1942-05-21

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

Mr. BRUCE:: ,
1.	Is the government still subsidizing grapefruit imported in tins?
2.	If so, to what extent?
3.	Is grapefruit itself subsidized?


Mr. RALSTON:: 1.	Canned grapefruit was included in the "schedule of specified exclusions from sub-
Questions

sidy" issued with the statement of import policy of the wartime prices and trade board in extra No. 124 of the Canada Gazette dated December 29, 1941.
2.	See above.
3.	No.


FARMERS' CREDITORS-DEFINITION OF DEBTOR
Mr. DOUGLAS (Weybum):: Will the government give consideration to bringing down legislation defining the term debtor, under the Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act, notwithstanding the absence of privity of contract ?


Mr. RALSTON:: While the matter is one of government policy as to which no final present statement is possible, it is not the intention of the government to introduce a bill amending the Farmers' Creditors Arrangement Act during the present session.


NATIONAL FILM BOARD-LEGAL ACTION BT MARCH OF TIME INC.
Mr. HOMUTH:: 1.	At any time, since September 1, 1941, has legal action been started in the courts of the United States or Canada against the national film board by March of Time, Inc., or the producers of the series of films known as "March of Time"?
2.	If so, on what date was such action commenced and upon what alleged grounds?
3.	Was this action dropped by the producers of "March of Time" and, if so, on what date?
4.	Was settlement made as between the producers of "March of Time" and the national film board, its agents, or any other incorporated company against whom action had been taken jointly with the national film board?
5.	What did the producers of "March of Time" allege with respect to their ownership of film material?
6.	Was settlement of the action arranged by the payment of money to the producers of "March of Time" by either the national film board or companies associated with the board in the distribution and exhibition of films in the United States?
7.	If so, what was the amount paid to the producers of "March of Time" from the public treasury or from funds accumulated from the receipts from the distribution in the United States of films produced by the national film board?
3.	What was the total amount expended by officials of the national film board for travelling and other purposes in connection with the settlement of this action?


Mr. THORSON:: _ L No. "March of Time" entered an action in the District Court, Southern District of New York in December, 1941, against Loew's Incorporated, Warwick Pictures Inc., and Moredall Realty Corporation to restrain them from exhibiting in the United States a film entitled "War Clouds in the Pacific" produced

and released in Canada by the national film board in November, 1941. The grounds alleged were that a certain quantity of film material furnished by the "March of Time" and used in the film had been supplied for exhibition in Canada only. This allegation was denied by the defendants. The action was discontinued after a conference between the interested parties, at which the government film commissioner, the assistant film commissioner and Mr. Stuart Legg, producer of the Canada Carries On Series, were present, together with representatives of the "March of Time," Loew's Incorporated and Warwick Pictures, Inc. It was agreed that a subtitle in the following terms should be added to the film:	"This motion picture was produced by
the national film board of Canada with the cooperation of the 'March of Time'." No money payments of any kind were involved in this settlement. The film secured nationwide distribution in the United States.
2,	3, 4, 5, 6 and 7. See answer to question 1.
8.	$179.23. (See answer to question 1.)


NATIONAL FILM BOARD-16-MILLIMETRE PROJECTION CIRCUIT
Mr. MacKINNON (Kootenay East):: 1.	Does the national film board either alone or in conjunction with the director of public information operate a 16-millimetre film projection circuit?
2.	How many persons are employed in connection with this work?
3.	What are their names?
4.	What is the total salary paid to each such person?
5.	What is the total amount of travelling expenses paid to each such person during the past year?
6.	What is the previous experience of each such person?
7.	What equipment, if any, has been purchased for use in this work?
8.	What was the total cost of such equipment?
9.	What was the budget of the amount required for this work?
10.	What has been the actual expenditure to date upon this work?
11.	For what purpose or purposes is this work carried on?


Mr. THORSON:: 1.	Yes. The national film board has been operating, in conjunction with the director of public information, since January 1, 1942, some forty-three 16-millimetre travelling theatres serving remote rural areas in every province in Canada. The Canadian council of education for citizenship collaborates in the project.
2.	Thirty-seven. In addition, the services of ten projectionists have been supplied free of charge by cooperating organizations.

Questions
3,	4, 5 and 6.
Total salary paid per
Name-Classification	month
D. W. Buchanan, National supervisor $270 00
Stanley Rands, Regional agent		100	00
J.	A. Bramham, Regional agent and
projectionist	
140	00R. K. Nevers, Regional agent, part time	
60	00J. D. Nadeau, Projectionist	
130	00Hilda Gillis, Projectionist	
130	00Gaston Morin, Projectionist	
108	33Elmer Brownell, Projectionist	130	00Mrs. S. C. Perry, Projectionist	130	00J. C. Peck, Projectionist	
130	00Robert Taylor, Projectionist	
130	00Gerard Boutet, Projectionist	
108	33Earl Rowan, Projectionist	
130	00David Smith, Projectionist	
130	00Lucien Dallaire, Projectionist	108	33L. A. Johnson, Projectionist	
130	00R. F. Allen, Projectionist	
130	00William M. Ritchie, Projectionist....	130	00J. D. McIntyre, Projectionist	
130	00Harold Moore, Projectionist	
130	00Paul Karpetz, Projectionist	
130	00George LeBeau, Projectionist	130	00Luc Forest, Projectionist	
130	00W. Hahnel, Projectionist	
130	00Jean L. Thibault, Projectionist	108	33Victor Buchanan, Projectionist	130	00R. H. Cunningham, Projectionist.... 130	00David Sharpies, Projectionist	130	00W. A. Thomson, Projectionist	130	00A. F. Mitchner, Projectionist	
130	00C. W. Gray, Projectionist	
130	00A. E. Gawreluck, Projectionist	130	00Total travelling	expenses during	Previouspast fiscal year	experience$116 02	Former national secretary, National Film Society of Canada, and supervisor of public affairs broadcasts, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.102 08	School teacher.590 26	16 mm. projectionist.266 94	Director of New Brunswick Visual Education Bureau.358 65	16 mm. projectionist.252 92	Visual education, Prince Edward Island Libraries.374 69	16 mm. projectionist.197 97	16 mm. projectionist.Employment	16 mm. projectionist.began since March 31,1942	Employment	16 mm. projectionist.began since March 31,1942	304 30	Rural extension service, Macdonald College, Ste. Anne de Bellevue.291 24	16 mm. projectionist.439 72	16 mm. projectionist.211 15	Rural education officer, University of Toronto.392 12	16 mm. projectionist.527 95	16 mm. projectionist.340 95	16 mm. projectionist.63 90	Rural education officer, United Farmers of Ontario.335 75	16 mm. projectionist.379 35	16 mm. projectionist.393 48	16 mm. projectionist.319 00	16 mm. projectionist.379 34	16 mm. projectionist.514 90	16 mm. projectionist.Employment began since	March 31,1942	16 mm. projectionist.431 24	Educational services, Saskatchewan.378 76	Farmer, motor mechanic.418 80	16 mm. projectionist.480 31	16 mm. projectionist.385 15	School teacher.412 82	16 mm. projectionist.492 81	16 mm. projectionist.
Questions

	Total		
	salary	Total travelling	
paid per	expenses during	PreviousName-Classification.	month	past fiscal year	experiencePaul Gutoski, Projectionist	... $130 00	$447 75	16 mm. projectionist.Damase Bouvier, Projectionist	.. 130 00	584 33	16 mm. projectionist.K. E. Purdy, Projectionist	.. 130 00	527 81	16 mm. projectionist.J. A. Black, Projectionist	.. 130 00	651 03	16 mm. projectionist.Thomas Prime, Projectionist	.. 130 00	459 58	Music teacher.
Also certain fees for assistance in supervising the operation of the circuits are paid to certain cooperating organizations as follows:
Department of Extension, University of Alberta, $30 per month.
National Film Society of Canada, Ottawa, $30 per month.
Joseph Morin, Director, Service de Cine-photographie, Quebec, $200.49 until March 31, 1942.
7.	Thirty-five 16-mm. projectors and complete accessories. Also fourteen portable power units for operation of projectors when electricity is not otherwise available.
8.	$22,446.51.
9.	$93,000.
10.	$84,006.65.
11.	To bring the full story of Canada at war to rural areas which do not normally see motion pictures, and which are less effectively served than other areas of Canada by the various information media. Motion pictures explaining the strategy of war and depicting the training of Canada's armed forces, her industrial production, and every other aspect of Canada's war effort are shown, as well as films describing the geographical and social structure of the dominion. Special care has been taken to reach communities of nonAnglo-Saxon extraction, including Ukrainians, Germans and Mennonites.


ATLANTIC SHIPPING
Mr. HATFIELD:: What is the average sailing time of a sixteen-knot vessel from the port of London to the ports of Saint John, Halifax and Montreal, respectively?


Mr. HOWE:: Approximately 182, 172 and
203 hours respectively.


GRAIN ELEVATORS
Mr. HATFIELD:: 1.	How many grain elevators in Montreal, Saint John, West Saint John and Halifax are owned or controlled by the government?
2.	Are they operated under lease?
3.	If so, what is the name of the person or company holding each lease?

4.	If any elevator is leased to a company, who are the directors of said company?
5.	What rental is paid by each lessee?


Mr. HOWE:: 1.	Seven.
2.	Only one of the elevators is operated under lease namely, the National Harbours Board elevator at West Saint John.
3.	Canadian Pacific Railway Company.
4.	Sir Edward Beatty, G.B.E.; L. J. Belnap; Col. Henry Cockshutt; D. C. Coleman; Aime Geoffrion, K.C.; G. Blair Gordon; Hon. Eric W. Hamber; John W. Hobbs; Right Hon. Reginald McKenna, P.C.; R. S. McLaughlin; Ross H. McMaster; Maj.-Gen. Frank S. Meighen, C.M.G.; Sir Edward Peacock, G.C.V.O.; Robert C. Stanley; W. N. Tilley,
K.C.; Morris W. Wilson and W. M. Neal.
5.	$4,000 plus one-tenth (1/10) cent per bushel on all grain received into the elevator and one-tenth (1/10) cent per bushel on all grain shipped through National Harbours Board grain galleries and twenty-five (25) per cent of all storage revenue accruing on grain stored in both the National Harbours Board elevator and the Caandian Pacific Railway elevator and in railway cars.
Rental received in 1941-$73,420.62.


NATIONAL FILM BOARD
Mr. HOMUTH:: 1.	Was the film entitled "High Over the Border", recently released by the national film board, produced in Canada?
2.	If so, was it produced either wholly or largely by the regular staff of the national film board and was the work, including the sound recording, carried on in the plant of the national film board in Ottawa, or, was it produced by private enterprise under contract or agreement with the national film board, or was it purchased as a completed film from a private company or individual?
3.	If produced by private enterprise, did the national film board advance funds to the producer or producers to meet expenses in connection with the film, and, if so, what amount?
4.	Was this film produced in Canada?
5.	If not produced in Canada, where was the film assembled and edited and by whom?
6.	Where was the sound recorded, and by whom?

Questions
7.	What was the total amount expended from public funds on the production or purchase of this film, including any salaries or fees paid to persons engaged upon the production of the film, travelling expenses, purchase of film material for use in the film, sound recording and all positive prints of the film made to date?
8.	From what appropriation or vote of public funds for the current fiscal year was the cost of this film met?
9.	Was the film made on behalf of any part of Canada's war effort, and, if so, what relation has the subject matter of this film to any such war effort?


Mr. THORSON:: 1.	In part.
2.	(a) No. (b) No. (c) This film was produced by the national film board in collaboration with the New York Zoological Society and the government of the United States.
3.	See answer to question 2 (c). No advance was made for expenses.
4.	In part.
5.	Assembled and edited in New York and Ottawa by Irving Jacoby.
6.	Sound recorded in New York-English version by Fox Movietone News, French version by Reeves Sound Studio.
7.	$5,252.38.
8.	The national film board share of the cost of this film was met from the war appropriation for the fiscal year 1941-42 by the public information division, Department of National War Services.
9.	The film is a parable of unity in the Americas, with emphasis upon the importance of free movement across international borders, illustrated by the migrations of birds common to north and south America. It is a comment on the deep natural forces making for mutual understanding between peoples, and contributes to an appreciation of the common interest of the countries of the western hemisphere in wartime defence.


NATIONAL FILM BOARD-&quot;CHURCHILL'S ISLAND&quot;
Mr. HOMUTH:: 1.	What was the total footage of the film called "Churchill's Island", produced by the national film board?
2.	What was the total number of feet of film used in this reel which was purchased or acquired in any other manner from any British film company or organization?
3.	What was the total number of feet of film used in this reel which was seized from Germany or other enemy sources?
4.	What was the total number of feet of film used in this reel which was actually taken in Canada?
5.	What was the total cost of this film?
6.	By whom was this film distributed (a) in Canada; (b) in the United States?
7.	Upon what arrangement was this film distributed by such organization or organizations?
Mr. THORSON;
1.	1,924 feet.
2.	957 feet.
3.	762 feet.
4.	205 feet.
5.	$4,990.15.
6.	(a) Columbia Pictures of Canada; (b) United Artists Corporation.
7.	Under terms of contracts agreed upon.


NATIONAL FILM BOARD-SECRETARY AND CONTROLLER
[Stage Direction]
Mr. HATFIELD;
1.	Who is the secretary and controller of the national film board?
2.	What is his salary, and/or allowance?
3.	What is the total amount paid to him since March 31, 1941, as travelling or living expenses?
4.	When was he appointed and/or assigned to this position?
5.	By whom was he appointed and/or assigned to this position?
6.	By whom was he recommended for this position?
7.	Has he any blood relatives employed by the national film board?
8.	If so, what are their names and what positions do they hold?
9.	What salaries and/or allowances are paid to them?
10.	When were they appointed to their present positions?
11.	By whom were they appointed to their present positions?
12.	By whom were they recommended for their present positions?
Mr. THORSON:: 1.	A. G. McLean.
2.	Salary-$4,500 per annum. No allowances.
3.	Travelling expenses-$120.02.
4.	October 21, 1941.
5.	Services of A. G. McLean, executive assistant in the Department of National War Services, loaned by Department of National War Services to the national film board, to act as controller and secretary.
6.	Appointment of A. G. McLean as controller and secretary of the national film board recommended by motion of the national film board at its regular meeting, August 12, 1941.
7.	Yes.
8.	(a) Ross McLean-assistant government film commissioner.
(b) C. Grant McLean-temporary assistant camera man, employed by the government film commissioner under Section 12 (1) of the National Film Act.
9.	(a) Ross McLean-salary, $4,500 per annum. No allowances. (Out of pocket expenses when travelling on business of the national film board.)

Questions as Orders for Returns
Ob) C. Grant McLean-Salary, $108 per month. No allowances. (Out of pocket travelling expenses necessary to production of specific films for which he is engaged.)
10.	(a) Ross McLean-September 1, 1941.
(b) C. Grant McLean-First appointment,
December 19, 1941 to January 31, 1942. Second appointment, February 1, 1942 to March 9, 1942. Third appointment March 12, 1942.
11. (a) Ross McLean-By civil service commission.
(b) C. Grant McLean-By government film commissioner under Section 12 (1) of the National Film Act for production of particular films, on a temporary assignment basis.
12.	(a) Ross McLean-Recommended by Hon. J. T. Thorson, as chairman of the national film board, pursuant to a motion of the national film board passed at its regular meeting, August 12, 1941.
(b) C. Grant McLean-Recommended by the government film commissioner.


MILITARY SERVICE-FARMERS AND FARM WORKERS
Mr. LACOMBE:: 1.	How many young farmers, sons of farmers and farm labourers have been mobilized to date under the terms of the mobilization act of 1940?
2.	How many underwent their training of one month?
3.	How many were in training for four months ?
4.	How many, having failed to obtain leave, are still in the military training camps?


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: The statistics respecting persons called up under the provisions of the national war services regulations for military training are not kept on the basis of occupations. The answering of this question would entail the reviewing of files of over 120,000 persons. This would take a great many weeks and the work of a considerable staff which is already heavily pressed. I therefore ask that the question be dropped.
Question dropped.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. HANSELL:: 1.	How much gold (in ounces and value) is now held in Canada by, (a) the Canadian government, (b) the Bank of Canada, (c) foreign exchange control board, (d) the chartered banks ?
2.	How much of this gold is held on behalf of foreign governments?
I Mr. Thorson.]
3.	How much gold was exported from Canada and to what countries during each of the years 1930 to 1941 inclusive?


Mr. McLARTY:: Return tabled.


BRITISH COLUMBIA AND YUKON AIRPORTS
Mr. BLACK (Yukon):: 1.	What amounts has the government expended to date on each of the following airports, Dawson Creek, Fort St. John, Watson Lake, Fort Nelson, Whitehorse, Dawson?
2.	What amount has been spent to date on each of the airports on Vancouver island, and what are the names of such airports?


Mr. POWER:: I would ask the hon. gentleman if he would be satisfield with a statement of the aggregate amount spent on all these aerodromes, in answer to question No. 1, and on the aerodrome on Vancouver island in answer to question No. 2. My officers advise me that it might be giving information to the enemy as to the capacity of each aerodrome if the figures of the expenditures were given for each individual aerodrome. If my hon. friend would be satisfied with the aggregate amount, so many million dollars for the aerodromes mentioned in question No. 1, and so many millions for those in question No. 2, I should be very glad to furnish that information.


Mr. BLACK (Yukon):: I cannot agree with the minister that the enemy would get the slightest information through this question being answered. If the minister thinks our enemies the Japanese do not know as much about the details of what has been done and what is being done in Canada as we do, and as the minister does, then he has more faith in human nature than I have.


Charles Gavan Power: Then I am afraid I will have to take the stand that it is not in the public interest to give the information as it is requested here, but I .will give it in the manner I have indicated.


George Black: Many of these are civilian aerodromes; they are used by Trans-Canada Air Lines and other civilian organizations operating civilian planes. The government has spent large sums of money on them, and surely the public is entitled to know what those sums amount to.


Mr. SPEAKER:: Stand, in the meantime.


Charles Gavan Power: I do not see why it should stand, because I do not believe I could change the position arrived at by my officers. I am forced to the position where I say it is not in the public interest to answer the question in

Questions as Orders jor Returns
the manner in which it has been put. I will give such information as I can to my hon. friend.


Georges Parent: Dropped.


Charles Gavan Power: No; it should stand, but with the understanding that the answer will be given in the manner in which I have indicated.


Georges Parent: Stands as amended.


Charles Gavan Power: Perhaps it might best pass as an order for return.



PRINCE GEORGE AND GRANDE PRAIRIE AIRPORTS

George Black: What amounts has the government expended to date on each of the airports at Prince George and at Grande Prairie?


Charles Gavan Power: I should like to make the same answer as I made to the previous question of the hon. member. Perhaps this question should be passed as an order for return.



NATIONAL FILM BOARD

Mr. FRASER (Peterborough West):: 1.	How many of the following persons, appointed to the staff of the national film board under authority of the National Film Act, to wit: Ross McLean, Allan G. McLean, Annette Allard, Alan II. Adamson, Irene Baird, Gudrun ,J. Bjerring, Maurice Blackburn, Lois M. Bright, Kathleen F. Brooks, Donald W. Buchanan, James A. Beveridge, F. Elizabeth Bertram, Edward Buckman, Henry C. Campbell, Marguerite C. Chestnutt, May Kathleen Corp, Doreen Curry, A. P. Cote, Thomas C. Daly, R. J. Edmonds, Donald G. D. Fraser, Herbert G. Glover, Dorothy R. Hazel, Alice Heggtveit, Robert J. Humble, Margaret Humble, Charles C. Hyndman, Richard J. Jarvis, Mrs. S. Josie, Anne MacDonnell, Graham B. Mclnnes, Robinson F. MacLean, W. A. Macdonald, C. Grant McLean, Jane Marsh, L. G. Marcotte, Sydney C. Newman, R. K. Nevers, John A. O'Meara, Vincent Paquette, Margaret M. Palmer, Nicholas C. Read, Roger Racine, Lois Rae, Leon M. Shaw, Douglas Sinclair, Janet C. Scellen, Edwin W. Scythes, Hazen E. Sise, D'Arcy Sheard, Katharine P. Symons, Fay Thomson, Gordon Weisenborn, Pamela Wilcox, have had any technical or professional experience in motion picture production and laboratory work, prior to their appointment, indicating in each ease the experience which such person has had?
2.	How many of the above persons have been continuously employed for more than three months, indicating which persons?
3.	How many of the above noted persons have been in receipt of a regular weekly or monthly salary, honorarium or fee from the national film board since the date of their appointment?
4.	Before each of the above noted persons were appointed to the position he or she now fills, what steps, if any, were taken by the national film board or its executive officers to advertise the positions or to provide so that other Canadian citizens, including the heads of
families and wrar veterans, with equal or better qualifications and experience, especially in film production, distribution and laboratory processing work, might have an equal opportunity to make application and receive equal consideration for appointment to the positions now filled by the above noted persons?
5.	How, upon what basis and by whom was each of the above persons selected for and upon whose recommendation was each of them appointed to the position he or she now fills?
6.	Prior to the appointment of each of the above persons were any recommendations submitted to the national film board for approval or were the appointments, in each case, made by officers of the national film board on their own initiative and responsibility and the board then asked to confirm them?
7.	Has treasury board at any time ruled that the National Film Act should be interpreted as applying to persons employed casually for the duration of individual projects and not to any person continuously employed?
8.	If so, when, and what was the full import of such ruling?
9.	Has the treasury board at any time ruled that the authority of the National Film Act for the employment of staff without prior approval of the establishment by treasury board could not be accepted?
10.	If so. when and what was the full import of such ruling?



NATIONAL FILM BOARD-WARWICK FILMS OR WARWICK PICTURES OF NEW YORK

Mr. HATFIELD:: 1.	Has the national film board any (a) production contracts; (b) distribution contracts with Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York?
2.	If so, how many in each category?
3.	What is the total number of feet of film which have been acquired by Warwick FilmB or Warwick Pictures of New York from the national film board since March 31, 1941?
4.	Upon what arrangement or ai-rangements was such film acquired by Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York from the national film board?
5.	Has the national film board sold to Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York any seized German films that have come into the board's possession or any copies or reproductions thereof other than that contained in completed films produced and released by the national film board?
6.	If so, how many feet of (a) negative, (b) duplicate negative, (c) duplicate positive and/or (d) positive has been sold to Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York, and on what terms and conditions?
7.	Has the national film board, at any time since the outbreak of war, made available to Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York any seized German films that have come into its possession or any copies thereof in order that the latter might duplicate or reproduce all or any portion of such films or copies thereof ?
8.	If so, who authorized such loan and upon what terms and conditions were the films or copies thereof loaned to Warwick Films or Warwick Pictures of New York.



Questions as Orders jor Returns


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: Subject to the reservation, in the first place, that it might not be in the public interest to indicate the extent to which German films have been seized, and likewise reserving the giving of information which may be helpful to competitors, this might pass as an order for return.



NATIONAL FILM BOARD-PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION OF FILMS

Mr. JACKMAN:: 1.	What are the names of all films produced by the national film board since January 1, 1941?
2.	What was the total number of feet of film used in each such film which was purchased or acquired in any other manner from any British film company or organization?
3.	What was the total number of feet of film which was seized from German or other enemy sources?
4.	What was the total number of feet of film used in each such film which was actually taken in Canada?
5.	What was the total cost of each such film?
6.	By whom was each such film distributed (a) in Canada, (b) in the United States?
7.	Upon what arrangement was each such film distributed by each such organization or organizations ?


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: Subject to the same reservation as to the giving of information which may be helpful to competitors, and likewise as to information with respect to the supply of German films which have been seized, this might be passed as an order for return.



NATIONAL FILM BOARD-FILM PRODUCTION CONTRACTS

Mr. JACKMAN:: 1.	How many contracts in connection with the production of films have been awarded by the national film board since March 31, 1941?
2.	Of these, how many were for amounts in excess of $5,000?
3.	How many were approved by the Minister of Trade and Commerce or the Minister of National War Services in his capacity of chairman of the national film board prior to being awarded?
4.	How many were approved by the treasury board and/or the governor in council prior to being awarded?
5.	How many were awarded after tenders had been called or on a competitive basis where two or more companies or individuals had been given an equal opportunity to submit tenders or proposals?
6. Of those for total amounts in excess of $5,000, how many were awarded to, (a) companies owned and operated by Canadians in Canada; (b) foreign controlled companies operating in Canada; (c) British companies; (d) companies owned and operated in the United States of America?


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: It will not be possible to answer paragraph 6 of this question. Subject to that however it may be passed as an order for return.



NATIONAL FILM BOARD-FILM DISTRIBUTION CONTRACTS

Mr. JACKMAN:: 1.	How many contracts in connection with the distribution of films have been awarded or entered into by the national film board since March 31, 1941?
2.	How many, if any, of such contracts were submitted to and approved by the national film board prior to being signed?
3.	Upon whose recommendation were these contracts approved and awarded by the national film board?
4.	In each case, who signed the contracts on behalf of the dominion government and/or the national film board?
5.	How many of such contracts were awarded by public tender or on a competitive basis where more than one company or individual submitted proposals?
6.	How many of such contracts were entered into as a result of direct negotiation with one company, without others being given an equal opportunity to submit proposals?


Joseph Thorarinn Thorson: Subject to the reservation that information which may be helpful to competitors ought not to be given, this question may be passed as an order for return.


Georges Parent: Order for return, subject to the reservation stated.



WARTIME HOUSING

Mr. CHURCH:: 1.	What is the total guarantee to the banks, by provinces, on account of capital building expenditure for subsidized houses built, (a) by federal subsidy; (b) by local authorities and private enterprise; (c) the wartime housing commission for war munition workers?
2.	What number of the wartime housing houses have been utilized and in what cities, (a) for civilians out of homes; (b) for families of soldiers?
3.	What municipalities have asked the government for aid to house soldiers' families?



DEFENCE OF CANADA REGULATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. GROTE STIRLING (Yale):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask a question of the Minister of Justice, of which I regret I have not been able to give him notice. I should like to ask him if his attention has

Hon. Walter Nash
been drawn to the press reports of a speech delivered on Tuesday evening, the 19th instant, at St. James Market, Montreal, by Rene Chaloult, member of the Quebec legislative assembly for Lotbiniere? If so, has he considered the question whether this speech contravenes the defence of Canada regulations, and whether it is not a case for action similar to that taken in the instance of one Camillien Houde?
Hon. L. S. St. LAURENT (Minister of Justice): My attention was called to the fact that the press were reporting a speech which might be of a doubtful nature. Before coming to the house I secured a copy of a newspaper which purports to give a full text of that speech. I have not yet had time to consider it. When I have had an opportunity to see it, if it seems to require further attention I shall refer it to the officers of my department for a report as to what action if any should be taken.



PATENTS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. K. BLAIR (Wellington North):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to draw the attention of the house to the following article:
Roosevelt Orders Seizure of Patents.
Because of the many charges that American-German patents pooling arrangements have restricted production essential to the nation's war programme, President Roosevelt has ordered the seizure of all patents directly or indirectly controlled by nationals of enemy countries.
May I also refer-


Georges Parent: The form of the question indicates that no answer is possible at this time. I suggest that it stand as notice of question.



HON. WALTER NASH ADDRESS OF NEW ZEALAND MINISTER TO WASHINGTON AT MEETING OF EMPIRE PARLIAMENTARY ASSOCIATION

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. H. BLACKMORE (Lethbridge):: Mr. Speaker, before the orders of the day are called I should like to ask a question of the Prime Minister. Some time ago we had the privilege in the house of listening to the then Prime Minister of Australia who on that occasion gave a most inspiring address. We have in our midst at the present time a most prominent official from New Zealand, our other sister dominion.
44561-166$
I am wondering if the Prime Minister has made arrangements whereby Mr. Nash might come here and make his speech, as Mr. Menzies did.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I have already expressed to the Hon. Mr. Nash the hope that he would give over the radio to the people of our country the speech he delivered to the members of the parliamentary association who met him at luncheon to-day. If that is done a very much larger number would have the privilege of hearing Mr. Nash than would be possible were he to speak only in the House of Commons.
On the occasion of Mr. Menzies' visit Mr. Menzies was returning to Australia as the Prime Minister of his country. He was invited to addresss this House of Commons in his capacity of Prime Minister of Australia. Mr. Nash as hon. members know has for many years been foremost among the members of the government of New Zealand, and I know what a great privilege it would be to all hon.. members to hear him. I should think however that we would have to consider carefully the precedent which would be set of having others than those holding the office of Prime Minister addressing the House of Commons during its proceedings. I feel sure Mr. Nash would be the first to appreciate the reason- that would govern if he were not invited on his present visit to Ottawa, to address the house.


Mr. COLDWELL:: May I ask the Prime Minister if he has taken the opportunity to see that an invitation is extended to Mr. Nash to speak to the people of Canada through the facilities of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I expressed to Mr. Nash the hope that he would speak over the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation facilities, and I shall certainly make it a point to see that that organization is asked to make an effort to see that he does give an address.


John Horne Blackmore: Did not the occasion of Mr. Menzies' addressing the House of Commons create a precedent? It might be easy so to arrange matters that no new precedent would be set by asking Mr. Nash to address the house. If he did so his address would appear in Hansard.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I believe a precedent had been established at the time of the previous war when a prime minister of another countiy addressed the House of Commons from beside the speaker's chair. In these matters the government must necessarily consider very carefully the precedent it establishes. Otherwise it seems to me we might.
Vichy Representation

on some occasion be obliged, by failure to extend an invitation, to adopt a course which might seem to be invidious.



GLASS CONTAINERS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. J. H. LECLERC (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, I hold in my hand a copy of the Temperance Advocate, which states that the liquor bill for Ontario this year will be $88,000,000 as compared with $73,000,000 last year. It is not my intention to scold the people of Ontario for this rather high consumption of liquor, but I should like to ask the government how it is that the distributors of hard liquor and the brewers of beer seem able to get all the bottles they need when the milk distributors have to beg the glass controller to give them the bottles they need.


Georges Parent: I think that question is
in the same category as the previous one.



VICHY REPRESENTATION


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Herbert Alexander Bruce: In view
of the statement made yesterday by the Prime Minister that he had advised the French minister to take the necessary steps to suspend the operation of French consulates and consular agencies in Canada, I should like to ask the Prime Minister if he does not think that the reasons which he gave apply with equal force to the continuation of the French legation. Secondly, does the French minister continue to enjoy the usual diplomatic immunity in so far as telegraph, telephone, correspondence or other communications with Vichy are concerned?
Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING {Prime Minister): In reply to my hon. friend I would say that I do not think that the reasons which I gave with respect ,to the closing of French consulates and consular agencies would apply in equal measure to-the French legation. The day before I gave reasons why it was thought advisable to maintain the diplomatic relations that exist at the present time between France and Canada. So far as the privileges and immunities which the French minister enjoys are concerned, they are the same as those enjoyed by all who hold the position of minister to Canada from another country.
fMr. Mackenzie King.]
The acting leader of the opposition, the hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling), asked me yesterday whether as a result of the forthcoming suspension of French consulates and consular agencies there would be any consuls and employees of the consulates who were French nationals and who would be obliged to return to France. He asked1 also if Canada had consuls in unoccupied France whose offices would be closed and who would be obliged to return to Canada. I was unable to give my hon. friend the exact information at the time, but I can now give him the following reply to his question.
The various consuls and vice consuls, and some of their employees, are French nationals who came to Canada solely in their official capacity. When a consulate is closed, the official status in Canada of the consular officers and employees is automatically ended and such officers and employees would naturally leave Canada. Consular officials who lived in Canada before their appointment are not in the same category as full-time career officials. Some are British subjects and some are French nationals, but their status as residents of Canada is not affected by the closing of their offices. There are no Canadian government consuls or officials in unoccupied France and therefore no question of any exchange arises.


Grote Stirling: I should like to ask the Prime Minister a question with regard to the phrase which he used in his reply. He said:
The consul himself was removed from the Quebec consulate a few days ago, but the office itself is not as yet closed.
What are the implications of that word "removed"? Removed by whom?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: It was suggested to the French minister that it might be advisable if the gentleman occupying that position were removed somewhere else, and at the instance of the minister himself the change was made.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.
Mr. J. G. DIEFENBAKER (Lake Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Prime Minister if he could indicate to the house whether it is the intention of the government to proceed with the second reading of the bill to amend the National Resources Mobilization

Prison Camp Administration
Act immediately the war appropriation measure has been concluded by the committee of the whole?


William Lyon Mackenzie King: My hon. friend will have to allow the government to decide the order in which the public business will be taken up. I cannot give him an answer at the present time. In connection with the bill to which he has referred, as well as with respect to other legislation, I assure him that the government will endeavour to take the course which it believes will be most in the interests of all concerned.



VICTOHIA DAY

[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. T. L. CHURCH (Broadview):: I have a suggestion to make to t)he Prime Minister (Mr. Mackenzie King) and the other leaders in the house. To-morrow will be empire day. Appropriate services are to be held in nearly all the schools and elsewhere in the provinces. I suggest respectfully that this house should pause to-morrow to pay some tribute to the mother country for what she has done in the war, having borne the brunt for over two years, and for the way in which she has stood for the protection of the weak the world over. As in the parable, I do not believe that in history she will be considered like the priest and the Levite, but will be declared to be the good Samaritan of the world.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: As I understand it my
hon. friend is referring to Victoria day which is May 24. My hon. friend seems to be just a little ahead on his time. I did not catch the whole of his question, but I shall be glad to consider his suggestion when I have had the opportunity of reading it.


Thomas Langton Church: Will the Prime Minister be good enough to clarify his reply? To-morrow is empire day and it is being celebrated all over the empire. I think we should take this opportunity to express our appreciation of the mother country. The new world of America owes her a debt of appreciation and gratitude.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I must confess to my hon. friend that I did not realize that May 22 was Victoria day; I have always understood that it was May 24.


Thomas Langton Church: We will not be sitting
on the 24th because it is Sunday.


William Lyon Mackenzie King: I believe the celebration of the holiday is to take place on Monday, which puts my hon. friend still further ahead.


Thomas Langton Church: All I wanted was that we should not forget it this year anyway.



PRISONERS OF WAR


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Herbert Alexander Bruce: I should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Defence arising out of his answer on Monday to a question which I had placed on the order paper. Is there not a filing system in his department which would classify the 40.000 offers of services which he has received and which would make it easily possible to find the list of British officers now resident in Canada with experience in large prison camps during the last war?


James Layton Ralston: I can say to my hon. friend that I have no personal knowledge of the filing system. The answer which I made was the answer given to me by a responsible officer of the department in whom I have confidence. This answer indicated that the classification to which my hon. friend refers is not made. There need not be any mystery about this thing. If my hon. friend will just give me the name of the gentleman to whom he refers I shall be very glad to have it looked up to see whether he made an offer of his services. There should be no need to go through 40,000 applications in order to find some British officer who had experience in internment camps. If my hon. friend does not care to give this name publicly, he can give it to me privately and I shall be glad to have it looked up.


Herbert Alexander Bruce: I have received permission only to-day to give the minister the name, and I shall give it to him in private.



DEFENCE OF CANADA REGULATIONS


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day.
Mr. A. H. BENCE (Saskatoon City):: As the Minister of Fisheries is the only member of the government who is on the defence of Canada regulations committee, I would ask him if he can inform us when that committee will be convened.


Hon. J. E. MICHAUD (Minister of Fisheries) :: I understand that orders have been
given to ask hon. members who have been appointed to sit on that committee to convene to-morrow if they are available for organization purposes.
War Appropriation-Supplies



WAR APPROPRIATION BILL


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Wednesday, May 20, consideration in committee of a resolution to provide sums not exceeding $2,000,000,000 for the year ending March 31, 1943, for granting to his majesty aid for national defence and security-Mr. Ilsley-Mr. Vien in the chair.

[Stage Direction]
Mr. O'BRIEN: I understand that the Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe) expects to be finished in a short time and I wish to assure the committee that it is not my desire under the circumstances to take up a great deal of the time of the committee or of the minister. But in fairness to the constituency I represent and to the province of New Brunswick I feel I should make reference to certain subjects which are of the utmost importance to New Brunswick and to the dominion, in so far as New Brunswick is a unit in the confederation. First of all let me say that I realize fully my responsibility in taking up any of the time of the committee, but I trust I have done so to a minimum since I have had a seat in this chamber.
As a background for my remarks I should like to place on the record part of a resolution passed by the Maritime board of trade at Moncton, New Brunswick, on November 20, 1941. It says in part:
Be it resolved that relative to population and resources, the maritime provinces have made an immense contribution to the war effort in men and money, and whereas the larger portion of expenditure on new' industrial plants is being made in central Canada, thereby threatening to make an acute state of economic dislocation permanent and irreparable, and whereas through lack of this development we are failing to harness a large part of the potential industrial population of these maritime provinces to the war effort, the maritime board of trade earnestly recommends that the government of Canada take immediate steps to alleviate and rectify this unbalanced condition through a process of decentralization of new war industry so that all social and population factors shall receive an equitable opportunity to participate in the industrial life of Canada.
This resolution I regard as background to my remarks, because it comes from the most responsible commercial body in the maritime provinces, representing New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.
I can understand that in the war effort we must submerge our commercial hopes and desires with due regard to the permanent good of the nation, so that in the most speedy way Hitlerism and all it stands for may be defeated.

But if Canada is to remain a united country of nine provinces, greater consideration must be given to the maritime provinces. We have heard a good deal in days gone by of so-called maritime rights. Unfortunately that movement, I think, was badly handled so that maritime rights developed more or less along the lines, shall I say, of something jocular. I am not so sure that we have any "rights" in the maritimes; in fact, I do not know that any person or any assembly of persons has any particular "rights". I do know positively, however, that we have a great many wrongs, and perhaps that is one and the same thing.
What I mean by wrongs are those things perhaps which one must charge to the march of events since the first conferences on confederation were held in the Provincial building in Charlottetown prior to 1867. Again, some of our troubles are due to things that nature in her providence has failed to place in our province. That is not an unusual thing. Few provinces, indeed few countries in the world, have possession of all the raw materials required to make them a complete economic entity. One important thing we lack in New Brunswick-which province I admit is small geographically, but, after all, the finer things in life should not be overlooked entirely through consideration of might and enormous size, as seems to be the case in this mad age of speed-I refer particularly to water power. Evidently Canada's war effort is primarily based upon large available power resources in close proximity to war industry. While the provinces of Quebec and Ontario have been bountifully endowed by nature with water power, which man has developed, nevertheless, in Ontario particularly, coal is almost completely lacking, and all the coal requirements of that province must come from the maritimes, principally from Nova Scotia. That of course assists the province of Nova Scotia in an economic sense, but it seems to me that in this time, since money has ceased to be the important factor we considered it to be in the so-called days of peace, if not of happiness, a plan could be worked out by which industries requiring coal to develop steam for power could be located in the maritime provinces, and here I speak for Nova Scotia as I do for my native province.
At Grand Lake in the province of New Brunswick there is a steam-developed electrical plant supplying the province through a hookup. It seems to me that that should be further developed at this time. I realize that the answer will be that the electrical machinery required to put in such a development is not available, although one hon. member a day or so ago mentioned that some

War Appropriation-Supplies
used electrical machinery of this sort was available in the United States. Whether that is so I am not prepared to say, but I do think that the Department of Munitions and Supply, in seeking to get supplies, might well be actuated by another motive also, that of trying to build up Canada. This machinery might be found by that department, with a view to a further development in New Brunswick.
Without wishing to be carpingly critical, let me say that the other day I received a reply to a question I put on the order paper asking what was the amount of money provided by the dominion government by way of capital assistance to private industry and to wholly owned government corporations. I asked:
1. What is the total amount of capital assistance given by the Department of Munitions and Supply to (a) private industry, (b) wholly owned government corporations since war was declared?
The answer to that was:
(a)	$498,766,451
(b)	$71,464,857
as at December 31, 1941, for United Kingdom account and January 31, 1942, for Canadian account.
Figuring that out according to the arithmetic table, which so far at least has not been changed by order in council or government regulation, I find that we have received what I might call the ridiculous percentage of [DOT]00019 of .that total for (a) and (b) of $570,231,308. At least New Brunswick has received plenty of zeros. But our people down there cannot consume or live on zeros. Perhaps after many years Euclid has been proved to be correct when he said that a point (or zero) is that which has position but no magnitude. I do think, Mr. Chairman, that these figures illustrate that there is not a consistently conceived national policy prevailing in Canada at the present time. We in this chamber do represent our own constituencies; when we become members of parliament, as I have said on a previous occasion, we lose our personal identity and become a symbol, the member for a particular riding. But in the larger sense the 244 members, not counting Mr. Speaker, endeavour to govern this country as a national entity, and I cannot understand how we can hope to have a united Canada if each province is to be governed by a sort of patchwork system, putting a patch on when pressure develops here, hoping the patch will hold the pressure back until pressure in another location will call for a patch elsewhere. True, the Department of Munitions and Supply cannot be used at this time as a means of promoting social welfare for the present or into the future if
it is going to retard Canada's war effort. But I cannot understand why 500,000 people in the province of New Brunswick and the populations of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island cannot participate in a larger way in Canada's war effort.
In New Brunswick we have some oil shales. This was mentioned yesterday, and the minister explained, rather briefly, I thought, the situation prevailing there. I put a question on the order paper and received a reply. I now wish to state that a lease covering some 10,000 square miles in New Brunswick was made to a company to promote the development of products from that area. This company was primarily engaged in the production of natural gas, and as a result confined itself to sinking shallow wells, the idea being that if deeper borings for oil were made the pressure of the natural gas, in which this company was chiefly concerned, might vanish. But the general welfare of the province suffered as a result, and I am glad to say that I understand within the last few years that lease was cancelled. I was also glad to know, from a statement made by the minister, that he is asking officials of his department to determine to what extent oil may be developed from shales in New Brunswick. As I understand it, the deepest well in the province is down to about 3,500 feet. I believe there are about 126 such wells.
The situation there was somewhat similar to that which prevailed prior to 1936 in the Turner valley, where only shallow wells had been put down. But six years ago very deep wells were sunk, and as a result the Turner valley became one of the bright spots in our .Canadian industrial life, and is proving to-day to be of the utmost importance in, may I say, the preservation of civilization. If such is our objective, and we believe it is, considerations of dollars and cents should vanish completely, and the New Brunswick deposits should be thoroughly investigated and promoted. Nature gave us these resources, and man should put them- to use.
In New Brunswick we also have a coal supply, principally at Grand Lake. The coal deposits in the province have never been developed, although there are, I believe, some thirty outcroppings, appearing in eleven out of the thirteen counties. There again, it seems to me, nature has provided us with something which might be developed.
What I rose to discuss principally was the situation regarding pulpwood in New Brunswick and the maritimes, as this is another commodity which comes under the Minister
War Appropriation-Supplies
[Stage Direction]
of Munitions and Supply. Busy man though he is, it also has been attached to his department, and in turn, of course, a timber controller was appointed, and a deputy controller for pulpwood under the timber controller. I happen to know something of the pulpwood business, because lumber is the product to which I devote my private activities. It is not the first time that I have referred here to the pulpwood situation in New Brunswick. In December, 1940, the Minister of Finance had a resolution before the house regarding tax concessions to be given to pulp and paper companies, upon the theory that they were depressed during the basic period 193639. At that time I said I agreed that business generally should be treated flexibly. Here is a brief quotation from my remarks which appear on page 746 of Hansard of December 6, 1940:
. . . the newsprint industry should be informed that the primary producer of pulpwood, the farmer, is not receiving a sufficient return in view of the increased profits and the much greater returns which evidently the newsprint companies are making to-day.
By "returns" I of course referred to the financial return. At that time, Mr. Chairman, pulpwood was being purchased in the province of Nova Scotia at $7 per cord of 128 feet. Again, as recorded in Hansard of March 18, 1941, and in November, 1941, I was forced to quote from the press references to the pulp and paper companies indicating the enormous earnings they were then making, which in one case increased from 44 cents per share to $4.14; in another case it advanced from 14 cents per share to $6. If these companies were earning at that rate, I submitted, they were in a position to pay more than $7 per cord for pulpwood to the farmer-producer. Nothing was done in the way of appointing a controller. However, as always happens, the law of supply and demand operated, and pulpwood began to acquire in the hands of the primary producer a greater value. Because of some requests, a controller or deputy controller was then appointed. There was a great fanfare of publicity, and we were told that an acute shortage of pulpwood existed in Canada. I could not understand, if that were so, why there was no great demand-and there was no great demand in the province of New Brunswick. In a return brought down on April 28 the following question and answer appears:
5. Is there a serious shortage of pulpwood in Canada?
Answer: No.
If that be so, it seems to me that the appointing of a controller with the embargo which that controller has placed on pulpwood constitute another very serious handicap
[Mr. O'Brien.!
against the people of New Brunswick. After all, if Canada is short of any commodity- it makes no difference what that commodity is-and it is necessary to the winning of the war, it follows, first, that the primary producer should receive a fair and just return for his product, and, second, if it is needed by the nation it should not be allowed to go beyond the boundaries of the nation.
May I, without wishing to become too parochial, cite a case in point? One of my keenest competitors in the Miramichi district received a contract from a mill in the United States which would have brought into the constituency, in United States funds, between $80,000 and $90,000 in a few weeks. That gentleman was refused a permit to ship the total quantity of cordwood mentioned in the contract and was permitted to ship only 500 cords. Yet the Montreal Star referred about a month ago to a further tax concession given to two particularly-named companies because they were extending their plants. One company was bringing in just over 8200,000 in United States exchange in a year. Now, why is this New Brunswick person, who is the keen competitor to whom I refer, not permitted to bring $90,000 in United States money over a short period of time into the constituency of Northumberland for the benefit of the people of that constituency and for the benefit of the foreign exchange control board, while another company was given tax concessions because it would bring in, in the course of a year, approximately double that amount?
That seems to me to be most illogical and not quite fair. Again, to-day we- are facing, we were certainly facing several weeks ago, a most acute shortage in Canada of meat for human consumption. What did happen? In western Canada the farmers held their cattle off the Canadian market, so we are informed, in order that they might receive a higher price by expcrting them to the United States, notwithstanding the fact that there was and still is a ceiling on meat in Canada. It has been reported that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Gardiner) refused to abide by the ruling of the wartime prices and trade board, on the theory-and I think he was certainly sound in this, morally if not legally-that all through the years the farmers in western Canada had received poor prices for their cattle and are therefore entitled to something more in those particular areas. I say, that is humanly understandable. But if that is proper in western Canada, I should like to know by what line of argument or on what theory the producers of pulpwood in eastern Canada are refused a permit to ship this wood to the United States, there being no shortage in Canada.

War Appropriation-Supplies
I want to make it clear that the ruling, so far as I can find out, is that if an exporter of wood in Canada had been shipping to the United States prior to the placing of this embargo,' that Canadian exporter could go on sending wood to the United States, but not to a new company or to a new purchaser in that country. What logic is behind that? Let me ask this question. How would the Canadian government, the minister himself, individual Canadians feel if we suddenly found placed against our Canadian effort a ruling by the United States government that because a Canadian company had not purchased steel or any other article going into war work that company would not be permitted to buy from a United States manufacturer? To me these things do not in the slightest degree spell consistency or logic. There is a way of sabotaging Canada's war effort indirectly, unconsciously and innocently. We sometimes think of the saboteur as a man who in the [DOT]dead of night creeps into some power plant and, as a culprit, blows up and destroys that property. But in higher places, in broad daylight, I might even use the words through stupidity, certainly through lack of knowledge -that would be a kinder expression-Canada's war effort can be sabotaged. I do not say for a moment that any person is trying deliberately to do these things; but innocently such things can be done. Members of parliament, because of their experience from day to day, are in close contact with what is going on in industry and other lines, and surely they should be in a position to advise the minister, not necessarily here in the house, but at any rate in private in his office, or they could advise his officials, as to what might be done in a practical way to make governing regulations workable. There are so many regulations being passed now, and after all, Canadians are, if I may use the term, free thinkers in these matters; certainly they are of a pioneering spirit, and it seems to me that all these orders and regulations imposed upon business are seriously retarding Canada's war effort.
I believe that members of parliament could be made use of in this respect. They are elected to represent the people in all parts of Canada, and they are in constant touch with every phase of industrial life in the *dominion. Their advice could be given, but instead we are wasting our time in this house wdien we could be devoting our attention to something more useful. Frankly, I wonder why I spend my time in Ottawa. This experience of being a member of the House of Commons has been a great disillusionment to me. True, I realize that we are passing through most strenuous times, but at the
same time the situation demands of us much greater sacrifices and greater energy than we may be able to afford in times of peace. I plead with the minister and the government to recognize members of parliament as human beings possessing some degree of intelligence and devoting their time in parliament to the end that this institution may not, through its present trends, completely vanish as a part of our governmental life. It can happen here; it has happened in other places. A similar governmental institution vanished from Venice, for example, many centuries ago, and all that was heard in pre-war days in the empty senate in Venice was the click of the heels of tourists. Am I to ask myself whether some day tourists will come in here, walk through the building, look at this gorgeous chamber, and say, "Here once democracy functioned, but those who were charged with that democracy failed, so that it is now a museum?"
I repeat, these things can happen here. In my opinion, this institution of parliament is sick and diseased. That disease, that atrophy, is creeping on from day to day, from week to week, unless leadership comes from the government. The things that I mention are not simply the result of my own phobias. I know them and they are presented to me. I am not taking up the time of the house from any desire to embarrass the minister or his department. No. I wish in any way I can to be of service to others, to represent those who have been of great service to.me. I, sir, have been most fortunate; but I must say that down in New Brunswick, one of the oldest provinces in the dominion, a young man starting in life to-day to build up for himself a future, such as my father built for me and passed on to me, has not the chance of the proverbial snowball. It just cannot be done, because business to-day in Canada has become involved in enormous corporations and these corporations are so far-reaching that it is the balance sheet that is ever present whenever human values are to be considered.
Again I plead that this house take unto itself very quickly ,the idea that politics and the seats we hold here are secondary things and that we must preserve our institutions to pass them on to those who will come after us. Let us realize that if we squander these things we shall some day be held greatly responsible. As a case in point, it is a dreadful thing for me to have to say at this moment in Canada, in our present circumstances, that because of the lack of Canadian policy in days of peace, when we thought we could talk ourselves out of depression, if it had not been for the Germans buying pulpwood in eastern Canada
[Stage Direction]
War Appropriation-Supplies
[Stage Direction]
many of our people would have starved. I sat at my desk in my own office and opposite me sat the captain of a German boat. He said, "Mr. O'Brien, what a wonderful country you have here. If we only had this country what would we not do with it!" And I, sir, in great humiliation sat there and listened to that man, knowing that if the Germans had this country they would make it indeed industrially a wonderful country. The river up which his ship sailed for forty miles, from the sea, with 35, 40 and 45 feet of water at the docks, is now completely abandoned. There is not to-day the slightest sign of a ship or a sail or of any animation on that river. Can any other country squander these natural resources and fail to develop them as the governments of Canada down through the years have been doing?
I have spoken about pulpwood, but I have not made any recommendation. I think I should make at least a suggestion. I ask the minister to have his officials seriously consider the lifting of the embargo on pulpwood, until such time as it can be proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that there is a shortage in Canada and that the interests of the Canadian people, not necessarily those of the owners of Canadian pulp mills, are to be served. If that is done then, as in the case of the recent gasoline restrictions, our people, rich and poor, will submit to the very last ounce of endurance. But if there is no shortage in Canada and these people are restricted in their God-given right to earn a livelihood, then I think something is seriously wrong.
I have here a short clipping which rather expresses my experience here in this House of Commons. The article was written by Mr. Bruce Hutchison and appeared in the Victoria Times; I found it extremely interesting. I quote:
One leaves Ottawa with a certain relief, like a man leaving a well-kept hothouse and getting into the fresh air. Ottawa is a hothouse and many of its most attractive growths are orchids, which can survive only in a high temperature and with the greatest care. In fact, Ottawa, speaking in an entirely non-partisan sense, is much too orchidaceous to be the capital of a rough, tough young country like Canada.
It is easy to be absorbed into the official hothouse of Ottawa. Few men survive it. In an intellectual sense they become orchidaceous very quickly and seldom can stand intellectual frost and rain any more.
This is not due to any particular sinfulness of the capital. The House of Commons, in fact, is probably as moral and straight-laced a group of men as you could ask for. There is no management wickedness such as the movies have given Washington; no glorious sirens who lure state secrets from fat old prairie states-

men: no dramas of blackmail and seduction; but rather an intolerable respectability, a dullness which numbs the heart.
That article which I have quoted in part rather expresses my views. I am one of those who desire to serve, and from my seat in this House of Commons I freely offer my assistance to the government. I cannot do more. Again I plead with the minister to make use of the members of this house coming from New Brunswick, irrespective of party. We have ten members here, and I am quite sure those ten will submerge their political leanings at a time like this for the ultimate good of New Brunswick and of Canada. If I can be of any assistance in that respect, even in a small way, I freely offer my services.
Clarence Decatur Howe: I am always glad of the advice of members of parliament; I am always glad to .draw upon their experience, but if the advice is to the effect that we should lift our export restrictions on raw material, I am afraid that would not be very helpful in winning the war. As bon. members know, we have a controlled economy in Canada, and have had for a very considerable time. There is a legal limit to the price which may be paid for pulpwood. There is a legal limit to the price that may be paid for steel, as there is in the case of many other raw materials and finished products. The country to our south, and the various countries to the south of it, have not economies controlled to the same extent that ours is controlled. The price of almost anything is higher in the United States, and higher again in central and south American countries, than it is in Canada. What would be the result if we did not exercise export controls? Almost everything we have in the way of raw materials would be sent abroad as raw materials. For instance, there would be no lumber industry in this country, because the logs would go over the border. There would be no paper industry, because the pulpwood would go over the border. There would be no steel industry, because the pig iron and billet steel would go across the border as such. There would be no munitions industry, because all the copper, nickel and other materials we have would go over the border as such. In other words we would be left as producers of the rawest of raw materials, and our manufacturing industry would cease to exist. We control the prices of our finished products, and of course in order to make those products it is necessary to retain in Canada sufficient raw materials at prices consistent with our whole price structure. Pulpwood is not a munition of war,

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as such. By putting it through a paper mill or an explosive plant it can be made into a munition of war. My hon. friend speaks of the export of pulpwood to Germany, which he says saved the economy of New Brunswick. Britain is getting that pulpwood back now in the form of explosives. Many of the bombs dropped on London probably were charged with explosives produced from New Brunswick logs.
Mr. O'BRIEN: I should like to deal with that matter right now. The people of New Brunswick, or certainly the exporters of pulpwood, are being more or less accused of having sacrificed the greater and better things of life for the selfish bank account, and I protest most vigorously against that suggestion. At that time there was never any thought of war. But the minister who just made that statement belonged to a government which permitted exports to go to Japan in time of war to be made into bombs which now are falling upon helpless people, and which before long may be falling on helpless Canadians. Our people in New Brunswick have been subjected to this sort of economy for so many years that it would have been nothing short of ridiculous then to refuse that business from Germany, when the Canadian government of the day was unable to offer them any other relief.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Hear, hear.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I am glad to hear those cheers. That was a very illuminating explanation, and I am sure everyone is quite convinced that any control over the exports of pulpwood is entirely wrong. However, if I may be allowed to continue until I complete my statement-my hon. friend now having made two speeches, he may permit me to make one-the reason there is control over the export of pulpwood is that there is only so much pulpwood available in Canada. Everyone is allowed to log as much pulpwood as he will or can; there is no restriction on the logging. All we ask is that the needs of Canadian industry for pulpwood be filled first. We impose the same regulation on lumber. We tell the lumber industry to manufacture all the lumber they can. We would like them to manufacture every piece of lumber that can be manufactured, but *before they export to a market where prices are higher they must fill the needs of the Canadian market, at Canadian prices. That is what we say in regard to pulpwood and what we say in regard to any number of raw materials. There are very few materials required in the war economy of Canada that
44561-167J
are allowed to be exported freely. I thought everyone understood that; I am surprised that I must explain it. However, I am very glad to do so, because it seems that the explanation is necessary. There is no restriction whatever on the logging of pulpwood, and every stick may be disposed of.
The reason we ask our manufacturers not to accept new customers in the United States is that we wish to manage our own economy while causing the least possible dislocation in the United States. We take the view that if manufacturers in the United States have been in the habit of coming to Canada for their supplies, we would like to see these customers given a preference when we are disposing of our commodities. But we do not wish our people to take on new customers in the United States because of the dislocation that might be caused in that country due to Canada's domestic regulations.


Mr. HAZEN:: Madam Chairman, arising from the discussion which took place in the house yesterday afternoon with regard to further restrictions in connection with gasoline rationing in the maritime provinces, I have received a further telegram from the New Brunswick automobile dealers' association, and from the Saint John automobile association, which I should like to read to the minister. It is as follows:
With further reference to yesterday's discussion in the house in which Mr. Howe states that no tank cars are being used transporting gasoline from Sarnia to the province of Quebec he cannot deny that tank cars are being used to distribute gasoline from bulk storage plants to plants in Ontario and Quebec. How then does he justify his statements of a few days ago-


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: I rise to a point of order. It is obvious that the hon. member or any other hon. member cannot read outside comment on statements by a minister while the debate is in process.


The ACTING CHAIRMAN (Mrs. Cassel-man):: Under citation 306 I rule the hon. member out of order.


Douglas King Hazen: Perhaps I may be permitted to give a summary of the telegram.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is all right.


Douglas King Hazen: And then I might be permitted to put a question to the minister. The purport of the telegram as I have read it so far is that the minister states that no tank cars are being used in transporting gasoline from Sarnia to the province of Quebec. That statement appears at page 2617 of Hansard.
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Frederick Clayton Casselman: Order. The rule to which I have referred contains the expression "emanating from persons outside the house". Therefore the hon. member's observations are not in order. The rule is:
It is not in order to read articles in newspapers, letters or communications emanating from persons outside the house and referring to, or commenting on, or denying anything said by a member or expressing any opinion reflecting on proceedings within the house.
I believe the hon. member is still out of order.


Douglas King Hazen: I shall not read the rest of the telegram, but I will read the question asked yesterday afternoon by the hon. member for Northumberland (Mr. O'Brien) and the answer given thereto by the minister. They are as follows:
Mr. O'Brien: How is Montreal being serviced to-day with gasoline from Sarnia?
Mr. Howe: By tankers.
Mr. O'Brien:	Are any railway cars being
used to take gasoline from Sarnia to Quebec?
Mr. Howe: No.
If I am not permitted to refer to the telegram my difficulty is increased. If tank cars are being used to distribute gasoline from bulk storage plants to plants in Ontario and Quebec, then these tanks are enabling the owners of cars in Ontario and Quebec to get five gallons of gasoline while the people in New Brunswick have to be content with two gallons. Yesterday the minister said he was trying to divide the gasoline fairly. Would it not be fair to divert some of these cars to New Brunswick, even if it meant that the people in Ontario and Quebec who drive motor cars were obliged to be content with four gallons instead of five? If some of those cars were diverted to New Brunswick it might result in the people of Ontario and Quebec getting only four gallons. Surely New Brunswick is entitled to more than two.
I am sorry I am not permitted to read this telegram, because I believe it puts the matter in a better light than I have been able to.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I shall be glad to look into the situation, and if there are any cars that can be diverted for transporting gasoline to the maritimes I will examine the situation to see whether such cars can be diverted.


Douglas King Hazen: I will send the telegram to
the minister.
Mr. O'BRIEN:	Madam Chairman, I
should like to reply to the minister.	I

believe I am in order, since in the meantime other hon. members have made statements. The minister referred unkindly to the people of New Brunswick, presumably exporters, shipping pulpwood to Germany. I wish to state clearly, however, that just as soon as war broke out and the British empire needed pitwood, although we knew nothing about this product in New Brunswick-the sizes required were from 4 to 12 feet in length, with top sizes 2^ to 8 inches-New Brunswick operators immediately entered into the production of pitwood. But one of the large Canadian pulp and paper companies operating in New Brunswick, through a subsidiary, refused to turn their organization into the making of pitwood for the United Kingdom until they were paid a price of $14.80 per cord. At that time, nearly two years ago, pulpwood in Nova Scotia was being bought by a pulp mill at $7 per cord. A cord of pulpwood contains approximately 87 to 90 cubic feet, and weighs approximately 3,000 pounds. Now the price is fixed by the timber controller at $10.
I remember some months ago in this house the_ Minister of National Defence (Mr. Ralston) and the leader of the opposition (Mr. Hanson) had a very interesting argument regarding the price paid for hemlock lumber by the Department of Munitions and Supply in Nova Scotia. The minister defended the price of $32 a thousand for hemlock lumber, which is an inferior grade in eastern Canada, and cited the timber controller as his authority for that price. A thousand feet of lumber converted into cubic measure is about 87 cubic feet and it weighs approximately 3,000 pounds.
Here is one branch of government which through the timber controller has said that $32 for hemlock lumber is a fair price for 87 cubic feet; yet another branch of government says that the farmer producing pulpwood shall get only $10 for the same volume by cubic measurement, and the same weight content, for his valuable pulpwood. At the time the timber controller authorized the Minister of National Defence to state that $32 was a fair price for hemlock lumber, the Canadian National Railways, under the guidance of the Minister of Transport, was permitting that organization to buy railway ties for approximately $17.80 a thousand. If these things are consistent, then I do not understand consistency.


Mr. NOSEWORTHY:: Madam Chairman, I should like to call a few points to the minister's attention before he becomes com-

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pletely bored. I am sure his patience must be wearing thin. Let me assure him however that that is the price one pays for greatness.
I have been particularly delighted to note the grasp the minister has shown of details in his department. Following him one is filled with amazement because he speaks with freedom on so many phases of the immense undertaking over which he has charge. My purpose this afternoon is not to criticize. I have a number of questions to ask in which a number of people in Toronto and the surrounding area are interested.
I was rather disappointed to hear from the Minister of National Defence for Naval Services (Mr. Macdonald) that there is no organization in Canada made up of scientists and investigators which is working for the improvement of designs sent here from the old country to be applied to boats we are building in this country. The hon. member for Yale (Mr. Stirling) called attention to this fact during the discussion. I think our war effort would be improved if we had some organization to cheek the specifications laid down in Great Britain for boats and for war equipment to be produced in this country. I am informed that a plant in my riding at the present time is making porthole covers from bronze costing forty cents per pound, whereas the engineer of the plant is reported to have said that the purpose for which these are made could be equally well served by a material costing four cents per pound. This is only one small item, but I feel that there are many items of this nature which could be checked.
Another matter of greater importance to me is in connection with our cargo boats. The minister has thrilled the country with the report of the speed shown in the production of these boats. However, if the minister and his department had deliberately set about to build boats that would serve as good targets for submarines, I doubt if they could have done better than the cargo boat that is being built to-day. These boats are of 10,000 tons, and I am told that they are somewhere near 400 feet in length. They are propelled by reciprocating steam engines weighing 100 pounds per horse-power produced, the engines being placed in the centre of the boat, which necessitates a long tunnel to house the drive shaft. These boats move along at from ten to twelve knots, which is approximately the same speed as the underwater craft. As I say, they make particularly good targets. According to reports published in the United States, in order to replace the ships being sunk on the Atlantic route between Canada and Great Britain it would be necessary to build approximately two ships a day, which is more than we are producing in both Canada and the United States.
I should like to ask the minister if any attempt has been made to improve the design of these cargo boats which bear the precious munitions of war manufactured in this country, which carry the aeroplanes which we make and which are so esesntial to our allies. I have been informed on what I consider to be good authority that small diesel engines are manufactured on this continent, and that these could be arranged in groups on a ship near the stern, thus permitting greater loading capacity and almost doubling the speed. I am told that ships can be built with watertight compartments along the side in which could be loaded grain or other cargo that would absorb moisture and enable the ship to remain afloat long after it was attacked.
I am informed that these boats have practically no armour and carry light guns only, which give them practically no defence against a surface raider. I should like to know if any attempt has been made to change the structure of these ships in order that they may carry heavier guns and be able to defend themselves. This is an important issue in our war effort. I am convinced that Canadian ingenuity and Canadian engineers should be given the opportunity of improving, if possible, upon merchant marine designs which were antiquated long before this war began.
Since we have in the greater Toronto area a number of aeroplane plants, I should like to deal for a moment with the question of aeroplane production. I asked the Minister of National Defence for Air (Mr. Bower) a question about the Martin bomber project at the Malton plant. I think when a project costing well over three quarters of a million dollars and employing hundreds of men for nine months is abandoned without a single ship having been built, we are entitled to a more satisfactory explanation than that given by the minister. I take it that the Minister of Munitions and Supply is informed of this project and can give us an explanation.
I should like to call the minister's attention, as I did the attention of the Minister of National Defence for Air, to the condition of the road running to Malton. When discussing roads running to another munitions plant the minister explained that their condition resulted from the fact that they ran through private property. This road runs through publicly-owned property; it is a publicly-owned road, yet because of the conditions of this road many thousands of man-hours have been lost at the Malton plant. The manager told me
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that one of his greatest difficulties was to keep his men. The plant is situated a long way from the centre of Toronto, and the transportation problems are so great and the workers find it so difficult to get to work that they take the first job offered nearer the city. This matter is of such vital importance to the nation that no provincial government or municipal authority should' be allowed to hold up the improvement of this road.
I want to call the minister's attention also to the situation of the plant of Canadian Associated Aircraft Limited. I have a letter from employees indicating that they have been informed that the plant, which has been engaged in the production of Hampden bombers, is to be closed until such time as the neighbouring plant, the National Steel Car company, is in a position to take it over and proceed with the production of Lancaster bombers. Since coming into the house to-day I have received a telegram from the employees of that plant to the effect that they have just been notified that 35 per cent of the employees of the plant are discharged, while the rest .are to be put on part time until such time as the nearby company is able to absorb their labour. There you have a group of workers who are anxious to get on with the job of [DOT]building Hampden bombers. They have written to the department and asked why the production of that particular bomber has been discontinued. The only satisfaction they received

I have a copy of the letter which was sent in reply to the employee who 'wrote- from the official who replied was an inquiry about the writer of the letter, who he was and what his interest was in that plant. The situation is such that unless the men are put to work a group of experienced aircraft production workers will be dispersed, and then there will be a further hold-up of production until the new company find skilled mechanics for the project they have on hand.
I should also like to call the minister's attention to a complaint I have received regarding de Havilland. I am told that that plant is working on a four-engine bomber of English design, most or many of the parts of which must come from England. The hazards of shipping may render the receiving of these parts difficult, or at all events delay may be experienced in their reception, and those who work at that plant are questioning the advisability of that production. I have no doubt the minister has much more knowledge of the situation than these men have, but here are men who are interested in war production and they are anxious to know that the best possible means are being taken to increase our war production. I think the

questions they ask should be answered. The statement which the minister has already made on the work of his department, and the knowledge it has given to the people of this country of the vast ramifications of our war effort, is all to the good. I am simply bringing these questions before the minister in order that he may have an opportunity of clearing up much suspicion and many doubts in the public mind regarding this work.
Turning to the field of construction, I have a letter here signed by an employee of the Massey-Harris plant on Weston Road. He has been employed at that plant for three years, and is a reliable man. He tells me that the plant is very much overstaffed, that the employees are actually getting in one another's way. His suggestion is that the work that is being done at that plant could be done by half the number of people who are now employed. I should like the minister to tell us whether or not that plant is working on a cost-plus contract.
I am also told by the same writer that at that plant skilled workmen are engaged in producing kitchen and office furniture from American whitewood which costs approximately $100 per thousand feet-furniture that could be made from Canadian wood and serve the purpose equally well. The Canadian taxpayers who see these things or hear these things from men working in these plants want to know where their money is going and whether they are really getting value for all the money they are spending on the war.
I am further informed that at the small arms plant at Long Branch, also near York South riding, very expensive building material is being used, material so costly that a building in which it is used should last for fifty years. It may be that it is the intention of the minister or the department that that building should last fifty years. It is possible that they have plans in mind that will thoroughly justify the use of these expensive materials. But you have the public wondering why. They wonder why, in an office building for the air training scheme, we are using cut stone, 7,500 feet of it, I am told, im one building. The people are asking whether that expenditure is warranted.
I have also a few questions for the minister about the fuse-filling plants, one of which is situated in that locality. I am not sure whether the minister's department has any responsibility for contracts placed with United States companies, but he told us the other day that he received orders for material from various ministries and that he places the contracts wherever he can get the material. There are a number of fuse-filling plants in the United States working on the same type

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of contract and filling the same type of fuse as the plant at Scarborough and Cherrier Field. These American companies are Exell Foundry, Falls River, Boston; National FireWorks, Elkton, Maryland; and National Munitions, Elrick, Pennsylvania. My information is that the first shipment of 90,000 fuses delivered by National Fire-Works at Elkton-I have reference to fuse 119, mark 4- were rejected by the inspection board of the United Kingdom and Canada. That knowledge is spreading among the workers in these plants. I have been asked to find out whether these are the facts.
I am also informed that the Canadian factories are filling these fuses at about half the rate of the United States plants, and that a very high percentage of the fuses filled at the Scarborough and Cherrier Field plants are rejected.
My attention has also been called to the fact that considerable difficulty has been experienced with workers in structural steel and heavy steel generally, and that many plants have received shipments of steel and found that they had not the skilled help required. The help in the meantime has probably gone to another plant. A foreman in an industry of that kind asked me to suggest, and I pass the suggestion on to the minister, who has probably thought of it already himself, that there be formed a pool of steel workers under the direction of the minister or some official, so that when a plant does receive a shipment of steel, the officials will know immediately where the workers may be found, whence they may be sent immediately to that plant and be available for plants working in the steel industry, in order that there may be no delay through loss of time on that account.
Finally, I would ask the minister if any steps are being taken*in his department to set up a cooperative effort between workers and management. We have received numerous reports from the United States where this cooperation between managers and workers by means of cooperative committees has speeded up production in numerous instances. I understand that the workers' representatives have been asking for a long time that some such committees be set up in the munitions plants and other war industries in Canada. I doubt whether that can be done unless the government itself is prepared to take the initiative and show some leadership in that respect. I think it should be done. Managers and workers alike are interested in production, and given some leadership from the government, it is quite possible that cooperative committees can be set up in our industries which will assist us greatly in our war effort.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Regarding the design of ships, I think it is hardly fair to say Canada is contributing nothing. We have a firm of marine engineers and designers, Messrs. Lambert and German and Mill-to give them some publicity. They have been here for many years; they are very expert; they have designed a large part of the shipping which has been produced in Canadian yards. Mr. Mill is retained permanently by our director of shipbuilding. He has, I think, contributed a good deal to the design of ships which have been built in our shipyards during war time.
My hon. friend referred to the type of 10,000 ton cargo ship we are building to-day and said that it might be greatly improved. I may say that this ship was designed particularly to meet present day war conditions. All the designers in England pooled their ideas to produce the design which came from England, and I might say that in the United States and in Canada that design was accepted with very slight modifications. I understand that the Liberty ship in the United States is slightly, but only very slightly, different from the 10,000 ton freighter which we are building in Canada. Both follow the design which is being used in England for common type cargo ships. The ships which are being built in the three countries are practically of the same design. The reason that it is a slow ship is that all ships to-day travel in convoys, and the speed of even the so-called fast convoy is only about ten knots, so that a ship of eleven and a half or twelve knots is as efficient travelling in a fast convoy as a ship whose speed is five or six knots greater.
Early in the war it was the practice that ships of fifteen knots and over travelled without escort. However, it has been found that losses of ships travelling without escort, even at considerable speeds, are heavier than of ships in convoy. To-day very few freighters, regardless of their speed, travel out of convoy. As a matter of fact, ten knots is a rather high speed for a convoy. I believe that nine knots is more nearly the speed of a fast convoy, and about six knots is the speed of the so-called slow convoy.
Steam is used as a propellent for several reasons. One is that the steam engine is cheaper to construct. Another is that coal is a fuel available everywhere. And of course, in case of damage steam engines are the most easily repaired. Diesel capacity is highly regarded for high-speed passenger ships, but in the freighting trade steam has always been preferred to internal combustion engines.
The story of the Martin bomber is typical of what the aircraft industry is up against in war time. The story is that our air force
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ordered the procurement by my department of a considerable number of Martin bombers. It was decided that the Martin bomber should be manufactured in Canada, and arrangements were made to manufacture them at the National Steel Car plant at Malton. The job was put in hand at Malton and a considerable amount of work was done in setting up jigs for that type of manufacture. When the work was nicely under way we received a very urgent demand from Great Britain to arrange in Canada for the manuufacture of a new-type four-engine bomber which was believed to be superior to anything then in combat. Naturally we objected that we had no suitable capacity. We had an emissary come from England to urge the necessity of developing this type of production, and after consultation with the air force we finally decided that the urgency and the needs of Britain were such that we would be well advised to change over from the Martin bomber to the British type. The British-type bomber is on the secret list, and it is not permissible to mention the name.
Britain had an order of Martin bombers in the United States, and these bombers for Britain were the first off the production line in the United States. To compensate us, or at least to ensure the procurement of the Martin bomber for our own air force, we were promised the first bombers off the production line for British account. The understanding was that there would be an exchange of dollar for dollar: we would get the Martin bombers from the United States through Great Britain and we would credit Great Britain with the cost of the Martin bombers in the United States against the British-type four-engine bomber in our plant. The cost of tooling was included as part of the amount for which we were to receive compensation in the form of Martin bombers from the United States. There was no monetary loss to Canada on tooling, but of course there was a dislocation there, which has been unfortunate. However, the Anson project was close to production at that time or perhaps had started production. We put a very considerable number of Anson bombers into the plant, and there was actually very little dislocation of labour through the change in arrangements.
I might say that that sort of thing is an everyday incident in the aircraft industry. Unfortunately it is not possible to take a pre-war type of plane and continue to manufacture it indefinitely, for the reason that the art of building fighting planes advances as conditions of combat change. At the beginning of the war the Hurricane was

perhaps the plane that saved England, but to-day it is not suitable for fighting over England because the fighting takes place at altitudes which the Hurricane cannot reach, so that other types are used there. The Hurricanes we are making at the present time are sent to other areas where different conditions apply. From time to time we have had in almost every type of production radical modifications of design which have necessitated interrupting production and introducing changes into the plane, with a good deal of loss of production and slacking off of employment.
The road to Malton is a subject about which I have heard a good deal. As hon. members are aware, the building of highways is not a matter for the federal government. The provincial government, cities and counties are responsible for the building and maintenance of highways with the limited exception of the Trans-Canada highway in which the dominion takes an interest. We have sponsored improvements in the road from Toronto to Malton and have made a gratis contribution of a considerable proportion of the cost of building the road. That contribution has been paid in cash to the provincial government. The sub-grade of the new road is built. We are aware that the road is in bad condition and are making proper representations to the provincial government. I am hopeful that the governments concerned will take action shortly to improve that situation, but it is not a matter in which the federal government can go further than it has already gone.
The matter of Hampden bombers is as my hon. friend states. The plant alongside the National Steel Car plant was assembling Hampden bombers, and the National Steel Car plant was building components of Hampden bombers. That bomber is no longer of sufficient value as a fighting machine ,to be useful in the war, and production in this country has been suspended. The production of the four-engine bombers, to which I previously referred, will supersede that work in the plants formerly operated by the Associated Aircraft companies. This plant will become an annex of the National Steel Car plant. I doubt whether there is any great interruption in employment. As a matter of fact the National Steel Car plant has been, I understand, short of aeroplane mechanics for some time. I rather imagine the men will be absorbed by the plant in Toronto and that the men in Montreal will be absorbed into overhaul work. In any event anyone who calls himself an aeroplane mechanic will have no difficulty obtaining employment in any of

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the various plants in Toronto-the National Steel Car, de Havilland, Massey-Harris and one or two others. No man in the aircraft industry will have any difficulty in being reabsorbed immediately into the aircraft industry even though he must leave the plant in which he is working at the present time.
My hon. friend spoke of the de Havilland plant and criticized the type of plane being built there. I hardly think that his statement, that a great number of parts must come from England, is correct. It might have been true with regard to a few initial planes, but my understanding is that the new plane being produced by de Havilland will be an allCanadian product except for the engine. Here again we are building a very modern British plane. It is also on the secret list. We think it marks a definite advance in the type of plane to be built in Canada. It is quite fast, well armed, and capable of flying the Atlantic. It is equipped with twin engines, not four engines, and should be one of the most useful planes in the war. We undertook the construction of this particular plane because we were urged to do so by Great Britain. They felt it highly desirable to have a Canadian source of supply for this aeroplane. My hon. friend spoke of Massey-Harris as manufacturing furniture. I was not aware that Massey-Harris manufactured furniture.


Joseph William Noseworthy: Furniture from
American wood at $100 a thousand.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I was not aware that they
manufactured furniture and I am sure it is not for our account.


Joseph William Noseworthy: My report is that the employees there were engaged in making kitchen and office furniture from American wood at $100 a thousand.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I suggest that my hon. friend may have another plant in mind. I would not be dogmatic about it, but I have never heard of this company manufacturing furniture. Certainly I doubt that they are manufacturing furniture for the Canadian government. It is my information that very little wood from the United States is imported into Canada in connection with the furniture business. However, I am not competent to deal with this question without obtaining more information.
In the matter of small arms, this is a government arsenal for the manufacture of rifles and sub-machine guns. The number of employees per square foot at the plant is very high as manufacturing plants go. To afford employment of that kind it is necessary to have an air-conditioned plant, the best lighting, and conditions that cannot very well be
maintained in a temporary building. I am familiar with the type of construction at Small Arms, and I hardly think it is extravagant considering the extensive use made of floor space. Those familiar with manufacturing will agree that the cost of building is reasonable in proportion to the output. The monthly output valued in dollars from that plant is quite high in comparison with the cost of the plant.
I appreciate the spirit in which my hon. friend has given the information, and I hope I have covered the points he raised. If not, I shall be glad to amplify what I have said.


Mr. MacNICOL:: Can the minister give us some information in reference to the telegram I left with him?


Clarence Decatur Howe: The hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol) sent me a telegram stating that 35 per cent of the employees of Canadian Associated Aircraft at Malton would be discharged in three weeks.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Signed by some of the workers' committee.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes. That is very likely correct. This is the plant which was formerly making Hampden bombers, but I feel sure the workers will be absorbed in the adjoining operation or in the de Havilland or Massey-Harris plant.	_


Joseph William Noseworthy: Will the minister give some information on the question I raised with regard to the fuse plants?


Clarence Decatur Howe: In regard to the fuse plants, we did buy a few fuses before our plants came into production. We got them from a British order in the United States. I daresay there were some rejects, but if there were they were not paid for. They were purchased subject to inspection. I believe the record for fuse filling and small arms ammunition is very much better in Canada than in the United States. At the moment we are obtaining no fuses from the United States; as a matter of fact we are shipping filled fuses to the United States. Everything I learn about the fuse-filling operation at Scarboro leads me to believe that it is a very efficient operation. I know that the costs are good, because we have no difficulty in disposing of the fuses outside the country. I believe the operation is very efficient as to both quality of ammunition and cost.


John George Diefenbaker: The minister has dealt with Canadian Associated Aircraft Limited, the employees of which apparently sent quite a number of telegrams to members of the house this afternoon in regard to the closing of the plant and their discharge from employment. From time to time letters have
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been received by hon. members in regard to conditions in various aircraft factories in Canada. Within the last day or so I received one such letter, and I think I should mention the name of the plant. I refer to the Noorduyn factory at Cartierville, Quebec. In that factory are a thousand workers, many of whom, according to the information I have received, are idle part of their time because of a shortage of materials. That is something which requires explanation. It is all very well to say that these things are just gossip, but the fact remains that not only in this case but in the case of the plant at Malton there are substantial grounds of complaint.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Did I say it was gossip? M3' hon. friend has given me a specific case.


John George Diefenbaker: I am dealing with a specific case.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Do not put words in my mouth. I have not said ans'thing.


John George Diefenbaker: I have heard that expression used by the minister on several occasions when such matters were mentioned, but I hope he will not regard this as gossip.
With regard to the Noorduyn .factory, is it a fact that those employed there are idle during some part of their working time because of a shortage of materials? Is it a fact that there has been a shortage of materials? I think there would be a great deal less recrimination in regard to this subject if the minister would place before the committee' such surveys as he has made, which will set forth an>- shortages that have been found and any delays that have resulted therefrom, together with the number of men who have been kept idle due to the fact that there has been any shortage of materials. As far as the aircraft production in December last is concerned, there must have been a decline; otherwise a director of morale would not have been appointed, his duties being to increase aircraft production. I think the committee is entitled to know the circumstances connected with his appointment, including any surveys that were made leading up to the appointment of such an official. My information is that not only was such an official appointed-and I am not now dealing with the circumstances connected with his appointment-but two journals, one in English and one in French were turned out for circulation among the aircraft workers. Is it a fact that such journals were published and circulated among the workers? If so, was the cost met by the government, or was it indirectly financed as overhead? What in general were [Mr. Diefenbaker.J
the circumstances that impelled the director of aircraft production to undertake a morale building campaign?
According to the evidence that was given before the Truman committee in the United States, which went into the matter very fully, there was a hold-up in aircraft production, for which the committee found several reasons. The first was that too much red tape held up production. Is that one of the reasons in Canada? The next reason was that there were too many changes in specifications, with a lack of standardization in combat and bomber planes. The explanation given to-day by the minister in regard to the change from Martin bombers to four-engine bombers was, I thought, very reasonable. Explanations like that clarify the situation; recriminations do not. Is it a fact that there have been too many changes in specifications in Canada? Have we yet arrived at a point where there is uniformity as great as can be secured in view of changing conditions and the exigencies of war?
I would also ask the minister what plans are being made for the production of aircraft engines in Canada. Is not difficulty being experienced in securing aeroplane engines in the United States, now that that country is in the war? The Truman committee also found that there were hold-ups because of the action of certain organizations which interfered with labour engaged in the production of aeroplanes. Has that been the case in Canada? I do not think so. I believe labour has cooperated well, but if it has not, let us have the particulars. Let us know why production is not what was expected. Have any manufacturers, producers or distributors of supplies been negligent in furnishing the aeroplane factories with necessary supplies? Has their neglect resulted in hold-ups in the various factories? If so, have these men been punished? What has been done in order to accelerate proper distribution on their part?
After taking evidence over a long period of time the Truman committee came to certain conclusions, and acted thereon. That was last January, and as a result aircraft production in the United States has greatly increased. So great was this increase that according to a recent authoritative statement, the United States is producing more aeroplanes than Germany. I ask the minister: Has there been an increase in aeroplane production in Canada since the appointment of a director of morale? Does he find that there are wide-spread shortages? These are things which, if explained, may very well go a long way toward explaining the situation which apparently exists in a number of aircraft plants throughout the dominion to-day.

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In November, 1940, when the minister first enunciated in this house his scheme of giving financial assistance to industry, he told us he had plans for this industry after the war. The other day he told us that some $380,000,000 had been advanced to industry. The Truman committee looked into the matter of advances to industry in the United' States; they wanted to know what were the plans of the government for the post-war period, in connection with the industries so financed by the government. The dominion government has put millions of dollars into private plants by way of subsidy or capital assistance. Is it the intention that after the war these plants shall compete with private industry?
In -November, 1940, the minister said he had a post-war plan for these plants. What are the plans or what is the nature of the contracts he has entered into with these private industries, and the general purport of the government's plans for their utilization after the war? According to the evidence given before the committee in the United States, the general plan in that country is that private industry to-day operating government plants to which advances have been made are in the position where they shall have priority after the war in the leasing of those plants, and their continuance in civil production.
I would ask the minister frankly to set out the situation with regard to his difficulties in the aeroplane industry. If he places the matter fairly before us, we will give him our cooperation. We are not asking for particulars as to amounts or as -to production in any one factory, because to furnish such information may cause harm. But we want to know something more than mere generalizations in connection with production of aircraft. We want to know whether all is well and, if all is not well, what can be or is being done to accelerate production.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I shall surprise my hon. friend by answering this simple question with a simple answer. He asked if there was a shortage of material at Noorduyns, and I will say, yes, there is, and surprise him very much.


John George Diefenbaker: No; that is being frank; we want that.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I was going to say that there is a temporary shortage of aluminum forgings at Noorduyns.


John George Diefenbaker: How long has it
continued?


Clarence Decatur Howe: It has been temporary. It has affected production for about a month, and we think we are catching up with it fairly quickly. Production at Noorduyns has been stepping up very fast indeed.
I would point out that an aeroplane plant such as Noorduyns is really an assembly plant.
It assembles the product made by a great many other plants across Canada. If one of those plants gets out of step, the assembly line is closed down. When we are expanding industry as rapidly as we have-and I said the other day that the aeroplane industry had expanded fortyfold in the last two years- it is, in my experience, impossible always to keep a balance. We may be short of labour or materials at one point; for instance, in the Noorduyn plant we are temporarily short of aluminum castings. However, I do not think anyone has been laid off entirely on that account, although some of the staff may have been put on shorter hours. Instead of working overtime they have been working regular hours, or perhaps curtailed hours. I do not know how it can always be kept in balance. As I said before, a plant, if it is fully manned and fully machined, and with an unlimited rate of output, can be streamlined so that the product comes through evenly every day. But I do not think one could achieve that in the aeroplane business to-day. These temporary upsets or shortages of one kind and another-labour	and material-do	occur
from time to time. That is why the production figures for various months are uneven, and they are bound to be uneven. However, the industry as a whole is making tremendous strides.
The hon. member has asked why a director of morale is necessary. I suggest to him that when 2,000 men come in from the farms and the cities every month, a little help in that direction is necessary to enable those men to be absorbed into industry. I think morale building has had a good effect. Just how it has affected the output of planes I do not know, but I presume it has not done any harm. I would think, too, that it has done some good because the output of planes has risen from week to week, and at this stage of our programme has reached a very healthy figure, especially when we remember that three of our plants are still tooling, and not producing.
I must say that I have not given a great deal of thought to the disposal of our plants after the war. I should like to get a little further along with the war before giving my attention to this. As I said earlier, capital assistance to industry in the form of plant and equipment is retained in the ownership of the
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crown. That is, the product of the expenditure remains in the ownership of the crown. When we build a plant, we own the land on which it stands. When we put machines in, we own them. As far as the use of plants built by capital expenditure is concerned, all I can say is that everything is under rigid control. When the war is over, we can do what we like with these plants. We can turn the key in the door, if we wish, and shrink an industry back to its pre-war size. Or, if circumstances warrant it, we can use the addition to a plant for any type of production we may wish.
Very few commitments have been made. Commitments have been made only where secret processes have been used, and in that event we have given the firm which provided the process and supervised the building of the plant the opportunity of first refusal, in the event of the government deciding to sell. This is the only commitment we have made in connection with any plant built with public moneys. In other words, a plant could not be sold to a competitor without our first having offered it to the firm which designed, built and supervised it, and whose process we used without cost. In that way the plant would not pass into the hands of a competitor without first being offered to the firm in question which had built the plant.


An hon. MEMBER:: At the same price.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes, refusal at the bid price.


Mr. JACKMAN:: On Thursday last, speaking of this morale-building campaign, the minister said, as reported at page 2451 of Hansard:
I do not believe in this kind of propaganda in an industry. However, it was represented to me that the industry decided this was a desirable thing to do.
I am at a loss to understand whose policy prevails in the department, whether it is the policy which the minister believes to be the correct one, or the policy put forth by the director general of aircraft production. In that regard also, when the letter first came before the house last Thursday the minister said that when he learned the circumstances he stopped the charging to overhead of any contribution to this morale-building campaign. If the morale-building campaign would help the production of more aeroplanes, which we so badly need, then why is it not just as legitimate a charge against operations as labour or material costs? I fail to understand why the minister at that time had Mr. Bell's suggestion cancelled. What is the position to-day?


Clarence Decatur Howe: As the hon. member knows, by unanimous vote the industry asked that the campaign be continued. My reply was that if the industry itself wished to continue the campaign, it was at liberty to do so. But there were several objections to the letter, the chief of which was the suggestion that printing be diverted, as a means of compensation. I took strong objection to that. I took objection, too, to an officer of my department asking an industry to contribute money for any purpose whatsoever. If the industry had started a morale-building campaign within the industry, it would have been a legitimate undertaking. My objection was to the letter, not to what was done. There are certain rules of costing which provide for the payment of certain personnel. The director of personnel is a legitimate employee and if he wishes to conduct a morale-building campaign and associate himself in doing so with other directors of personnel, that would be legitimate. My objection was to an officer of my department appointing a man and asking the industry to pay him. If we appointed the man we should pay him.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I quite appreciate that, but the minister was most definite on Thursday last, and I think again on Friday. On Thursday last, as reported on page 2451 of Hansard, he said:
I also made sure that the payments would not become an element of overhead cost on the part of any of the subscribers.
While I agree that it was outside the functions of the director-general of aircraft production to organize this campaign, apparently without very much knowledge on the part of some of the constituent companies, nevertheless I do not see the difference between charging it to the cost of operations when carried on by the director of personnel of one company, and having an association of aircraft producers get together for this purpose and hiring a man to do the job for the whole industry. I do not yet understand if the function was legitimate. If the manner of doing it was not reprehensible, I cannot understand why there should be the slightest objection to charging the cost to operations. The minister was quite sensitive to it at that time; but if it is now being carried on with his endorsation, or at least with his consent, by an association or an officer who is not a direct employee of any one company, I cannot understand why it should not be a proper charge against the operations of the various companies.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The collections made at the request of my director-general were not a

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legitimate charge in my opinion, and I made sure that they were not so regarded. The rules as to what are legitimate manufacturing costs are laid down very exactly and agreed upon between my own officers, the treasury and the auditor general. If personnel work can be carried on within the four walls of these rules, no doubt it will be carried on. I did not wish to have funds Taised at the request of my director-general for any purpose whatever and have those funds included in costs, and I took steps to see that that particular fund was paid for by those who subscribed and not by the government.


Mr. CASTLEDEN:: Was there an arrangement with the treasury contained in that
letter?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I could find no evidence, and my colleague could find none.


George Black: In effect the resolution now before the committee is a $2,000,000,000 item in the estimates, and I should like to ask the minister a few questions about a matter, the expenditures for which will probably come within the vote to be based upon this resolution. Is it the intention of the government to put Trans-Canada Air Lines on the route from Vancouver and Edmonton to the Yukon and Alaska in competition with planes now being operated over that route? Are airports for this purpose to be built by the government to constitute a route in addition to the route now in use? Does the minister consider that the present temporary abnormal volume of business due to the construction of the Alaska highway will continue? In normal times the planes now operating this route are able to carry all the business offered. What is the estimated cost of putting the government air line on this route?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Trans-Canada Air Lines is owned by Canadian National Railways, and reports to me at the moment because I am Acting Minister of Transport. I am not in very close touch with the company at the moment. The airfields on the route to Alaska are being built to provide an air route, but we are not going to duplicate. Any aeroplanes using this route will use the fields now being built.


Major James William Coldwell: The government is
building those fields?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes; just as it has built all the fields along Trans-Canada. The purpose of Trans-Canada Air Lines is to operate a
mainline service from coast to coast and certain international routes. Trans-Canada is operating certain international routes to the south, and it was the intention that it would operate any international route to Alaska and northward. Another company has been operating in this area for some time, and I cannot say just what will be the future policy. It will depend upon the wishes of Trans-Canada Air Lines and the decision of the board of transport commissioners which has jurisdiction over all air service routes in Canada. The decision is not likely to lie with me unless I happen to be Acting Minister of Transport at the critical time, which is unlikely. I do not remember my hon. friend's other question.


George Black: I asked the estimated cost of putting the government air line on that route. I am asking this question because up to the present time the transport commission have taken great care, and properly so, to prevent any overlapping of aeroplane services in Canada. They decide whether an established service is sufficient and, if it is, they will not allow another service to go in. As I see it, this is going to be overlapping of a most serious nature.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The only recompense that any company using this route would get from the government would be payment for carrying the mails. The company operating there now is being paid for carrying the mails. If Trans-Canada went into this territory, the only recompense it would get from the government would be payment for carrying the mails. I may say that the Post Office Department has always protected the future position of Trans-Canada as the company to carry the mails on this route. The present contract is a month to month contract, and there have been warnings issued at all stages that eventually Trans-Canada will probably operate on the route. There will be no question of competing lines; if Trans-Canada goes in. the other line must go out.


Heber Harold Hatfield: Will the minister consider issuing permits to pulpwood dealers selling to kraft mills in the United States who are manufacturing war material? These mills were not in operation before the war and are now denied permits because they were not purchasing pulpwood in Canada at that time.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I assume they can find sources of supply in the United States. If the production of pulpwood in Canada extends beyond all previous figures so that it can supply the needs of Canada plus the former purchases by all customers, I have no doubt the timber controller will consider applications for permission to take on new customers.
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Heber Harold Hatfield: The newsprint mills have had no trouble in getting permission, but these new mills which are manufacturing war materials are denied permits. In my opinion these mills should have preference.


Mr. McNIVEN:: I was interested in the remarks of the hon. member for Northumberland, New Brunswick (Mr. O'Brien) who, in a forceful, clear and logical manner, presented the case of what he described as the forgotten province.


Clarence Decatur Howe: We have now passed to the war of the provinces.


Donald Alexander McNiven: Coming from a province which is in that category industrially, I think I can justify an intrusion upon this debate even at this late hour. I was also interested in his conversation with the German merchant who called at his office some time in 1936. In 1933 the world's grain show was held at Regina and that exhibition was attended by representatives of all the grain producing countries of the world, including Germany. The representative in attendance from Germany had visited all parts of Canada before coming to Regina, and after he had been in that city for a day or two he was asked to give a summary of his impressions of what he had seen and of his experiences. He readily consented, and said that it could be given in two words-"waste" and "space." That description has constantly come to the minds of many Canadians and suggests the thought as to whether or not at this critical time we are making a maximum use of our resources, both natural and man-power.
Recently, owing to the courtesy and consideration of the hon. member for Verdun (Mr. Cote), I had the privilege of visiting a couple of munitions plants in the city of Montreal, and were this an earlier stage of the debate I would have been glad to portray what I saw in those two plants. But since being there, I have seen the edition of Maclean's of May 15, and I want to congratulate the publishers of that magazine upon that particular issue. It contains a description of certain parts of Canada's war effort. It describes it graphically and dramatically and gives to the Minister of Munitions and Supply a great deal of credit for what has been accomplished in a very short time. After reading the account of Canada's development in the last two and a half years, and after having seen what I have seen, one can readily understand how it is and why it is that the universities of this country are conferring degrees upon the hon. gentleman in recognition of his accomplishments for Canada and the empire, and I personally con-

gratulate the minister upon being honoured by one of the most eminent of Canadian universities.
Arising out of my visit to Montreal I should like to bring to the attention of the minister and of the committee three or four matters. First, the plant utilized by Defence Industries Limited at Verdun was in use in the last war. I believe it was built by the British government, and following the last war it was used, prior to eighteen months or two years ago, by the Dominion Textile company as their manu-turing plant. What I draw from that is that plants constructed during this war may have and should have a post-war use, and this plant did have a post-war use and was readily converted to the needs of the nation when the occasion arose.
The next point is that of the four men I first met on entering the plant three were from my own city of Regina and the fourth was from Estevan, Saskatchewan, which is an indication of the migration from the prairie provinces to eastern Canada and of the part our people from the prairies are taking in industry.
Apart from the tremendous production in that plant, I think what interested me most was that part of the plant devoted to the manufacture of machine tools, and I was informed that they were manufacturing right in the plant, in the building itself, all the machine tools they required.
The next matter that interested me was a delicately constructed balance which weighed the cartridges after they had been inspected, automatically eliminating those that were underweight, or overweight, and sending down another chute those that were of the proper weight. That machine was constructed by the Bata Shoe company, an institution which has come into this country within the last four or five years, and is an indication of what Canada has drawn from troubled Europe in the way of industrial development and of what can be-developed in the future.
On this occasion I had the privilege of hearing the Hon. Charles A. Dunning, who-is the chairman of the board of .Wartime Industries. Hon. gentlemen will be glad to know that the Hon. Mr. Dunning is gradually recovering a measure of good health, and he had not been speaking very long before he exhibited much of that old-time vigour which we knew so well on the floor of this house. Mr. Dunning was responsible for this statement, and I do not think in repeating it here I am breaking any of his confidences or imposing on the restrictions laid down by the minister himself with regard to quantitative production. Mr. Dunning stated that the plants of Defence Industries were now pro-

War Appropriation-Supplies
during more ammunition every month than was produced by the whole of Canada in the last war, and I understand that at the conclusion of the last war Canada was producing approximately 55 per cent of all the ammunition used by the allies.
While I do not intend to elaborate on what I saw at the two Montreal plants, I do wish to make a more detailed reference to a plant in Regina, my home city. That plant up to the 15th of August last was operating an assembly line for General Motors and employing between five and six hundred men. During each one of its productive years it turned out approximately 10,000 motor units. About the 15th of August, they started clearing out the assembly line and to acquire and install new machinery. Much of that machinery had been installed by the first of the year and production started. The plant is not fully equipped yet. When it is, it will employ approximately 1,000 men, and at the present time there are between six and seven hundred men engaged there. The plant is manufacturing the most modern anti-tank gun that mechanical science has yet produced, and those guns are being turned out every day in the Regina plant and have been turned out for a considerable time. I saw those guns boxed and labelled ready for shipment to a far distant point.
I have always felt-and I am glad to have some confirmation of my ideas in that regard -that it is wiser and safer, and costs less in the long run, for industry to be taken to labour rather than for labour to be removed to industry. Recently there was a conference of national war labour leaders in the city of Ottawa, and on his return to Saskatchewan, Hon. R. J. M. Parker, minister in charge of municipal affairs, said this, in summary of what occurred at the meeting:
Mr. Humphrey Mitchell, federal Minister of Labour, also dealt with labour conditions in the dominion and suggested that the proper policy to follow with respect to the employment of people was to take the work to the people rather than to transfer large numbers to the work. Such a policy might have averted the exodus of people from Saskatchewan in recent years, had industry been established here.
That seems to me to be a very wise policy, and one that will avoid many of the difficulties which undoubtedly will arise in the post-war period.
When General McNaughton was here I had a short conversation with him during which he outlined his experiences in going through one of the large industrial plants in eastern Canada. In going through plants he engaged the foremen in conversation and ascertained what their duties were and where they came
from. Himself a Saskatchewan man, he was proud of the fact that eight out of twelve foremen with whom he conversed in one plant came from that province. That emphasizes the migration of skilled labour from our province to eastern Canada. It is established by the fact that since 1936 Saskatchewan has lost 42,000 people, to say nothing of the natural increase which has not been tabulated during that period.
Mr. Little has ordered a new registration of unemployed. Every unemployed man between sixteen and sixty-nine years of age is required to register. I have no quarrel with that order; I think it is as it should be. But when the unemployed are registered in Saskatchewan, what is Mr. Little's intention? Is it his intention to move those unemployed persons to industries in the eastern provinces, or will he recognize as a principle that which his minister enunciated, namely that it is better to take industry to labour rather than the reverse?
Recently the teachers of my own city sent me a communication which to a certain extent applies to the teachers of the rest of the province. They are anxious to know where they can obtain employment for the two months of their holidays, because they wish to devote their leisure time to the war effort. It seems to me that in view of these facts-I am not censuring the Minister of Munitions and Supply, for I know it is his duty and responsibility to get production, and get it in the shortest period possible-there might be greater collaboration by the Minister of National War Services and the Minister of Labour in setting up war industries which will impose a minimum of trouble in post-war years.
The other evening I referred to the coal deposits in Saskatchewan and expressed the opinion that they should be converted to national use at this time. That thought was emphasized by a recent visit of Mr. Jeckell to western Canada. While there, he consulted authorities in Manitoba concerning the development of 100,000 horse-power of electrical energy, and indicated an intention, should it be found, of building a $40,000,000 aluminum plant. The authorities in Manitoba could not provide the necessary power, and his investigations proceeded no further. I suggest that consideration should have been given to the development of power at the lignite coal fields in Saskatchewan. It may be said that that is a far too ambitious undertaking for an agrarian province, but the manufacture of aluminum depends on bauxite brought from British Guiana, on cryolite brought from Greenland, and on coke brought
.2648
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from Mexico; and if Mr. Jeckell was willing to take all these commodities brought from such great distances right up to the city of 'Winnipeg, they could have been carried another 300 or 350 miles to the lignite fields of Saskatchewan, where a head of power can be developed sufficient to produce the required aluminum.
It seems to me that those who are interested in locating large industrial undertakings for these and other departments are equipped with hundred-league boots, and when they come into western Canada just one stride takes them over the province of Saskatchewan. It seems to me, too, that somebody has whispered that *Saskatchewan can only produce wheat. That is not so. In military matters, somebody has said that our province is the coldest in the dominion, but that is not so. Somebody else has whispered that it is the centre of the dus1 bowl, but that is not so.
Much has been said at different times with reference to the bits-and-pieces policy. The trouble in that regard is not peculiar to the Dominion of Canada but obtains also in the United States. I noticed in the issue of PM for April 13 last that that magazine had financed a delegation of idle owners of machine shops and workers to Washington for the purpose of making representations to the authorities there. The reason that PM gave for undertaking that responsibility was this .statement:
Every idle machine, every idle worker, is a national scandal at this date in American history; and to ask this question-Why 85 per cent of the hundred billion dollar war contracts were awarded to only 350 corporations while the rest were spread thin over 186,000 small manufacturers. And later received the answer quite frankly-that limited inspection and clerical facilities made it easier for the government to dump the orders into the hoppers of General Motors, Remington Arms, Bethlehem Steel and General Electric.
Pretty much the same situation has developed in this country, and we find the large corporations being given major orders and then developing their own institutions to the point where they can take care of much that is required in the way of component parts. I find similar complaints voiced by the mayor of the city of London who, on returning to his home city after visiting Ottawa, said:
"It was difficult to find out exactly how industry should go about getting contracts directly from the Department of Munitions and Supply," he said. "By persistence it developed that practically all the large prime contractors had been selected already and that only these were being asked to tender on new jobs. Therefore he' advised London industrialists to appeal directly to other manufacturers with prime contracts for war work."

We have a prime contract at the city of Regina, and the management of that plant for the time being must, because of conditions which it is not necessary to discuss, obtain their manufactured component parts from certain eastern connections. It is equally true that the management has been instructed by the Department of Munitions and Supply to obtain its manufactured component parts in western Canada, but in the search for these manufactured component parts they have spread their requirements from Winnipeg clear through to Vancouver. They have not attempted to centralize it in Saskatchewan but have distributed it pretty fairly over the three prairie provinces and to some extent in British Columbia. As far as our machine shops in Saskatchewan are concerned; as far as our other producers are concerned, all we ask is reciprocity, similar consideration. There is an office of the minister's department in the city of Winnipeg, and manufacturers have gone there seeking places where component parts could be manufactured; but because of the freight regulations in effect, because of freight tariffs that have burdened the development of western Canada for many years, they refuse to go further than Winnipeg. The Eastern Car company is an example. They refused to consider employment of any subcontractor for the manufacture of component parts west of Winnipeg, and the only reason given is freight rates. The Ogden shops at Calgary have substantial orders, but these shops, although they were instructed so to do, to my knowledge, have to a very limited extent distributed the manufacture of component parts. Western Steel Products, another company that has been favoured with large war contracts, has not utilized its own facilities either in Regina or in Saskatoon for the manufacture of component parts or anything else. My only thought is that the minister's Winnipeg office should be clothed with some authority in the distribution of war orders and in the spreading out of contracts for the manufacture of component parts.
The question has been asked, what is going to happen, after the war is over? The minister said a moment ago that he had no clear-cut opinions in that regard, but in Maclean's magazine, in a biographical sketch, the minister is quoted as follows:
After the war? Mr. Howe isn't worried about overproduction or excess plant. We are penning back a tremendous demand for things-[DOT] houses, office buildings, apartment blocks, motor cars, goods of all kinds. It will not be difficult to adapt war plants to civilian needs. Invention will find new products to raise the standard of living and put people to work. There will be Europe to rebuild, and China and India will

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be great markets. There is no reason for anybody to be discouraged about post-war problems.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Donald Alexander McNiven: Mr. Chairman, I had almost completed what I wished to say. In conclusion, I would point out to the minister that in Saskatchewan ours is a badly balanced economy, and that we are now reaping the harvest of that economy. We have regarded ourselves as an agricultural province and have tried to do that which we were best equipped to do, leaving the industrial production to other parts of Canada. A distribution system has been established in my province, but daily the components parts of that system are receiving notice from the eastern manufacturers that no longer will it be possible for them to deliver goods, that the goods produced in their plants are required in the immediate district in which they are produced. In other words, the central provinces are looking after their own customers. We have relied upon the eastern manufacturer, but he has not made an equitable distribution of the goods he has been able to produce in these strenuous times. He is depriving his western customer of those goods in order to supply local demands.
That is one reason why we are alarmed at the continued industrial expansion of eastern Canada. In the east we are building up an industrial Frankenstein which, immediately the war is over, will absorb our markets and keep us in the position we have occupied thus far, namely, hewers of wood and drawers of water for those who live in the more favoured parts of this country. We think that because of our contributions of men to the army, the navy and the air force, western Canada deserves a better deal by way of industrial expansion. We think it deserves greater consideration by the Department of National Defence in the matter of camps for the training of men. I was greatly interested in a question placed on the order paper by the hon. member for Lethbridge (Mr. Blackmore), a question which I was afraid to ask. The hon. member wants to know the number of men who were recruited in Saskatchewan and the number of men who were trained in that province. I know that when that question is answered he will be told of the 500 men from Saskatchewan who have been sent to Lansdowne park, Ottawa, this year; of the 250 men who have been sent to Windsor; of the group sent
to Three Rivers; of another group sent to Sherbrooke; of another group from Dundum camp sent out to Chilliwack, British Columbia ; of the 450 men sent to Sarcee camp, notwithstanding the fact that we have a modem, well-equipped, up-to-date training camp at -Dumdum, Saskatchewan, which the Minister of National Defence has described as a "natural". At the present time we have fewer than two thousand men at that camp, and there have not been more than that there at any time.
I need not detain the committee any longer, Mr. Chairman, but I do ask for a better and fairer deal for the prairie provinces and in particular for the province of Saskatchewan, a deal that will enable us to assist in the solution of post-war problems.


Mrs. NIELSEN:: Mr. Chairman, during the time this matter has been under discussion I have had a number of questions to ask, but either the minister has given the information himself, or other hon. members have asked the questions I had in mind, and I have avoided any repetition because I believe the valuable time of the minister should be used as effectively as possible. But under this bill we are spending tremendous sums of money, and my only reason for taking part in this debate is to say a word on behalf of the people whom I represent and who are helping to provide this money. The only thing we wish is to get full value for the money spent, and to be sure that in the spending of this money the munitions of war are made as quickly as possible, and in the largest possible quantities. The Department of Munitions and Supply and the Department of Labour are very closely connected, and in the spending of this money I want to impress upon the minister one matter which perhaps has not as yet been stressed sufficiently in this house; that is, that in the placing of contracts and the obtaining of supplies, it is not only a question of getting raw materials, having the machinery and the factories, and all the rest of it. There is also the human element, which plays such a tremendous part in production.
The question of morale has been mentioned in connection with the aircraft industry. I noticed that this afternoon the minister said he was satisfied that morale had reached a healthy stage; I believe those were his words. Personally I am continually surprised that morale is as good as it is among the working people of this country, considering the conditions under which many of them have to work. I really was surprised when I heard the minister say that he thought morale in the aircraft factories had reached a healthy stage. I wondered whether it was Mr. Bell who had given him that impression, because my infor-
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mation, coming from the men who work in the aircraft factories, is to the effect that Mr. Bell is not doing a great deal to increase morale, that in fact, in their opinion, he has done something calculated to destroy it. Only the other day I received a letter from the international association of machinists, Montreal aircraft lodge No. 712, in which they discuss the question of morale among the workers. They say they think it is very timely that Mr. Bell has given attention to the problem of morale building, but they feel he has chosen a most unfortunate wTay of going about it. They say:
We are convinced that morale can never be built by the superficial method of having someone who is a virtual stranger to the workers in the industry touring the country and setting up citizens' committees. We know that morale can only be built among workers themselves under the leadership of their own chosen representatives. This was clearly demonstrated in threat Britain and the United States.
This particular lodge, No. 712, say that they can be very justly proud of the work they have done, together with the management and Mr. Bell, in raising the morale in the Montreal plants. They go on to cite many instances of the type of activity to which they have contributed. Then they say this:
We wish to emphasize that for appeals of this kind to win the greatest lesponse from the workers they must come from the ranks of the workers themselves, from their own chosen leaders in whom they place their confidence and trust.
I suggest that the minister might see to the proposals of the workers themselves, as well as to those of men like Mr. Bell, because from the men who day by day work in the factories a considerable influence may be brought to bear to increase production. They say:
Our proposals would be that an authoritative representative of labour, preferably a member or the international association of machinists, be appointed by the government to assist Mr. Bell.
We would propose further that an apparatus similar to the war production board in the United States be set up in Canada, and that the establishment of joint production committees be encouraged in every war plant in the country.
While we are discussing the question of morale we must point out that the speech which Mr. Bell recently made to the war labour organization production conference here on May 7, which was published in the press, has had a yTery bad effect on the morale of all war workers m this area.
We have refrained from replying to some of the allegations made in Mr. Bell's speech which are most bitterly resented by workers, because of our unwillingness to do anything which would endanger the spirit of national unity which we have striven to create. But we feel it is in order to point out here that speeches and

statements of this kind must inevitably have the effect of breaking down whatever good might develop out of Mr. Bell's desire to conduct a morale-building" campaign.
In the speech to which they refer, Mr. Bell is reported to have said that the workers in industry were "in the front line-like hell." In my opinion a statement of that kind was an insult to the workers of this country, and certainly it would not be one -Hdiich would help to build up their morale.
I know, myself, that morale is an intangible thing. Yet it is built up upon certain concrete and physical things. But no man going around to industry and giving pep talks to the men is going to increase morale. However, unless we do have an increase in morale in this country we are never going to have the total war effort which we are supposed to be having, and which we have pledged to the other countries fighting in this war-the allies.
We must have a total war effort. We cannot have it without better morale than we have at the present time. What does morale depend upon? I am not just speaking of aircraft factories; I am speaking of factories in general. It seems to me that morale is built up on certain things. The main factor would, in my opinion, be this: the physical and mental health of the working people, an understanding of what they are fighting for, and an assurance by the government that in this war effort it is a case of one for all and all for one, that one being Canada.
I remember at this time last year during the debate on the war appropriation bill I placed on record some figures with regard to loss of time in the United States due to strikes, sickness and industri?' accidents. Figures of that kind are rather difficult to get in Canada. In fact I have not been able to get anything very recent from the dominion bureau of statistics. But I did notice a while ago a report issued by the Canadian institute of public opinion, and a release by the Gallup poll. I know a Gallup poll is a Gallup poll, and that it is not anything like as authentic or as true as a statement from the dominion bureau of statistics. On the other hand it paints a fairly accurate picture in a very general way of conditions as they are.
The report of the Gallup poll published in the Toronto Daily Star states:
It has been estimated that there are some four million Canadian workers to-day, including farmers. Assuming a 48-hour week, and a 4-week month indications are that among employed people alone, 26,000,000 man-hours were lost through sickness in February, or

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three and a quarter million man-days. A man-day, of course, represents the amount of worn done by one man in one day.
To put the same thing in another way, this means that every Canadian worker on the average, lost six and a half hours, or four-fifths of an entire working day, because ot illness of some kind.
Here again I should like to be fair and say that in February sickness is possibly at its highest level, because there is more illness in winter, mostly by way of colds. The report of the Gallup poll goes on to say:
In terms of production, this amount of lost time equals approximately 370 medium bombers, or 70 corvettes, or 377 cruiser tanks.
I know these are very general figures; they are not specific. But they do show what a saboteur of our total war effort sickness can be. When we consider the money we are spending to buy raw materials and the money we are putting into contracts, and then realize that at the same time we are permitting sickness, the thief of time, to destroy our total effort, it seems such an idiotic thing that we have not done something to combat it, to get more for our money, more for our people, and speed up production by keeping the people in a state of physical health whereby they may contribute as they want to do.
I can quite agree that sickness is one of the arch saboteurs of Canada's war effort. As long as we have sickness going on as it is to-day, without something more being done to ensure health to our working people, a great deal of the money being spent on war appropriations is not going to be used as expeditiously as it should be. Nor is it going to give us the value it should, because at the present time the whole value in munitions of war is to get the war won quickly, and not to continue it unduly into the future.
I got some further figures from the bureau of statistics which I felt were worthy of consideration. They have to do with the keeping up of the morale of our workers. These figures represent one further thing which seems to indicate that the remark of Mr. Ralph Bell was entirely out of order, when he said that the working people in industry were "in the front line-like hell". Mr. Chairman, I hope you will excuse my language, but you will remember that I am quoting Mr. Bell.
The increase in industrial accidents in Canada is quite alarming, as shown from
these figures from the bureau of statistics. The following table will give a comparison between 1939 and 1941:
Province
Nova Scotia	
New Brunswick. . ..
Quebec	
Ontario	
Manitoba	
Saskatchewan	
Alberta	
British Columbia....
No. of	No. of
accidents,	accidents,
1939	1941
11,823	15,150
8,126	12,292
53,942	82,568
53,110	104,655
9,401	12,927
5,260	5,825
11,832	14,903
27,776	46,496
The very small increase in Saskatchewan is due to the fact, of course, that there is no industrial activity in that province. I say again that in the matter of health and industrial accidents insufficient provision is made to ensure that the health of the workers in the factories is safeguarded. I was speaking to friends in Toronto a while ago who were greatly alarmed at the number of accidents which had occurred to women in industry, small things such as the loss of a finger from standing too close to a wheel or a lathe and other accidents of that kind. Hundreds of thousands of industrial accidents could be prevented.
I know, of course, that on March 2, 1942, order in council P.C. 1550 was passed. To tell the truth, I did not know anything about this order in council until I saw it mentioned in the Toronto Star. I do not know whether hon. members are able to keep pace with these orders in council, but I confess that I cannot. In my opinion it certainly would have been a good thing if this matter had been discussed before the order in council was passed. As far as orders in council go, if they can be considered as being good, this is one of the best. It makes provision for the supervision of factories and provides regulations with regard to sanitary conditions and so on. Food served inside a factory must be up to certain standards. A few doctors and welfare workers are now taking greater interest under this order in council in the working conditions of the people. All that is to the good.
However, I do not believe for one moment that sufficient attention is being paid to the care of our working people. It is by such things that morale can be built up. In the same article which appeared in the Toronto Star on April 13, 1942, mention was made of this Gallup poll. It says:
Doctor J. J. Heagerty, chief of the dominion public health service, has written that tuberculosis rates are beginning to rise in Canada. The reason for it, he says, are the longer hours, the intense strain, the inadequate diets and the low standard of living still prevalent among many workers.

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The basic question affecting the health of our people is not the sanitary arrangements in the factories in which they work; it is the amount of wages they need to give them necessary food which is a primary consideration in building up the health of a people. We should realize the amount of time lost in this country through strikes and other causes. Because of strikes in 1941 there were 23,997 days lost. In a whole year only 23,997 days were lost because of strikes, but according to the Gallup poll, in the month of February alone 3,125,000 man days were lost from sickness. Some people think that our industrial workers have sabotaged the war effort with strikes; but when we come to analyse the reason for strikes, we find that it is, first, wage disputes and, second, the question of collective bargaining. In most instances the attempt to obtain collective bargaining by the workers is made so that they may be in a position to bargain for better wages rather than go on strike. If more money were expended to build up the health and morale of our people, we would not be losing 3,215,000 man days in a month like February.
In my opinion the Minister of Munitions and Supply has more to do than just to consider where various contracts should be placed. As a minister of this government it is part of his responsibility to see that the workers in our factories are given an opportunity to make their maximum contribution. It is part of his responsibility to use properly the money which he is expending through these contracts in order to get the most value and to produce things more speedily. I believe the minister has said already that the contracts have always been turned out in time, that all that Great Britain and Russia have been asking for has been supplied by the factories. But if we had not lost time through sickness and industrial accidents, these contracts could have been filled much sooner than they were and we could have gone on with other contracts. Our war effort could have been speeded up just that much more.
Perhaps the Minister of Munitions and Supply considers that these things are outside his department, but in my opinion he shares responsibility with the Minister of Labour and with others of the government to see that we do not lose time through strikes, sickness and other causes. Because of that I would urge upon him that if he wants to build up the morale of the people of this country, he should not listen to men like Mr. Bell. Rather he should listen to the legitimate demands of the workers in the industrial plants who are working and have been working for a long 
time in order to obtain the right guaranteed by this house of parliament, the right of collective bargaining. If it were mandatory tj give that right to the workers in industry, I dare to say that we could speed up the war effort considerably and provide more munitions and other things in which the minister is interested.
The second requisite for building up morale is to look after the mental health of our people. The industrial workers want to know why they are asked to speed up, why they are asked to accept certain hours of labour and so on. Not only that, they want to be assured that in this war it is a case of one for all and all for one. I dare to say that at the present time the industrial workers are not satisfied that in this war it is a case of one for all and all for one. Ninety-nine per cent of the people of Canada are willing to sacrifice and are already sacrificing for the sake of this war. They are not afraid to go on sacrificing, to sacrifice even more than they are at the present time. But the 99 per cent of the people who are sacrificing are not satisfied in their minds that the other one per cent of the Canadian people are doing their share of sacrificing. In fact, in the minds of many people there is a great deal of apprehension that the one per cent, those who control industry in this country, are more concerned at the present time about what is going to happen to them after the war than they are with putting everything they have into the winning of this war and making the sacrifices which are demanded of them.
That is the thing which is causing an unhealthy mental condition among thousands and thousands of Canadian people. Do any of us know where we shall be after the war is over? Thousands and thousands will be underneath the sod with nothing but a little cross over them, if they are lucky enough to get that. Many will be blown to smithereens long before there is a chance of picking them up and putting them together in order to put them underneath the ground. After the war is over, many will be in the relief lines again. No; this one per cent, those who are to-day in charge of the industry of this country, must realize that they will be very lucky if they come through this war. They will be very lucky if we win this war. They must realize that if through their own selfishness, if because they refuse to go ahead maybe and increase their production, because they are afraid that after the war they will not be able to make their profits, if they refuse to make the sacrifices, if by any chance we lose the war they will find out that German big busi-

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ness will kill them just as effectively as German bombs can kill women and children in the cities of Europe.
Let us consider the long history of the war against Hitler. I do not like to be too severe in my criticism, but through the long years of the war against Hitler the record of this present government has been a rotten one. It has been a record of appeasement, and the government know it. The individual members of this government have all along taken a position of isolationism and appeasement to Hitler. The people of this country want to see from this government no more appeasement. I think they are pretty well satisfied that the government do not now want to appease Hitler, but what they are afraid of is that the government are appeasing the one per cent. As long as they have that feeling in their minds it is going to be difficult to build morale and get a total war effort.
As far as the workers of Canada are concerned, I know they are out to win the war. They are going to win the war; they are going to defeat Hitler. But the thing I would like this government to consider is this. Are the people going to win this war with this government-or in spite of it? They are going to win it; of that they are sure, and I am sure; and if they do not come to feel that they can win it in cooperation with the government, it may be necessary that they change some of those who to-day are conducting our war effort. It will be necessary to find men who are not willing to appease, but rather men who are willing to listen to the voice of the working people and to build national unity and build morale so that we can attain to a total war effort.
Labour itself has said that it wants to be treated as a responsible group. Only the other day I received a copy of a speech which was made by Elliot M. Little, Director of National Selective Service, on May 9, when he spoke before the Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association, and I would commend heartily the sentiments he expressed in that speech. If we had more of that attitude expressed not only by men like Mr. Little but by our leading industrialists, we would have a far better tone of morale in this countiy. I should like to quote briefly what Mr. Little said:
Do not mistake what I am talking about. By better employer-employee relations I do not mean a concession to the workers here, a privilege there, such as a cup of tea at four o'clock. Those things have their place. I am talking about the whole broad field of personnel management which boils down to mean the best possible personal relations between management and the employees. The workers I meet and have worked with do not want employers to hold their hand. They simply asked to be treated as you want to be treated-as an adult and a responsible citizen.
Considering the times and the circumstances, considering what is being asked of our workers to-day, I think it is high time factory managers and employers recognized this and, having recognized it, do something about it.
Men do better work if they feel they are working with you and not merely for you. I know what amazing benefits will flow from away down the line, if men are encouraged to take an interest in their jobs and in the operation of the plant. I will go this far: I feel certain that if the masses of our workers were permitted that interest in their plant, and allowed a reasonable voice in the affairs of their plant, many of the problems now hampering our production efforts would disappear.
Labour itself has expressed its opinion and has said in relation to the filling of contracts that if only it could share with the management the right to suggest improvements, it is positive that it could speed up the work which has to be done.
I noticed in PM magazine of April 13 an article which deals specifically with this very question in the United States, and I see no reason why there should be a difference between the United States and Canada. The article says:
Colt's Patent Fire-arms Manufacturing Company, situated in an open-shop stronghold, is one of the first companies in New England to form a labour-management production cimmittee.
It also says that immediately after this committee was set up, the management wanted to see what help they could get from it, and so they asked the union to investigate why, during the early days of the contract, spoiled machine-gun barrels in one plant were running to 17 per cent. With company encouragement union shop stewards investigated. The article goes on to say:
This ordinarily would be a "management" problem.
But because the company had the cooperation of the union this is what happened:
Union shop stewards investigated. The stewards found the faults: defective steel, improper inspection, and the fact that some operators were wandering away from their automatic borers.
The union representatives reported their discoveries to the management and spoke quietly to the errant operators, with the result that spoilage was reduced to eight-tenths of 1 per cent. That was quite a reduction from 17 per cent.
There was one other case where the company had been absolutely unable to discover the cause of a certain stoppage of work, but as soon as this labour-management committee
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Harry Rutherford Jackman: Mr. Chairman, the minister has been good enough to give this committee some account of the war production of this country at the present time. He has told us something of the number of machine guns, tanks, automatic rifles, automotive equipment and many other individual items, that are being manufactured, I find myself, however, in the position of a builder who has a lot of materials but no general blueprint to which to work. I know that the minister will know and appreciate just what that feeling is, for without a plan it is difficult to know what to do with the materials which we may collect. All hon. members understand that, when a modem sky-scraper goes up-and after all we must liken the war effort to that-the steel framework goes up first, and the bricks and all the parts are merely fillers-in to finish the completed building. I do not think the minister, despite the pains he has taken at times to give us information, has yet given us the general framework of our industrial contribution to this war. I would1 ask him, there-

War Appropriation-Supplies
fore, what is the blueprint, what is the general plan? What are we aiming to accomplish from an industrial point of view? It is hardly enough to say that we are busy. We cannot proceed helter-skelter. We must proceed according to plan if things are to go along smoothly and we are to avoid bottlenecks and achieve the maximum production of which we are capable.
Let us take, for example, the steel supply in this country. What do hon. members know about the considerations which entered the minds of the government when steel was first considered in the early days of the war, or even after the fall of France, or even at the present time? How much has this country expanded its iron and steel production so that we shall have enough of that basic commodity out of which nearly all armaments are made?
May I ask the minister, for instance, what were the considerations which his department entertained when the Ojibway plant was considered, as I assume it must have been considered at some time? If I am correctly informed, some two years ago it was understood that this plant, which had never been brought into production as a steel producing unit, although parts of it had been been brought into production as a fabricator of steel products, would have required no less than two years and possibly twenty-five million dollars to bring it in as a great steel producer. What were the expectations in the mind of the government at that time, that they did not go ahead with the production of steel at the Ojibway plant, entailing, as I have said, two years of time and possibly twenty-five million dollars? When did the minister and the government expect the peak of industrial war production would occur in this country? Would it be in 1941, let us say the fall of that year, or in 1942, or in 1943?
These are major problems which hon. members should consider, and they should be given information, to some extent at least, in so far as the government can do so without giving away secrets which would be valuable to the enemy, so that we may know what we are aiming to accomplish, what we can reasonably expect to do; and we, not a few closeted together, should have something to say and should be able to make some contribution to the decisions which are made.
May I ask him also whether or not I am correctly informed that the Canadian Car and Foundry company had a steel-producing plant at Welland, Ontario, a plant which made a fairly notable contribution during the last war to war production, and yet has only recently been dismantled, during this war, not having turned a wheel?
I saw in the Montreal Gazette not long ago a dispatch from the New York Times of February 16, stating that Japan's scrap steel supply was ten million tons, all from the United States, and that it was held that this would be enough to last for three years. With Japan four thousand and more miles away from this continent, why was it that we in Canada did not make available to ourselves some of the scrap which went to that country? It is a fact that we are not producers of iron ore in any quantity ourselves. The situation is somewhat different from the production and export of some of our own minerals, because we have them in the bowels of the earth to-day and can get them out for our own production, perhaps not so fast as we should like; nevertheless we have them. But we have not a commodity like scrap, and at the present time we cannot get it in sufficient quantity to achieve the maximum production which I am sure the minister himself would like to see.
In fact the hon. member for Broadview (Mr. Church) last night stated that some of the scrap which Japan got came from Canada, and I noticed that his statement was not challenged. Were we afraid at that time, as a country, to borrow from the United States in order to accumulate this very necessary supply of scrap for armament purposes in this country? We all knew that we were faced with the possibility of war, and that we must import iron ore and scrap if we were to engage in a major struggle. It is true that we have some of these materials ourselves, but not nearly enough to carry on a major conflict. Or was it that Canada was unwilling to put restrictions on the consumption of goods imported from the United States so that we could accumulate sufficient United States dollars with which to purchase scrap and store it in this country?
Only last summer a delegation from Toronto waited upon the steel controller in order to obtain a priority for the construction of a sewage disposal plant in that city. The director, who was then new to his office, explained to us that he believed that our cause was a very necessary one, and that, inasmuch as we would need the steel, not immediately but in a few months-the first requirement would then be needed and it would extend perhaps over two years-it would not be unlikely that we could get the steel. However, he had been in his office only a few weeks, and, shall I say, had not become politically conscious, as every civil servant must be to some extent, and he said, "So far we have no balance sheet." That is, after two years of war the Minister of Munitions and Supply did not have-if I take this state-
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ment at its full worth, and I see no reason why I should not-a balance sheet of the steel production and the steel requirements of this countiy. He did not know in what form he could get iron and steel, what shapes were available, what the needs of essential civilian industry would be, and what would be available for war industry.
If I am mistaken in the presentation of this picture I know the minister will correct me. But I also took some steps to check the impression which I gained, and I found, from what I could learn, it was by no means an incorrect one. Is it any wonder then, Mr. Chairman, we find that there is an announcement on the part of the government that two destroyers will be built, and then, that this programme is to be cancelled because the steel is not available in this country and cannot be purchased in the United States?
These are things which parliament and the people of Canada want to know.
There are many small, vexatious and perhaps inconsequential things, like delays when there is a change-over from production of one model to another. But it is the vast general plan, respecting steel, aluminum and other essential products which are what one might call primary products and which go into the making of the finished article, with which we are deeply concerned.
There have been times when the shipyards have been closed down temporarily because of shortage of steel in particular forms. Why is it that, when we have steel in great quantities available for some things, we do not have it available for other things? Of course, the answer is that certain implements of war have priority. But the questions which this committee should be informed about, so that they may have a reasonable opinion on them, are questions like these.
There is a plant not very far from where I live which is turning out millions of large shells every year-a tremendous and extremely creditable output. The amount of steel which is consumed in the production of these shells must be staggering. Yet we find there is a shortage of steel for certain other commodities. Would the minister explain to the committee, if it is not a military secret, just what is being done with these shells? Is too much steel going into that production as against certain other essential war materials which require steel? We should have some understanding as to why so many shells continue to be turned out even though this has not yet developed into what we would call a shooting war.
Again, we are now to produce aero engines. That subject came up in the house a year or

eighteen months ago and it was held that it was not worth while, that it was not economically feasible to use certain of our productive capacity and our mechanics for the making of aircraft engines. Yet we find that only within the last few months, within recent times at any rate, we have begun a programme of building a fairly simple aero engine. Surely mechanics are scarcer to-day than they were when the subject was first mooted in this house.
I should like the minister to say a word or two about his experience with industrial councils. They are now coming to the fore more and more, and I notice that his director-general of aircraft production stated that he had found them very useful. It may be that the workers in industry have something to contribute in the way of ideas to management. We hear a great deal about this nowadays, and I feel that the minister must have had many reports sent him as to what can be accomplished in the way of workers sharing by contributing their ideas to .more effective management. One cannot help feeling, on the other hand, that the problems of management are very grave. Managers are for the most part qualified men who have had experience; nevertheless, most of the managers in this country and in the United States are, like Mr. Knudsen, men who have themselves come up from the ranks of industry, and it is the same type of brains they have that exists in the ranks, only perhaps in a lesser degree.
I have been informed also that there are certain difficulties in some of the departments -and I do not think the Department of Munitions and Supply is any exception in this regard-in finding capable men to carry out the war effort. It is difficult to get men through the civil service because of the regulations and the fixed salaries there. Perhaps the minister would outline the situation to us. There are civil servants who have been given very much greater responsibilities because of war work, and I am told that there are civil servants to-day who are getting $1,500 to $2,000 though they have assistants from outside business who are second or third in command, and who receive substantially more than themselves. Surely the rules of the civil service are not so rigid, so impossible to rectify, that recognition cannot be given the splendid work which some civil servants are doing and the responsibilities which they now bear, responsibilities which are out of proportion to those which they had prior to the war.
Before leaving the subject to which I referred this afternoon, namely the Hirst matter, I do not want the minister to feel that those of us on this side of the house do not recognize

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what a serious principle is involved in what I may term dereliction on the part of the director-general of aircraft production. We know that he is a splendid man in many ways. We understand that he is doing a good job, and there is no desire to hamper in any way the maximum production of aircraft. But I am constrained to point out to the minister that if he allows directors of production, or directors anywhere throughout the government sendee, to commit these faults, very serious faults, such as the one in question, and says that we cannot do anything about it; that we have two alternatives-either to dismiss the man or to retain him; if we adhere to the policy which I hope is the right one in this case, namely, that of retaining the man; nevertheless, we are putting these dollar-a-year men, some of them directors of production, in a position where they become a power above parliament. We must have men who will act according to the principles which must obtain in the carrying on of government business. We cannot have men given the tremendous power which a director of production has to-day and have such men abuse that power by taking away business from citizens of the country and giving it to those whom they favour. It is a principle which is reprehensible and one which the minister has admitted to be such. What I want to point out is the general principle behind the retention of a man who does such things. While willing to make an exception in this case, I want the minister to know that we feel deeply that an essential principle is at stake in this matter.
I cannot help saying a word here about the letter of endorsation which the minister brought down in the house last Friday, whereby various members of the aircraft industry-endorsed this morale building campaign undertaken by Mr. Bell through Mr. Hirst. It would have been better if the minister had left that alone. Here he is in a position of awarding contracts to every one of these aircraft producers. Their action may have been spontaneous; I do not know to the contrary ; but they produce a letter signed by each one of them endorsing what is admitted by all in this house to have been an act which should not be too lightly condoned. Perhaps I should not say they put their stamp of approval on it, but they certainly put their stamp of approval on the subject matter around which the whole thing revolved, namely, the morale-building campaign.


Clarence Decatur Howe: May I interrupt to ask if the hon. gentleman is suggesting that the resolution from the industry was not spontaneous? I want him to answer yes or no.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I do not think I am required to answer the question. I did not say it was not spontaneous, but let me tell the minister this. That letter was signed, I suppose, by every aircraft manufacturing company in this country; but what amazed me mostly was to see the name of Trans-Canada Air Lines, a wholly owned government corporation, supervised by the minister himself, on it. The minister might just as well have signed it.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend can accept this or not. It just so happened that while this debate was on, the gentlemen represented by those signatures were in conference in Ottawa, and they walked into my office at a quarter to three on the day I presented the letter and asked me to accept it. I thought it of interest to the committee and I read it. If the hon. gentleman suggests that there was propaganda on my part, or on the part of any officer of my department, I wish he would withdraw the suggestion or accept the onus of the statement, because this should be publicized.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I do not feel myself compelled to do either. If the minister thinks I suggested that he did it, he may read that into my remarks. I did not intend that he should.


Clarence Decatur Howe: What was the purpose of saying it?


The ACTING CHAIRMAN (Mr. Roebuck):: I think the speaker is required by the rules to accept a statement made by some hon. member whom he is criticizing with regard to that gentleman's own actions. I think the hon. gentleman should accept the minister's statements in that regard.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I accept the statement of the minister that it was spontaneous on the part of the aircraft producers. I am not surprised that it should be because they are all beholden to him for contracts.


Clarence Decatur Howe: That is my hon. friend's opinion. Take a look at him, imputing motives.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: Not at all. I want to point out this, that the power which the minister has to-day is perhaps the greatest power in this country. He has, according to his own statement, placed contracts to the value of four billion dollars, a sum which he states was greater than the total debt of this country prior to the war. Every citizen of this Canada of ours knows the power that is his through the spending of the $15 or $20 a week he may earn, at the comer grocery store or the chain store, and these stores all compete for his money. In the same way industry competes for the orders given out by the

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minister; it is anxious to get those orders, and there is not a single industry of any size in this country that cares to run foul of the Minister of Munitions and Supply.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I think the industry would
be very glad to know my hon. friend's view of their action. I think they will be glad to know that they are accused of kowtowing to my power and trying to please me. I had nothing to do with that letter. I stated that I took no responsibility for it, that I believed it was a very improper letter. The industry had no particular reason to please me, but I shall be glad to have the public know the view my hon. friend takes of their action.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I must say I do not feel very badly about what the minister has just said. Some of my friends are in the industry, and personally I would think the minister was not well advised in bringing the letter down here.


Clarence Decatur Howe: A very cheap remark!


Harry Rutherford Jackman: The minister is very fond of saying things about various people. I might mention a few things he said during one day, Mr. Chairman. He referred to one hon. member's speech as "hysterical" and to the hon. member as a displayer of "histrionics." We in this house are great sinners if we dare to rise in our places and criticize the Department of Munitions and Supply. Another hon. member was called a perpetrator of "trick questions"; another was admonished not to talk so "glibly"; another was told he was making a "sales talk," while still another was advised to "stick to matters that he could understand." All I can say is that when I find myself in such good company I really do not feel badly off at all.
The minister has said that the opposition, and even some members of his own party who occasionally have matters they wish to bring up, should not rely on gossip. I should like to tell him one reason why we have to rely on information which may not be quite as authentic as scripture. I find that business men who favour the principles of the party of which I am a member but who, like all business men to-day, are doing business with the government in one way or another, do not want to be seen with Conservative members because they are afraid it might work to their disadvantage.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I think there may be other
reasons.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I am not suggesting that the minister has any gestapo or anything like that to watch over them, but they do not like to be seen-


Clarence Decatur Howe: Do not be too sure of the
reason, though.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: Thank you very much;
that is another of the innuendoes which the minister is so fond of handing out. However, it is a fact that it is most difficult to get information because, as we know, this is a party government; there is no national government, as so many of us on this side would prefer to see. We are not interested in politics, and I hope I am not talking politics now.


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Oh, oh.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: I want to read to this
committee a document for which the minister is responsible, which I think is one of the principal reasons for our failure to get authentic information. Let me read the oath which is required to be taken by every officer of the Department of Munitions and Supply, and this oath applies to men who are appointed as directors of government corporations and who are serving without remuneration.


Mr. POTTIER:: Including a number of
Conservatives.


Harry Rutherford Jackman: Indeed, yes; in fact it
was a Conservative who let me know about this. I dare say the minister would like to call out, "Who is he"? so that I might name somebody, and then possibly the services of that gentleman, at SI a year, would be terminated. This oath applies to our friends the dollar-a-year men who might furnish us with responsible information. My good friends to the left do get information from their particular sources. They get some of it from working men, as we do, and in addition some of us happen to know these dollar-a-year men. Here is the oath:
I . . . solemnly swear that I will faithfully and honestly fulfil the duties which devolve upon me and shall not divulge any knowledge or information obtained by me in the course of my employment to anyone not employed by the Department of Munitions and Supply unless expressly authorized by my superior officers. So help me God.


An hon. MEMBER:: What is wrong with that oath?


Harry Rutherford Jackman: If you wish us to make constructive suggestions, surely members of parliament can be trusted with the information these men may have; and if the minister does not want us to rely on gossip-


Mr. MACDONALD (Brantford City):: Is that oath not similar to the civil service oath?


Some hon. MEMBERS:: Order.

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Harry Rutherford Jackman: If the minister is not opposed to our obtaining correct information; if he does not wish us to have to rely on what he terms "gossip", surely he would be willing to put through an amendment to that oath, to make it read, "shall not divulge any knowledge or information obtained by me in the course of my employment to anyone, other than members of parliament, not employed by the Department of Munitions and Supply". That would be purely permissive; it would not make them tell anything they did not want to tell. But as ordinary business men, surely these men can be trusted. Those appointed as dollar-a-year men are placed in those positions, by the minister if you like, because they are men who are able to hold their tongues when they should, and who do not talk out of turn. But surely if they believe that something is wrong and that it should.be rectified in parliament, they should be in a position to tell their member about it.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I would not speak again but for the fact that my hon. friend has made two statements which I should correct. In the first place he said we have given up the idea of building destroyers because we *cannot get steel. I do not think it is any secret that the Minister of National Defence for Naval Services attended the ceremony of the laying of the keels of two destroyers some days ago. The other statement was that we are building aeroplane engines in Canada. That is not correct. I have stated many times in this house that we believe our industrial effort can be used to better advantage than in the building of aeroplane engines; that we had made satisfactory arrangements for all the aeroplane engines we required for our programme, and that we did not intend to manufacture aeroplane engines in this country.
Then the hon. gentleman wished a blueprint of Canada's war effort. If he could give me an accurate blueprint of the progress of Canada's war for this year, next year or any other time, I think I could give him an accurate blueprint of Canada's industrial effort for a concurrent period. But I think all we can do is try reasonably to anticipate the requirements of the war and plan our course from week to week and month to month accordingly. We have had an objective, which is to put into the hands of Canadian troops every weapon and every supply they require to carry on the war and to make them the best equipped troops in the world. Beyond that it has been our 44561-168}
objective to make the maximum contribution to the munitions programme of the allied armies as a whole. We have found that certain lines of production are particularly adapted to this country, and we have gone full out on those lines. Certain exigencies of the war have made it necessary for us to go full out in directions which we did not intend to go in earlier stages. We have changed our course from time to time, as the developments of the war have indicated. We have watched our material situation very carefully. We have had a well-considered chart of that from the beginning, and had that not been so we would have had no mtmitions programme to-day. I say that because we have expanded our programme beyond anything that could have been anticipated eighteen months ago.
In the matter 6f steel Canada has never been self-contained. It has been our custom to import from the United States about a third of our steel requirements. We determined to plan our programme on continued importations in the same proportions. We discussed the matter thoroughly with responsible officers in the United States, and it was agreed that if we maintained this proportion we could reasonably count on the United States furnishing the same proportion of our requirements that had been their custom to furnish in peace time.
We have increased our production. Our billets production to-day is about 50 per cent greater than pre-war capacity. To those who know the time and money involved in developing capacity for basic steel, the tremendous increase will be readily understood. No other country in the world has, I think, had the same proportionate increase in the same period. I am speaking of basic steel.
In the matter of alloy steel we have gone considerably farther, and we have multipled our pre-war capacity by more than five, and, I think, more than six times, to make possible the gun programme and other programmes involving the use of alloy steel in this country.
My hon. friend has said that we have no balance sheet. The interview he had took place at a time when we were moving from a system of priorities into a system of definite allocation. The practice is to-day to place in the hands of every producer of steel1 a rolling schedule which will cover his rollings for the next month, and to attach to that schedule definite allocations for every pound of steel that is rolled. That requires, as hon. members know, an accurate balance sheet. It requires an accurate forecast of steel requirements for the succeeding months, and an accurate breakdown into rolling schedules.
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In the first phase of the war steel was not as tight. We could get along very well with priorities; that is, giving the first call on steel to types of production where war requirements were most urgent. We have watched our raw materials situation very closely. However, we have not proceeded timidly; rather we have proceeded boldly. We have stretched our resources, as we think, to their limit. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that the increase in raw products sometimes gets out of step with the increase in finished goods. There are times when finished goods are planned at a certain rate of production, and it is found that the machines will do better than anticipated, and turn out an increased production. Unfortunately we cannot stretch basic steel production as we can the production of finished goods, and we have situations where we have temporary [DOT] shortages of steel. Similarly, in connection with United States steel, on which we depend, and which is about a third of our total supply, we have found difficulties from time to time. Our shipments get out of step, and we do have shortages. Such conditions are inevitable, if we want to proceed boldly and get the last ounce of finished production out of our factories. But the situation is improving all the time. Production is coming in from the factories, and these delays are getting less as time goes on. We hope they will shortly be eliminated. We still have considerable basic steel production coming in. I think we have a half million ton capacity of pig-iron under construction at the present time. Part of that will be in in July of this year, and part of it in the early months of next year.
We have carefully assessed our scrap capacity, and the ability of this country to produce scrap. We believe that that situation is well in hand. My hon. friend rather implied that while the Japanese had been piling up the scrap we had done nothing about it. As a matter of fact we have in this country substantial reserves of scrap which we are doing everything possible to protect, through salvage campaigns.
My hon. friend asks why we did not proceed with steel development at Ojibway. The situation at Ojibway is this:	Two blast
furnaces were built there many years ago. They were never brought into production. Essential parts of the furnaces, such as blowing equipment, which is in fact the most important part of a furnace, were never supplied. The only operation carried on there was galvanizing of steel plate. That, of course, is not in any way an operation having to do with basic steel. The furnaces were there; we looked at them at the earliest

opportunity to see whether they would offer a reasonable point at which to expand our steel production. It is quite obvious from the report made to me by the best experts in this country that the same capacity could be obtained very much more cheaply by expanding the steel plants already in operation. The expansion at Ojibway meant putting in coal-handling equipment, ore-handling equipment and dock facilities. The docks there are not in any way equipped. It involved improving the blast furnaces which, while modern at the time they were installed, are entirely out of date to-day. They are not of the size or capacity which anyone would buy or install at this time. As I say, the expense was vastly greater than would be the expense of expanding the existing plants. The result is that our expansion was made at existing plants, namely Dominion Steel and Coal Corporation at Sydney, the Steel Company of Canada at Hamilton, Canada Foundries and Forgings Limited at Hamilton, and the Mgoma Steel Company at Sault Ste. Marie. We have stepped these plants up, and balanced them up, until we have increased our production of basic steel by more than 50 per cent over the pre-war capacity.
We have expanded our production of aluminum in this country by some five times. We have heard a great deal about the expansion of aluminum production in the United States, but to-day in Canada we have a greater capacity for aluminum production than we ever had in our history. I think about 44 per cent of the aluminum which is produced on this continent is produced in this country.
We have carefully weighed our power resources, and have stepped them up in a practical way. Our industries have been distributed to use those resources to the utmost. I believe to-day we are making a very efficient use of the power at our disposal.
The hon. member mentioned one further point, namely the oath of secrecy. We thought we should go the whole way, because we were doing very secret work with secret weapons. For clients in connection with whom secrecy was necessary we thought we should go the whole way. We made provision that our employees must obtain the consent of their senior officers before information could be given to anyone. I think that is the usual form, and I think there are few countries in the world that do not exact that oath from employees handling confidential war documents.

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Harry Rutherford Jackman: I presume the minister has no objection to members of parliament who represent the people of Canada having the information at their disposal. That would not force his dollar-a-year men to give information; it simply puts them in a position where they would feel that they are not breaking their oath.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend has been a member of parliament for a sufficient length of time to know there is a proper way to obtain any information that he wishes from any department of government. The proper way is to apply to the minister of the department for the information. As he knows, it is highly improper for a member of parliament to go to a deputy minister or a minor officer in the department fo obtain information, particularly information which he intends to use in this house. The net result of that is that he embarrasses a man who has no protection except the ordinary protection he gets in his duties. I think it is highly improper for any member of parliament to question an officer of a department for material which he intends to use in this house. I think the position in the Department of Munitions and Supply is exactly the same as that in any other department of government. I have men delegated for the express purpose of providing information to members of parliament when that information is asked for through myself. I challenge any hon. member to say that he has been denied any information by my office when he applied for it in the ordinary way.


John Horne Blackmore: I have greatly enjoyed the discussion thus far, but I believe we should revert for a time to the question of labour supply and the attitude of labour. That there is a most gratifying extension of Canada's war production, no one could possibly doubt. One great danger I see, however, is the spread of deterioration in the morale of our labouring ranks. I have seen some evidence of great indiscretion during the last two or three months with respect to labouring men. I should like to comment on the labour situation and draw to the minister's attention some of the causes for anxiety that I feel exist.
As an example of the sort of thing that I think ought not to appear in Canada, may I refer to a leaflet which came to my desk not a great while ago. This contained advanced pages from the May, 1942, issue of Industrial Canada. The heading of the leaflet is "Recent appeals by the press in the United States and Canada for an all-out war effort." I read this through with some care and marked certain passages which I rather wished had not
appeared in print in Canada. One of these appeared in the Windsor Star of April 21, 1942, and it reads:
The workers in our shipyards are undoubtedly entitled to fair and decent treatment. They are entitled to take every fair and decent means to obtain it. They are not entitled to demand the lives of soldiers and sailors in order to gain their ends.
I think we must all grant that there can be no objection to what the words say, but what the words imply is extremely offensive. There may be nothing wrong with this, but what came into my mind was: What is a fair wage? I wonder if it ever entered the minds of the printers of the Windsor Star to canvass the whole wage situation in Canada in order to determine what would be a fair wage and then examine the wages paid in the particular plants involved to see whether they conformed to the level of desirable wages throughout Canada? There is in evidence the greatest amount of loose, slipshod, careless and unscientific thinking on this matter. The former Minister of Labour (Mr. McLarty) is looking at me very earnestly, but I think he will agree with me that there is a lack of objectivity in thinking with respect to the wage situation in this country.


Norman Alexander McLarty: The only thing is that I doubt if it is the duty of one particular newspaper to make an analytical study of all the wages paid in Canada to see if they are relatively fair and decent.


John Horne Blackmore: I will grant that it probably is not the duty of any particular newspaper; but when the newspaper endeavours to obtrude itself into a discussion and makes remarks which might be offensive to people, it pretty nearly becomes essential for that newspaper to have something constructive to offer.


Norman Alexander McLarty: I would not agree with the hon. member for Lethbridge. Newspapers do inject themselves into many discussions without assuming the basic responsibility of conducting a national canvass to see whether or not their observations are entirely well founded.


John Horne Blackmore: I did not rise to discuss newspapers, so I am not going any farther. I have said what I think and the minister has said what he thinks, so we will leave it at that. They say that labouring men are entitled to fair and decent treatment, but again there is a lack of objectivity. People are not agreed as to what constitutes fair and decent treatment, and the result is that bitterness is likely to be engendered. We must not have bitterness engendered in the minds of the men
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or in the minds of their employers. The newspaper goes on to say that the men are entitled to take every fair and decent means. What are fair and decent means? To what can the miners or the labouring men resort?


Mr. MITCHELL:: The Industrial Disputes Act of this country stands out in bold relief when compared with any other form of labour legislation of a like nature.


Mr. MacINNIS:: Is it working to-day?


Humphrey Mitchell: My hon. friend knows that it is working to-day.


John Horne Blackmore: The retort which naturally comes into one's mind is, "ye shall know them by their fruits." I believe before I get through I shall be able to show that there are sufficient fruits from the labour policy of this country to show that it is not working as it should.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Would my hon. friend let me interject a remark? The Minister of Labour and I made a very important engagement for 9.30 o'clock and we have been postponing it, relying on the fact that we would be kept here for only half an hour this afternoon. Would my hon. friend excuse us for a few moments and let the acting Minister of Labour carry on? I think it is going to be a labour argument, and we promise to return as soon as we can.


Humphrey Mitchell: I will say to my hon. friend that the matter he is discussing is one my colleague and I are going to discuss, and it will affect the welfare of thousands of working men in this country.


John Horne Blackmore: Then I certainly wish the Minister of Labour could be here. May I just say to him that I think he is doing the job in a way that is going to make for improvement, and I wish him well in the very difficult task ahead. I was referring to certain passages in certain newspapers. I turn now to the Toronto Globe and Mail of April 14, 1942, where these words appeared:
We have not read that these gallant seamen are quarrelling with their employers about overtime pay. There can be no excuse for a shut-down in any Canadian shipyard. Unfortunately, Canada has had more than one. Less than ten days ago a Quebec shipyard was closed down pending adjustment of complaints about wage schedules.
Again there is an insinuation and an implication which is offensive. I notice that this paper attaches the blame entirely to the poor working men and never a word of blame to the man who is employing the men. If there develops in a plant ill feeling as a result of which the men feel themselves
[Mr. Blackmore.l
obliged to take drastic measures, no blame is attached to the man who goaded them on and refused to listen to their plea. That is entirely as it ought not to be. The paper goes on to say:
Men producing guns, tanks, planes and ships ought not to be allowed to down tools in face of the enemy. They are entitled to fair wages.
Again we have fair wages mentioned with no definition as to what fair wages are. I believe we will grant that the men who are working in munitions plants ought not to down tools, but may I say once more that the men who are managing these plants ought not to put the working men in a position where they are obliged to lay down their tools.
I turn to the Montreal Gazette of April 22, 1942. These newspapers by the way are commenting on the strike which took place in the shipyards at Midland and the sympathetic walk-out that took place in the Kingston plant. The Montreal Gazette says:
Shipyard workers at Midland, Ontario, downed their tools last Wednesday mainly because a semi-skilled workman had been dismissed or transferred. It does not appear to have been a good enough reason for paralysing an essential industry.
Once more the blame is attached to the men, and not to the man who dismissed this worker. We are not given any details to show whether the dismissal of this worker was justified. The whole thing is left in such a way as to cast reflections on the men who are working in our munitions plants. That is decidedly not fair; in fact, it is decidedly pernicious. May I read another passage from the same editorial?
Labour interests can be safeguarded, and where legitimate will be safeguarded, without the necessity of strikes which interrupt war production and are gifts to the enemies of this country.
If only Canada would safeguard those rights! If only we had the evidence to prove that they had been safeguarded! If only we had evidence to show that provision woidd be made to safeguard these rights, things would be so different from what they are to-day in Canada. I wish to point out to the minister that this situation is, in my judgment, exceedingly grave. It is far easier to keep men feeling enthusiastic when they are not bitter than to get them back into the right frame of mind after their morale has been destroyed. '
I believe that all the members of the federal cabinet who have anything to do either directly or indirectly with labour policy in this country ought to get together in the most earnest manner and, having regard to

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the way in which labour problems are taken care of elsewhere, draft a policy which will be most completely designed to make the labouring men in Canada happy, for unhappy men cannot produce as well as happy men. The cabinet should have in their minds in approaching this task this principle, that they will make the labouring men in Canada partners in Canada's war effort and not servants in Canada's war effort.
There may be those who will think I am probably overstressing this matter but, Mr. Chairman, I find on the streets as I talk with the ordinary man here and there an antagonism to the interests of the labouring man which undoubtedly has been engendered by such things as the newspaper comments to which I have referred already in this speech. Such antagonism undoubtedly offends the labouring men whenever they come into contact with it. The whole effect is altogether undesirable. So I say that every cabinet minister who has anything to do with the labour situation in Canada should devote himself most earnestly to the drafting of the finest labour policy that can be drafted for this country.
In that policy there are several important principles which should be incorporated, and the first one is the principle of the fair wage. A board of men in Canada should be set the task of determining what a fair wage policy in Canada is; whether or not, we will say, a wage of $120 a month which might perhaps be fair in one city is fair in another city, and whether sufficient allowance is made for the cost of living and other considerations, so that we can be sure that the wage rate throughout Cainada from coast to coast is fair and equitable.
There will be those who will answer me in this way: "Now, look, you simply cannot have the wage rate in Canada raised without causing inflation. The freezing of wage rates is a necessary precaution against inflation." Let me answer them thus. Inflation is a rise in price. When men were given additional reward for their labour, if the added pay were not registered in increased -costs or increased prices there would be no inflation. The only danger then would be in having extra purchasing power going out into the hands of the people, which might, by their using the goods which were available, tend towards inflation.
There will be no increase in the costs of the articles produced if the government subsidizes the wage rate in a given plant so that the government pays the additional increase. Such procedure would obviate the necessity of the plant adding anything to its costs and raising prices.


Mr. WOOD:: Who will pay the subsidy?


John Horne Blackmore: The government will pay the subsidy.


George Ernest Wood: Who is the government?


John Horne Blackmore: The government must use credit, the credit of Canada, to do it.


George Ernest Wood: Where are we going to get the cash?


John Horne Blackmore: I know my hon. friend does not understand that. I know he is quite earnest and sincere, but may I tell him that he is living in the middle of the twentieth century, in a time when orthodox methods of finance can no longer safely be used or relied upon. There are financial principles as a result of the application of which the government can use the credit of Canada to increase the wages of the men working in plants without causing an increase in the costs of the goods those men are producing, and without causing additional taxation or occasioning additional borrowing.


Norman Alexander McLarty: Or inflation?


John Horne Blackmore: No, it is not inflation. Remember that inflation is a rise in price. Does my hon. friend accept that as the definition of inflation?


Norman Alexander McLarty: No.


John Horne Blackmore: That is true. I know my hon. friend does not know that, but I am telling him.


Norman Alexander McLarty: I wonder whether the hon. gentleman has analysed the experience in the last war as to the rise in the cost of living, which exceeded much the rise in wages as this rise in the cost of living progressed.


John Horne Blackmore: Now, Mr. Chairman: before very long, in this whole general debate, the question of inflation will be discussed in great detail. I am thoroughly familiar with what happened in the last war. I know the causes of it, and I know the way in which it could have been remedied and prevented. But to obtrude a discussion in detail on the subject of inflation at this time would probably not be in order, as the minister will acknowledge.


Norman Alexander McLarty: Quite true.


John Horne Blackmore: So that, while the subject is exceedingly interesting, and there is no subject which I would rather discuss, if he will permit me we will not go into inflation now. In passing, however, I wish to say one other thing about the question of inflation. I have shown that if the government pays the additional increase of the wage-
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An hon. MEMBER:: Who is "the
government"?


John Horne Blackmore: Well, I did think my hon. friend knew that. The result is that, if the government pays the increase of the wage there will not be a rise in price of the product of the industry, so there will not be inflation in that respect.
With respect to the money which would go out into circulation, we must, by increasing production, prevent that from causing inflation. Canada has not by any means attained her maximum of production of milk, cream and various other commodities for which people spend money. Meanwhile if the government find there is too great a pressure on the supply they will have to ration-that is all- to prevent inflation. Or they will have to use some means, let us say, of paying in victory bonds, or war savings certificates, or something of that sort, which cannot be spent at once but which the labouring men can hold to comfort them for the future.
I think I have dealt enough with the question of inflation to show that there is no reason why the government cannot step into a given plant and, by subsidizing the rate of wage which is paid in that plant, raise all wages in that plant to a level which will be equitable.
The second principle which should be involved in our labour policy is the right to organize. I have under my hand at least seven different memoranda prepared and submitted by the labouring men throughout Canada, and I have magazines and other periodicals here which have been published in Canada in which are articles by men who are leaders of thought with respect to labour. In every single one of these the request is made that the men be given the right and allowed to exercise the right of organization and collective bargaining. I do not believe, sir, you can content the labouring men of Canada unless you give them that right and guarantee it to them and allow them to use it-the right to organize and to bargain collectively.
Why should Canada be the only one of the British countries in which this right of collective bargaining is denied the men. Why should it be possible to grant it to the men in Britain and the United States-


Norman Alexander McLarty: Does the hon. member suggest that any act of this government or any other government of Canada refuses the right to organize to employees in industry?


An hon. MEMBER:: Another straw-man!


John Horne Blackmore: At another time
probably I shall discuss this matter in the

presence of the minister, and I believe he will be astounded to learn how completely this government-the government which holds office right now-has destroyed in Canada the right of collective bargaining.


Norman Alexander McLarty: Let us be fair about this. There is no act of this government which has disputed or in any way challenged the right of men engaged in industrial enterprise to organize.


John Horne Blackmore: And to bargain
collectively?


Norman Alexander McLarty: And to bargain collectively, yes.


John Horne Blackmore: And if a company discovers an organizer in its ranks and fires him, what does the government do?


Norman Alexander McLarty: Under the criminal code, if anyone is discharged by reason of the fact that he belongs to a legitimate trade union, the company concerned is subject to prosecution.


Mr. DOUGLAS (Weyburn):: How many prosecutions have taken place?


Norman Alexander McLarty: I could not answer that question offhand. There are some that I remember quite well. There was one in Vancouver and, I believe, one in Montreal. I do not remember the actual number. Naturally, I have not the facts beneath my hand now. But there is a definite introduction into the criminal code, made, if I remember correctly, in 1938, that no man can be discharged from employment by reason of being a member of a trade union. It was introduced by this government.


John Horne Blackmore: I must perforce accept the word of the minister, but I believe he will find some difficulty in explaining the passage which I have already read from the Montreal Gazette:
Shipyard workers at Midland, Ont., downed their tools last Wednesday mainly because a semi-skilled workman had been dismissed or transferred. It does not appear to have been a good enough reason for paralysing an essential industry.
The minister will have upon his shoulders the burden of explaining why the men would consider it necessary to strike if they had assurance that their interests would be protected. I think the mere fact that these men in Midland did strike was the very best possible evidence that they had lost confidence in the government's willingness or ability, or both, or courage, to protect them in their demands to organize and bargain collectively.

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As I say, I must accept what the minister said, but I have plenty of evidence, which I just do not happen to have under my hand and organized so that I can deal with the subject to-night, to show that in this country to-day there remains hardly anything substantial of the right of collective bargaining. It has been emasculated. It has a form of reality, but denies the power thereof.
The third principle which must be embodied in the labour policy of this country is that labour shall be permitted, be invited, be guaranteed to enjoy the right to participate with the management of industry in determining the policy of the plant concerned. That has not been done. I have here comments, statements in memoranda, every one of which agrees that all the offers of the men to cooperate with plants have been rebuffed. There has been a determination manifest on the part of industrial managers to treat the labouring men as servants, not as partners. That must be changed. It has been changed in Great Britain; it has been changed in large measure in the United States, and it must be changed in Canada.
There is one other thing which I think is rather important in this connection. May I give an illustration? Some time ago we were discussing the matter of pensions. We were discussing the Pension Act for soldiers, and a good deal of misunderstanding arose on account of the fact that we were looking only at the pensions Canadians were receiving and not at the social benefits which they were not receiving. Hon. members would rise in this chamber and say that the Pension Act of Canada grants higher pensions to men than does any other country in the world. That may possibly be. But in order properly to gauge or assess the value of the Canadian pension one must first examine and see whether or not there are other benefits to be found in other parts of the world which are not to be found in Canada. We in Canada are the most laggard nation on earth in the matter of social services. I have never heard of a modem nation anywhere that neglects the welfare of the common people as Canada does, and before I am through I shall be able to prove it. Those of us who were fortunate enough to be in the empire parliamentary group at luncheon to-day and heard Mr. Nash of New Zealand must have blushed for shame to think how pathetically inadequate was Canada's showing in comparison with what is being done in little New Zealand. If there was anyone who did not feel ashamed he must have become very callous. In Canada we lack social services, and therefore we must have a higher [DOT]wage scale than is to be found in other 44561-169
countries. I do not believe there is any other country among the British peoples in which the wage scale is lower than it is in Canada.
I may be wrong, but I have not read about it if there is such a country.


Norman Alexander McLarty: Will the hon. member give us figures to substantiate such a statement, which is directly opposite to what I have understood to be the fact.


John Horne Blackmore: Very soon I shall give figures which will impress the minister.


Mr. GRANT:: Just dealing in platitudes.


John Horne Blackmore: What is the hon.
gentleman's complaint? Murmuring as usual 1 I shall read three or four statements from labour men themselves. The hon. member for Vancouver East (Mr. Maclnnis) the other day referred to a pamphlet called "Victory needs steel", by C. H. Millard, executive director of the steel workers organizing committee, Canadian region. I am not in a position to know a great deal about this organization, but the pamphlet bears evidence of having been prepared in a scholarly manner and is written with apparent regard to accuracy and moderation. I am going to read several passages giving the labouring man's point of view. The first one appears on page 14:
The workers oppose nazism with all their might because they hate slavery. They want nothing more than an opportunity to share in the country's effort for victory, and they cannot make their best contribution if they do not feel secure in their jobs; if they are not permitted to associate themselves in the union of their choice; if their wages are inadequate, and if they see lack of planning and great mismanagement around them without being able to do anything to remedy the situation. Under such conditions their minds are worried and their spirit depressed, they lose confidence, they become discontented and bitter. They begin to distrust their government and their faith in the democracy of their country becomes shaken.
The implication is that conditions are not by any means as rosy in this country as the minister has been led to believe they are. Again on page 17, and this bears on the minister's question:
Wage rates in the Canadian steel industry are both woefully inadequate and chaotic. In the four basic steel plants the minimum rates vary all the way from 37J cents an hour to 46| cents an hour, or a spread of 24 per cent.
How you can justify that, needs a lot of explaining.
The same spread is to be observed in the rates of most of the skilled workers. Thus, the wages of a machinist vary from 62 cents to 75 cents an hour, or a spread of 20 per cent, and those of a pipefitter from 46 cents to 76 cents an hour, or a spread of 65 per cent.

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I think the erstwhile Minister of Labour will grant that there is a condition there that needs explaining.


Norman Alexander McLarty: Far from bearing out the remarks which the hon. member made earlier, it deals with the relative spread as between particular employees in a particular industry and not the relative spread as between wages paid in Canada and wages paid in other countries, to which he earlier referred.


John Horne Blackmore: 
Mr. REID:: What about Great Britain?


John Horne Blackmore: I am sorry to say I was not prepared to deal with that. I did not come prepared to deal with the whole thing in an encyclopaedic way.


Thomas Reid: I challenge the hon. gentleman's statement that this country is paying the lowest wages of any British country. I say to him without fear of successful contradiction that wages are lower in Great Britain, but that does not mean that they are suffering more.


Mr. JOHNSTON (Bow River):: What are the wages in Great Britain?


Thomas Reid: I can give some of the
trades. Take the moulders. They are earning 810 a week, and in this country they are earning SI an hour.


Charles Edward Johnston: More than $10 a week, surely?


Thomas Reid: Two pounds.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: They make more than that now.


Thomas Reid: From two pounds to two pounds ten shillings. I challenge the hon. member to say that they pay more in Great Britain than we pay here.


Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: The hon. member for Lethbridge
(Mr. Blackmore) has the floor.


John Horne Blackmore: If it be so, that the labourers in Great Britain are receiving less than the labourers in Canada, it is only to be excused. I am not prepared to prove that Canada is receiving the lowest rate of all. Let us bear in mind that Great Britain is not in a position to supply the goods which would enable her to pay the rate Canada could pay. But Canada should be far ahead of Great Britain; and, since the hon. member referred to actual living conditions, from what I could gather, those of the people of Great Britain were far ahead of the living conditions of the people of Canada.


Thomas Reid: That is a different point.


John Horne Blackmore: I grant that. I wish now to read another short extract, from a pamphlet called "Labour's plan for production," recently issued by the Canadian Congress of Labour.	On page 1, I find the
following statement:
The workers on the job are fully aware that present production policies are inadequate; they know that vastly more can be done; they realize that only by the widest and most efficient use of the machinery of production, the material resources, and the man-power of the nation can victory be achieved. The congress therefore believes that a plan should be adopted which will arouse the enthusiasm and release the energies of the workers by treating them as partners in the war effort, with a full understanding and a voice in the determination of production policies. Labour management cooperation is the key to maximum industrial efficiency, as has been proven by the experience of Great Britain and the United States.
Undoubtedly the men who wrote this are far better informed on the subject than I possibly could be, since as a member of parliament I have to wrestle with scores of problems. I take it these men know what they are talking about. Let me read another passage, which is quite significant.

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Arthur Wentworth Roebuck: I am sorry to have to tell the hon.
gentleman that his time is up.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I desire to take only a few moments to say something about the matter of production in the aircraft industry. When I suggested yesterday afternoon that I should like to ask the minister a question or two I had no intention of keeping the minister tied up here all day, but I have been trying to ask these questions for a day or two. If I had not found an opportunity before eleven o'clock to-night probably I would have forgotten about it, because I do not like to see the minister tied down here when he has so much work to do.


Mr. CRUICKSHANK:: Then why waste time?


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I do not think it is a matter of wasting time, but the hon. member may judge for himself. I think there is some information we should have, and this is the only place where we have an opportunity of bringing certain facts to the attention of the minister. I can assure my hon. friend that I am not going to take time to make any general speech or indulge in any rhetoric.
I think to-day it is recognized by everyone, even by those of us who have no technical knowledge, that the aircraft industry has become one of the most vital industries to the winning of the war. Every battle we have lost has, in the main, been lost through lack of support in the air. The few battles we have won, Dunkirk, the Coral sea naval battle and one or two other engagements, have been won because for a time at least we had mastery of the air. For that reason the production of aircraft has become of increasing importance in the eyes of everyone who wants to see the united nations not only wun the war but win it as quickly as possible. Therefore, during the last two sessions I have been asking the minister some questions about aircraft production. He will remember that last year we discussed the question of the Malton plant, and at that time the minister said he was not very well satisfied with production there. The other evening the hon. member for Bow River said that in his opinion the aircraft factories were not working to full capacity. I do not think there should be any misunderstanding when that statement is made. There is no doubt that aircraft production in this country is much better than it was last year and that last year it was better than the year before; and any person who criticizes that production must not be understood as saying that we are not making progress. I think those responsible are making progress; but the questions I raise
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to-night are whether we are making that progress fast enough, whether we could not have made more progress, and whether we are utilizing our full capacity.
The hon. member for Bow River said his experience was that we were not utilizing our full productive capacity. The only answer I heard was in a speech by the hon. member for Fort William, who painted a rosy picture of what was happening in that city, where we have probably one of the best aircraft factories in Canada. I was rather amused, because the other evening when the hon. member for Mackenzie and myself were asking some questions about wartime housing, the minister intimated in a very kindly way that two ministers of the gospel, as he called us, could not know much about these matters. But when the hon. member for Fort William, who is also a minister of the gospel, was eulogizing the minister as the new Napoleon of the mechanized age, the minister seemed to consider a theological training a good thing in that it helped a man to discern what constituted a really great national figure. As a matter of fact, what the hon. member for Fort William said about the aircraft industry is, in my opinion, not altogether borne out by the facts. He spoke of the industry being in full swing, with everyone being very busy; but, in the language of one of the radio comedians, "that ain't the way I heared it." A great many men have left western Canada and gone to work in these factories. I know quite a number of these men, some of whom were soldiers in the last war, many of whom took technical training and went to these factories with the idea that they might render a real service to Canada's war effort. I have had communication with a number of them, with some by correspondence and with others by personal conversation as I have moved across the country, and one hears disconcerting statements from men who have become disillusioned. A man writes, for instance, that the slogan seems to be, "Don't work too fast or you will find yourself out of a job." One hears of men given a certain amount of work to do and told they must spread it over a considerable period of time. Another man points out that these factories work five and a half days a week, with only one shift a day. I know there may be many factors to cause that, which I do understand and which these men do understand, but there is a feeling among these people that somehow or another they are not being given an opportunity to pull their weight, and I think it only fair to draw that fact to the attention of the minister.
I am not in a position to speak with firsthand knowledge, and neither is the hon. mem-
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ber for Fort William, who painted such a glowing picture. But in looking through the newspapers I find, for instance, that the Port Arthur board of trade, who would have no reason to be unsympathetic to the minister or the work he is doing, sent a resolution to him protesting the fact that there did not seem to be a full-out effort being put forth in the aircraft industry in Fort William. I understand the minister replied to that resolution. In a little publication called The Effort, which is the official organ of aircraft lodge 719, International Association of Machinists, an affiliate of the A.F. of L., I noticed an editorial which I should like to read. This is written by men working in the plant, men who have reason to know what is going on. If they were only interested in earning their bread and butter they would simply take their wages and say, "Whether we produce planes or do not produce them is not the essential thing"; but these people are interested, as we all are, in the winning of the war. This is what the editorial says:
In a letter from the Hon. C. D. Howe, Minister of Munitions and Supply, to the Port Arthur trades and labour council, we are informed that our plant has produced 726 Hawker Hurricanes to March 12, 1942, and considering the comparatively brief period during which our plant has operated we should be proud of this production record. Yet, vre, the aircraft workers cannot be proud of such a record, after thirty months of war with nazism.
We do not blame the local management for this poor production record, but vre do blame those in high places, and we state that there is something wrong in our aircraft industry, and our effort is not total war. We have not seen a great change-over from peace to total war in this country, we will agree that Canada is endeavouring to fight Hitlerism, but at the same time interfere as little as possible with the profit system and the standard practices of the controllers of industry. It is true that excess profits are heavily taxed, but the scramble for profit still goes on, and the exploitation of the great mass of workers continues as in the days of peace.
The main question of self-satisfaction will not get us anywhere, it is time all bottlenecks be removed and that the government should realize that the workers are not satisfied with present production records. Labour has already made many sacrifices in order to expedite the general war effort. This was done for two reasons: primarily because organized labour is composed of good substantial Canadians with a sense of real patriotism, and second, in an effort to show in this emergency that we stand one hundred per cent for total war, we the workers have buried the hatchet and are concentrating our efforts upon the common enemy, Hitlerism. There is a little question as to just what must be done-not to-morrow, but to-day, to do away w-ith all bottlenecks, also governments and management must realize and confess that they don't know all the answers. Invite labour to participate more fully in the readjustment to meet the war emergency, and don't hide behind

726 planes as a total war effort. We, as labour, do offer one suggestion-one that should be accepted willingly: Establish in all war industries a board of six members, three from the management ana three from labour, to be called the production board.
I notice, incidentally, that in the same issue of this little paper appears an article which shows that this feeling is not confined to the one plant. This article states: "Lodge 712, Montreal, charges plane output 'below possible output'," and it quotes Robert Haddow, grand lodge representative assigned to the aircraft industry. The article states:
Robert Haddow, Grand lodge representative assigned to the aircraft industry, said the meeting was giving expression to the opinions of about 7,000 aircraft workers in the Montreal district and that indirectly they represented the 17,000 in the aircraft industry of the district, who were "in the front lines of this great battle to produce the sinews of war." The conference was held to put "more steam, more pressure behind that battle, for the men and women behind the machines will not fail the men behind the guns."
There is this further paragraph:
He further stated: "We, of course, do not know what plans the government may have for stepping ujr Montreal aircraft production," he continued. "The planning of production is Mr. Bell's job, not ours. However, we do know that machines are standing idle in our factories for many hours in the week, that production schedules have not been increased to any considerable extent this year, that workers are being laid off at a time when, to win the war our industry should be humming 24 hours a day, when production schedules should be accelerated, when, instead of lay-offs we should be training thousands of new workers."
Naturally I am not in a position to judge as to the accuracy of this statement. But it is disconcerting to me, as a member of this house, and to any other hon. member, to find men actually engaged in production of aeroplanes in two different places in Canada making known to the minister and to the public the fact that they do not feel that industry has yet anywhere near reached its maximum output. What steps has the minister in mind to step up this production?
I know that one of the reasons why they are not working three shifts a day, six or seven days a week, must, of course, be the lack of raw material. I am sure that must be a factor. Another factor would be the difficulty of getting aeroplane engines. But I think the committee would like some assurance that plans are being laid and steps being taken to mobilize all the resources of the aeroplane industry, with a view to getting maximum production, because while some veiy rosy pictures have been given by different officials as to the total number of planes produced per

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month, the fact remains that a large percentage of those planes are training planes-not frontline planes.


Clarence Decatur Howe: No.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Well, I will not argue with the minister.


Clarence Decatur Howe: It switches the other way. In the beginning it was training planes; now it is combat planes.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I will not argue with the minister; but as a member of the war expenditures committee I have seen some of the production figures. However, I will not argue with him just now, but will argue it out with Mr. Bell when he appears before the war expenditures committee. I have seen production figures, but I would not make any statement which would involve a breach of confidence. That, however, is my impression.
Mr. JOHNSTON (Bow River); Quite right, too.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I wish to
make two suggestions. I cannot make suggestions along technical lines, because that is not my business. It seems to me, however, that there are two things which could be done, the first of which was mentioned to-night by the hon. member for North Battleford. It seems to me that if labour were taken into partnership to a greater extent than has been done, we would get much better production. I believe there is a great reservoir of skill and cooperation the government has not yet begun to tap. I believe the production committees in Great Britain, and the labour movements both in Australia and New Zealand are to a very great extent responsible for the wholehearted cooperation which those people have been able to give in their production effort.
When I say that, I am not casting any disparagement upon our own effort. But I do say to the minister that if labour were given the feeling that it had a voice in the councils of the nation, and that in the different shops it was sitting in with the management, planning production, offering suggestions about the removal of difficulties, and putting forth concrete recommendations for new ways and new methods, and, in some instances, providing substitutes where certain raw materials are no longer available, it might be possible to step up production much more rapidly than has been done.
The second suggestion I wish to make is one which I hope the minister will not misunderstand. From time to time it is our task to bring suggestions and even to offer criticisms of government policy. We have not always
agreed with the policies of the minister, or with some of the policies of this government. I hope the minister will never take that as meaning that we do not appreciate the work he has done for Canada. I think every hon. member-certainly every member of the group with which I am associated-has admired the minister's dynamic energy and the tireless way in which he has worked for this country. He started in with a department, from scratch, and he has built up a tremendous organization which has produced very worth-while results. That does not mean it has produced all the results it could have produced; but I should like the minister to know that, as a general rule, the Canadian people look with a great deal of favour upon his work, and are appreciative of it.
I say that because I wish to make a suggestion. The Department of Munitions and Supply has now grown to a point where in the interests of Canada's war effort it ought, in my opinion, to be divided. As has already been said, here is a department which has already placed contracts to an amount in excess of the national debt of Canada prior to the outbreak of war. In the early days when this department was being set up, probably it could be set up only in the way it was. But we have moved to the place now where it is the largest spending department in the government, larger than all the other departments put together as far as the actual placing of orders is concerned.
It seems to me that the department falls legitimately into two categories. First, it is a purchasing department, and for that reason there ought to be a separate ministry of supply charged with the responsibility of placing contracts, looking after the rationing of gasoline, rubber and many other products. These are things which ought not to be laid upon an already overworked minister, no matter how ambitious, energetic, and tireless he may be. He should not be loaded down with the purchasing, even though he may do it through subordinates, of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of commodities, all the way from boots and shoes to tanks. This is a responsibility which no one person can humanly carry.
As I say, there ought to be a ministry of supply and, on the other hand, there ought to be a ministry of production. I think the government would be well advised to turn over the whole task of placing orders and of making purchases, which has now been organized probably to a point where it is routine, to another minister and leave the present minister free to become the minister of production. He could then devote all
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his drive and energy to the task of getting production. This problem is becoming more pressing. Steel has been talked about a great deal. It is not only a problem of getting steel production up to capacity; there is also the problem of whether or not the capacity can be increased.
There is now the question of getting oil. When I was home at Easter I talked to one or two men interested in the oil business and in geological surveys. They mentioned a Mr. Gower, who I believe works for the Regina Industries Limited. I do not know the gentleman, but I am told that he has spent a good deal of his own money-I believe he appeared before the national research council-working on a formula for extracting high-grade gasoline from the tar sands of Alberta. As far as I know, his formula has never been adopted. There is a whole field which ought to be investigated with a view to finding whether or not we can secure additional oil resources in Canada.
There is also the question of synthetic rubber. I believe a government-owned company, the Polymer company, has been formed, but I do not think it is anywhere near production. This is something to which a great deal of attention ought to be given. The work in this connection will have to be speeded up. Let there be a lot more drive put into it. We cannot wait six months or a year in order to get synthetic rubber. It seems to me that here is a full-time job for the best minister the government can get, and I suggest that the present Minister of Munitions and Supply should be placed in charge of production. There should be left to him the task of speeding up production if it is humanly possible in the different lines pertaining to Canada's war effort.
I make these suggestions in the best of faith. I ask the minister if everything that can be done is being done, if the complaints made by men who work in these factories have any justification in fact. I should like to ask what steps the government proposes to take in the near future to put the aircraft industry on a full-time basis in order that it may produce more of the planes without which it will be absolutely impossible for the united nations to achieve the victory we all desire.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I may say to my hon. friend in connection with the aircraft industry that if we agreed to level off the industry and call it a day, if we said that this was our maximum objective and concentrated on reaching that objective, we could produce more planes than we are doing. The reason

why we are not producing more planes is the fact that we are constantly expanding. We have three plants that are producing nothing at the moment. They are coming in with a new type of plane and will produce eventually. I do not think we have ever stopped adding floor space to the aircraft plants. Incidental to that, we have never stopped expanding the personnel of the industry. I think every week since the war began has seen more workers in the aircraft industry than were there the previous week.
It is impossible when you are introducing new types to streamline the industry. I know my hon. friend is quite a student of production and has probably been to these plants, but I can take him to plants which he would call streamlined where every man's work is balanced against every other man's work. Every man putting in a full day's work can balance out the production of the plant. I am sorry to say that that has not been possible in the aircraft industry. There are a great number of learners in this industry, and the absorption of these learners slows down the general production. The output per man is not as great as it would be if we levelled off the industry and balanced out each man's production.
There are inequalities of that kind; nevertheless we are producing a very respectable number of planes. On the basis of comparative floor space, I would not hesitate to compare our production with that of any other country. I quite understand why people in the industry say that they are slowed down. There may be legitimate cases of that kind, but I would point out to my hon. friend that a campaign is in progress which has emerged from the country to the south. This is a campaign on the part of labour to form labour-management councils. I am not quarrelling with the objectives of that campaign; I am not quarrelling with the methods; but I say to my hon. friend that if he read the press of the United States six or seven months ago, he would have seen-the claim made that management was holding back and that the only way to cure the situation was to institute management-labour councils. That campaign has been brought over here holus-bolus and is now being carried on. I do not object to it, but I think my hon. friend, when quoting letters of that kind from labour organizations, should bear in mind that this campaign has that objective in view.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Does the
minister think that is the only objective?

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Clarence Decatur Howe: No; I think that is the principal objective of the campaign. I do not think that fact is serious enough to warrant the publicity it has been given.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Does the
minister think they are not genuinely interested in increasing production?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I believe they are, but I think the concentration on that particular phase of the thing is too true to form. Quite often I sit down with labour groups. I sat down with one in Windsor a few days ago, and I sat down with one in the House of Commons just recently. I sit down with these groups almost every week, and the story is exactly the same. In Windsor it was the automobile industry. I hear the same thing about the aircraft industry and about the gun-making industry. As I say, the objectives of this campaign are quite legitimate and I have no objection to its succeeding. In fact, in a qhiet way I am willing to help, but I do not think it is my problem.
The aircraft industry is probably the most vulnerable for the reasons I have given. It is aD industry that is being expanded tremendously. We have orders on our books for well over 10,000 planes; I think it is more like 15,000 planes to-day. We must expand the industry farther to fill these orders. Not only is the number of planes quite high, but larger and more difficult types of planes are being produced. As my hon. friend knows, back of the industry itself, is a great multitude of plants making components which will also have to be expanded. All these parts must flow into the aircraft plant in a uniform way to bring about streamlined production.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Could the present plants work more shifts, or is there a lack of raw material?


Clarence Decatur Howe: They can when we get levelled off, when we get uniform production. If they are working on a standard order there is an unlimited scope. Some plants are; some plants are not. For example, Noorduyn has a standardized plane and is working on a very large order. I hope that the whole industry can get on a three-shift basis in a reasonable time. But National Steel Car and de Havilland are changing to different types of planes and it is impossible for them to do it.


John Ritchie MacNicol: For the very simple reason that the companies manufacturing the component parts cannot begin to manufacture until they receive the templets.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes, it takes a long time to get templets made and distributed back to the
parts industry. No plane has ever been brought into production in any country in less than a year or fifteen months, and while the change is being made there is a disorganized period, finishing up odds and ends. We are now in the process of changing over to make parts for the new planes and, in such a period, production drops. The period of disorganization is longer with some managements than with others, depending upon the type of management. Some managements are more expert than others.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Canadian Car and Foundry have an order for a standardized plane?


Clarence Decatur Howe: No. They are changing from the Hawker Hurricane to a new type of dive bomber. The production of the Hawker Hurricane is tapering off, and parts for the new dive bomber are being manufactured, but it will not be assembled as a plane that can be flown for a good many months yet. In the meantime, there will be a gradual tapering down from one kind of production, and a gradual stepping-up in the production of a totally different type of plane. That is the nature of the industry. It is not a streamlined industry such as our gun industry, where we are working four shifts a day, three shifts and a swing shift to take up the seven-day week. The tools are being worked every hour of the seven-day week. That is incidental to the gun industry.
All I can say is that we have developed good management in the aeroplane industry. My hon. friend will remember that there was no aircraft industry in this country at the beginning of the war. Every man in a management position in our aeroplane industry, with very few exceptions, is new to the industry. We had very little background in this type of industry. Nevertheless we have developed top-notch production men in the aircraft industry and top-notch designers, but they have been developed over the last two or three years. It is an industry apart. I make no great claims for it.
I will not deny that there may be people putting in time at the factory who may not be usefully employed because their section is ahead of some other section. If it was peacetime such a condition might lead to lay-offs in the aeroplane industry, but when the industry is carrying the men it can tell them frankly that their section is ahead of another section; that that is holding up the assembly, and that they had better ease down a little. That may happen. When it happens, it is not done with any idea of slowing down production as a whole or anything of that
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kind. It can happen where a change-over is taking place and a new plane is coming into production.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is what I was pointing out to the minister the other day.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I know my hon. friend knows a great deal about production, having been in it most of his life, but this time I am making a statement.


Charles Edward Johnston: I was simply pointing out that the minister objected when I gave the very same explanation the other day.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I think I have covered the aeroplane Industry now. I am probably the goat of the industry, but I think, as the months go by, the people of Canada will be more and more pleased with the output of the industry. We could have closed the door on expansion six months ago and had a very satisfactory industry to-day, with plant on a three-shift basis and production coming out in a streamlined way, but we have tried to keep abreast with new developments in the war and take on new types of production rather than go on making planes which were becoming obsolete. We are making the changes as fast and as efficiently as we can.
My hon. friend spoke of dividing my job. I would give three cheers for that. I would like very much to have less work. But the tendency in all countries is not to divide up, but to centralize. My hon. friend has followed the progress of events in Great Britain. He knows that they have three supply ministries and that they recently appointed a ministry of production to coordinate the work of the other three branches.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Production
and supply are separate in Great Britain.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The three supply ministries are subordinate to the minister of production, who is a coordinating officer; the same has happened in the United States. The United States had separate agencies for army and air and for the navy and for the navy air arm, and it was found that they were competing in the same factories and that there was conflict. Then the office occupied by Donald Nelson was set up as a coordinating office with complete authority over all procurement. There is a reason for that. The work of procurement and production is subdivided. But to have authority divided leads to disorganization. There is a great

advantage in having all production procurement centred in one office. My method has been to subdivide the work under me as often as it has seemed necessary, and to delegate as much work as possible. I am busy enough, it is true, but I do not know that I am doing more work than a good many other people in this country. I can say to my hon. friend that the reason why the work of procurement is not divided is that it would mean a loss of efficiency.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I thank the minister for the explanation he has given. I appreciate it very much, but he did not have to intimate that I was a student of production. He was either pulling my leg or being sarcastic.


Clarence Decatur Howe: My hon. friend was very nice to me, and I thought I would be very nice to him.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I did not appreciate his either pulling my leg or, being sarcastic. The explanation given by the minister is the kind of statement which, it seems to me, does serve a useful purpose because when the men in these plants are not being utilized to the full, the impression gets around that this thing is a racket. That is how they talk, and some explanation of why they are idle ought to be forthcoming. I do not know anything about production, it is true, because a member of this house cannot be a student of everything that comes within the departments of all the ministers, but it is the duty of a member of this house to bring these matters to the attention of the minister so that he can make the kind of statement he made to-night. I do not think the minister ought to pull anybody's leg or be sarcastic about members being students of production all their lives.


Clarence Decatur Howe: I did not intend any sarcasm. My hon. friend has shown a great interest in production.


Charles Edward Johnston: The sarcasm was intended for me.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I did not take any offence. I want to thank the minister again for his statement, and if statements of that kind were made more often it would be of great value to the country. The explanation is that there is a tapering-off from one type of production so that the plant can move into the production of another type of plane because some of the older types have become obsolete. But in the case which the minister mentioned at Fort William, that is a plane which, I understand, is still in use-the Hawker Hurricane.

War Appropriation-Supplies


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: What is the object in making a switch there? Men who have done some reading along the line of aircraft production say that one of the things that got Great Britain off to a bad start before the war was the fact that, whereas Goering went into mass production of Messerschmitts and probably produced inferior planes but produced them on a standard line, the British constantly kept changing their designs, which meant long periods of delay. Is there a danger of us doing that here? Is a lot of this switching necessary? Is it necessary to be constantly changing some of the types? Are we reducing the number of types and trying to get down to two or three standard lines which could be produced on a steady basis, rather than making these constant switches which, as the minister has said, must entail periods of non-production?


Mr. FRASER (Northumberland):: That is the first change which has been made.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The reason why we are leaving the Hawker Hurricane for another plane is that our air force demands the best and the Hurricane is getting out of date. To-day there are much better fighting planes, faster and more manoeuverable planes, than the Hurricane, and I think it is desirable not to maintain in production an obsolescent type. It is true that far more planes would have been produced by this time if the British had kept to pre-war types, but I would point out that by getting more advanced types they have gained control of the air, and gained it at a time when they undoubtedly had fewer planes than the enemy. I certainly have to accept the judgment of the operational forces as to the type of planes which we should produce.


Thomas Reid: I have a question to ask regarding the manufacture of steel. We know that steel is in great demand these days. The last time I visited Trail smelters I noticed they had a mountain of what looked like good material if it were smelted down and perhaps manufactured into steel. This was the residue from their mining operations. I do not know how many tons would be there, but it seems to me that the mountain they had was about a mile long. Has the minister had any report regarding the great mountain which they have there and which I believe they are willing shall be used?


Clarence Decatur Howe: I have no report on it, but I think there would be transportation difficulties in the way. The equipment necessary to turn ore into steel is very rare. We have
only three places in Canada with sufficient equipment to take ore of any kind and make finished steel from it-Sault Ste. Marie, Hamilton and Sydney, Nova Scotia. While I have no knowledge of this particular situation, I assume the transportation difficulty is there.
I will, however, make inquiries.


Thomas Reid: I believe that it is worth looking into. I am under the impression that it could be smelted there, and there is sufficient to warrant the installation of a small smelter.


John Ritchie MacNicol: In Great Britain they
design planes. Their engineers design a new plane from experience of their pilots in the air in opposition to planes which have been designed in Germany or elsewhere. In the United States also they design planes. In Canada we do not do any designing; we make only what has been proved to be satisfactory in Great Britain. Is that not one of the main differences between conditions of aircraft manufacture in Canada and Great Britain? So, when we undertake to make a type of plane which has been proved to be satisfactory in Britain, our companies first have to make their blue prints, of which there may be 20,000 or 25,000 for one new design; then they have to adjust their tools to suit that work, or retool, and arrange for all the component parts involved in the new design. But we do not really design any new plane in Canada in the sense that they do in England-for instance, a Lancaster. *


Clarence Decatur Howe: Please do not mention the names of new planes. We do design in Canada a Fleet-60 which is used for advanced training by the air force. We have designed some very important modifications of planes, but of course the designing industry is new in Canada as it is elsewhere. We have brilliant designers, but they have not the background of experience which is possessed by designers in either the United States or Great Britain. Designing talent is improving month by month, and I think that if occasion calls for the designing of a new type of plane in Canada, we have people here who are competent to do it. I may say, however, that when we take a British or even a United States design, but especially the former, there is a good deal of redesigning to do to fit Canadian methods. We here are fairly well advanced in mass production, and our methods are different from those in the old country. So we have quite an engineering department in our aircraft industry.


John Ritchie MacNicol: What I meant was the
new planes.
War Appropriation-Supplies


Clarence Decatur Howe: The Fleet-60 is, I think, the only case of a new plane which was completely designed in Canada.


Charles Edward Johnston: It has been brought to my attention that in some cases where contracts have been given for aeroplane construction, for example, where the government would place a contract for, say twenty-five planes with a company, the plant would get tooled up for that work, and they have represented that they could have made thirty-five planes just as easily-I am using this number as an illustration-in practically the same length of time, but their instruction was to make twenty-five planes and they could not go ahead any faster than that limited order would permit. If, however, the order had been increased they could have manufactured quite a number of additional planes in the same period.
One other point. In the minister's remarks a while ago I think he stated-I am not arguing the point with him-that in some departments of a factory it was possible that the management would require the workers to slow up a little bit. I think that is a fair interpretation of what he said, and it bears out exactly what I was trying to tell the minister the other day, that in some of those places the fellows have come to me and told me they were requested not to do so much work.


Clarence Decatur Howe: But the implication my hon. friend drew was that they were trying to slow down production of the finished article- which is not the case.


Charles Edward Johnston: Whether that was the final result or not is not the point I am now discussing. The point is that these people were deliberately advised to slow down. They came to me as a member of parliament and objected to that, and I think they were perfectly right in doing so. The minister now admits it would be possible in some instances that the management would go to these fellows and say to them that they might not have to work very fast, that if they did they would run out of a job.
Would the minister straighten up the question I asked him about the limited number in a contract? Would these companies be allowed to make five or ten planes more if they could, if they had the material?


Clarence Decatur Howe: When my hon. friend speaks af twenty or twenty-five planes he is talking about pre-war days. Planes to-day are built certainly in the hundreds; I do not know of any contract for less than two hundred that
[Mr. MacNicol.j
has been placed in the last two years. However, we do build planes to meet a demand. Sometimes we build them without knowing exactly who wants them, if they are a plane in common use. But in pre-war days we used to tool up to make ten or fifteen or twenty planes, when the industry was very small. To-day we place large orders. Any factory that is in production to-day is either working on an unlimited order or is tooling up to make planes for which it will have an unlimited order. Therefore my hon. friend's question is hardly pertinent to the present-day situation.


Charles Edward Johnston: If they are working on a limited order will they be allowed to go over that?


Clarence Decatur Howe: It would depend on whether we thought we could get rid of the planes. We would have to find a use for the planes. We are not flyers ourselves and we do not want the planes to rust. The Hurricane plant at Fort William had an order for 600 Hurricanes; they were coming to the end of the order and I told them to make 400 more. I did not know al the time what do with them, but since then I have found uses for them and now the plant are unlimited in the sense that they can make all the Hurricanes they can until the new plane comes into production. That is the usual situation in our plants to-day. Fairchild has all the work it can do until the end of 1943 and Nooduyn until the end of 1944. These might be called unlimited orders.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is the way it should be.


Clarence Decatur Howe: That is the way it is. Nevertheless, we do get modifications. For instance, there may be modifications interjected into a programme which might slow the plant down for a month or two. That is incidental to war. If actual experience indicates that better results can be obtained through a modification, we have to stop the production line and make the modification; but of course we appreciate the desirability of working without interruption, and we are as anxious to do this as my hon. friend is to have us do it.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: If you are on an unlimited order for Hurricanes, could you not get greater production? Is it a matter of trained personnel?


Clarence Decatur Howe: It is a matter of both supervision and trained personnel and organizing the shops behind the assembly plants to feed the material in.


Mr. FRASER (Peterborough West):: Are you making any torpedo-carrying planes?

Labour Conditions


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes; we are coming into production.


Mr. ROSS (St. Paul's):: Is anything being done with regard to duplicating oil pipelines from Oklahoma to Sarnia? I do not quite understand why the notification has been given about no oil for homes. I do not know why it has come so suddenly seeing that a month ago we were told that heating for homes would be all right. Two months ago, I know, several buildings in Toronto were notified to put coal in. I was wondering if something had suddenly happened in the central provinces to make the difference.
Has the minister's department done anything in connection with the study of camouflage for factories and so on, as they are doing in the United States?


Clarence Decatur Howe: We are not building pipelines at the moment. With regard to oil, I was asked a question in the house and I gave an answer which I wish to amplify. Our study of the situation has not been quite completed. There is no doubt in the world that those who have converted coal furnaces into oil burners will be required to convert them back to coal. For the furnace which has been put in as an oil furnace, and which cannot be converted except by removing the furnace and putting in a new furnace, we will, I think, endeavour to find a supply, for the reason that it is not practical to build furnaces and supply them under such circumstances. Here again, every hon. member knows that the oil situation is extremely critical. The best I can say is that a complete statement will be made on the whole fuel situation for next winter in the course of a week or two. In the meantime I should like to amplify the statement I made yesterday to that extent, that an effort will . be made to supply the oil installation which cannot be converted to coal.


Mr. BLACK (Cumberland):: Will that rule apply to the ferryboat serving between the mainland and Prince Edward Island? It is only within recent months that there was a change over from coal to oil.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The reason why that was
done is that it is impossible and always has been impossible to keep up steam with a coal-fire boiler when that boat is working in the ice. It was changed to oil as a measure of security having regard to the fact that there is no standby for this ferry. I do not wish to speak finally on that, but that might be one of the cases where the use of oil as fuel would be considered imperative for the sake of safety. That again is the subject of investigation.	*
As regards the question of camouflage, we are camouflaging key plants in areas that are regarded by the military authorities as dangerous. That work is going on at the present time.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Friday, May 22, 1942