1937-02-11

[Stage Direction]
Mr. S. W. JACOBS (Cartier) moved that -the first report of the standing committee on standing orders ibe concurred! in.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. A. E. MacLEAN (Prince) presented the first report of the standing committee on marine and fisheries, and moved that the report be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.

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

Mr. BROOKS:: 1.	What is the total amount of expenditure in 1936 in respect to breakwater at Toney River, Pictou county, Nova Scotia?
2.	Who was the foreman or person in charge of the work?
3.	What is the rate of pay allowed such foreman or person in charge; for how many days was he allowed pay; what is the total paid to him?
Questions

4.	If any balance remains unpaid, what is the amount of such balance?


Mr. CARDIN:: 1.	$6,767.07.
2.	W. Scott MacDonald.
3.	(a) $4.50 per day; (b) 102 days; (c) $459.
4.	District engineer reports a further amount of $80.25 for labour has now been passed for payment.


NATIONAL EMPLOYMENT COMMISSION
Mr. DOUGLAS:: 1.	What was the date of appointment of each member of the National Employment Commission ?
2.	What was the amount of travelling expenses and living allowance paid to each member?
3.	Does the $20 per day salary paid to certain members of the commission include Sundays and holidays?


Mr. ROGERS:: 1. May 13, 1936.
2.	Travelling expenses	Living allowanceName	$	$A. B. Purvis	A. N. McLean	. 1,141 07	Alfred Marois	. 603 75	1,843Tom Moore	. 228 95	Mrs. M. Sutherland.	. 2,151 93	3,439W. A. Mackintosh.	. 771 98	1,425E. J. Young	. 1,538 25	3,0213.	No. They are paid for working days only.


CAPE TORMENTINE-BORDEN CAR FERRY
Mr. KIRK:: 1.	What were the total receipts from the operation of the car ferry from Cape Tormen-tine to Borden from January 1, 1936, to January 1, 1937?
2.	What were the operating costs of the said car ferry between the same dates?
3.	What is the amount of the annual interest charges upon the initial cost of the said car ferry and terminals at Borden and Cape Tor-mentine?


Mr. HOWE:: 1.	$96,606.97.
2.	$393,846.73.
3.	$379,487.25.


HARRINGTON EAST, QUE., POST OFFICE
Sir GEORGE PERLEY:: 1.	In what year was the post office at Harrington East, Quebec, first established?
2.	Has it been closed?
3.	If so, (a) for what reason; (b) did the people using the post office wish to have this done; or (c) did they petition against its being closed?


Mr. ELLIOTT (Middlesex):: 1.	1st August, 1856.
2.	No.
3.	Objections were received in the form of a petition.


CANDLE LAKE, SASK., POSTMASTER
Mr. COLDWELL:: 1.	Who is the postmaster at Candle Lake, Saskatchewan?
2.	When was the appointment made?
3.	Was the position advertised?
4.	What is the salary involved?
5.	Who carries the mail between Candle Lake post office and Meath Park, Saskatchewan?
6.	When did the present carrier begin his duties?
7.	Was this work advertised or were tenders invited?
8.	If so, who applied, and at what salary or tender ?
9.	What is the present carrier being paid?


Mr. ELLIOTT (Middlesex):: 1.	Mrs. Sadie Grier.
2.	23rd Ocober, 1936, on the inauguration of post office.
3.	No, not necessary.
4.	$100 a year.
5.	Simon Lehne.
6.	October 23rd, 1936.
7 and 8. No. A reasonable rate being available, temporary arrangements were made in order to permit prompt opening of post office. It is the intention to invite public tenders for a permanent contract at an early date.
9. $260 per annum.


POST OFFICE-LETTER CARRIER DELIVERIES
Mr. MAYBANK:: 1.	Did the government recently change the hours of service of postal employees so as to make deliveries of mail more frequent?
2.	If so, what changes were made?
3.	Was any estimate made as to the number of additional persons who would be employed as a result of such changes?
4.	What was the number so estimated?
5.	What was the number so estimated for each of the provinces of Canada?


Mr. ELLIOTT (Middlesex):: 1 and 2. Continuous service is now given six days a week. This involves letter carrier delivery on Saturday afternoons and statutory holidays.
3.	Yes.
4.	478.
5.	Nova Scotia, 13; New Brunswick, 15; Prince Edward Island, 2; Quebec, 118; Ontario, 193; Manitoba,, 33; Saskatchewan, 24; Alberta, 31; Britis'" Columbia, 49.

Questions


POSTAL EMPLOYEES TRADE UNION
Mr. MAYBANK:: 1.	Are the employees of the Post Office Department organized into a trade union?
2.	If so, what is the name of said trade union ?
3.	Does the Post Office Department deal with the accredited representatives of said trade union from time to time, recognizing them as the proper representatives of the men employed in the post office?
4.	Did the Post Office Department discuss with said accredited representatives changes in postal service making for greater frequency of delivery before said changes were effected?
5.	Does the Post Office Department recognize the principle of collective bargaining with the employees of the Post Office Department?


Mr. ELLIOTT (Middlesex):: 1.	There are several unions or organizations amongst postal employees.
2.	The names of the organizations are Federated Association of Letter Carriers; Canadian Postal Employees; Amalgamated Civil Servants of Canada; Railway Mail Clerks' Federation.
3.	Questions affecting working conditions and the welfare of staffs are discussed with the representatives of the various organizations.
4.	Yes.
5.	This is a matter of government policy.


MARKET GARDEN IMPORTATIONS FROM THE UNITED STATES
Mr. LENNARD:: 1.	What was the approximate value of the market garden products imported into Canada from the United States during the year 1936?
2.	What was the approximate value of market garden products exported to the United States during the same period?


Mr. ROGERS:: 1.	Imports of fresh vegetables into Canada from United States in 1936 amounted to $3,7S5,505.
2.	Exports of fresh vegetables from Canada to United States in 1936 amounted to $1,970,794.
1,0 WER BURLINGTON, N.S., GOVERNMENT WHARF


Mr. BROOKS:: 1.	What amount was authorized for expenditure on the government wharf at Lower Burlington, Hants county, Nova Scotia, in the year 1936?
2.	What amount was expended on said wharf, to whom paid, and what amount as: (a) salaries; (b) wages; (c) material; (d) other expenditures?
3.	Who was in charge of the work, and who was the foreman?


Mr. CARDIN:: 1.	$2,800.
2.	(a) and (b) Clifford Sanford, $285.74; Percy Tucker, $178.80; Gesner Tucker, $132.00;
Ernest Lycett, $76.80; George Wilson, $133.20; Chas. Salter, S60.00; Thomas Benedict, $13590; John Walker, $24.00; Orland Card, $66.30; Alvin Burgess, $56.40; Clarence Card, $95.15; Lorimer Bryden, $57.60; Edgar Card, $165.00; Merton Burgess, $15.40; Alfred Marsters, $51.60; Lewis Marsters, $28.80; Clyde Bryden, $15.40; Eric Lycett, $7.20; Con. Mosher, $37.40; C. Sanford, S5.85; Palmer Burgess, $24.00; H. Benedict, $10.20; II. Chudleigh, $13.20; Prescott Sanford, S12.00; Seymour Sanford, $4.50; total (a) and (b), $1,692.44.
(c) and (d)
R. M. Card, timber, $105.31; Harold Card, timber, $22.41; Mrs. Jean R. Young, timber, $80.28; S. E. Sanford, timber, etc., $36.30; H. K. Sanford, timber, $52.20; Windsor Traders, Ltd., hardware, $33.04; Wilcox Bros., Ltd., hardware, $150.90; Frank Salter, ballast poles, S54.00; Douglas Harvie, timber, $19.80; Lewis G. Sanford, timber, $98.66; Clyde Bryden, timber, $51.03; Fenton Mosher, ballast poles, $18.00; "SB. Rotundus" freight charges $0.35; Lucius Bancroft, timber, $9.90; Prestoi Marsters, timber, $25.11; Fulton Eller, plank $130.53; Lewis Sanford, timber, $76.68; Bernard Sanford, timber, $12.06; Mrs. Gracie A Sanford, timber, $46.80; total (c) and (d) $1,023.36; grand total, S2,715.80.
3.	(a) Work done under supervision of district engineer, Halifax, N.S.
(b) Clifford Sanford.


LIFE SAVING STATIONS ON GREAT LAKES
Mr. CHURCH:: 1.	Are there any federal life saving stations on the great lakes or inland waters, and where are they located?
2.	W'hat sum for life saving voted in 1936 was spent on the great lakes, and where?
3.	Does the government contribute annually to the cost of the Toronto harbour life saving stations?
4.	If not, what arrangement, if any, has the government for such service outside of Toronto harbour?


Mr. HOWE:: 1.	Yes. Point Pelee, Southampton, and Port Stanley (caretaker).
2.	$2,851.15-at Point Pelee, Southampton and Port Stanley.
3.	No.
4.	None.


FOUNDERING OF THE &quot;SAND MERCHANT&quot;
Mr. CHURCH:: 1.	What steps are being taken by the government to carry out the recommendation of Mr. Justice Errol MacDougall in his report of the sinking of the Sand Merchant in December, 1936, on lake Erie, for a further investigation on certain lines?
Western Feed Conditions

2.	How many lost their lives in this wreck?
3.	Was there any barometer on the ship, wireless aids to navigation, modern or adequate life boats or drills of crews on life saving, and were the life boats in working order?
4.	Will any steps be taken as recommended, to regulate hatches and their use on the lakes by such draft of ship?
5.	Will any steps be taken to consider granting a pension to the dependents of those who lost their lives in this wreck?
6.	Will the Minister of Transport take steps to prosecute, under the direct power given him in the criminal code, those owners who send, or those who take unseaworthy ships on the great lakes in the late fall, without adequate aids to navigation, as set out in the criminal code, sections 288 and 289?


Mr. HOWE:: 1.	A special technical committee has been formed to conduct a thorough investigation into the design, construction and navigation of vessels of the type of the SS. "Sand Merchant."
2.	19.
3.	Barometer on board inefficient.
No wireless equipment carried. Ships of this class exempt from carrying wireless.
Boat drill not carried out.
Vessel well found and equipped, including life boats.
4.	For special committee to consider.
5.	Question raised would be a matter of government policy.
6.	Yes.


SURRENDER OF RESERVES BY INDIAN BANDS
Mr. NEEDHAM:: 1.	What number of Indian bands, if any, have surrendered their reserves on account of mineral leases being applied for on such reserves?
2.	What benefit accrued to each such Indian band as a result of such surrender?


Mr. CRERAR:: Mr. Speaker, the question cannot be answered in the form in which it appears on the order paper. No reserves have been surrendered by Indians on account of mineral rights. If the hon. member has reference, as I expect he has, to what mineral rights may have been given by lease on the reserve, it can and will be answered in that form.


QUESTION PASSED AS ORDER FOR RETURN
Mr. HEAPS:: 1.	Have any contracts been awarded during the past five years to the Woods Manufacturing Company Limited, of Hull, Quebec?
2.	If so, what wrs the total value of such contracts?



COMBINES INVESTIGATION ACT


[Stage Direction]
Hon. NORMAN McL. ROGERS (Minister of Labour) moved that the house go into committee at the next sitting to consider the following proposed resolution:
That it is expedient to introduce a measure to amend and consolidate the Combines Investigation Act and amending act of 1935, to provide for the administration of the act under the Minister of Labour by an officer to be known as the commissioner of the combines act, for the investigation of alleged combines by the commissioner, and for the appointment of such a commissioner, special commissioners and assistants; and to provide salaries, remuneration and expenses therefor.
He said: His Excellency the Governor General, having been made acquainted with the subject matter of this resolution, recommends it to the favourable consideration of the house.
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. H. BLACKMORE (Lethbridge):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to inquire of the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) whether anyone has directed his attention to the serious condition which has developed throughout southern Alberta. On account of the deep and drifted snow and long continued cold weather there has come about a dangerous scarcity of feed and water which threatens the destruction of thousands of breeding stock which are highly essential to the economic well being of Canada. If the minister's attention has been drawn to this matter, would he mind telling the house what measures have been taken to meet the emergency?


Hon. J. G. GARDINER (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, about two weeks ago the officials of the rehabilitation organization of this government in the west wired me stating that difficulties were being experienced by owners of a considerable number of cattle located in the southern portion of Alberta who as yet have not come definitely under the arrangements made previously in connection with direct relief. There was not sufficient feed shipped into this area during the earlier part of the season to take care of the cattle. I immediately wired the representatives of the department in the west and asked them to make a complete investigation of the situation and report both here and to the

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
government at Edmonton. A few days later I had a wire from the Minister of Agriculture in Alberta, and I wired him in reply indicating what had been done from this end and suggesting that he wire us later informing us what he considered the condition to be. I understand the situation is now being handled by our organization in cooperation with the provincial organization in Alberta. .



GRAIN MARKETING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. NORMAN McL. ROGERS (Acting Minister of Trade and Commerce):	Mr. Speaker, on Monday last the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) took exception as a question of privilege to an answer given on February 3 to a question asked by the hon. member for Qu'Appelle (Mr. Perley). The answer was in the following terms:
1, 2, 3. The subject to which this question relates, namely, the marketing of Canadian grains abroad, is now being investigated by the royal grain inquiry commission, which has not yet reported to the government.
As Acting Minister of Trade and Commerce I am responsible for that answer. I regret the suggestion that there has been any discourtesy to the hon. member for Qu'Appelle, as none was intended in the answer given. I have examined the records in relation to this matter and I agree with the leader of the opposition that the answer as originally given, while the facts were correctly stated, was not happily expressed. I have revised and expanded the answer to the question, and with the permission of the house I should like to place upon the records a correction of the original answer, as follows:
1.	Yes. To exporters only.
2.	Made without knowledge or advice of wheat committee of the cabinet.
3.	Cancelled without knowledge or advice of the wheat committee of the cabinet on December 20, 1935, because the wheat board considered it advisable to do so.

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. FERNAND RINFRET (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday evening, February 9, the hon. member for Kindersley (Mr. Elliott) put a question to me in committee of supply with reference to the circulation of The Canada Gazette. I have this information to give to the house. On February 10 the distribution of The Canada Gazette
stood at 557 copies free and 569 copies on subscription. The complimentary distribution includes copies sent to senators and members of the House of Commons on request, to registrars under the Bankruptcy Act as provided for by statute, to the library list as provided for by P.C. 1471, and to the daily newspapers. Subscriptions include copies sent to various departments in Ottawa and requested on departmental requisitions. Other copies are paid for at the rate of $8 per year by the public in general.



HOME IMPROVEMENT LOANS


[Stage Direction]
Hon. CHARLES A. DUNNING (Minister of Finance) moved the third reading of Bill No. 11, to increase employment by encouraging the repair of rural and urban homes.
Motion agreed to, and bill read the third time and passed.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. G. GARDINER (Minister of Agriculture) moved the second reading of Bill No. 18, to amend the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act.
He said: Mr. Speaker, in rising to move the second reading of this bill I desire to give to the house the information which I promised three different members would be forthcoming on the motion for second reading. The information is with regard to the area affected by drought in the three western provinces, the general conditions which have existed in that section of Canada since it was first settled, the actions which have been taken by different governments which have been in power from time to time to deal with the situation, and the details of what is intended to be done during the coming year under the present legislation.
I think I can best outline the area which has been affected by referring to the map which I have in my hand. If you take a point on the boundary line between Canada and the United States immediately south of the town of Morden in Manitoba and draw a line directly from there to the town of Lloyd-minster, which is located on the boundary line between Alberta and Saskatchewan, just south of where the North Saskatchewan river enters the province of Saskatchewan, then westward and southward to about the town of Cochrane, west of Calgary, and then directly south to where the western boundary of Alberta meets the American boundary line, generally
768	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
speaking you will have taken in the area known as the open prairie country of western Canada which has been affected by what we have been pleased to call the drought in recent years.
Mr. BENNETT:: Could the minister give the number of acres in that area?


James Garfield Gardiner: I think I can give all that information in a general way. Before going on to discuss the general question, I should like to make this general statement which I am sure will meet with the approval of everyone who has been interested in the problem. I believe the great majority of the people in that area, while realizing that they have suffered manj- hardships, would wish me to emphasize the fact that they appreciate the efforts which have been put forth by the Red Cross, by governing bodies generally, by the railways, by individuals and communities in other parts of Canada, and by creditors in general to make their burden lighter during this period of difficulty which has extended for from five to seven years. I think the great majority, if not all, of the people in that vast area believe that a real effort has been made, by all those to whom I have referred, to do something to lighten the burden of those who are passing through these difficulties.
I might describe in another way the area that is affected. As the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) said the day before yesterday, about three hundred municipalities are affected. I would estimate that the acreage contained in those three hundred municipalities would be approximately 60,000,000. Of course that 60,000,000 acres embraces all the different types of land that are to be found within the area I defined a moment ago, and includes not only the land but the portion of it which may be covered by water. The whole area, figured out on an acreage basis-640 acres to the square mile -covers a little over 60,000,000 acres. I think I should be well w'ithin the mark if I were to say that about 45.000,000 acres, or about three fourths, of that land is occupied, but probably not more than about 20,000,000 acres of it has been improved. In other words, not more than about 20,000.000 acres in that area have actually been used for the production of crops, and the raising of live stock, as we understand the term when we speak of small farmers having stock running on pasture. That would cover the area that has been affected more or less during the last six or seven years.

The only qualification I would make in the description of the area would be that as you follow that long line from south of Morden on to Lloydminster, and that long line from Lloydminster down to Cochrane, zig-zagging back and forth across it you will find differing conditions. Sometimes you will find the land north of the line affected by drought, and in other cases you can go well into the southern section and find land which has not been affected by drought for any considerable number of years.
I might add that you have within that area, well within the centre of it in some cases, sections of territory which have not felt the real effect of the drought in the same way that other sections of the territory have. For example, you can take the heavy lands fhat surround Regina city and Moose Jaw. Those lands, while well within that area, have not been affected to the same extent as lands farther south and farther west that are not as heavy in their texture. Then we have right in the centre of the larger district. about the town of Rosetown, and to the south of Rosetown on towards Elrose, a section of country w'hich during t.he whole period of the drought and the difficulties of the drought have had a fair crop. In some years it has been better than in others, but in any case these people during the greater part of the time have been able to keep entirely off relief. The same is true of the majority of people who live on the heavy lands around the city of Regina and the city of Moose Jaw.
I would point out that this year the area does not take in quite the 300 municipalities, but it does take in a larger area than it has in any one of the previous seven years. This year the area affected, which has been admitted to the care and administration of the federal government so far as assistance is concerned, covers about 250 municipalities. This area represents more than 50,000,000 acres of land, about 35,000,000 acres of which is occupied, and about 18,000,000 acres of which is improved or being farmed in the ordinary sense of the term.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is, 18,000.000 of the
35.000.	000?


James Garfield Gardiner: About 18,000,000 of the
35.000.	000, yes. I think the size of this area can be better appreciated if I put it in this way. The area comprises more than one-quarter of the occupied, and more than one-fifth of the improved, area of farm land in the whole Dominion of Canada. I do not know whether that is generally understood or not. but I repeat that the occupied part of

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
what is now generally called throughout Canada the drought area, but which I prefer to call the open prairie section of western Canada, has within it one-quarter of all the occupied farm land in the Dominion of Canada and a little more than one-fifth of the improved farm land in the Dominion of Canada. I might say further that it contains a population of approximately 900,000 people-almost equal to the entire population of the province of Saskatchewan. It is a population greater than that of any province in the Dominion of Canada except the two great central provinces of Quebec and Ontario. That I think expresses more completely the importance of the problem from the p'feint of view of the Dominion of Canada than any mere statement of what the area is and the acreage involved. The population affected is equal to that of the third greatest province in Canada in point of population, and greater than the population of any other province except the two largest provinces in the dominion.
Within that area, inside the lines I have spoken of, you have the city of Calgary, the city of Lethbridge, and the city of Medicine Hat in the province of Alberta; you have the cities of Moose Jaw, Weyburn, Swift Current, Regina, Saskatoon and North Battle-ford in the province of Saskatchewan. I recite these facts, Mr. Speaker, in order to impress upon the house, if I can, the impossibility of even considering the question of placing such a large number as 900,000 people to better advantage in any other part of the dominion.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does that 900,000 include the cities and towns?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, it includes the cities and towns, which are largely dependent on the area in which they are located.
I think I have said sufficient, Mr. Speaker, to impress upon the house the importance of the question that has to be dealt with under any legislation having to do with rehabilitation, and as well the importance of that area to the remaining part of Canada.
There has been a great deal of discussion during the last seven or eight years as to whether difficulties of this kind were experienced in the prairie sections of Canada prior to the last five or six years, whether the lands in that area have been depleted by winds and other conditions, whether they have been depleted by certain methods of farming. All these questions naturally arise in our minds as a result of the experience we have been having in the last six or seven years. I make bold to say that if we had any other kind of climate than what we have in the
prairie provinces, people could not live there and maintain homes. I think that statement can be made without fear of contradiction. If we had any different kind of climate in the area I have described, people could not live there if they relied upon farming for their maintenance. I should like to take a moment or two to give my reasons for making this statement.
In the first place the western plains of Canada are divided into three steppes, and the borders of those steppes of prairie and park land run parallel with the Rocky mountains. These borders in the form of hills run from the northwest down towards the southeast. The first steppe, the one nearest the Rockies, extends from the foothills to the	east of	the mountains	just tothe west of	the city	of Moose	Jaw	and itseastern border almost parallels the Rocky mountains. The edge of the next steppe runs just east of the city of Brandon, and again parallels the Rocky mountains, w-hile the edge of the third	steppe	parallels	the	Rockiesthrough a point east of Winnipeg. The area contained in the third steppe averages about 800 feet above sea level. The area contained in the second steppe, which extends from Brandon to	Moose	Jaw, has	an	average
height of about 1,600 feet above sea level, while the area contained in the steppe extending from Moose Jaw to the foothills of the Rocky mountains has an average altitude of about 3,400 feet above sea level.
Those who are familiar with the western part of Canada know that the growth in the first steppe is naturally different from the growth in the second steppe, while the growth in the third steppe, is different from either of the other two. You find oaks and elms, similar to those in eastern Canada, growing in the Red river valley. You find poplars and willows growing in the second steppe, but the natural growth in the third steppe, at least in the southern part of it, is short grass, and for that reason we speak of it as prairie country.
One of the reasons why I say it would be very difficult if not almost impossible for people to live in that area under any other climate is shown by the figures of average rainfall which I should like to present:
Inches
Vancouver	 58
Lethbridge	 15-9
Regina	 14-11
Winnipeg	 20
Port Arthur	 22-5
Belleville	 35-6
London	 38
Sherbrooke	 36-9
Kempt ville	 38
768	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
These are the centres of some of the most important farming areas in Canada, stretching right from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Hon. members will note that as compared with any other part of Canada the rainfall in those prairie sections is very much less. Someone may say that Vancouver is almost as far north as Lethbridge and Regina, so why is it that crops cannot be grown with equal success on the other side of the mountains. That reason is found in the fact that the Rocky mountains lie between Vancouver and the prairies, and the winds that come over the warm currents of the Pacific ocean carry both moisture and heat, giving a more equable temperature during the year on the western side of the Rocky mountains. When they cross over to the eastern side of the mountains they are associated with temperatures ranging from 110 degrees above zero, as we had it last July, to 40 and SO degrees below zero, as we have it in January. Then you have the seasons shortened by the fact that the warm winds do not come over the mountains, and therefore, since we are so far north and at such an altitude above sea level, it would be impossible to produce farm crops if we had as much rain as they have in Vancouver. Perhaps that may be understood better if I remind hon. members that any year we get more than the average rainfall on the western prairies we are afraid of one of two things. We are afraid of rust which we had in 1934, or we are afraid of frost, which we had in 1907. Of course we have had frost in many other years that I could enumerate, but 1907 was most severe.
I recite these facts in order to indicate that those plains are particularly suited to the production of certain crops because of the climatic conditions that exist. In recent days there has been some controversy as to the possibilities of the Peace River country for the production of wheat, as compared with the open prairie country. I am not going to enter into that controversy in any way. The Peace River country is suited to the growing of some varieties of wheat. The northeastern part of the province of Saskatchewan is suited to the growing of some varieties of wheat. The province of Manitoba is suited to the growing of certain varieties of wheat. But the one section of western Canada which, under all conditions excepting those of frost, extreme drought or too great rainfall at certain seasons of the year, is certain to produce No. 1 Northern wheat or in some instances No. 1 hard wheat, is the short grass prairie region of western Canada. No. 1 Northern wheat or No. 1 hard wheat are known the world over as

strong wheat, and there is no other place in the world where a better variety of strong, hard spring wheat can be grown than in those short grass prairie regions. One of the reasons for that is that you can grow hard wheat only where you have a comparatively low rainfall and at the same time fairly long and fairly cool nights. These are the two conditions that contribute to the high protein content wheat that is being produced in those areas.
Now, Mr. Speaker, may I repeat that I make bold to say that if you had any other kind of climate in that part of western Canada it would be impossible to maintain a population there at all, doing what we are attempting to do at the present time. I should like to ask this question: What does the history of the area show? Well, I do not know whether you call it good fortune or bad, but I have always considered it good; I have had the privilege of living in the prairie sections of North America ever since 1890, with the exception of the four years from 1896 to 1900. During five years of that time, from 1890 to 1895, I lived in the state of Nebraska, which is in the heart of that part of the United States that has suffered so severely within the last few years. What I want to say to the house is this, that during the period through which we are passing we have not experienced anything more difficult than farmers all through the prairie section of the central part of the United States experienced during the nineties of the last century. The area of Canada of which I am now speaking was not settled in the sense that it is settled to-day, but from the old timers who live in it I understand that exactly the same climatic conditions prevailed over that area in the nineties as have prevailed during the last five or six years.
Most of us in this house can remember the experiences of the years from 1914 to 1921. I have brought to the house the records of crop yields during some of the years since this section of country has been settled, and I have done so in order that I might more fully illustrate to you what I have in mind in the statements I have just made. Let us take crop district No. 3. This district lies between the Soo line in Saskatchewan and Shaunavon- or rather it extends almost to Shaunavon. It runs up on the north of Swift Current towards the Saskatchewan river, taking a triangle out of the centre of the southern part of the province. I find that in 1914 the farmers in that district harvested a little under two bushels to the acre on all the land then under cultivation. That is a poorer crop than they have had in district No. 3 in any year since 1914;

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
in other words, it is the poorest crop they have ever had since they settled that country. They were fortunate enough to have a good crop in 1915, and to illustrate another point with regard to the possibilities of the country, I may say that whereas the yield in 1914, one of the most difficult years they have ever experienced there, was two bushels to the acre, that same area of country, with an increased acreage, had an average in 1915 of thirty-one bushels to the acre, a higher average than any crop district in Saskatchewan.
I have before me the average rainfall in those different years and I will mention one or two of them to indicate the impossibility of theorizing about rainfall in western Canada and determining whether we are likely to have a good crop. In 1914 the rainfall in district No. 3 was 12-53 inches and in 1915 it was 16-30 inches, about 3^ inches more. In 1915 it was a little above the average that you get around, say, the city of Regina and in 1914 it was slightly below the average. Now in the one year they had a yield of two bushels to the acre and in the other a yield of thirty-one bushels to the acre; and that yield, of thirty-one bushels came in the year following one of the driest seasons they have ever had.
Let us come down to 1928. Everyone in this house knows that the year of greatest wheat production in Canada was 1928, and I will read to the house the rainfall in the different crop districts in that year:
District 1.. .. 2.. .
3..	..
4..	..
5..	..
6..	..
7..	..
8..	.. 9.. ..
Rainfall
inches
12
11
11
9-2
These are for the province of Saskatchewan. District No. 8, I may observe, is away up in the northern part of the province and district No. 9 is north of the North Saskatchewan river.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The point is, is it not,
that it came at the right time?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, I think that is the point. Now, if we take all the years from 1913 to 1934 and study the rainfall right across the grain-growing section of western Canada we shall probably find that the rainfall in 1928 was as low as in any one of those years; and yet they produced the greatest crop that western Canada has ever had. And, as the leader of the opposition says, the reason for that is that the rainfall came at the right 31111-49
time of year. But we might add this, that even when the rainfall does come at the right time, if it is preceded by heavy winds, particularly in the open prairie country, the winds themselves ruin the crop before the time for the rainfall to do it any good arrives; and if the rainfall is succeeded in the early weeks of July by very extreme heat, as in the last year, that very extreme heat in itself offsets the good that the rainfall did in the month of June. These are some of the difficulties facing the grain growers in that area of Canada; they are some of the factors that have to be faced when considering ways and means of dealing with the problem.
I said that we had difficulties there in the nineties. We had them in 1914, and then we had two good crops, and thereafter we had comparatively bad crops from 1917 to 1921. Now we have been experiencing, from 1931 to 1936, another series of poor crops, and some might be inclined to ask why it is that we have experienced greater difficulty in some of these periods than in others. In so far as my memory takes me back to the experience of the nineties, I do not think that we have had any greater difficulty in western Canada in the thirties of this century than the Americans had to cope with on land of the same kind further south towards the close of the last century. The experiences are almost identical.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There are more people in the west.


James Garfield Gardiner: At that time the prairie states were not as thickly populated as now, but many people moved out of that section in those days back to the areas they had come from. Those of us who went from Canada returned to this country and started all over again, and that has been the experience of many persons who have gone into the west during the last few years. But speaking of the period between 1914 and 1921, there was something else that intervened. Although the yield was almost though not quite as low as it has been during this period, and although the only real difference in the two periods was the comparatively large crops of 1915 and 1916-1 may remind the house that we had a big crop in 1932 as well-in the period from 1914 to 1921 wheat prices to the farmer at the elevator ran from $1 a bushel up to $1.84, and in some years even higher than that. So that a farmer who had a crop of five bushels to the acre in the period between 1917 and 1921 had very little difficulty because he was getting $1.84 for his wheat. When, however, he gets five bushels to the acre, with the



Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
elevator paying him 35 cents per bushel, or in some cases, for No. 1 wheat, as low as thirty-four cents, then his problem is an entirely different one. Someone says, Yes, and twenty-five cents. Yes; there were a great many instances where the farmers did not get more than twenty-five or twenty-six cents. So that even with a crop of ten bushels to the acre in 1932, say, the farmer would be very much worse off than in 1917 or 1921 with crops of three, four, five, or seven or eight bushels to the acre.
I wanted to deal with these different areas in order to lead up to the next point which I desire to discuss. It has to do with the history of this particular area-and when I speak of the history of it I mean the settling of that particular part of the country. It is in this matter that I think some obligation rests upon the people of all Canada in connection with that area. Prior to 1905 this area was comprised in the Northwest Territories and administered by a government situated at Regina. But that government did not have the same powers, particularly in connection with finance, as the provincial governments which later were set up. The immigration policy in connection with the settlement of that area was administered entirely from Ottawa. The western areas differed in some degree from other parts of Canada in regard to settlement. The lands and resources of the eastern provinces and of British Columbia were owned and controlled by the provinces, and they had some control of the settlement of such lands. When the western part of Canada was first being opened up one or two things were done that seemed wise at the time but the wisdom of which, reviewed in the light of experience of this district of which I am now speaking, has turned out to be at least questionable. One of these had to do with the system of survey that was adopted. If I understand rightly, we copied that system from the United States. The country was blocked off into areas twenty-four miles square; then these were divided into four parts six miles square, and those again split into sections; then people were brought in and settled on quarter sections, cut out here and there all over the country. In such areas as the heavy lands around the city of Regina, those around Rosetown, and some of the heavy land areas in Manitoba, that system worked out successfully and settlement was carried on in a way well suited to those sections. But looking back on the problem as it is in the southwest part of Saskatchewan and southwest of Manitoba and southern Alberta, I am inclined to think that 
something more in the interest of the future generations who are to live in that country could have been done than the carrying on of that type of survey. I shall deal with that later.
In 1905 the provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta were set up. Settlers began to go there in great numbers in 1908. An hon. member from Alberta made a statement the other day as to why settlement did not take place there earlier. It is true that pamphlets were written by explorers and men sent out to make surveys calling attention to the difference between that area and some other parts of western Canada. I think it was in 1908 that the minister of the interior brought down in this house legislation providing for preemptions as well as the giving of homesteads to people who would settle in the western part of Saskatchewan and southeastern part of Alberta. If I remember aright, when that bill was introduced in the house the statement was made that while a farmer could make a good living on a quarter-section of land in the settled areas of western Canada, it would not be possible for him to do so in the areas we are discussing this afternoon; therefore the position was taken that men going into that section to homestead should be given a quarter-section of land free of any other charge than the S10 homesteading fee and the three years' residence requirement, and also the right, if desired, to purchase another quarter-section at $3 per acre. In other words a settler could get a quarter-section of homestead land and a quarter-section of preemption land. That was done, I believe, because it was realized that conditions there were more difficult and that more land would be required to enable a family to make a living.
Between 1908 and 1914 a great part of that area was settled by homesteaders. In 1914 the wheat acreage of Canada was approximately ten million acres. Then the war was declared, and in 1915 the wheat acreage of Canada increased by 4-8 million acres, or almost 50 per cent in one year. The increase in wheat acreage in Canada between 1914 and 1921 was from 10,300,000 acres to 23,000,000 acres, something over 12,000,000 acres for the dominion as a whole, and of that increase
5,500,000	acres was in this area of which I am speaking. In other words, farmers were induced to go into the production of wheat in the southern part of Saskatchewan and Alberta. Why? Simply because Canada wanted them to find homes there? Not at all. I think I am right when I say that the government of the day suggested to the present leader of the opposition-I know they suggested to

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
me and to the present Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning) and to everyone else who at that time was occupying public office-that they would like him to go out through that section of Canada and impress upon the people the importance of getting into wheat production in order to help win the war. And we did it. We did it to such good effect, apparently that, looking back at the records now, I find that five and a half out of twelve million acres of increase in the whole dominion took place in that particular part of western Canada.
We not only persuaded them to break up land; we persuaded them to buy the machinery with which to do it. During those years, as everyone knows, the sons of most of those men were overseas, and when we went to them we had to devise with them means of breaking the land and getting it under cultivation. We told them of the possibilities of machinery, how the work could be done without the employment of more labour than was available. This acreage was broken up and used for the production of wheat, and whether that had anything to do with it or not, the war was won. At any rate it was as a result of an appeal made by the dominion that these people went there and broke up these lands. It is all very well for us to look at that area to-day and criticize the men who settled there and broke up lands which were not suited to the production of wheat, to say they should not have done it and therefore now they should shift for themselves and leave that area and go to some other part of Canada. But there is some responsibility upon all the people in Canada through the national government for the action then taken. I have no criticism to make of the action taken-


Richard Bedford Bennett: It was a union government.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes. I have no criticism to make, even if it had been a Liberal gov- * ernment, a Conservative or any other kind.
I think any government in power in Canada at that time would have tried to get the wheat to feed the armies and the people overseas who needed it. Fortunately the wheat production during some at least of those years was fairly good; during others it was not so good, but the price during all the time was sufficient to maintain the people who were there.
From 1914 to 1919, therefore, we doubled our acreage in wheat in Canada, and of that increase a great part was in the area to which I have been referring. To-day we talk a great deal about the necessity of reducing 31111-491
acreage. People in that area in 1934 were sowing to wheat one and a quarter million acres less than they were sowing to wheat in 1921. They were sowing -two and a half million acres less to wheat in 1934 than they sowed to wheat at the peak in 1932. la other words these people themselves have been cutting down the wheat acreage in that area. They have been trying to adjust themselves to the condition that exists. All I should like to suggest to the house in that regard is that we have some reason for giving special consideration to the people who are in difficulties out there, first, because of the manner in which the settlement was started; second, because of the inducements which were given them during war time to go into the production of wheat on areas of land that would not be suitable for such production when prices dropped, and, third, because of the fact that in -that great extent of territory there are possibilities for the settlement and maintenance of a population in Canada such as is not to be found anywhere else in the country.
In concluding my remarks on this angle of the matter may I say that -there are some
900,000	people living there now. For the purposes of this discussion let us consider that there are a round million in the area which might require consideration. I believe I can say that if we are in the house five or ten years from now we shall find that there will be still at least a million people in that section of Canada. I say that because I know conditions, having been from one end of Canada to the other, I do not know of any place to which these people could go where, under average circumstances, they would be any better off than they will be right where they are. May I say further that I am inclined to think that if we are in the house ten years from now we shall probably find that there are more rather than less people living in that section of the country. The probability of there being more will be greater if we handle the problem in the way it ought to be handled.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Before the minister proceeds to the next branch of his subject, -may I ask, first, whether he has an estimate of the rural population in the area, and, second-I think this is very important-what was the sum total of the revenue derived from that area by the population inhabiting it between -the years 1914 and 1919?


James Garfield Gardiner: I have not the exact figures, but I believe I can deal with the question in a manner which will illustrate the point the leader of the opposition has in
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mind. I have not the figures broken down for the area in question, but I believe the population for the province of Saskatchewan is broken up in a manner which would indicate that about 34 per cent of it is in the urban centres of the province. Some of that percentage is so close to the land we might very well call it rural. Then, about 66 per dent is in the rural districts of the province, and actually living on the land. I believe that would be almost true of the area about which I am speaking, although the existence of some of the larger cities in the area might change the percentage slightly.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The percentage is smaller in Alberta?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes; it will be much smaller in Alberta than in Saskatchewan.
In order to deal with the matter just raised by the leader of the opposition, namely as to what we have obtained from that country during certain periods, I should like to go back to the point I was discussing a moment ago. I called attention to the three difficult periods we have had. It is within the memory of most hon. members that what we might call one of the best periods in that section of the country extended from about 1900 to 1914. There are different reasons why that was a good period, from the point of view of the whole dominion. One reason is associated with the fact that immigration was coming in rapidly. Then, railway construction was taking place throughout the whole country. New lands were being opened up, and capital came in with the immigrants and with the development, which proceeded very rapidly. A prosperity went with all these things, one such as we have not had in any other period. But in the period between the depression of 1890 and before the beginning of the depression in 1914-which would have been a great depression indeed had there not been a war to raise the prices-there was a period of fair production and fair prices. The fair prices along with fair production made it possible for people to exist in the area. Then, there was the second' period about which I spoke, namely the time during the war when yields were poor but prices were high, and people got by on the small yield and high prices. Then, there was the time between 1922 and 1928 in which we had the highest yields we have had during any period since the opening of western Canada. Along with that we had fair conditions, because we had fair prices in combination with the high yield.
In order to illustrate the effect of conditions on the people in that section of the country I shall attempt to show the differ-

ence between fair crops combined with low prices and good1 crops combined with good prices. I shall take three years from the hearts of two different periods, and shall begin with the years 1926, 1927, and 1928. In order to use figures familiar to me may I confine my remarks to that section of the area which extends	into the	province	of
Saskatchewan.
In 1926,	1927 and	1928, we	produced	in
Saskatchewan 793,000,000 bushels of wheat.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The whole province?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes, the whole province; two-thirds of the wheat came from the area about which I am speaking. In the three years 1931, 1932 and 1933, which were not by any means the worst years we produced
471.000.	000	bushels.	We must	compare	the471.000.	000	in three	years out	of the worst
period with the 793,000,000 bushels in three years out of the best period.


Richard Bedford Bennett: If the minister has the information, would he give the average price during those periods?


James Garfield Gardiner: In one period it ran up around SI.50 to $1.75, and in the other it was down around eighty cents.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The bureau of statistics
does show an average, I believe, and I thought the minister might have the information. However, I do not wish to interrupt him.


James Garfield Gardiner: I have not the information set out in that way, but I can give it in another way. Taking all farm products in the first three year period, namely 1926, 1927 and 1928, we find that returns amounted to $1,180,000,000, which was derived from a combination of good crops and good prices. Then, in the later three year period the returns amounted to only $354,000,000, or showed a decrease of $800,000,000. These figures indicate that from one period to another the sum derived was cut to about one-third. Putting it in another way, in the second three year period, as compared with the first, the difference in receipts by farmers in the southwestern part of the province throughout the whole of what is called the drought area, would be even greater. Farmers in the drought area were without any crop to sell at any price, but people in the other sections of the province had some crops to sell, even at the low prices which prevailed.
When I say that about $800,000,000 indicates the difference in the returns to the farmers between one three year period and another, I am stating something which is important from another point of view. We have heard many

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
estimates of the indebtedness of the farmers of western Canada. More particularly have we had estimates of the indebtedness of the farmers of this section of western Canada. The government of the province of Saskatchewan have made a survey of this area and they know very well the indebtedness of the individual farmers. They know exactly the indebtedness of the school districts, the municipalities and all the other organizations that are related to the carrying on of government in the province, including the telephone companies. When we estimate the indebtedness of the province, of the municipalities, of the school districts and of individuals, we find the total to be $600,000,000 in round figures.
I should like to say to those who are concerned about the future of the province of Saskatchewan that we are going to have good crops again in western Canada and some day we will have a combination of good crops and fairly good prices. When we do get a combination of good crops and fairly good prices our position will not be an impossible one. This is why I think governments should give some attention to the maintaining of the people upon this area.
May I put the matter in another way? We sometimes wonder how people who could produce in the last few years all the wealth of which I have been speaking in the last few minutes could be in the position in which they find themselves to-day, without money and without credit. These people came into this country between the years 1908 and 1914. The war came on and they were induced to spend money in order that they could produce more wheat. They did produce more wheat, partly for that reason and partly because they could get a good price for it and hope to make some money. Producing wheat in the volume in which they did at the prices which they were able to obtain, like most human beings under similar circumstances they carried on developments which probably would not have been carried on otherwise. It is true that to-day you can go into that section and find shacks similar to those described yesterday by the hon. member who introduced a motion stressing the necessity for some kind of action in connection with youth-in some of the new areas you will find quite a number of them-but in that portion of Saskatchewan of which I am speaking I think you will find that the homes compare favourably with the homes on farms throughout most of the Dominion of Canada.
I think you will find the condition of the roads to be better than the roads were in other parts of Canada during the first twentyfive years of settlement. I think you will find accommodation by way of telephone service which was not enjoyed in other parts of Canada or probably anywhere else in the world during the settlement of the first generation upon farming lands. It is true that they have all these things, a considerable part of the cost of which was paid during the years of good crops. In spite of their optimism, in spite of their enthusiasm for their jobs, in spite of the suitability of these people to the area in which they are to be found, they could not pay for these developments in the six or seven years in which they had good crops at good prices. I do not think any population anywhere could have done it. They find themselves in debt to-day, and I believe any other population in similar circumstances would find themselves in exactly the same position.
They came into this period of difficulty with this debt hanging over their heads. I think that ninety-nine per cent of them expected to pay every dollar of that debt and every dollar of the interest that they had signed to pay. They ran on for three years, and the interest was being added at the rate of eight per cent year by year. They ran on for five years and they began to think more about it. They got into the sixth year and found that their debt had increased by fifty per cent or more without their having obtained anything other than the use of the property which they had created by partly paying for it with previously borrowed money. They then began to ask themselves whether they would ever be able to pay the full amount of their indebtedness. I think it is better in this house to give encouragement to men of that kind, to let them know the possibilities of the future by quoting figures, such as I have quoted, which indicate that this debt can be paid within the lifetime of the present generation without imposing any great hardship upon the people who live in this area. With this picture before them they will go on with greater hope than they would if we tried to convince them that the debt could never be paid.
I asked a question a moment ago as to whether the government of the day and the governments of the past had been grappling with this problem as governments should. I want to take you back just for a moment to the difficult year of 1914-15, the first year of the war. The government of that day was of the Conservative party. They went into this area and organized the whole area for relief purposes. They put an administrative organization into the area and paid every

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
dollar that was paid out in direct relief, that is outside of what was put up by voluntary organizations. At that time there were less than half as many people in the area, and yet the government spent S8,715,000 in Saskatchewan.


Mr. PELLETIER:: Has the minister the figures for the three western provinces?


James Garfield Gardiner: I do not have the records of the other provincial governments. I have the figures for Saskatchewan because I brought them down with me.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Does that figure include payments for seed grain?


James Garfield Gardiner: I have some doubt about that, but it probably did. In 1914 the dominion government of that day assumed what the leader of the opposition referred to as a national problem. They set up an organization to take care of this and they spent 88,715,000 in doing so. Since then we have had two periods of difficulty. During the period of the war higher prices prevailed, but the yields were somewhat low. We had other troubles, but they did not require the setting up of an organization, either by the federal government or by the provincial government, to handle the situation. However, there was a cooperative effort on the part of the two governments, or I should say on the part of the four governments, because Manitoba and Alberta were also interested. In Saskatchewan-I think this is also true of the other provinces-it was necessary to provide seed wheat. The federal and provincial governments each undertook to pay fifty per cent of any loss which might be incurred by the municipalities as a result of seed being advanced to the farmers. During that period
84,385,000	was advanced for seed purposes.
I want to emphasize the fact that I examined the records in 1928, after there had ceased to be any need for the giving of seed or the providing of relief of any kind, and I found that only $180,000 of that money had not been paid. There was advanced $4,385,000 and at that time only $180,000 had not been paid, and much of that has been paid since. Of the amount paid, the government of Canada was called upon to pay only $334,000, and the government of Saskatchewan paid $334,000. Ini other words, when these farmers got good crops from 1922 to 1928 they paid off that indebtedness almost in its entirety. It was only in respect to farms which had gone under foreclosure or had been taken for -taxes that the government were called upon to pay.

The farmers of that area paid amounts which, with interest, aggregated $4,000,000 during those years. So that there is nothing or very little standing on the books to-day charged against the farmers of western Canada as a result of the difficulties of that period.
This brings me down to the period from 1931 to 1936. During the first year, 1931, the government, in its best judgment, and I -think the government had the support of all sides of the house in so doing, paid a bonus of five cents a bushel on the wheat grown in the northern part of the three western provinces. That bonus amounted ultimately to somewhere between $12,000,000 and $13,000,000. But it so happened that in the southern part of Saskatchewan, the area we are dealing with to-day, there was very little if any wheat, and the government again in its judgment, with that condition existing, agreed for that year to shoulder the entire cost of taking care of the people of that southern area, although perhaps it was not put in exactly those words. At all events they advanced or agreed to advance $10,000,000 to the government of the province of Saskatchewan to take care of the people in the southern and western part of the province, and they did a similar thing with respect to areas outside the province of Saskatchewan. That bill in the first instance was charged back to the farmers because of the method of administration that was set up by the provincial government and. agreed to, I think, at the time by the federal government. But eventually the notes taken from the farmers were cancelled and the Dominion of Canada to-day is carrying the entire cost of the $10,000,000 that was spent in the southwestern part of Saskatchewan and amounts spent in other provinces, which was put up in the year 1931.


Richard Bedford Bennett: 1930-31.


James Garfield Gardiner: 1931-32.


Richard Bedford Bennett: There were 330,000 people on relief-men, women and children.


James Garfield Gardiner: 
Mr. MacNICOL:: In reading from that article did the minister refer to flood control?


James Garfield Gardiner: No, not flood control; I think it was rodent control. This is in the dry area just to the south. Some slight amount might be spent to control the water in certain areas in order to make use of that water elsewhere, but this article has to do with water control and similar things such as are being done on our side of the line, in a smaller way.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I thought the reference was made in regard to submarginal lands.


James Garfield Gardiner: I do not see any reference to flood control. There is mention of the construction of reservoirs but not to flood control.
The reason I mention that, Mr. Speaker, is that it calls attention to the very situation that is before the house at this moment. During the last six years we have spent something over $50,000,000 in doing what to all intents and purposes leaves those people at the end of each season just where they were in the beginning. That is, we have been doing a necessary work; we have been maintaining them there throughout the winter. But we have been doing very little through the expenditure of that money to direct the people or to assist them towards a condition where it will not be necessary in the future to do the same thing over again. We believe that we should do something constructive in that area during the coming year rather than leave ourselves in the position where the whole expenditure a year from now, if there is another crop failure, will have to be made to maintain people in that area during another winter. To that end we have changed slightly the existing organization in order to take care of this problem.
One of the members from Toronto, speaking the other night, misunderstood me when he came to the conclusion that we were going to set up another organization in the form of other committees to deal with the problem confronting the people in that area. That is not in the mind of either myself or the government. There have been set up under the present organization-there were set up in 1935 and again in 1936-local organizations in the form of agricultural associations who simply organized themselves. They did not necessarily get our consent to do this,
but they themselves have organized and gone to work. We were trying to persuade the people in that area to dig dugouts in order to have water, and when I went there last summer I found that very few of these dug-outs were being made. When I went on some of the farms and saw the conditions I could understand why the dugouts were not being constructed. The leader of the opposition said that when he went and viewed that country about a year ago he had to admit that it created in his mind a depressed feeling. The hon. member for Rosetown-Biggar (Mr. Cold well) has made a similar statement. I must say that when I went and looked at it in the first week of July last year, having gone over the area during the previous five or six years at about the same time of year, it created even more than a depressed feeling in my own mind, and I began to wonder just why those people would stay there year after year and face those conditions continuously; and the only answer I could get was the answer that occurred to myself, that it was the experience between the nineties and the present time that induced them to believe that they were doing a real service to themselves and to the country by remaining there. When one went to an individual farmer and suggested that a solution for his problem was to dig a dugout to catch the spring runoff of water so that he could have a water supply for his cattle, he said, "You show me a spot sixty feet long and forty feet wide, and tell me to take a team of horses, which I have no oats to feed, and one scraper and dig a hole twelve feet deep, and say you will give me three cents a yard for every yard of earth I dig." When farmers made that statement to me I realized exactly the thought that would occur to my own mind as a farmer if the proposal had been put up to me. If I worked every day of the year, from beginning to end, it would be difficult for me to dig that hole, and if I worked only at such times as I could spare from farming, I should probably not be able to dig it at all.
At a meeting that was held I called attention to the experience that I had when I was in Ontario-and every farmer from Ontario knows this-when the farmers want to thresh their crops they get in about a dozen of the neighbours and spend a day threshing that crop; then they go to another farmer's place and do the same thing. I said, "Why don't you do the same thing down here?" The chairman replied, "I will tell you what we will do. You make that four and a half cents a yard and that will
778	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
pay approximately half the cost of digging the holes. We will dig the top half; you do not need to pay us at all. Then you bring in a drag line and take out the bottom half and the four and a half cents will pay for it, and we will dig these dugouts." Well, they started the next week to organize a committee and in that area they made dug-out after dugout, with the result that next spring, when the water run-off comes along, the farmers will have a store of water for their stock. It is committees of that sort that we need in that area, committees that organize themselves voluntarily or under the direction of the department; and we want some legal authority to deal with these organizations as committees organized under the act. We are going ahead if this bill passes the second reading and goes on to final signature by the governor general. The other existing committee will probably remain.
There is one thing more I think I should explain in connection with the present intentions of the government in carrying out the activities proposed under the rehabilitation act. I will not go over what has already been done under the act as it stands. Everyone is familiar with the digging of dugouts, the building of dams, the reseeding of grass in certain areas, and everything of that kind that is being done.


Mr. WOODSWORTH:: To what percentage of the whole territory involved does this work apply? How much does it cover?


James Garfield Gardiner: It applies to approximately all the area I spoke of at the beginning, that is, the area contained in the lines from south of Morden to Lloydminster and towards the southwest.


James Shaver Woodsworth: Up to the present time to what extent have dams and dugouts covered that area?


James Garfield Gardiner: When I was there last summer I had some discussions with our own organizations as to the rate at which this work was proceeding, and in order to convince them that they did not have a proper picture of it I took two of them in an aeroplane and we flew over the district. The picture one gets flying over the district is this. One looking down on a certain area sees that half the farmers have dugouts which they probably made when they first went there; no doubt they dug them in some better period. These men have no water problem to worry about because they have their water supply. But one will find in every one of these communities half a dozen other

farmers who for some reason or other did not provide themselves with these dugouts and now in these difficult times they are without the means of doing the work. I shall be able to give the exact figures when the estimate comes down, and perhaps it would be better not to attempt to speak accurately until then; but I can say that a considerable number of these dugouts and dams have been completed over the whole area.
We have deemed it advisable to set up a central office in Regina and there we are compiling all the information that is available from the municipal authorities and the provincial and dominion governments with regard to moisture condition, soil condition and so forth in these areas; and in addition to that we are completing a survey made in the province down to the first of January, 1935, showing ownership of lands in the area. We hope to have that survey completed early this spring, and, when it is, we intend to call into conference representatives of all the organizations mentioned in the original act and there determine upon some line of policy to deal with the situation. To indicate what I have in mind, I may say this. There is an area where a complete survey has been made in the northwestern part of Saskatchewan. There is another in Alberta. The area in Saskatchewan shows that in a considerable extent of country there are only fourteen farmers still left on the land, because these lands are marginal lands. In all probability the fourteen who are there are among the best of the farmers who were in the district to begin with, and they are still there partly because they have a run for their cattle near where they are living. What we hope to do is to get the cooperation of the railway companies, which still have an interest in some of these lands; the cooperation of mortgage companies, who may have some interest; the cooperation of municipalities who may have taken over lands for unpaid taxes, and the cooperation of the provincial and federal governments, in getting the people moved off, say from a piece of mortgage company land in the centre of the area to a piece of land owned by the mortgage company outside the area, transferring the obligation along with the farmer. Then we hope to be able to have the whole marginal area fenced and turned into what may be called a community pasture. We hope to have the government take some responsibility for providing a water supply and directing the breeding of live stock in those areas. In other words, instead of trying to convince the people of that section that the land should

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Gardiner
all be turned back to range country, comparatively small areas, which are surrounded by better land, should be selected and turned into community pastures, which should be placed at the disposal of the people in the neighbourhood without cost to the individual other than the fees he pays to put his stock there. In brief, the land would be converted into what are for all intents and purposes public ranches.
Last year some of our friends from eastern Canada went west to purchase cattle under a scheme which the government evolved of paying half the freight on cattle brought from the drought area to eastern Canada. I think they will all agree that in buying cattle they got the best satisfaction when they could go to a ranch where the cattle were all bred in one way so that when they looked at one animal it could be taken as fairly representative of most of the stock to be found in the herd. They purchased these cattle, brought them to eastern Canada, and are feeding them on their farms here. We believe that the setting up of a number of these community pastures will result in their becoming breeding areas for the stock of that district, to which people can go and obtain stock from time to time. Experience shows that 600,000 head of cattle in the southern part of Saskatchewan, and a much greater number in southern Alberta, is too large a number to be fed there from year to year under the weather conditions that exist.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is true.


James Garfield Gardiner: If we can have the herds properly established in the first place, breed them properely, and make it possible for individuals, either dealing indirectly or going and seeing the stock for themselves, to have this well known breed of stock brought down to feeding fields elsewhere at about one year old, we believe we shall be doing something for agriculture not only in the drought area but throughout the length and breadth of eastern Canada. In other words, we hope to bring together all the people of Canada, not only as has been done in recent years in helping the people in that area in difficulties which are beyond their power to overcome, but to cooperate in reestablishing them.
Going back to a point I made in the beginning, to the effect that I believe the system of surveys adopted was wrong, I am sure we can settle people to better advantage around these community pastures and around water supplies throughout that part of the country than in any other way. That resettlement will probably require the organization of these people into communities, and the
communities will require committees such as are spoken of in the bill. These committees will work at the job with the advice and assistance of officials of the Department of Agriculture. In other words we hope to put some direction from the department at the disposal of committees established here and there, helping the people to do something for themselves. Nothing is more disheartening than to see a man in that country with a section of land on which he has been doing his best to grow a crop, and the winds and the heat in the early part of July gradually wiping it out, while he wonders what he is going to do for the next winter. And yet, looking down over the bank of a ravine such as that of the Qu'Appelle, if he is far enough north, or the Frenchman river, if he is in the southwestern corner, or the valley of the Saskatchewan, spots of land can be seen upon which he could live and use the land to much better advantage than it is now being used if there were means of getting there. When we build a dam that costs $130,000, as we did at Valmarie, and see below it some 6,000 acres of land that can be used for the settlement of people, this government believes that that land should be in the possession of the people of Canada, or at least in the possession of the province in which the dam is located, and we believe that land should be used for the resettlement of these people.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


James Garfield Gardiner: If we could take people off some of the large expanses at the top of the hill and put them down in the valleys on farms of forty or eighty acres, give them a water supply from the dams that are built, put them in a position where they know they can grow sufficient feed for a certain number of head of stock, and then at some other point where wheat grooving is not practicable organize a community pasture into which they can put their stock during the summer, have them properly bred and taken out in the fall and brought back to the feeding lots, we should be doing two things: organizing the people into communities where life would be more worth while, and at the same time cutting down the expenses of the municipalities, the school districts, and the province. And I think we can do the same thing about community pastures on the marginal land as we can about these reservoirs of water of which I have been speaking. As to the areas of better land, I think we need not worry particularly. Those for the time being will operate very much as they are.
May I conclude by saying that this not a one year job; it is not a job that can be done
780	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. McDonald (Souris)
by having an act on the statute book providing so much money this year and perhaps nothing next year. I do not think it is a job that can be done even in three years. The bill now before the house is limited to three years, merely to allow us to proceed with the job we have in hand to the point where we can come back to the house, show what has been accomplished and ask for the amount of money we believe will carry the job to a conclusion. We believe the time has arrived when the Dominion of Canada, looking back at an expenditure of $50,000,000, should be prepared to face an expenditure of at least $10,000,000 over a period in order to avoid similar expenditures in the future.
I therefore move the second reading of this bill in order that it may go on to the committee.


Mr. G. W. McDONALD (Souris):: Mr. Speaker, I am very much interested in the bill which is before the house, and I know that all hon. members from the west, and particularly those from the southern parts, are equally interested, as well as a large number of people who have been affected by the drought of recent years. I wish to compliment the minister on his presentation of the case and to concur in all he has said on this burning question. It is quite evident he has made a real study of the subject, and I believe all hon. members ought to show an interest in it, not only to save future expenditures, but because it is good business to grapple with the problem when it presents itself. I am sure hon. members were interested to hear that one-quarter to one-fifth of the tillable land in Canada has been affected by the drought. One other fact seems equally evident, namely that if the problem is not solved in the near future the trouble will spread.
Before discussing the subject under review, on behalf of the people from the west may I thank the former administration for introducing the legislation, and the present one for amending it and trying to put it into operation. Further, may I thank both governments for the splendid help given the people in the west by way of relief. Ten years ago our people would have scorned the idea of having to accept relief. We have as good a class of people in western Canada as are to be found anywhere, and relief is one of the things they never thought they would have to accept. For that reason I would urge that the house do everything possible, as soon as possible, to help overcome conditions in the west which

are bound to spread. Drought and drifting sand will not confine themselves to a small area, 'but will soon extend to greater and greater proportions.
Further, may I thank the combined churches of Canada who were responsible for shipping hundreds of carloads of vegetables into western Canada. One should refer also to the Red Cross, because surely if there is one organization in Canada which is doing good work, it is that one. In thanking the Red Cross one must include those who contributed to its fund. Then, in this connection I cannot leave out the manufacturers. I have talked to some of the secretaries responsible for the distribution of the clothing shipped into our country by hundreds of bundles, and they have said to me that some of the articles were too good. I replied, "Not a bit of it." We received all kinds of underwear for the people in the district, and other commodities, including the best grade of woollen blankets Those things are not too good for our people. Those who received them certainly feel grateful to the people who gave them, and I believe good will come of it. We must remember the old saying that it is an ill wind that blows nobody good. It is my belief that the spirit of gratitude in which the people of the west received these goods will certainly cause them to have a better understanding of and a more kindly feeling towards their friends in the east. It will be a long time before we forget the kindness of the people throughout all Canada, and the splendid way in which they came to our relief at a time when we so sorely needed it.
I am not in a position to give expert advice as to how the difficulties in the west can be obviated, but I am pleased to see that the government has made a start. The minister was talking about dugouts, of which in my constituency there are hundreds. We have machines in the west which will dig as many as two in a day. They have been working for many weeks, and yet it will be a long time before every person can have a dugout. They are still within thirty miles of the town of Boissevain in which I live. However, the people who have the machines are digging them as quickly as they can be dug, and in every instance the government is doing its share.
Then, we are planting trees. We have begun an experiment in the southwestern portion of our province. Two whole townships, with the exception of very few farmers, have agreed to prepare the land and to plant the trees furnished free by the government, even to

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. McDonald (Souris)
the extent of paying the express charges. The farmers are paid at the rate of $3.50 per thousand for planting the trees, and in addition they are paid $20 per mile per year over a period of four years for attending to the trees which have been planted. In 1936 hundreds of miles of land within the area were prepared for the planting of trees, but I am sorry to say the drought was so severe that the experts from the Department of Agriculture would allow us to plant only 125 miles. The trees are of the giant Caragana type. They are planted forty rods apart, and will be cultivated by the farmers of the district and paid for by the government. This is the first experiment of the kind, so far as I know, in the province of Manitoba.
In addition to that the Souris river has been surveyed from the boundary as far north as the town of Souris and I believe it is the intention of the government to put in at least a few dams. Some may say that it was an act of God that brought on the difficulty. I wish to say that these are conditions of which we have had no experience. The land on the western plains is possibly as fertile as any land under the sun. Past events have proven the truth of this statement. In some seasons when the rainfall is slight and when the winds are high we experience continual drifting, which in a very short time will blot out or cut off even the most rapid growth. At that time of the year it takes almost continuous rainfall to produce growth.
We have these conditions, but it does not matter now whose fault they may be. We must face them, and I believe they can be overcome. There is such a thing as dry farming, and with the planting of trees, favourable seeding conditions, less cultivation, and more pasture land, conditions would improve. The time is not far distant when the farmer will be only too glad to take the advice of the Department of Agriculture in these matters.
In some respects the department has made mistakes and suffered through lack of experience, the same as the people did. I have been told that weed inspectors told different provincial departments that a serious condition was ahead of us, and that it must be tackled, but no attention was paid to them. In western Canada we have been afraid to advertise our troubles. We were afraid we might give our country a bad name. However, the conditions are now known and it would be folly to try to hide them. Fortunately they are not insurmountable, and with the cooperation of the house, departments
of agriculture in the west, the federal department and the farmers there will be little difficulty in overcoming them. But it will take time.
I understand there are other hon. members who will wish to talk on the subject. I had not intended to attempt to give expert advice. True, I have lived in the west for thirty years and knowing the conditions I would express the hope that the rest of Canada may never have to experience the difficulties through which we have passed. But if that time should come the house may be sure that if people in the west are in a position financially to do it, they certainly will be willing to help out. I hope, however, that such help may never be required. No doubt after the experience we have had, the rest of the country will take every necessary precaution.
I shall not deal with the subject at greater length, except to say that the west is worth saving. Last year I heard the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett) speak of conditions in Alberta, where the farmers could produce in one year more than $100,000,000 in wealth. In the mind1 of the Minister of Agriculture, Saskatchewan may be the richest province, but speaking broadly of western Canada the former prime minister said that in the prairie provinces wealth can be produced! in volume in a shorter time than it can be produced anywhere else. The matter therefore is well worth the serious consideration of this house with a view to the devising of ways and means of combating the drought problem as we have known it in the west for the last seven years.


Mr. T. C. DOUGLAS (Weyburn):: Mr. Speaker, may I take this opportunity of congratulating the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) upon the statement he has made. While there are many matters that we do not view in exactly the same light, I doubt whether I have ever heard the case for the farmers in the drought area of western Canada presented in a more informative or comprehensive manner. The constituency to which I belong is in the centre of the drought area, and therefore I feel that in discussing this problem I am not asking the house to devote its attention to a merely local problem. This problem affects more than half the province of Saskatchewan as well as large areas in Manitoba and Alberta. The problem of drought affects the welfare of hundreds of thousands of people in western Canada and ultimately the welfare of the entire dominion. The problems of the drought area may be divided mainly into two classifications.
782	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Douglas
First, there are the problems directly attributable to economic conditions. In common with the rest of Canada we have felt the repercussions of the world^wide depression which has been in effect since the fall of 1929. I am cognizant of the fact that every section of Canada has its own peculiar economic problem, and western Canada is no exception. However, there are several particular problems that have led to straitened economic circumstances in the west, and it is my intention to review these briefly.
The present economic condition of the prairie provinces had its origin in part, as the minister has already said, in certain mistakes in early land settlement policies. These were evolved and applied at a time when the control of the natural resources of the province was administered from Ottawa. It is unnecessary for our purposes here to endeavour to place the blame for these mistakes; suffice it to say that some 290,000 farm families were scattered over a huge triangle, the longer side of which stretched for some 1,200 miles from southeastern Manitoba to the Peace River block in British Columbia. Hindsight is always better than foresight, and it is apparent now that some more orderly type of farm settlement would have saved enormous sums of money during the past forty years. If outer areas had been opened up, only after reasonably close settlement along a limited network of railway mileage, the population would have been better supplied with roads, schools and transportation services at a much lower cost.
Another mistake made was throwing open for settlement large areas of sub-marginal lands, unsuitable in many respects for the growing of grain. Even under the best possible conditions, only a precarious livelihood could be hoped for in such areas, and in times of drought only failure could be expected. No continuous or extensive attempt was made to test the soil scientifically or to determine the sources and amount of water available. Where attempts were made to classify new land, these were ignored totally by the incoming settlers.
Added to the mistakes made in land settlement is the even more serious problem of the burden of debts now being carried by the people of the prairie provinces. Under the urge of speculation, farm and other properties were bought for sums out of all proportion to their capacity to produce. On the strength of prices prevailing at that time, money was borrowed against these newly acquired lands at high rates of interest. It is useless to say that the debtors were not compelled to

borrow, for it can be said just as truthfully that the creditors did not have to lend. The money was not lent to the western pioneer because of any philanthropic motives. Money was lent to the west because higher rates of interest were available there than could be secured in the east. Money was invested in western Canada for purely business reasons; it was a partnership in which both parties hoped to profit. What was true of agriculture and business was equally true of municipal and provincial bodies. Expanding prosperity seemed to warrant heavy capital expenditures. In those days there were to be found lenders just as eager to lend as the borrowers were to borrow.
It is unnecessary to review in any detail the results which followed the deflationary period, commonly referred to as the depression. With the sudden falling of prices of all primary commodities, there occurred conversely an increase in the value of the dollar. Debts that had been incurred when wheat was $2 per bushel had to be met with wheat selling at fifty cents or less per bushel. The value of property dropped alarmingly and was no longer considered as good security. Loans were called in and credit restricted. As a result, farmers, workers and businessmen are now faced with the problem of debts, the principal of which cannot be paid at existing prices and to which has been added, in most cases, the unpaid interest for the past five or six years.
The Minister of Agriculture made some reference to the attempts which have been made along the lines of debt adjustment and to the debts which have been cancelled during the past year. I have no wish to digress from the matter before the house and get into the question of debt adjustment, but I should like to point out that the problem facing the western farmer who has had to accept debt adjustment can be summed up in a single paragraph contained in the standard renewal agreement which these farmers have been compelled to sign. I quote as follows:
For better securing the punctual payment of the moneys payable under these presents and said mortgage, and pursuant to the Land Titles Act, the farmer does hereby agree to become and does become tenant to the mortgagee of the said land, and the mortgagee does hereby lease the said land to the farmer for a term of three years from the 1st day of January, 1937, at a yearly rental of one-third of the whole crop of grain of the different kinds and qualities grown on the said land in each year, to become due and payable at the time of cutting of any of the said crop. The mortgagee may at any time after default under these presents determine the said tenancy without any notice to quit.

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Douglas
Nor have government bodies fared any better. Municipal and provincial authorities have been called upon to assume hitherto undreamed of responsibilities in the way of relief. Feed and seed requirements had to be met, and added to these was the fact that revenues were curtailed because of the inability of large numbers of the population to pay their taxes. It has been estimated that the funded debt of the three prairie provinces is in excess of $500,000,000, and that the net municipal debts, including those of municipally owned utilities, are in excess of $300,000,000. There must be added to these amounts the huge sum owing in farm and urban mortgages, balances due on agreements of sale and on commercial accounts. When we add to all this the freight discrimination which has operated for years against western Canada; when we consider further the fact-this is taken from the report of the Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) as published in 1934-that the tariff cost the western provinces $54,925,352 in the fiscal year ended March 31, 1931, and when we recall to mind the fact that, with the exception of the years mentioned by the minister, the price of wheat has seldom equaled the cost of production, it must be clear to hon. members why the economic conditions of western Canada are so acute.
As I said, there is a second classification of conditions affecting the welfare of the people of western Canada. I refer now, not to the economic conditions which are general throughout Canada, but to the climatic conditions which are peculiar to the section known as the drought area. For the past five years drought has affected an area of 75,000 square miles, including some of the best wheat land on the North American continent. This area is on a front of about 700 miles in length. When we call to mind that in 1928 one billion bushels-let there be no mistake, one thousand million bushels-of grain were produced in western Canada, and when we realize that over much of that land black blizzards have since blown with relentless fury, we can understand how parts of that country have been reduced to a veritable desert.
The real tragedy of the drought, however, was not the loss of crops, but the fact that the absence of water meant the loss of hogs, cattle, poultry and vegetable gardens. In short, the drought took from the prairie dweller his livelihood and left him, for the first time in his experience, entirely dependent upon the outside for his daily food. The result has been a lower standard of living for western people. Relief measures may have provided sufficient to keep body and soul
together, but there has been no way of replenishing the stock of dishes, bedding and furniture that have worn out during the period of the drought. The vitality of our people has been slowly sapped; their health has suffered; the social life of the drought area population has been seriously impaired, with disastrous results to the mental and physical condition of our people. The Wey-burn Mental Hospital, located in the constituency which I represent, is at the present time admitting an average of over one person per day to that institution. Education has been maintained only because some of our teachers with undaunted courage have continued to teach in rural schools for the unheard of pittance of from one to three hundred dollars a year.
I think nothing could show better how the income of the western farmer in Canada has been reduced than to quote from sessional paper 146, which gives the income tax paid and the number of farmers paying income tax in Saskatchewan since 1930. I quote:
Number of farmers in Saskatchewan paying income tax
1929-	30	
1,3041930-	31	
9941931-	32	
1441932- 33	321933-	34	
291934-	35	
381935-	30	
96
This is the total amount paid in income tax by the farmers of Saskatchewan during that period:
Amount of income tax paid
1929-	30	$53,324	511930-	31	
53,128	501931-	32	
5,434	981932-	33	
776	261933-	34	
1,312	071934-	35	
2,614	721935-	36	
3,166	21
Nor has the drought problem affected the rural population alone. The greatly diminished purchasing power of the farmers in the drought area has meant hardship for the workers, professional and business men whose livelihood depends upon the farmers' prosperity. Merchants and professional men have found it impossible to collect back debts and have been compelled in many instances to continue serving the drought-stricken farmer without any hope of immediate remuneration. Workers have found that lower wages and unemployment have inevitably followed the bankruptcy of the western farmer.
The effect of this combination of economic and climatic conditions has been twofold. First, it has produced a system of relief of the most pernicious kind. Since the opening

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Douglas
of the session some statements have been made in this house with reference to racketeering in the matter of relief. May I ask the house why we have such a condition? Is it not largely that we have placed a premium upon improvidence? In Saskatchewan, for instance, the government has a relief schedule depending upon the number of persons in the family, but there are deductions if the farmer milks cows, keeps chickens or raises hogs, with the result that the farmer is best off who does the least to help himself.
The second effect has been on one of our greatest natural resources, namely, the wheat growing land of western Canada, which is in danger of being very rapidly wiped out. The report of the Canadian Conservation Institute shows that the area affected by drought is slowly spreading northward, and unless some immediate steps are taken to combat this menace we are in danger of losing one of our greatest natural assets. I submit therefore, Mr. Speaker, that this affects not only the actual area involved but the entire Dominion of Canada. It has been estimated that the western farmer has had his purchasing power reduced to the amount of $450,000,000 a year since 1929. This undoubtedly has had a disastrous effect upon the industrial areas of eastern Canada. I feel, as has been already suggested by the leader of the opposition (Mr. Bennett), that these conditions constitute a national menace. Were an epidemic or a flood or a forest fire to break out in any part of Canada, the government would promptly rush assistance to the district affected. I contend that an equally serious calamity has occurred and that definite steps must be taken at once.
The first step which I think should be taken, and indeed must be taken, is that the people within that area shall be guaranteed at least food, clothing, shelter, fuel and the necessary medical services. It is hardly necessary to stress this point. In a country which produces wealth to the extent that Canada does, there is no need for any person, or any group of persons, to suffer privation. But may I say this cannot be done if provincial relief grants are to be cut, as has been announced in the press, on April next. There can be no money in western Canada until after the next crop, if there is a crop. Most of the provinces are close to bankruptcy; they have been unable to collect their taxes, and a reduction in relief grants could have only one result, namely, a lower standard of living for our hard pressed people in the drought area.

The second step which I would suggest is a rehabilitation program similar in some respects to that outlined by the minister. The speech from the throne this session contains this sentence:
A comprehensive program to meet the serious conditions created by widespread and intense drought in western Canada was adopted during the summer months.
Without being unduly critical, may I say that while such a program may have been adopted, no material evidences of it were at all apparent in the large part of southern Saskatchewan which I covered.
The constituency from which I come borders on the international boundary, so I have had an excellent opportunity of studying the work being carried on by the United States government in what is commonly called their "dust bowl." In an area slightly smaller than our drought area the United States is spending $500,000,000 over a period of ten years. This means $50,000,000 a year. Compare this with the situation in Canada, where we have spent $850,000 in two years in rehabilitating the drought area. In other words, we are spending less than one per cent of the amount being spent by the United States government in the same period in a slightly smaller area, admitting, of course, that the United States area is much more densely populated.
I contend, Mr. Speaker, that if rehabilitation is to be anything more than a mere gesture, we must be prepared to spend at least $5,000,000 per year over a ten-year period in order to produce any serious effect in retarding the ravages of the present drought and to take the necessary measures to meet a recurring drought. There may be some dismay experienced at a figure of $5,000,000 per year. The other evening the right hon. leader of the opposition reminded the house that there is a limitation upon the money which may be expended, having relation to the benefits to be derived therefrom, and to this the Minister of Finance (Mr. Dunning) nodded his assent. May I point out that $5,000,000 is not anywhere near the point of limitation.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No one suggested that it was.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I am not suggesting that; I am merely saying, with reference to the figure I am citing, that it is nowhere near the point of limitation. In the first place, this area constitutes the granary of the world. It would cost a great deal more than $5,000,000 if we were to lose some of the finest wheat growing land in Canada or if we had to

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Douglas
transport and resettle the people now living in the area. May I point out also that under an appropriate rehabilitation scheme whereby wages would be paid for services rendered, this $5,000,000 would not be expended entirely on rehabilitation; it would relieve us of the necessity of paying relief in some instances, and thereby a saving would be effected.
Let us examine, therefore, whether there is any hope of such an expenditure being warranted. It is often said that no matter what you do you cannot change the climate. That is granted, but there are things we can do. I have before me reports on a number of surveys that have been made by engineers, some under the auspices of the Canadian Conservation Institute and others under the direction of Secretary Wallace of the United States Department of Agriculture. Most of these reports agree on one or two cardinal points. The first is that the great tragedy of the drought was due to the fact that we were not prepared for it. The second point on which they agree is that the reason for most of the suffering occasioned by drought, was not merely the lack of crop but the lack of the necessary water to sustain stock, water gardens and carry on the ordinary routine of life. In short, the real tragedy was that the farmer was no longer able to supply his own table and feed his family. Had the average farmer been able to keep his cattle, hogs, chickens, horses and so on; had he been able to irrigate even a small garden, the loss of crops would not have occasioned anything like the suffering which has come to the people in the drought areas during the past six years. Most engineers are agreed that while we cannot change the drought cycle, nevertheless we can prepare for the contingency of drought. Some authorities contend that the drought cycle ended in 1936, which may or may not be true. If the present drought cycle is broken-and we hope it is-then not only must we rehabilitate the soil from the ravages of the drought that has taken place, we must also take measures against future contingencies.
Whether we like it or not, Mr. Speaker, drought will continue to be a recurring problem. The measures to which we may resort have been dealt with already to some extent by the Minister of Agriculture, but I wish to group them into three classifications. In the first class are those measures necessary for replacing fibre in the soil. In the second class is the conservation of water, in order to keep
311X1-50
stock alive. In the third class are steps to prevent, as far as possible, evaporation of moisture, which is so great a factor in soil drifting.
With reference to the first group, the replacement of fibre in the soil, I quote from the report of the Canadian Conservation Institute, which makes the following suggestions: First, soil drifting can be largely prevented; second, strip farming is at least effective temporarily until other factors are adjusted; third, cover crops help and, fourth, fibre can be returned to the soil by growing forage crops.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then it is no longer wheat producing land.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: That will be true of some of the areas, and I shall be more specific about that in a moment. There are areas which never should have been opened up for the production of wheat, principally the highlands, which are dotted here and there with lowlands which can be used for wheat production. Not only that, but farmers have been in the habit of leaving a large part of their farms in summer fallow every third year. Now they have come to the point where, if they can afford to do so, instead of leaving part of their farms in summer fallow, they put in some cover crop in order to put fibre back into the soil. In North Dakota I came across a number of farmers whose soil had been tested. The nitrate qualities were still in the soil; the difficulty was that the soil had been reduced to a powder by the constant erosion of the wind with the result that the soil lacked fibre. The government of the United States, under the A.A.A. program, gave these farmers crested wheat grass seed free of charge and paid them $7 an acre to put it in. They did so, and the results were twofold. In the first place, the farmer was no longer dependent upon relief in any shape or form; he had enough to buy feed for his horses and was able to keep his machinery in a state of repair. Most important of all, however, was the fact that he had begun to rehabilitate the soil in order that once again it might produce wheat.
I am not suggesting that we are in a position to supply free crested wheat grass seed and pay farmers $7 an acre to put it in, but I am suggesting that this seed could be made available and at least feed could be given for the horses of the farmers or fuel for the tractor farmers.


Mr. EVANS:: Might I ask a question? Was that not done in Saskatchewan? I understand that crested wheat grass seed already has been furnished to the farmers.

786	COMMONS
Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Douglas


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Yes, crested wheat grass seed has been furnished, but in most cases where it would have been of value the farmers had no feed for their horses, with the result that they could not put in the seed. In many cases the horses are in such weakened condition or have died or been sold, with the result that the farmers are not in a position to put in the grass seed even if it should be given to them. It will be necessary to give not only grass seed but also feed for their horses or fuel for their tractors.
With further reference to the point raised by the right hon. leader of the opposition, before passing on I may say that in the drought area there are areas of land which never should have been opened up for wheat growing. Some of them will have to go back to grass for ranching purposes, and in those areas there will have to be such a movement as has been suggested already by the minister. In the majority of cases, however, proper cover and forage crops will bring back the soil to the point where once more it will be able to produce cereal crops.
Now I should like to say a word1 with regard to water conservation. As I have suggested already, during the drought the main difficulty was that it caught us unprepared. The impounding of water in small bodies would make it possible for a farmer in the drought area at least to keep himself and his stock. The other evening someone said you could not impound water if it was not there, and unfortunately in many districts that is only too true. But in many districts there is water which is not being impounded. In the spring of 1934 I stood at a point twelve miles north of the town of Trossachs and watched many tons of water pouring down into a gully. When I came back three months later, it was a desert where one could not even pasture cattle. Some steps should be taken in such places to catch the freshets in the spring by means of small dams built to hold water so that the horses might be kept alive. This might be done in three ways. First of all, individual dug-outs might be built on the farms. The Minister of Agriculture has said that, despite the fact that the government has been offering $76 for the building of dug-outs, very few of them have been built. The explanation is simple. First of all, it costs $150 to dig a dug-out to the specifications set down by the department, and this means that the farmer must be able to put up the other $75. But that is not the most serious handicap; the real handicap is that the farmer must have the necessary scrapers and these he has to borrow from the municipality. But when he borrows them

and has only his son or a hired man to help him, it takes several weeks to dig the dug-out, and while they are digging it, other farmers in the community have not the use of the scraper. Unless there can be some way of paying the farmers so much per day or supplying feed for their horses and putting in sufficient machinery to enable them to work in groups, no progress will be made. A group of men could dig a dug-out in less than a week, whereas the individual farmer without any assistance will work the entire summer at it. In Manitoba, I understand, the provincial government has put out digging machines with the result that an entire dug-out is made in a day. That is not done in the part of the country I come from, and there is need of it. If every farmer had in his backyard an individual dug-out according to the specifications set by the department, he could see his way through the summer and would be able to keep his stock alive.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Will the dug-outs hold water?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Yes, they will. I had thought the water would seep away, but this has not happened. The ground is so hard that it retains the water. This fall I visited dugouts made a year ago and it did not seem possible that animals had been drinking from them at all.


An hon. MEMBER:: Does the water not get very foul?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Yes; it would not be fit for human consumption, but it is excellent for stock. Another method would be to build small dams in some places. Farmers who have good horses and can buy feed should be able to build these dams very successfully, but a great many of the farmers are not in a position to do this. Again, there is the possibility of putting gangs of men to work. Here I would refer to the United States, though of course I do not suggest that we should follow them slavishly. In North Dakota and Montana I found groups of men working. A farmer working by himself received $4.80 a day, and a man with a team of horses received $8.80.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That was before the election.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: He was allowed only ten day's work. The elections may have had something to do with it, but I know the results were beneficial. It gave the people purchasing power and it gave them supplies of water for their cattle. Another thing that can be done has already been mentioned, and that is the building of municipal dams.

Farm Rehabilitation-Mr. Winkler
Once the problem of storing water has been settled, the next question to be considered is the possibility of retaining the moisture and of preventing evaporation. This could be accomplished by planting shrubs and trees and keeping summer fallow from lying bare by having coverage growing on it.
I suggest that the attitude taken by the Minister of Agriculture this afternoon will be something of an inspiration and encouragement to the people of the drought area. Very frankly, they were discouraged last summer and fall. The Minister of Labour (Mr. Rogers) visited the drought area and some of us hoped that something would come of his visit. Unfortunately, however, he could not spend much time there. He remained two days in the drought area and most of the time he spent in Regina and Moose Jaw. Returning to Ottawa he said to the press that he had been encouraged by his visit. Unfortunately he was the only person on whom the visit had that desirable effect. However, the statement of the Minister of Agriculture leads me to think the government is going to take a more constructive attitude to the problem.
May I suggest to the government that the spending of less than an average of half a million dollars over a period of two years does not begin to touch the problem. It seems to me that in the past two years the government have been penny-wise and pound-foolish, in connection with this scheme. We have spent less than one per cent of what our neighbours to the south have spent in dealing with a similar problem. Five million dollars a year may look like a lot of money, but I submit that the returns warrant it, especially when we remember that in last year's budget we set aside $140,000,000 to meet interest on funded debt, and this year it will be $138,000,000. I remember also that some $3,000,000 went to the railways for maintenance of way work and this year we shall vote in the estimates nearly $300,000 for delegates and decorations in connection with the coronation.


Mr. SPENCE:: What has that to do with the question?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: In sessional paper 129 I see that we are paying to legal counsel in the Turgeon wheat investigation $20 a day living expenses and $200 a day salary. In view of all these expenditures, surely $5,000,000 a year to help to reclaim 75,000 square miles of country and to take care of nearly a million people and make it possible for them to raise their standard of living is not too much. This country cannot give too serious consideration to a group of people who are on the verge of starvation and bankruptcy.
31111-50J


Mr. H. W. WINKLER (Lisgar):: As one representing a constituency lying partly within and partly outside the dried-out area, I wish to make a few remarks. The ground has been pretty well covered, but I would say that whether sunspots or trade winds or other contributing factors have created the condition which exists in western Canada and in certain parts of the United States, we are all agreed on one thing, and that is that it is a national catastrophe. Floods have been regarded as a national calamity in the United States and earthquakes have been so considered elsewhere. These calamities are spectacular, and though the calamity that we are now discussing is not spectacular it is nevertheless just as devastating.
Naturally there are difficulties in connection with the question of boundaries and the minister no doubt fully appreciates this fact. In the district I have the honour to represent there are two rural municipalities that still lie outside the dried-out area, but they are as badly affected as any in southern Manitoba. In fact, last summer I motored over most of the area in southern Manitoba and I can say that there is no area that is in a worse condition than the particular district to which I refer, namely, the municipalities of Stanley and Rhineland. These are only in part affected; nevertheless I am sure that those who have gone over that part will say that those areas are as bad if not worse than any in southern Manitoba. There has been considerable difficulty over these; letters have poured in to the provincial government and representations have been made, and the understanding seems to be that the federal government refuses to consider these areas as part of the federal relief scheme. I have before me a letter dated November 16 last, signed by Mr. Miller, the legislative assembly member for Morden, in which he says:
I have been advised by the provincial government that the government at Ottawa definitely^ refuses to extend the drouth area to take in the southern section of the municipalities of Stanley and Rhineland.
In view of that I put on the order paper last Monday a question which appears at page 631 of Hansard, and the answer clearly indicates that the Department of Agriculture regards this area as not having been requested for inclusion in the area for which the dominion government would be asked to assume responsibility. The minister has just said that the department insists on the province making the recommendation in advance. Apparently no other recommendation was found than the map submitted early in the negotiations. So I suggest that there is room
Farm Rehabilitation Act

for considerable improvement in striking these boundaries. I am confident that ultimately these areas which are so bad will have to be included, but until they are there is going to be a great deal if dissatisfaction. I suggest that the provincial government be required to make a survey, because if they do not there will be municipalities all over the province asking to be included, and if the government depend upon petitions they will go very much astray. I have only one recommendation to make, which is that this government ask the provincial government to make a survey; if that is done, such an area as I have described cannot be overlooked.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, and the house went into committee thereon, Mr. McIntosh in the chair.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.
On section 1-Committees.
Richard Bedford Bennett: Is it proposed to pay these committees?


James Garfield Gardiner: No, there will be no pay.


[Stage Direction]
Section agreed to.
On section 2-Duties of committees.
Richard Bedford Bennett: I find great difficulty in this section. I believe it is a duplication of the existing section, and provides merely that two shall do what one is now authorized by law to do. That cannot be controverted. The position under section 3 of the act of 1935 is that named persons constitute a committee, and the duties of the committee are defined in section 4 of that act. It is now proposed to establish one or more committees, and the section defining the powers of the new committees, as well as of the old, is the same as the existing section 4, with the exception of changing the word "committee" to into "committees" and adding the words "land utilisation and1 land settlement." The first question which suggests itself to me is this: Is it proposed to do away with the advisory committee?-because otherwise the new section means nothing more or less, as I say, than simply the creation of another committee with the same duties as the advisory committee? Perhaps the minister would enlighten us on that.


James Garfield Gardiner: If I thought the section meant what the leader of the opposition has indicated, I would have it redrafted. However, I believe it provides what we wish. As I said this afternoon, a number of committees have already been set up. They are advisory committees, but they advise locally. For example, in connection with the area surrounding the town of Estevan there is a farmers' committee known as an agricultural association, and taking in, I would say, about three or four municipalities. It has no direct connection with the municipal council, but the reeve of one of the municipalities happens to be chairman of it. That committee has been very active, it has taken great interest in the reseeding of areas, providing of water supplies, and organizing methods of digging dug-outs which I described1 this afternoon. This is done without expense to the government. Any time any departmental official or I may have been in the district, we have been willing to sit in with the committee and listen to suggestions they had to make. We have adopted those which seemed good, and have directed1 their activities in connection with other matters. It has not cost the government anything. It is all to the good, and we would like to encourage that kind of thing. The original committee for which there was provision in the act advised strongly in favour of organizations about which I have been speaking. Before I took charge of the federal department, half a dozen organizations similar to the one I have indicated had been set up. In entering upon the work we found that such committees had no legal standing. This year, in making an effort to get someone to take responsibility for the building of some of the community dams, we found that we really had no one to whom we could go who seemed to have any constituted authority to deal with the matter. We believe it would be much better to have power under the act to have more than one committee with the right to advise the government. Of course, if we think it is good, we take the advice of the original committee. Otherwise, we explain our reasons for not following their suggestions.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Well, one cannot change the language of the bill merely by stating that it does not mean this or that. The real truth of the matter is this: This measure wipes out of existence the prairie farm rehabilitation advisory committee. That is number one. And mark you, it does it very clearly. Why should the advisory committee be wiped out? If one looks at section 3, which is printed on the opposite page of the bill, we find the personnel of the committee therein set out.

Farm Rehabilitation Act
When the original measure was passed:, the house give a good deal of thought to it. First of all, the committee was to consist of the following personnel, as set out in paragraphs
(a), (b), (c) et cetera. They are wiped1 out.


James Garfield Gardiner: I would not say they are wiped out.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But they are; the section says so.


James Garfield Gardiner: No. We do not of necessity have to have them, but we can reconstitute the same committee.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Surely the minister is not going to say that. The present measure repeals the provision setting out the personnel of that committee. Let us have no misunderstanding about that.
_ Mr. GARDINER: I can say this, and say it definitely, to the leader of the opposition, that committee is still going to exist, and will be reappointed under this section.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But it cannot exist under that authority, because the authority is being repealed. Let us have no misunderstanding about it. I shall read the new section 3, so that it may appear on Hansard.
1. Section 3 of the Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Act, chapter 23 of the statutes of 1935, is repealed and the following substituted therefor:
"3. (1) The governor in council may establish one or more committees to be known as prairie farm rehabilitation committees, the members of which shall hold oflice during pleasure.
(2) One of the members of each committee shall be appointed chairman thereof by the minister."
That is the whole of the new section 3. The section being repealed is as follows:
3. (1) The governor in council may establish a committee to be known as the prairie farm rehabilitation advisory	committee, hereinafter
called " the committee," the members of which shall hold office during pleasure.
(2)	One of the members of the committee shall be appointed chairman by the governor in council.
(3)	The committee	shall	consist	of	the
following:
(a)	one representative of the Manitoba grain
growing farmers from	the	drought	and	soil
drifting areas;
(b)	one representative of the Saskatchewan gram growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(c)	one representative of the Alberta grain
growing farmers from	the	drought	and	soil
drifting areas;
(d)	one representative of Saskatchewan live stock farmers from the drought areas;
(e)	one representative of Alberta range farmers from the drought areas;
(f)	one representative of mortgage companies of Canada;
(g)	one representative of the Canadian Bankers' Association;
(h)	one representative each from the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways;
(i)	two representatives from the dominion. Department of Agriculture; and
(j)	one representative of the government in each of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta."
This bill repeals all of section 3 in the original act, and the personnel of the committee, in its entirety. Why is that done? The minister says it is proposed to reappoint them. Then, why repeal the statute under which they are already appointed? I cannot understand the position at all.


James Garfield Gardiner: I should like to read the section as it stood originally, and then read the new section.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I have just read it.


James Garfield Gardiner: And I should like to interpret it.
(1) The governor in council may establish a committee to be known as the prairie farm rehabilitation advisory committee, hereinafter called " the committee," the members of which shall hold office during pleasure.
That is section 3 of the present act. Section 3 of this bill simply says this:
(1) The governor in council may establish one or more committees to be known as prairie farm rehabilitation committees, the members of which shall hold office during pleasure.
_ The only difference between the two clauses is that the same committee shall continue to advise, but we may name other committees for similar purposes in connection with similar matters in the areas where they are working. We are suggesting that we should not be compelled to maintain at all times the personnel of the committee as now provided for in the act. But I repeat that there is no present intention of changing that committee.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But they are gone the minute this bill is assented to.


James Garfield Gardiner: Under the old section they could be done away with at pleasure; under that section it was not necessary to maintain them.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No one is suggesting it was. The minister read three lines of section 3 and he did not read subsection 2 and 3, which I have just read and which are the operative sections with respect to this matter. He now says that committee can be removed at pleasure; of course that is true, but they are now being removed by statute, wiped out by statute. I want to know why and I think I have a perfect right to know.
Farm Rehabilitation Act


James Garfield Gardiner: I really do not think it makes a great deal of difference. The old section 3 says that we may wipe them out at pleasure, and section 3 of this bill says that we may wipe them out at pleasure. I am not saying that it is the intention to wipe them out, but the power is there under both sections.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They are wiped out now.


Mr. STEWART:: I think the minister will agree that any committee of this kind should be thoroughly representative of every interest affected in this important and large area. Undoubtedly that was the plan and the purpose of those who drafted section 3 in the act as read. The minister says that the members of that committee may be dismissed at pleasure, but I understand that means the particular individuals shall hold office during pleasure. Under that section 3 you would still have to maintain a committee based upon the lines set out in the section. It seems to me that section was well drawn, and drawn for the purpose of making the committee thoroughly representative. The principle of the old section has been departed from and there is no underlying purpose in the new section. Any person may be appointed. It seems to me that the minister is weakening the act; he is taking a step calculated to make it less effective than it should be, and he has not given any reason why he is departing from the principle I have stated.


Mr. STIRLING:: Does this not mean that the minister desires power to constitute more than one committee and he does not want his hands tied as to who shall comprise those committees? Does he not consider that the membership set forth in the original act would make a good committee for the purposes of the act? If he intends to retain them, why not continue to set out the personnel of the committee?


Mr. ROSS (Moose Jaw):: Could you have four committees all the same?


Richard Bedford Bennett: The fact is that the committee described in the act is not accidental. The committee provided for in the original act is one that came into being after much consultation with many people. It was not an accidental act of the government. It was the most representative committee we could possibly secure. It embraced representatives of every institution and organization concerned in the problems to which reference was made this afternoon.

Whether or not we like it, the bill now being considered by us wipes out that committee. It is no good to say that the committee will be continued, that it will be reappointed; there is no guiding principle as to who it shall be and as to how it shall come into being. The committee is to be wiped out and the minister will then be in a position to appoint a committee composed of as many people or as few as he likes personally. The minister will have complete control over that committee.
The whole principle of the act was, if possible, to get this matter out of politics. It will be observed that the committee was representative of all classes and interests and organizations concerned in this matter in the three prairie provinces. That precluded the possibility of its being political. The only manner in which politics may be said to have entered into the appointment of that committee was in connection with the appointment of the chairman. The minister still has power to appoint a chairman of each committee, but he has repealed the old section in its entirety. The original section set out a list of the organizations from which the selection should be made, but that section disappears. It is idle for the minister to say-I do not think he is really serious-that the committee continues because the minute this bill is assented to, that minute the advisory committee disappears. All the negotiations and discussions and efforts which were made to try to arrive at some basic principle for the appointment of the committee are wiped out. There is no longer provision that the committee shall consist of representatives of the various interested parties and organizations; the appointment of the committees provided for by this bill is to be entirely at the discretion of the minister. In other words, the appointment becomes political, using the word "political" in its proper sense. It is appointment by governor in council without limitation as to who shall be members of the committee.
The limitation which appeared in the old act was not accidental. It took a great deal of time and effort to get that section in the shape in which it is. Mark you, the committee was to be only an advisory committee. There was no suggestion the other day that it was to be wiped out, and I was curious to see what would be suggested about it. That was not stated even this afternoon by the minister. I can readily understand a desire to set up local committees. I said the other day that while that might mitigate to some extent against the national nature of the effort,

Farm Rehabilitation Act
nevertheless I was prepared to concede it. But the national committee is being wiped out; the personnel is being wiped out; the sources from which the new committee is to be selected are no longer indicated in the statute. In other words, they may be members of political organizations instead of members of the various mortgage associations, railway companies and others interested in this matter.
I submit that we should not make this most retrograde step. At a time when we should be concerned about the national interest, we are vesting this matter with purely political considerations. Such a step was not contemplated when this statute was introduced, because section 3 contained a list of the organizations from which the personnel should be drawn. The list was as comprehensive as one could possibly get. It was to include a representative of the Canadian Bankers' Association, of the railway companies, of the live stock and farming interests, and of the three western provinces. There were to be two representatives of the Department of Agriculture, but that did not give them a predominating voice in the advisory committee.
The committee was purely advisory. In his statement of a few days ago the minister certainly did not intimate that the government proposed to repeal the provisions of section 3 with respect to personnel. Nevertheless, that is what is happening. If it is the desire to strengthen the purposes for which this rehabilitation effort was made, the principles that governed in the creation of the committee in the first place should not be departed from.


Mr. McIVOR:: As one who formerly was a farmer I can see the utility of these small committees. Suppose you want to dig a hole in southern Manitoba or build a dam in southern Saskatchewan; I think it would be a foolish waste of time to call together a big committee when a small local committee could deal with the matter far better.


Richard Bedford Bennett: No one has even suggested that. The hon. member for Fort William (Mr. Mclvor) puts a construction on my words that does great violence to his own intelligence. We have said distinctly we are quite ready and willing that there should be small committees to deal with local matters. The advisory committee was a national committee to deal with large problems affecting expenditures of a national kind to be borne by all the people of Canada. That is the reason the provisions are as they appear in the act. Their insertion is not accidental; they were put in after a tremendous effort to try to secure agreement on the part of those concerned-great interests that have a deep
concern in this part of the country, people who have a large amount of money invested there and are concerned also with the larger interests of the welfare of the people-in order that from these voluntary cooperative organizations in the various provinces there should be selected a committee which should destroy any possible chance of the national nature of the effort being made secondary to political considerations.


James Garfield Gardiner: Of course, I do not
know what the leader of the opposition had in mind when the act was first drafted nor do I know what provisions the Minister of Agriculture of that day had in mind, but if either of them had in mind what the right hon. gentleman is now attributing to me, it would have been very easy under this act to do the very thing he says we want to do by amending it. This act reads:
The committee shall consist of the following:
(a)	one representative of the Manitoba grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas.
It does not say that he is to be a member of any farmers' organization. He is selected by the minister and he can be any person at all that the minister sees fit to select from anywhere in Manitoba. Then paragraph (b) reads:
(b)	one representative of the Saskatchewan gram growing farmers from the drought and eon drifting areas.
Again, it does not say that he has to be a member of any grain growers' organization in Saskatchewan; all he has to be is a grain growing farmer in Saskatchewan. Then paragraph (c) reads:
(c)	one representative of the Alberta grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(d)	one representative of Saskatchewan live stock farmers from the drought areas.
Not a member of a farmers' live stock organization or an officer of such an organization, but any individual at all who raises live stock in the province. Then paragraph
(e)	reads:
(e)	one representative of Alberta range farmers from the drought areas.
There is even a distinction in the terms used for Alberta as compared with Saskatchewan. In Saskatchewan it is live stock farmers; in Alberta it is range farmers. Any range farmer at all from the drought area may be selected. Then paragraph (f) reads:
(f)	one representative of mortgage companies of Canada.
Farm Rehabilitation Act

Again, 'he is appointed at the will of the minister, and it may be anyone he desires to appoint. It is not necessarily someone chosen by a mortgage association. Then the subsection continues:
(g)	one representative of the Canadian Bankers' Association;
(h)	one representative each from the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways;	. .
(i)	two representatives from the dominion Department of Agriculture; and
(j)	one representative of the government in each of the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
All I wish to say in respect to that is that these men were appointed by the previous government, and we have not changed a single one of them. So, if there were any politics in the matter when the act was set up, we have not seen fit to play any politics by changing any of the men appointed. They are still there. We have been in office now for considerably over a year administering the act, and I do not know why the leader of the opposition should want to attribute to us intentions to do in the future what we have not done in the past.
In relation to what it is desired that committee or any other committee shall do, I attempted this afternoon to outline one of the things we had in mind to do. We have in mind to call representatives of the mortgage companies, not appointed by us, but appointed by them; representatives of the railway companies, not appointed by us, but appointed by them; representatives of the provincial governments, appointed by themselves; representatives of the rural municipalities in the three provinces, appointed by themselves; representatives of the farmers' organizations, live stock organizations and grain growers' organizations, not appointed by the government, but appointed by themselves. We have in mind to call them together in conference this spring just as soon as the information is available that I indicated this afternoon was being compiled in our office at Regina. Then we hope to ask these people to cooperate with us in dealing with certain problems having to do with the resettlement of areas into which some of these organizations assisted in bringing settlers, in the financing of whose activities some other organizations took a part. I venture to say that if we want advice with regard to that particular matter from any outside group, we would not be calling exactly the same persons who might be appointed. But I am not anticipating any difficulty in that direction. I have already discussed our intentions

with these organizations,, and I know they are prepared to coopera to with us. We have no reason whatsoever for feeling that they think there is going to be any political reason for anything that we are suggesting to them. As a matter of fact, I have always followed the policy; as I think most of us in connection with matters of government have, that the best politics is to deal with this kind of thing in a businesslike way, to call together people who are interested and to discuss the whole matter with them, whether they be Liberals or Tories or whatever they may be, and then, after having discussed it with them, to proceed in a cooperative way to handle the problem before us.
If it is necessary to set up committees that are more or less local in order to carry out the wishes of all these organizations and the wishes of the government, then we desire in this act to have the authority to do that. But we do not know that we would be either strengthening our position or putting these organizations into a position that they would probably like to be in if we are going to call in some other organization which we set up and choose individuals to advise us on what we are going to do when we call them together. Probably there might be reasons for changing the personnel as provided in the original act, and doing other things in connection with the setting up of local committees that are not suggested in the present act at all. The only difference in the powers that are given to " committees " as against " the committee" is contained in the words: "land utilization and land settlement." What is intended to be covered by that is the rearrangement of population in cooperation with railway companies, mortgage companies and others in order to put these people in better relationship to possible water supplies and community pastures.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Chairman, in dealing with the points made by the minister, I have to point out that he is now endeavouring to put on the statute a construction entirely at variance with that which he placed upon it when it was first mentioned in the house. At page 637 of Hansard, in moving that the resolution go to committee, he said:
In moving that this resolution go to the committee of the whole I should like to make a brief explanation. Dealing with the matter of committees I may remind the house that in the act passed in 1935 provision was made for the setting up of an advisory committee. The membership of that committee was indicated, not in its personnel but in regard to the organizations which were to be represented on it. We have had certain experiences during

Farm Rehabilitation Act
the last two years in connection with the carrying on of the work in the different provinces which indicate that it would be desirable to have authority to appoint more than one advisory committee. This particular committee which is provided for in the act as it stands will not necessarily be done away with.
That was the statement made on the motion to go into committee. I do not think the minister is serious in suggesting that the provision respecting one representative each from the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways would be complied: with if the governor in council appointed some persons not connected with either railway. The difficulties of defining with any degree of accuracy the organizations in any of the provinces concerned with farming or ranching so that there would be representatives of those particular industries on the committee would be very great. The reason the word' "range" is used in connection with Alberta is that that is the term used with respect to cattle grazing in that province. Would one say that any person other than a representative of the mortgage companies of Canada could represent those institutions? Would one say that other than a member of the Canadian Bankers' Association could represent that organization? I think the interpretation the minister placed upon the matter the other day was the proper and correct one.
As to the case for the appointment of local committees, I repeat I am satisfied that this may be desirable. I said so to the minister the other day. It may serve a most useful purpose, for the reasons given by the minister this afternoon. If he desires to get rid of the advisory committee, possibly he has power under the statute to do so. If he desires to say that he is not going to be bound by this limitation, as he said very properly, the limitation not upon the personnel but with regard to the organizations which will be represented on the committee, I can understand that, but I should like him to say so. The effect of it is that he merely says this advisory committee is to be wiped out. In its place are to be what are known as prairie farm rehabilitation committees and the advisory committee, which might or might not have served a useful purpose, is to perish. Perhaps the minister would give us the names of the members of the advisory committee, because my recollection is -that they were appointed as representatives of the various organizations to which the statute refers.


James Garfield Gardiner: I have not the list of names before me at the moment, and I would hesitate to try to give them from memory.
I quite agree with what the right hon. gentleman has said. I remember the personnel fairly well, and I know that those I remember were not appointed for political reasons.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But the point is that they were members of these various organizations, the bankers' association, the railways and so on.


James Garfield Gardiner: There were representatives of the railways, the mortgage companies and so on, and some of the other members may belong to stock organizations and grain growing organizations, but they were not appointed as representatives of those organizations.
Mr. COLDWEtLL: If the minister proposes that these gentlemen shall be appointed by or from various organizations, what would be the objection to rewriting the clause, specifying that where they represent organizations they shall be appointed by and from those organizations? Would that not meet the difficulty which has arisen in this discussion? I may say that I do not question the motives of the minister in making this change, but I feel that if it can be specified that certain people shall represent the grain growers, the stock men, the municipalities and so on, probably it will strengthen confidence in the act, particularly in view of the discussion which has just taken place.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Before the minister speaks, Mr. Chairman, may I say I did not suggest that the minister's motives were improper. What I said and what I repeat is that a limitation placed upon the exercise of the power by the minister was a fundamental principle of the statute of 1935. No such limitation now appears, and the appointments -and I was very careful to use the word in its proper sense-are what are described as political appointments. That is, the minister, in the exercise of his discretion as Minister of Agriculture, makes the appointments, and without limitation. As originally framed, the act imposed a limitation, and that limitation was imposed in order to prevent the possibility-I shall put it in that way-of purely political considerations governing with respect to the appointments. I did not suggest, and the minister should not say I did, that he had any improper motive. I was merely describing what is meant under our responsible institutions and representative government when I said the appointment was a political appointment without any limitation as to the classes that should be represented in such appointments. If, for instance, the minister maintained the section as it now stands-and
Farm Rehabilitation Act

as I must confess I thought, until to-night, he intended to do-and added his provision for additional committees, I would understand his position. If, for instance, he disliked the advisory committee he could dismiss it, since I assume its members hold office during pleasure. He could get rid of them, and then if he saw fit to do so he might select political appointees out of these classes. In that case I could not have a word in the world to say.
I am not putting it in that way at all, nor do I intend to put it in that way. I do say, however, that when parliament initiated this legislation, it was extremely concerned about an endeavour being made to place the effort upon a national plane, and the limitation imposed upon the government, which is upon the minister, as to appointments was contained in the statute. Parliament limited the government in the exercise of power; in other words, parliament said that the personnel of that committee should consist of representatives from the various organizations named. The minister says it does not mean representatives from these organizations, but that is how it was read. Certainly with respect to banks, railways and mortgage companies the appointees have to be representatives of those classes. If the act is open to another construction-I do not think it is-that could be easily remedied.
The point I desire to make beyond all question is that parliament, in setting up an advisory rehabilitation committee as distinct from a local committee, differentiated a national concern from a domestic concern; a matter in which all the taxpayers of the country are interested from one in which those who are upon the soil in the localities in question are interested; those who are concerned with their investments from those who have borrowed, and all this is dealt with in this statute by imposing a limitation upon the appointments. If that limitation is no longer observed, I can only say that I think it will militate against the general success of the effort. There never before was a time when there was such crying need for some unity of thought and action with respect to any matter as there is with respect to this. That advisory committee, serving without pay, was selected with these limitations, so that there could not be any possible chance of any racket with respect to it, or any favouritism. It was provided that the Department of Agriculture should have two members on the committee, though not representing it, in order that the minister and the department might be 
kept thoroughly informed and in - a position to make such representations as might be thought desirable to ensure the national nature of the undertaking.


James Garfield Gardiner: Of course, I had nothing to do with the drafting of the original act. but I must say that the leader of the opposition is reading into the act a great deal that does not appear there in terms. Section 3 of the act provides:
The governor in council may establish a committee to be known as the prairie farm rehabilitation advisory committee, hereinafter called "the committee," the members of which shall hold office during pleasure.
Then it goes on to recite where those men may be chosen from. Then the act continues:
4.	The committee shall consider and advise the minister as to the best methods to be adopted to secure the rehabilitation of the drought and soil drifting areas in the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta and to develop and promote within those areas systems of farm practice, tree culture and water supply that will afford greater economic security and to make such representations thereon to the minister as the committee may deem expedient.
5.	No member of the committee shall receive any payment or emolument for his services, but he shall be repaid all actual reasonable travelling or other expenses in connection with the work of the committee.
6.	The minister may appoint such temporary technical, professional and other officers and employees as he may deem necessary and expedient for carrying out the provisions of this act and the salaries and expenses of such officers shall be fixed by the governor in council.
7.	The governor in council may make such regulations as may be necessary or expedient for the effectual execution and "working of this act and the attainment of the intention and objects thereof.
8.	For the purposes of this act the sum of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars shall be appropriated. . . .
9.	The minister shall annually lay before parliament a report of all proceedings under this act for the preceding fiscal year.
That is the whole act. I want to call the attention of the committee to the fact that there is in that act nothing which says that the committee is ever to be called by anyone. There is not a single word to indicate that the committee has to be called. No provision is made for any one having authority to call it at any time. In other words, if I wanted to do what the leader of the opposition seems to imply might be done, all I should have to do would be simply to sit back and not call this committee at all; it would not become effective and we should have no expense in connection with its operations. I do not know what the intention was in drafting the act in that form in the beginning, but that is the

Farm Rehabilitation Act
form of the act. In my opinion, nothing is to be gained by having on the statute books an act that presumes to do something and does not do it. That setting up of the committee has not had any effect on the administration other than that they are. called together from time to time and you listen to the discussions and if you care to adopt their suggestions, very well. But you can do that without having it stated in an act. I have dealt with these men for a long time and I know them well enough to realize they are prepared to go anywhere and discuss any matter such as this without expense to the government. It is their business as well as that of the people who are interested in the area, and they are prepared to meet at any time. On previous occasions I have invited some of the very persons who are on this committee to come from eastern Canada to Regina and discuss matters concerning Saskatchewan, and there has never been any bill to the province. They come and discuss these matters because, as I say, it is their own business as well as that of the people of the province, and I see no necessity whatever for drawing conclusions which are not contained at all in the previous act.
On the other hand, as I have said, I do not see any reason for disbanding that committee, though I can conceive of the committee itself having very strong reasons for asking that I should disband it and appoint other committees, and the main reason is that these are the very people-the last three or four organizations mentioned; that is to say, the mortgage companies, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company and the Canadian National Railways as well as the bankers' association-to whom we are going to go and ask to have certain things done in connection with rehabilitation. I venture to say that they, in fairness to themselves and everyone else, would be the first to suggest that there should be some other form of advisory committee, and if they so suggest I want to be in the position of being able to say that I am not compelled by the act to keep a certain type of committee set up. There is no intention whatever of using the committee for the purposes that seem to be in the mind of the leader of the opposition.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not see how the
minister could seriously make the statement he has just made. He suggests that the act does not provide for calling the committee and that, therefore, it need not be called. But this amending bill does not provide for calling the committees.


James Garfield Gardiner: We left the act as it
was.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister leaves the act as it was; therefore, if it is good now it was good then. I need hardly say, however, that the purpose of framing the act as it was framed was to leave the widest possible discretion and power without limitation, because to endeavour in a statute to state what the limitation should be would be to defeat the very object for which the statute was framed, and the provision with respect to regulations that might be made would be ample if it were necessary to select that very committee in a locality to deal with a purely local matter.
The minister suggests that while the statute provides for the governor in council naming a chairman, it does not provide for the calling of the committee, although it provides for its appointment. Of course, there are certain legal implications that are inherent in a bill of this kind, and it is assumed that the persons thus named will discharge the duties which they are appointed to undertake. And then the chairman is appointed under the statute. The minister says that that committee is being disbanded. That is not what is happening. The committee is being decapitated, it is being put out of business; it no longer has any continuance because the statute that provided for its appointment is being repealed. It is not a question of the disbandment of the committee; it is a question of the dismissal of it by statute. There need be no doubt about that, and I do not think any good reason has been given for it.
The minister also referred to the fact that the representatives of the mortgage companies, the two railways and the bankers' association, making four in all, would be appointed. As, I believe, there are ten other members of the committee, they are placed on the committee for the purpose of enabling their views to be thoroughly canvassed by the other members of the advisory committee in order that the advice given the minister may correspond with what is enacted in the section. But it will be observed that the only change the government has made in the act of 1935, after the criticisms made by the minister as to the looseness with which it is drawn, is to add a section providing for the repeal of the limitation imposed with respect to the appointment of the advisory committee and to abolish that committee and provide for the appointment of one or more committees to be known as prairie farm rehabilitation committees, adding the words "land utilization and land settlement" among the purposes in respect of which the committee is to advise.
Farm, Rehabilitation Act

You cannot have it both ways. You cannot adopt the act as being satisfactory, adding to it only the words I have indicated, and on the other hand say it is entirely unsatisfactory because you need not do anything under it. The whole purpose is to do something under it, and something was done under it. This leads me to ask this further question: Has there been any termination of the services of any of those named under the act to be appointed by the minister? It obviously was intended, not that the committee should make appointments but that it should give advice, and I ask now, whether, by action under the provisions of the statute, there have been, since this government came into office, any dismissals of those who were employed under the act.


James Garfield Gardiner: Since the government came into office, the offices have been moved from Swift Current to Regina. The main reason for that is that in our opinion it is advisable to have the records at a more central point, where many records were gathered in any case in connection with the carrying on of provincial matters. The same man is in charge of the engineering staff now who was then in charge. During the last winter some of the engineering staff were dropped because the work in the winter months was not considered necessary. Some of the same men were taken on in the spring. Not all, but a considerable proportion of the staff is the same now as before.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Who is the chairman? I do not remember.


James Garfield Gardiner: Mr. Vallance is in charge of the whole activity.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Mr. Vallance?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes. Immediately
under Mr. Vallance is Mr. Russell, who, I believe, was taken from the staff of the old Interior department here and sent out. Mr. Jacobs is under Mr. Russell and he also, I believe, was taken from the same organization and sent out. Four or five of the leading men were with the Interior department before the lands were turned over to the provinces. These men were put in charge of the work and are still in charge.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Whose place did Mr. Vallance take?


James Garfield Gardiner: The direction of the work prior to that time was under Mr. Thomson who was in charge at the experimental farm at Swift Current. We considered Mr. Thomson had sufficient work to do in connection with the operation of the farm;

it had always been necessary to have a farm superintendent there; his services are still available.


Richard Bedford Bennett: What salary is paid to Mr. Vallance?


James Garfield Gardiner: The salary is $4,000.


Mr. LEADER:: I do not rise to discuss the legal point at issue, but I wish to point out to the minister what I think must be an omission. Section 3 of the act sets up committees, and what I have to say is in regard to their composition. The act states that the committees shall consist of the following:
(a)	one representative of the Manitoba grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(b)	one representative of the Saskatchewan grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas;
(c)	one representative of the Alberta grain growing farmers from the drought and soil drifting areas.
The house will notice that the three prairie provinces are all represented as far as the grain growing organizations are concerned. Then we have:
(d)	one representative of Saskatchewan live stock farmers from the drought areas;
(e)	one representative of Alberta range farmers from the drought areas.
I do not think the omission is intentional, but the live stock growers of Manitoba are not represented.


Richard Bedford Bennett: That is all wiped out.


James Garfield Gardiner: The proposed amendments make it unnecessary to appoint that committee, as has been pointed out by the leader of the opposition. Under the bill as drafted we could add to the representation on that committee or take away from it. It is not our present intention to do so, but as we go along there may be reasons why that committee should be either added to or members taken from' it or that we should set up new committees.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Could the minister give the committee a short resume of the activities of the advisory committee? I am not sure whether any report of the committee has been laid on the table of the house, but it would be interesting to know how far the committee have gone, what they have accomplished1, what they have recommended, and whether at the stage they have reached it is not almost fatal to disturb or destroy such a committee before they have completed a scheme and made a report. It seems to me that if they have launched any line of inquiry, until they have made a report they should at least be continued and permitted to finish their work.

Farm Rehabilitation Act


James Garfield Gardiner: I am not at the moment
in a position to say how many times they have met, but it is not very often. Since I have taken over the department I have attended one of their meetings, the one held here in Ottawa. I think they held a meeting prior to that in Regina; I am not sure whether they held any others. I am not familiar with the meetings that may .have been held in the fall prior to our coming into office. At the meetings which they held they did consider certain propositions which have been placed before the government to be undertaken under this act; they passed upon them as to feasibility. The greater number of these passed upon have either been completed or are in process of being investigated. I do not think I have anything to say in criticism of the work they have done; I think their work has -been satisfactory to all concerned, but some even of the members themselves have suggested that the meetings might be more or less futile. They have no authority; it is very difficult for them- to say that this thing should be done and the other should not; they simply meet and carry on discussion for the day, get reports from engineers and others and then advise on the reports they get.
As to the amounts that have been expended, I have under my hand the different projects for the two years the work has been carried on, and I think this indicates the scope of the work. Perhaps it would be sufficient if I read a summary of the larger conservation projects in the three provinces:
Wild Horse dam, province of Alberta, $14,990.
Middle Creek reservoir, Saskatchewan, $12,645.41.
Adams lake project, Saskatchewan, $5,429.55.
Municipality of Edward, Manitoba, $10,214.03.
Municipality of Lajord, Saskatchewan, $11,770.
Valmarie project, $123,332.25.
Eastend irrigation project, $63,080.
Canada Land and Irrigation Co., Alberta, $80,000. .
Eastern irrigation project, Alberta, $14,990.
Dam near town of Souris, $4,000.
Crystal City, Manitoba, $2,978.91.
Red Deer gas well, Alberta, $4,378.29.
That is an experimental well put down to discover whether or not gas could be obtained at less than 800 feet, the gas to be used in pumping water for stock in certain areas.
High Creek, to the southwest of the town of Estevan, Saskatchewan, $17,431.08.
Mountain View project, Alberta, $2,500.
Crystal City, further expenditure, $355.30.
wild Horse dam, Alberta, further expenditure, $3,000.
Valmarie, further expenditure, $1,488.72.
That makes a total expenditure in Alberta of $119,858.29; in Saskatchewan, $235,177.01; in Manitoba, $17,548.24.
Those are the types of project upon which this committee would be consulted. Then, on the general work of the department in connection with rehabilitation, such as the digging of dug-outs, all the committee would do in relation to that would be to advise whether or not it is a proper policy to follow. The work from then on would be conducted under the administration of the office which has been set up by the department. The same thing would be true of small dams and other projects. In connection with regrassing, the committee would only be asked their advice in the first instance as to whether re-grassing is a good thing to do. Then, an agreement having been reached as to that, the experimental farm branch would go on with the work. That is the nature of the procedure which has been followed.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: The minister's report
refers more to specific undertakings than to any general comprehensive scheme that would seem to attack the problem along the lines set out in the statute. I should like to know if there are any reports along that line. The minister speaks about the committee considering suggestions made to them-made to them, I assume, by his department. It seems to me that is putting the matter the wrong way about; it is reversing it. The committee was organized, as I understand it, for the purpose of studying the whole problem, all the conditions, and then on its own account making recommendations and developing a plan which over a long period of years was calculated to relieve the unfortunate and distressing conditions to which the minister has referred. I should like to know if there is any report on any action taken by the committee along that line, rather than action dealing with specific projects which may be said to be merely local in their nature and effect, and altogether much less in scale than that contemplated by the act.


James Garfield Gardiner: I would say that the minutes of the meetings held and the discussions conducted would indicate that at the earlier meetings of the committee matters of policy such as have been mentioned were discussed. That is, the question was discussed as to whether it would be a good thing to embark upon a program of strip farming. It was agreed that in certain areas that would be a good thing. Then, the question was further discussed as to whether it would be a good thing, in certain areas or sections where there were marginal lands, to start re-grassing, and it was decided that might be a good thing to do. Advice was given that moneys might be
70S
Farm Rehabilitation Act

expended for that purpose. Another question considered was whether the planting of trees and the formation of protection belts might be of assistance. One or two areas were selected in which experiments along that line were to be tried out. Then it was decided, as a matter of policy, that it might be a good thing to dig a number of dug-outs, and that was agreed upon. It was thought it would be a good thing to build a number of dams on the ravines which, during the greater part of the year, are dry, but which, in the early weeks of the spring, contain considerable water. And the suggestion was that the water should be conserved for stock during the succeeding months. That has been adopted, and work has been carried on along that line.
Then, discussions arose in a meeting as to whether we should assist certain irrigation organizations already in existence. I imagine that even some of those members of the committee might feel themselves a little out of place in discussing and advising on a policy of that kind, because of their relationship to it. In any case, all those matters were discussed and certain lines of policy were laid down. Once the work had been planned, there Was not much more for the committee to do until we had money to embark upon some new line of operation. So far we have not had sufficient to do even all we have been asked to do or all that we might like to do in connection with the policies about which I have been speaking. There are minutes of the meeting showing the decisions on these questions, and favourable decisions were made at that time.
Then, there were projects, such as the building of a dam on the Saskatchewan river, to the northwest of Moose Jaw. This dam would have involved a very heavy expenditure of money, and a further expense would have been involved in connection with pumping the water from the river to the banks. There would have been a further construction of works to carry irrigation to the south and east of the bow of the river. That matter was discussed before the committee. I assume they got their information from exactly the same engineers as would give it to the department or any other body if it were investigating a matter of that kind. The decision was reached that such undertakings were too costly and perhaps would not bring the results expected from them. It was felt that an expenditure of money to that extent would be more or less uneconomical.
Those situations have been discussed before the committee and, as I said a minute ago, we have arrived at the position where, when

the members of the committee are next called together, if we are going to follow out the proposals made this afternoon we might have to suggest to them that, since we are going to be dealing with the organizations named in the legislation, probably they are not the people who should be advising as to whether we should proceed. As I said a minute ago, probably some of these concerns would be the first to see that. I do not think we should be limited by any act as to the exact personnel which must be set up in order to deal with any of the problems put before us in the future.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: I should like to ask again whether there is available any report of the meetings of the committee, or if such a report is referred to in any report of the department.


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes; I have read a complete report of it, and if desired, I can table it.


Richard Bedford Bennett: But has the report called for by statute been tabled? I could not find it the other day, but possibly it has been.


James Garfield Gardiner: It is the report which
is to be laid upon the table annually, and which is described in the statute as "A report of all proceedings under this act for the preceding fiscal year." Yes, that has been done.


Richard Bedford Bennett: and on, and every government has been called upon -to make some payment in connection with lake McGregor and the distribution of water over the areas tributary to this system.
Under these circumstances I feel quite certain the minister will see that the bill does not meet his point at all. If this report has not been tabled, I suggest that it be tabled to-morrow. There are two or three matters in the province in which I lived about which I am very anxious. On one of them the minister spent $80,000 last year, and it may be necessary to make some inquiry with respect to this as the bill progresses.


James Garfield Gardiner: I have no objection to having the committee rise in order that we may give this matter further consideration, but I would just like to say to the leader of the opposition that this is not my suggestion. This suggestion came from those who have been administering this act.


Richard Bedford Bennett: About the local committees?


James Garfield Gardiner: Officials of the department; not from Mr. Vallanee, who is handling the work on the ground, but from others in the department who are in charge. I wish the section to be wide enough so that I can continue this committee if I so desire.


Richard Bedford Bennett: As the section stands now, the committee ' would have to be reappointed.


James Garfield Gardiner: I can reappoint it; that is a very simple matter. I raised the very question brought up by the leader of the opposition. The latter part of the section reads:

and to develop and promote within these areas systems of farm practice, tree culture, water supply, land utilization and land settlement that will afford greater economic security and to make such representations thereon to the minister as the committees may deem expedient.


Richard Bedford Bennett: The minister very frankly says that that is the national nature of the plan as distinguished from what would be considered the local nature.


James Garfield Gardiner: The man who drafted the bill tells me that that part of the section is intended to deal with the very matters the committee has been considering. Under the old section they submitted to the committee questions like these small dams as a matter of general policy.


Richard Bedford Bennett: They did not have to submit them at all; the committee was advisory.


James Garfield Gardiner: They have been using it for that purpose.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think if the minister takes the matter up with the law officers in the light of the discussion to be found on Hansard, they will have no difficulty in realizing that the section does not express what the minister desires it to express. In the evident intention of taking a short cut, they have cut out the very committee which the minister desires to create, that is, the local committee. On the other hand, they have conferred upon the advisory committee powers that are national in their nature.


James Garfield Gardiner: I suggest that the section be allowed to stand.
Section stands.
On section 3-Committees.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I think possibly the minister will want to redraft this section.


James Garfield Gardiner: It had better stand.
Section stands.
On section 4-Appropriations.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I wonder whether the minister thinks it necessary to have that. All it says is that the governor in council may authorize the expenditure. What is called the release of an appropriation takes place as a matter of course after parliament appropriates the money. The Minister of Finance submits to council a recommendation for release of the estimate, and the governor in council may release the estimate of such sums as have been appropriated. I think the minister desires to say there that there may be expended, under whatever direction he may think desirable, under the direction of the minister or of the governor in council, such sums as may be appropriated for said purposes. But to say that the governor in council may authorize the expenditure-well, the very minute we give approval to the estimate we have authorized the expenditure. The minister knows that quite as well as I.


James Garfield Gardiner: I am well aware of that, but we thought it wise to express the idea of continuity. I did not want a limitation on the amount of money which was going to be available. I thought that might well be left to the house and, in turn, to the government after the house had voted the appropriations. The government still has control over the expenditure.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Oh, yes, there is no doubt about that.

Supply-Labour


James Garfield Gardiner: It was dealing with the idea that there is some continuity about this, that it is not just a thing which can be done this year and dropped next year.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: It seems to me the idea of continuity is better preserved in the old section 8 than in this new section. Provision is made there for the work going on for three years, but in this new section no provision is made unless it is appropriated by parliament in subsequent years.


James Garfield Gardiner: The section will not do any harm.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I do not want to seem (o be factious, but I am sure the minister would be the last man in the world to put that section in a statute. It says:
The governor in council may authorize the expenditure in each of the fiscal years from and including 1937-38, up to and including the fiscal year 1939-40 for the purposes of this act, such sum or sums as may be appropriated by pai 1 lament in each of the said fiscal years respectively, for said purposes.
I am sure the minister will see that that does not mean anything. He can easily devise words which will be a combination of the old section and the new to preserve that sense of continuity which I think probably is desirable, because it is notice to everyone that it is a continuing operation, not just a one year campaign but going on not merely for one, two or three years, but, as the minister said this afternoon, probably' for many years. What he wants to say is that this is going to last longer than one year, and an appropriation for one year is an indiea-tion that there are going to be appropriations for other years. I do not believe he will ask us to accept this section as it stands. It would be a reflection on the parliament of Canada to put it in that way. The minister has had much experience and knows that once parliament has voted the money, it is available for the purposes of the appropriation.


Mr. DUNNING:: The right hon. member must take into account that authorizing an expenditure by the governor in council may mean the authorization of a particular expenditure under an appropriation. Where you have many small sums expended, such as has been the experience under this act, the release on the recommendation of the Minister of Finance is of the whole sum voted, but that does not relieve the particular minister concerned from recommending to council expenditures for the purpose of dealing with small projects within the gross total.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Quite so. 31111-51


Charles Avery Dunning: That is really the thought which is in mind.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then it is easily provided* for. You could say that the governor in council may from time to time authorize the expediture, in each of the fiscal years mentioned, of sums that do not exceed the sums appropriated.


Charles Avery Dunning: That is the intention.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I see the point.
Section stands.
_ Mr. BENNETT: Before the committee rises, would the minister make sure about that report?


James Garfield Gardiner: Yes.
Progress reported.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Sanderson in the chair.



DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR

[Stage Direction]
Civil government-
Salaries, $212,685.75.
Contingencies, $30,000.
Mr. MARSHALL:: What is the reason for the increase in this item?
Hon. NORMAN McL. ROGERS (Minister of Labour): As to salaries, there is a decrease as compared with last year due to the abolition, in accordance with P.C. 144/1268 of May 28, 1936, of the position of editor, grade 1, which had not been filled with permanent appointment prior to June 15, 1936. As to contingencies, the increase of $4,000 over the previous year has been found necessary owing to an increase in the activities of the department with a resultant added expense for travelling, long distance telephone, telegraphs and sundries.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: What is the position that was not filled?


Mr. ROGERS:: The position of editor, grade 1, on the Labour Gazette.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Was the vacancy created by death or resignation?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The position was made vacant by retirement.
. *^r- BENINETT: How did he come to retire?


Norman McLeod Rogers: He retired* due to age.


Richard Bedford Bennett: He was superannuated,
I suppose?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes.

Supply-Labour


John Ritchie MacNicol: What do the industrial research clerks do?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They carry out special investigations with the librarian of the department, particularly in connection with the matter which is prepared for publication in the Labour Gazette.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I have been looking
through the details of the vote on page 75 of the estimates. I assume these are permanent members of the staff in the head office at Ottawa. If so, what officers would be looking after the provision of work for the young unemployed' or in directing any works planned by the department to provide employment? What officer of this staff would be assisting in the direction of such work as is performed in the United States by the C.C.C. camps in providing work for young men?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The special supplementary estimates will contain the votes for unemployment and relief. My hon. friend will recall that last year the estimates were divided in that way. We are now dealing with the ordinary expenditures of the Department of Labour, not with the unemployment relief branch. When the special supplementaries are before the committee, I shall be very glad indeed to deal with that question. There is in the list referred to by my hon. friend no official who deals directly with unemployment and relief as apart from the ordinary administration of the department under the deputy minister. Officials who deal directly with unemployment and relief are in a temporary branch of the department for which provision is made in the special supplementary estimates.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Then what does the director of employment service do?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The director of employment service, as I think I explained when the estimates of the department were before the committee on Monday, has general supervision over the employment service of Canada, but that employment service consists of employment offices which are maintained by the provinces on a basis of financial assistance by the dominion under the Employment Offices Coordination Act. That is to say, we contribute $150,000 per year to the maintenance of an employment service. I believe I have already given the figures with regard to that service.


Mr. ELLIOTT (Kindersley):: There seems to be a reduction of one typist, grade 1, $840. Is that an abolished position?


Norman McLeod Rogers: This case is similar to that of the position of editor, grade 1. The position of typist, grade 1, was not filled on June 15, 1936, and was abolished in accordance with the provisions of the order in council dated May 26, 1936.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Then the position has been abolished?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Might I ask the minister whether this would be the appropriate time to discuss the question of the annuities branch, or whether it would be better to take up that matter later.


Norman McLeod Rogers: There is a special vote for the annuities branch, and I think I would prefer to have the discussion come up under that vote.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Very well. There is one question that I might ask, because the matter was under advisement a couple of years ago, in happier days. It is as to whether the translator's office cannot be brought within the bureau for translations. It will be remembered that we endeavoured to effect a substantial saving, and the other evening the Secretary of State (Mr. Rinfret) spoke with great satisfaction as to the results which had been obtained, notwithstanding the attitude which we encountered when we took that action. I should like to know whether the Department of Labour could not bring its translations under that bureau.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The question of whether publications of the Department of Labour should be brought under the translations bureau has been under discussion recently. We have taken the position in the department that while we would be very glad indeed to work out a common arrangement with the translations bureau, we would prefer not to be brought directly under it. The Department of Labour differs a little from other departments in that it has its monthly publication, the Labour Gazette. Certain of the details connected with that publication have rendered it advisable, until the present at all events, that we should not bring our publications wholly within the translations bureau.


Richard Bedford Bennett: Some years ago I regarded that answer as being inadequate, and I certainly think the necessary change would have been made if an accident had not occurred by which the hon. gentleman is where he is this evening. I can readily understand the officials always being opposed to the change. The minister will be advised that it is a very undesirable thing to do. There

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never was in any department a curtailment of employment as to which any person in authority did not advise the minister with upraised hands that to think of doing it would wreck the whole institution. The whole idea is to add to the number; never decrease it. It increases your importance if you are able to maintain a larger number than previously was the case. I know all about that argument; we had to meet it, and we had enough courage to meet it in a way which ultimately brought encomiums from the Secretary of State the other evening.
I suggest that the minister exercise some of. l|lat tyrannical power which is vested in a minister, according to reports I have read in the press from time to time, and see to it that, notwithstanding the advice which may be tendered to him, his good sense is allowed to operate. He knows very well there is $4,800 that need not be spent at all, $3,000 in the one instance and $1,800 in the other. I know that from personal investigation, but I also know there will not be one official of his department who will not advise him, "Oh, no, let us keep on more people for this job! It adds to our importance." The minister will remember what a very distinguished mother is said to have told her son. May I speak as an old man to a younger man, and suggest that my hon. friend be a real minister for ve minutes and end those two positions. Just five minutes is all that is necessary.
My other point is with reference to statistics. The bureau of statistics claims it has all the information that may be necessary for the purpose of supplying a long-suffering and tolerant public with information, and the Department of Labour says, "We could not get along unless we had our machines and statisticians, because we are a little different from anybody else." There never was a department that you tried to cut down that was not different from any other. They are all different; they always will be. Is it necessary to have statisticians as distinct from the statistical department?


Norman McLeod Rogers: My experience and observation thus far lead me to the conclusion that it is desirable to have a statistician in the Department of Labour. I would say this, and feel quite sure the leader of the opposition will agree. The staff of the Department of Labour of Canada, as one sees it enumerated in the estimates, is astonishingly small when one considers the nature of the tasks that are being imposed upon departments of labour in our own and other countries. Certainly I have no desire to retain the services of any members of the department who are not performing their work as it ought to be done. 31111-51}


Richard Bedford Bennett: I did not say that: I was not suggesting that.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I wholly agree that we should make every effort to avoid duplication. When I came to the Department of Labour I was struck with the fact that there was a bureau of statistics and that some of the departments of the government also had their own statisticians. The publication of the Labour Gazette requires a continuous and concentrated attention to statistical data, which convinces me of the utility of such an official at the present time. As to the translations matter, I am not prepared to say that there might not be some economy in bringing the publications of the department under the translations bureau. As I said a few moments ago, the matter has been under advisement quite recently. I can assure the leader of the opposition that I shall be glad to reconsider it and to apply what common sense I have to the reasons that are given for retaining the publications within the department.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I am sure that if the hon. gentleman applies the common sense which he possesses, there will be two positions fewer in the department. There is one point I have not been able to satisfy myself upon. I did not have time in my day to press the matter as I should have liked, but it seems to me that the payment to the actuaries, having regard to the tremendous implications that arise from their position with respect to annuities, is not at all in keeping with the payment of $1,800 to a confidential messenger, the actuarial assistant receiving $1,920. It was one of those things that I could not get around to.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The confidential messenger's salary is $1,320.


Richard Bedford Bennett: I meant to say $1,320. The assistant actuary certainly has pretty large possibilities for increasing the charges on the public of our annuities branch, because upon his determination more or less rest rates and the settlement of many problems connected with annuities. The insurance branch does a large amount of business in connection with this matter and we all know what the report is. We are, of course, losing money in the annuities branch. I shall not discuss that to-night, but it is a matter we intended to deal with, and when the subject comes up the minister will have fortified himself with sufficient information to satisfy my not unreasonable thirst for knowledge in that regard.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The rates W9re increased.

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Richard Bedford Bennett: I know that.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Will the minister tell me how the work performed by the senior fair wage investigator and mediator fits in with item 175 passed some days ago?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The salaries are provided under the present vote. The conciliation and labour vote covered the expenses in connection with the performance of the conciliation services. The salary of the officer is provided under the present vote.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is the work of the fair wage officer the same as that taken care of under item 175?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The title is chief conciliation and fair wage officer.


Mr. LAWSON:: Coming back to the salary of the actuarial assistant, I see that it is the same as it was last year. Does that mean that he is at the maximum of his classification under the civil service? Apparently there is no statutory increase in that case.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The maximum for the
actuarial assistant is $1,920, but I would point out, particularly with reference to what was said a moment ago by the leader of the opposition, that there is also provision for two senior actuarial assistants at a higher rate of salary.


James Earl Lawson: Are they listed now?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They are listed just above __two senior actuarial assistants.


Mr. HEAPS:: What are the qualifications of these actuarial assistants?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The qualifications are laid
down by the civil service commission. I can only say that they do require specialized knowledge of higher mathematics.


Abraham Albert Heaps: Must they have passed the
Chartered Accountant examination?


Norman McLeod Rogers: That is not a requirement.


Otto Buchanan Elliott: What are
the duties of a confidential messenger?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I have not had very close contact with the confidential messenger mentioned in this list, but he does perform the duties of messenger between different branches, and he also attends to filing. I believe one finds confidential messengers in most departments of the government.


Mr. MacNEIL:: To what extent does this
vote provide for salaries of those officers of the department who are engaged in the work of the employment service of Canada?
I'M*. Rogers..]


Norman McLeod Rogers: The salaries of headquarters' office are included under the present vote.


Charles Grant MacNeil: What is the total personnel of those assigned by the department to the employment service?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There are twenty-seven
permanent and two temporary employees in that branch, and the director.


Charles Grant MacNeil: The other evening, when
this matter was under discussion, I directed to the minister some inquiries with reference to the Employment Service of Canada. I find that in consequence of what I said because of representations made to me, and because of the publicity that ensued, an unfortunate impression has been created that I intended to charge the officers of the department with laxity in the discharge of their duties. That was not my intention. I had hoped that it might be possible to extend the facilities of the Employment Service of Canada, but I had no reason to suggest at any time that the officers of the department condoned any practice which might expose young women seeking employment to unscrupulous exploitation. I wish to make that explanation in all fairness to the officers of the employment service.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I appreciate very much the statement made by my hon. friend. I did not understand him to make any specific charge against any officer of the employment service when he spoke some days ago. I believe I did assure him at that time that I felt certain that the officials of the various employment bureaux appointed as they are by the provincial governments, would be just as anxious as any officials of the headquarters' staff to prevent abuses of the kind he described.


Abraham Albert Heaps: The other evening the minister intimated to the committee that the department would probably appoint four additional men to study and become efficient in the work of conciliation. Is any provision being made in the estimates to cover work of that sort?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The authorization by the civil service commission did not go through in time for inclusion in the present estimates. The necessary provision will have to be made in the supplementary estimates.


Abraham Albert Heaps: In that case is it the intention that members of the existing staff retire in the coming year?

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Norman McLeod Rogers: I believe I informed the committee some days ago that two members of the conciliation service are approaching the retirement age. Provision has been made for extending the employment of one of the conciliation officers. I feel that if we can retain their services for the time being, it would be an advantage to do so, particularly as we wish the junior conciliation officers to have the benefit of their experience.


Abraham Albert Heaps: I observe that in many provinces men are employed by the various departments of labour to perform a duty similar to that performed by those of the federal department. Is an effort made to have officials of the federal and provincial departments work in conjunction, or do they work separately? It seems to me there is bound to be a certain amount of overlapping; I have in mind what happened in Welland in the last few days. This overlapping is bound to lead to friction. Does the federal department work in close harmony with the provincial bureaux of labour or the ministers in the various provinces?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There has been the utmost cooperation in the conciliation work which is done by the federal Department of Labour and that done by the provincial departments. Not all provincial departments of labour have conciliation officers. Quebec and Ontario at any rate have officers who specialize in conciliation work. At Welland representatives of the federal department and the Ontario department were on the scene of the dispute at the same time and worked with the utmost harmony. There is a possibility of duplication, and possibly of conflict, but normally the federal department sends its conciliation officers when the parties request the services of such an officer. The federal department has had perhaps a wider experience in this type of work, and generally speaking it does not happen that you have a conciliation officer of the federal department working with one from a provincial department in seeking to bring about settlement of a dispute.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Does the work of the chief conciliation officer coordinate with the work provided for under vote 174?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Item 174, which passed the committee on Monday, covers the publication of the Labour Gazette, and travelling and sundry expenses connected with the administration of the Conciliation and Labour Act.


John Ritchie MacNicol: And the salary of this officer?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The salary of the officer is covered under the present vote.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Under contingencies,
what is embraced in the items: clerical and other assistance, $9,972, printing and stationery, $9,000 and sundries, $11,028?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The item of salaries in the contingency vote covers the office staff of the ministers department.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Is there a list?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I have a list before me. Does my hon. friend wish the names and the salaries paid?


John Ritchie MacNicol: I have been trying to find it in the auditor general's report. If it is salaries, why is it not enumerated just as they are above under some one of the various branches?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I believe this is customary. The salaries listed under civil government are salaries of permanent officers of the department. The staff of the minister's office is not permanent; it is on a temporary status.


John Ritchie MacNicol: The salaries under contingencies are not permanent?


Norman McLeod Rogers: They are temporary employees in the minister's office.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Under the organization which has been built up by the National Employment Commission, have not some of the duties which were formerly discharged by the regular staff of the department been taken over by that organization? If that be so, should there not be some decrease in the staff? Then I notice one official in particular, an accountant. I know that in other departments the comptroller reorganized and took over the accounting very largely under his staff. Does that apply with respect to that particular official?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The accountant referred to by my hon. friend is a permanent officer of the department, has been there for many years, and is in charge of the personnel. As far as the general accounting service is concerned, the Department of Labour has cooperated with the comptroller of the treasury in the effort to concentrate the accounting under one supervising head.
As to whether certain duties formerly discharged by members of the department have not now been transferred to the National Employment Commission, I would remind the hon. member that we are dealing, under the civil government vote, with the permanent staff of the Department of Labour, a staff which was not expanded to any extent during
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the years of the depression. There has been a certain transfer of responsibility from the unemployment relief branch of the Department of Labour, which branch is on a purely temporary basis. That staff has been decreased to some extent in consequence.


Hugh Alexander Stewart: Is the accountant to whom the minister refers on the staff of the comptroller or on the staff of the department? In the other departments I understand the ac-cpuntants are on the staff of the comptroller of the treasury.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I am informed that the accountant referred to is Miss Dewan. She is a link as it were with the civil service commission and is in charge of personnel. I gather that she does not do very much accounting work.


John Ritchie MacNicol: The increase in the sundries item under contingencies seems very large in comparison with the whole item. The vote before us is for SI 1.028. whereas a year ago it was $7,055. Would the minister let us know what the $11,028 covers, or what it is proposed to cover?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There is an increase of about $4,000 over last year. As I explained a few minutes ago, that is accounted for by the increased activities of the department, with addled expenditures for travelling, long distance telephone sendee, telegrams, and sundries. It is a very small increase, but it has been put in to meet what we believe will be an increase during the coming year under the heads mentioned.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Are these expenditures
under unemployment relief works?


Norman McLeod Rogers: It is the work of the department, generally, and does not cover the unemployment relief branch at all. That is a temporary branch of the department, which is not included in the estimate before the committee.
Mr, MacNICOL:	The item has been increased by fifty per cent. There must be an increase of fifty per cent in the work to be done under that particular item.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Perhaps I should give the hon. member a statement of the sundries during the current year. They are:
Travelling expenses, $1,120.04.
Telephone and telegrams, $2,454.53.
Printing and stationery, $2,872.15.
Subscriptions to newspapers and periodicals, $235.42.
' Other sundries, $1,843.46.
The last item includes cartage, express, freight and advertising.


Mr. BROOKS:: Would the minister state the difference between the western representative and the general eastern representative? Would he state their duties, and why one is called the western representative and the term "general" applied to the eastern representative ?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Mr. Harrison is the western representative. He is also the conciliation and fair wage officer for that district. Mr. Quirk is the eastern representative. He occupied a similar position for Quebec and the maritime provinces. That is to say, he is available to deal with fair wage complaints, or to serve as a conciliation officer in the entire area.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: That is why he is called "general," is it?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes.
' Mr. LAWSON: Under the contingency item of "clerical and other assistance," to which the hon. member for Davenport referred I should like to ask one or two questions. I did not follow up the point because I thought $9,972 would include the private secretary. However, I see the private secretary is in a separate estimate, and I should like the minister to be good enough to give details of the item amounting to $9,972. I do not want the names, but what positions are involved?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Secretary to the executive in the minister's office; two clerks, grade four; a stenographer, grade two, in the minister's office, a stenographer, grade three in the minister's office, a confidential messenger in the minister's office; one stenographer, grade two. May I add that in the Department of Labour of necessity in these times there is a great volume of correspondence, and for that reason it has been necessary to increase the stenographic assistance in the-office.


James Earl Lawson: Does the secretary to the executive mean the young lady who does the work dictated by the private secretary to the minister?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes; that is correct.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
International labour conference, $15,000.
Mr. MacINNIS:: Was Canada represented at the last meeting of the international labour conference in October of this year?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Canada was represented. I take it the hon. member refers to the special conference dealing with maritime questions.


Angus MacInnis: Yes.

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Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes; Canada was represented. The government representatives were Doctor Riddel], permanent advisory officer at Geneva, and during its earlier sessions I, too, attended. The representation is a tripartite one. At the conference there was a representative of the employers interested, and also of -the employees' organization. Mr. Mac-Callum represented the employers and Mr. MacDonald represented the employees.


James Alexander Marshall: How much of the last vote was actually used?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Last year's vote was exceeded -by $600 owing largely to the fact that in addition to -the usual international labour conference held in June, there was the special conference on maritime questions held in October.


James Alexander Marshall: Does that mean an expenditure of $15,600?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Yes; that is correct.


Angus MacInnis: I believe a number of important conventions were adopted at the special maritime conference. I wonder whether the minister could tell the committee how the Canadian representatives voted on these conventions?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I have not before me the report giving the exact information the hon. member requires. I can say however, that the Canadian delegates-and I take it the hon. member refers to the governmental delegates- supported most of the conventions before the conference, but I would hesitate to make a statement concerning each convention. It would be of no service -to the committee unless the information were exact. I shall be pleased to secure the information later-.


Angus MacInnis: My next question may be considered as one touching on government policy. However, as I understand it, at present these maritime matters are under the jurisdiction of the federal government, and I do not think there would be any legal obstacles in the way of the dominion's ratification of the conventions. Could the minister inform the committee as to the intention to bring down legislation at this session ratifying these conventions?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The conventions dealt with by the maritime conference in October last were as follows:
Draft convention concerning the regulation of hours of work on board ship and manning.
Recommendation concerning the regulation of hours of work on board ship and manning.
Draft convention concerning the liability of the ship owner in ease of sickness, injury or death of seamen.
Draft convention concerning sickness insurance for seamen.
Recommendation concerning the promotion of seamen's welfare in ports.
Draft convention concerning the minimum requirement of professional capacity for masters and officers on board merchant ship.
I may say that the complete and official text of these various conventions was received only yesterday from the League of Nations. According to practice, these conventions are being brought to the attention of the Department of Justice. They will then be directed to the particular department of government which is chiefly concerned, in this case the Department of Transport.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Limitation of Hours of Work Act, Weekly Rest in Industrial Undertakings Act, and the Minimum Wages Act, $10,000.
James Earl Lawson: I had almost anticipated the minister advising us of the abandonment of this item, in view of the recent decisions. Would- he be good enough to state for what purposes this vote is now required?


Norman McLeod Rogers: As my hon. friend will realize, this particular item was included in the estimates before the decisions of the privy council were announced. It is of the same description and amount as the item that was inserted in) the estimates last year. At that time we felt that there was some possibility of expenditures being needed in connection with setting up inspectional staffs and possibly for drawing up regulations under these various statutes. I doubt whether we ought to eliminate this item at the present time. I think it might stand in the possible event that it might prove of value to have a conference with the provinces with respect to this legislation.


James Earl Lawson: What amount was expended last year?	.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Some $2,100, entirely in connection with drawing up regulations in anticipation of the possible decisions of the court.
Mr. LAW-SON: If only $2,100 was required last year, I would suggest that it is difficult to conceive that the calling of a conference of representatives of the provinces would involve an expenditure of $10,000. I think the minister must have in mind some more definite use than that when he asks that this item be left in the estimates.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I assure my hon. friend that I have no designs beyond what I have suggested. It is simply there, as I see it, to meet what might be a very remote contingency, that is, the desirability of having a conference
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with the provinces in connection with the subject matters of this legislation. As I have stated before, this item was included in the estimates before the decisions of the judicial committee of the privy council were announced. It does seem to me that it might be of some value to have it remain.


James Earl Lawson: Is this one of those votes that lapses if it is not used for the purpose indicated, or can it be used for some other purpose?


Norman McLeod Rogers: If it is not used for the purpose indicated, it cannot be used at all.


Daniel (Dan) McIvor: Has this item anything to do with the enforcement of the eight hour day for unorganized labour? I know of unorganized workers who do not have an eight hour day or who do. not get one day of rest in seven.


Norman McLeod Rogers: This item was included to provide for the administration of the Limitation of Hours of Work Act, the Weekly Rest in Industrial Undertakings Act and the Minimum Wages Act, assuming that these statutes were upheld by the judicial committee of the privy council. The judicial committee has ruled against their validity, and the item is retained against the contingency of a conference being held with the provinces to consider the subject matter of the legislation.


John Ritchie MacNicol: First of all, I want to express my regret for the fact that the legislation passed by the former government has been disallowed by the privy council. I hope the minister will use his most vigorous efforts to continue the line of activity of the last government to do something for labour. The previous government never received the credit they should have received for the honest efforts they made to help workmen throughout the country. They endeavoured to see that there was no violation of the minimum wage law, that the workers should work only for a reasonable week and that the hours of labour per day should be limited. When the legislation proposed by the late government was going through the house, the draft conventions and recommendations of the international labour conferences from 1919 to 1934 were referred to. I believe that at that time the then member for Kenora-Rainy River, who had previously been the Minister of Labour, the Hon. Mr. Heenan, supported the efforts of the government to relieve the disabilities under which workmen are now labouring. Article I of draft convention number 26 reads:
Each member of the international labour organization which ratifies this convention undertakes to create or maintain machinery whereby minimum rates of wages can be fixed

for workers employed in certain of the trades or parts of trades (and in particular in home working trades) in which no arrangements exist for the effective regulation of wages by collective agreement or other-wise and wages are exceptionally low.
It is about time that we had some law in Canada to control the rates as to minimum wages. Where there is no control over wages, we have sweat shop conditions, and there is too much of that in this country. For years the International Labour Union has endeavoured to induce all governments to adopt minimum wage laws. I am one of those who like to support the efforts of this union and the unions associated with it in Canada to ensure better conditions for the working man in the way of better wages and treatment. I am not one of those who condemn industry. My observations have been that industry generally treats the labouring man fairly. There is the odd industrialist who brings censure on industry generally. It was to take care of that odd man who does not treat labour properly that these draft conventions respecting minimum wages, hours of labour and the weekly day of rest were adopted. The minister, I am convinced, has at heart the best interests of the workers of this country, and I sincerely hope that he will achieve something along these lines. We read almost daily of men and women working an outrageous number of hours per week, apparently because the federal government has not sufficient authority, as I am convinced it should have, to enforce its will in this regard in the various provinces.
The time is past when one province or another-and I have no particular province in mind at the moment-should permit conditions to prevail in factories, which conditions another province would not tolerate for one minute. I am convinced the time has come- and I am sorry the privy council did not see it in that way-when this parliament should endeavour to bring about uniform conditions in labour from one end of Canada to the other. Uniform conditions in labour throughout Canada would work against the practice of employers in one province moving their whole plant to another province where labour restrictions are not as severe. I could name offhand a number, and I could easily obtain a list of perhaps fifty factories that in the last few years have moved from the city of Toronto to another province than Ontario, because in Toronto so far as possible industrialists are induced by compulsion, public opinion, and perhaps by the local government, which I believe does endeavour to carry out the majority will of the operators in this regard, to provide decent working conditions.

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These firms have moved outside the province of Ontario to where they can operate without the restrictions prevailing in Toronto. I hope the day is not far distant when employers in all the provinces of Canada will have to maintain in their factories more reasonable conditions than obtain in some places to-day.
Something was said the other day about the posting of wages. I am in accord with that. I believe that men working in factories should know what is being paid for the various grades of work therein. That is all provided for in the draft convention concerning the creation of minimum wage fixing machinery. I quote from section IV:
For effectively protecting the wages of the workers concerned and safeguarding the employers affected against the possibility of unfair competition-
That is surely one thing which this government should have power to ensure, protection against unfair competition.
-the measures to be taken to ensure that wages are not paid at less than the minimum rates which have been fixed should include
(a)	arrangements for informing the employers and workers of the rates enforced;
The workers should know what those rates are. A few days ago in this house it was stated that certain workers were not able to obtain the rates in force. It is surely their privilege to know how what they are being paid compare with rates being paid elsewhere. They should know that they are receiving a return equal to what is paid elsewhere. The section continues:
(b)	official supervision of the rates actually being paid; and
(c)	penalties for infringements of the rates in force and measures for preventing such infringements.
This vote is a very small one, and I do not know just what the minister can do with it. But if it would help him to call a provincial conference which might be induced to recommend that this government and the minister and his department shall have more control over minimum wages, the limitation of hours of labour, and the weekly day of rest, he would be doing a wonderful work for $10,000, a work that would be worth many times the vote. I wish the minister every success in such work. I believe he is earnest in his intentions, and I should like to see him obtain such recommendations from a provincial conference that he might obtain power to ensure fair play for the workers throughout this country.
When I stop to think of the throwing out of an act that was passed by the late government, the unemployment insurance act, I can hardly find words to express my feelings.
What is the result to-day? I have no hesitation in saying that it was one of the greatest social acts enacted by a British parliament. The workers in England are working full blast making munitions to-day. When that work slows up many thousands of men may be thrown out of work, but every man who is thus thrown out of work will, during his years of employment, have laid up for himself a fairly substantial unemployment insurance pension which he will find very helpful in the years when work is slack. I hope they will not be unemployed, because a steady wage is better than unemployment insurance. But next to a steady wage, unemployment insurance is the very best thing I know, and I sincerely hope that the minister, during his term of office, may be able to bring that great boon to the workers of this country.
I am not going to discuss the subject tonight because I spoke on it when the bill was before the house, but I may say that it is one of which I have made a very exhaustive and extensive study, examining into conditions in Europe and other countries. I do hope the minister with his sincerity will be able to bring this boon to the working men of Canada. I know that this subject does not come under this item, but all these questions are inter-related because a minimum wage, if enforced, will eliminate the sweat-shops, and the elimination of sweat-shops will provide more men and women with employment. The limitation of the hours of labour-in some places in Canada the workers work sixty, seventy and eighty hours a week-and the reduction of the hours of labour to what these draft conventions call for, forty-eight hours a week, will result in the giving of employment to many thousands of men now unemployed. The weekly day of rest, if enforced, will give many thousands more men and women employment. I know the minister is an idealist, and it is up to him now to put many of these things into practice by whatever means he can employ, using persuasion and all the force of his character to bring each one of these boons to the working men of Canada. The working men and women of Canada have been too long without them. I give the late government credit; it certainly made an honest and vigorous attempt to provide these boons to the working classes of this country. It is true that the acts were thrown out, but it would be unfortunate if the good things the working men of these nine provinces of Canada ought to have should be denied them because we have nine provinces. I certainly hope the miniate" will be able to
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do something which will bring these matters under the control of the department of which he has charge.
I cannot speak for the labour organizations, but I have seen their work, and during the time I was associated with business we had the benefit of the experience and assistance of sound labour organizations at all times. At that time, when I was in business, I believe the international labour organization of Washington and its counterpart here in Canada rendered actual service to industry. I am not one of those who attack these labour organizations, because I know what they do. When we had any trouble in the plant with which I was associated, invariably the labour organizations which directed or controlled men in that plant tried, by conciliation, to keep those men employed and never, so far as I can remember, induced them to go on strike if it could be avoided. A labour organization which does that does good work. In my twenty-five years in industry I saw many fine improvements which were recommended by labour organizations. I am sure, if the minister would attend the next nation-wide meeting of the Canadian labour organizations and present the benefits of minimum wages, one day of rest in seven and so on, with all of which the working people are familiar, they would assist him in obtaining from the provinces, by conciliation and agreement, the necessary support to enable him to have placed on the statute books of Canada legislation that would be beneficial to the country as a whole.
We are asked to-night to vote a fairly substantial bill of salaries. Perhaps it is not enough for what the men and women in the department are doing; I do not know. I am not in any way criticising or finding fault, or doing anything but praising the staff under the minister. But it is a fairly substantial staff and its purpose should be, and I believe is, to assist labour. If that department can get under its control all the things I have mentioned, then it will be a real, one hundred per cent labour department.
Mr. MaeINNIS: Before we leave this item, I should like to ask a question with regard to the $100,000 in aid of technical education, authorized by statute. Was the entire amount of $100,000 which was appropriated last year paid out in technical education grants?


Norman McLeod Rogers: Of the amount of $100,000 available, the following amounts were paid: To Nova Scotia, $22,261.24; to Manitoba, $14,099.12; to Saskatchewan, $21,633.73; or a total of $57,894.09. That expenditure was from April 1, 1936, to December 31, 1936.

Mr. MaeINNIS: How is this money paid? Is it paid on application by the educational department of the province? What are the conditions that must be fulfilled before the province may take advantage of it? I note that there was no payment to British Columbia, yet we have some very good technical schools in that province.


Norman McLeod Rogers: The explanation is this: the Technical Education Act provided for an appropriation over a period of years, that sum of money to be divided among the provinces on the basis of population. Not all the provinces took up the full allowance available to them under the act, which has been amended twice, the last amendment being made in 1934. That amendment simply provides that any portion of the $10,000,000 appropriated under the act which may remain unexpended at the expiration of the fiscal year ended the 31st day of March, 1934, whether previously carried forward or not, shall be carried forward and remain available according to its apportionment for the purposes of the act during any one or more of the five succeeding fiscal years, and no portion of the said $10,000,000 shall be paid to any province after the 31st day of March, 1939. So it is only in the case of a few provinces that the allowance is still made available under the section to which I have just referred.	'
Mr. MaeINNIS: How much of the $10,000,000 is still unappropriated?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The total sum unappropriated is $369,536.24, and the appropriation from year to year has been put in at $100,000, for the very simple reason that this amount has been more than enough to cover the applications from the provinces which still have claims to make on that amount.


Mr. GREEN:: Are any arrangements being made to call a conference with the provinces in order to try to work out some way of enacting this social legislation?


Norman McLeod Rogers: No arrangements have as yet been made. As my hon. friend is aware, the text of the decisions of the privy council was received only within the last day or so, and it appears in the Votes and Proceedings of to-day. The matter is receiving the consideration of the Department of Justice and also of the other departments particularly concerned, including the Department of Labour.


Howard Charles Green: May I ask if it is the intention to call such a conference?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I would prefer not to state at the moment, on my own authority, whether

Supply-Labour
such a conference would be called. Obviously if it were called, that would be done by the government and not by the minister of a department.


Mr. GRAYDON:: I assume I need not draw to the attention of the minister the great importance of the social legislation and its fate when it was brought before the judicial committee of the privy council some time ago. In almost every quarter where there is labour feeling, in my constituency and in other places throughout the province from which I come, the matter of the social legislation which was passed by the late government has assumed very great moment indeed.
I should like to point out to the minister, who I know has the matter in hand and who is very anxious that something concrete should be done, that this is one of the most important problems facing the government of the day. I would point out further that wherever you speak to the labouring men in industry or on the street, the same questions come up-the eight hour day and' the minimum wage legislation. In the last week I have talked with many people employed in industry and they are very much concerned over the attitude of the government of the day with respect to the enacting of legislation of this kind on a permanent basis. The eight hour day, the question of minimum wages and the question of unemployment insurance in the dominion at large are matters that vitally concern the labouring people in Canada. I submit that something should be done at once to implement the suggestion madte by the hon. member for Vancouver South a few moments ago, and that no time should be lost in calling a conference or at least in doing something along these lines, because the labouring people demand that the government shall do something worth while for them and do it quickly.


Angus MacInnis: Has the minister by him the number of provinces that have already enacted the legislation mentioned here, with regard' to limitation of hours and the minimum wage?


Norman McLeod Rogers: None of the provinces, to my knowledge, has enacted legislation precisely in these terms, and I have not before me a statement of the legislation respecting hours and minimum wages existing in the various provinces. Most of the provinces have statutes covering both hours and minimum wages, generally minimum wages only for women.


Mr. RYAN:: Is there a fair wage officer in the maritime provinces?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The eastern representative, Mr. Quirk, whose office is at Montreal, covers a territory including the maritime provinces. He does this in the same way as the western representative with an office at Vancouver covers the prairie provinces and British Columbia.


William Michael Ryan: I would point out to the
minister that the people of the maritimes are urging the appointment of a fair wage officer to be located in the maritime provinces. I appreciate the fact that the work is being done from Montreal and I have no particular criticism of the officer, but it has been brought to my attention at different times that there is a desire to have an officer appointed for the maritime provinces, to be located there, and I suggest that the most suitable place would be somewhere in New Brunswick, possibly Saint John.


Norman McLeod Rogers: Other suitable places have been suggested.


Mr. FINN:: I may say for the information of the hon. member for St. John-Albert that there was a fair wage officer at Halifax and he was removed by the late administration. Mr. Quirk comes from Halifax and has always been most satisfactory in every respect. I am only too pleased to be able to make that statement. I do think that the minister, together with his deputy and his assistants, might take into consideration the suggestion made by the hon. member for St. John-Albert, but I must add that I cannot endorse the idea that an officer should be moved from Halifax and the new appointee be located in Saint John.


Mr. LANDERYOU:: Are there any employees working on government projects or in government offices more than eight hours a day or six days a week? I have been informed that there are individuals who do.


Norman McLeod Rogers: If there are any complaints of that kind I shall be glad to have them brought to my attention, and if they fall within the Fair Wage Act it is the duty of the Department of Labour to see that the matter is rectified. It may be that certain projects are excepted from the operation of the Fair Wage Act. The act itself provides for such exception by order in council, but from the information given by my hon. friend I am not able to say whether the eight hour day is being exceeded in any particular project.


John Charles Landeryou: The complaint made to me has reference to firemen working in

Supply-Labour
the barracks in the city of Calgary. I was informed that they were working seven days a week and sometimes fen hours a day.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I shall be glad to look into the matter.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Are there more than two fair wage officers in Canada?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There are four in all.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Where are they located?


Norman McLeod Rogers: One in Vancouver, one in Toronto, one in Ottawa and one in Montreal.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: Has any section of the dominion complained that it has not received proper attention from these officers?


Norman McLeod Rogers: There have been suggestions from time to time that there should be a fair wage officer resident in the maritime provinces. The matter referred to a moment ago by the hon. member for St. John-Albert has received the attention of the department, and we realize that there are some reasons- particularly the question of easy access in cases of dispute-which seem to recommend the appointment of a fair wage officer in the maritime provinces. On the other hand, we have not yet been convinced that the eastern representative is not able to work satisfactorily. It will be remembered that provision is now being made for the appointment of four junior conciliation officers, and with that addition to the staff it may be possible to meet the situation which we have been discussing.


James Alexander Marshall: Under the act for the organization and coordination of employment services, what is the amount of the subventions paid to the various provinces?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I take it the hon. member wants to have the apportionment of the 8150,000 among the various provinces?


James Alexander Marshall: Yes.


Robert Emmett Finn: The minister speaks of four special officers who are practically undersecretaries in his department, and I gather from what he has said that perhaps one of these might be assigned to the maritimes. Am I correct?


Norman McLeod Rogers: I think that might meet the situation.


Robert Emmett Finn: I think the policy shall be to appoint as fair wage officer a person who is in contact with and has the viewpoint of the interests of the various sections of Canada and knows the industry in which labour is employed. Mr. Martin held that position at Halifax and his services were dispensed IMr. I.anderyou.]
with by the late administration. The person appointed should be one who has knowledge of local conditions in the maritime provinces, if there is to be one for the three provinces, and is in sympathy with the industries there and with labour generally. When these juniors to be appointed have become acquainted with local conditions it might be wise-I do not say it would-to consider assigning them to these various duties, in order to keep down the expenditure of the department. But I concur in the view of the hon. member for St. John-Albert that at least a maritime man should be appointed who knows conditions there; that was the policy of the administration prior to 1930- and I suggest to the minister the viewpoint which has been expressed by the hon. member for St. John-Albert, and in which I believe my colleague the junior member for Halifax (Mr. Isnor), who I am sorry is not in his seat at the moment, would concur. I should be pleased to confer at any time with the minister and my colleague and any other hon. member from the maritime provinces to present our views and receive those of the minister.


Norman McLeod Rogers: I appreciate the offer of my hon. friend. I now have the information with respect to the apportionment of the 8150,000 among the provinces for the maintenance of employment services. These figures are for the fiscal year 1935-36:
Nova Scotia	$ 4,040 13
New Brunswick	
4,411	97Quebec	
32,035	04Ontario	
61,840	78Manitoba	
9,666	88Saskatchewan	
12,680	23Alberta	
11,678	60British Columbia	
13,646	37

The federal subvention amounts to about 31 per cent of the gross expenditure on employment services.


James Alexander Marshall: Under what vote does the administration cost come?


Norman McLeod Rogers: The administration cost of the headquarters office in Ottawa comes under vote 177 which passed the committee on Monday last.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Progress reported.
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.

Farm Rehabilitation Act
Friday, February 12, 1937