spend this amount of money on building a wffiarf or landing place for a ferry without communicating with the provincial government and ascertaining that a ferry is going to be established, and that there will be a guarantee that the service will be continued for a number of years at least.


Grote Stirling: Supposing the legislature sends to the minister a resolution?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I am not bound to accept the resolution.


David Spence: I had the pleasure of being in Charlottetown last fall at a dominion good roads convention, and I met a number of the important people of the island at the hotel.
An bon. MEMBER: Were they all there?


David Spence: Pretty nearly all were there; there are not so many on the island. I do not know why people make so much of a place like Prince Eld ward Island, although it is lovely and the people very hospitable-never in my life did I meet better. But let it be understood, contrary to what my hon. friend has said, that the people did not expect to receive this service; they only hoped they ndght get it. I know this because I discussed it with many of them. Naturally, like the inhabitants of every other small place, they are out for everything they can get. It has been said that my honoured leader was unpopular in the island, but nothing has been said about their appreciation of what he has done. I met the most important people who were there-


An hon. MEMBER:: Naturally.


David Spence: -and we had a good time too; everybody was delighted with the fine road that was constructed while my leader was in power from Borden to Charlottetown, and from there to the sea. I can hardly believe the statement as to the number of
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wagons that could not get on that ferry, because I got a lot of information about good roads, and road building, and traffic, and I understood there were very few wagons or trucks that could not get on that ferry to return to Tormentine from Borden.
As to improving tourist traffic on the island, I hope they are able to do so, because it is a lovely spot and the people are fine people; and many of them were very disappointed at the ingratitude the island showed to the Conservative party at the last election.
The ferry from Tormentine to Borden covers a long distance and it is difficult and most expensive to keep it operating in the wintertime. I think Prince Edward Island has been treated very well by the dominion, and I doubt very much if this proposed expenditure is wise; in fact, my own view is that once you have built a landing place for this ferry, they will come back next year and ask for the ferry itself. So I advise the minister to be careful and not start it. [DOT]


Abraham Albert Heaps: Before this item carries I
should like to say a word or two, because a year or two ago when I discussed in committee the extent of the deficit on the ferry, I was dubbed reactionary by certain hon. members from Prince Edward Island; yet all I had done was to seek a little information. Anybody who asks any question about expenditures in Prince Edward Island is looked upon as an enemy of the island, although I am just as much interested in helping the people of that province as I am in the wellbeing of any part of Canada. At the same time there is no minister, present or past, of public works who can say that at any time I ever requested one cent of public expenditure for any sort of public works in this country. I do not believe in that kind of politics, nor do I go around looking for a little patronage for my own constituency. When public works are to be carried out, I want them to be only such as are necessary and to the public advantage, not primarily for political purposes.
Personally I do not believe that the minister could honestly inform this committee that the purpose contemplated under this item is worth the amount which it is proposed to vote. The minister has no information which he can give to this committee other than the fact that the provincial government have asked for this public work. Is the government going to adopt the policy of acquiescing in any expenditure for which a provincial government asks? I do not think they would; I do not think they could. If a request is received from a provincial government for the construction of certain public works, the
[Mr. Spencs.J
first thing that ought to be done by the Department of Public Works is to undertake a complete and exhaustive inquiry into the subject matter of the application, and then judge it on its merits. That has not been done in this particular case and I think it ought to be one of the first things the Department of Public Works should see to.
Evidently this is what has happened. The provincial legislature has requested certain public works to be constructed there, and no doubt the members from Prince Edward Island have been to see the minister and have impressed upon him the necessity of going ahead. I believe the Minister of Finance represents that particular district, and I have no doubt he has a good deal of weight with the Minister of Public Works. In justice to the Department of Public Works, to the finances of the country and to the people of Canada, the minister ought to give us more definite reasons why these works should be proceeded with. He has not convinced me at any rate of the necessity of spending this money, more than a quarter of a million, in that part of the island on something that is going to be of doubtful benefit, something at any rate that will not be commensurate with the expenditure.
Will the minister tell us whether a survey has been made, and how many people are likely to use the ferry? How many tourists were in this part of the island in the last two years, and how many are likely to avail themselves of the ferry when it is in operation? These are questions with regard to which the minister has not given us any information, and I feel that until he is in a position to explain fully the reasons for this expenditure he ought to leave the matter in abeyance.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The engineer has reported
that a population of 25,000 will be affected by the proposed ferry service.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Affected by it?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: It has been carefully estimated that the section of Prince Edward Island directly affected by the proposed ferry service has a population of 25,000, and there is an additional 20,000 very closely concerned. The whole province will benefit indirectly; that is what the district engineer says in his report. The probable value of the commercial traffic is estimated at $256,000 made up as follows: inward-coal, 10,000 tons, $65,000; general merchandise, $25,000; outward-live stock, $14,000; farm produce, roots, $10,000; dairy and poultry products, $20,000; hay and oats, $28,000; mixed fertilizer, $20,000; mis-

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cellaneous, $18,000; local fishing stations, 70 boats, at S800 per boat. The total estimated annual business is S256,000.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I did not catch what the minister said about the boats.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The estimate is $800 per boat on 70 boats.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is there any indication of the amount of new traffic to be developed?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: No. It would be difficult to estimate that because one cannot say exactly what use will be made of the new ferry.


Abraham Albert Heaps: How much will the government have to spend each year in connection with the ferry?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I do not see any other expenditure as far as the department is concerned. Nothing is anticipated in addition to what we are proposing now for the establishment of the landing place.


David Spence: You will have to buy the ferry next.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: We are not providing for the ferry.


David Spence: I know that, but they will ask you next year to do it.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Maybe, but we are not bound to accede to the request.


Mr. MacLEAN (Prince):: I am very much interested in the discussion of this estimate for Prince Edward Island and I am gratified to know that members from different parts of the dominion are pretty well acquainted with the situation down there. I was pleased to hear the remarks of my good friend from Parkdale (Mr. Spence), who visited us last year, and whom we were glad to see.
I do not intend to discuss the merits or demerits of this particular item because it is not in the county I represent. It is at the other end of the province, and no doubt the people in that part of Prince Edward Island know their own requirements better than anyone else.
As regards our good friend the leader of the opposition, I should not like the impression to go abroad that anyone down there thought that he was an enemy of the province in any respect. We greatly appreciate what all governments have done for Prinoe Edward Island. It is a small province, and if it is an island that is separated from the mainland, that is not the fault of the people of the province. Nature placed the island in the straits, and we were at one time in the happy position of having a continuous and profitable trade with
the United States. At the time of confederation Prince Edward Island was induced to join the other provinces in the formation of the Dominion of Canada, and the province came in on one distinct understanding, which was that we were to have continuous steam communication with the mainland. I want hon. members to know that after a fight extending over fifty years that goal was finally attained when the car ferry steamer service was established between Tormentine and Borden. All governments have contributed to that service, and we have had the second boat built. The leader of the opposition and the hon. member for Parkdale said a few minutes ago that it was doubtful whether any additional boat would be needed to carry the traffic. The captain of the steamer was in this building the other day, and he informed me that on fifteen different days last year they had to leave some twenty cars either on the mainland or on the island while they made the trip.


David Spence: You mean automobiles?


Alfred Edgar MacLean: Yes, automobiles, and they had to wait from two and a half to three hours while the car ferry made the round trip.


David Spence: That would not hurt them in a slow place like that.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: Well we are beginning to speed up since you were down there last fall, we have been trying to follow the pace you set while there. So in view of that congestion last year, there is no doubt that with the increased tourist traffic that we expect to attract, the congestion is going to increase. Different suggestions have been made as to the best solution. Some think the best thing would be an additional boat for the summer months, equipped to carry automobiles to run in conjunction with the present boat. But the time has come when something has to be done or else we shall have to try to prevent people going to the province. If the transport service is not sufficient to carry the tourists, I do not think it is fair to invite them to go there and be held up.
I never could see the advantage of the transfer of the car ferry accounting from the Canadian National estimates and placing it in an item by itself, possibly it is a disadvantage.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think so; it always has been.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: I do not think it is an advantage. We see the effect of it here to-night in this house, because anyone can pick up that item and say: Here is a loss
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of $300,000 on the car ferry. That is really not a fair comparison, for it must be remembered that the distance is only nine miles, and the car ferry is only credited with that nine miles haul, whereas -the bulk of the traffic originating in Prince Edward Island is long haul traffic, through to Toronto and all over the dominion and to the United States.


Richard Bedford Bennett: And they get the 20 per cent freight rate reduction besides.


Alfred Edgar MacLean: Certainly the
province of Prince Edward Island is not getting a fair deal, and we are shown up as costing this country a great deal of money, which is unfair. Therefore I think it was a mistake to have this accounting separated from the main operating costs of the Canadian National Railway.
As I said, whether this is the best solution for the problem which is developing there, it is not for me to say; but the time has arrived when something has to be done, and I believe better accommodation should be given in connection with the car ferry we have there. The'accommodation on the piers is not sufficient, and there should be improvements to give a better service. We entered confederation on the direct understanding that we were to be given continuous steam communication, and we should not have any complaints from other parts of the dominion about that provision. We know of the millions spent to build a railway to Churchill on Hudson bay, and to establish a port there, where probably very little traffic will ever go, and which will never be a paying proposition, but we do not hear any hon. member from western Canada say a word in complaint of that expenditure. I believe Prince Edward Island is entitled in all fairness to consideration from the rest of the dominion, not only on account of the position we are in, but also because of the terms of confederation we are entitled to everything we have got, and possibly something more.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Harbours and Rivers-Quebec
Anse a la Cabine, M.I.-slipway and hauling plant, $3,400.
Anse Millerand, M.I.-slipway and hauling plant. $3,400.	.
Bagotville-purchase and repair wharf, $35,-
000.
Baie des Sables-wharf extension. $32,000.
Baie St. Paul-protection wall, $20,000.
Bergeronnes (Point a John)-wharf, $17,000.
Bie-wharf reconstruction, $12,000.
Cap aux Meules, M.I.-wharf reconstruction and improvements, $22,000.
Cap aux Os (The Gulch)-landing, $3,300.
Cap Chat-deepwater wharf, $40,000.
[Mr. MacLean.l
Cap de la Madeleine-wharf repairs, $4,850. Cap des Rosiers-descent to beach, $2,300. Carleton-wharf extension, $70,000.
Chambly Basin-protection wall, $16,000. Chateauguay River-dredging, $13,500.
Chenal du Moine-dredging, $8,600.
Colonie des Greves-protection work, $5,000. Conception-protection wall, $1,500. Contrecoeur-protection wall, $25,000.
Cote Marcel-reconstruction of protection, $3,200. *
Cross Point-wharf repairs, $8,500. Drummondville-protection work, $15,000. Etang du Nord, M.I.-harbour improvements, $20,000.
Granby

protection work, $6,000.
Grande Entree, M.I.-wharf reconstruction, $13,600.	.	.
Grande Entree (West Point), M.I.-landing, $2,500.
Grande Riviere-rebuilding wharf, $47,100. Hamilton Cove (Riviere Portneuf)-wharf,
$41,000.	.
lie aux Coudres-wharf repairs, $16,000.
Isle Verte-wharf reconstruction, $6,900. Lachine-protection wall, $16,000.
Lac Duparquet-wharf, $1,500.
Lacolle River-dredging, the provincial government to contribute a like amount. $19,000. Lac Megantic-protection work, $16,000. _ Lac Nominingue-improvements to navigation, $2,550.
Laprairie-protection wall, $30,000.
Lanoraie-extension of protection wall. $2,800. L'Anse a Brillant-fishing harbour, $50,000. La Sarre-wharf extension, $1,000.
La Tortue-dredging, the provincial government to contribute a like amount, $16,000. Lauzon-dredging, $50,000.
Levis-wharf. $110,000.
Lorne Dry Dock-new power house-pump house equipment and machine shop, $125,000. Magog-protection wall, $4,700.
Maria-wharf repairs, $4,700.
Marsouins-wharf extension, $10,000.
Matane-extension to east breakwater, $40,000.
New Carlisle-wharf repairs, $8,300. Nicolet-dredging, $6,400.
Notre Dame du Portage-wharf repairs,
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Paspebiac-wharf extension and dredging, $56,000.
Peribonka-wharf, $5,900.
Petit Gaspe-wharf, $8,400.
Petite Riviere au Renard-extension to west jetty, $2,000.	_
Petite Riviere Est-construction of fishing harbour, $35,000.
Petite Vallee-wharf extension, $20,000.
Pointe Jaune-improvements to fishing harbour, $21,000.
Pointe Lebel-wharf, $12,000.
Port au Saumon-to take over and repair wharf, $19,000.
Port Daniel East-wharf improvements,
[Stage Direction]
Richelieu River-improvements. $500,000.
Rimouski-harbour improvements, $475,000.
Riviere Caplan-repairs to jetty, $4,450.
Riviere des Hurons-contribution towards dredging, the balance of cost to be borne by the province. $75,000.
Ruisseau Castor-purchase and repair wharf, $11,500.	.
Ruisseau Chapados (Gascons)-fishing harbour, $12,000.

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Ruisseau LeBlane-dredging, $22,500.
Ruisseau Pariseau - contribution towards dredging, the balance of cost to be borne by the province, $15,000.
St. Andre de Kamouraska-headblock, $14,600.
St. Cuthbert-wharf, $2,200.
St. Charles de Caplan-wharf extension, $25,000.
St. Chrysostome-protection walls, $12,900.
St. Denis-wharf reconstruction, $4,650.
St. Edouard de Fabre-protection wall, $11,000.
St. Etienne de Malbaie-wharf improvements, $5,500.
St. Felicite-wharf extension, $54,400.
St. Flavie-wharf extension, $20,500.
St. Godfroy-wharf repairs, $8,200.
St. Ignace de Loyola-protection wall, $15,000.
Ste. Jeanne d'Arc-wharf. $1,100.
St. Joachim (Cote Neuve)-breakwater, $3,000.
St. Paul (lie aux Noix)-improvements, $4,500.
St. Pierre les Pecquets-dredging, $13,000.
Ste. Rose-protection wall, $4,900.
Saguenay River-dredging, $170,000.
Sault au Mouton-channel, $24,100.
Sorel-harbour improvements, $180,000.
Tadoussac (Anse Tadoussac)-wharf improvements. $12,500.
Taillon (St. Henri)-wharf extension, $1,300.
Terrebonne-protection wall, $16,200.
Trois Rivieres-dredging, $4,900.
Val Barette-protection work. $3,000.
Varennes-protection wall. $15,000.
Vereheres-protection wall, $10,000.
Vercheres County-dredging-the provincial government contribution being a like amount, $5,000.
Yamaska

protection work, $9,300.
Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Hon. members cannot expect this vote to carry so rapidly. There is one item in it to which the house should give careful attention: I refer to that pertaining to the Richelieu river, $500,000. Last session when this same amount was voted, if my memory is correct, the minister said that the matter of increasing the size of the Richelieu canal would be referred to the International Joint Commission. That commission held many meetings; I attended quite a number myself; some were held at New York, also at Albany, Plattsburg, Burlington, and Montreal. I believe I spent three days at the session at Montreal. A vast amount of information was submitted by eminent engineers and thoroughly competent men for and against further canalization from the St. Lawrence to the Hudson. I took my time and made a careful survey myself all along the Richelieu river, along lake Champlain and south to where the proposed canal would enter the Hudson river. I am convinced that the time has come when this whole project should be laid to one side until the International Joint Commission has reported on it.
There were three main proposals in reference to this work, and as far as I know not a
single one of them has been endorsed. Certainly the engineers from the United States- and there were quite a number of them at these meetings-and representatives of the railways and of business organizations all along the route were not at all in accord with the proposal for canalization via the Richelieu river.
From the United States side there were two proposals that might be considered; one was to commence a canal six miles east of Montreal, I presume from part of Montreal harbour, across to Chambly basin. That was not at all supported. The main United States proposal was to run a canal from lake St. Francis fifty-four miles overland to lake Champlain. I cannot see how any Canadian government could support such a proposal as that. They proposed to divert 5,000 cubic feet a second from lake St. Francis, which is 152 feet above sea level, run it across country, which is fairly level, and drop it into lake Champlain by either one or two locks, a drop of 52 feet. It is proposed to make the level of lake Champlain 100 feet.
I asked some engineers a number of questions about the volume of water and such matters, and it came out that this proposal was to take 5,000 cubic feet a second from lake St. Francis. What would they do with it after they got it to lake Champlain? They could not allow it to run down the Richelieu river; I believe the footage there is from 4,000 to 5,000 cubic second feet to 7,000 or 8,000. It is not to be expected that the Richelieu river bed would take in an additional 5,000 feet per second. And they do not propose to send it that way. Their proposal was to take it through the height of land, which I believe is about 47 feet, south of lake Champlain; in other words, send the St. Lawrence water south into the Hudson, at Northumberland, through one or two locks. That is out of the question; this government could not support that. And all the other proposals that Canada might entertain are out of the question, because the Americans are all against them.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They would have to widen and deepen the Richelieu river to carry this additional water.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It was shown at these meetings that there are many private rights on the Richelieu that the government would have to buy, such as dam sites or present dams which are there. The engineers submitted figures showing that the cost would be staggering. In 1900 they figured the cost at $60,000,000, but they now figure it at $200,000,000 if they run the canal from lake St. Francis.


Vincent Dupuis: Oh, yes.
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John Ritchie MacNicol: O.K.? It is not OH.,
and I say no Canadian can support a canal running from lake St. Francis that diverts 5,000 cubic second feet from the St. Lawrence, which would injure the harbour of Montreal, as the hon. member knows. Therefore that is totally out of the question.
Now I will go back to where I left off in dealing with two or three other proposals. If the United States engineers are asking for anything, they are asking for a twenty-seven to thirty foot canal, for if the canal were to go through from the Hudson river to lake Champlain-that is, if the height of land were cut down-that would be the depth of the canal. They are opposed to anything less than that; they say a twelve foot canal is not of much use. I believe the present lake Champhin-Hudson canal is a twelve foot canal, with a potential capacity of over 8,000,000 tons per season. How much traffic goes over it? Only 351,000 tons. Why? Because the traffic is not there.


Vincent Dupuis: It has not twelve feet yet.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I am talking of the
lake Champlain-Hudson canal, from the south end of lake Champlain to the Hudson river, which is a twelve foot canal. I went over it and photographed it from one end to the other. I photographed the boats on it, though there were very few. There were two or three steel barges carrying oil, which were pushed along by a steam barge. The figures that were submitted were very striking as to the value of the present canal on the Richelieu river. These figures, I believe, were submitted by the Chambre de Commerce of Montreal in opposition to the proposal; that is my memory, though I speak subject to correction. In any case it was a very representative body. The report I have in my hand was prepared by Mr. Graham for M. Lefebvre, whatever body that gentleman is connected with. It was pointed out that in 1935 the Richelieu river canal, from lake Champlain to Sorel, carried traffic in hard coal amounting to 2,114 tons. That is a mere bagatelle, showing a tremendous drop from the high point of 124.000 tons in 1917. The traffic in hay amounted to only 880 tons, though if my memory serves me right, last year we were given figures showing heavy traffic on that canal.


Vincent Dupuis: The canal is not deep enough; that is the reason for the light traffic.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is plenty deep enough to carry all the traffic that is offering on that canal, and I say that, after having made a thorough survey.


Mr. RHEAUME:: Has my hon. friend the
figures before 1930?


John Ritchie MacNicol: Yes. Hard coal carried
amounted to 23,935 tons and hay to 2,087 tons. Coming back to where I left off, in 1935 no ore, pulpwood or sawed lumber was carried over this canal from Canada to the United States. The total traffic dropped from 669,299 tons in 1910 to the figure I gave a few moments ago, 45,000 tons in 1935. The traffic is not there. I saw the blueprints indicating what is proposed to be done; I went to Montreal in order to look them over, and then I travelled all over the canal. In my opinion it would pay this country forever to carry free any traffic going over that river rather than to launch upon this scheme which will call for a tremendous expenditure of money.
Last year something was said about lands being flooded, and I made a careful survey in that connection as well. By far the major portions of the flooded lands, the engineers tell me, would be in United States territory south of the international border. I asked the engineers where the flooded lands were on the Canadian side.


Pierre Auguste Martial Rhéaume: They cover an area
about twenty-five miles long on both sides of the river.


John Ritchie MacNicol: The banks on both sides of the river are high enough to take all the water flowing in.


Pierre Auguste Martial Rhéaume: No, sir.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I have not the photographs here, but I can show them to my hon. friend, and my eyesight is pretty good. In any event it was not the river flooding we were told about; it was the flooding of the lands around lake Champlain, and those lands are largely in the states of New Hampshire and New York. By far the larger portion of the water that flows down the Richelieu river originates on the United States side, and if they have floods there, they can take care of them.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I take this stand. Last year we voted half a million dollars, and this year we are asked to vote another half million.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: This is a revote.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Well, I am mighty glad to hear that. I hope this will only be revoted every year and never expended. If that is all that is to be done I have nothing more to say.

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Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I cannot promise that; but this is a re vote.


Vincent Dupuis: O.K., then.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Yes, O.K., if it is a revote and continues to be a revote. But before even a revote is placed in the estimates, I think the minister should wait for the report of the International Joint Commission. He will remember that last year he said in effect: Well, we will have the International Joint Commission make a survey. If the International Joint Commission O.Iv's any proposal to canalize the Richelieu river at twenty-seven feet, I say the Internationail Joint Commission ought to be abolished. But I am convinced that their engineers will never recommend any such proposal.
This whole thing should be left over until we have the report of the engineers, and then the country can fairly determine what policy should be pursued, whether we should canalize the Richelieu, or run the canal from a point six miles east of Montreal, which are the only two proposals that can be considered. As far as the United States are concerned, they have definitely made up their minds so far as I can see, to deepen the Erie canal to fourteen feet if they can find the water to operate it. They now have it deepened to fourteen feet for part of its length, but so far they cannot find water to' operate it the whole length at that depth. They have constructed two large reservoirs, but they were prevented from going further because of the uncertainty of finding additional water in New York state with which to operate a fourteen foot canal. If they can get that water they are ready to forget all about the Richelieu or the lake Champlain canal, because that would not be of any convenience to them.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, no!


John Ritchie MacNicol: Well, I discussed it with engineers at Albany and all up and down the series of canals, as well as in Washington, and so far as I am concerned I am certain that they are not interested in a twelve foot canal, so any expenditure by this country on a canal of that depth would be of doubtful value.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I probably should say a word in reply to the hon. member. The large amount of money he has mentioned in connection with the development of the Richelieu river refers to a development at a depth of twenty-seven feet.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I said from twenty-seven to thirty feet.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes; it would be equivalent to the proposed development of the great
lakes-St. Lawrence system. The proposal for the development of the Richelieu river to a depth of twelve or fifteen feet may not interest the United States, but it may be of interest to Canada. It may be of interest to that section of Canada through which the Richelieu river flows.
The reference made to the International Joint Commission is not for the purpose of obtaining the approval of that body of the development of the Richelieu river through its canalization. We have referred to the International Joint Commission the proposal with respect to the dam we propose to build with this sum of money between St. Johns and Chambly. That dam may have the effect of raising or lowering the water on lake Champlain, because it is being built between Chambly and St. Johns in order to permit the regulation of the flow of the Richelieu river during the navigation season.
The banks of the Richelieu river from St. Johns to the boundary are low. In fact, about a mile or two above St. Johns, one would think that the Richelieu is not a river but rather a lake.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is partly a lake.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: The river is very wide, because the banks are low. All the land is flooded by high waters in the spring, and those high waters do not disappear soon enough in most years to permit cultivation of the low lands on the Canadian as well as the American territory.
In order to dispose of that large amount of water each spring, it was proposed as far back as 1907 to dredge the river between the town of St. Johns and the boundary. But when parliament voted the money and we began dredging that section of the river, the Americans intervened and said, " By dredging the river between St. Johns and the boundary you are going to increase the section of the river. It is true that the water would flow more rapidly in the spring, but it would also flow more rapidly during the summer, and you are going to lower the level of lake Champlain.''
That was their objection. It was as a result of that objection that Canada and the United States discussed the proposal of building a regulating dam between St. Johns and Chambly. That dam would be open during the spring, when the water is high, and the river having been dredged between St. Johns and the boundary, the water would flow rapidly in the spring -through the openings of the regulating dam. But when the high water of the spring had passed the regulating dam would be closed and the level of the water on the Richelieu river -as well as on lake Champlain
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would be preserved at its normal point. That is the object of the construction of the regulating dam.


John Ritchie MacNicol: At what normal point?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: I have not the figure in mind, and I would not risk a guess. However, the level of the water would be maintained by that regulating dam, even if the river is dredged between St. Johns and the boundary at the normal level of lake Champlain. At that time the International Waterways Commission as it was then called agreed to the proposal of a regulating dam between Chambly and St. Johns, provided the dam were built with openings sufficient to dispose of the high water in the spring, but which would maintain the normal flow of the Richelieu river during the navigation season.
The project was not carried on, on account of the difficulties in which the country found itself as a result of the war. All I propose at the present time is the construction of the dam which was agreed upon by the American and Canadian authorities, and approved by the International Waterways Commission as far back as 1907, or a little later.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Is there an order issued by the commission?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, a resolution has been passed by the International Waterways Commission approving the construction of the dam. It was not proceeded with later on, and now we are asking that there be a confirmation of the order given in 1907 for the construction of the dam.
Strictly speaking, that does not affect the project of canalization of the whole Richelieu river. It covers more particularly the reclaiming of these low lands on Canadian territory also, to a certain extent, on United States territory.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Between St. Johns and the boundary?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, between St. Johns and the boundary. Besides there is going to be an advantage even if we do not decide to reconstruct the Chambly canal. The dam is going to be built half way between Chambly and St. Johns. The present canal is between Chambly and St. Johns. The dam being built half way will reduce by half, the length of the present canal, which is going to be an advantage to navigation. Instead of having to go through a canal twelve miles long, the boats will travel through a canal only six miles long, because the dam between Chambly and St. Johns will raise the level of the water so that from Friars Island it will be open river navigation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What is the distance between St. Johns and Chambly?


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Twelve miles. This would reduce by six miles the present length of the Chambly canal, a point which is advantageous so far as navigation is concerned. I repeat, that for the present this does not commit us to the canalization of the Richelieu river. It is true the question was raised before the International Joint Commission when they studied the different projects mentioned by the hon. member. Their meeting was not organized with a view to considering the Richelieu river. They had three projects which would have left out of consideration the Richelieu river from St. Johns or from Chambly right through to the St. Lawrence.
The suggestions which were made by the United States interests were (1) for a canal entirely on American territory; (2) from St. Johns, inland, right through to Laprairie; and (3) from Chambly, at the foot of the present Chambly canal, right through to St. Lambert, in front of Montreal. A fourth proposal was suggested by Canadian representatives for study. The International Joint Commision discussed and studied more particularly the twenty-seven foot canal-


John Ritchie MacNicol: Twenty-seven to thirty.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Yes, twenty-seven to
thirty. We admit the proposal for canalization at twelve feet does not appear to interest the Americans very much. It might interest us later on,, but that question is not raised at the present time. We are not now discussing the reconstruction of the Chambly canal. That would be the most expensive part of the whole project and would cost in the neighbourhood of $8,000,000. We propose only to build a dam, in order to help reclaim the low lands, and in the second place to better the present navigation system by reducing the length of the Chambly canal by half. That will be of great advantage.
It is no argument to say that there is no traffic at the present time. When there is no railroad between two points there is no traffic. Did we wait for traffic to build our railroads? No, we built our railroads to develop traffic, and we succeeded in developing traffic where there was not one dollar's worth before. In the present condition of the canal we cannot expect to show the same results that are being shown in other sections of the country where the canals are up to date. Forty or fifty years ago when the St. Lawrence canals were the same depth as the Chambly canal-


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is twelve feet.

Canada-Germany Trade Agreement


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: -they were carrying just about the same amount of traffic as is being carried by the Chambly canal. The St. Lawrence canals have been put in better condition to carry traffic, and they show better results. Where is the man who will contend that you can carry on a transportation business to-day with the old type of canal boat? It would not be profitable. Where are the small ships that used to ply our rivers twenty-five years ago? Why did the big shipping companies build the large boats they have on the lakes? Because small boats are not profitable, and large ones are. The same thing applies to the Richelieu river and the Chambly canal. We must be able to use larger boats and carry greater quantities of merchandise if we want to show a profit.
The best example of this is the condition of this ditch which runs through the best section of the province of Quebec which has been forgotten for a number of years. The paper companies have built special boats to navigate this ditch and transport paper and pulp to the United States. Last year the International Paper Company built two boats and this year they are building two more. These boats had to be specially constructed to navigate the shallow depth of about five feet and a half during the summer. Why has this company tried to accommodate itself to the present conditions? Because the traffic is there; because they find it more advantageous to ship by water than by rail. If it had been advantageous to ship by rail, they would not have gone to the expense of building special boats to navigate the canal, as they have done.
I am not asking the committee to commit this country to the canalization of the Richelieu river. I am simply asking for a vote to build a regulating dam and reclaim certain lands which I contend will prove profitable. In doing this, the Chambly canal will be improved. It is proposed to dredge the Richelieu river from the St. Lawrence to the foot of the Chambly canal, and from the proposed dam to the boundary line, a work in which different governments have been interested over a number of years. It is intended to straighten the channel which now exists. Considerable low-lying land along the river will be reclaimed for the benefit of the farmers.
We should not forget that from Sorel to Chambly, and to the boundary, there are many important localities which have no proper railway facilities. The present railroads cross the Richelieu river at right angles, and there is no line running parallel to it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: There are good highways.


Pierre-Joseph-Arthur Cardin: Important centres like St. Johns should be considered and proper facilities provided. With this explanation I hope my hon. friend will not continue to fear that I am placing the country in a hole. All I am doing is endeavouring to better conditions in that locality, and I think the vote is quite justified.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is the dam to which the minister referred north of St. Johns?


Abraham Albert Heaps: I would point out that it is eleven o'clock.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Yes, it is eleven o'clock. It is quite clear that any country represented by the Minister of Public Works can never be spoken of as the forgotten country.
Item stands.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
It being ten minutes after eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Thursday, April 1, 1937