1942-07-28

Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: As was indicated last night, I move:
That the house do now proceed to government orders.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Monday, July 27, consideration of the motion of Mr. Ilsley for committee of supply, and the amendment thereto of Mr. Green.
Mr. W. R. MACDONALD (Brantford City):: Mr. Speaker, when the house rose last night I had given a brief review of the military experience and qualifications of the officer in command of the Canadian forces overseas, General McNaughton, and also those of the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston). It had been my intention, had I not had so many interruptions, to place on Hansard the very fine military records of the two associate ministers of national defence. Time, however, will not permit.
The amendment suggests that there should be a comprehensive reorganization of the Department of National Defence. That presupposes changes in the department, and I presume that it presupposes changes from the head down. Other men may be suggested for those positions. If it is the intention of those who sponsor this resolution that Mr. George Drew, who is set forth as an expert military man, should have one of these appointments, then I say that Lieutenant Drew-for I would remind the house that in no field of battle did he serve in the last war in any higher rank than that of lieutenant-is not qualified by
experience, training or research to be set up as the greatest authority in Canada on military tactics. And I further state that he has no qualifications whatsoever which would fit him for the position of chief of staff, adjutant general, commander of the Canadian forces, or as head of any one of the branches of national defence.
It has been stated in the house that when hearing the evidence with respect to this commission, the chief justice was acting merely within his capacity of commissioner, and the impression has been sent abroad that in the inquiry he had no powers as a judge. An effort has been made to have the people think that he was merely a commissioner and had not the powers a judge would have. In that connection I would read from page 4255 of Hansard of July 15 last, where the following reference is made to the appointment of a commissioner under the Inquiries Act:
Such commissioner shall have all the immunities enjoyed by any judge of any superior court in Canada while exercising his judicial functions, and that any and all powers and authority of any such judge relating to any contempt of court, whether committed in the face of the court or elsewhere, shall be vested in such commissioner in respect of such inquiry.
I mention that so that hon. members may know that the judge when sitting as a commissioner also had the powers of a judge.
I would also bring to the attention of the house the fact that according to the record all proceedings before the commission were heard in camera. In that connection I refer to page 4254 of Hansard of July 15, on which appears a letter written by George A. Campbell, KG., in which, in the fourth paragraph thereof, it is distinctly pointed out that the hearing was held in camera. From the fourth paragraph of his letter I read these words:
It flows from such ruling that all persons, including counsel, were specifically enjoined as to their duty to preserve secrecy as to testimony given, documents produced and all other evidence placed before the commissioner.
I would also bring to the attention of the house the fact that it was definitely agreed that at the close of the inquiry all documents would be delivered up. The next paragraph in Mr. Campbell's letter states:
At the conclusion of the hearing for the taking of testimony in this matter, and some days before the date fixed for completion of the hearing of oral argument, all counsel-
I emphasize the word "all".
.-all counsel concerned received notice from the commissioner requiring them on the day of the final hearing of oral argument to deliver up to the secretary of the commission any and all transcripts of evidence, exhibits and copies thereof, written argument and copies thereof.
Hong Kong Inquiry

It was distinctly understood that all arguments would be delivered up to the commissioner. What happened? One of the counsel, namely, counsel for the leader of the opposition, boasted after the report came out that he had retained his copy, in spite of the arrangement which was made before the royal commissioner. The counsel for the leader of the opposition had the effrontery to boast that he had defied the agreement which had been entered into, that he had retained his copy. I quote from the press of July 15:
Of course I have a copy of my argument and it is fortunate indeed that I have same.
I do not think any lawyer in Canada would condone such practice. I do not think the leader of the opposition would condone such practice on the part of his counsel, and I say to him here and now, having regard to the example that we should set in the maintaining of respect for law and order in this country, that he should repudiate George A. Drew, K.C., as his counsel.
Yesterday in this house reference was made to two other commissions, the Dardanelles commission and the Roberts commission. I should like to refer to one other commission of inquiry which was set up in Canada several years ago. Hon. members will recall that prior to the war the Canadian government, in conjunction with the government of Great Britain, entered into a contract for the production and manufacture in Canada of 12,000 Bren guns, 7,000 of which were to be for Canadian account and 5,000 for British account. The present counsel for the leader of the opposition in the Hong Kong inquiry, George A. Drew, K.C., objected to the agreement, and by published articles and otherwise he insisted that a royal commission should be appointed to inquire into it. A royal commission was set up, and again I commend the Prime Minister for the personnel he selected. The Honourable H. H. Davis, a judge of the Supreme Court of Canada, was appointed commissioner. Mr. Justice Davis had no political affiliations; he had never been associated with the Liberal party. Prior to being appointed a judge he had been a prominent Conservative in the city of Toronto, but upon his appointment to the bench he had divorced himself entirely from politics. I might say that he had been appointed to the bench by the Right Hon. R. B. Bennett. The commissioner heard all the evidence and made his finding. The finding was not satisfactoiy to the present counsel for the leader of the opposition, he demanded a further investigation. A parliamentary committee was set up. The investigation before the royal commission and before a committee TMr. W. R. Macdonald.]
of this house lasted almost one year, and I charge the present counsel for the leader of the opposition, George A. Drew, K.C., with holding up the production of Bren guns in Canada for at least one year.


Mr. SPEAKER:: The hon. member's time
has expired.


William Ross Macdonald: I
would point out that I have been interrupted considerably; I should think at least ten or fifteen minutes of my time has been taken up by interruptions. Yesterday the hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) was interrupted and he was allowed additional time at the close of his argument because of those interruptions. If I am forced to stop at this moment it will be an invitation to hon. members who may not want another hon. member to speak to interrupt him and thus take up the time he otherwise would have.


Georges Parent: It is true that two members, I think, were given additional time, but in each case I think it was the sense of the house that they should be given that [DOT]time, as no objection was taken. They had been interrupted to a greater degree than the hon. gentleman who has just taken his seat.


Mr. J. A. ROSS (Souris):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to take part in this discussion in connection with the Hong Kong expedition may I say first of all that I knew many of the officers and men of the Winnipeg Grenadiers. A number of them came from my own constituency. Some of them were neighbours of mine, and one was a relative. I think that they and their relatives would expect that I should say something in this discussion. I should like to pay a tribute to those men for the gallant stand they made at Hong Kong, and to extend sympathy to their relatives during this very difficult period when they are awaiting some word from their loved ones.
For the benefit of those who think that we should not discuss the report or refer to the commission, I quote:
During the last great war, two royal commissions were appointed by His Majesty's government in the United Kingdom to look into various military operations. Lord Cromer headed a commission investigating the Dardanelles campaign. In the second volume of his autobiography, "Memories and Reflections", the then Prime Minister Asquith thus described the way the Cromer report was received:
"The first report (of the Cromer commission) did not survive four hours' debate in the House of Commons, in the course of which it was riddled by the criticisms of (Winston) Churchill and myself."
Lord Cromer was one of the most distinguished jurists of his day in Great Britain. Yet the report he submitted on the much-

Hong Kong Inquiry
disputed Dardanelles expedition was subjected in parliament not only to debate, but to such vigorous and successful criticism that the report was subsequently redrafted.
That in my opinion was the correct procedure. I submit that this is the proper place in which to discuss the report.
I believe that the errors of omission and commission which resulted in detriment to these forces should not be viewed only in the light of what happened to the forces, but rather with the thought in mind of what might happen to our forces in a much larger degree if these mistakes are not rectified. This situation might well become extremely grave if this same military organization were called upon to move large forces on short notice, forces made up of all the different branches of the service. It will be remembered that this was a small undertaking of some 2,000 soldiers, and they had a month in which to make their arrangements.
On page 9 of the report is set out the order in council authorizing the inquiry. It reads: -to inquire into and report upon the organization, authorization and dispatch of the Canadian expeditionary force and, without restricting the generality of the foregoing, the selection and composition of the force and the training of the personnel thereof; the provision and maintenance of supplies, equipment and ammunition and of the transportation therefor; and as to whether there occurred any dereliction of duty or error in judgment on the part of any of the personnel of any of the departments of the government whose duty it was to arrange for the authorization, organization and dispatch of the said expeditionary force resulting in detriment or injury to the expedition or to the troops comprising the expeditionary force and if so what such dereliction or error was and who was responsible therefor.
On page 11 it says this:
This inquiry is concerned solely with the decisions and the acts of Canadian statesmen and military administrative officers who were responsible for the authorization, organization and dispatch of the Canadian expedition to Hong Kong.
Going back to page 3 of the report, the commissioner says, in line 29'
A full statement of the facts and a full discussion of the evidence appear in the appendix hereto which is to be considered as part of my report.
If that were correct, then this would not be a secret inquiry. Moreover the commissioner in my opinion has an entire lack of military knowledge, and I should think that to make a proper investigation of the circumstances of this expedition to Hong Kong the person conducting the inquiry should have some military knowledge.
The evidence should certainly have been tabled in parliament, because it is difficult to discuss the inquiry properly without that
evidence. But there has been a determined effort on the part of the government to withhold the evidence, to withhold also Colonel Drew's letters on the subject, and in every way possible to keep the facts as to the expedition away from the public. In the Ottawa Journal of July 16 there appeared an article headed "Ben Proulx Back In Ottawa," reading as follows:
After being held prisoner by the Japanese at Hong Kong, Ben Proulx returned to Ottawa late Wednesday night to confer with dominion government authorities.
He told the Journal he would be unable to grant any interview regarding conditions at Hong Kong or his escape from prison camp there to India until he reported to the government. While in India he received a cable from the dominion government instructing him not to divulge any information whatsoever until he had reported here.
On page 16 of his report the commissioner
says:
The Canadian government, having no sources of its own of military information in the far east, naturally and necessarily relied upon the government of the United Kingdom for advice as to the military and diplomatic situation there. In September and October, 1941, it was the accepted view, both in England and in Canada, that war with Japan was not imminent, although it was recognized that, to use the words of Major Power, "if war broke out with Japan the Canadian forces in Hong Kong would be in a very difficult position."
Mr. Drew urged that from the report of Mr. Justice Roberts touching the occurrences at Pearl Harbour, it is evident the American government in October had in its possession information pointing unequivocally to an early outbreak of hostilities with Japan, and he argued that such information ought to have been in the possession of the Canadian government. The evidence establishes in point of fact that the Canadian government had no such information. I repeat that the Canadian government relied and necessarily relied upon the British government for confidential information as to the military situation in the far east.
Is that meant to prove that we have not an intelligence service in Canada? Furthermore, what about the joint United States^Canada defence board of which we have heard so much? Are we to believe that the army and navy of the United States during that month had information of an impending outbreak of hostilities with Japan but that our own officers of the joint defence board did not have that information, or if they did, that they did not convey it to the war committee of the cabinet?
That brings me to another matter, Mr. Speaker. I have always thought, with many other people in this country, that Canada should have a representative on an empire war council. That idea has been continually opposed by the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie

Hong Kong Inquiry

King) and his government, but the statement in the commissioner's report which I have just cited is proof of the necessity of such an organization, especially at a time like this. After all the talk we have heard about the status of this great nation, are we going to take part in this war as a mere crown colony? I suggest to the Prime Minister that we should have an empire war council if we are to conduct our part in this war efficiently.
I listened intently to the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) last night when for over three hours he discussed the Hong Kong expedition and the commissioner's report. Last January in this house I heard him make his first statement on the expedition, and I expressed my sympathy to him as head of the department, as well as to the families of the soldiers who went on this expedition. But if the minister proved anything in his speech of over three hours yesterday it was this, that there was an entire lack of properly trained men and a very difficult man-power situation confronting him at the time, and that such a situation called for conscription. His whole defence really amounted to support for the argument advanced by the hon. member for Lambton West (Mr. Gray), when, speaking on the amendment to the mobilization act, he said that no one in this country knew whether conscription was necessary at that time or not. He then went on to recall what had happened at Yimy Ridge and Passchendaele in the last war, and the difficulties encountered in getting reinforcements after those great battles. We have the minister's own words that the Hong Kong expedition was a difficult undertaking, that there was only one month in which to act, and that the expedition must go on a voluntary service basis. The result was that many men were taken who were untrained and unprepared. Must we wait for a repetition of Hong Kong on a large scale before we face the issue of conscription? Can we not forget our petty politics and bring in conscription, which we should have for the protection of our own armed forces and to avoid a repetition of Hong Kong?
I sympathize with the Minister of National Defence, because he was not in this country at that time and was not the responsible minister. The acting Minister of National Defence at that time was the Hon. C. G. Power, the minister for air, and as I gather from the evidence and this report there was neglect, so far as ministerial responsibility was concerned, in authorizing the sending of this expedition. The Minister of National Defence

deserves some sympathy, therefore, in having to defend the whole expedition, the whole set-up and the staff-


Mr. RALSTON:: I want to make it quite clear that the Minister of National Defence was in Los Angeles, but the matter was referred to him and the Minister of National Defence takes full responsibility. He was not away until October 9; by that date the expedition had been not only authorized but had been accepted, and a wire came that day as to the time when the expedition was desired.


James Arthur Ross: The minister still says that he was out of this country from October 9, by which time not much of the organization work had been done.


James Layton Ralston: My hon. friend spoke of the authorization. I was still here when the authorization was given and was responsible for the operation of the department, because the Organization which was done in connection with the force was done by those whom I had put in charge at the department. I do not want the Minister of National Defence for Air (Mr. Power) to have pinned on him any faults of an organization for which mine was the responsibility.


James Arthur Ross: That relieves the Minister of National Defence for Air of any responsibility whatsoever.
I can well remember General Crerar, in an address in 1940, in the Chateau Laurier, advocating a thirty-day training period for the men called up. I recall the arguments that were made by this group at that time urging that the men be given at least four months training, but considerable discussion had to take place before that became the law. I am happy to think that at last it was done and that many improvements in training have taken place since, but there are many improvements still to be made.
The argument of the Minister of National Defence last night as to firing practice not being necessary is just propaganda; with his fine record in the last war I know he agrees with me that firing practice is absolutely necessary.
The reference in this report to what General McNaughton said on individual training is just splitting hairs. When I think of what was said yesterday >by the hon. member for Wey-burn (Mr. Douglas) who appeared as a witness before the commission, as to the prejudice which had been shown in this report concerning his evidence, I say that I should like to discuss with General McNaughton, for whom I have great respect, many things which are mentioned in this report. Brigadier LawsoD

Hong Kong Inquiry
was a very fine soldier, and I am sorry he will not be back to tell his story that many of these men who were handed over to him for the Hong Kong expedition were untrained and unequipped.
The minister spoke last night [DOT] of the reorganization of his department, but he admitted that the transport controller, who is a civilian, and had vetoed the shipment of mechanical transport, was still on the job. I do not think it is sound organization to have a civilian transport officer in charge of the movement of troops and their equipment in this country. We have proof of this in what happened to this expedition as regards their shipping difficulties.
On page 17 of the report I read:
It was also not unreasonable to expect some assistance from the landward side by the Chinese forces. A telegram from Canadian military headquarters in London, dated October 26, 1941, stated that the Chinese government had undertaken to attack the Japanese in the rear of Canton if the Japanese attacked Hong Kong, and were prepared to use ten divisions for this effort.
From that it would appear that they considered war was quite possible.
There was a good deal of discussion at the hearings touching political changes in Japan which occurred a little more than a week before the expedition sailed. On October 16, Matsuoka left office and Tojo became premier. It was known that Tojo was sympathetic with the axis powers and there was an impression in Ottawa that his accession to poMrer might increase the risk of war in the Pacific.
As I have already stated, not many days after that the armed forces of the United States of America were so informed.
On page 2S, referring to training, the report states:
Practice in firing the tommy-gun was not possible to Canadian battalions before October, 1941, as they have only recently been equipped with them. There are 42 tommy-guns in the establishment of a battalion. This gun is a useful weapon for close fighting. It is simple to understand and use.
The anti-tank rifle is a high velocity, single shot rifle capable of firing armour-piercing bullets. In general, in its mechanism and use, it is similar to an ordinary rifle. There are now 25 anti-tank rifles in the establishment of a battalion; these are carried and intended to be used by the headquarters personnel of each platoon and by various platoons of the headquarters company. Until recently, this weapon and its ammunition have not been available to Canadian units.
As to the grenade, or Mills bomb, I am satisfied. on the evidence, that a soldier practised in the use of "dummy" bombs (which are similar in all respects to "live" bombs, except that they contain no charge of high explosive) would be capable of effectively using "live" bombs in actual operations. Training both in Canada and in England in fact is given with the "dummy" bomb and "live" bombs are reserved for use against the enemy.
44561-306J
It may be necessary to use dummy grenades in that fashion, but it would be much more beneficial to the troops to have training with live bombs if they were available. I do not think any ex-service man would deny that.
Then on page 31:
According to the report made by Colonel Sutcliffe on October 6, 1941, all elementary training in musketry had been completed anil refresher courses taken. With regard to the Bren and Lewis guns, the mechanism, drill and tactical handling of the guns had been thoroughly covered by the rifle companies and the anti-aircraft platoon, while the remainder of the personnel had been given elementary training. No range practice had been done with these weapons.
I maintain, and I know the minister will agree with me, that range practice is most essential in the training of these men.
On page 32, General Stuart, the present chief of the general staff, was questioned, and on page 33 the following question and answer appear:
Q. Then your opinion is, from what you have said, that any weapon training or anything of that sort that these units may have been short in as laid down in the books, could have been made up prior to the 8th December?-A. I not only think it, I know it.
Any ex-service man who has been transported on these boats knows how little opportunity there is for training on a boat. He knows what a short time these people had, the difficulties they experienced in unpacking their equipment when they landed in Hong Kong, and the limited time which elapsed before they were actually in battle.
At page 35 appears "Additions to the strength of the two battalions":
The higher rifle establishment for a Canadian infantry battalion provides for 34 officers and 773 other ranks-a total of 807 for all ranks. The "first reinforcements" for a battalion consist of 6 officers and 150 other ranks-a total of 156 for all ranks. Thus, a battalion with its "first reinforcements" comprises 40 officers and 923 other ranks-a total complement of 963.
Further on, on the same page, it states:
The Winnipeg Grenadiers, who had just returned from the West Indies, were under full strength by more than 100 men. To bring both battalions up to strength 136 men were required, in addition to 300 for first reinforcements. In obtaining these men there were two conditioning factors-rapidity and secrecy.
On page 36:
There were added (150 as first reinforcements) to the Royal Rifles 154 men from military district No. 2, of whom 52 came from the Midland regiment ... To the Winnipeg Grenadiers were added (156 as first reinforcements) 282 men and 12 officers; of the 12 officers and 189 men came from advanced training centre No. 15 at Winnipeg, 30 men from the advanced (machine gun) training centre at Dundurn, Saskatchewan, 40 from the
Hong Kong Inquiry

No. 10 district depot at Winnipeg (including 23 men formerly on the strength of the 18th reconnaissance battalion), and 23 men from the basic training centre at Portage la Prairie.
On page 39, dealing with "Additions to the Winnipeg Grenadiers", it states:
Brigadier Riley discussed the matter with Lieutenant-Colonel Sutcliffe (the officer commanding the Winnipeg Grenadiers) and Lieutenant-Colonel Graham (the officer commanding the Advanced Training Centre No. 15 at Winnipeg). There was some uncertainty as to the exact number of additional men required, but Colonel Sutcliffe estimated on October 10 that between 150 and 200 additional men would be required.
I know these officers very well, and have soldiered with them at times. I have been looking for the evidence of Colonel Graham, because I think I know his opinion on the matter of the training essential for men, but I have not found what he said about these men being ready to go into action; I cannot find evidence on this point in the report. Yesterday afternoon we heard the statement of the hon. member for Weyburn as to what had happened to his evidence, reference to which is made on this same page. Most of the page deals with the matter of reinforcements of the Grenadiers.
On page 40 it is stated:
Before examining in detail the qualifications and training of the men added, one further general comment should be made. It was decided that the Winnipeg Grenadiers should be brought up to the required strength by volunteers from mid-western Canada, through military district No. 10. This decision appears reasonable in view of the fact that this regiment had originally been mobilized in this district. The primary responsibility for the additions to the strength rested on the adjutant-general's department and its execution was committed to Colonel Ilennessy, the director of organization.
This would lead one to believe that all these reinforcements had been taken from district No. 10. I have already pointed out that men were taken from Dundum in Saskatchewan, which is in military district No. 12.
Then, on page 41:
In the period immediately prior to October, 1941, the advanced training centre No. 15, from which these men came, had, for training purposes, an adequate supply of rifles, bayonets, light machine guns, anti-tank rifles, tommy-guns and dummy grenades. This centre, in common with other training centres and units in Canada, was at that time without 2-inch and 3-inch mortars for training purposes.
Further down the report says:
Permission was accordingly obtained from headquarters in Ottawa to seek volunteers at the district depot. The district depot receives all men when they are recruited and also men who are being transferred from one unit to another. It was described as a "manning pool" for the district. At the time that volunteers

for the Winnipeg Grenadiers were being sought, there were 23 men at the district depot who had been left behind by the 18th reconnaissance battalion when that unit left the district. These men had had considerable training with their unit, but had been left behind because they were thought not suitable for the specialized work of a reconnaissance battalion.
Ou page 42 we find this statement:
The evidence as to the 23 men who joined the Grenadiers from the basic training centre at Portage la Prairie is as follows: One had been in a reserve battalion for one year, being attached to the training centre; one enlisted November 24, 1939, and had been a staff clerk receiving some training until his transfer to the training centre on October 3, 1941; one had been in a militia regiment for nine months; one had been called out in September, 1940, and was attached to a militia training centre until his enlistment on June 17, 1941, when he went to the basic training centre; two were qualified instructors attached to the training centre; one had been a member of the King's Own Scottish Borderers from 1915 to 1919; one had been in a reserve battalion from August, 1940, to May, 1941, when he was called out and attached to the basic training centre.
The remaining fifteen men without previous military experience served in the basic training centre for periods varying from three to eleven weeks-two served three weeks; three served five weeks; eight served six weeks, and two had served eleven weeks. All these men also were personally accepted by Colonel Sutcliffe, or his second-in-command, after inspection.
I understand that for the purpose of increasing the strength of the Grenadiers it had been found necessary to lower the medical standard.


James Layton Ralston: If the hon. member will look at the report he will find that the British authorities said that it was quite satisfactory to have men of medical category of C-2 but as a matter of fact no men were taken on lower than medical category B-l.


James Arthur Ross: That was lower than it had been prior to that.
There is another matter I would point out. The suggestion has been made that this subject should not be discussed on account of the relatives of the men. I have received a note from the mother of one boy in Winnipeg who is with the contingent, in which she asks me to find out "how many men were taken out of Tuxedo hospital, Winnipeg, and put on the train with the Grenadiers on the evening they left." That may be only rumour, but as I say, it is from a mother of one of the boys.


James Layton Ralston: I can only say that I never heard of it. As I have already stated, I think I have heard about everything that could be said with regard to the Hong Kong expedition, but that is something I have never heard until this moment. I certainly do not take any stock in it, nor do I believe there is foundation for the suggestion.

Hong Kong Inquiry


James Arthur Ross: I said it was in a note I had received from a mother of one of the boys. Now I quote from page 45:
On the whole matter I find that there was no dereliction of duty or error in judgment from the mere fact that approximately 120 men were included in the expedition before they had completed their prescribed periods of training.
I have already found that the addition of these men did not impair the efficiency of the expedition nor did it constitute an injustice to these men themselves.
I ask any ex-service man whether he agrees with that statement. It does not make sense to ex-service men.
It is beyond question that it is better practice to send fully trained men overseas than it is to send men who are only partly trained.
I am sorry that time does not permit me to deal in more detail with the report. I have made reference to the controller of transport, and that question is discussed on page 51. The statement is there made that he stopped shipment on October 15. In my opinion that was a very serious blunder, which undoubtedly proves that we have not an efficient organization in this respect, even to-day.
I quote from the bottom of page 55:
Colonel Spearing did not correct the information given Mr. Connor, and a letter was sent at a later day by Mr. Connor addressed to the "Ordnance Transit Officer". After some travels, it reached Lieutenant Winter, -who had been sent out from Ottawa to assist in superintending the loading of the ship. Perhaps any delay in the delivery of the letter may not have produced any result so far as the getting of any of the vehicles on the Awatea is concerned, but the incident is one which a little more care *would have prevented.
That was very careless. On page 59 the commissioner deals with the evidence of Mr. Lockwood, the controller of transport. He says:
Mr. Lockwood is a man of immense experience in the shipping business before the war as well as in his present office.
On page 60 he says:
I accept Mr. Lockwood's evidence. I do not accept Sir. Cooke's evidence that it was a simple matter to load these vehicles and that all could have been loaded.
Mr. Cooke's evidence was not accepted, notwithstanding the fact that he headed the company that owned the boat. He had had a vast shipping experience, extending over a period of thirty-five years. Why should not his evidence have been considered as well as that of the transport controller?
On page 61 the statement is made that the soldiers had to carry a tremendous load and how impossible it would have been if they had not had proper transport. I am satisfied
that if certain members of this government wished to go through the country at the present time the question of transportation would not present any difficulties, and yet when it comes to the shipment of the materials for that expedition there was a difficulty. I suggest that the minister should make a change in this respect so as to assure our troops, together with their equipment, of more satisfactory transportation. I am satisfied also that if all the evidence had been produced before parliament, some dereliction or error would have been found on the part of the war cabinet, of which the Prime Minister is chairman, or on the part of the members of the joint defence board of the United States and Canada, or probably both, and certainly of a number of high ranking officers.


Mr. MACDONALD (Kingston City):: Does the hon. member think it is the duty of the joint defence board to deal with such matters as the situation at Hong Kong?


James Arthur Ross: Yes. I think they should have had the information. As I have already pointed out, information with regard to the impending break with Japan had been made available to the armed forces of the United States, and in my opinion our board should have had that information and should have passed it on to the war cabinet. To say that it does not matter whether the soldiers are trained or equipped does not make sense to ex-service men. I think the Minister of National Defence will agree on that point.
There is another question I wish to ask the Minister of National Defence. Who wrote the soldier's manual which was quoted in this debate yesterday, where it is said:
It is a mere 120 years ago that William Lyon Mackenzie sacrificed a hard-earned livelihood, his safety, faced imprisonment and exile for the freedom of speech to attack a selfish controlling group.
This caused quite a scene in the chamber yesterday. Perhaps the Minister of National Defence can tell us who the author is.


James Layton Ralston: Does my hon. friend think that has anything to do with the expedition?


James Arthur Ross: No, but it is part of the training. It is a manual which has been got out, which the soldiers are expected to read.


James Layton Ralston: If hon. members think it is' necessary to take the time of the house discussing it in connection with this debate I will tell the hon. gentleman what I have been able to learn about it this morning. As a matter of fact I knew there was a plan by the special services section to provide for the
Hong Kong Inquiry

giving of lectures in connection with matters of citizenship. I made inquiries this morning in that regard and I find that over a year ago the material for a series of lectures was prepared. It was gone over by the officers of the department. It was sent out-a very limited number-to the various establishments in Canada, with instructions that such material as was desired be used in connection with a series of experimental lectures, to see whether or not it was suitable, whether it was desirable to continue that phase of training, and to have a report back on the question. The reports have come in and the idea of the lectures generally is approved, but very extensive revisions have been suggested, and they are in process of being made at the present time. It was so temporary and experimental that the booklet was never printed; and if my hon. friend has seen a copy he will notice that it is a photographic reproduction of a typewritten pamphlet. The matter is under extensive revision at the present time in view of suggestions that have been made from various training centres and establishments. The department of course must take full responsibility for the document having been sent out.


James Arthur Ross: In closing may I just say that I sincerely trust that the very sad experience which this nation has encountered through the authorization and shipment of this Hong Kong expedition may prevent any repetition of any such incident. As I said at the outset, if the long argument of the Minister of National Defence proves anything, it is the impossibility of adequate training of men in the time these men had. I trust that the government will take immediate action to see to it that the gallant men now awaiting the zero hour in England do not have any such experience, and that proper steps are taken to reinforce them and do everything we can as a nation to win this war.


Mr. J. SASSEVILLE ROY (Gaspe):: A great many things have been said in the course of the debate on this unhappy and deplorable Hong Kong expedition. I agree with the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) when he says that he and his lieutenants are doing their utmost to improve conditions in the army. I congratulate him upon his spirit of humility in acknowledging that everything in his department is not perfect. I do not think there is any man in the world who would accept such a responsibility as he has and give the assurance that there will be no mistakes anywhere, on his part or that of any of his men. This affair comes within the domain of human action where perfection is impossible.

I wish, however, to bring up a point and make a few remarks arising out of the minister's speech last night, in which he said that this expedition had to be undertaken because if we had not responded to the request other nations would have said that Canada was afraid to send soldiers where there was danger. At that time Canada was not even at war with Japan. Hong Kong is not one of Canada's possessions. There, it seems to me, is found the reason for the authorization of that expedition. From the reading of the report of the commission and from all that has been said by the officials, my impression is this: the reason was that we wanted to show our good-will, our earnestness in answering the call of the British government. That is why we authorized this expedition in such a hurry without being better prepared and without the men being well trained and equipped. All sorts of excuses and explanations might be given, and some of them might be acceptable to some people.
But there is another point which is pretty hard to explain and justify. First let me say that when a man volunteers his services in the army he is entitled to receive proper training and proper military instruction before he is sent to a battlefield. Some of the boys from Bonaventure and Gaspe counties who were sent to Hong Kong with the Royal Rifles of Quebec were recruited in the first part of August, 1941, some in the latter part of August, and some in the first part of September. They were sent to Hong Kong, as we all know, in November. This is not a mistake; it is not an error; it is nothing but a crime. Some of these boys were only seventeen and eighteen years of age at the time. It is my desire on behalf of the families of those boys to protest against this, and to condemn with all the energy of which I am capable the officers and all those responsible for that crime, which will remain a black spot in the record of the Canadian army and of the government.


Mr. G. RUSSELL BOUCHER (Carleton):: I do not intend to take up much of the time of the house in discussing the Hong Kong matter. I believe every Canadian is very much impressed by its seriousness, having regard not only to the results of the ill-fated expedition but also to the disturbance of the public mind and the concern that has been occasioned by what took place. I felt I might contribute something by endeavouring to give what I conceive to be the opinions of the man on the street not versed in military knowledge, but very much concerned with the fate of our sons, our brothers and our friends overseas. Many people in my constituency

Hong Kong Inquiry
are intimately acquainted1 with boys who took part in that ill-fated expedition, and they have become more and more concerned over the situation at Hong Kong as time has elapsed.
It seems to me that the Canadian people, and especially those with whom I am so closely connected, have had every reason to approve, and do approve, the sending of the expeditionary force to Hong Kong. They have not at any time changed their minds upon the advisability or duty of Canada to send even a token garrison to Hong Kong at the request of the British government. But they have felt, with the pride of Canadians, that to carry out a task of the kind at the request of the British government the best that Canada could do was none too good, and in that regard there has been much concern in the public mind with respect to the expedition.
As we look at the report of the royal commissioner we find that the request for the sending of an expeditionary force came on September 19. It was accepted by the government of Canada on September 23, and that acceptance was communicated to Great Britain on September 29. We find also that we received word on October 9, that the Awatea, the ship which was to take the expeditionary force to Hong Kong, was to be available about the end of October.
On October 16 a change in government in Japan certainly made the people of Canada feel that danger in the east was imminent. I do not think the findings of the royal commissioner have quite appeased the concern of our people in that regard. On September 16 the press of Canada spread the information that Tojo had assumed the head of the Japanese government, that he was sympathetic to the axis powers, and that he was head of a military clique who were likely to be more militant so far as the allied nations were concerned. That I believe was commonplace knowledge about October 16, or within a few days thereafter.
I believe the government should know a little more than the average Canadian who has or should have faith not only in the government but in the military authorities. How the commissioner can say that no change took place in the information the Canadian government had between October 16 and the sending of the expeditionary force on October 27 is a big question in the minds of the Canadian people.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) has repeatedly told us, when dealing with the question of his not agreeing or urging that a minister be sent to the war council in England, that he has been kept closely in contact with war developments, through Great Britain; that Canada House has been a most
efficient and effective liaison between the two countries. He has pointed out that the joint defence board is helping us in our relations with the United States, and that through our neighbours to the south he is kept constantly advised as to the exact situation. Be that as it may; it is not up to me to say how efficient that organization is. But in the minds of the Canadian people the fact remains that on October 16 they were alarmed and the commissioner finds there is no reason why the dominion government should not have been alarmed also.
To send two battalions to Hong Kong for garrison duty left plenty of opportunity for training. A wholly combatant fighting unit might not be necessary for garrison duty. But to send a combatant battalion to Hong Kong is a different proposition. Last night the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) stated what I believe was probably the case, when he said that the chief of general staff had recommended these two battalions, and had stated that in his opinion they were among the best in Canada at the time. But that statement was made before October 16. It was made at a time when there was no reason to expect war in the east, as it might have been expected, I submit, after October 16.
The minister has asked the leader of the opposition (Mr. Hanson) if he would have recommended the withdrawal of the expeditionary force when the change of government in Japan had changed the complexion of things. I do not think any Canadian would have made that recommendation. But I do believe every Canadian would feel that that was sufficient to impress upon every person in the government of Canada, and particularly in the Department of National Defence, the necessity of using the utmost care to have for this purpose the best they could produce in Canada.
The minister said he did not deem it wise to take a battalion out of the fourth division. He said that he took battalions which had not been allocated to a division, and took them from two different parts of Canada. In that he would have been wise had it been for garrison duty. He claimed he had commitments with England, and that he did not wish to withdraw therefrom. I believe the best commitments with and the best service he could have rendered to England was to send to Hong Kong the best battalions, equipped and trained to the limit of Canada's possibilities, from wherever he may have been able to get them at the time.
The other aspect of the matter in relation to which the Canadian people are alarmed is
Hong Kong Inquiry

-I was going to say the bungling; perhaps I should not use that word-the misfortunes or mismanagement in the transporting of the troops, and the failure to transport such equipment as could go on the Awatea. The people of Canada may receive some consolation when they learn at this very late day that about twenty men in the department have been relieved of their jobs, and have been either put elsewhere or retired. That does seem to be an admission-and I think the minister was very fair in admitting it-that something was wrong.
In this connection I would like to make a personal reference. I have known Colonel Spearing for a long time, and I have always heard of the high respect in which he was held in the department in which he worked. For many years he was a soldier tried and true. I believe his services have been outstanding in connection with the transportation of troops and equipment. Looking over the findings of the commissioner I have found that, although only third in command in connection with the transportation of equipment and troops, Colonel Spearing was in a most responsible position, and that he did not until about October 20 know with any definiteness the capacity of the Awatea to carry mechanized equipment. He did not at any time know the cubic contents of that ship, nor did he have given to him any knowledge as to what vehicles he could load in even the estimated capacity. He is relieved of his position. Was full justice done to Colonel Spearing in asking him to take the rap for this unfortunate incident?


Mr. BLACKMORE:: I am interested in this particular matter, and I should like to ask the hon. gentleman if he has any information which would indicate why Colonel Spearing did not know these facts?


George Russell Boucher: I should like to find that out. I quote from page 56 something which I think should be put on the record:
Brigadier Macklin undertook to take care of the question of priority. He did so by acquainting both the commander of the force (Brigadier Lawson) and the staff captain (Captain Bush) with the situation and handed to both of them, on October 22, before they left Ottawa, a memorandum setting out these facts. From that time forward no one at national defence headquarters did anything further in connection with these twenty vehicles. This was left in the hands of the transport controller.
I ask the house to pay attention to this: It is clear on the evidence that the amount of free space in the Awatea was at this time merely an estimate.
We must be fair. Surely when the ship was made available on October 9 and its

name was known; surely when Cooke, the general manager of this company, was available, these particulars should , have been handed to the transport controller. The report shows that Brigadier Lawson was insisting upon getting what mechanized equipment he could, and these facts should have been known a long time before they were. They should have been given to Colonel Spearing or to the transport controller and should not have caused the debacle-I think that is the word to use-or the fumbling or the bungling or the muddling in connection with what was to be done.


James Layton Ralston: Should have been given to Colonel Spearing by whom. Who is the hon. member suggesting should have given them to Colonel Spearing?


George Russell Boucher: The minister asks who would have given them to Colonel Spearing.


James Layton Ralston: I am asking my hon. friend to suggest who should have given them to Colonel Spearing.


George Russell Boucher: I suggest that they should have had the capacity of the Awatea from whoever would know it.


James Layton Ralston: The commissioner has
found that Colonel Spearing was the one who should get that capacity, because he was movement control officer in the quartermaster-general's branch which had the responsibility for the movement of troops and the movement of equipment by land, sea and air. That is exactly what the commissioner has found. He found that Colonel Spearing did not take all the care or show the diligence and aggressiveness which he should have to ascertain that as early as he should have.


George Russell Boucher: Was it also Colonel
Spearing's responsibility to find out what twenty vehicles should be sent when there was capacity for those twenty?


James Layton Ralston: The report is clear with regard to that. Before you can decide what vehicles are to be sent you must know what space there is. Colonel Spearing found out what space there was available and had to give that information to the director of staff duties and to Brigadier Lawson in order that they might make up what vehicles would fill up that particular space. As I pointed out yesterday, he gave that information to Brigadier Macklin, the director of staff duties, on the 18th, and to the transport controller on the 20th.


George Russell Boucher: He gave an estimate.

Hong Kong Inquiry


James Layton Ralston: It could only be an estimate; it could be nothing else. You cannot tell exactly how many cubic feet are going to be taken up by equipment.


George Russell Boucher: The inference which 1 would take, and which I believe the average Canadian would take, is that there is something hinging in the commissioner's mind in connection with the knowledge that was available to Colonel Spearing when he was making his report.


James Layton Ralston: I do not know what my hon. friend means.


George Russell Boucher: Possibly the minister does not, but I think my point is quite clear. Anyway General Schmidlin was relieved of his post. I see no evidence in the report of his ever having given any evidence before this commission. Surely that was his right?


James Layton Ralston: Certainly it was his right. An invitation was issued to everyone who had anything to contribute to the commission to give it. The commision counsel could have called him, or the government counsel or Colonel Drew could have called him.


George Russell Boucher: Was he called? *


James Layton Ralston: I am not certain whether he was called or not. I was present at only three hearings.


George Russell Boucher: Condemned without a hearing is what it amounts to.


James Layton Ralston: The action taken with regard to General Schmidlin was taken before the commisioner's hearing was held. That action was taken by the department and it was taken not as a result of the commissioner's hearing and not as a result of any charge.


George Russell Boucher: Is there any excuse for his not having been heard?


James Layton Ralston: I am talking about the commissioner's hearing; I am not responsible for that. I am saying that I as head of the department investigated this matter that concerned General Schmidlin and I took the action which I described last night before the commissioner's hearing was held at all. The matter of his being called before the commissioner's hearing is quite another thing. My hon. friend seems to think that the action taken with regard to General Schmidlin was taken because of some condemnation by the commissioner's hearing. Whatever fault was found with General Schmidlin was found by me in the department before the commissioner's hearing.


George Russell Boucher: The minister is intimating that I suggested that fault was found with General Schmidlin at the hearing. I
have already shown that General Schmidlin does not appear to have been called or to have been mentioned in the report.


James Layton Ralston: My hon. friend said that General Schmidlin had been condemned without a hearing, which meant that in some way or other the report said something about him. I am saying to my hon. friend that General Schmidlin was dealt with in the department.


George Russell Boucher: This report seems to indicate that General Schmidlin was never down there. Furthermore, the report, so far as I can see, has not the slightest intimation of condemnation of General Schmidlin, but the fact remains that General Schmidlin was relieved of his post without having given evidence at the hearing, whereas his knowledge in my opinion was apropos.


James Layton Ralston: He was relieved of his post before there was any commissioner's hearing, before there could be any opportunity for him to give evidence at that hearing.


George Russell Boucher: Why was he?


James Layton Ralston: I stated last night that it was a departmental matter, a matter of my own judgment with regard to the responsibilities of officers. I do not have to wait for a commissioner's hearing in order to take what action I think is necessary.


George Russell Boucher: Was General Schmidlin relieved of his post before the hearing because of his mismanagement of the Hong Kong expedition transportation?


James Layton Ralston: I said that I had gone into the matter myself, that I considered not just this matter taken by itself and that I considered this was a case where departmental officers should be impressed with their responsibilities and should carry them out. I was convinced that running all through this thing was the responsibility of the quartermaster-general's department. I felt that responsibility had not been fully taken, had not been fully carried out, and I suggested, not that the most drastic action should be taken but that General Schmidlin be offered a post somewhere else for the good of the service. He was offered a district which he declined, and he was retired at his own request.


George Russell Boucher: The minister has been quite fair in saying that he relieved General Schmidlin of his post because of his misfeasance or nonfeasance, but he was not called before the commission.


James Layton Ralston: I had nothing to do with calling anybody before the commission. This commission was being run by the commissioner
Hong Kong Inquiry

or by the commission, counsel. I gave as little time and attention to the hearings of the commission as possible. If I was going to run the department, I had to run it and mind my own business. I appeared before the commission when the time came for me to be there. I had officers attending the commission. The department was dislocated enough without my taking the responsibility for considering what witnesses should or should not be called before the commissioner. That was a matter for the commissioner, and he had able counsel to assist him. If there was any lack in that respect-and I am sure there was not-I should think it would be supplied by the fact that the leader of the opposition also had nominated counsel to assist in any way, and the government had nominated counsel for the same purpose.


George Russell Boucher: I shall not labour the point any further.


Mr. CRUICKSHANK:: Why did you not ask Colonel Drew?


George Russell Boucher: My answer to that is that if Colonel Drew were to write me I would not be permitted to put in evidence before this house anything he said.
Let us look at this thing, Mr. Speaker, from the point of view of the man on the street. Here we have an inquiry into the Hong Kong expedition and the commissioner himself says that he is restricted because of war requirements in the evidence he can receive. I do not quarrel with that.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: May I ask my hon. friend-


George Russell Boucher: I should like to continue.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: All right; I shall answer him later.


George Russell Boucher: The commissioner makes his report, and he cites part of the evidence, but the bulk of the evidence he does not divulge. The commissioner required counsel who appeared before him to hand in their briefs and all their notes.


James Layton Ralston: That includes counsel
nominated by the government.


George Russell Boucher: Then we have a prosecution by the Minister of Justice (Mr. St. Laurent) against a man of very high standing in Canada. I am very glad to hear my hon. friends opposite laugh. It symbolizes their partisan prejudices against Colonel Drew. Then came the withdrawal of that prosecution, with counsel being prohibited from saying a word on Colonel Drew's behalf. We have letters written by Colonel Drew to the Prime

Minister and kept sub rosa. Then we have the Prime Minister's promise to table those letters rescinded. Naturally the public became very curious to know what was in those letters to make the censorship forbid the newspapers to print them. I say to those who were expressing their amusement a moment ago: is it any wonder that the people of Canada are suspicious as well as alarmed over the Hong Kong inquiry, and that they want a free and full and frank discussion of the whole matter? Hong Kong is not like the Dardanelles or Pearl Harbour. The public realize quite well that Pearl Harbour has not fallen into enemy hands, whereas Hong Kong is in the hands of the enemy. There is very little that could not be told the people of Canada about Hong Kong, because the enemy already have a strangle-hold upon it, and there is no need for further military secrecy about it. All this secrecy and this hush-hush policy of the government has but accentuated the fears and anxieties and suspicions of the man on the street.
If the Minister of National Defence had announced that General Schmidlin had been relieved of his job at the time it took place, a great deal of the apprehension that has run rampant throughout Canada might have been obviated. Public morale has to a very large extent been destroyed in Canada by all the suspicions, fears and secrecy that the Hong Kong expedition has engendered. In my opinion the man on the street wants assurances rather than fears and suspicions.
In closing let me say that there should be a full, frank, free and open disclosure of all the facts of this expedition, as well as of our whole war effort, to instil confidence into the minds of the people of Canada. More harm is being done through the creation of fears and suspicions among Canadians, through censorship, secrecy and the hush-hush policy of the government, more harm by ten to one, than would be done by any comfort the enemy could get from publication of all the facts about the Hong Kong expedition, because it does not seem possible that the information could be of any military value to the enemy. I trust therefore that the people of Canada will be given a complete disclosure of all the facts and the assurance of the minister, which he gave in part last night, that such a situation will not occur again.


Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview):: Mr. Speaker, I had not intended to take part in this debate because it was not until last Saturday that I read the report of the learned Chief Justice of Canada who heard the evidence in the Hong Kong inquiry.

Hong Kong Inquiry
My first point is this. Ever since I have been a member of this house I have taken the stand that it was a mistake for us ever to part company with Japan, to please somebody else. Japan in the last war was our loyal and faithful ally, and she looked after six of the seven seas. I do not agree with the Japanese in sentiment, but sentiment and right are one thing and diplomacy is another. Not only have we parted with our defences, but we have parted with our friends.
I have known twelve of the officers of the Royal Rifles for a long time, including their commanding officer. Four of them I saw off at Saint John-Major John Herbert Price and three others-when they went over in the last war. I am not here this morning to criticize anybody-far from it. I remember that when the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) gave up the comparatively easy portfolio of finance to accept his present post he received the expressed unanimous support of the whole house, and I am not here to criticize him or my old friend the right hon. the Chief Justice. I think it is a great mistake for us to blame or attack individuals as such, when we here as a whole house are far more to blame for all this disarmament.
While I read this report for the first time only last Saturday, I have read it three times since, and speaking of it not from any partisan standpoint but to win this war and seek no preferment because I have no politics, may I say that the report itself, if you will look at the text, deals with certain questions of fact, and those questions of fact are answered to the best of the ability of a very great Canadian, bound as he is by the exact text of his reference. I knew him before he went to the west and I have always had a great regard for him and his family.
The timing of this debate in my opinion is very bad for the country and the empire. That is one of the things I spoke of last month and the month before. Every second, every minute, every hour, now are to Canada and the empire very fateful on the battlefield, and every hour and every second brings us nearer and nearer to the most awful collapse probably of civilization and a slavery for Britain and for us worse than even death itself. We do not know where we are going to be. I do not know where it is to end, and for that reason I did not wish to speak in this debate at all, and be accused of criticizing anyone or hurting our war effort.
The Japanese situation came up in 1937 in the discussion on the external ' affairs estimates. The Minister of National Defence was not in the house then-I think he came in in 1940. I remember that in the debate in this house in 1937 I referred to the very grave
danger of imminent war with Japan. I hated to see us lose so faithful an ally. War with America was being preached in all the schools and universities of Japan. To-day the whole far east is involved. The Pacific is on fire. You cannot consider Hong Kong as a unit by itself except with reference to Singapore, Java, Burma and the far east. Hong Kong had been a crown colony for seventy-five years, always under the protection of Britain. We never knew in America how much our whole life was dependent upon the far east. Our mode of living, our mode of transportation, all was dependent to a great extent on the resources of the far east.
Hong Kong was a crown colony, on which Great Britain spent a great deal of money, and we had two units assigned to defend it. I saw some of the men of one battalion-the Royal Rifles, I believe-passing through Toronto on their way to the West Indies; the other battalion was going to Newfoundland. They were doing garrison duty, as they were requested to do by the mother country. Before Britain gave up her bases in Newfoundland, British Guiana and elsewhere, many units did that kind of work, and they were experienced in it. Canada was asked by Britain to take on the Hong Kong garrison, and after due consideration agreed to do so and in a hurry accepted and attempted to do so in a rush. There was too much secrecy and some real mistakes in transportation-only to be expected. If the facts had been given, the loss of Singa-port might have been averted.
I listened often in this house, sitting right at this desk, to the pacifist speeches of a very fine citizen who is now gone from us. He was urging when I came back to the house in 1935 that the militia estimates be cut almost to a dollar. When our own government was in and he proposed reductions in the estimates, I told him we were fortunate to have the Girl Guides and the honorary colonels and the Boy Scouts left for an army; for that was about all we had. Do not forget that the first sin of Canada in this war was our unpreparedness for the world's greatest disaster. Whom are you going to blame for it? I cannot blame one man or one leader. The greatest sin this country ever committed was to ignore the danger when they knew of it, when they saw evidences of it every day, when it was clear what the world was coming to. This war is brought upon us as a visitation: there is no doubt that to-day we are answering for the sin of unpreparedness. I ask again, who was to blame for it? I notice people now going around the country posing as super-patriots who told us in those days
Hong Kong Inquiry

that we would have no more war, that war was a thing of the past, and all that kind of thing, and refused to arm and said we could depend on pan-Americanism. They were trying to abolish the army, the navy, the air force, and even did abolish the cadet corps from the schools, and all we were to depend upon were the Girl Guides, the honorary colonels, and the Boy Scouts. What are these gentlemen doing now? Well, some of them are going around the country posing as super-patriots and they do not realize they caused this war. As I said in this chamber two or three months ago, if I had been guilty of taking a stand of that sort for years before this war I would come to this house and admit I had made a mistake and that I had helped cause this war, and I would have sat on the penitent bench and admitted my share of responsibility for what has befallen Hong Kong and Singapore and the rest of these places which have been overrun by the ruthless enemy of mankind.
Since I entered public life I have had a great deal to do with the Public Inquiries Act. The origin of the act was in the municipalities of Ontario, in the days of Sir Oliver Mow-at. It was applied in the case of heads of departments when anything went wrong. It was utilized in Ontario and other provinces, and afterwards, I believe during the days of the Langevin block, it was adopted by the federal authorities as part of the revised statutes of Canada, This particular statute is referred to in the publication of a very learned jurist. I call the attention of the Minister of Justice (Mr. St. Laurent) to the textbook of Sir William Meredith, entitled "Public Inquiries, Federal and Provincial". This subsection was first extended to servants by 3 Edward VII, chapter 18, section 69 (1). A great Prime Minister, the Right Hon. Winston Churchill, dealing with this very question, told the House of Commons on January 27, as reported in the British Parliamentary Debates, volume 377, page 593:
But no one need be mealy-mouthed in debate, and no one should be ehickenhearted in voting. I have voted against governments I have been elected to support and, looking back, I have sometimes felt very glad that I did so. Everyone in these rough times must do what he thinks is his duty.
That is the opinion of the Prime Minister of Great Britain, and as a result there have been many debates. See the record of the debate of July 1; there are pages upon pages of it, contributed to by major-generals, admirals, commanders, air marshals and scores of members of parliament, and almost everybody else, and the government say that they are very glad to have it as long as it is constructive criticism.

I wish at this point to refer to the need of a war cabinet to take up these questions. As the two prime ministers of Australia have said, and Sir Keith Murdock, the dominions are not willing to take the responsibility of complying with orders to send troops here, there, and everywhere, without having something to say as to the circumstances. The war cabinet was a good thing in the last war; it will be a good thing in the present war if our three ministers had somebody to advise them.
With reference to the appointment of commissions under the statute to which I have referred1, Chief Justice Meredith expressed himself as follows in the footnotes of this text book:
The judge does not act judicially in holding the inquiry. He is in no sense a court and has not power to pronounce judgment imposing any legal duty or obligation on any person, and he is not, therefore, subject to control by prohibition.
This is from the decision in Godson and Toronto (1889), which went to the Supreme Court and is reported in 18 Supreme Court Reports, page 36.
In this case there was some kind of inquiry into the works department of the city hall. The contractor, a capable man and in many ways a good citizen-, applied for an injunction. It came before the chief justice, who stated:
It has been held by Robertson, J., in re Godson and Toronto (1888), 16 O.R. 275, that prohibition would lie, and he expressed the opinion that if the judge, in the course of his investigation, took evidence in the United States, "any oath administered by him would have no legal significance. ..."
And so forth. The Godson case was followed in re Thomas' License (1895), 26 O.R. 448, and in Chambers v. Winchester (1907), 15 O.L.R. 316. There is power under this section to order an inquiry into an election for members of the council and board of education at which it is alleged that corrupt practices have prevailed, the election being a "matter connected with the good government of the municipality". The court will not, in an action by a. ratepayer for an injunction, interfere with the conduct of the inquiry by the judge in regard to the admission or rejection of evidence, et cetera.
It was decided by Chancellor Boyd, a very learned judge, in the case of Chambers v. Winchester, that the inquiry should be conducted in open court, but in exceptional cases "the commissioner will exercise a wise discretion in excluding witnesses (while one is being examined) or in excluding the general public where the disclosures are of a nature unfit for publication, but evidence should not be taken behind the back of the person chiefly

Hong Kong Inquiry
interested." When the learned commissioner is functioning under this statute he is not entitled to the word "judge," he is called *"commissioner" or "Mr. Commissioner." Certain immunities from prosecution, for instance of county court judges for libel, are provided under the Judges Act. Outside of that the judge, in holding an inquiry, is just a committee of the legislature. As I have said:
The frequency, of recent years, with which judges are drafted for all kinds of such_ work impairs the efficient administration of justice and causes congestion in the law courts, and, as they are largely only fact finding commissions when ' appointed, they duplicate the efficient powers and functions of parliament, of the committees thereof, and of the many outside hoards of recent innovation in war work, and furthermore they are a costly adjunct to good parliamentary government of the people, by the people and for the people, cause delays and interfere with parliament's right to immediate solution of social and economic problems of urgency to good government, thus a system of "judicial commission government" is slowly being built up in Canada.
This matter was referred to the chief justice.
I believe in the report he has dealt with all the facts very ably and conscientiously. He had before him the witnesses and all the papers, and three of the ministers were before him. I was urging the same thing myself a year ago in connection with the campaign in Libya. At that time I pointed out that Australia had 100,000 men in Libya, that she had many thousands of men in Greece and in Crete, that she had been guarding all that territory and was helping the Dutch East Indies. Mr. Menzies, the premier of Australia at that time, came here and sat in front of the throne you occupy, Mr. Speaker-and by the way, sir, may I congratulate you on the patience you have shown throughout this session-and he told us exactly what the situation was in the far east. An unwritten agreement was entered into between Britain, the United States, and Canada with respect to the Pacific ocean in 1938. I remember when the then minister of national defence in 1938 explained what it was. He outlined the cardinal principles of the agreement. Britain had not the necessary fleet because it had to withdraw ships into home waters if war came. The result was that we depended on the United States for our naval protection in the Pacific-at any rate very largely. We had no fleet of our own except such as was set out in the return which the minister tabled in his estimates in 1938.
What happened? This war came and the other dominions were found to be depending on the mother country. They had strong garrisons not only at Hong Kong but in
many other places, in the West Indies and in India as well. They had to be recalled to fight the battles in Libya, because it could not be expected that a country like Britain, which had to a considerable extent become demilitarized as a result of the importunities of the pacifists and those responsible for this war, could guard the seven seas, when she guarded only one in the great war. The result was that they had to withdraw part of the garrison at Hong Kong, and they asked Canada if we could send troops to take their place. We had a garrison at Bermuda in the West Indies and one at Newfoundland. The cabinet met. I remember the minister was in Los Angeles at the time. I read the report in this connection and I can almost repeat it when I once read it. He was away and the minister who suffers from this thing is the Minister of National Defence for Air (Mr. Power), who is head of one of the finest patriotic homes in Canada, and whose household represents real sacrifice and patriotism as well. Canada was asked by Britain to help and, as it was her turn, decided to do so in an empire sense, and did, by those who were serving formerly in garrisons in the West Indies and Newfoundland.
There were some unfortunate mistakes, as we can find indicated in the report. The evidence is given and the officers and the three defence ministers are named. We were not a military country, Mr. Speaker, and we were not ready for war. That is the truth of the matter. We had no friends. Down to that hour we had no friends because it was not as a result of diplomacy that Russia came into the war. Russia came into the war through the mistakes Germany made. There was nothing that Britain did in the way of diplomacy that could induce that great ally, Russia, to enter the war on our side, and we were fortunate when later on that other valuable ally, the United States, which had been isolationist up to that time, entered as a result of Pearl Harbour. Pearl Harbour was the mistake that Japan made and it brought in our great friend to the south.
However, the contingent was sent and as I say a great many mistakes were made. There are always mistakes in connection with mobilization and mistakes will continue to be made. I have no desire to shield anybody. The Minister of National Defence and his colleagues are well able to tike care of themselves, but in my opinion the blame for the present dangerous situation rests on the pacifists who babbled away for years, and cost us all our friends. They were responsible for our unpreparedness. We had no adequate defences, and they left us unprepared for the
Hong Kong Inquiry

greatest war in history-so great that we may possibly be yet engulfed. This matter has been discussed for a long time. Mr. Attlee in the British House of Commons made a statement on January 8 in which he said that the government took full responsibility. He said that the member who had been criticizing might put the blame where he liked, and carry it back as many years as he liked, but Mr. Attlee's point was that it was unfair to blame local commanders for deficiencies for which they were not responsible. Mr. Churchill was aware of the iron limitations imposed upon, the country by unfortunate circumstances-limitations upon supplies, involving the necessity for priorities as between different theatres of war.
The governments of New Zealand and Australia indicated that they had known what the situation was and it is also said that Canada knew. Canada knew what? Canada knew the weaknesses of the British position in the far east; there is no doubt about that. Mr. Menzies and Mr. Curtin knew all about it, and Sir Keith Murdock, owner of a great newspaper, the Melbourne Herald, writing in the London Times, expressed the belief that we also knew. We knew the situation, we knew the weakness of Britain in the far east, and there were assessments of priorities between different theatres of war in consequence. British regulars from the far east went to Libya, and Libya and Russia got the preference. The result was that there was not enough to go round. I am not at all surprised at what has happened. I predicted what would happen. We should have been in command of the far east sooner. Let us face facts. I do not think that things have been put in their proper perspective up to date.
I say, let us face realities. As Mr. Churchill has said, it is no use simply looking for a scapegoat; you have to do something more than that. In Libya the British authorities replaced General Wavell, the greatest genius the war discovered. He was succeeded by General Cunningham, who resigned in consequence of alleged illness, and General Ritchie, a fine young general, replaced him and was there only five days. They had no supplies or munitions. He was replaced and now we have General Auchinleck. Let us see the picture as a whole and see it rightly. If we face the facts, I think it will be admitted that parliament has singularly failed during the past twenty years, the most vital twenty years in the history of the world, the outcome of which might possibly be the downfall of civilization. We as members of parliament should take some responsibility. This debate is badly timed, coming off in the month of July, with the world situation as it is, but I 
think it will do some good if it urges upon the government the importance of giving more publicity' and of taking the people into their confidence and of acquainting them with the facts and of our very grave peril.
The whole story of Hong Kong was told in the British House of Commons on March 11 last by Mr. Eden who gave the details from eye witnesses. I will not read it. There it is. There is the text of the report he gave the house, and hon. members who care to do so can read it. But the fact is that the Canadian people hear about these things only from secondary sources. You can hear it over the British Broadcasting Corporation, you can read it in the New York Times, you can see it in United States magazines. In a great British magazine I found all the details as given by Mr. Eden in the British House of Commons, and there is nothing in it that anyone should not know. It is precisely the same as what Japan did in 1933 to the Chinese. That shocked the whole civilized world and it was repeated at Hong Kong. They had their German gestapo police there to tell them what to do. There is nothing in it that need be hidden now; it is history.
I say, Mr. Speaker, that the time has come when we should have a war cabinet, because the dominions have a very considerable interest in this war. I have urged one for two years, as in the last war, to save us from such errors and lack of information. We do not know' as yet to whom this country is going to belong. If our empire goes down, all is lost. It would do a great deal of good if from now until the end of the war the government would table all papers and let the people know what is going on. Give them the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The last twenty years have been the most fateful in the history of the world. This world threatens the safety of our whole civilization. On January 8 in the House of Commons in London all that was given by Mr. Attlee. There should be no hiding, no secrecy. Let us build up from the worst of the facts. Let the people know it all.
We should have had a war cabinet long ago. The dominions will no longer stand for grave decisions such as Ilong Kong and the far east being given against them without their having anything to say about it beforehand. Mr. Menzies, and his successor, Mr. Curtin, have told us all about this, and so did Sir Keith Murdock in the London Times. They said that for three years the dominions knew of the very grave weakness to our empire of our defences in the far east. It was said by London papers that Canada was told the same thing and said nothing about it until the war was on.

Hong Kong Inquiry
Mr. JEAN-FRANQOIS POULIOT (Temiscouata): On February 5 I said that it would be better for the Canadian soldiers and sailors to forget Hong Kong but that we should remember it all our lives. There has been some complaint about the report made by the commissioner, who happens to be the Chief Justice of Canada. He is a very kindly old gentleman as well as a great imperialist, and he has coated the pill. But if you remove the coating of sugar the pill leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
One has only to take the trouble and have the patience to read the report to see that everything is in it. In the first place the chief justice recites the tenor of the order in council in virtue of which he was appointed. Then he gives the reasons why an expeditionary force was sent to Hong Kong. His report is divided into three main parts. First he deals with the authorization of the expedition. He says: The principal considerations prompting the invitation by the government of the United Kingdom to the government of Canada to send reinforcements to Hong Kong .	.	. are set
forth in the telegram containing that invitation, dated September 19, 1941.
He goes on:
These considerations were largely those which influenced the Canadian government in accepting the invitation. I have been unable to obtain the consent of the government of the United Kingdom to the textual reproduction of this telegram.
Note, sir, that this was drafted by a man of great experience, who knows the exact meaning of each word. He says that he could not reproduce the telegram textually. But we know what was in the telegram, because the report tells us. It is precisely the reasons that have been disclosed by the evidence.
What are those reasons? I will take them one by one:
The chief of the general staff having expressed to tlie government his opinion that there was no military objection to the acceptance of the proposal-
Note that: "there was no military objection." It was not a military necessity. The chief of the general staff does not say he himself has thought of that, no; but "there was no military objection" from Canadian headquarters to the acceptance of the suggestion made by the British government. The sentence concludes:
and that the reinforcements ought to be dispatched.
Well, there was no objection.
. . . the view of the war committee, as disclosed in the evidence of three ministers of the crown, the Minister of National Defence, the associate Minister of National Defence, and the
Minister of National Defence for Naval Services, was that in the circumstances the only possible answer to the invitation was an affirmative one.
Of course they had to say that. You have the evidence of the guilty party. The three ministers were those who agreed to it, and they say. there was only one possible answer- "yes". It is evident that they should have spoken like that.
Now, what were the principal considerations prompting that invitation from the British government to the Canadian government? Here they are, as disclosed by the evidence of the three war ministers. I will take them one by one. First:
In view of what other dominions had done in Abyssinia and Libya it was Canada's turn to help.
That was the first reason. The leader of the opposition (Mr. Hanson) on February 24, 1941, said, as reported at page 942 of Hansard:
To me personally there is an element of regret that no Canadians participated in this campaign.
That was the African campaign. Well, who decided that it was Canada's turn to help? It was precisely the three ministers. On what grounds we do not know. Then the second reason:
Canada ought to share in the responsibility for garrisoning the Pacific area, just as Australia was assisting in Malaya;
In virtue of what obligation? Nobody has said. And the third reason is:
. . . the military value of the reinforcement would be out of all proportion to the numbers involved.
That sentence I do not understand
At one o'clock the house took recess.
The house resumed at three o'clock.


Mr. POULIOT:: I do not rise to a question of privilege but I hold in my hand a copy of the Ottawa Journal of to-day, in which there is an article referring to my questions respecting the compound gin. My first answer is that I want my country to be as well defended under the law as that concoction is protected against the law. And there is the second very important reason: I do not want the poor people and the soldiers to be poisoned by this bad stuff which is advertised for sale under false pretences and against the regulations.
To return to the subject I was discussing before the adjournment, may I point out that the fourth consideration for the acceptance of the invitation by the United Kingdom to the Canadian government to send reinforcements
Hong Kong Inquiry

was that the arrival of the contingency-and that must be a clerical error; it must mean the contingent-the arrival of the contingent in Hong Kong would have had a great moral effect on the whole of the far east.
It was three days after the adjournment of the house on November 14, 1941, to January 21, 1942, that the Canadian troops arrived in Hong Kong. On November 17 there were front-page items in all the daily papers. The first one was a Canadian Press dispatch from Washington as follows:
Kurusu-[DOT]
Who was the special emissary of Japan. Kurusu talks to open to-day. Japanese peace envoy will call on state secretary Hull. Basie differences of opinion believed bar to settlement on Pacific problem.
The second dispatch was from Hong Kong: Canadian troops reinforce Hong Kong, guard key colony. Quebec, Manitoba units sent to check aggression. Troops arrival across Pacific thrills and encourages oriental outpost.
The third one was from Ottawa:
Prime Minister ^rackenzie King, in announcing in Ottawa Saturday night the arrival of the Canadians at Hong Kong, said that defence against aggression, actual or threatened, in any part of the world to-day is part of the defence of every country which still enjoys freedom, and that the dispatch of the Canadians to the orient was in accordance with this view.
The same words were used by the Prime Minister as in the Hong Kong dispatch.
The fifth consideration was this one-
-and would reassure the Chinese as to the British intention to hold Hong Kong.
I have a clipping from the New York Times of December 26, which reads as follows:
Hong Kong's loss long anticipated. Important trade centre was never regarded as strong military position, Canton's fall a blow. Japanese then flanked the British on mainland, and commerce declined.
Here is the first paragraph of that article; I am sorry I cannot read the whole of it:
The British crown colony of Hong Kong has been one of the most important trade centres of eastern Asia for a hundred years, although it has never been regarded as a strong military position. Until its garrison was strengthened by a Canadian contingent about the middle of last month, the general impression among military and naval experts was that it would be abandoned in the event of hostilities between Britain and Japan.
Hong Kong was excellent as a trading post, but was an absurdity as a military outpost. Here is the sixth consideration:
The moral effect of the expedition might operate as a sensible influence for the preservation of peace there.
[Mr. PouliotJ
How could peace be preserved by an act of war against a neutral country? Then, on November 28, on the inside pages of the dailies was the following item:
Hong Kong troops to get cigarettes from buckshee fund.
Then on December 5:
Japan to reject the United States basis for negotiation. Orient war issue to reach climax to-day. Outlook is gloomy.
And on December 6:
War declared by Great Britain on Finland, Roumania, and Hungary.
And this Canadian Press dispatch on December 5:
Canada to war on new enemy, but may not intern nationals.
On December 8, which was a Monday, there was a report of what had happened at Pearl Harbour the day before. That information is contained in the following:
Japanese open war on empire and United States. Bomb Hawaii, Hong Kong, land in Malaya, raid Singapore; Dominion enters conflict.
And later, this Hong Kong Canadian Press dispatch of December 7:
Canadians fear scrap as war theatre shifts to orient.
And on January 21 of this year the house was informed officially that Canada was at war with Roumania, Hungary, Finland and Japan as from December 7, 1942. And it is to be noted here that Pearl Harbour was bombed with gasoline from the United States and scrap iron from Canada.
The seventh consideration is this:	The
expedition left Canada on October 27 and arrived at Hong Kong on November 16. At that juncture in September the action taken was beyond measure important. The chief justice mentioned the telegram sent by the war office on October 30, and quotes it in part as follows:
The moral effect of their arrival-
The arrival of Canadian troops.
-in November will be much greater than it would have been two months later.
Two months later would have been on January 16, three weeks after the surrender of Hong Kong, which surely would have been quite late.
On page 6 of the report General Crerar is reported as having said:
Information at my disposal during latter part of September, 1941, indicated that outbreak of hostilities with Japan was not imminent and that time would, in all probability, be available to carry out intensive,

Hong Kong Inquiry
adequate and possible extensive training of Canadian forces at Hong Kong after their arrival.	.
General Stuart agrees with this.
Let me give the house some headlines and reports which appeared in newspapers in December. December 9:
Hong Kong is bombed twice, one Jap downed.
December 10:
Axis behind Japan's sudden smash at U.S. Hong Kong repulses Jap invasion. Canadian troops see first action.
December 11:
The Prince of Wales, the pride of the fleet and the stout battle cruiser Repulse sunk.
And a Canadian Press cable from London:
Greatest naval loss Britain has suffered since the battle of Jutland.
And some more from the press of December 11:
Hong Kong repels two Japanese attacks. Entire landing party wiped out. Machine guns sink two boatloads.
The Japanese were sinking the Prince of Wales and the Repulse while we were sinking two boatloads of Japanese with machine guns. A Canadian Press dispatch from London, December 16, read as follows:
Britain concedes Hong Kong and Singapore in danger. Defence of far east posts had been based on navy's aid. Sea control gone. Hong Kong problem aggravated by feeding of 1,500,000 Chinese civilians.
December 12:
Chinese drive aids Hong Kong. Chunking reports inflicting 15,000 casualties on Japanese. Hong Kong fight raging.
December 13:
Japan reports Kowloon taken. Forces said massing for attack on Hong Kong fortress.
December 15:
Japs announce Hong Kong drive as colony spurns surrender.
Ottawa, December 14:
Canadians at Hong Kong will uphold traditions.
December 15:
Britain concedes Kowloon lost. Forces join in Hong Kong defence. Advices from Hong Kong said imperial forces on the peninsula in the face of preponderant Japanese strength, had begun a methodical withdrawal.
December 18:
Second ultimatum sent to Hong Kong is rejected. Hold on! is advice from London in cable of praise to defenders.
December 19:
Japs claim successful landing on Hong Kong island. Resistance fierce. Tokyo tale unconfirmed. Further operations under way. Chinese ease pressure. Chunking troops harry invaders outposts, inflicting heavy losses.
December 19:
Desperate battle rages for possession of Hong Kong. Colony is isolated. Garrison . fights valiantly without hope of reinforcement. Japs claim victory. London admits situation serious. Defenders will hang on to end.
December 21:
Empire thrilled as Hong Kong defence holds out. No hope of relief. The King and government officials send messages of praise. Japanese are amazed. Governor of colony exhorts troops in rock-hewn stronghold.
Ottawa, December 22:
The position of Canadian troops at Hong Kong is confused.
That was a statement of the minister of defence, December 23:
Ottawa hears Lawson killed. Ralston to say when general casualty list or further information due.
We do not have that yet. Ottawa, December 25:
Hong Kong, defence minister Ralston said to-night, will be a sombre but glorious page in the record of the Canadian army.
Mr. King said the resistance of Hong Kong defenders had spared the defenders of the Philippines and Malaya even stronger assaults than they had to withstand when gaining time was important.
The Canadian contingent took with it heavy supplies of equipment as a precaution against the interruption of communications with home and the possibility of a siege.
That is what was published in the press. A Canadian Press dispatch from London, December 26:
Lack of air support at Hong Kong held partly to blame for its loss. War office issues graphic story of defence by British, Canadian and Indian troops against overwhelming Japanese odds.
In my humble view that is one of the main reasons why the Hong Kong expedition should be condemned. Parliament has not been consulted. If my colleagues will take the trouble to go back to Hansard of 1933 they will see what was said then by the present Prime Minister, by the then Prime Minister, Mr. Bennett, and by the present Minister of National Defence. At that time the house was discussing a bill respecting visiting forces of his majesty. This was a kind of imperial legislation supposed to be passed by the dominion parliament because of the statute of Westminster, strange to say. The present Prime Minister was quite definite in his statement that parliament should be consulted before troops were sent outside of Canada. On this particular occasion we had not declared war on Japan. The expedition left in October, arrived in Hong Kong in the middle of November, and war was declared on Japan by Canada on December 8, with a
Hong Kong Inquiry

retroactive effect to the day before. It ia strange that a country with a population as small as ours should do things like that in spite of statements which have been made repeatedly by the leader of the Liberal party and even by Mr. Bennett. Replying to the late Mr. Lapointe, Mr. Bennett said that the act was merely pro forma in character, that it brought about just minor changes. The present Prime Minister is reported on page 2722 of Hansard of March 6, 1933, as follows:
In other words, the government of the country apart from express authority from parliament should not have the authority to place Canadian forces under a single command in any other part of the empire or in any other part of the world.
I quote from page 2723 of the same Hansard:
Also is there not a possibility that section 6 will be construed as giving to the Minister of National Defence power which up to the present time we have assumed would be exercised only by parliament itself?
And from page 2726:
I submit that it would be within the power of the Minister of National Defence himself under the provisions of the bill now before us to transfer those forces to a single command, all this before parliament had any say in the matter at all. I believe that phase of the matter should be looked into very carefully before we proceed finally with the bill.
And again from the same page:
Mr. Bennett: If forces are sent beyond Canada it must be for the defence of Canada.
Mr. Ralston: It always has been so.
Mr. Bennett: That is the first point. Then it is provided that parliament must be called to meet within fifteen days in any event.
And from page 2727:
Mr. Mackenzie King:	May I just make
doubly clear the position I take in the matter. I assume that this act has really been drafted by the British government and not by our own government.
The present Minister of National Defence went on, and his idea was precisely that the orders in such a case should be delivered, not by the Minister of National Defence, but by the governor in council. Thus we see a difference of opinion between the present leader of the government and the Minister of National Defence. The leader of the government wanted parliament to be consulted, and the Minister of National Defence wanted the matter to be decided by order in council rather than by the minister himself. Those were the views that were expressed on those- occasions.
The second point dealt with by the commissioner in his report was the selection of the units for the expeditionary force. He says:
If this handicap, as General Crerar describes it, from the "short supply of mortars and anti-
[Mr. Pouliot.3
tank rifles", was to be a reason for exclusion from the expeditionary force in the ease of the two battalions in question, then that reason was based upon a condition that, to repeat General Crerar's words, "was general in all units of the Canadian Army and not peculiar to the Royal Rifles and the Winnipeg Grenadiers" and must have applied equally to all such units; with the logical result of excluding all.
If all were excluded, why send these units on? General Crerar was referring to the handicap arising from a short supply of mortars and anti-tank rifles.
Then at page 6 the commissioner makes his third point, as follows:
Third, of the steps taken to bring the units up to strength, including first reinforcements . . . In an interval of not more than two weeks it was necessary to obtain the required additions .... but also with extreme secrecy.
The commissioner goes on:
A period of sixteen weeks has been laid down as the standard period to be devoted to the training of an infantry recruit before sending him overseas. In individual cases and by reason of the exigencies of shipping, this standard has on occasion not been enforced. Of the men added to the strength of the Hong Kong expedition, all but about 6 per cent had undergone more tjian sixteen weeks military training after enlistment in the active army. As I have already said, all these men volunteered for service with the expedition and all were accepted as suitable by officers of the battalion to which they were going.
Sixteen weeks is four months, and if four months' training is sufficient, why did the minister by a stroke of the pen extend that period indefinitely? That is the question.
The report is long enough to justify very long speeches, but I want to be brief, Mr. Speaker. I quote from page 7:
The war office was most anxious that the troops should go on this ship, as another opportunity to sail was not likely to occur for two months. *
The report goes on:
Shortly before the expedition sailed, space for the vehicles unexpectedly became available in an American ship and that ship sailed with the vehicles on November 4. but did not reach its destination before the outbreak of hostilities, as she was diverted by the United States naval authorities.
There the commissioner excuses the staff. But why did they not press the matter with United States naval authorities in order that the troops at Hong Kong could get their supplies?
At page 8 the commissioner says:
There is no evidence, however, that the troops suffered through the lack of them, or that they were not supplied at Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Inquiry
A Mr. C. E. Ross escaped from Hong Kong and tells his story in Maclean's magazine of July 1. I quote part of it:
The majority of the Chinese stuck to their A.R.P. posts, food control and other duties very well indeed, although considerable trouble was had with the Chinese truck and lorry drivers. They simply stopped their cars and beat it when the shelling was heavy, usually taking the keys with them, and the majority of them didn't return. We were urgently appealing for foreign truck drivers, men and women, all the time. There was so much trucking to be done, mostly military, but a great deal in handling food for feeding kitchens and distribution centres. Large food and rice stocks had to be snatched from burning warehouses and salvaged for use.
Here we are, Mr. Speaker, with the debate about to conclude, and yet there are many things to say about the Department of National Defence. What the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green) asks for by his motion is a reorganization of the Department of National Defence. That is what I have always advocated, and it is necessary that it should be done. We live in a very strange country. You know, sir, the old Latin phrase, poeta natus est-a poet is born, and it would seem here that ministers are born, and when born they are supposed to be infallible, incapable of making any mistakes. Changes are made in all other countries, but here there are none. I think, sir, it is time to change. I think all three branches of the Department of National Defence should be reformed, and not by the feet but by the head. I think it is an absurdity, when we speak so much in favour of coordination, to have three ministers of war. During the last war there was only one minister of war, and no minister of munitions and supply. What happens here reminds me of something I saw between Wallaceburg and Chatham at the time of "Honest George" Henry's election in 1934. I was travelling along the road with a friend for whom I had been speaking and I asked him if men were working on the highway. "Oh, yes," he said. I saw that the road was beautiful and the weather was beautiful, but I could see no men working, but at a turn of the road there was an elevation to the left and there I saw crowds of men standing with shovels in their hands. I asked my friend, "Are these men working on the road?" "They are supposed to," he said. But those men were 100 feet from the road, and there were so many of them that they were afraid of hitting each other with their shovels if they started to work. That gives me an idea of what is happening in the different war departments now.
There is something which I do not understand. It is no insult to a shoemaker to say
that he is incompetent as an astronomer, nor is it an insult to the astronomer to say that he is incompetent as a shoemaker, but here in, this house, if we say of a minister that he is incompetent the immediate effect is to see him jump up in a rage as though one had lighted gasoline under his seat, and he cannot even conceive that one man may think him incompetent for the job he holds. But it is no insult to hold such an opinion, Mr. Speaker; it is just a matter of appreciation.
The ministers of defence have full-time jobs, and I do not see how the Minister of National Defence can be Minister of National Defence and perpetually serve also as guardian to the present Minister of Finance (Mr. Usley), who is exceptionally well gifted. It reminds me of an occasion when I heard Lord Hail-sham, the Lord Chancellor, mumbling something. I could1 not understand what he said and asked him, "Did you say you are the guardian of the king?" He said, "No, I am the guardian of his conscience." I wonder whether the Minister of National Defence looks upon himself as a guardian of the conscience of the Minister of Finance. Certainly the Minister of Finance does not need that. I want the Minister of Finance to be free and not to have a mentor always beside him. That the Minister of National Defence should be perpetually busy as acting Minister of Finance is a great absurdity. Therefore let us suggest to the three ministers of war that they drop gently from the picture. They say they are not infallible, and they are not indispensable either. I suggest to the Prime Minister that he might do what President Roosevelt did to General MacArthur. Roosevelt is a good man and MacArthur is a good man; they put their differences aside, shook hands and worked together for the .common good.
There is one reform which I suggest to the Prime Minister. He has already told me that he is free. If he wants the war effort to be carried on in this country as it should be, he should have the very best leader to help him and I assume he would accept a man of that quality. The best way to have coordination in the war departments is to put them under a single head. The man whom I suggest-I do not recommend him, because I have no authority to recommend-is a good Liberal, a man who had marvellous accomplishments to his credit in the part of the country where he lives. He is a man who is quick, and we need men who are quick, so that nothing comes too late. That man is bright: he has bitter enemies but he has also good friends. I owe nothing to him and I expect nothing from him.
Hong Kong Inquiry

He was once my colleague in this house. He is a man for whom I have great admiration, and a man who can do more for the war effort than any minister has done until now-under the Prime Minister, I assume. That man is the Hon. Mitchell Hepburn, Premier of Ontario. Some hon. members may not agree, but if he were put in charge of these three departments we could be sure that the Canadian war effort would be much better than it is now.


Hon. H. A. BRUCE (Parkdale):: Mr. Speaker, my first words in participating in this debate must be those of tribute to the brave men who fell in Hong Kong for our defence; who fell because they were no match for the overwhelming army of Japan, thoroughly equipped with every form of armament which modern science can supply in war. It is no disparagement of them that they went down as they did in defeat. I wish to express my heartfelt sympathy with the relatives of those men-those who made the supreme sacrifice and the others who are now languishing as prisoners of war.
I regret having to take part in this debate. The reason is that the commissioner, the Chief Justice of Canada, is a very old friend of mine. But I do not think that on that account I should refrain from saying something with reference to the judgment he has handed down on the facts which were placed before him. We know that not infrequently counsel have appealed to the privy council against his judgments in the supreme court. I might instance the late Norman Tilley, who also was a great friend of the chief justice. My own feeling is that the chief justice, if he erred in his conclusions respecting certain evidence which was placed before him-and I believe that he did-did so only because of his lack of military knowledge.
I desire to refer for a moment to a speech made yesterday in this chamber by the hon. member for Brantford City (Mr. Macdonald), in which he sought to belittle the military training and standing of Colonel George Drew. May I point out that Colonel Drew was a youngster of only twenty when the last war broke out; that he immediately enlisted in the 16th Battery of the Canadian expeditionary force; that he went overseas the following year; that he was wounded in France in 1916, and when able to be about again, took up instructional work for the forces. After this he spent three years in hospital recovering from the wounds he sustained in battle. I ask the hon. member for Brantford City if he expected a young man

of twenty-one upon going overseas, and who was later wounded, to have attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel during that war.


William Ross Macdonald: I did not expect it. I merely pointed out that he had not, although many people thought that he had. I detracted in no way from the military service of Mr. Drew.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: Well, I am afraid that was the inference left by the hon.- member. I do not think that any of Colonel Drew's friends would claim that his present knowledge of modern warfare is due to his experience in the last war, but it is because he has maintained since then a keen interest in military affairs. In proof of this I will give a brief review of what he has done. He took command of the 16th Battery at Guelph on its reorganization in 1920, and commanded this unit until 1929, when he took command of the 11th Field Brigade with headquarters at Guelph. He is honorary president of the Toronto Flying Club, past president of the Canadian Artillery Association, honorary president of the Ontario Artillery Association, and second vice-president of the Dominion Command of the Canadian Legion, British Empire Service League.
I quote from an issue of the Olobe and Mail of July 6 a report of a broadcast which was given by Colonel Drew over the British Broadcasting Corporation in England in September of . last year.


Mr. FRASER (Northumberland, Ont.):: Would the hon. member permit a question? Who is this person, Colonel Drew, to whom he refers?


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I think I can afford to ignore the interruption of the hon. member for Northumberland, Ont. (Mr. Fraser). The report I am about to give is on the subject of a plan of victory. Amongst other things, Colonel Drew said:
The outstanding lesson of this war is that there must be the closest possible team-play between the air, the land and the sea forces. . . . I think it is clear that if we are to defeat Germany we must defeat the German land forces. I believe it can be done, but not with the forces now in existence. The events of the past two years have imposed the needs of a special type of hitting force. It must be divided into fast, compact, hard-hitting units wThieh can be transported easily by ships, and these units must 'be trained to work in the closest cooperation with aircraft, parachute troops and air-borne troops.
He said further on:
Our task is to create a hitting force so much more powerful than anything Germany has yet produced that it will be able to overrun a superior number of panzer divisions and leave the way open for the larger holding forces. It can and must be done.

Hong Kong Inquiry
Further on he suggests that Canada is the place where such training should be carried out:
Canada offers the space and freedom from air attack which would make it possible to give the right type of training to such an offensive force. ... If the attack force is to be properly trained it must be in close cooperation with the aircraft and ai r-borne troops. . . . This force should be an empire force under the direction of experienced men from the whole empire.
Commenting on that speech over the British Broadcasting Corporation the London Evening Standard said that:
The British military authorities are not letting the broadcast suggestion of Colonel Drew go unnoticed. Colonel Drew speaks with authority. He says the only way we can win this war is by the creation and training of an overwhelming panzer army trained in Canada.
There are other favourable comments from the London newspapers which I will not stop to read. When the Canadian edition of the British Encyclopedia was being brought out, the late Sir Arthur Currie was asked to recommend some Canadian officer to write the article on Canada's forces, and Colonel Drew was selected by Sir Arthur for that task. The article appearing in the Canadian edition of the British Encyclopedia, entitled "Canada's Fighting Army", was contributed by Colonel Drew. From the record I have given of Colonel Drew it will appear that he has continued to take the liveliest interest in military affairs ever since 1916. I have no hesitation in saying that men who have not advanced in the intervening years since the last war have no knowledge of modern warfare.
The hon. member for Brantford City, speaking this morning, said that the investigation before the royal commission and before a committee of this house lasted almost one year, and he charged the present counsel for the leader of the opposition, Mr. George A. Drew, K.C., with holding up the production of Bren guns in Canada for at least one year. I can tell the hon. member that the production of Bren guns was not held up for one day, because the Inglis plant was being set up during the entire time that the inquiry was being held. There was no stoppage. Colonel Drew was one of the first in Canada, if not the first, to recommend the production of Bren guns in this country. He made that recommendation in the fall of 1935 before the conference of defence associations in Ottawa.


William Ross Macdonald: Does the hon. member for Parkdale know that while the investigation was going on, the manager and officials of the Bren gun plant were in Ottawa for almost a year, and that therefore production could not go on?


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: The
organization of the plant went on from day to day.


William Ross Macdonald: That is incorrect; it did not go on. There was one year's delay. I take back nothing I said about Colonel Drew this morning.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I do not think the reason given by the member for Brantford City is a valid one. With proper organization there is no reason why the work of getting a plant ready for production could not go on.


William Ross Macdonald: It was just being organized.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: There is a tendency to adopt the cynical attitude that what Canada may do or fail to do will not decide the issue of victory- or defeat in this war. That is a poor defence for inefficiency. It is true that from a population of twelve million Canada cannot hope to defeat the axis armies; but Canada is not fighting alone. Canada is fighting as a partner on the side of the allies, and it is the sum total of the efforts of these allies that will produce victory or defeat. It was stated in a press dispatch a few days ago- last Saturday, I believe-that one convoy arriving in Libya might turn the scale in Rommel's favour, so evenly balanced were the two forces. It might very well happen, therefore, that Canada may produce that weight of fighting power which, thrown into the balance, may turn the scale of war into victory for the allies.
We are fighting professional soldiers trained over long years who will make few mistakes. We cannot afford to make mistakes. We cannot win with untrained men against men who have been trained in actual warfare for many years. We must look at what happened in connection with this small expedition, not with the idea of finding scapegoats, not with the thought even of punishing for the sake of punishment, but merely for the sake of increasing our fighting strength by weeding out from positions of high responsibility those who have been tested and found wanting. Here we have under examination the very simplest type of military operation. The war committee, the Department of National Defence and the headquarters staff were called upon to send two fully equipped battalions from Canada to Hong Kong. The only thing which could have been simpler would have been to send one battalion. It is almost impossible to believe, and yet the record is clear, that in the case of the Winnipeg Grenadiers the only weapon with which they had had any firing practice with service ammunition was the rifle and even with that weapon the training only came in a hurried last-moment
Hong Kong Inquiry

effort at Winnipeg before their departure. In the case of the Winnipeg Grenadiers there was no firing practice with the Bren gun, which is now the principal weapon of the infantry. They had no firing and no real training with either the 2-inch or the 3-inch mortar, which to-day are the most powerful weapons of the infantry.
In the case of the Winnipeg Grenadiers, men who had never thrown either a live or a dummy bomb were soon called upon to go into heavy bombing attacks against the Japanese. Men who had never at any time fired an anti-aircraft gun were called upon in a few weeks' time to do their best to drive off the devastating dive-bombing at attacks of Japanese aircraft at Hong Kong. Men who had never handled anti-tank rifles faced armoured barges and armoured vehicles of picked Japanese forces. The Royal Rifles of Quebec had some advantage. They had had firing practice with the Bren gun; they had had practice with dummy bombs. Otherwise they were in an equally untrained state for actual warfare.
This force left Canada without a single vehicle, although space was available on the troopship for the twenty vehicles which Brigadier Lawson had said were necessary. These obviously were vehicles which were required to move the weapons of the force. Neither those vehicles nor the larger number of vehicles to make it a completely mechanized unit ever reached Hong Kong.
The report repeats with emphasis the statement that the Canadian authorities had no reason to anticipate, any increased danger of war in the Pacific which would have called for some caution in examining the actual state of training of the men to be sent or of their equipment before the force left Vancouver. But there was no necessity to place so much emphasis on whether Canada received warning from Britain; any child in Canada who read the newspapers carefully knew perfectly well that the danger of war had increased on October 16. The press of Canada from one end to the other on that day carried belligerent statements of the representative of the war party in Japan which had then come into porver.
The simple fact which must not be evaded in this discussion at any time is that our men were called upon to fight three weeks after their arrival in Hong Kong. On the basis of the report before us, the war committee, the Department of National Defence and the headquarters staff failed in their duties in this task. National security and the fulfilment of our part in this wa.r call for immediate remedial action.

Newspaper reports showed that the new Japanese government proposed to follow the policy of expansion by force. That was public information, and that in itself was sufficient warning to put the government on guard and to call for some review of the situation- not with the idea of withdrawing from our obligations, but with the very proper idea of finding out if the forces we were sending at that time were suitable for the task which we were laying upon them, and unfortunately did lay upon them so soon afterwards.
Unless the Prime Minister is prepared to discuss the information possessed by the Canadian government, or by himself personally as chairman of the war committee, there can be no yardstick by which to measure the degree of responsibility of those who were called upon to deal with this force. The report does set out a whole series of steps which would indicate the most hopeless confusion, and then points out that only by arranging for a special train could the vehicles have been got to Vancouver in time, when it was discovered that they were likely to be late. What earthly reason was there for a special train not being arranged for? There can be no excuse for not sending the vehicles with the force when, according to the commanding officer of the force, those vehicles were considered necessary. And what ultimately happened in no way limits the responsibility of those, whoever they were, who caused the failure of the vehicles to reach Vancouver in time.
But the point above all others which seems to me must be emphasized is that we are looking to the future and not to the past. It is the duty of every Canadian to be concerned about our ability to defend ourselves. No member of parliament can relieve himself of that responsibility. Yet we find that in spite of constant assurances as to the equipment and training of our forces the only excuse offered for sending untrained men to Hong Kong is that other Canadian battalions were no better off. On that one point the government stands indicted for having misrepresented to the Canadian people for nearly two years the actual state of our defences. It is the inescapable duty of every member of parliament to insist that we be given adequate assistance that the weaknesses disclosed in that report no longer exist.
Did the British government as a matter of fact not advise the Prime Minister that the change of government in Japan on October 16 was likely to mean war?
Are we to understand from the Prime Minister's statement that if in discussing the Hong Kong report we quote from Colonel

Hong Kong Inquiry
Drew's letter we shall be guilty of an offence, and subject to an action for contempt? If we are to arrive at the truth, surely it should be permissible, without infringing the rules of this house or having any restrictions placed upon us arbitrarily by the Prime Minister, to quote all or parts of Colonel Drew's letters to him of July 11 and July 16 without being liable to an action for contempt. Then and only then shall we be able to arrive at the truth. There is growing indignation among the people of Canada over the government's hysterical efforts to stifle full parliamentary discussion of the Hong Kong expedition. The evidence supplied by Colonel Drew, now in the hands of newspaper editors all across Canada, shows the bungling and incapacity which has seriously interfered with recruiting and is causing added anxiety to the parents of boys who are now serving in the armed forces. Surely the public has a right to demand an assurance and a satisfactory guarantee that the conditions which permitted so many mistakes and so much bungling in the handling of this very small force shall not continue to jeopardize the hundreds of thousands of men now under arms. We have the humiliating spectacle of the government, which is itself clothed with supreme authority, hiding behind the skirts of an outside counsel who is paid to tell them what they should do or what they may not do. Could anything be more farcical? It would be a screaming farce if it were not a tragedy where the lives of our boys are involved.


James Layton Ralston: Does my hon. friend suggest that Mr. Campbell's payment influenced him in any way in giving that opinion?


Richard Burpee Hanson: The hon.
member did not say that.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I did not say that.


James Layton Ralston: I want to know if he
suggests it.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I said his advice was being
paid for at the public expense, when surely the law officers of the crown could give it without any cost to the public purse.


James Layton Ralston: My hon. friend said he was paid to advise them that that document should not be laid on the table, and the inference was that the payment had influenced Mr. Campbell in that respect. I want my hon. friend-and I am sure he will-to indicate on Hansard that he had no such intention.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: ,1 did not make any such assertion, but if the minister wishes to draw that inference, that is his privilege. I did not wish to insinuate it in any way.
I should like to refer to page 59 of the report, where it is stated:
The statements made by the stevedores on the one hand and the wharf superintendent and a marine surveyor on the other are at variance as to the possibility of loading any of the vehicles in No. 1 hold, the opening to which is only ten inches wider than the length of the smallest case. They are also in disagreement as to the fitness of the vessel's equipment for loading. These statements were not subject to cross-examination, and one of the stevedores made a later statement changing his earlier one.


James Layton Ralston: Read the next sentence.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I will read it. It says:
In these circumstances no finding can be made upon them.


James Layton Ralston: Yes, "in these circumstances no finding can be made upon them". In other words, what the hon. member has read is read for effect.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: It is a fact that the statements of the marine surveyor and the wharf superintendent to whom the commissioner refers were statutory declarations made under the full force and effect of the Canada Evidence Act. May they not therefore be considered much more solemn declarations than any which were accepted and quoted in the report?


James Layton Ralston: I point out to my hon. friend that it is indicated that they are not accepted, and that no finding was made upon them. The sentence	the hon. member
omitted to read indicates that they were not accepted, because the statement is, "In these circumstances no finding can be made upon them". I know that my hon. friend persists in keeping back that sentence.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I might say to the Minister of National Defence that I did not decline to read it.


James Layton Ralston: The hon. member did not read it until he was requested to do so.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I just stopped for a moment to get my breath. I have it underlined in red pencil, to read.


James Layton Ralston: The hon. member took a long breath.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I had no intention of leaving it out, and I did read it. I should like to add that the action of the commissioner in refusing to accept the evidence of Mr. Cooke, a most respected citizen of Vancouver who came to Ottawa to give his evidence, was most reprehensible.


James Layton Ralston: I object to that. Because the commissioner accepted the evidence of one
Hong Kong Inquiry

witness rather than that of another, his action is designated as reprehensible. That is unparliamentary; it should not be permitted and should be stricken from the record.


Georges Parent: The expression used by the hon. member is certainly not one which should be used. I would ask him to withdraw it.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I will withdraw it, and substitute the word "incorrect."


James Layton Ralston: I would ask that it be struck from the record, because it should not appear thereon in connection with the action of a judge of the supreme court, in fact the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.


Richard Burpee Hanson: What
word?


James Layton Ralston: The word "reprehensible."


Richard Burpee Hanson: It was not made with reference to a judge of the Supreme Court of Canada. It was made only with reference to a royal commissioner, and I must insist upon that distinction.


James Layton Ralston: That is not only hairsplitting; it is casuistry.


Georges Parent: The hon. member used the word "reprehensible" in the first instance, and then he substituted the word "incorrect." The only conclusion one can draw from the modification is that the meaning is still the same, and I would ask the hon. member to withdraw those words.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I must say that I entirely disagree with the statement made by the Minister of National Defence. I am referring-


Georges Parent: Order. I have asked the hon. member if he will withdraw the word "reprehensible" and his subsequent use of the word "incorrect." In my opinion these words, taken together, mean the same thing; and 1 would ask the hon. member to withdraw.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I disagree with the conclusions, but I am bound to accede to Your Honour's request, and substitute the word "inaccurate" for "reprehensible."


Georges Parent: The hon. member may not agree with the ruling of the Chair, but if not, he has his remedy. Certain words must be withdrawn. Those words will have to be withdrawn, absolutely and without reservation.


Mr. NEILL:: May I say one word? Are we not getting rather thin-skinned when we say the word "inaccurate" is out of order?


Georges Parent: The word "inaccurate" if used in the first instance might have been in 
order, but when the word "reprehensible" was used at first, and later modified by the word "inaccurate," the meaning which was conveyed was the meaning conveyed by the original word. Therefore I ask that it be withdrawn.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I bow to your request, Mr. Speaker, and substitute the word "inaccurate" for "reprehensible."


Georges Parent: I have asked the hon. member twice to withdraw the words he has used, namely, the words "reprehensible" and "inaccurate," and I ask him to do so immediately.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I have no alternative but to bow to Your Honour's decision. I wish to protest against the ridiculous restrictions the government is seeking to apply in this instance. The Prime Minister will never be able to boast that he or his government permitted a free debate on the Hong Kong expedition, because they strangled and smothered it in advance, and then made the pretence of having a debate. It is not a real debate we are having; it is a contortion and travesty on words to call this a debate, without having the evidence.
How can the government ever justify using the authority of the criminal investigations branch of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, a great and honoured force, to obtain evidence in a civil inquiry, when-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


An hon. MEMBER:: He is reading his speech.


An hon. MEMBER:: Go ahead.


Mr. DOUGLAS (Weyburn):: Don't bother; he is slap-happy.


Richard Burpee Hanson: There is no point of order; proceed.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: There is a point of order.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: No doubt some hon. members do not like what I am saying.


Gordon Knapman Fraser: The point of order is that the hon. member is reading his speech.


Georges Parent: The point of order has been taken that the hon. member is reading his speech.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: This is a very old dodge, that of interfering with material placed before the house which happens to be disagreeable to members of the government.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: The word "dodge" is unparliamentary.

Hong Kong Inquiry


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I have prepared every word of my notes from which I am speaking, and I am afraid that does not always happen in the house.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: At page 98 of Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms the word "dodge" is stated to be unparliamentary.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I am asking the government to justify its action in using the criminal investigation branch of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police for the purpose of getting information in a civil inquiry-not a criminal inquiry. I am informed that they sent a police officer to Vancouver to get evidence from stevedores who had formerly been in the employ of Mr. Cooke, and that this evidence was used to try to destroy the character and reputation of Mr. Cooke.


George Alexander Cruickshank: What page is that?


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I have not the time to look up the page at the moment, but the hon. member will see a reference to it on page 59.
I have seen no reference in the report by way of rebuke by the commissioner to those who were responsible for having this done.


Georges Parent: The hon. gentleman certainly is infringing upon the ruling I gave yesterday. He is referring to evidence which he says was brought before the commission. Before the hon. member breaks the rule again I would remind him that the terms of the amendment before the house confine the debate to the evidence as tabled and in the possession of the house. I must ask the hon. gentleman to observe the ruling.


Richard Burpee Hanson: On the point of order, there is no evidence tabled; there is only reference to the evidence in the report. Our position is that we should have the whole evidence, that the commissioner's interpretation of the evidence may or may not be correct. Therefore, this discussion is vital.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Look at your own amendment; you drew it up yourself.


Richard Burpee Hanson: The government will not table the evidence.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: You do not like it now.


Georges Parent: The amendment, which I think I have read at least three times, reads:
This house is of the opinion that such of the evidence taken before the inquiry into the dispatch of the Canadian expeditionary force to the crown colony of Hong Kong as has been disclosed-
The hon. gentleman is referring to some evidence or information which he has received with regard to something that happened in Vancouver but which is not before the house.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: It seems most difficult to have a free discussion in this house, in which freedom of speech is still supposed to be permitted.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Georges Parent: I presume the hon. member is rather thinking that there is a restriction by the Chair. The hon. gentleman must realize that the Chair is bound by the rules of the house. He is bound by what is before us, and all that is before us is the amendment which I have read and by which every hon. member must directly regulate his speech.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I understood that this'was to be a free discussion on the Hong Kong inquiry. I submit that even the authority of the Speaker is subject to parliament, that parliament is above any order that the Speaker may give. Parliament is supreme. I have the words of the Prime Minister of Canada for that.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Let the hon. member appeal from the ruling of the Speaker, if he so desires.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I do not know that it will serve any useful purpose to pursue this further, but I must express my regret at finding that I am restricted by the rules of this house in giving free expression to the views I have in regard to this Hong Kong report.


Georges Parent: The hon. gentleman has indicated that there is a restriction, and I rather gather that he thinks that restriction comes from the Chair. I am sure the sense of the house will be with me when I say that there is no intention on the part of the Chair to restrict the hon. gentleman in the expression of any opinion that he may have upon the subject which alone is before the house. I hope that the hon. gentleman does not mean to imply that the Chair has been unfair to him.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: No, I would not for a moment suggest that the Speaker has been unfair. I think he has been most impartial. During the years I have been here I have found him to be absolutely fair. I am only suggesting that the restriction which he is now asking us to observe has been placed upon him by the government of the day.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: No, no.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.

Hong Kong Inquiry


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I think it is a prostitution of the great Royal Canadian Mounted Police to aslc them to assume a responsibility of the kind which they were asked to assume, and which is a direct responsibility of the Minister of Justice (Mr. St. Laurent) for having done so.


Georges Parent: I do not think the Speaker should enter into a debate, but the hon. member who has just taken his seat must realize that the Speaker is a servant of the house bound by the rules of the house. He can do nothing other than the house directs. When a matter is brought before the Speaker in the form in which it is, the rules of the house must be applied.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Apropos of the question that has been raised several times during the debate, may I direct Your Honour's attention to the words of the motion moved by the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green). They are:
This house is of the opinion that such of the evidence taken before the inquiry into the dispatch of the Canadian expeditionary force to the crown colony of Hong Kong as has been disclosed-
It does not suggest the evidence as is contained in the report. If evidence has been disclosed from any source other than the report, if it is bona fide evidence it ought to be permissible to discuss it in this house. It seems to me that Your Honour ought to reconsider your decision in the light of the wording of the motion.


Georges Parent: I have said already that I do not think it would be proper to enter into a debate with regard to the Speaker's ruling. The amendment reads:
This house is of the opinion that such of the evidence taken before the inquiry into the dispatch of the Canadian expeditionary force to the crown colony of Hong Kong as has been disclosed-
If the words "to the house" were added, it would give the full meaning of it. All that may be discussed here is what has been disclosed to the house.
Hon. L. S. ST. LAURENT (Minister of Justice): Mr. Speaker, I had hoped that I should have nothing at all to say in this debate, but I counted without the hon. member for Parkdale (Mr. Bruce). My attention was called a few days ago to a dispatch in the Vancouver News-Herald under a startling headline, and I was not surprised to hear the language of that headline from the lips of the hon. member for Parkdale. This headline reads: "Drew charges justice minister prostituted R.C.M.P. work here." The dispatch (Mr. Mackenzie King.]	|
states that a letter of Colonel George A. Drew to the Prime Minister contained thirty-two pages, and that the long, closely-typed pages of the letter charge Chief Justice Sir Lyman Duff with no less than six major mistakes, and declared that the Minister of Justice had prostituted the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in the search conducted in Vancouver for evidence the letter called favourable to the government. It contains this statement in quotation marks:
The conduct of the government was under inquiry, yet secret criminal police who are under the control of the government were used to obtain statements which obviously were very much in keeping with the wishes of one department of that government.
It goes on to say:
Canada has had reason to be proud of the high standing of the R.C.M.P. and members of the force must not be employed to obtain statements in civil proceedings suitable to members of the government.
It also stated that Mr. Drew called the proceedings "a shameful prostitution of a great force with a world-wide reputation" and said, "the justice minister must be called to account without delay". Until just before that date I knew nothing whatsoever of what had been done in connection with the preparation of this inquiry, or the evidence to be submitted.
When this was called to my attention I communicated at once with the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and was informed by him that at the request of the deputy minister a certain investigation had been conducted in Vancouver by members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I then communicated with the deputy minister and was informed that while the inquiry was being conducted, Mr. Kellock, who was counsel to the commissioner, chosen by the commissioner and appointed by him, after a conference with the commissioner, communicated with the deputy minister and told him that there was some conflict of evidence as to whether or not some twenty vehicles intended for the Canadian expeditionary force could have been loaded on the Awatea had they arrived in Vancouver before the sailing of that ship, and that it was desired to have an investigation made by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police among the stevedores who had handled the loading of the ship, to ascertain whether any expression of opinion or statement of fact might be obtained which would assist the commissioner. Mr. Kellock left with the deputy minister a memorandum setting out briefly the question upon which further evidence was sought, and the deputy minister thereupon communicated with the

Hong Kong Inquiry
commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and asked that the investigation be made following the lines of the memorandum prepared by Mr. Kellock. When he received from the commissioner a report-there was no man sent to Vancouver, but the officers of the police in Vancouver were communicated with-he communicated it to Mr. Kellock, but Mr. Kellock then asked that signed statements be obtained from the stevedores who had been interviewed by the police. This was done, and copies of the signed statements were made available to Mr. Kellock. Afterwards, the deputy minister was informed by Mr. Kellock that Mr. Drew wished to see the original declarations, and requested the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to make them available for inspection at Royal Canadian Mounted Police headquarters here. A few days later Mr. Drew called to inspect them, but they had not arrived.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Mr. Speaker, is this not a violation of the rules?
Mr. ST. LAURENT: I am stating what happened in the Department of Justice. Mr. Drew called at the Department of Justice to see the letters, but they had not arrived. The originals were still in Vancouver. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police offered to bring them to Ottawa by air mail, but Mr. Drew expressed himself as wholly satisfied with the copies and declined the offer. Some weeks later, without any previous intimation of any change of attitude on his part, Mr. Drew wrote the deputy minister this very nice letter:
May I ask if it is, or is not, the intention of the Department of Justice to obey the direction of the commissioner to produce for my inspection the originals of the statements alleged to have been obtained by the criminal investigation branch of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police under your instructions.
You will recall that unsworn typewritten sheets were produced before the commissioner, which were said to have been signed by stevedores in Vancouver. The commissioner made a direction that I should be permitted to inspect the originals, of which these statements were alleged to be copies.


Richard Burpee Hanson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I ask whether the statement now being made by the Minister of Justice is relevant to this debate.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: On the point of order, I submit that it is relevant to the charge being made here that the head of the Department of Justice has prostituted the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.


Georges Parent: I was debating in my own mind the point of order just raised by the leader of the opposition. The hon. member 44561-307J
for Parkdale did in his speech make an attack on the Minister of Justice and referred to the prostitution of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I have allowed the Minister of Justice to continue, taking care that he confine himself to the denial of the charge that was made against the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and against himself and his department.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: To continue the letter:
You are aware that when I called at the Department of Justice at four o'clock on the afternoon of May 22, as previously arranged,
I was told that the originals were not available. This information conflicted with that previously given to me by counsel at the inquiry in the presence of the commissioner.
I may say right here that counsel retained to represent the government told me that he knew nothing about this, any more than I did until the matter came out in the manner I described in opening. The letter continues:
I thereupon informed the commissioner that I had not been permitted to inspect the originals as directed, but notwithstanding the fact that the report of the commissioner has been signed, there are special circumstances which impel me to insist that the direction of the commissioner be carried out.
The originals were then sent from Vancouver to Ottawa, and from Ottawa to Toronto, to be shown to Mr. Drew in Toronto, but I am informed that he has not yet called at the office of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Toronto to see them.
I must say that although I knew nothing at all about this until this thing came out, if Mr. Varcoe had informed me when he got Mr. Kellock's request I would have felt it proper to take the action which was taken, and I take full responsibility for the action which was taken by my department.
I do not know Mr. Kellock personally, not even by sight, but I am informed, and I think the information is accurate, that he is a member of high standing at the bar of Toronto. I know that he and Mr. Fowler had been selected by the chief justice to act as his counsel in conducting this inquiry. I did not communicate directly or indirectly with any of the counsel who were acting in this inquiry at any time while it was in progress, and I knew nothing whatsoever about the evidence until I read the report of the commissioner and the appendix thereto a few days ago.
Both the Deputy Minister of Justice and the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police knew that the Chief Justice of Canada had been appointed to inquire into this matter, and had been authorized to engage counsel, and that he had appointed Mr. Kellock and Mr. Fowler to assist him as counsel. I should have considered, as the deputy minister and the commissioner did. that it was quite proper and in order to comply
Hong Kong Inquiry

with the request for the assistance of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in proceeding to secure the information which Mr. Kellock requested. I have satisfied myself, sir, and I feel that on the facts the house will be satisfied, that the charge of improper conduct in that regard is quite unfounded.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a question of privilege. As the Minister of Justice in quoting from a Vancouver newspaper has cited portions of a letter submitted by Colonel Drew to the Prime Minister, to my leader and to the leaders of the other groups, I may say that I also was quoting from that letter, and I was not attacking the Minister of Justice personally.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: I thank the hon. member for Parkdale for the withdrawal of the implication at least which his former words contained.


Mr. CASTLEDEN:: Mr. Speaker, I believe it has been stated in this house that a member must not quote from a letter unless he is prepared to table it.


Georges Parent: I understand that it was a newspaper, not a letter, that was quoted.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: The Vancouver News . Herald.


Mr. G. G. McGEER (Vancouver-Burrard):: In rising to participate in this debate, may I say at the outset that I do so simply because there is one feature of the discussion which I as a lawyer think should be reviewed. The investigation which was held is probably one of the most important which was ever ordered by a government in our dominion. Now, I subscribe to the proposition that members of parliament have the right to review, to criticize and to disagree with any finding made by any commissioner appointed by the government to investigate a matter and report to parliament, and it does not make any difference whether the investigating commissioner is a judge, a chief justice, or a layman of the land. But when, let me say, a commissioner's findings are questioned, it is the duty of members of parliament charged with the responsibility of voting on an amendment of the kind before this house to review not only the findings of the commissioner, but the appointment made by the government, because it might be possible under such circumstances that the appointment itself would be a proper subject of criticism.
In presenting these matters to you, Mr. Speaker, I simply review the problem which confronts me in making up my decision as to how I should vote on this amendment. I should like to draw the attention of hon. members to the manner in which the inves-

tigating commissioner dealt with the problem of transporting military supplies to the city of Vancouver and thence to Hong Kong. I think it offers a splendid illustration of the genius of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada not only to go to the kernel of a case, no matter how deeply it may be smothered in detail, but to present in fairness a judgment on a dispute involving the careers of men in public service, and particularly the careers of responsible officers in war time who have to face the responsibility of guarding and protecting the lives and the well-being of the soldiers of the nation. You know, we do not judge under our system of jurisprudence the actions of men alone; it is a cardinal principle of our law and our administration of justice that men shall be fairly judged in their actions in the light of all the surrounding circumstances at the moment of the action.
I do not intend to go over the whole report. I should like to point out that an order or an invitation came from Britain; it was decided to act upon it; and, with but a few weeks' time at their disposal, the officers of the Department of National Defence were called upon to bring units up to strength, provide the reinforcements, obtain the supplies, arrange for transportation across the continent, and secure, in the confused state of shipping of to-day, the transportation facilities to move approximately 2,000 men and their equipment across the Pacific ocean to Hong Kong. Of course there was the difficulty of secrecy. Anyone who knows anything about the Pacific ocean has long been aware of the fact that at that time German submarines were thought to be operating out of the ports of Japan. It was in the light of all of those circumstances that the findings rvere made. At page 58 of the report the commissioner says:
On October 25 Major Gwynne had informed Captain Bush, the staff Captain of force "C", that the vehicles would not arrive before sailing time. Unqestionably this would have been reported to Brigadier Lawson. Also on that day the ship's master told Major Gwynne that even if the vehicles did arrive, he could not take them, giving as his reason that the ship was going on a long journey, that he would probably go in a roundabout way and needed extra fuel oil.
The evidence showed, as the report indicates, that the loading of that ship with the vehicles in question involved the pumping out of one hundred tons of fuel oil which the captain was not willing to release. I would have said that evidence might have ended the matter. The investigating commissioner gives it much further consideration. He says:
I accept Mr. Lockwood's evidence. I do not accept Mr. Cooke's evidence that it was a simple matter to load these vehicles and that all could have been loaded. The result is that had these

Hong Kong Inquiry
vehicles arrived on October 27 before the ship sailed, and had the captain been willing to accept them about fifteen out of the twenty vehicles might possibly have been loaded. Mr. Lockwood seems to have thought that seven trucks and the two water tanks could have been loaded but the evidence as to whether the captain would have been willing to take any of these vehicles enables me to form no confident opinion on this point.
He goes on to deal with another iphase of that problem of transportation. The Awatea had been converted from a passenger ship to a transport ship and a troop carrier in the harbour of Vancouver. I believe that just as soon as the shipwrights and other artisans and mechanics walked off that ship the Canadian troops walked on. The available cargo space under those circumstances was a matter which could not be determined until almost the last moment, but it was known that there was not sufficient space to carry the mechanical transport equipment. At page 51 of the report the chief justice points out that another ship was secured on October 21:
This vessel had other cargo to load, but space was obtained in her. To do so her agents were induced to shut out some 75,000 feet of lumber which she had arranged to carry to Hong Kong. The Don Jose was originally routed for Shanghai, Hong Kong and Manila in that order, but, due to instructions received by the master on November 1 from United States naval authorities, the ship proceeded first to Honolulu and from thence to Manila, where she arrived December 12 and where, war having broken out, arrangements were made to turn over to the American army in the Philippines the vehicles which she carried. Had it not been for this deviation, under instructions from superior authority, the Don Jose would, under normal conditions, have reached Hong Kong about December 6.
The review of the evidence as presented by the chief justice indicates that in a very short period of time the officers of the Department of National Defence faced and met, with a rare degree of success, an extremely difficult problem. The troops sailed on the 27th, and, notwithstanding all the difficulties that were involved, every bit of equipment that they required was on board ship on November 4. Seven days elapsed between the sailing of the troops and the sailing of the ship that carried the mechanical transport. I think, in the light of shipping conditions as they exist to-day, that is not a record that calls for condemnation of the Department of National Defence.
I want to go a little further, because the commissioner making this investigation was not unconscious of his responsibility and he made a finding in all those circumstances which goes as far as any member of the
opposition who has spoken could ask him to go in criticizing a failure on the part of an officer of the department. At page 8 he says:
There was a small amount of free cargo space in the ship carrying the force and some twenty vehicles were sent to Vancouver to fill it. These, however, had not arrived before the ship sailed. Had more energy and initiative been shown by the quartermaster-general's branch, charged with the movement of the equipment for the force, the availability of this space would have been ascertained earlier and the vehicles would have arrived in time for loading on October 24; and there is, in my opinion, no good reason for thinking that, had they arrived at that time, they would not have been taken on board. There is no evidence, however, that the troops suffered through lack of them, or that they were not supplied at Hong Kong. The facts are fully examined in the appendix.
On that record, alone there is much to support the amendment before the house. But what happened? Long before the famous charge was made in a political rally in the by-election of South York, the Minister of National Defence had acted. Let me tell you-he gives me this information himself- that he had decided on a date preceding January 4, 1942, that a reorganization of the quartermaster-general's department was necessary. He reviewed the situation and decided upon the man he wanted, and that man happened to be Brigadier-General John Peter MacKenzie of my own city of Vancouver. On January 4 he	telephoned	to General
McNaughton indicating the decision he had made, and asking if General MacKenzie could be released, and with General McNaughton's approval MacKenzie was ordered to return to take on the responsibilities of quartermaster general, consequently there is no need for a reorganization of the quartermaster-general's department now, because that was done before the charge was made by Colonel Drew in a political election partisan speech. Instead of condemning the Department of National Defence we as members of parliament should be commending the minister for the promptness and propriety of his conduct in that respect. And mind you, the information about the reorganization of the quartermaster-general's department was in every newspaper in the land, There was no secret about it, that the whole department had been reorganized from top to bottom. The reorganization was published in the press of Ottawa and in the press completely across the country.
Well, I begin to ask myself whether this record does not indicate that I should not agree with the other criticisms of the findings of the commissioner. Let us see what the
Hong Kong Inquiry

other findings are. First, he deals with the authorization of the expedition. His finding is:
It is my duty to say I have no doubt the course taken by the government was the only course open to them under the circumstances.
Will any man say that if this government had refused to comply with the invitation' of the British government to send troops to Hong Kong there would not have been a roar of condemnation of the administration? Why, I venture to suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that if the Prime Minister had refused, as has been indicated he should have done, to send troops to Hong Kong at the invitation of the British government-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No, no.


Gerald Grattan McGeer: My hon. friends say "no, no"; I will deal with that in a moment. If he had refused and war had come, they would have charged the Prime Minister with being the cause of the Asiatic war. Now my hon. friends say "no, no". Let me refer to the record. You will find it at page 4. Because, recognizing that they were on untenable ground there, they said: Oh, when Tojo came into office you should have known all about that, because the United States government knew all about it, and you had an interchange on your common defence committee. What is the matter with your liaison? Your people were asleep. Let me point out that there was no such surprise at Hong Kong as there was at Pearl Harbour. But that was not good ground; so they said-I quote from page 4:
It was urged by Mr. Drew that the change of government in Japan on October 16, by which a cabinet notoriously sympathetic with the axis powers came into office, ought to have led the Canadian government to reexamine the question of policy raised by the invitation of the United Kingdom.
What would have happened if you had changed your mind? Those who were crying for Canadian troops to go to Australia, to be sent to Libya, those who were crying that Canada was not doing its share, are now the very men who stand up and say that having given our word to the British government we should then have gone back on it.
I come now to another finding, upon the selection of the units for the expeditionary force:
So long as the minister's confidence in the chief of the general staff remained unimpaired, the minister would not overrule such a recommendation upon a purely military matter; and he cannot be justly criticized for acting upon it. . . .
After reviewing in the light of the evidence the considerations which it was the duty of General Crerar-

No relation of the Minister of Mines and Resources, I understand.
-to weigh, I arrive at a clear opinion that I could not justify a declaration that he was wrong in his decision to recommend the selection of these two battalions .	. . There is
therefore, no good ground for imputing to General Crerar, in the matter of the selection of the battalions who compose the expeditionary force, any error in judgment, much less any dereliction of duty.
Coming now to the steps taken to bring the units up to strength, including the first reinfocements, the finding is:
I have found no dereliction of duty or error in judgment in connection with the additions made to the strength of the two units.
In that connection I want to refer briefly to page 37 of the report, because it certainly indicates that there was no hurried selection of these additions to the force. Here is one illustration:
On October 22 two officers and three sergeants from the Royal Rifles, representing Lieutenant-Colonel Home, the officer commanding the regiment, came to Toronto and cheeked over the documents of each of the 154 men. These documents disclosed the particulars of service of each of the men. The two officers from the Royal Rifles expressed themselves as well satisfied with the volunteers provided by military district No. 2.
At page 39 the commissioner gives some indication of the various men selected. At page 40 we have these illustrations:
As illustrations the following may be noted: One man who enlisted on July 16. 1941, had served with the Royal Irish Constabulary and for two years with the Seaforth Highlanders; one who enlisted on July 17, 1941. had had one year with the Dragoons; one who enlisted on July 24, 1941, had also had one year with the Dragoons; one who enlisted on July 16, 1941, had had six years in the Gloucester regiment; one who enlisted on July 10, 1941, had had nine years in a militia regiment.
This was the type of men that the officers commanding the regiment and the officers of the department responsible for training and for those selections obtained to bring these regiments up to strength. On that particular matter the finding is, "I have found no dereliction of duty or error in judgment".
Dealing now with the general organization and dispatch of the forces, the finding is this:
Leaving aside for the moment the question of mechanical transport, I am satisfied that the expedition to Hong Kong was fully and properly equipped. It was stated by one of the senior officers at national defence headquarters that he believed that the "two battalions went out of this country better equipped than any units ever left the shores of this country".
I have reviewed the mechanical transport, the decision to send the forces, the selection of units to make up the expeditionary forces,

Hong Kong Inquiry
the steps taken, to bring them up to strength; and upon all these matters, with the exception of transport and the quartermaster-general's department, the Department- of National Defence and the men responsible for organization and taking the expeditionary force are commended and not condemned.
That brings me to the main point on which I rose to speak, and it is an important phase of this discussion. To me, the democracy that we are fighting for, that we are still struggling to achieve, may be described as a point equidistant between the regimentation of dictatorship and the chaos of mob rule. Even in a democracy men of intelligence, men of honesty of purpose, can disagree. Certainly in politics they can disagree with ease. But when we disagree in a democracy we do not go duelling, or bludgeoning one another; we leave it to one who we can all agree is capable of judging and giving a judgment that we can all accept. Our judges are not above criticism, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada would be the last to say that his judgments are infallible. But I have a right, I think, to make up my mind as to whether I will accept the challenges upon which this amendment is based or accept the findings which commend the Department of National Defence rather than condemn it to immediate and complete reorganization.
Let me review the record of the selection by the government which ordered the investigation. Lyman Duff was bom in Meaford, Ontario, on January 7, 1865. His father was the Reverend Charlie Duff, for many years a central figure in the Canadian Congregational church. After a brilliant academic course, particularly in mathematics, at the university of Toronto, he was called to the bar of Ontario in 1893. Those of us who come from British Columbia have an interest in the career of that brilliant Canadian, because after practising law in Fergus he went to British Columbia, and was called to the bar of that province in 1895.
He soon gained prominence when, in 1903, he was associated with the Hon. Edward Blake and Christopher Robinson as counsel for the dominion in the Alaska boundary commission. He was called to the bench of the Supreme Court of British Columbia in 1904. Two years later, in 1906, he was appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada, where he has remained ever since.
At the turn of the century, as a very young man, he had gained the confidence of the government of the day, which had appointed him as one of the counsel of the Alaska boundary dispute, a judge of the Supreme Court of British Columbia and had elevated him to a
seat on the bench of the supreme court of this nation. He became the chief justice following the resignation of the Right Hon. F. A. Anglin in December, 1932, an appointment made by the Conservative government under the leadership of the Right Hon. R. B. Bennett, now Lord Bennett.
In 1916, he was appointed by the Conservative government, under the leadership of the Right Hon. R. L. Borden, as a royal commissioner for the investigation of the shell contracts, and the next year was appointed by the same Conservative government to the arduous duties of the court of central appeal under the Military Service Act.
In 1935, he was honoured, on the occasion of the Silver Jubilee of King George V, with a knighthood.
The Montreal Standard-and I do not know what the politics of this paper is; however I am sure it is not C.C.F.-


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: You can say that again.


Gerald Grattan McGeer: -pointed out that in addition to being head of the supreme court as administrator, he takes over the duties of the governor general when his excellency is absent. It goes on to say:
The chief justice is well known in Great Britain, for he is a member of His Majesty's Privy Council, and sits frequently on the judicial committee-the highest judicial body in the empire. He has been entrusted with the delivery of the opinion of that body in several important cases.
He is an honorary bencher of Gray's Inn. A former Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain was authority for the statement that Sir Lyman Duff was one of the three greatest jurists on the North American continent, listing two distinguished judges of the United States Supreme Court along with him.
For many years the chief justice has been [DOT] admired for the clarity and soundness of his judgments. Particularly has he been praised for the directness with which his mind functions, enabling him to quickly grasp the kernel of an argument.
The people of Canada were able to more intimately appraise the wisdom and intellectual capacity of this jurist when he headed the Royal Commission on Railways and Transportation in 1932.
This was another appointment by the Bennett administration. The article concludes:
During the comprehensive hearings of the commission, the chairman demonstrated his characteristic capacity for separating the important from the worthless in the mass of information.
I draw this magnificent record to your attention, Mr. Speaker, because it helps me to decide how I should vote on this amendment. Here is a man who enjoyed the confidence of the Laurier administration at
Hong Kong Inquiry

the turn of the century, a man who at the time of the great war enjoyed the confidence of the Borden administration, a man who enjoyed the confidence of the King administration in the twenties, the confidence of the Bennett administration in the early thirties and who again enjoys the confidence of this government to-day; and yet in the eventide of his life;, after this distinguished career, one which should warm the hearts of all Canadians and make us proud of the achievements of one who stands so highly, he has lost the confidence of. Colonel George A Drew!
Let hon. members opposite just stop and think for a moment what they are doing with this amendment. They are not only challenging this government, hut challenging the government of Great Britain, because the decision to send troops to Hong Kong did not originate in Ottawa. The man who was responsible for this expedition was the man who is responsible for the conduct of the war being waged by the British empire. Yes, it goes that far. To vote for the amendment I have to condemn the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Winston Spencer Churchill, as well as the Prime Minister of Canada (Mr. Mackenzie King). To vote for this amendment I have to say that at this moment of grave difficulty Canada is a blundering, bungling nation.
Never in Canada's history has she stood in a position where so few carried so heavy a responsibility. We happen to dominate a goodly part of the north American continent, a continent which to-day, is the last great citadel of the freedom of the world. We as Canadians should hold our heads proudly end go forward with the United States in shouldering the great responsibility of the tremendous tasks which lie before us.
Hong Kong should be something more to us than a means of arousing a purely political discussion. I do not wish to question the motives of my hon. friends, but I do have the right to draw the attention of the house to the amendment, and suggest that it did not originate here. It originated at the by-election in York South.


Mr. GREEN:: On a question of privilege, I moved the amendment, and the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. McGeer), who by the way, is a valued constituent of mine, must withdraw that statement. It is not correct.


Gerald Grattan McGeer: I will withdraw it, because it is insignificant. Every hon. member knows what I am saying.

What I want to bring to the attention of the house to-day is this-and I do so because it is our grave responsibility at this time- that instead of dealing with this type of thing, what we should be dealing with is our cooperation with the United States to expand our powers so as to bring greater assistance to China and to Russia. In our land to-day we know' what is going on in the North Pacific. To-day our government and members of this parliament should be concentrating upon the thought that railways and highways must be built to Alaska, which will become the Gibraltar of the skies, and a base of decisive operations.
There is much we can do to help the government to carry the burden and responsibility that is on them. I think we can all be grateful for the fact that this debate has arisen, because I believe the Prime Minister, the Minister of National Defence and the government have emerged standing higher in the estimation of the people of the Dominion of Canada than they ever did before.


Mr. GORDON GRAYDON (Peel):: Mr. Speaker, in entering the debate at this stage I do so with hesitation and with some degree of humility. I am not an expert in military matters, nor am I expert in the type of argument which has been so well advanced by the previous speaker, the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. McGeer). I find myself in agreement with some points in his remarks, but there were one or two points to which we on this side of the house must take sharp exception. First, the hon. member stated that there had been a reorganization of the department of the quartermaster-genera! and intimated that part of that reorganization had occurred before the Hong Kong inquiry. I am sure that hon. members who have read the report and who are familiar with the terms of reference will readily understand that the dismissal or removal of one man from the department before the inquiry and of another one after the inquiry scarcely constitutes w'hat one would call a thorough and complete overhaul. I do not wish to pursue that argument any farther. I should like to go on from there to one other point in the argument of the hon. member.
He has placed the whole matter of our decision as a house upon the ground that we are going to condemn the Prime Minister of Great Britain and to call Canada a bungling and blundering nation. Let me say that in so far a3 the decision of Great Britain to have reinforcements sent to the crown colony of Hong Kong is concerned, I have not heard during this debate a single reference to the type of feeling indicated by the hon. member.

Hong Kong Inquiry
So far as I know there was nothing suggested beyond simply asking for reconsideration as to the type of troops, that reconsideration to be based upon one point only. In the midst of the decision there had been a change in the government of Japan-this has been referred to by some of the speakers-and this change caused many people throughout the world to believe that Japan was about to enter upon the dangerous and perilous course of war. I am sure that if the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard will reconsider and reflect upon his statement he will readily realize, as will hon. members generally, that no one in this party has attempted to cast any aspersions upon the decisions of the government of Great Britain.
I am not going to attempt to deal with all the questions raised by the report with respect to military decisions, nor am I at this juncture going to attempt to deal in detail with the Department of National Defence. If this discussion, this report and the various things which have been said in connection with this whole matter are going to be of any use to us as a nation, we must find out how we can apply the lessons which the report and the evidence have given to us, and apply them in the right and proper way to our departments. There is no reason why the Department of National Defence should be specially sensitive to criticism, and perhaps it is not. I would not think very much of the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) if he did not fly to the defence of his department when it was attacked. But there seems to be a certain element of tenderness on the part of some government departments when honest criticism is directed against them. Departments of our government should never get into a position where their feelings are hurt or where they feel tender just because honest-to-goodness criticism comes from this side of the house. I am sure upon reflection the minister will be the first one to recognize the necessity of that.
This is not the only country where criticism is made in full measure of departments of government having to do with the conduct of the war. This morning I picked up the current issue of the favourite newspaper of the Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King), the Toronto Globe and Mail, and I found a Washington dispatch of the Associated Press dated July 27. I read this simply to show the government that in the United States they also criticize their government to the full extent. The congressman who is referred 44561-308
to in this article happens to be of the same political stripe, if they have politics there now, as the president himself. I quote: Representative Lyndon B. Johnson (Democrat, Texas) reiterated to-day his criticism of some military and naval heads of the United States, declaring that if their leadership was tolerated the results would be "long casualty lists, wasted dollars and spilled blood".
Recently returned from the Australian war zone, where he served as a lieutenant-commander in the United States navy, Johnson declared in a transcribed radio forum broadcast Sunday over stations in Texas that the United States "must get rid of the indecisive, stupid, selfish and incompetents among our generals, admirals and others in high military positions".
I am not suggesting that a condition as bad as that exists in this country. But there is always a great danger, and I point this out with every seriousness to the minister, that there may grow up in our national defence departments, and in other departments, that complacency or that "blimp" complex which all of us are so anxious to avoid. I know the minister feels the same way about this; I have no doubt that there is no one more anxious than he that such a condition shall not exist. Unless we, as representatives of the people, are prepared to criticize, I do not think we are doing our duty as members of parliament in seeing that what has happened in the past shall not be repeated.
May I say to the minister that there are many lessons to be taken from this inquiry. One of them, which has been pointed out and which need not be repeated, is/ that the Department of National Defence is not infallible. Even in the limited evidence which was adduced there was sufficient to show a layman like myself that there was room for tremendous improvement in the Department of National Defence. I thought the best part of the speech of the Minister of National Defence last night was not where he attempted to defend his department at all costs, but that part where he made some very frank admissions with respect to what had to be done in his own department. That showed me that the Minister of National Defence was capable, with respect to the administration of his department, of rising to certain heights which most members of the house I am sure were glad to see. I hope that as long as he occupies that position, whenever he finds something wrong, he will not fly to the defence of his staff but rather will see to it that ' whatever is required to be done is done and then come to this house and make a frank admission, just as he did last night, on this one point. It raised him very much higher in my estimation and, I believe, in the opinion of the house generally.

Hong Kong Inquiry

We had the privilege this afternoon of hearing from the Minister of Justice (Mr. St. Laurent), and I want to say just this with respect to his contribution to the debate. I had hoped that this afternoon he would make some reference to his part, which was not an insignificant one, in this whole Hong Kong question, with its historical background and present position, and I am quite sure that it was by accident and not by design that he omitted to explain to the house the factors and influences that prompted him to have a charge laid against Lieutenant-Colonel George A. Drew under the defence of Canada regulations. I had hoped that the minister would have said something about the matter this afternoon. His failure to do so was an omission which I hope he will correct at the earliest opportunity. I am not an expert in matters of this sort, but it did seem to me that the Minister of Justice was going a long way afield from Canadian justice when he would prosecute a man who has been identified with our army and our armed forces not for just a little while but continuously ever since 1910, and insinuate that he was likely to prejudice recruiting in the Dominion of Canada. I am not going to embarrass the minister with any further remarks in that regard because I am sure that he must be sufficiently embarrassed over the fact that he had to withdraw or at least did withdraw the charges which had been laid against the leader of His Majesty's loyal opposition in the province of Ontario.
May I say a word to the Prime Minister himself before I conclude my remarks. I am glad that he is in his place in the house this afternoon.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: He is here all the time.


Gordon Graydon: I hope the Prime Minister did not think I intended any reflection, but on certain occasions he is here very much more than on others. This is one of those occasions on which he has been very regular in his attendance. May I say this to him in a friendly spirit, if he does not mind a little bit of kindly advice from one who would earnestly like to see him change his ways a little bit. This is how I would like to see him change his ways. I do not want him to leave the Liberal party, because we have to have some landmarks left to go by here and there when that old party passes out of existence.
I am not asking him to change his ways politically. It is the war I am thinking of, and if he would take my advice he would try to follow the example of the Right Hon. Winston Spencer Churchill. I would like to see the Prime Minister step into the Japanese and the Germans just like he steps into the opposition day after day whenever he 
feels like a fight. For a long time I thought the Prime Minister was not able to do it. I thought perhaps there was something in his make-up which caused him to step back from a fight when it was in progress, but in the last few weeks I have changed my mind entirely. We have in the Prime Minister a potential champion of whom every Canadian can be proud if the Prime Minister would only change his ways. We have a potential champion worth something to Canada and to the empire, if he would do so.
I listened to him attacking the leader of the opposition (Mr. Hanson). I suppose he had a ' right to do so; I am not questioning that. I have seen him take up his cudgels and attack the leader of the opposition, and I have thought to myself as I sat in my seat: If only the Prime Minister would take off his coat, throw off his waistcoat, roll up his sleeves, * shake his fist and go after these enemies of ours outside this country and leave his Canadian enemies alone, he could make a really worthwhile contribution to Canada and the war effort. I say that in all friendliness to the Prime Minister. Frankly, when I hear him on the radio I am never satisfied with his speeches. I am excluding election time because he always makes good arguments for his own side then. But it seems to me that the Prime Minister ought to put more steam and pep into these things, and I would like to see him go after our enemies on the other side of the water as he goes after the hon. member for York-Sun-bury on this side of the water, and then he could do something effective for our war effort. I would like to see the Prime Minister of this country take a stand like that taken by Mr. Churchill when he addressed this House of Commons in these words:
We have not at any time asked for any mitigation in the fury or malice of the enemy. The peoples of the British empire may love peace. They do not seek the lands or wealth of any country. But they are a tough and hardy lot. We have not journeyed all this way across the centuries, across the oceans, across the mountains, across the prairies, because wre are made of sugar candy.
Look at the Londoners, the cockneys. Look what they stood up to, grim and gay, with their cry, "We can _ take it", and their wartime mood-"What is good enough for anybody is good enough for us".
We have not asked that the rules of the game should be modified. We shall never descend to the German and Japanese level; but if anybody likes to play rough we can play rough too. Hitler and his Nazi gang have sown the wind; let them reap the whirlwind.
The Prime Minister knows me well enough to know that I make that suggestion in the friendliest way, and when he goes on the radio
again I shall listen, to see if he puts the same

Hong Kong Inquiry
steam and power into his remarks that he did with respect to the opposition within the last day or two, but addressing them not to the opposition but to Canada's enemies on the other side of the water. Then he will be doing a real job, and it will have a good psychological effect on Canada's morale.
The last speaker referred to political discussions, and some reference has been made to playing politics with this question. There was perhaps some hint that if any politics were being played they were being played by the opposition, but I am sure the Prime Minister would deny that at once; for whatever our sins may be over here-and I imagine we have plenty of them; I do not think any party in this house can say that they are the emblems of purity and godliness-the responsibility for this whole Hong Kong affair can be laid to something else-political discussions, if you will, and all those things that hinge around what we call partisanship. But beyond all that the Prime Minister and the members of his government-I say this guardedly and advisedly-have a definite, clear-cut and very heavy responsibility for it all, because at the root of the whole thing is the failure of one political party to gather to itself the best brains throughout the dominion, to form a non-party national government and go forward in our war effort, seeing to it that no stone is left unturned. By this means they would obviate all the difficulties which now seem so great and all the criticism which is brought forward, and a government would be established which would be representative of all sections of public opinion. I trust that the Prime Minister will find in this suggestion the germ of an idea which may grow and develop into something worth while for our war effort, for ourselves, and for our nation as a whole.


Mr. ROWE:: And for the Liberal party.


Gordon Graydon: The Hong Kong question has been most unfortunate from many points of view. I have been sorry to see the house .at times with its nerves frayed, and hon. members bandying epithets backwards and forwards over what seem to be inconsequential matters. I do not like to see the dignity of the house lowered, particularly when the news from so many fronts is so bad. I caution the government and all hon. members that at this time in our history we must rise to a position where the public will have supreme confidence in us as their representatives, and will say that we are doing a good job and leaving nothing undone to achieve a total war effort. The government as well as private members have a responsibility in this regard, which I hope that they and we shall be able, with God's help, effectively to discharge.
44561-308 jj
Lion. ANGUS L. MACDONALD (Minister of National Defence for Naval Services): Mr. Speaker, I had not intended to take part in this debate, and probably I should not have done so but for the fact that I sit as a member of the war committee of the cabinet which in the first place authorized the sending of this expedition to Hong Kong. On that account I feel that the house might expect that I should say something in justification of the action of the war committee.
It is well to keep in mind certain points of time in connection with this whole matter of Hong Kong. The first significant date is January 12, 1942, when Mr. George A. Drew, K.C., speaking in the city of Toronto, in the midst of a by-election campaign in support of the candidature of the Right Hon. Arthur Meighen, made what I believe to be the first direct charge or statement that something was wrong with the Hong Kong expedition. Mr. Drew at that time devoted his criticism to the state of training of the men who were sent to Hong Kong.
The next date which is significant is January 21. When the house reassembled on that day, the Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston), without any prompting or urging, made a very full and fair statement with regard to Hong Kong. He dealt with the decision to send a Canadian force there. He went on to deal with the composition of the force; then he referred to its preparation, its equipment and transportation, and finally its operations in Hong Kong itself. That statement, as I say, was unsolicited, unasked for; it was made by the minister at the earliest moment at which he could make it to this parliament. The leader of the opposition (Mr. Hanson) complimented the minister upon his statement and said this, as reported in Hansard of January 21, 1942, at page 4473: ... I think the country owes the minister (Mr. Ralston) its thanks for having made an objective and explicit statement about the situation at Hong Kong.
He went on to say:
I offer no criticism at all of the government for having sent these two battalions to Hong Kong.


Richard Burpee Hanson: And I
never have.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: That was on January 21. On the following day, that is within twenty-four hours of his first statement, the leader of the opposition had a change of heart or a change of mind, either of his own accord or by some sort of suggestion from outside, because he then said this, as reported at page 3 of Hansard, of January 22:
After careful perusal and intensive study of the statement made yesterday by the Minister
Hong Kong Inquiry

of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) regarding the Hong Kong expedition, I have now come to the conclusion that a very serious situation is revealed and one with which I feel bound to deal. When I made my statement yesterday I was not dealing specifically with the question of man-power.
The hon. gentleman went on to say that he was concerned about, first of all, the lack of trained man-power in Canada. That statement is significant in view of the fact that a political campaign was going on in this country at that time, that four by-elections were being held, in which the question of man-power and the question as to the best method of obtaining man-power were very much under discussion. My hon. friend put that as the first of the problems which worried him. The second was that there were no universal carriers which he called "fighting vehicles", but which are not in the strict sense" of the term fighting vehicles. In the third place he complained of the lack of mechanical transport. He ended up by asking that a committee of investigation into this matter be appointed.
That was on January 22, and the leader of the government (Mr. Mackenzie King), speaking almost immediately, said that there would be no desire on the part of the government to limit the investigation in any way or in any particular.
The next date which has significance was February 13, when the Prime Minister announced that he was laying on the table a copy of the order in council appointing Right Hon. Sir Lyman Poore Duff as commissioner to inquire into and report upon the Hong Kong affair.
May I pause to say that before Sir Lyman Duff was appointed as commissioner', his appointment, his suitability for the task, were discussed with the leader of the Opposition, with the leader of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (Mr. Coldwell), and with the leader of the Social Credit party (Mr. Blackmore), and they, as I understand, agreed without any dissent whatever that the appointment would be an excellent one. They had no objection whatever to that appointment. But it was not only they who agreed. The press of the country generally welcomed the appointment, and so did the House of Commons. I need cite no further support in the way of newspaper comment than an editorial from the Montreal Gazette and another from the Globe and Mail. This is what the Gazette had to say a day or two after the Prime Minister had announced the appointment:
Prime Minister King's announcement that a royal commission will conduct the promised inquiry into the circumstances attending the Bending of two battalions to Hong Kong would

be welcome in itself, but it comes with greater, much greater, force by reason of the fact that Right Hon. Sir Lyman Duff, Chief Justice of Canada, has undertaken to conduct the inquiry. Premier King has described this as the best possible choice and no one anywhere in Canada will take exception to his statement.
That was the view of the Montreal Gazette on February 16. The Toronto Globe and Mail, in its editorial on February 14, the day after the announcement, said:
The greatest commendation can be given to Prime Minister King for his decision to entrust the investigation of the Hong Kong tragedy to Chief Justice Sir Lyman Duff instead of to a special committee of the House of Commons. The proceedings of such a committee, in which there would have been a partisan majority, could scarcely have failed to produce a series of unpleasant wrangles and evolve an unsatisfactory report. . . .
And so on. I would point out that these two newspapers are foremost to-day in criticizing the report made by Sir Lyman Duff. These men, who agreed in advance that the appointment was an excellent one, are the very people who to-day are criticizing the findings of the commission. He is an excellent commissioner before he is appointed, but when he does not find the things which were expected to be brought out by the inquiry, he is no good. Certain members of this house -and I shall come to them in a moment- some of them with no experience either in war or in law, or in the interpretation of evidence, have criticized Sir Lyman Duff, and particularly has he been criticized by Mr. Drew. In fact, the criticism by Mr. Drew is the whole head and front of the offending in regard to this investigation and everything that went before it. If it were not for the statements and the activities of Mr. Drew, who seems to have an unusual but most unhappy flair for instigating investigations which bring no credit on himself and no benefit to the country, I venture to say that this Hong Kong inquiry would never have been held. The opposition, who yesterday and to-day have been so vociferous in their criticism of the report would have had nothing to say and the country would have gone about its business. I say that he is the head and front of all this offending, because of all who have spoken, of all who can speak either in this house or outside, he is the only one who knows all the evidence. Hon. gentlemen opposite are criticizing the Chief Justice of Canada because he has cited certain portions of the evidence, and certain portions only.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I rise to a point of order. I for one have not criticized the Chief Justice of Canada.

Hong Kong Inquiry


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Hon. gentlemen opposite are criticizing Sir Lyman Duff because he has cited only certain portions of the evidence, yet they themselves have before them only certain portions, at least they ought to have before them only certain portions. Some of them had a good deal more. The hon. member for Bow River (Mr. Johnston) had a good deal more yesterday when he was speaking because he was merely repeating, largely-


Mr. JOHNSTON (Bow River):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to a point of order.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I say to my hon. friend that he was merely repeating, largely, extracts from a letter written by Mr. George Drew-


Charles Edward Johnston: I ask the hon. gentleman to withdraw that.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: The hon. member was repeating-


Charles Edward Johnston: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I ask for your ruling on the statement which the Minister of National Defence for Naval Services has made. I ask him to prove that in any instance any reference that I made is untrue.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: That is the most amazing point of order ever raised in any assembly. I say to my hon. friend that he was quoting from a document prepared by Colonel George Drew. He has not denied it and cannot deny it, because it is true. Then he rises in his place-


Charles Edward Johnston: On a point of order, I deny that I was reading from a document.
Mr.	MACDONALD	(Kingston	City):	A
letter is a document-


Charles Edward Johnston: I ask the minister to withdraw that statement.
Mr.	MACDONALD	(Kingston	City):	A
letter is a document-


Charles Edward Johnston: Again I ask him to withdraw that statement.
Mr.	MACDONALD	(Kingston	City):	A
letter is a document, and if my hon. friend was not reading from a document prepared by Colonel Drew, he was reading from a copy of it. He was following exactly the same sort of order and using exactly the same sort of arguments that Colonel Drew used in that letter.


Mr. JACKMAN:: Great minds think alike.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Yes, great minds think alike.


Charles Edward Johnston: The minister said I was reading from a document written by Colonel Drew, and I ask him to withdraw that statement.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I ask my hon. friend if he was not quoting from a copy of a document or a letter-


Charles Edward Johnston: I ask the minister to withdraw that statement because it is untrue.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I want to know if my hon. friend was not yesterday, when making a speech in this house-


Charles Edward Johnston: I am asking for your ruling, Mr. Speaker.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: If my hon. friend says he was not-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Georges Parent: A point of order has been raised. The hon. member for Bow River states that the Minister of National Defence for Naval Services is making the statement that he, the member for Bow River, had been quoting from a document-


Charles Edward Johnston: Prepared by Colonel Drew.


Georges Parent: -and the hon. gentleman denies that it is so.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Does he deny it?


Charles Edward Johnston: Yes. I was not reading from a document prepared by Colonel Drew.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: My hon. friend denies that he was reading from a document prepared by Colonel Drew, or quoting from a document prepared by Colonel Di'ew, and I must accept his denial under the rules of the house. But I would ask him from what he was quoting yesterday afternoon.


Charles Edward Johnston: The minister seems to know all about it.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I think the house can judge who is right and who is wrong in this particular argument These hon. gentlemen are criticizing Sir Lyman Duff for citing only portions of the evidence. They go presumably-they must go-on those portions which the chief justice has quoted. He has had the advantage of having heard all the evidence, and he has done what judges have done from the beginning of time in framing judgments; he has quoted only portions of the evidence. I ask my hon. friend the leader of the opposition
Hong Kong Inquiry

or any other lawyer in this house if he has ever seen a judgment delivered anywhere where the whole evidence is quoted? It is never done. The judge quotes simply such portions of the evidence as he regards as-relevant and supporting his findings.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I should
like to answer that and! to ask the hon. member a question. I say I never have, but has he ever known a court of appeal, which parliament is, to deal with a case without having the evidence before it?


Angus Lewis Macdonald: This is not a court of appeal. It is a place where matters may be discussed, that is all. It has not the power to overrule a judgment. That is the power a court of appeal has, a totally different matter.


Richard Burpee Hanson: It has the power of reviewing the whole matter.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Yesterday hon. members had this to say about the chief justice. The hon. member for Lake Centre (Mr. Diefenbaker) said that the commissioner had quoted only such portions as supported the finding. If by that my hon. friend means that the commissioner was illustrating his findings, then I -would say a statement of that sort is all right; but if he means that the commissioner deliberately picked out parts of the evidence and suppressed others in order to give some colour of logic and -truth to his findings, then I say it was a most unfortunate statement.
The hon. member for Weyburn (Mr. Douglas), who is not a lawyer, said that the report and the appendix were amazing documents and that the conclusions were not warranted by the facts.
Then my distinguished friend from Bow River went further, much further than anybody else, because he started out by saying that the commissioner was most partial. He then said that it was a most biased report. He then said that -the report misrepresented the truth. He then said that the report white-washed the government. He went on to say that the evidence of the Minister of National Defence for Air (Mr. Power) had been misinterpreted. He went on to say that exhibit 45, only part of which the chief justice -would allow to be published, was inaccurate.


Charles Edward Johnston: I never
said that exhibit 45 was inaccurate.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: That is the note I took down. That is the sense of the words used by my hon. friend as I heard him.


Charles Edward Johnston: On a point of order, I ask that the minister withdraw that statement. I never said that exhibit 45 was inaccurate.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I
will get the exact words my hon. friend used. I cannot read all my hon. friend's speech, but the note I took down was as I say. What did my hon. friend say about exhibit 45?


Charles Edward Johnston: Let the minister tell it.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: My hon. friend raised the point of order. Will he point out what he did say?


Charles Edward Johnston: I ask-as a point of order that the minister withdraw the statement that I said that exhibit No. 45 was inaccurate. I ask for your ruling, Mr. Speaker.


Georges Parent: The hon. member says
that the statement attributed to him was not made by him and asks that it be withdrawn.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I am bound to accept my hon. friend's word that he did not say it, and I have not time to run -through his whole speech in Hansard to find what he said, but I say again that my note which I took down at the time-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I am bound to accept my hon. friend's statement.


Richard Burpee Hanson: I suggest that my hon. friend withdraw.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I have said I am ready to accept my hon. friend's word. If he states that he did not say that, I withdraw.
My hon. friends after criticizing the commissioner, after criticizing Sir Lyman Duff, defend themselves -by saying that they are not attacking the Chief Justice of Canada; they say he is only a commissioner. But I would point out that under the order in council appointing the Chief Justice of Canada as commissioner, he was given all the powers and immunities enjoyed by a judge of any superior court in Canada while exercising his judicial function.


Richard Burpee Hanson: If he was a judge, why give him the powers of a judge? He had them anyway.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I recognize that there is a distinction between a man sitting as judge and a man sitting as commissioner. But in this case the order in

Hong Kong Inquiry
council definitely gave to the commissioner the immunities of a judge. In any event, the very same qualities that are necessary in a good commissioner are the qualities necessary in a good judge. Hon. members cannot begin to attack the findings of the commissioner, his interpretations of evidence, his conclusions from testimony. They cannot attack Sir Lyman Duff, the commissioner in the Hong Kong inquiry, without at the same time attacking Sir Lyman Duff, the Chief Justice of Canada.
At six o'clock the house took recess.
After Recess
The house resumed at eight o'clock.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I had been discussing the references made in the house and outside it to Sir Lyman Duff, the commissioner appointed to investigate the Hong Kong affair. I pointed out that the criticisms made here of Sir Lyman Duff are criticisms that go to his value as a judge, just as surely as they are directed against his value as a commissioner. The statement that the commissioner drew wrong inferences from the evidence, the statement that he made findings unsupported by fact, the statement that he quoted only such portions of evidence as would support his findings-all of these things are just as evil and just as much to 'be condemned in a judge as in a commissioner. If the man who sat as commissioner in this instance possessed these qualities which have been attributed to him by some hon. members, then he is not fit to be a judge in any court in this country.
The judiciary of Canada, the judiciary of any part of the British empire, has always been held in the very highest esteem. In that judiciary to-day, as was pointed out this afternoon by the hon. member for Vancouver-Burrard (Mr. McGeer), there is no brighter name than that of Sir Lyman Duff. It is not to be thought for a moment that this venerable judge, now nearing four score years of age, with fifty years of distinguished service on the bench and at the bar of his country behind him, in the twilight of his life, would deliberately misinterpret evidence and draw conclusions not warranted by the facts, or do any one of the dozen other things attributed to him by some hon. members.
I come now to the decision of the war committee to send troops to Hong Kong. That decision has been criticized. The hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green) said that the report showed clearly a lack of
understanding of the Japanese and the Pacific situation on the part of the war committee, on the part of the Department of National Defence and on the part of the Department of External Affairs.
The hon. member for Weybum (Mr. Douglas) said that the intelligence service of the United States knew on October 16 that hostilities were likely to break out in the Pacific, and word of this was forwarded to their army and navy commands. Then he went on to say that either the British intelligence knew it or did not know it; and he asked, if the British intelligence knew it, was it or was it not conveyed to the Canadian government? If it was conveyed to the Canadian government, why did the Canadian government not take some action in that regard? If the British government did not convey that information to the Canadian government then, he asked, have we the proper machinery to establish a liaison between the war office in London and the Department of National Defence in Canada.
The hon. member for Souris (Mr. Ross) said that the joint defence board should have been seized of the situation, and that the Canadian press might have acquired some knowledge of it from their United States confreres.
The hon. member for Temiscouata (Mr. Pouliot) also criticized the war committee for its stand on this point.
Let me state first of all with regard to the United States opinion something which appears in the Roberts report. I find this:
On October 16, 1941,-
This is what the hon. member for Weyburn was referring to.
-the commanding general, Hawaiian department, and the commander in chief of the fleet were advised by the war and navy departments of the changes in the Japanese cabinet, of the probability

Note the word "probability."
-of hostilities between Japan and Russia, and of the .possibility of attack by Japan on Great Britain and the United States.
Notice the reference to the "possibility of attack by Japan on Great Britain and the United States" and "the probability of hostilities between Japan and Russia."
That is the finding of the Roberts commission, and the only finding I can find within the Roberts report to indicate the action taken on October 16. Yet hon. gentlemen time and again in the house, both to-day and yesterday, have spoken as if the United States government had some information which we did not have and which we did not know about but which we ought
Hong Kong Inquiry

to have had. The Roberts report points out that all the information there was, indicated that there was the possibility of a war between Japan and the United States, but the probability of a war between Japan and Russia.
As to the information from Great Britain, hon. members have made much of exhibit No. 45 which is quoted at page 61 of the Hong Kong report, and to which reference is made at page 16. The hon. member for Bow River called me to order before six o'clock, because I had stated that he had referred to that exhibit as being inaccurate. The hon. member denied that, and said that he had not stated it was inaccurate. Turning to page 4800 of Hansard I find the hon. member spoke as follows:
The telegram of October 26 mentioned by General Stuart contains the following: "Consensus opinion that war in far east unlikely at present."
Then the hon. member proceeds to say:
I suppose I shall have to refer to the report again, so that I will turn to page 61 of the report. I fancy I will be correct when I say that here again a partial statement was issued in the report.
I want the house to mark these words:
When a partial statement is taken out of its context and put in as giving a fact and an impression of opinion is based on that portion of the document, it is most misleading.


Charles Edward Johnston: Is that not correct?


Angus Lewis Macdonald: I say to my hon. friend that he gave the impression that the quoting of part of the telegram which was set out as exhibit 45 was misleading. I say that is a much stronger statement than to say it was inaccurate.


Charles Edward Johnston: I did not say that the portion was misleading; I said when a section is taken out of its context, that would be misleading.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: My hon.' friend said:
When a partial statement is taken out of its context-[DOT]
He was referring to exhibit 45.


Georges Parent: The statement as it appears in Hansard will speak for itself. The hon. minister has given his interpretation, and the hon. member has recalled the remarks he used. The house will be able to put a proper interpretation upon it.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: The hon. member has referred to the telegram from the war office, and has suggested, if he has not definitely stated, that certain things were
fMr. A. L. Macdonald.]
suppressed which might have put an entirely different aspect upon that telegram from the war office. It is true that the telegram, of which exhibit 45 is part, contained a good many other things which the commissioner did not see fit to make public. But I cannot see how anything in the telegram could detract from or vary the meaning of these plain words, "consensus opinion that war in far east unlikely at present." That is the opinion we had from Canadian military headquarters based upon the opinion they had from the war office. The British opinion was that war was unlikely; the United States opinion was that war with Japan was only a possibility, and yet hon. members keep on trying to create the impression that we had some knowledge or that we should have had some knowledge to the contrary.


Charles Edward Johnston: What did the Minister of National Defence for Air (Mr. Power) say about that?


Angus Lewis Macdonald: The evidence of the Minister of National Defence for Air was that there was a good chance of war with Japan. There was a chance of war with Japan and we knew that all summer. Does my hon. friend or any other hon. member suggest that when we were asked to send troops to garrison Hong Kong in time of peace, when we were not at war with Japan, that we should have withdrawn those troops the minute we heard there was going to be war? If we had done that, all the commotion that we are going through to-day would be as nothing compared with what would have happened.


Mr. CASSELMAN:: Another straw-man
knocked down.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: Hon. gentlemen have been urging that troops be sent to almost every quarter of the globe. They have been advocating conscription for overseas service in order that more troops may be sent overseas. Yet when we send 2,000 troops to Hong Kong


An hon. MEMBER:: Untrained.


Angus Lewis Macdonald: They were not untrained; they were well-trained troops, as well trained as any troops in Canada. When we send 2,000 troops to Hong Kong there is all this talk and commotion. I say it would have been accentuated a thousand-fold if we had not done what we did. There was no other course open to the war committee. We took the course we did, and for the reasons that were apparent. If we had to do the same thing over again, I am sure we would bake exactly the same course.

Hong Kong Inquiry-Division
There is an amendment before the house which has for its main purpose the criticism of the Department of National Defence. It reads in part:
. . . proof of incapacity on the part of the responsible military authorities and demonstrates the immediate and urgent need for a comprehensive reorganization of the Department of National Defence.
I am not here to beg mercy for anybody, and least of all need I ask it for the Minister of National Defence. I am sure if the Minister of National Defence for Air were here, he would support me to the full. As compared with our distinguished colleague, the Minister of National Defence, the Minister of National Defence for Air and myself have had easy times. We have had no great difficulty in getting men. The air force is fighting; the navy is fighting, but the Minister of National Defence has had to contend for over two years with criticism from every part of this country against the methods of his department. Why is the army not fighting? Why are they not doing this? Why are they not doing that? The fact that they are not fighting is not the fault of the Canadian army, and it certainly is not the fault of the Minister of National Defence. As one who has worked closely with the Minister of National Defence for more than two years, I cannot conceive of any minister in any department who brings to his department greater experience, greater zeal, greater energy, greater patriotism and greater devotion than does the Minister of National Defence to his.


Georges Parent: I am sorry to have to inform the hon. minister that his time has expired.
The question is on the amendment. Those in favour of the amendment will say "aye."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Aye.


Georges Parent: Those opposed will say
"nay."


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Nay.


Georges Parent: In my opinion the nays
have it. I declare the amendment lost.


Richard Burpee Hanson: On division.
Mr. MacKENZIE. (Vancouver Centre): For the first time in Canadian history an opposition moving a vote of want of confidence has virtually withdrawn it on division.
And five members having risen in their places:


Georges Parent: Call in the members.


Mr. PERLEY:: I was paired with the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


George Alexander Cruickshank: I was paired with the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Black). Had I voted I would have been delighted to vote against the amendment.


Mr. BLACK (Cumberland):: I was paired with the hon. member for Halton (Mr. Cleaver). Had I voted I would have voted for the amendment.


James Arthur Ross: I was paired with the hon. member for Swift Current (Mr. Graham). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. BENCE:: I was paired with the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Tripp). Had I voted, I would have voted) for the amendment.


Charles Edward Johnston: I was
paired with the hon. member for Medicine Hat (Mr. Gershaw). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. QUELCH:: I was paired with the hon. member for Cochrane (Mr. Bradette). Had I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.


Mr. MacKINNON (Kootenay East):: I
was paired with the hon. member for New Westminster (Mr. Reid). Had) I voted, I would have voted for the amendment.
Main motion (Mr. Ilsley) agreed to, and the house went into committee of supply, Mr. Yien in the chair.



DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

[Stage Direction]
88. Departmental administration, $156,750.
The CHAIRMAN:: Item stands.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: No.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Would the Prime Minister be good enough to explain just what is proposed to be done, so that the committee will have a clear understanding.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Mr. Chairman-


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Richard Burpee Hanson: Well, it does not take much, does it?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It looks as
though the government still has the confidence of the House of Commons. At the moment we are seeking to have two or three new departments called simply that we may be able to proceed with the estimates of those departments later in the week. We have taken one item of the Department of Justice. It is proposed to take now one item of the Department of Mines and Resources, and, if no exception is taken, we would call one item in national war services. I understand that it is the desire of the leader of the opposition to retain one department for to-morrow.


Richard Burpee Hanson: One for
each day.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: Wednesday is the only one more day.


Mr. CRERAR:: Unless you go to next week.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: When these
items are called the committee will be asked to rise, report progress and sit again to-day. As I indicated this morning, we shall then return to the routine proceedings, and after the orders of the day have been called we shall come back later into committee of supply.
Item stands.



DEPARTMENT OF MINES AND RESOURCES

[Stage Direction]
122. Departmental administration, $151,088.
Item stands.

[Stage Direction]
200. Canadian travel bureau service-to assist in promoting tourist business in Canada, $500,000.
Item stands.
Progress reported.

[Stage Direction]
Third report of standing committee on banking and commerce.-Mr. Moore.

Wheat and Coarse Grains

[Stage Direction]
Mr. ALPHONSE FOURNIER (Hull) moved that the fifth report of the special committee on war expenditures be concurred in.
Motion agreed to.


Mr. W. H. MOORE (Ontario) moved:: That Bill 116, to incorporate Canadian Alliance Insurance Company, reported upon this day by the standing committee on banking and commerce, without amendment, be placed immediately on the order paper of the house for consideration in committee of the whole.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.

[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. A. MacKINNON (Minister of Trade and Commerce) moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 121 to amend the Precious Metals Marking Act.
Richard Burpee Hanson: Will the
minister explain why this bill has been left to the eleventh hour?


Mr. MacKINNON (Edmonton West):: When Bill No. 121 was presented to parliament in the second session 1940-41, the intention was to amend subsection 7 (a) of section 10 of the Precious Metals Marking Act, but through inadvertence (a) was omitted from the amendment. Consequently all of subsection 7 was repealed, thus eliminating (b) of subsection 7 of section 10 of the act.
Subsection (b) is an integral part of the act. It prevents the stamping of such marks as "lOK-Gold plate" on a watch ease when the gold would be of infinitesimal thickness. It draws a distinct line between gold-filled watch cases and gold-plated watch cases. It affords definite protection to the buying public. It has been an effective part of the act since 1934.
It is important that it be legislated back into the act with force and effect as of the date of the amendment of the act of 1941 when it was inadvertently repealed.


Richard Burpee Hanson: It looks
like poor staff work.


James Angus MacKinnon: Somewhere, certainly.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.



WHEAT AND COARSE GRAINS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Ernest Edward Perley: I wish
to direct a question or two to the Minister of Trade and Commerce on the basis of a report in the Winnipeg newspapers under date of July 25. I quote from the Winnipeg Tribune:
Grain Storage Problem The greatest grain storage problem in Canada's history is now in sight. ... At present roughly 380 million bushels of grain are visible in Canada.
The report goes on:
Assuming that Canada, on the basis of present crop prospects, produces a total of all grains of approximately 1,000,000,000 bushels and allowing for the storage space now in sight of 170,000,000 bushels, or eATen 200.000,000 bushels, the immense total of possibly 800,000,000 bushels of all grains will have to be stored elsewhere.
The report says further that there are indications that the government is considering some form of aid to farmers to provide storage space on farms. With labour scarce and the season relatively close to harvest time the situation is a serious one.
My questions are these: The wheat board, I understand, were in Ottawa consulting with the minister last week. Will he make a statement assuring this house and the producers that some form of storage will be allowed on the farms similar to that provided for in the regulations for storage on the farms in connection with the 1940-41 crop, and will he assure the producers that the government will endeavour to make available lumber for increased storage on farms?


James Angus MacKinnon: All I can say is that the matters referred to by the hon. member for Qu'Appelle have been receiving the close attention of the wheat board and of the members of the government. The wheat board have been in Ottawa in consultation with the government and with members interested in this problem. Recently they returned to Winnipeg for further study of the conditions that will confront the board and the government in connection with the prospect of a very heavy crop of wheat and of coarse grains. The question of farm storage ha* been and is being discussed, but no definite decision has been reached.
As regards lumber supplies being made available for the construction of granaries on farms, that matter has been taken up with



IN FIFTH

[Stage Direction]
Status oj "O Canada'
[Stage Direction]
the proper authorities not only as regards lumber but as regards nails, which are a very important factor. Other matters in the same connection have been receiving attention.
Ernest Edward Perley: Is the minister considering the bringing into force of regulations providing for storage for farmers?


James Angus MacKinnon: The whole matter is under consideration.



&quot;0 CANADA&quot; REQUEST FOR STATEMENT IN ANSWER TO QUESTION AS TO STATUS

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Thomas Langton Church: I wish to ask the Prime Minister a question arising out of the reply which he gave the hon. member for Comox-Albemi (Mr. Neill), as reported at page 4775 of Hansard yesterday, with reference to "0 Canada". I did not like to bring this matter up on the motion to go into supply for the simple reason that I did not wish to take up the time of the house, but I would point out that the hon. member for Quebec-Montmorency (Mr. LaCroix) has had on the order paper eight different questions, all to the same effect, about a change of flag and anthem. The reply which the government has invariably given in this connection is that the war is on and that secondary matters can wait, which is right. But yesterday the Prime Minister gave a different answer with reference to "O Canada". The reply which he gave me in 1927 was that "God Save the King" had been and always would be Canada's national anthem, by law, statute, custom and usage. The learned gentleman informed me in 1927 that there was another anthem, provincial, not national, by custom in certain sections of Canada. I think that if the right hon. and learned gentleman will look into this question he will find that his answer given yesterday was not correct, because we were told, in reply to the eight questions to which I have referred, that the matter was being left in abeyance until after the war. I challenge his statement of yesterday. The House of Commons consists of 245 members, and it has decided on four or five different occasions that there shall be no change. I fail to see, therefore, why the Prime Minister made the statement which he did yesterday and which I repeat is incorrect.

Right Hon.. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister): The statement I made yesterday is wholly correct. My hon. friend refers to some date some years ago. Since that time we have had in Canada a visit by our King and Queen and on the occasion when Their Majesties were here, both "God Save the King" and "O Canada" were given like recognition as national anthems.



TAXATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. NORMAN J. M. LOCKHART (Lincoln): I do not like to raise the question too frequently, but I wonder if the Minister of Finance could answer either "yes" or "no" to the question I asked in connection with payments on income tax and excess profits. I have telegrams from people inquiring whether they must raise the money before July 31 for two months' payments at once, or whether there is to be some change.
Hon. J. L. ILSLEY (Minister of Finance):: I will make a statement to-morrow at eleven o'clock on the orders of the day. I cannot make one before then. I have discussed the matter very fully this afternoon with my officials, and it may be possible to make some amelioration of the present plans, but not to the extent that the hon. gentleman requests.



HOUSING


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day
Thomas Langton Church: I should like to ask the Minister of Finance whether he is prepared to make a statement to-morrow on the general housing situation. The situation in the big cities is very grave.


James Lorimer Ilsley: I said I would make a statement before the house adjourns. I intended to make it when I introduce the supplementary estimates or on the finance estimates, but I might possibly be able to make it on the orders of the day to-morrow, if that would be of any advantage.



LABOUR CONDITIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Percy Chapman Black: I should like to ask the Minister of National War

Supply-Post Office
48S9
Services and the Minister of Labour if there has been an inquiry into the need for additional men to operate the mines, more particularly on the mainland of Nova Scotia, so that they may operate to capacity to meet the pressing demands for coal especially at this season of the year. I understand that in those mines there is a great shortage of men on account of the very large enlistment in that section of Nova Scotia.


Hon. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (Minister of Labour):: The whole question of man-power in certain basic industries, including mining, is receiving the attention of the government at the present time.

The house in committee of supply, Mr. Vien in the cfiair.



POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT

[Stage Direction]
ZJfS. Departmental administration, $743,650.
Alfred Henry Bence: When this matter was before the committee on Saturday night I was making some remarks, first of all on general lines with respect to the matter of the continuation of political patronage in certain sections of the Post Office Department. I took, and I still do take, emphatic objection to the continuation of this practice, irrespective of the fact that it may have been carried on for some years, and, as some hon. members suggested the other evening, under several administrations. I do so because I believe that the continuation of admitted political patronage in the matter of appointments to any department is damaging to the morale of our people, particularly during time of war.
I say that for this reason. It is recognized that within the Post Office Department certain appointments are made by way of political patronage, and naturally the person who receives the appointment bears the same political stripe as the government of the day. The man on the street makes no great differentiation between departments of the government, whether it be post office, munitions and supply, army, navy, or any of the other departments. I think he almost necessarily comes to the conclusion, as I suggested on Saturday night- you have a very hard time to persuade him otherwise-that the same practice holds true with respect to other departments. I suggest that at a time when the government is asking the utmost from our people and wanting them to put everything they have into the war, to make the sacrifices they do in the way of money and services, and to give their sons
and their daughters to the armed services, the government should, for the duration of the war anyway-although as far as I am personally concerned I should like to see the practice completely eliminated-see that all appointments in all departments should be on a purely non-political basis.
On Saturday I read certain correspondence-


Mr. MULOCK:: Would the hon. member permit me? We are on an item dealing with general administration. The next item deala with post offices. It makes a difference as to which official is present. If the hon. member has no objection, before continuing with the Bruno matter, which I believe is the one he wants to discuss, would he wait until we reach the next item? I would have the official in charge here.


Alfred Henry Bence: I have no objection; the only thing is that I thought I should complete the record, because the Postmaster General asked me to put a certain letter on record, and there are two or three others.


William Pate Mulock: It is just a matter of having the proper official here.


Alfred Henry Bence: It will come under the next item, will it?


William Pate Mulock: Yes.


Mr. MacNICOL:: Under departmental
administration I should like to ask the Postmaster General a question. He will remember that last fall in Toronto particularly, there was a good deal of turmoil and excitement over the interference with mail of what is known as the North Toronto Bible House. I have never yet heard an explanation or read anything in the press as to how that interference came about and the result of it. But I do remember a great meeting was held in Knox church, Toronto, one of the most important churches in the city. The speaker on that occasion was one of Toronto's outstanding citizens, Rev. T. Christie Innes, and at that meeting a resolution was passed, only part of which-so as not take too much time- I shall read:
That we, gathered together in the historic Knox Presbyterian church, Toronto, for public worship, on Sunday, October 12 at seven p.m. are shocked to realize the seriousness of the situation created by your action as Postmaster General in prohibiting mail to a North Toronto Bible House. Bearing all the facts in mind, we do hereby unanimously convey to you our profoundest moral repugnance at an action which we, as law-abiding citizens and loyal Canadians, regard as a flagrant outrage against our traditional British liberties.
Supply-Post Office

I was not at the meeting because I was out of town, but I read about it in the press and I should like to know for my own information what was the background that encouraged the minister first to rescind the mail privileges of that house and, presuming they were later restored, why they were restored.


Mr CHURCH:: I wish to support the statement of my colleague. I can say that the Post Office Department had little to do to go to the Department of Justice and ask for an opinion on a pure matter of policy and administration. I fail to see what that department-it was done before my honourable and learned friend came into the department-has to do with the administration of a public utility like the Post Office. I claim that the order issued was absolutely illegal, under the Post Office Act and under the code. The department had no such right. It is not done in Great Britain, or in other places, and I fail to see why it was done here. The papers with regard to the matter should be tabled so that the committee may understand what kind of administration this is, when it comes to the administration of a public utility like the post office.
I call the attention of the committee to the fact that Toronto provides the greatest post office receipts in Canada, running to about $8,444,000, or maybe a little more than that. In that city there is a surplus in favour of the Post Office Department of about $1,500,000 from the administration of the Toronto post office. Long ago we should have had drop letters for one cent. In that way we would get back a little over half a million of that surplus, and the department would be giving a better service.
Like the Bell Telephone company and other public utilities, the post office is a public utility; but it is away behind the times, compared with the British post office. The British post office has added many new features through the period of two wars and a depression. This is a public utility which has a direct bearing on the life of every retail merchant, every wholesaler and every person in every city of this dominion. We are proud of the men in this department, and as a public utility it has been well run. The men who do the work for the department do it at very low rates of pay. I should hope that in connection with the Toronto post office and many others throughout Canada the minister might be able to announce improved labour conditions and an eight-hour day by law. Because of the war some of the older men in the service are having a struggle to get along, and some are not even making a living.
[Mr. MacNicol.l
I should like to see the department keep up to date. For instance, many soldiers are travelling on trains, but when they get off those trains at divisional points they cannot buy postage stamps. It is the duty of the post office to provide for sales of stamps on trains. Every railroad station should sell postage stamps, through the Post Office Department, and the conductors or some other officials on the trains should be able to supply stamps, as is being done in many states across the boundary line.
I should like to have a statement from the minister as to the policy of the department in war time. There is about one residential delivery a day in Toronto. One mails a letter from here on Thursday night and it is delivered on Monday morning. There should not be a condition like that in a city having the commercial importance of Toronto. Toronto is only one city; I have no doubt the same condition applies to all other cities and towns in Canada.
Costly post offices have been built throughout Canada without any regard for economy. If one looks at the report of the Postmaster General, he will see that public buildings are being erected all across the country at huge cost, some of them with, vacant top stories. I know of one post office building in my constituency in which the upper floors are vacant. I am sure that would not happen in connection with a large corporation like the Bell Telephone company or the Consumers Gas company. In my opinion that is an irregular procedure. The banks are building skyscrapers. In so doing they are violating section 82 of the Bank Act, and when that violation is committed the property should, by law, revert to the crown. One finds quite a wide difference between what was done by the British Post Office Depai'tment before the war for the working class in Great Britain, and what has been done in Canada.
I have discussed these matters with two or three of the minister's predecessors. It is true that the minister's report reflects an efficiently operated department, from what I can see of it. They seem to be a capable and able lot of men. The delivery men go round the streets in all kinds of weather, and at very small salaries. I do hope they get some improvements, and certainly drop letters should be reduced from twTo cents to one cent in Toronto, in view of the heavy revenues the department derives from that city.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I should like to join the
hon. member for Davenport in making a protest against the action of the Post Office

Supply-Post Office
Department, I have had a number of letters from substantial citizens of Toronto expressing their regret and resentment at the action of the Postmaster General or the Post Office Department in discontinuing the mailing privileges to the North Toronto Bible House.


William Pate Mulock: Quite a number of matters have been covered by the three hon. members who have spoken. The hon. member for Davenport will excuse me if I answer some of the representations from other hon. members before turning to a discussion of the North Toronto Bible House.
I turn first to the points raised by the hon. member for Broadview with regard to the financial end of the matter. He referred particularly to the sale of stamps on railway property. I would suppose that that would be a matter for some other organization; certainly it is not for this department.
Second, the Post Office Department does not erect buildings. When it requires space it communicates with the Minister of Public Works. If he in his wisdom thinks it advisable to grant the accommodation, we are consulted-I will not say fully, but at least to some extent-as to the premises we require, and the general lay-out of the buildings we need. However, the Department of Public Works frequently make allowances for other government departments when they erect a public building.
The hon. member for Broadview raised the question of expense. May I point out to him that this department this year has a net surplus of about $4,500,000. I believe he will agree that that is a very substantial surplus, but I cannot give him any hope for any reduction in postage in war time. No doubt representations have been made to him, with the suggestion that he should pass them on to me, to the effect that postage should be decreased. I do not think there is any immediate possibility of that taking place. I cannot hold out any hope to the hon. member for Broadview that during war time there can be any reduction in postage.
The matter of the North Toronto Bible House was originally dealt with as a purely departmental matter. It came to the attention of the deputy minister, and I am advised that he communicated with the deputy minister of justice seeking an opinion as to what action should be taken with respect to certain pamphlets which he doubted should be given the use of the mails. He sought an opinion as to whether there was any contravention of the Post Office Act, and whether they should not be denied the use of the mails.
The matter was considered by the Department of Justice, and in due course a report was made to the deputy minister of this department that in the opinion of the Department of Justice these pamphlets should not be allowed the use of the mails.


John Ritchie MacNicol: For what reason?


William Pate Mulock: I shall deal first with the
question of power. There was some question as to whether the Post Office Department had a right in a case such as this to prohibit the use of the mails. Section 7 paragraph (d) of the Post Office Act gives the Postmaster General the following power:
(d) make regulations declaring what shall and what shall not be deemed to be mailable matter for the purposes of this act. and for restricting within reasonable limits the weight and dimensions of letters and packets and other articles sent by post, and for prohibiting and preventing the sending of explosive, dangerous, contraband or improper articles, obscene or immoral publications, prints or photographs, or obscene or immoral post-cards, or letters or post-cards having printed, stamped or written on the outside thereof any words or devices which, in the opinion of the Postmaster General, tend to injuriously affect the commercial or social standing of the persons to whom they are addressed.
Under the above-mentioned authority regulations were established many years ago providing for the treatment to be accorded such articles found in the mail. This is not a new regulation. As far as I have been able to ascertain, it has been the general practice down through many years, under all governments of all parties. These regulations are contained in section 206 of the "Canadian Official Postal Guide", which reads as follows:
It is forbidden to post for delivery or transmission by or through the post any obscene or immoral book, pamphlet, picture, print, engraving, lithograph, photograph or other publication, matter or thing, of an indecent, immoral, seditious, disloyal or scurrilous character, or any letter upon the outside or envelope of which, or any post card or post band or wrapper upon which there are words, devices, matters or things of the character aforesaid, or any w'ords or devices which in the opinion of the Postmaster General "tend to injuriously affect the commercial or social standing of the person addressed". Matter posted contrary to this prohibition is to be stopped and sent specially by first mail to the general superintendent, postal service (for inspection service), Ottawa.
In September, 1941, the attention of the department was directed to the fact that the mails were being used for the distribution of printed tracts entitled "My life in *the convent" and "Presbyterian minister replies to Roman priest". The pamphlets also advertised certain other religious books. The Department of Justice was asked for an ex-
Supply-Post Office

pression of opinion as to whether this literature contravened the provisions of the criminal code or the Post Office Act. Under date of September 12, 1941, W. Stuart Edwards, deputy minister of justice, advised that in his opinion the pamphlets were published for an illegal purpose within the meaning of the Canadian postal regulations and that the posting of the items was forbidden by postal regulation 206.
In view of the opinion expressed by the deputy minister of justice, the officials, acting in accordance with the requirements of the foregoing regulation, issued an order prohibiting the delivery of all mail addressed to or coming from the Protestant Book and Tract House, Toledo, Ohio, United States, and the North Toronto Bible House, 2721 Yonge street, Toronto, the names of which organizations appeared on the printed tracts under discussion as distributors. The case was first brought to my attention on September 31, 1941, when I received a letter from the Reverend J. Taylor, proprietor of the North Toronto Bible House, asking why his mail was prohibited, I immediately had a full inquiry made and after a careful review of all the circumstances I was satisfied that the action taken in this case was in accordance with that taken by the department in many other cases of this kind and was the only proper and feasible course for the department to pursue in view of the requirements of the postal law and the regulations.
I fully explained the circumstances to the Reverend Mr. Taylor in a telegram dated October 2, 1941, and advised him that upon receipt of written assurance from him that he would discontinue the use of the mails for the distribution of the literature which had been declared illegal by the Department of Justice, full mailing facilities would be restored to the North Toronto Bible House, but that failing the receipt of such assurance the prohibitory order would remain in effect. Under date of October 4, 1941, the Reverend Mr. Taylor advised me that after carefully considering my message he found he was unable to furnish the assurance requested. I am informed that the district director of postal services at Toronto, Mr. A. M. Gibson, also got in touch with the Reverend Mr. Taylor on this point and was informed that he, the Reverend Mr. Taylor, would not give an assurance of this kind. In view of these refusals and of the opinion expressed by the Department of Justice that the pamphlets in question were illegal, the prohibitory order issued against the North Toronto Bible House has remained in effect.
I wish to point out that this is not an isolated case. A number of similar cases have come before my department, and I find that the attitude of the various Postmasters General in all administrations has been the same as that of the department in connection with the North Toronto Bible House. The only difference between the various other cases and that under discussion is that in the other cases the decisions were made solely by the Post Office Department, while in the case under discussion the officers in my department, having come to the conclusion that the pamphlets published immoral, indecent and scurrilous matters, decided to obtain an independent opinion from the Department of Justice, which as all members know, is the legal adviser of the government. As previously stated, Mr. W. Stuart Edwards, deputy minister of the latter department, expressed the opinion that the pamphlets were published for an illegal purpose within the meaning of the postal regulations. In this connection I would invite the attention of the committee to the House of Commons debates of April 29, 1940, volume 4, pages 3056 and 3057.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I have never seen the pamphlets and I know nothing about them; all I know is what I have read in the statement. But I cannot understand how the pamphlets were published for an illegal purpose. I do not know who these people are, but I can hardly credit anyone calling themselves the North Toronto Bible House with publishing pamphlets for an illegal purpose? What was the illegal purpose?


William Pate Mulock: I think it would be a good idea for the hon. member to see the pamphlets, and I shall be glad to show them to him. I think he will then agree with the department.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I cannot understand why such a highly reputable and prominent man as the Reverend T. Christie Innes should hold, along with many other distiguished men, a great demonstration protesting against the action taken. What were they protesting against?


William Pate Mulock: Against the mail for the North Toronto Bible House being stopped.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I can hardly understand a man such as the Reverend T. Christie Innes subscribing to anything that was illegal. The minister comes from Toronto, and I know he has the right perspective and understanding of a man such as Reverend T. Christie Innes.

Supply-Post Office


William Pate Mulock: There is no question about the standing of the Reverend Mr. Innes.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I cannot credit for one moment that he would subscribe to anything that could be considered illegal. What I am trying to find out is what was illegal about the pamphlets?, I have never seen them and they may be illegal, I do not know.


William Pate Mulock: I invite the attention of the committee to the debates of this house on April 29, 1914, at pages 3056 and 3057 of Hansard with regard to a somewhat similar case, that of a publication entitled "The Menace", dealt with by the Hon. L. P. Pelletier, Postmaster General of that day.
An examination of the case of "The Menace" and that of the North Toronto Bible House will establish that the attitude and the policy of the Post Office Department in matters of this kind has been consistent down through the years. I wTish to stress the fact that the attitude of the department is and has always been that any newspaper or pamphlet discussing religion in an abstract way is responsible for its own opinions, and the department does not in any way interfere in such cases. Men, whether Protestant or Catholic, may hold their views in the extreme and give pronounced expression to them in the most extreme way, and the department does not interfere; but when personal abuse reflecting on the honour and chastity of the women and the clergy of any denomination as a whole is indulged in and the Canadian mails are used for the distribution of such matter, the Post Office Department has always considered it as its duty not to permit the use of the mails for such purposes.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Have mailing privileges been restored to the North Toronto Bible House, and if so, under what conditions?


William Pate Mulock: They have not been
restored because these people have not given us the necessary assurance. If they will give us the assurance that they will not use the mails for that purpose, they may have mailing privileges restored right away and they have been so advised. I spoke to the district inspector over the telephone and asked him to get in touch with Mr. Taylor and explain the situation to him, and the district inspector subsequently advised me that he had been in touch with Mr. Taylor, but they have not seen fit to give that assurance.


Mr. HAZEN:: When the distinguished
grandfather of the present Postmaster General occupied the position which the hon. member for York North now occupies in the government of the day, he appointed a number of
men who were deaf and dumb to positions in the civil service, thereby indicating a sympathy for and a desire to help a class of people who have to pass through life under a great disability. These men can be employed as sorters and stampers, and I believe that on the whole they perform their work satisfactorily and well. These appointments, as I am informed, were made about thirty-five years ago, and the men who were then appointed are now being superannuated.
I would ask the Postmaster General hi give serious consideration to the suggestion I wish to make to him to-night that he endeavour to have more men who are deaf and dumb employed in the Post Office Department of this country. I believe there will be opposition to the- suggestion from some quarters, but I would urge the minister to give my request serious consideration. It is quite possible that there may be civil service regulations which would make it difficult to make such appointments, but if that is so, I suggest that the Postmaster General endeavour to have those regulations changed in order that some of these men who have to pass through life under this handicap may be so employed. They have no great organization and no great political influence. They are scattered here and there throughout the country. They want work and find it very difficult to get, and here I suggest is an opportunity to place these men suffering from this handicap in positions where they can be of real service to their country and be in a position to maintain themselves.


William Pate Mulock: I thank the hon. member for his suggestion. I would point out, however, that conditions in Canada to-day are very different from what they were thirty-five years ago. At that time the ministers had a great deal more power in the matter of making appointments. In fact, the minister appointed practically everyone in his department. I can assure my hon. friend that men of this class are taken on through the civil service commission, and so far as the Post Office Department is concerned we shall be glad to take on as many as we can use in certain positions. But their appointment comes under the civil service commission, and not under the department. However, I can assure the hon. member that there will be no holding back by the department, no endeavouring to avoid taking in such people. We shall be glad to take on a reasonable number so far as we can properly employ them in the service.


Douglas King Hazen: Have any of these men been taken on in recent years, and are there any
Supply-Post Office

regulations of the civil service commission which prevent these men from being appointed to the service?


William Pate Mulock: In answer to the first question, yes; some have been taken on in recent years. Replying to the second question, I know of nothing, and I have inquired of the officials and they know of nothing in the Civil Service Act to prevent the appointment of these people, but I shall make further inquiries and give the matter consideration.


Douglas King Hazen: How many have been taken on in recent years?


William Pate Mulock: I am sorry that I have not that information before me.


Gordon Graydon: Has consideration been given by the minister and the department to free postage on mail from Canada to the boys overseas? I know the minister is interested in this, and I should like to know what the prospects are.


William Pate Mulock: As my hon. friend is aware, mail to Canada from the troops overseas, posted in army, navy and air force offices is carried free, but I can hold out no great hope that my hon. friend's suggestion will be carried out because the volume of mail going overseas is tremendous. We have, as a matter of fact, reduced the rate on certain items. While we had a surplus of less than 81,750,000 a year ago, this year the surplus is nearly $4,500,000, and all that mail is not being carried at the expense of the troops. We are not making money out of that end of the business. It is a very expensive business to handle. We have reduced certain rates and are trying to get mail between the troops and Canada down to the lowest possible rates. Most of the mail going overseas to-day is for the troops, army, navy and air force.


Howard Charles Green: Is the merchant navy included in that?


William Pate Mulock: No, it is not. To give the committee an idea, I may say we paid out for space on board ship last year about one and three-quarter million dollars. Before the war most of the space for mail was handled by subsidies by the Department of Trade and Commerce to the steamship lines; the government and the Post Office Department got free space for the mails. Apart from coastwise ship space, which cost from $325,000 to $350,000, there was no expense to the Post Office Department as far as space was concerned. Now we have had to absorb that amount in the earnings of the department in order to meet that additional expenditure.

Let me give the hon. members some idea of the volume for the fiscal year 1941-42. Mail dispatched from Canada to the Canadian armed forces overseas:	letters, 13,690,640,
with a weight of 342,266 pounds; news, 32,590 bags, weight 1,682,134 pounds; parcel post, 1,764,784 articles, weight 9,172,895 pounds; tobacco parcels, 1,403,294, weight 3,167,117 pounds; or a total weight of the four items of 14,364,412 pounds.
I can understand the hon. member's interest in helping to get as much mail to our troops as possible. I sympathize with him and agree with his object. But we are faced with the problem of obtaining sufficient space for shipping overseas. No doubt he has read in the press that the British authorities are requesting us to do everything possible to conserve space in shipping, and he probably remembers a short statement I made a few days ago, in response to the hon. member for Peterborough West, as regards space and the weight of parcels and the change which is to be put into effect. If we gave free passage to parcels, I do not believe that the volume of space which we could obtain would be anything like sufficient to accommodate the quantities which would come into our hands. It is not just a question of paying for that space on the ships; that space must be allocated to us by the representative in this country of the British admiralty. We can get only a certain amount of space. To illustrate the problems which our officers have across this country, I might mention that frequently, after ships have been loaded with mail, that mail or a part of it has to be unloaded because it is urgent that something else be sent in its place. I think the hon. member for Peel will realize that if his suggestion were adopted, there would be such a deluge of parcels that it would be humanly impossible to get enough space to take them overseas.


Mr. MARSHALL:: I regret that the estimates have been brought in so late in the session that we cannot avail ourselves of full discussion with reference to these matters. I intended to take up quite a little time on the items of the Postmaster General's department, but I will make my remarks as short as possible because I realize that anyone who holds up the work of the house at this particular time will find himself very unpopular.
The post office is a public utility; it is a business venture, and is not and should not be looked upon as entirely a department of government. I was interested in the statement which the Postmaster General made on Saturday, particularly his reference to what he termed the very substantial profit on the year's operations. He stated, as reported in

Supply-Post Office
Hansard, page 4761, that the profits for the year amounted to $4,492,002, as compared with $1,683,692 for the previous year. I contend that that is an inaccurate and misleading statement.


William Pate Mulock: I believe the hon. member has my statement in front of him. If I remember correctly, the expression I used was "net surplus".


James Alexander Marshall: Yes. The minister is
correct. If we turn to page 9 of the Postmaster General's report for the year ended March 31, 1941, we shall find there a statement of the revenue and the expenditure, the deficit or the surplus for each year since confederation. I want to. go back to the year 1936, because the question which I am now raising was raised for the first time, to my knowledge at least, in that year. The profit or surplus on that occasion was $2,407,786.89; yet the Postmaster General, the late Hon. J. C. Elliott, said on that occasion that the department was facing a heavy deficit when one took into account the rental of the buildings at fair prices. When he was further questioned with respect to this matter he confessed that the way in which the department kept the records was a most unusual way of keeping accounts. Since 1936 the auditor general and the Postmaster General have urged strongly that a new system of accounting should be adopted in order that the report should reflect the true facts. So far as I am aware this has not been done. For example, the receipts do not show that the franking privileges in 1941 amounted to $1,700,000. Further, there is no credit for the postmasters acting as agents for government annuities, or for the collection of radio licences, or for the sale of war savings stamps and war savings certificates.
On the expenditure side we have no account at all of the cost of the buildings erected, which are used to-day as post offices. We have no record of the caretaking expenses, no record of the repairs and the heating or equipment. That is generally conceded. The time has come when we should adopt a better system in the Post Office Department. I think we are entitled to a more businesslike and satisfactory statement than we have been getting from year to year. Anyone who reads the auditor general's report from page 267 to page 284 for the last year will see how urgent the need is for a complete overhauling of the-whole bookkeeping structure of the department. I do not intend to say anything further at this time seeing that we are nearing the end of the session, but I would ask the minister this question. Would he care to make any
comment on this matter, and is he prepared to bring about the changes which have been recommended by the auditor general and by previous Postmasters General? These changes are long overdue.


William Pate Mulock: The hon. member asked a question about allowances. He says that we do not charge certain rentals for buildings which we occupy or in some cases partly occupy. I could give him a good many figures. Take the net surplus of $4,492,002.79, and the first credit that the department should receive, according to the officials, is a credit in respect of postage value of the franking privilege at dominion government departments at Ottawa, $2,409,985.41. The next is postage value of franking provincial government documents, ballot boxes, customs notices of manifests, books for the blind, diplomatic and consular mail, notices under the National Resources Mobilization Act posted elsewhere than in Ottawa, $83,693.67. The next item is estimated expenses operating the post office savings bank, $80,000; next the estimated cost of free conveyance of newspapers in the forty-mile area, $30,000. This makes a total of $7,095,681.87. There are to be deducted certain items, such as rental value, post office space in government owned and rented buildings, space occupied by fhe post office department-because the post office department does not occupy the whole space in buildings that have the name "post office" over the front of them-$3,205,000. There is a net surplus, after adjustments of $3,890,681.87. With regard to the second question as to whether I would agree to adopt the suggestions that have been put forward, is the hon. member referring to the suggestion that these amounts that come in should not be paid out to the postmasters in different parts?


James Alexander Marshall: I am not suggesting any such thing. I am simply suggesting that the Post Office Department as a business organization should submit to parliament from year to year a proper financial statement similar to that which has been submitted to us, say, by the .Canadian National Railways, or some other institution of a similar nature. That has not been done, and I cannot find any record of such a thing in the auditor general's report or in the report of the Postmaster General himself. It has been recommended by the auditor general, from year to year, and I do not understand why these recommendations are not carried into effect.


Mr. BLAIR:: Can the minister give a
report of what the department has made each year for the last three years?
Supply-Post Office


William Pate Mulock: On the basis of net surpluses, the amounts are, for the fiscal year 1940.	$3,235.19;	1941,	$1,683,692.69;	1942,


Alan Webster Neill: Is it quite fair for the Postmaster General to allow the impression to go out to the country that these are surpluses when we are aware, or ought to be, that there is a large amount of expenses which are not mentioned? It comes under another department, the public works department.


William Pate Mulock: I do not know whether the hon. member was here a few moments ago when I dealt with the question of additions and deductions for this year in connection with rents and allowances for franking. A statement was put on the record about ten minutes ago.


Alan Webster Neill: I am not talking about
allowances, but about the cost of running the post office. The public works department builds the post offices and maintains them, and you cannot say that the post office is run at a profit when you leave out one of the biggest items of expenditure in connection with it. I aim not saying that it is not run properly. I think it is run wonderfully, but it is not wise to tell the people that we are making a revenue of over $1,000,000, of profit, from running the post office, when we purely and simply are not. There is something else that is grossly misleading, and that is the fact that we buy stamps and put them on cheques. That is a tax, and is not a part of the cost of delivering letters, so that it ought to be taken off the alleged profits, if you are to present the picture in its true light. I do not expect the Post Office Department to be run at a profit, because it gives service in out-of-the-way places at an enormous loss, comparatively speaking. All I say is that when the minister makes a statement of this kind he should point out that the profit has relation to certain expenses but is not an absolute profit.


James Alexander Marshall: The hon. member for
Comox-Alberni is quite correct. Rentals are not taken into consideration. Caretaking in many buildings is, I understand, done by the Department of Public Works, and so are repairs. I know that in some of the leading post offices in the country the equipment and heating are all taken care of by the Department of Public Works, and those things are not taken into account when the departmental officials figure out the surplus. I contend that that surplus is not correct.


Mr. ROEBUCK:: I wish to call the attention of the Postmaster General to a condition

in Toronto which I imagine is duplicated in many other places. That is with regard to the large number of men on the temporary list who undoubtedly ought to be on the permanent list. I have in my hand a circular letter signed by no less than forty-five postal employees in Toronto, protesting against being kept as temporary employees since 1936.


John Ritchie MacNicol: That does not come
under this item.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: Why not? It is administration.


William Pate Mulock: If we could get this first
item passed, this matter could be discussed under "post offices," the next item, because I should like to have the official in charge of post offices here when that matter is discussed.


Mr. LOCKHART:: Strictly under administration may I ask the minister when the system of selling stamps by vending machines was introduced and how long the act had been in effect before that change was made?


William Pate Mulock: I am unable personally to give that information, but the officials advise me that they can remember back to 1922 or 1923 at about which time the stamp-vending machines were started.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: Was the act not changed about 1936? I have a clear recollection of certain supposed slug machines being brought into this country about that time which -were converted into stamp-vending machines, selling four two-cent stamps for 10 cents and three three-cent stamps for 10 cents. I wondered why the change.


William Pate Mulock: The officials advise me
that they were not continued because they were not satisfactory.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: Are they not still in
operation?


William Pate Mulock: The officials advise me
that improvements have been made since the original machines. There are some, not a great many. It was found that climatic conditions interfered with their proper operation. They have been trying to overcome that difficulty. I understand such machines are all used in private stores, not in the post offices.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: Not long ago I happened to be in a so-called private store, but it is a public store at that, and stamps are sold as I have indicated, four two-cent stamps or three three's for 10 cents. Was that change not made within the last few' years? I want to know why because I always understood it was the established policy that stamps were to be sold for their face value.

Supply-Post Office


William Pate Mulock: I shall be glad to make
inquiry into that matter. I see the point. Of course those stamps in the first place would be sold by the department at face value.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: They are prepared in
special rolls, and cannot be used except as so prepared, and sold to these vendors. The stores are giving the impression that government men are coming round and supervising them. Is this being done by some commercial group, or is it being done by the government and is the government reaping the benefit?


William Pate Mulock: The hon. member does
not mean the postal meter machines?


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: No.


William Pate Mulock: I shall endeavour to have an investigation made and let the hon. member know.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: These stores I have in mind said that government men had come in and arranged for the sale of these stamps in rolls or packages. The reason why I raise the question is that I want to know whether some private individuals are making a profit out of postage stamps or whether stamps are to be sold at their face value, according to the act as I understand it. I want to know whether certain individuals, incorporated as a stamp-vending machine company-I will come out plainly with the situation as I know it- are organized and selling stamps at a profit at the expense of the public.


William Pate Mulock: My officials advise me that they have no information on the matter, but I will have investigation made immediately.


Norman James Macdonald Lockhart: For the benefit of the officials let me say that if they will go to the refectory building at Niagara Falls they will see there these stamp-vending machines in operation. If they will follow through they will find a very interesting story about the organization of the company and the profits that are being reaped by certain individuals, and the whole story that lies behind it. The public is paying the price.


Thomas Langton Church: I wish to support the statement of my colleague, the hon. member for Lincoln. The post office is supposed to be a public utility operating from the commercial aspect at cost. There is another practice as bad as this one. In a large city like Toronto where they collect $8,444,000, nearly one-third of all the post office revenue of the country from stamps, they let a contract to a collector who gets a fleet of motorcars and collects the mail from the boxes, three times
a day it used to be, twice a day, once a day. As soon as there is a change of government the system is all changed, and a new man gets the contract. If this is a public utility it should be operated like a privately-owned public utility, a light and power company or a telephone company, but at cost. It should have its own cars and motor trucks and equipment, including its own appliances for stamp vending to which my hon. friend has referred. I think some changes could be made, because the department is making a large amount of money out of the city of Toronto. It made $1,500,000 last year, and it has made more this year, because receipts have gone up. I believe there has been an increase of $750,000 since last year.
What is the minister's policy with regard to a small number of employees who may take a dollar or fifty cents out of a letter? Prosecutions have been laid since 1896 under section 363 of the criminal code, with respect to judicial or official documents, section 364 which deals with post letters, section 365 which provides the penalty and section 366 which has reference to the theft of mailable matter. When one considers that nearly $8,500,000 is collected in a year in Toronto, it is a fine record that only a very small sum is lost. It is not proper to send a poor man to prison for three years for having stolen a very small sum of money. That man may have gone through the depression and two war-time periods. That is not the sort of thing a public utility should do.
I know about labour conditions in the Toronto post office. Last year I received over one hundred letters containing complaints from employees about hours of labour and conditions. They had a further complaint with respect to leave. They work hard for their pay, and they require holidays. I believe the minister has been looking into this matter, and he may be in a position to indicate some change. An eight-hour day should be mandatory.
When I was chairman of the board of police commissioners in Toronto, a magistrate spoke to me about this matter of prosecutions under the criminal code. He pointed out that he thought it was too bad that a man with a small family of two or three children should, by decoy letter detection, be sent to gaol for three years for the theft of a very small sum of money. Some of the men prosecuted have been returned soldiers, old employees.
The predecessor of the present Minister of Justice was very sympathetic with regard to some of these cases, but his hands were tied because the report of the magistrate had to be considered. I suggest that public utilities
Supply-Post Office

should treat their employees even better than private utilities. Let me point out that private utilities are doing wonderful work for their employees in the way of pay, pensions and holidays. That has been the condition in the city of Montreal, I believe, and it certainly has been in the city of Toronto. Surely the Post Office Department should set an example as a pioneer public utility. Let us look at what is being done by many of the heat, light and power and gas companies for their employees. It is simply magnificent. They are up to date with pensions, sick pay and new allowances.
The time is coming when there should be a shake-up in labour conditions in the Post Office Department, and when they should use labour much better than they are using it. What is going to be the position with respect to mail delivery in the coming winter? There will be a shortage of rubber and oil, and I am wondering what facilities will be accorded people in residential sections for a better mail delivery. I have received complaints from two or three constituencies in Toronto stating that they do not receive their mail for two or three days after the date of mailing. Most of those complaints have been received during the winter time. I would ask the minister to look into such complaints.
Certainly there should be some change in this procedure of sending a man to gaol for three years for a trivial offence. Possibly the offence is not trivial in practice in a utility like the post office, but the sum involved certainly is, when one considers the work done by an employee. In my opinion the penalty should be materially reduced. I know of other cases which come up in the law courts where the penalties are much lighter for thefts of greater sums of money. I ask for fair treatment for the rank and file of the men in the department, and some change should be made with respect to these sections in the criminal code.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: Since we are on the
subject of employees, may I continue the discussion?


Thomas Langton Church: I should like to have an
answer to the questions I have raised, if the hon. member has no objection.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I have no objection, but I am talking about the same matter, namely the conditions in the Post Office Department with regard to the staff, which I think should be considered by the committee, and which I wish to bring forcibly to the attention of the minister.


Thomas Vien: I would suggest that items 243 and 244 be taken together, because the discussion has covered both items.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I took my seat with the idea that we were going to pass item 244, and that I could proceed immediately.


Thomas Vien: Is it the pleasure of
the committee that the two items be taken together?
. Some hon. MEMBERS: Yes.


William Pate Mulock: The hon. member for Saskatoon City was kind enough to agree to allow us to deal with item 243 first, and said he would wait until we reached item 244 to discuss the matter he had in mind. If we were to proceed otherwise, I doubt whether it would be quite fair to the hon. member.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: With your permission, Mr. Chairman, I shall finish this statement.


Thomas Vien: I am not free to give
leave or permission; I am bound by the rules of the house. I must confess, however, that the remarks of the hon. member for Broadview were more directed to item 244 than to item 243. My difficulty is to draw the line between the two items, and I am suggesting that they be taken together.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I am referring to a condition in the Toronto post office where no less than forty-five men who signed the document have been kept on the non-permanent or the temporary list since 1936. These gentlemen say:
We were successful candidates at a competitive examination for letter carriers and mail porters in 1936.
The circular announcing this examination intimated that successful candidates would serve a probationary period of six months; then, on appointment, would receive an annual increment of $120 until a maximum of $1,500 was reached.
Not one of us entertained the idea that four or five years hence we would still be bringing our wives and families the same yearly wage of approximately $960, with no status or assurance of permanent employment. That is the position we present to you.
Then the letter goes on to state certain orders in council which have been passed. I need not read them into the record.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Does it not come to $1,020 or $19.50 a week?


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I have simply read the document they placed in my hands. The

Supply-Post Office
post office officials will know accurately what they get. It is a very small salary, anyway. Then they go on to say:
This was very disappointing, but, worse still, recent information places the permanent quota at Toronto closer to 75 per cent than to 90 per cent.
On inquiry we find that again the treasury board is the stumbling block; why? We know not. Their action may be actuated by an economic point of view, but why prey on a few faithful servants?
We respectfully suggest to you there is something amiss when the treasury board can apparently veto an order in council.
Our present Postmaster General said, on December 3, 1941, to Mr. Tom Moore of the Trades and Labour Congress, "that our request was reasonable and if there was no favourable action soon he would take the matter up personally with the Prime Minister."
Here are forty-five men who have been on the non-permanent list, who are denied the benefits of superannuation and who are denied the benefits of increases in wages. They have no assurance that they will not have to stay on that list for the rest of their lives. It is not businesslike; it is not fair; it is not humane. I know many of these men. Some of them are married with families, and the condition I have described is one which should be remedied.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Many of these men have come to see me at my home, and I have received letters from others. They passed the postal examination, and from what they were told they inferred that in due course they would be taken on permanently. They are not receiving the annual increase of $120 which would increase their salary to $1,500. The information they gave me is that they are now getting $19.50 a week or about $1,020 a year, which is too small for a man who has to live in a city and take care of his wife and family as he should. I strongly endorse the sentiments just expressed by the hon. member and I urge the Postmaster General to give these men fair play. They have been on probation long enough, and it is time they were put on the permanent list and paid the regular permanent staff pay.


William Pate Mulock: I agree with the hon. member for Trinity (Mr. Roebuck) and the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol). As the hon. member for Trinity has made quite clear, it is not a case of my not being sympathetic. The hon. member for Davenport knows that this is not a matter that can be dealt with by the Postmaster General. I can make a recommendation to the treasury board as to what I think should be done, and I have done so in this case. In fact I
recommended that the 90 per cent limit should be removed. That is the way it stands at the moment.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: Does that rule apply to other departments as well as to the Post Office Department?


William Pate Mulock: Yes, and that is one of the difficulties. If they gave way in this case it might look as though there was discrimination in favour of the Post Office Department as against the other departments. That is probably one of the things which has given the treasury board some difficulty. This matter has been under consideration for a considerable length of time.
The hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church) dealt with the question of a 1-cent rate on drop letters in Toronto. The same thing applies in this case as applied in the suggestion of the hon. member for Peel (Mr. Graydon). I do not think there is any chance of getting reduced postage during this time of war, and I cannot see any great reason why we should do so. The hon. member suggests that it should be given to Toronto, but I must tell him that a special rate cannot be given to one city. We are legislating for the Dominion of Canada; the post office is a dominion service, and all cities must be treated in the same manner. The fact that there is that large surplus will not make it possible.
The hon. member also referred to the cutting down of the number of deliveries in residential districts. It is not so much a question of saving dollars as it is a question of saving man-power. We have tried to obtain a sufficient number of women employees to make this service possible, but women simply cannot do the work; it is too heavy. They have been tried out at three different places, and it was found that they could not carry on. I do not honestly think it is a tremendous sacrifice to ask people to make in order to conserve man-power. The residential districts should not object to receiving only one delivery a day when many rural districts receive only two or three deliveries a week.


Mr. ROSS (Moose Jaw):: Many receive none at all.


William Pate Mulock: As the hon. member says, there are many districts where the mails are delivered to the post offices and the people must call there. There is nothing unreasonable about this. We are trying to maintain the fullest possible service for the business districts and those districts turning out war materials, and it may be necessary to cut
Supply-Post Office

down the service in what might be termed the non-essential districts. The man-power situation is bound to get more serious. We realize that, and we are making plans accordingly. Certain routes have been rearranged so that three men are now doing the work formerly done by four. We just cannot get a sufficient number of employees in certain districts in order to carry on. I am glad the hon. member brought the matter up so that I could make it clear.


Mr. MARTIN:: A few moments ago the hon. member for Vancouver South (Mr. Green) asked the minister if the recent changes in the rates of postage and the other facilities provided for the armed services could be extended to the men of the merchant navy, and the minister replied in the negative. I am going to urge as strongly as I can that the men in our merchant navy be placed in exactly the same position as the men in the armed forces as far as the facilities of our postal services are concerned. I have before me an excerpt taken from a letter which appeared in the Windsor Daily Star, which letter purports to come from a woman in west Vancouver. Her words speak more eloquently and more effectively than anything I can say. She says:
My sou has been in the merchant navy ever since war broke out. He was 15 at that time. His ship has been bombed and they've carried vital supplies and troops to all parts of the empire, through all the most dangerous routes. The other day I sent him one of the new air mail letters the government has put out to send to soldiers and sailors. Mine has been returned by some official, marked "Not trans-mittable to civilians." I've sent on this information to my son so that he and all the other brave boys on his ship will know how much Canada thinks of her merchant navy boys."
Here is a boy whose ship was bombed. He belongs to a service which has given many lives. They are fighting for the same cause. Surely they should be included in the provisions the minister has made.


Thomas Langton Church: Will the minister let me know if decoy letters are used in connection with the prosecutions to which I referred? Decoy letters are not considered as postal letters. I think there was an amendment to the statute under I George VI by which a decoy letter was said to be a letter under the postal act. In my opinion that is a most reprehensible practice of detection and prosecution. I am going to ask the minister to confer with the Minister of Justice and see if there cannot be some amelioration of these three-year sentences.


William Pate Mulock: I shall be glad to give the suggestion of the hon. member for Broadview consideration and discuss the whole matter with the Minister of Justice.


Paul Joseph James Martin: Is the minister in a position to tell the committee what he thinks should be done in respect of men serving in the merchant navy?


William Pate Mulock: The hon. member for Essex East will realize the difficulty. When you have your armed service, whether it is the army, the navy or the air force, you have your post office for your men in the same place where the men are. But the men of the merchant marine may be in any part of the world, and we could not give them free postage from any country. We do not know where they will be and we do not have arrangements with every country.


Paul Joseph James Martin: You know their addresses.


William Pate Mulock: Sending letters from Canada to the men of the merchant marine is a different matter. I thought the hon. member was asking whether we could not give the members of the merchant marine the right to free mail to Canada as our troops have.
So far as the special letter is concerned, it is available to the armed services now, but has not been made available to civilians. We are hoping however to make it available. I shall go into the matter of the merchant marine as soon as the session is over and I have an opportunity to take the matter up with my officials.


James Alexander Marshall: I take exception to the minister continually referring to a surplus of 84,000,000 in the Post Office Department. I also regret that he has not answered my question. On the question of surplus I read from the auditor general's report for the year ended March 31, 1941, at page 267. The auditor general, in commenting on the surplus on operations, has this to say:
According to the departmental and treasury records, the operations of the department during the fiscal year 1940-41, resulting in a surplus of $1,700,718.87, consisting of revenues amounting to $40,400,392.03, deposited to the credit of the consolidated revenue fund, less statutory and appropriation expenditures of $38,699,673.76.
Here is the significant sentence:
This, however, is only an approximate statement of the results of operations because (i) with few minor exceptions, account is not taken of the revenues and expenditures representing the value of work done and accommodation supplied by the Post Office Department for other departments, without payment, and vice versa, and (ii) the revenue improperly include

Supply-Post Office
the value of lapsed money orders and postal notes, and excise taxes, derived from the sale of postal stamps, et cetera, for use in respect of imposts under the Special War Revenue Act.
The question I ask is, why is the suggestion of the auditor general not acceded to, and why have we not a proper balance sheet for the post office?


William Pate Mulock: I understand that the
financial administration of the Post Office Department has been quite satisfactory to the treasury. I can quite understand the hon. member's suggestion regarding the statement of the auditor general. We could get out some statement, but it would be only an approximation. We are making an approximate valuation, for instance, of the amount of space occupied in public buildings, but it is only an approximation. We could not give the exact amount for rent; I do not think any of my officials- can certify any amount to me as being correct, but they feel that a fair value is set down in this item of $3,205,000. This question has been brought up at almost every session since 1936, when Mr. Heaps, then member for Winnipeg North, raised it. I shall be glad to give the matter consideration.


James Alexander Marshall: Nothing has been done about it since?


William Pate Mulock: I would not say that. We are trying to get around to these things. We have more items this year than last. We have been able to figure out an amount for the privilege of franking, for example, and the operating expenses of the post office savings bank, but there are other services which the department renders the value of which it is very difficult to estimate in dollars and cents. These services save other departments a lot of expense. You might go on the basis of the value of these services to other departments, or what they would have to pay for equivalent service if they went outside to get it; or you might estimate what it actually costs the Post Office Department. I shall be glad to discuss this matter with the hon. member and get his ideas upon it. I can understand his desire to have a full, detailed statement of a public utility, showing all its operating expenses. If the franking privilege is valued at nearly two and a half million dollars, we should get credit for it. If we take another building, our rent goes up. Those are just illustrations. I can see no objection at all to giving the working position of the post office from year to year.


James Alexander Marshall: The objection I take to showing a surplus of over four million dollars 44561-309
is that it is misleading. I do not know whether other hon. members are approached as I am by rural mail carriers who will say: If the post office is making a profit of over four million dollars, some of that money should be distributed amongst those who are getting a very small wage for the work they do in carrying mail. That is why I take exception to showing a figure which is misleading.


Alfred Henry Bence: On Saturday evening I made some fairly lengthy remarks on the two items with which we are now dealing, and particularly with respect to the appointment of postmasters. I do not propose to reiterate all that I said then, because I think I made my point very clear, that in my opinion, and I would advance that opinion as seriously as I can, we should eliminate political patronage in the appointment of postmasters, in fact, in the appointment of anybody to any department.
I dealt specifically with the appointment of the postmaster at Bruno. I do not know this man personally myself, but very strong representations were made to me and, I have no doubt, to the Postmaster General and other members of parliament in connection with this matter by three veterans' associations, the Army and Navy, the Canadian Legion and the Canadian Corps, which were represented at one time by a joint council. I have also received representations from an organization known as the Saskatchewan Civil Security Corps, a body which is well known to this house.
The correspondence which I read into the record on Saturday evening, July 25, fully sets out the position as far as I am concerned, and I do not propose to read it into the record again. But I should say this, that I took the matter up with the Postmaster General on the basis that if he would assure me, or these people who were making the representations to me or himself, regarding the particular individual who had received this appointment but who at that time had not been put mto actual occupancy of the post office, that the police reports in connection with him were entirely favourable, as far as I was concerned I would have nothing further to do with the case. I read various letters into the record the other day, and there are one or two others I wish to refer to now, including a letter of the Minister of Justice written to the Postmaster General. But first of all I should like to read a letter which was written to the Postmaster General

Supply-Post Office

by the secretary of the war veterans' joint council It is dated at Saskatoon, April 10, 1941, and is as follows:
W. P. Mulock, Esq.,
Postmaster General,
Ottawa, Canada.
Re: Postmastership at Bruno, Sask.
Dear Sir:
We understand that a decision is to he made shortly regarding the appointment of W. F. Hargarten to the postmastership at Bruno, Sask.
The veterans' organization of this district have repeatedly asked you to confirm or deny that the R.C.M.P. reports on Hargarten are unfavourable.
They feel sure that the reports of the R.C.M.P. officers in the field are not favourable to this man and that he is not a fit person to hold a public office at this time.
They request that Hargarten do not receive this appointment under any circumstances.
A reply by return mail is requested.
On January 15, 1942, a letter-the one referred to by me a few minutes ago-was written to the Postmaster General by the Minister of Justice, as follows:
Office of the Minister of Justice, Canada Ottawa, January 15, 1942. The Hon. W. P. Mulock, K.C.,
Postmaster General,
Ottawa.
My dear Colleague:
With reference to your telephone inquiry of the 14th instant, respecting William F. Hargarten, postmaster at Bruno, Sask., I may say that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police advise that no concrete evidence has been adduced which would show that Hargarten's sympathies or leanings are disloyal to the British empire.
Subsequently to that, as appears by the return-and these letters which I am quoting are taken from a return made to this house on the 27th of March, 1942, sessional paper 196-a telegram was dispatched by the secretary of the Canadian Legion to the Postmaster General as follows:
Saskaton, Sask.,
March 6, 1942.
Hon. W. P. Mulock,
Postmaster General,
Ottawa, Ontario.
Canadian Legion vigorously protests appointment Hargarten postmaster Bruno. We have had no reply our wires last May if R.C.M.P. reports favourable.
This telegram is signed by the secretary of the Canadian Legion.
In view of the controversy which has arisen in connection with this man's appointment and the suspicion which has been aroused, it seems to me that this is one case in which the Postmaster General would be very well 
advised to bring before the committee and table the reports of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers in connection with that	investigation-particularly	the field
reports. I say that because if that were done we should have a complete and accurate picture before us of the whole situation and there would be full justice to everyone. I have no axe to grind in this matter. As I say, I do not know this man. These representations were made to me. The Postmaster General, in writing me a letter, was kind enough to accede to my request that he would produce the file for my perusal, but at the same time he told1 me that there were certain parts of it which were very secret and would have to be given to me in the utmost confidence. Under these circumstances it was impossible for me to scrutinize the file, because, as I told him in my letter which I read into the record the other day, of there were any suggestion that this man had nazi sympathies I would be in an impossible position and I felt I could not keep it to myself.
The Postmaster General would not be creating a precedent if he did bring down these field reports, because I have in my hand sessional paper 348. which had to do with a return made to this house on July 3 on a motion of the hon. member for Mackenzie with respect to rural mail routes at Spalding, Saskatchewan, and in which is contained a copy of the R.C.M.P. reports. As far as I can tell, it is a copy of the field reports, and it was enclosed in a letter to the district superintendent of postal services at Saskatoon by the superintendent of the R.C.M.P., criminal investigation branch, at Regina.


William Pate Mulock: I may tell the hon. member that in my opinion that should not have been included. I believe that is a case where the tenderer was not a British subject.


Alfred Henry Bence: That is a case where one man was an American, and the question was whether or not he had participated in subversive activities. The file and the police report clearly showed that there were absolutely no grounds for the suggestion, and I suggest that if the same thing could be shown in this case, this matter could be very quickly and easily cleared up.
There are two questions in this particular connection which I should like to ask the Postmaster General. What are the regulations with respect to the matter of age in the appointment of postmasters at the present time; what were these regulations in December, 1940? If there were any regulations which

Supply-Post Office
restricted appointments to men of sixty years or under, what was the age of this man at the time he received the appointment, in December, 1940? I should also like to receive a comment from the Postmaster General on the first question that I raised, namely, the question of the continuation of political patronage, and whether or not in this particular case, in view of the recommendations which were made by the district superintendent at Saskatoon, that another man should receive the appointment as a well-merited promotion, it would not have been better in the interests of all concerned and of the country generally to make the appointment as suggested by the district superintendent of postal services at Saskatoon.


William Pate Mulock: The hon. member for Saskatoon City says that he takes the greatest exception to the manner in which appointments of postmasters are made in certain cases where post offices bring in a revenue of under $3,000 a year. At one time these post offices were under the civil service commission, but during the term of a former government, in fact in 1932, a committee of this house dealt with the matter. Hon. J. Earl Lawson was the chairman of that committee which made the following recommendation:
From the evidence adduced and in view of the submissions of officials of the Post Office Department, your committee recommends that order in council P.C. 1053, dated June 29, 1922, as amended by order in council P.C. 17/1751-
They even passed orders in council in those days.
-dated September 12, 1929, be further amended so as to provide for the exemption from the operation of the Civil Service Act of postmasters in revenue post offices where the revenue does not exceed $3,000 per annum.
Your committee further recommends that such amendments be made to the Civil Service Act and/or the regulations thereunder of the civil service commission so that postmasters hereafter appointed to revenue post offices having a revenue in excess of $3,000 per annum shall be within the full operation of the Civil Service Act. I
I am not finding fault with the findings of that committee. I think they took the right action. In my opinion there would be a great deal of travelling expense and waste if civil service commission officials ran all over the country to small post offices throughout the rural districts and therefore I am not criticizing that report in any way. I repeat, I think they took the right action. I am pointing out to my hon. friend, however, that it was not the government of to-day that made that regulation-


Alfred Henry Bence: I knew that.
44561-309J


William Pate Mulock: -and the appointment' to-day is made on the responsibility of the' Postmaster General and not of an official in Saskatoon or even of an hon. member who>
may recommend him. The responsibility for an appointment is that of the Postmaster General.


Mr. BROOKS:: Where do you get your recommendation? That is the point.


William Pate Mulock: I get it, not from the
same place but in the same way as the hon. Mr. Sauve obtained his recommendations when your party was in power.


Alfred Johnson Brooks: I do not agree with that
altogether because I know absolutely differently as far as my own post office in New Brunswick is concerned. They are political appointments; that is the objection to them.


William Pate Mulock: I should like to finish,
what I have to say. The 'hon. member cam speak afterwards. The second objection of the hon. member for Saskatoon City appears to be that there was political patronage; that this was the governing factor in connection with temporary employees appointed at Christmas at Saskatoon.


Alfred Henry Bence: I said Saskatoon, but I
understand that the practice is general.


William Pate Mulock: The hon. gentleman was
dealing with Saskatoon. My officials advise me that the facts with regard to Saskatoon are considerably different from those stated on Saturday night by the hon. member. I have here a report addressed to the chief superintendent of post office service from the postmaster at Saskatoon, giving a breakdown of all appointments made in Saskatoon post office during the last Christmas rush. When forwarding that statement the postmaster sent the following letter:
Sir:
Re Attached
Referring to the attached form, one list only, that submitted by the Canadian Legion was received. I was advised by Mr. Carl Niderost, K.C., to engage persons considered most suitable for the work by this office. Therefore, with the exception of those whose names appear on the list from the Canadian Legion, selections were made from persons applying at my office for employment.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
C. W. Heisler,
Postmaster.
I understand the high motives which inspired the hon. member to make the statements he did with regard to these appointments. May I refer him to a letter of February 24, 1941-


Alfred Henry Bence: Written by myself.
Excess Profits Tax Act.


William Pate Mulock: Yes. I quote:
Dear Mr. Mulock:
I have been advised by Conservative members of parliament from Toronto that they were given the privilege of nominating a certain number for temporary positions in the post office department for the Christmas rush, but no suggestion was ever made to me that I had a similar privilege. I should be very glad if you would advise me as to my position in this matter.
Yours truly,
A. H. Bence, M.P. for Saskatoon City.


Alfred Henry Bence: That is fair enough,, is it not?


William Pate Mulock: Certainly it was fair. I replied on March 8 advising him-he has the letter-that I had received the letter. He had referred to Conservative members of parliament in Toronto who were given the privilege of submitting a certain number of names for temporary positions. I went on to say:
.. . . but that you yourself were not approached in this regard as far as Saskatoon was concerned.
The situation at Toronto and Saskatoon, as far as the Christmas rush are concerned, were not in any way comparable. Of course, as far as both Toronto and Saskatoon were concerned in general, the department depended upon existing civil service and post office lists and the returned soldiers' preference as applied through the returned soldiers' organizations for the temporary Christmas help required.
In Toronto, however, the large number of men needed made a much larger organization necessary for their procurement than was in the case in Saskatoon city, where only 70 men all told were taken on.
In Saskatoon, all men given employment, with the exception of three, were secured through application to the Postmaster and included twenty-seven returned soldiers.
Yours faithfully,
W. P. Mulock.
In Toronto, I may tell the hon. member, there were 3,660 taken on at Chrstmas and the situation is considerably different. I understand, Mr. Chairman, that it is necessary to get some financial resolutions dealt with, and I am afraid I shall have to let the third .complaint stand for the moment.
Progress reported.



EXCESS PROFITS TAX ACT

James Lorimer Ilsley: 
An hon. MEMBER:: First thing in the morning?


James Lorimer Ilsley: Yes.
The house resumed from Friday, July 24, 1942, consideration in committee of Bill No. 113, to amend the Excess Profits Tax Act, 1940-Mr. Ilsley-Mr. Yien in the chair.
Progress reported.


James Lorimer Ilsley: (Minister of Finance): I would request that by unanimous consent of the house I be allowed to withdraw the bill and introduce another.


Thomas Vien: Is it the pleasure of the house that the hon. Minister of Finance shall have leave to withdraw the bill?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Carried.
Bill withdrawn.
Mr. ILSLEY moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 122, to amend the Excess Profits Tax Act, 1940.
He said: This bill is based on the resolution relating to excess profits.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.

Questions



DOMINION SUCCESSION DUTY ACT

[Stage Direction]
On the order:
Second reading of Bill No. 112, to amend the Dominion Succession Duty Act.-The Minister of Finance.
James Lorimer Ilsley: I move, with the unanimous consent of the house, for leave to withdraw the motion for second reading of this bill.
Motion agreed to and bill withdrawn.
Mr. ILSLEY moved for leave to introduce Bill No. 123, to amend the Dominion Succession Duty Act.
He said: This bill is based on the resolution relating to the Dominon Succession Duty Act.
Motion agreed to and bill read the first time.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Wednesday, July 29, 1942