1944-05-25

OFFICIAL REPORT


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itotisse of Commons debates
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Thursday, May 25, 1944

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Second report of standing committee on railways, canals and telegraph lines-Mr. Dupuis.


Right Hon. W. L. MACKENZIE KING (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I have a brief announcement to make. I am making it on motions because it will be made at three o'clock this afternoon in two other countries.
I should like to inform the house that the Canadian government have agreed with the Chilean government for the elevation of their respective legations to the rank of embassy. No change in personnel is contemplated. Mr. Warwick Chipman, who presented his letter of credence as Canadian minister on March 5, 1943, will remain as Canadian Ambassador to Chile, and Doctor Eduardo Grove, who presented his letter of credence as Chilean Minister to Canada on September 15, 1942, will become Chilean Ambassador to Canada upon his return from Chile, where he is at present on leave of absence.
A similar agreement has been reached with the government of Peru. Hon. members will recall that on January 28 of this year it was announced that diplomatic missions would be exchanged between Peru and Canada, and it has now been agreed that these will be of the rank of embassy.



QUESTIONS

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(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk)

Mr. RAYMOND:: 1.	How many applications for permits to manufacture balanced meal have been made to the government on behalf of persons in the province of Quebec since November, 1942?
2.	What are the names of the persons who applied for such permits?
3.	How many permits for the manufacture of balanced meal have been granted in the province of Quebec since November, 1942?
4.	What are the names of the persons to whom such permits were granted?


Mr. ILSLEY:: 1.	There have been fourteen applications made to the wartime prices and trade board for permits to manufacture balanced meal in the province of Quebec since November 2nd, 1942, to date.
2.	The names of the persons who applied for
these permits are:	Hilliard I. Hobbs, Shawville, Que.; J. W. Trudel, Amos, Que.; Theo. Phenix, St. Hyacinthe, Que. Plant to be situated at Galt, Ont. Quebec Stores, Reg'd., 62A Commercial St., Levis, Que.; G. Arthur LeMay, 170-172 rue St. Pierre, Quebec, Que.; J. A. Laforest, Squatticlc, Que.; Moulin Co-op. de Michel de Squatec, St. Michel de Squatec, Que.; Co-op. Agricole des Cultivateurs, Riviere du Loup, Que.; Societe Agricole Co-operative, St. Germaine de Grantham, Que.; Societe Agricole de Beurrerie et Fromagerie de St. Wences-las, St. Wenceslas, Que., Ival Paquette, Ste. Brigide, Que., Lorenzo St. Pierre, Plessisville, Que.; Co-operative de Deschaillons, Deschail-lons, Que.; Co-operative Agricole de Moulees Alimentaires, Cabano, Que.
3.	Eight permits have been granted.
4.	The names of the persons to whom such permits have been granted are: Hilliard I. Hobbs, J. W. Trudel, Theo. Phenix, Quebec Stores Reg'd., G. Arthur LeMay, J. A. La-Forest, Moulin Co-operative de Michel de Squatec; Co-op. Agricole des Cultivateurs.



EXCISE ACT


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: 1.	Did the excise branch of the Department of National Revenue cause an information to be laid against Andrew Perry and Clovis Perry, Prince county, P.E.I., for illegalities against the Excise Act?
2.	If so, who is acting as counsel for the crown in this case, (a) on the preliminary hearing; (b) on the trial of the indictment?
3.	When was the first information laid and by whom?
4.	Was there a preliminary hearing, and if so, before what court?

Questions

5.	What counsel fees have been paid to date
and to whom?	,
6.	What witness fees have been paid to date?
7.	What other costs have been paid in this case?
8.	What further fees or costs have been incurred but not yet paid?
9.	What will be the total cost to the federal treasury of these proceedings?
10.	Has the attorney general of the province of Prince Edward Island been requested to prosecute in this case? If so, has he acted?
11.	Has there been more than one trial of this case, and if so, how many?
12.	Why were the proceedings taken by way of indictment, instead of by summary conviction under the appropriate part of the criminal code?


Mr. GIBSON:: 1.	Yes.
2.	(a) Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, PE.I.; Peter J. Hughes, K.C., Fredericton, N3.
(b)	Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, PEI.; Peter J. Hughes, K.C., Fredericton, NB.
3.	14th Oct., 1942, Cst. Truman D. Trenouth, R.C.M.P.
4.	Yes. Walter E. Darby, Esq., stipendiary magistrate, Summerside, P.E.I.
6 to 12. It is not considered to be in the public interest to answer thesfe questions at the present time for the reason that the case is still before the courts.



EXCISE ACT-CHARGES AGAINST JOHN HOLMAN GALLANT

Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: 1.	Did the excise branch of the Department of National Revenue cause an information to be laid against John Holman Gallant, Prince county, P.E.I., for illegalities against the Excise Act?
2.	If so, who is acting as counsel for the crown in this case, (a) on the preliminary hearing; (b) on the trial of the indictment?
3.	When -was the first information laid and by whom?
4.	Was there a preliminary hearing, and if so, before what court?
5.	What counsel fees have been paid to date and to whom?
6.	What witness fees have been paid to date?
7.	What other costs have been paid in this case?
8.	What further fees or costs have been incurred but not yet paid?
9.	What will be the total cost to the federal treasury of these proceedings?
10.	Has the attorney general of the province of Prince Edward Island been requested to prosecute in this case? If so, has he acted?
11.	Has there been more than one trial of this case, and if so, how many ?
12.	Why were the proceedings taken by way of indictment, instead of by summary conviction under the appropriate part of the criminal code?


Mr. GIBSON:: 1.	Yes.
2.	(a) Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, PE.I.; Peter J. Hughes, K.C., Fredericton, NB.

(b) Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, PEI.; Peter J. Hughes, K.C., Fredericton, NB.
3.	14th Oct., 1942, Cpl. Lewis J. Watson, R.C.M.P.
4.	Yes. Walter E. Darby, Esq., stipendiary magistrate, Summerside, P.E.I.
5 to 12. It is not considered to be in the public interest to answer these questions at the present time for the reason that the case is still before the courts.



EXCISE ACT-CHARGES AGAINST FRANK AND HARRY GALLANT

Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: 1.	Did the excise branch of the Department of National Revenue cause an information to be laid against Frank Gallant and Harry Gallant, Prince county, P.E.I., for illegalities against the Excise Act?
2.	If so, who is acting as counsel for the crown in this case, (a) on the preliminary hearing; (b) on the trial of -the indictment?
3.	When was the first information laid and by whom?
4.	Was there a preliminary hearing, and if so, before what court?
5.	Wha-t counsel fees have been paid to date and to whom?
6.	What witness fees have been paid to date?
7.	What other costs have been paid in this case?
8.	What further fees or costs have been incurred but not yet paid?
9.	What will ibe the total cost to the federal treasury of these proceedings?
10.	Has the attorney general of the province of Prince Edward Island been requested to prosecute in this case? If so, has he acted?
11.	Has there been more than one trial of this case, and if so, how many?
12.	Why were the proceedings taken by way of indictment, instead of by summary conviction under the appropriate part of the criminal code?


Mr. GIBSON:: 1.	Yes.
2.	(a) Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, P.EI., and Peter J. Hughes, K.C., Fredericton, N.B.; (b) Richard S. Hinton, Summerside, P.E.I, and Peter J. Hughes, K.C, Fredericton, N.B.
3.	14th Oct, 1942, Cst. Percy Kinch, R.C.MP.
4.	Yes. Walter E. Darby, Esq, stipendiary magistrate, Summerside, P.E.I.
5 to 12. It is not considered to be in the public interest to answer these questions at the present time for the reason that the case is still before the courts.

On the orders of the day:


Mr. HANSON (York-Sunbury):: Mr.Speaker, on a question of privilege, on May 16 I put a series of questions to the ministry relating to certain prosecutions which have been carried on by the excise branch of the Department of

Questions
National Revenue in the province of Prince Edward Island-twelve identical questions relating, however, to three different prosecutions. Questions 1, 2, 3 and 4 have been answered to-day, but I am denied the answers to questions 5 to 12 inclusive on the alleged ground that "it is not considered to be in the public interest to answer these questions at the present time for the reason that the case is still before the courts."
What are the questions?
5.	What counsel fees have been paid to date and to whom?
6.	What witness fees have been paid to date?
7.	What other costs have been paid in this
case?	.
8.	What further fees or costs have been incurred but not yet paid?
9.	What will be the total cost to the federal treasury of these proceedings?
10.	Has the attorney general of the province of Prince Edward Island been requested to prosecute in this case? If so. has he acted?
11.	Has there been more than one trial of this case, and if so, how many?
12.	Why were the proceedings taken by way of indictment, instead of by summary conviction under the appropriate part of the criminal code?
I suggest that I am denied the privileges of a member of parliament. I am entitled to have that information notwithstanding that the case may be under appeal.



WARTIME PRICES AND TRADE BOARD-BYRNE HOPE SANDERS

Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: 1.	Upon what date was Byrne Hope Sanders appointed to the consumers' branch of the wartime prices and trade .board?
2.	What is the nature of her position, and her monthly salary?
3.	What is the total amount that has been paid .to her since her appointment for, (a) salary; (b) living expenses or other .allowances; (c) travelling expenses; (d) any other payments?


Mr. ILSLEY:: 1.	Byrne Hope Sanders was appointed to the consumer branch of the wartime prices and trade board effective January 29, 1942.
2.	Miss Sanders is director of the consumer branch, serving without remuneration.
3.	(a) See answer to question 2.
Living Travelling Expenses Expenses
(b) and (c) January 29,
1942 to March 31, 1942 $ 111 60 $ 662 96
April 1, 1942 to March 31, 1943	
2,243 49	1,487 52April 1, 1943 to March 31. 1944	
2259 78	1,263 82April 1, 1944 to date.. 21 66	239 06
(d) Nil.



FIFTH VICTORY LOAN

Mr. NOSEWORTHY:: 1.	What is the cost to the government for raising the fifth victory loan, for, (a) publicity; (b) canvassers; (c) banks and investment dealers, commission, etc.; (d) other expenses.
2.	What was the total amount subscribed?
3.	What was the total number of subscriptions?
4.	What was the total amount subscribed and the number of subscribers in each denomination in which subscriptions were received?


Mr. ILSLEY:: 1.	(a) Advertising and publicity	
(b)	Salesmen's commissions
(c)	Remuneration to banks,
trust and loan companies, etc	
Remuneration to investment dealers ____
(d)	Other expenses

2 and 3.
Amount Number
Cash subscriptions.. .$1,374,988,500 3,008,336 Conversion
subscriptions		195,591,500	24,715
Total subscriptions. .$1,570,580,000 3,033,051
4.	Records of the national war finance committee are not maintained in such a way as to disclose the number of subscribers and the amount subscribed in each denomination.



WAR VETERANS' ALLOWANCES-WIDOWS

Mr. KNOWLES:: 1.	Does the provision of order in council P.C. 5/3655, dated May 15, 1944, apply to the case of widows receiving special allowances from the war veterans' allowance board, under the terms, of order in council P.C. 1/5028, dated June 22, 1943?
2.	If not, is consideration being given to applying this provision as noted above?


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: 1.	Widows receiving compassionate allowances from the war veterans' allowance board do so under the authority of appropriation acts. No limitation as to the date of marriage has at any time been included in the regulations approved by order in council under the statutory provision.
2.	Answered by No. 1.



BASIS FOR UNITED STATES WHEAT VALUES

Mr. PERLEY:: 1.	What basis is used in arriving at the-United States values of wheat?
2.	Why is it necessary to use the formula of issuing a price for Canadian wheat to exporters and mills that as in force from 1.15 p.m. until.

9.30	a.m. the following day, except on Saturdays when they are in force from 12 noon until 9 a.m. the following market day?


Mr. MacKINNON (Edmonton West):: 1.	The same question by the hon. member for Qu'Appelle was asked in Votes and Proceedings No. 27, page i, and replied to on March 13, 1944 as follows:
The basis is the differential between the values of wheat in Canada and the United States. The prices are issued daily to exporters and mills and are in force from 1.15 p.m. to
9.30	a.m. the following day, except on Saturdays when they are in force from 12.00 noon until
9.30	a.m. the following market day.
2.	The prices so established are valid during the period from the close to the opening of United States markets. When the prices are received by the exporter at 1.15 p.m. he has until 9.30 a.m. the following day to contact the United States buyer and endeavour to arrange -a sale based on the price established for the period.



WARTIME HOUSING, MONTREAL-T. PANOS

Mr. BERTRAND (Terrebonne):: 1.	Is Mr. T. Panos in the employ of the wartime housing, district of Montreal?
2.	What are his position and salary?
3.	Has he held several positions with wartime
housing?	,
4.	If so, what were these positions, when did he hold them, and. by whom was he recommended for each of said positions?


Mr. CHEVRIER:: 1.	Yes.
2.	District supervisor of wartime housing district No. 3, $4,000 per annum.
3.	Yes.
4.	On July 6, 1942, Mr. Panos was appointed superintendent of staff houses at Sorel, Quebec, on' the recommendation of the administrator of the Sorel branch of Wartime Housing Limited. On February 11, 1943, Mr. Panos was appointed acting administrator of the Sorel branch of Wartime Housing Limited, owing to the illness of the administrator. On April 1,
1943,	on the death of the administrator, Mr. Panos was appointed administrator of the Sorel branch of Wartime Housing Limited by Toronto head office management. On February 15, 1944, Mr. Panos was appointed district supervisor of Wartime Housing Limited district No. 3 by Toronto head office management on merit of his past performance.
WAR FINANCE COMMITTEE-ADVERTISEMENT IN "liberal advocate"


Mr. BENCE:: 1. Was an advertisement inserted by the national war finance committee in the April,
1944,	number of the periodical known as the Liberal Advocate?
IMr. Perley.]
2. If so, what was the cost to the national war finance committee, and/or any other department of the government for such advertisement?


Mr. ILSLEY:: 1.	Y'es.
2.	$180.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. DORION:: 1. Since the 1st January, 1940, has the Gallup poll received any payments from the dominion government or any agencies, commissions, boards, controls, etc., subject to or under the control of the dominion government or organized under the authority of any dominion laws?
2.	If so, when and for what?



MUNITIONS AND SUPPLY-QUEBEC ARSENAL- S. J. MYLER


Mr. HAZEN:: 1.	Why was the recommendation of the Canadian army overseas that the 213 officers it returned to Canada be discharged, not carried out in 142 cases?
2.	What was the rank of each of these 142 officers?
3.	In what branch of the service is each of these 142 officers employed at present, and what is the nature of his employment?
4.	What was the rank of each of the 71 officers who were discharged?
5.	Were any of these 71 officers awarded pensions ?

Post-War Civil Aviation


PRIME MINISTER CHURCHILL
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. JEAN-FRANQOIS POULIOT (Temiscouata): I wonder whether the government and the house would be willing to have published in Votes and Proceedings the complete text of the speech made yesterday at Westminster by Mr. Churchill. It is a report of the meeting of dominion prime ministers, and it is the sequel of the speech of our Prime Minister which is already on the same record. What is the intention of the government in that regard?
Hon. T. A. CRERAR (Minister of Mines and Resources):: That question, Mr. Speaker, might be allowed to stand, and an answer may be given, perhaps, to-morrow.


LABOUR CONDITIONS
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. GORDON GRAYDON:: (Leader of the Opposition): Will the Minister of Labour kindly advise the house as to what disposition the government has made of the requests of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, and others, with respect to the application for certification of the employees of the dominion arsenals at Lindsay?


Hon. HUMPHREY MITCHELL (Minister of Labour):: The leader of the opposition was good enough to give me notice of this question.
I am informed that the wartime labour relations board-that is the national board-has not been able to entertain the application affecting the dominion arsenals at Lindsay for the reason that the employees concerned are directly employed by the crown and, hence, are outside the jurisdiction of the board.
As hon. members are aware, the government has a number of employees in the arsenals at Lindsay and elsewhere. Some of these form part of the peace-time establishment of the government service. They have always been classed as civil servants and as such outside the legislation provided for collective bargaining. In that respect they are in the same position as all other prevailing rates employees of the government, that is, employees who are paid on an hourly rate basis.
Consideration is being given to the possibility of having the recently established national joint council of the public service of Canada deal with the matter.


Gordon Graydon: If these men are civil servants, do they come under a superannuation scheme?


Humphrey Mitchell: I could not answer my hon. friend off hand. I understand that some do.


Gordon Graydon: I think there is quite a distinction. That is why I asked the question.


QUEBEC FARM LABOUR BUREAU
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. LIGUORI LACOMBE (Laval-Two Mountains). I gave notice to the Minister of Labour of the following question, which I now direct to him. Is the Quebec farm labour bureau, located at 31 West St. James street, Montreal, a federal organization or an organization of the government of Quebec?
Humphrey Mitchell: The Quebec farm labour bureau, located at 31 West St. James street, Montreal, is a branch of the dominion-provincial farm labour organization in Quebec. A similar office is operated in Quebec city. The administration of these offices is the responsibility of the province and under the dominion-provincial farm labour agreement one-half of the expenses are borne by the dominion. The function of these offices is to recruit and place workers on farms.


POST-WAR CIVIL AVIATION DISCUSSIONS BETWEEN SOVIET RUSSIA AND CANADA
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. H. C. GREEN (Vancouver South):: May I direct a question to the Minister of Munitions and Supply arising out of a press dispatch yesterday in which it was intimated that the Soviet ambassador to Canada had stated that it was likely there would be discussions between Russia and Canada concerning post-war air routes and air lines. Will the minister tell the house whether that is correct; and perhaps he can also give us a statement in that connection.


Hon. C. D. HOWE (Minister of Munitions and Supply):: We have been advised that a
delegation from the Russian government are in the United States, or on their way there, to discuss with -the United States government civil aviation problems. The conference will be one of a series of bilateral talks which are being held between various countries interested in civil aviation. An invitation has been extended to the Russian government to send representatives to Canada to hold similar bilateral talks with this government, and we are hopeful that the invitation will be accepted.
Italian Campaign


THE WAR
[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. J. L. RALSTON (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, perhaps I may be permitted to make reference to-day to something which is, I am sure, in the minds of every Canadian, and that is the spectacular advance which has been made by Canadian troops on the western flank of the 8th Army drive.
Hon. members will recall that, after crossing the Rapido river, veiy stiff resistance was encountered, and a cessation occurred in the advance for something like two days. In the last thirty-six hours there has been what is regarded, I believe, as a brilliant advance of something like six miles, in which the Canadian troops have aided in the capture of Pontecorvo, which had proved of considerable difficulty for some time. As a matter of fact Pontecorvo is one of the important communication points in the Hitler line. Instead of making a frontal attack, the Canadians cut in behind Pontecorvo and breached the line on a five-mile front. I cannot as yet say anything with regard to casualties. I know there has been severe resistance; many temporary obstacles, mines and the like, have been encountered, and quite a number of prisoners have been taken. The advance is still continuing and is well across the Melfa ri'ver, six miles from the start thirty-six hours ago, and about twelve miles from the Rapido. At the present time Canadian troops are spearheading the advance up the Liri valley.
Members of this house and Canadians all across the dominion will unite in pride and satisfaction at this fine achievement of the Canadian corps in Italy. I am sure it is of more than passing significance that the operation took place on Empire day and Victoria day.
I have word just now with regard to operations between the Anzio beachhead and the left flank of the 5th Army. Word has come in- although not yet confirmed, I think it is authentic-that the Anzio beachhead troops and the 5th Army have joined forces, and that on the Adriatic side there are signs that the enemy is moving back on the right flank.


Gordon Graydon: May I join the minister in expressing the pride which I think everyone in Canada has in the splendid achievement of our Canadian forces in Italy. May I say also to the minister that we in parliament

hope that from time to time he or the Prime Minister will see his way clear to giving us reports on such important engagements as those which have just been mentioned by the minister. I think it is proper that parliament should have such information; for we in this chamber are of course extremely interested in the progress of these developments.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Hon. GROTE STIRLING (Yale):: May I ask the government whether it will give consideration to the taking up of private bills to-morrow evening from eight to nine? There is standing in my name a bill which is most important and which should be proceeded with if possible.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am informed that it is the intention to have these bills considered on Monday evening.



MOUNTED POLICE


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. LIGUORI LACOMBE (Laval-Two-Mountains)i: Mr. Speaker, I gave notice to the Minister of Justice that I would ask this afternoon the three following questions. First:
(Translation):	Has the Department of
Justice been informed that members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have been arrested on the order of the attorney general of Quebec, and charged with manslaughter in connection with the death of young Georges Guenette, of St. Lambert de Levis?
Hon. LOUIS S. ST. LAURENT (Minister of Justice) (Translation): I have been advised by the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, on Friday last, May 19, that a complaint had been lodged against a constable of the mounted police and against a special constable employed by that body since December, 1943. The complaint was lodged by a member of the provincial police. We have no official information to the effect that he was acting on the instructions of the attorney general of the province of Quebec, but we have reason to believe that such is the case. The preliminary hearing had first been postponed till to-day and I understand that it has been further adjourned to June 1,

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


[Stage Direction]
On the orders of the day:
Mr. LIGUORI LACOMBE (Laval-Two
Mountains):	The second question is this
(Translation):	Can the minister tell the
house on what day of this month will be held before the advisory committee the inquiry which is to take place in Fredericton in connection with the application for release filed by Mr. Camillien Houde?
Mr. SPEAKER (Text):: Perhaps the minister will say what the question is.
Mr. ST. LAURENT: The hon. member inquires whether I can state the date upon which the advisory committee will consider the request of Camillien Houde for a review of his case. I am not in a position to state the date. I can say that the advisory committee is on its way to Fredericton, if it has not yet arrived there. It is expected to arrive this afternoon. It has seventeen files to consider, and it is the practice that the members of the committee themselves determine in what order each of these cases will be proceeded with.



WAR APPROPRIATION BILL


[Stage Direction]
The house resumed from Tuesday, May 23, consideration in committee of a resolution to grant to His Majesty certain sums of money for the carrying out of measures consequent upon the existence of a state of war-Mr. . Ilsley-Mr. Bradette in the chair.

[Stage Direction]
Mines and geology branch-development of tar-sands of Alberta. Remodelling and expansion of plant of Abasand Oils, Limited, $500,000.
Thomas Alexander Crerar: Mr. Chairman, it might be useful and helpful to the committee if I gave a statement, which I shall make as brief as possible, in the nature of a summary of the developments in the tar sands of northern Alberta, which has been receiving the consideration and assistance of the government now for the past few years. When the government first became interested in a financial way in this development it was through the Department of Munitions and Supply. Before I touch upon that, however, it might be useful to look back over the years very briefly and get the background for this development.
These oil sands or, as they were commonly called, tar sands, were first noticed by Mackenzie when he made his trip down the Mackenzie river to the Arctic in 1789, if my memory is correct. At various times since then notice has been taken of them. From time to time a great many stories came out until the tar sands of the Athabaska area became a sort of legend in Canada. I recall over fifty years ago stories circulating on the prairies of western Canada of the wonderful sands that existed in the far northern country. In 1914 some sixty tons of the sands were taken to Edmonton by rather costly means of transportation, and were used for street paving purposes. Later in 1926 and 1927 over 33,000 square yards of roads and paths were paved in Jasper park with these sands. The interesting thing to record in both these cases is that the roads have stood the test of time in the years that have gone by since the material was laid down, which indicates that at any rate these sands have a real practical value for road-making purposes.
In 1915 the government of the day reserved over 2,000 acres from any alienation whatever by the crown, and this was later definitely confirmed by order in'council. In 1930, as hon. members of the committee are aware, the resources were transferred to the provinces, and Alberta received the so-called tar sand area in the northern part of that province along with its timber and land. Since that time the complete control and administration of these tar sands in Alberta, with the exception of the few thousand acres that were reserved by the federal government, have been under the control of Alberta.
Beginning in 1922 and in subsequent years the university of Alberta carried on experimental work to determine if possible What practical value the oil sands had in the production of fuel oil. Those experiments resulted in a process by which the oil, or to describe it more correctly, the bitumen, could be separated from the sands. It might be mentioned, too, that about twenty years ago, or a little more, a substantial quantity of those sands was shipped to Great Britain for testing purposes by a company there which was interested generally in the recovery of oil from various kinds of material.


Mr. MacNICOL:: In what year was this?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: About twenty years ago, I think, in 1922 or 1923. In 1935 a company known as the Abasand Oils Limited) was formed. This company consisted wholly of private
3212	COMMONS
War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
capital, and they leased a hundred acres of what was known as the Horse River area in Alberta. I might say that this was leased to them from the portion retained by the federal government. This was a new venture. I think it is important to note here that in a development of this kind new ground has to be broken. I know of no other place in the world where as large a similar occurrence is found, and consequently the matter of the commercial exploitation, of these sands quite obviously depended on a great many factors that were at that time wholly unknown. All that the Abasand company had to go on was that a process of separation of the bitumen from the sand had been worked out with a fair, or perhaps I might say, good measure of success.
The shipment to Britain did not result in any particular increase of knowledge regarding the manner in which these sands could be treated. As I recall that case, if my memory serves me rightly, the federal government bore the expense of transporting the sand to Edmonton, and from Edmonton thereafter the whole expense was borne by the British company.
In the initial stages of its operations the Abasand company naturally ran into a good many difficulties. As I stated a moment ago, it was practically new ground. In the initial years, and indeed up to the present time, its work had to be very largely of an experimental character. At any rate they got along to the point where the plant was operating fairly steadily in 1941. But the results they reached clearly indicated that a great deal of work still remained to be done before there could be a successful exploitation of those resources. In the latter part of 1941 this plant was destroyed by fire, and for the time being operations ceased completely. In the early summer of 1942 the plant was rebuilt and operated intermittently for several months.
That is the brief story of the development, apart from any government participation up to that period. In 1942, as hon. members are fully aware, the gasoline situation became increasingly more difficult. I need not here recount the reasons for that. Submarine warfare was at its highest peak at that time. A lot of oil tankers were being sunk by submarine action and the oil, of course, was lost. It therefore became a matter of great concern to the government here how best to deal with that situation. One of the proposals considered was the possibility of exploiting commercially the oil sands in northern Alberta. At that time this work was all under the [Mr. CrerarJ
direction of the oil controller of the Department of Munitions and Supply; and in 1942, through the agency of the oil controller, arrangements were made with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company to do certain work. This was fully covered in a statement made by my colleague, the Minister of Munitions and Supply, on April 14, 1943.
Under the agreement with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company three main tasks were assigned to them. It might be useful if I gave them in brief form to the committee. Under the arrangements made with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company, that company undertook to do the following work:
Test drilling of the bituminous sands areas in the vicinity of Fort McMurray, Alberta, to provide reliable information as to the thickness and richness of the sands and the extent and location of areas which might support large scale developments, including data on depth of overburden and on all other relative factors;
Studies at the plant near Fort McMurray of the Abasand Oils Limited, such as checking costs and efficiency of mining and extractive operations and making test refinery runs;
Inquire into research and development work on the processing of tar sands, to include the utilizing of the facilities of research laboratories and/or commercial refineries in Canada or the United States to discover by actual experiment and trial runs what kinds and quantities of products can be produced from bitumen extracted from the tar sands.
I do not wish to comment adversely upon the work of the Abasand company, but looking in retrospect at the work carried on from the time it first put in a plant about 1935 gives me the impression that they proceeded without full knowledge of the factors involved in making a commercial success. For instance, one of the important things in the successful development of such a project is not only the quality of the sands but the cost of getting them from the beds to the point where they are to be treated. There is an overburden of as much as 150 feet in some cases, although in other cases it is less. These tar sands cannot be mined in the way that coal or mineral ores are mined; you cannot sink a shaft and proceed to take out the sands and bring them to the place of treatment. Apparently the only method by which the sands can be obtained is to remove the overburden and then take the sands to the place where the required treatment is given.

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
The committee will have noted that there were three points upon which the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company were asked to provide information. I might interject here to state that the total cost of this work was approximately $132,000. After they had carried on the work they made a report which was tabled in the house on April 15, 1943, and was thus made available to hon. members. The Consolidated Mining and Smelting company have been a successful mining organization and they have many high-class technical men in their employ. Naturally their recommendations carried a great deal of weight. I shall not refer to the report at any length, but it contained a number of recommendations as follows:
The continuation of the drilling programme in the Steepbank river area and elsewhere;
Making certain alterations to the plant of Abasand Oils Limited so that more complete operating data can be secured;
The securing of complete data on the kind and quality of products which could be made from Athabaska tar sands;
The preparation of plans and estimates to indicate the capital expenditure, operating costs, transportation and marketing problems which would be involved in the construction of a large scale development.
The oil controller and the technical officers of the Department of Mines and Resources gave careful study to this report. If anything, the need for fuel oil had increased. It was decided after careful consideration to enter into an arrangement with the Abasand company. It had certain works on the ground, although incomplete, which provided a basis upon which a real test could be made. As a result an agreement was entered into with the Abasand company, which was tabled in the house on May 20, 1943. That agreement fully sets out the conditions of the arrangements that were made with the company. I shall outline them briefly.
The government advances all costs necessary to construct a new plant and carry on the operations, on the security of all the assets of the company. Second, the construction and operation remains with the company, but the government has the final word. I may say here that some new directors were placed on the board of the Abasand company, men who had general experience in mining work. The manner in which the Abasand company proceeded from that time on was subject to the approval of the director of the mines and geology branch of the Department of Mines and Resources.
At the expiry of the agreement the government has the first option of taking over the whole enterprise upon fair and equitable terms without any allowance for good will. We took over the assets of the old Abasand company. If the government wishes to retain them and there is disagreement with the original owners as to the value of such assets as may be taken over, there is provision for the matter being adjudicated in the exchequer court. The first step which was taken after this was done was, as I said a moment ago, a reorganization of the company, and the introduction of new management. The first matter which engaged attention after this step was taken was to what extent the existing plant was suitable for carrying on the work required so as to have a complete test made of the commercial possibilities of these sands. It is on this point that a difference of opinion exists, I believe.
All I can say is that the best advice the Abasand company could get was secured. That advice was checked by the technical officers in the mines branch of the Department of Mines and Resources. Every step taken in the alteration of the plant and in the work carried on in connection with it was taken only after careful consideration and after agreement between the technical men of the Abasand company and those of the Department of Mines and Resources. It was found that it was not possible to secure a fair test with the existing plant. In the first place it was not properly designed; in the second place it was out of balance as between its various factors, and, in the third place, it was so constructed that it was practically impossible to make the change over to the kind of plant it was- considered necessary to have in order to give a fair test on the whole operation.
There was the problem not only of rebuilding the plant but of getting a water supply to it. First, if there was to be commercial operation throughout the year, then there must be a steady water supply, because the process of separation depends almost entirely on water. That is my understanding of it. These sands are immersed in hot water, agitated over a certain length of time, and in that process of agitation the particles of oil which adhere to the grains of sand are detached, come to the surface, flow off, and form the bitumen, which is the first step in the process of getting oil.
In addition, a water supply had to be secured
for fire fighting purposes. I believe there was



War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
some criticism by the hon. member for Davenport (Mr. MacNicol) with respect to the removal of some tanks-presumably oil storage tanks-across the stream, for other purposes. One tank was moved as a water reservoir for protection purposes. It can readily be understood that in a plant like this, which processes inflammable materials, it is necessary to have most complete protection against fire.
There have been some exaggerated statements made respecting the town site. If this process was to be given a fair test, it was necessary to provide facilities for the people who would be doing the work. The committee should remember that this whole operation was still very much in the experimental stage a point to which I shall refer in greater detail in a moment. It contemplated operations which might last over a considerable period of time. If employees are working in a plant, particularly one located several hundred miles north of Edmonton, they must at least be given comfortable quarters, or reasonably comfortable quarters, in which to live.
I am not saying that here and there mistakes might not have been made. I confess frankly that I am no more competent than any other member of the committee to judge on that point. But I do wish to dissociate myself fully from any criticism that there was reckless and foolish expenditure of money. There was not.
I have no doubt hon. members will be fully aware of the fact that in the last few years it has been extremely difficult to get the necessary labour to carry on this work near Waterways. There is no place in Canada where labour has been more difficult to secure in the last two years than it has been in northern British Columbia and northern Alberta. There has been work in connection with building the highway for military purposes from Terrace to Prince Rupert. There has been the Canol project in the Mackenzie River valley. Then, the building of the Alaska highway made heavy drafts on labour, and it was very difficult to get the labour required to carry on the work of, shall I say, rejuvenating the Abasand company's plant at Fort McMurray.
Another difficulty arose in connection with the priority on materials and equipment. As hon. members know, materials have been scarce, and this fact contributed to delays in having the work completed. It is now, however, pretty well advanced. The separation plant is practicaly completed, and it is anticipated that the changes in the refinery will be completed by September 1. We shall then have a well-balanced plant, and one which can be efficiently and, we hope, economically operated.

But let me add that this does not provide a commercial plant for commercial purposes, a fact which I cannot emphasize too often. After all, this is an experimental plant, or, if you like, a pilot plant. There are many problems to be solved before the exploitation of these sands can result in commercial success. There is nothing new in that principle. For instance, I remember the facts associated with the formation of one of the larger mining companies in Canada, the name of which I shall not give.
They found a large body of base metal ore of a very complex character, completely new in mining experience. There was no question that the body of ore was there and no question that it had base metal elements in it, but there was no known process by which this ore could be treated to extract the metals from it. The whole project started with experimental work in the laboratories of the department of mines in Ottawa and in a mines laboratory in Denver, Colorado. The company spent approximately one million dollars in building a pilot or experimental plant. After it had been constructed the company found that they had to make changes in it. They found that the experience derived from the laboratory tests did not always carry through when it came to large scale operations. That case is analogous to the plant of the Abasand company. When it gets into operation it will, I am convinced, be on a basis that will afford the fairest possible test of what can be done with the bitumen in these tar sands.


Mr. JOHNSTON (Bow River):: When do they expect to get into operation?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The separation plant will, I hope, commence operations on June 1, and the refinery about September 1. It is necessary if you are going to have a fair test to operate the year round, because you might have a process that might work well in summer and not work nearly as well in cold winter weather. So that in order to have a commercial development you must find a process that can operate three hundred and sixty-five days a year. That I think will be apparent to everyone.
I come now to practically the concluding part of what I have to say, and here I wish to sound a note of caution about the possibilities of these sands. The Consolidated Mining and Smelting company submitted a considerable sample of the bitumen to Universal Oil Products, a firm of oil chemists-I do not know whether I am describing them quite correctly-in the city of Chicago who have had long and varied experience in work of this kind. They tested the bitumen that was

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
submitted to them and reported-it is worth while to note this-that 22 per cent by volume would be recovered as aviation gasoline of 100 octane rating, and 17 per cent by volume would be recovered as motor fuel of from 73 to 74 octane rating, which is about the quality of the gasoline we use in our motor cars.


Charles Edward Johnston: What was the percentage of motor car gasoline?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They reported that 17 per cent by volume would be recovered as motor fuel from 73 to 74 octane rating. Also 164 per cent by volume of fuel oil would be available for sale; that is the cheaper fuel oil that might be used, for instance, in diesel tractors. The total saleable products in high grade gasoline, lower grade gasoline and fuel oil would be 55-5 per cent. Some use might also be found for the residue. The percentages I have given and the qualities of these percentages give some indication of what could be recovered from the bitumen on a large scale operation.


Charles Edward Johnston: Would it
be a commercial success?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I shall deal with that in a moment. Assuming that our pilot or experimental plant works out, that you can get the sands from their present beds transported to the plant, get them through the plant and make the separation, and then in the refinery make the breakdown on the basis, let us say, of the report presented by Universal Oil Products, you would then have a large-scale operation, and of course the larger the scale of operation the better the chance there is of reducing the costs.
Universal Oil Products estimate the cost of constructing a refinery to treat 5,000 barrels of bitumen per calendar day at $8,700,000 in United States funds, which, if you include sales tax, duty and exchange, would be approximately $12,000,000 in Canadian funds. Those figures do not include the cost of mining or the cost of a separation plant. The cost of a separation plant is not nearly so large as *the cost of a refinery, because it simply provides the vats into which the sand and hot water is poured and an agitation carried on, much as hon. members have seen in gold mining using the cyanide process. Once you get the bitumen off, the real job starts. It is very difficult to give any estimate of cost. In fact I would hesitate to give any estimates of cost because they are really little more than guesses. I do not believe in guessing in a matter of this kind. I have always in my experience wanted the facts before me and
100-203J
then analysed and weighed them, and on such an analysis reached a conclusion as to the wise action to be taken.
That is the story up to the present time. A great deal of information has yet to be secured before any definite conclusion can be reached that the project is capable of successful commercial development. I might mention two or three factors. There is first of all the sands. Drilling is going on, and we propose to carry on that drilling this year under the Department of Mines and Resources, separate wholly from the Abasand company. That drilling is being carried on to determine, first, the amount of overburden on the sands; second, the richness of the sands; third, their quality. Some sands are very coarse; some are fine. As a matter of fact, in a commercial operation the fine sand which may be coated with these oil particles is much more expensive and difficult to treat than is the coarse sand. But the drilling has revealed that frequently when, starting at the top, going down through 40, 50 or 100 feet of overburden, you reach the sands, you may have a layer of coarse sands with oil; then you may have a layer of thin sands. In a good many of the drill holes they have run across layers of sand interspersed with clay seams.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is not the difficulty in their pilot plant now, because they are not even attempting to do that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No, but what I am getting at is this, that if you clear off fifty feet of overburden, and you find: five feet of sand, and then two feet of clay, and then some lean sand under that, and again below that some coarse sand, you have certain problems in mining the sands and getting them out. I do not know, and as yet, so far as I am aware, no one knows, what effect clay particles in these sands may have on the separation of the oil from the sands. It may not present any problem at all, but that is something which must be and can be worked out in a pilot plant, in the experimental plant which we shall soon have in operation.
Beyond that, there are the tests to be made of whether you can reach the same results as were attained, for instance, by the Universal Oil Products in their laboratory tests in Chicago and in the tests which in a smaller way have been made in our own laboratories in the mines branch. There is the problem of disposing of the overburden. You go out on a level area of sands; you have to scoop off say forty or fifty feet of overburden, where are you going to put it? There is the problem of the disposal of the sands once they are separated from the bitumen in the plant. You
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pile them up like tailings at a mine; you must get some process, some way of disposing of them, of getting them out of your way. I would point out that all these items are factors in the costs in the final determination of whether the project can be successfully developed or not.


Charles Edward Johnston: What is the total expenditure by the government up to date?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that up to the present time we have advanced about $800,000. In addition there is what is estimated in this vote.


Charles Edward Johnston: Has all the $800,000 been spent?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No, about $766,000 has been spent to March 31 last. I have no hesitation in asking the committee to support this vote. There may be differences of opinion among hon. members whether we have dealt wisely with the project up to the present time. I have endeavoured to inform the committee of some of the difficulties we encountered. I feel assured that this asset is worth a fair test to determine its commercial possibilities. I repeat that the plant on which we are expending this money and the work which is being done at the present time should be looked upon as experimental. It is test work at a pilot plant. Doubtless when you start operating a plant through which several hundred tons will go every day, changes and improvements will be made. But the end to which we are working is the most complete and economical test which can be made, having in mind the possibility of the development of this area.


Charles Edward Johnston: What check has the minister or his department to ensure that there is no wastage of money at the plant?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: All expenditures must be approved by the director of the mines and geology branch, and he has his technical advisers in the department. Also there is a treasury officer who sees to it that the money is spent in accordance with the purposes for which it is allocated. I think there is a very complete check.


Charles Edward Johnston: What check is there down at the plant?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The accounts of the plant comprising the operations of the superintendent are audited regularly, and can be checked against the allocations of money.


Charles Edward Johnston: But the government has no superintendent right there to see that moneys are properly spent and the

work is properly performed. They just take the estimates sent in by the officials, and they are checked here by the minister's department.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I omitted to say that when it was decided practically to reconstruct the plant, that job was entrusted to the General Engineering Company of Canada. That company has a long and honourable record and a very wide experience. I believe it is associated with companies of a similar kind in Great Britain. They have built and installed the equipment of many of our successful mines.


Charles Edward Johnston: Are they still in operation there?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They are supervising the construction. Once the construction is completed their task is finished. We engaged them because of their experience; we believed they would build this plant in accordance with the * best principles of successful operations, and do it more economically than anyone else could do.


Charles Edward Johnston: Are they on a contract basis, on a day basis, or on salary?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that they are on a contract basis.


Charles Edward Johnston: Every building which they put up is on a contract basis?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They do it on a management fee basis. We check the costs and pay them a certain management fee. That is the basis on which a great deal of construction work done by the Department of Munitions and Supply for war purposes has been carried on.


Mr. McDONALD (Pontiac):: What is the daily capacity of this experimental plant which it is intended to build?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: About 600 tons a day of twenty-four hours' continuous operation.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I want to thank the
minister for his courtesy to me on Monday evening last when I had to leave the city to give an address on the following day in connection with western matters. It was kind of him, because I did want to have something to say about this vote. I am going to support the vote, not oppose it. Apart from the hon. member for Athabaska (Mr. Dechene), who I am glad to see in his place, I do not know of anyone in this house who has been to Fort McMurray. There may be others but I do not know of them. I have been there on several occasions.


An hon. MEMBER:: You are forgetting the member for Bow River (Mr. Johnston).

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


John Ritchie MacNicol: I asked the member for Bow River and he told me he had not been there. If he has been there since then, well and good; he will be able to follow what I am going to say. I do not speak from what I read but from observation.
At the outset I wish to assure the minister that there is nothing personal in any criticism that I offer. I hope he will not take anything personal out of the remarks I make. I think a good deal of the minister and I realize that he has had much to do as Minister of Mines and Resources. If he has not been at Fort McMurray he could not be expected to devote his time to this particular item, out of the thousands of matters to which he has to attend. I know that he has been terrifically busy, and so has the Minister of Munitions and Supply (Mr. Howe).


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I have been at Fort McMurray twice.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Was the minister at the plant?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes, once-the original
plant?


John Ritchie MacNicol: Since 1941?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No; that was in 1938.


John Ritchie MacNicol: They were not in operation in 1938; the plant started in 1941. In any event, I am not rising in any critical spirit. I feel it is my duty to do what I can to bring about the production- of oil at Fort McMurray from the Alberta tar sands. If a quantity large enough can be produced to be piped down to Edmonton, as I hope it will be, I am satisfied that that fine city will grow to a quarter of a million within ten or fifteen years. I believe that will be possible if the refineries are built there. Edmonton by pipeline to Fort McMurray would be distant about 250 miles; it is 305 by rail.
This is my objective; my purpose is not to criticize but to offer something constructive. As I say, I am going to support this vote, and I will support any other votes intended to promote the development of the Alberta tar sands. But I ask myself just how many millions have already been expended on the tar sands in one way or another. This is not a matter that affects only the present Minister of Mines and Resources. All the ministers who have gone before him, back to 1913, have been interested in the matter, and the same is true of all parties that have governed the country back to that time. It is not a party question, and what I say is not by way of criticism of the minister or of any of the ministers that have preceded him. Nevertheless, I ask myself how many millions have
been spent in one way or another to produce oil at Fort McMurray. I was there on a number of different occasions and I surveyed the situation up and down in every direction. I saw the ruins of one plant on the Christine river and one on the Clearwater river, and the plant, or what it is hoped will be a plant, on the Horse river, and the other plant about forty miles down the river built by the International Bitumen company. All these companies must have spent a great deal of money. How did they come to go there? They went there in consequence of reports sent out for the most part by the Department of Mines and Resources. It was through their engineers that these reports and pamphlets were sent out. I myself became interested through reading a pamphlet written by Doctor
S.	C. Ells. As far back as 1913, Doctor Ells, who is a capable geologist, was in that part of Alberta, and I presume he went up and down, if not every year, at any rate every other year. He has been in that part of the country for the department and has written many articles which have inspired producers everywhere and encouraged engineers from the remotest parts of the world to visit that area. I am not going to thresh old straw to-day; I am not going to repeat what I have said on former occasions; I wish to put something new on the record. Engineers whose names I have mentioned in previous addresses, men eminent in their profession, agreed with the report sent out by the Department of Mines and Resources, or, as it was formerly known, the Department of the Interior, indicating that there is a very large deposit of oil in these sands.
The American Bureau of Resources at Washington, through their engineers, state that there is five times as much oil contained in the tar sands as that to be found in the whole world. Whether that is so I am not going to argue, but I do know that various reports were sent out on this subject, and looking up some of these reports to-day I came across an article not referred to on a former occasion, written by a gentleman named C. Bruder in the Nor'West Farmer in January, 1942. Mr. Bruder heads his article "Oil in the Bank", and he writes:
There's ten thousand square miles of that up here.
That is, the oil sands.
Those tar sands contain enough oil to lick Hitler, Japan, and Italy. Enough oil to put diesel power on every western -farm and to asphalt all the highways from Halifax to Vancouver.
He says that there is more oil there than in all the proven oil fields of the world,
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according to United States engineers' estimates-250 billion barrels, five times the estimated reserves of all the oil fields of the world. It was strong statements such as this, sent out by the department itself, that resulted in the investment of millions in that part of the country. This investment is also in large part the result of investigations carried on ever since 1913. I congratulate all the departments on what they did in the way of investigation, but I am not a bit satisfied with what is being done now, and I shall give my reasons as I go on.
The minister said that $132,000 had been paid to the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company for their investigation. I do not know whether that was in 1942 or 1943-


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Some was in 1942 and some in 1943.


John Ritchie MacNicol: That is the total? The Minister of Munitions and Supply said that to the end of last year the amount spent by the Consolidated company was $112,000. Therefore the minister's figures carry over into 1944.
The minister referred to an investigation made in England back in 1922. I know nothing about that investigation, but I did hear that one was made, and I saw a report of an investigation said to have been made some time in the thirties. I have not been able to find out the exact year; whether it was 1934, 1935, or 1936 I do not know. Doctor Ells, testifying before the reconstruction committee on November 30, 1943, stated that it might have been about that time, and that he personally had dispatched two carloads of tar sands to Wales for testing. I spoke to an engineer and the impression I got was that those sands had been sent to Freeman at Cardiff; whether that is true or not I do not know. Freeman, who is a great scientist in this business, is said to have made a test and discovered that out of each ton of tar sands 36-7 gallons of crude oil were produced. Doctor Ells stated to the committee on November 30, 1943, that his memory was that the test, whether Freeman's or some other, cost about $500,000.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I might tell my hon. friend that it did not cost the government anything more than the cost of transporting the sands to Edmonton.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I do not know that the two incidents are the same. Are they the same? Evidently Doctor Ells did not know or had forgotten on November 30 last that the test was made many years prior to 1930, because I stated before the committee that my

information was that the sands were sent over in the middle thirties. I was given that information by an engineer, but I cannot recall his name at the moment. However, it is neither here nor there. Doctor Ells' statement was that it had cost $500,000.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I understand Doctor Ells stated somewhere that the cost to this company in Britain was $500,000.


John Ritchie MacNicol: No. I have his statement here. He did not say who paid the money. I got the impressison that it cost the government $500,000. I may be wrong in that. If I am, I am subject to corection. When the Minister of Munitions and Supply was speaking earlier in the year, I believe on March 21, as recorded on page 1728 of Hansard, he said that the government, up to that time, had spent $900,000 on the work going on at Fort McMurray. That is probably correct, according to the minister's own figures to-day. Then we have this vote of $500,000, which I am going to support. Therefore in the aggregate many millions of dollars have been spent in connection with the Alberta oil or tar sands, or bitumen sands-they are called all three.
How did the government get into this business? That is the question I ask myself. Then I look back into the records, and what do I find? I find that the minister himself said to-day-and it was quite correct-that the shortage of gasoline and the necessities of the war had encouraged the government to go into the business of producing oil at Fort McMurray. I may say right here that I am wholly opposed to government plants of this nature, for the very good reason that no government plants can be operated as economically as a private plant. It cannot be done, because it just runs itself. There is no necessity for anybody to exert himself to do anything in a government-operated plant. When I hear people talk about industries being operated by the government I think back over my thirty years' experience or more in industry and I feel sorry when I hear such a statement. Here is an example of a government operation that has now cost away beyond anything that it should have for the reasons that are associated with government-operated plants.
How did the government get into the business? Mr. Haanel, testifying before the committee on November 30, 1943, stated that:
Up to 1930 the rate of discovery of new oilfields was capable of keeping pace with the mounting demand. But since that year has greatly declined. In the United States, for example, the rate of discovery of new oil reserves has for several years been scarcely one-third of the rate of consumption.

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
If that is a fact it would be one very good reason why it was necessary to produce oil at Fort McMurray. He also stated that in Canada in 1941 we produced 10-1 million barrels of oil and imported 55-4 million barrels, and that Canada imported 87 per cent of her oil requirements. That is a very good reason why Canada should produce oil from every available source. Here was one source; the Alberta oil sands, a very good source from which to produce oil.
I come now to the agreement which was entered into on April 1, 1943. The minister referred to this agreement. The very first paragraph reads as follows:
Whereas the oil controller, Department of Munitions and Supply, has recommended to the government that for the purpose of more effectively prosecuting the war in which His Majesty is presently engaged all possible sources of new oil supplies in Canada should be investigated and put into production if such is found feasible.
There was every reason why the greatest effort should be made to produce oil anywhere, and particularly, because of this vote, at Fort McMurray, as I have always been led to believe it could be produced there. Therefore (he government decided to do something. The government did not enter blindly into an agreement with Abasand. Right here I must correct the minister. Before the committee on November 30, one of the officials disputed my assertion, but I am going to state it again bluntly and strongly. The Abasand company with which the government is dealing is not the Abasand company which built the 1942 plant. The government took over the works from the Abasand company, but there is no official belonging to the original Abasand company working there to-day, that I know of. Max Ball, the former manager, is in the United States. The next official is living in Edmonton. A few of the employees may be there. The plant is operated by the government, not by the original Abasand company. So far as I know, the old Abasand have nothing to do with it, and are not responsible for the operation of this new plant.
I said a moment ago that the government did not go blindly into this thing. They appointed the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company to make an investigation. They made an investigation. I was up there in 1942. I met the engineers on the job. I saw them making investigations. The minister gave their recommendations and the results of their investigations. To make it emphatic I am going to cite a few remarks from the report. This is what the report says:
(1) As to the process-
We heard the minister say that some new plant has been erected. I want the facts and
figures to prove that; because so far as my photographs go it is the same line of construction as that which preceded it. In any event what did they say about the process? This is what they say:
-we are of the opinion that the process of Abasand Oils Limited for separating the bitumen from the sands is a practical one, which could .be used in a large scale plant and which would yield reasonable results.
Could anything be plainer than that? The next clause covers equipment:
The equipment in the Abasand separation plant is largely standard equipment and little difficulty is anticipated in adapting the process to a large scale operation.
We believe that a well designed and equipped plant based on the present process would give satisfactory operation.
To arrange with Abasand to expedite contemplated changes in separation plant and refinery-
That is, the government must arrange for them to do that. As far as I know the Abasand people had planned for everything.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No.


John Ritchie MacNicol: 
Mr.   ROAVE@: Who pulled it down?


John Ritchie MacNicol: I presume it was done on orders from the department. I have a picture of the plant here. Why was it pulled down? It was pulled down because someone told the men on the job that the plant should be put down in the pit so that they would not have to bring the sand up to the mill. Then after they had started to place the plant down in the sand pit, which is about fifteen to twenty feet deep, someone told them that the Horse river would overflow and drown out the plant. They then proceeded to erect it again and I believe it is now constructed just where it was before. I am not censuring anyone, but someone must be responsible for this needless waste of public money.
This plant had been erected in 1942 and had operated intermittently, as the minister has said. The refinery had been built to take care of from two hundred to three hundred barrels per day, whereas the separation plant could produce four hundred. The refinery could not absorb the full production of the separation plant, and yet in seventy days, according to the statement of the Minister of Munitions and Supply, they produced 11,000 odd barrels of oil. That is a plant that was pulled down and is now being rebuilt.
I am for this vote. I am for anything that will help to rebuild the plant that was destroyed. When I go up there next summer I 
expect to find exactly the same separator that operated in 1942. I may be wrong and I shall not be able to tell until I get there, but go I will if I can to see what has been done. I am anxious that oil should be obtained from these tar sands to be used in the prosecution of the war. That is why the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company was sent up there to investigate. Since that time we have had two years of war, 1943 and 1944, and up to date not a barrel of oil has been produced.
The old company should have been left in charge, because they were the only ones who knew how to extract oil from these sands. They had discovered how to do this after many years of trial and error and they were doing a pretty good job. According to one report I have, they produced 30,000 barrels of oil in 1941, even with the difficulties they had to overcome, one of which was in connection with mining. I was there when the mining difficulty was overcome.


Mr. ROWE:: How much have they produced
since?


John Ritchie MacNicol: There was nothing produced in 1943 and nothing in 1944. The latest report I have is that they will not be producing anything until next fall.


William Earl Rowe: They may pull it down by that time.


John Ritchie MacNicol: That is a very good interjection. So far as I can find out the men on the job there to-day have had nothing whatever to do with the extracting of oil from tar sands. Unless they follow the Abasand procedure they will have to develop their process by trial and error. That is what I expect they will do. I do not want to pass any comments about anyone's ability, but the manager is an oil man from Petrolia, Ontario. We all know how much oil sands there are around Petrolia. There the oil is pumped out of wells. If working there gives a man sufficient experience to operate an oil sands plant, then I might just as well hang out my shingle as a doctor, and I know nothing about medicine.
Coming back to the agreement, which I think is important. The government entered into an agreement, which was not followed by those operating the plant. What was the agreement? It states:
And whereas the government during the past thirty years has investigated the extent and quality of northern Alberta bituminous (or tar) sand deposits and the most conclusive results to date is that the Horse River reserve, near McMurray, is known to contain substantial

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
deposits which, because of their grade, location and volume have the most immediate potential importance for petroleum production.
And whereas the contractor has carried on investigations since 1930-
Here again I wish to interject that that is not quite correct. The Abasand company did carry on from 1930, but not the present contractor. The agreement continues:
And whereas the contractor has carried on investigations since 1930 into machinery and processes for mining the Alberta tar sands, extracting the bitumen, and refining petroleum products therefrom.
And whereas the oil controller, Department of Munitions and Supply, and the director of mines and geology branch, Department of Mines and Resources, recognizing the necessity of exploring all possibilities of producing petroleum products greatly needed in this emergency and afterwards, have recommended that a test or pilot plant should be developed for the purpose of proving what can be produced from the Alberta bituminous or tar sands-
Well, Mr. Chairman, if they had only kept on with the plant that was there, they would have got somewhere. And, had a new refinery been put up, or had the present refinery been enlarged, in 1943 and 1944 they would have perhaps produced not less than 50,000 barrels of oil. In contrast to that, we have nothing so far as the production of oil is concerned.
What was the next step? It was to take over the plant. On April 14 the Minister of Munitions and Supply said. "We are simply taking it over." That is not the Abasand company; that is the government. He said:
We are simply taking it over to conduct certain experiments. We hope to recover from paving material produced for the Alaska highway the costs we expend, and the property will not be returned until the money is recovered.
Then, in another place:
We hope to have a small commercial operation as a by-product of the research this summer.
That was last summer, 1943. The minister was optimistic. If only he himself had been able to go there, I venture to say he would have produced oil. Then he said:
We hope to have a small commercial operation, as a by-product of the research this summer, producing bituminous material for the Alaska highway, so that there will be some revenue to offset the expenditure.
Well, there has not been any revenue from oil for the Alaska highway, as everybody knows. I will not say anything about it. Everybody knows what position it is in to-day.
What was this to cost? In his statement the minister said:
Developments within recent weeks, following upon the insistence of the oil controller for constructive plans, have included the proviisonal taking over of the management of Abasand Oils Limited by Mr. Earl Smith, refinery
engineer of Canadian Oil Companies Limited, at Petrolia. Mr. Smith, in his first report, estimates that an expenditure of $268,000 will be necessary for repairs, replacements, and remodelling of the present Abasand plant-
I have no doubt that Mr. Smith is qualified, but his programme definitely was not carried out. Instead of that, the plant was torn down, for the reasons I have given, one of which was to erect it in the pit, and afterwards take it out again and put it up at the point from which it should never have been taken.
I now feel it incumbent upon me to say a word about Max Ball. I have not seen nor heard from Max Ball since 1942. I saw him at the plant when I was there making an investigation. I should like to express, as a Canadian, my sorrow at the fact that Max Ball, in, some way or other, was forced out of the plant. He is not now there. Had Max Ball been left in charge of the plant, with his staff, there is no reason under the sun why he should not have done as well in 1943 as was done in 1942, and no reason why he should not have done much better in 1944 than was done in 1943. Instead of that we have produced nothing. Most of their difficulties might have been overcome if they had not sent men up who, so far as I can ascertain, had had no experience in connection with taking oil from oil sands. Those men may have had experience in ordinary oil production, but not oil from oil sands. Had they had that experience, this comedy of errors would not have taken place, and all this unnecessary expenditure of money would have been avoided.
And yet I say I am in favour of the vote, because we are into the mess now, and we have to get out of it the best way we can. There is oil there, and if the government has to have another half million or another million, I will support such a vote.
I believe I have recorded everything in connection with oil sands that can be use-, fully recorded on this occasion. Let me say that I must confess I am deeply disappointed when I think that in 1942 an appeal was made to the house to vote a sum of money for an investigation by the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company, and in 1943 there was an appeal for another sum of money to proceed with the development of oil at Fort McMurray; in 1944 again we have set out another sum of money-and still we are producing nothing. Sonffibody is responsible for that. I do not blame the minister one iota, but I would like to see a parliamentary committee set up with power to subpoena witnesses. Let us bring here before a parliamentary committee everyone we can bring who
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can give us any advice as to how to produce oil at Fort McMurray. I would like to see Max Ball subpoenaed before such a committee, I would like to hear the evidence of his different foremen, whoever they may be. I would like an investigation made into why the agreement was not carried out. What business did anyone have to alter an agreement which had been made by the Minister of Mines and Resources, and under which it was understood that oil would be produced, at an expense of $268,000? Who has been responsible for altering this whole business-this comedy of errors, tearing the plant down, starting to put it into a pit, taking it out of -the pit, and putting it back where it was before?
The minister referred to the moving of the tanks. That may have been necessary. But so far as the building of a townsite was concerned-no, it was not necessary. The agreement in the first place was to make that plant a pilot plant. Max Ball had about 54 men working at the plant. In January last I am told there were more than 90 men working there. The latest report I have is that there are 159. If we had given Max Ball this amount, or if the country had said to Max Ball, "Here is a half million dollars" the country would have been a million dollars in, and would have had another 50,000 barrels of oil.


Mr. REID:: May I ask the hon. member a question?


John Ritchie MacNicol: Not until I finish, if the hon. member does not mind. I should like to know why competent men were displaced. I have letters from men who work in the plant. I shall not read their letters, but they say what has been going on. I should like to know why the separation plant was tom down. There must have been some gross incompetence there. Who was responsible for starting to put that plant down into the pit.


William Earl Rowe: The Minister of Munitions and Supply said he wanted to experiment.


John Ritchie MacNicol: No, I do not think the Minister of Munitions and Supply did it, and I do not think the Minister of Mines and Resources deserves criticism on that point either. Somebody was responsible for tearing that plant down. I saw it working myself. As I said, in 1942 it turned' out intermittently, 11,000 barrels in 70 days. Surely our duty was first to produce oil. It was to get a pilot plant in operation, and to ascertain whether the recommendations that were made were

satisfactory. Who gave instructions to build the townsite? It was all right, after the town-site was built, to bring in water from the Athabaska river. But we should know what we are doing. The minister will recall that when the piping was put in the trench, the welding was not done properly, and after the water was run in the trench had to be opened up again and the pipes taken out. The equipment that dug the trench in the first place had in the meantime been sent back to Edmonton. What a comedy of errors and incompetence I Somebody is responsible for such a waste of public money.
I should like to know why, instead of monkeying-that is a good word

with the separation plant which the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company had pronounced very good, and the minister said had been working fairly steadily, a larger refinery was not built. They knew that the refinery was too small. Max Ball was going to put up a larger refinery. If they had put up a larger refinery there would have been some reason for that. Lastly, I should like to know, after the Department of Mines and Resources had set out in the first place to produce oil because of the necessities of war, who was responsible for the non-production of oil at Fort McMurray. The minister said to-day that some inquiry had been made from so-and-so, in order that we might carry on the production of oil there in the winter time. No one has produced oil from the sands there in winter time. Have the men who are directing the work that is going on in that plant produced oil from tar sands in winter? No, they have not. How are they to know that the plant can produce oil in winter? They do not know. They should have left that separation plant alone. It was working very satisfactorily. They were getting the oil out of the sands, and the refinery should have been enlarged.
I believe they had a programme for taking out the sulphur that -was in the oil. I have found that the oil produced at that plant was fine oil. I have talked to the engineers at Box on lake Athabaska, and to the engineers at Yellowknife, and they told me it was first-class oil. Abasand produced all the gasoline they needed for the operation of their trucks and for their boats that went up and down the river. The plant was not in such a mess as some would lead us to believe.
I should like to see a committee of this house inquire into this question, where we could examine the men who know about oil sands, not men who do not know, how to extract oil from the sands; and then after that, let the

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
minister, if he desires, bring in an estimate for five million dollars or ten million dollars to support a plant to produce 30,000 barrels of oil a day. That would be a commercial plant which would be able to supply a refinery at Edmonton with oil required to make gasoline for farmers on the prairies.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Perhaps I might be permitted to give some information on some of the points my hon. friend has raised in his speech.
He inquired as to the total amount of money that had been spent over the years in an effort to develop these sands commercially.
I do not know what has been spent by private companies, but government expenditures up to 1932 amounted to a total of $105,000. That was spent largely in surveys and in putting in a few test pits and that sort of thing. The amount spent under the arrangement made between the Department of Munitions and Supply and Consolidated Mining and Smelting company for the purposes I indicated a short time ago was $132,000. The amount that has been advanced to the Abasand company since the agreement was made between them and the government was $850,000, and of that I understand the Abasand company has expended $766,000.
My hon. friend rather criticized the administration for going into this thing, and stated that he was opposed to government operation. I wholly agree; I do not think that government can operate a business of this kind-


William Earl Rowe: There has not been much oil come out since you went in.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: That is very true. I do not believe that government can operate a business of this kind as efficiently as private enterprise. The reason why the government made the arrangement with the Consolidated Mining and Smelting company has been stated at various times. It was embodied in the various orders in council that have been tabled. The arrangement was made because oil was needed for war purposes. That was the sole reason. Oil was desperately needed wherever it could be found. There may be a difference of opinion on the government's part in these operations. It may be said, perhaps with some force, that there was insufficient knowledge of the possibilities of getting oil out of these sands, that the time that would elapse before oil could be secured was too long to warrant the government going into it. That is a matter of opinion, and there will be a final judgment of history upon that question.


Gordon Graydon: That is a long time to wait.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We are getting the judgment of the hon. member for Davenport to-day.


Gordon Graydon: He said it was monkey business.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Does my hon. friend agree with him?


Gordon Graydon: I do not know. I am trying to find out who is right, and up to the present I think he is.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Well, I hope to add to my hon. friend's knowledge of the matter.


Gordon Graydon: Thank you.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The utmost that the Abasand company produced in 1942 was not 30,000 barrels, as the hon. member for Davenport stated, but under 10,000 barrels, according to the actual data supplied to the Department of Mines and Resources.
My hon. friend also criticized the administration on the ground that we had dispensed with competent men who were in the employ of the Abasand company giving direction to the enterprise. I have to differ directly with my hon. friend on that point. I have met Mr. Max Ball. He was an oil geologist, with a considerable reputation. But he was not an engineer. He had never had experience in designing plants, and I think that if Mr. Ball and those associated with him had got some practical men in 1935, when they went into this thing, they would have met with a great deal more success.
At this point I wish to read-and to avoid misunderstanding let me state that this is only an extract-a portion of a letter which was written by J. M. McClave to Doctor Ells about the middle of February this year. I have not the complete letter here, but the extracts bear on this particular matter, and if I may read them without being asked a moment later to table the letter I should like to do so. Mr. McClave is an oil engineer of considerable experience and reputation. He worked out what was known as the McClave process in connection with these tar sands, and the method which was being used by the Abasand company was based. I am informed, both on the experimental work done by the university of Alberta and the work done by Mr. McClave. He was associated in some capacity with the Abasand company.


John Ritchie MacNicol: They were using his equipment for separating the oil from the sand after it passed through the separation or emulsion tank.
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Thomas Alexander Crerar: I believe that is correct. In any event, Mr. McClave was at Waterways-


John Ritchie MacNicol: I met him there.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: -last year, I think. He writes:
In my last letter before leaving camp-[DOT]
That is, Waterways.
-I gave you some news about the completion of the bunkhouse and the work on the new office building. Before leaving camp November 15, 1943, they had the foundation in for the new machine shop and garage, which is located between the warehouse and the laboratory. The location of the new separating plant is on the other side of the warehouse. I did not see Paul Schmidt before leaving camp, but knew of his caustic reactions about the new construction work.
I know about how much work had to be done this winter before the wheels began to turn, viz., the machine shop had to be finished, the separating plant completed and machinery installed. The boiler house building had not been started, engine and electric power units had to be installed. Then the many details of assembly of machinery and apparatus had to be in place before starting operations. With a mild open winter this work should be completed this spring.
As I indicated this afternoon, there were delays in getting the work pushed forward rapidly because of labour problems and priority problems regarding materials.
What I would like to get over to you is that this is an engineering job and has no relation or comparison to Fitzsimmons' makeshift plant.
That is the plant further down the river.
I know when this plant is completed, we can operate twenty-four hours per day, every day.
I would like the hon. member for Davenport to note that.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Did he say, "in the year"?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No, he says "every day".
I shall have a word to say about that in a moment. I want the hon. member for Davenport to note this, because I think that Mr. McClave is an engineer of standing.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I know him very well. Mr. CRERAR: Well, this is what he says: When the General Construction Company-
He means, the General Engineering company.
-took over the first of last October all we had was a junk pile and the jig-saw puzzle of putting this junk back into a working condition is no easy job.


John Ritchie MacNicol: It is certainly a reflection on whoever ordered it tom down.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: That was Mr. McCIave's opinion about it.

In regard to the new water line from the Athabaska river this was Mr. Nielsen's job and as he had been in the oil business and was familiar with oil pipelines, I thought he had the know how for installing a mile of six-inch water line and I did not pay any attention to the work. I believe the General Construction Company have outlined a practical plan for the development of a large pilot plant and this is no time to jump on them as they are not encumbered with a magic carpet or Aladdin's lamp to guide them in their work.
You ask, "What is the matter, anyway?" The construction and operation prior to the fire in November, 1941, and the redesigning after the fire was about the extreme limit of poor design for practical operation of a separating plant. In 1940 I prepared a complete working flow sheet of a separating plant. These drawings were never used. At first, Mr. Sage, construction engineer, said he had never received the drawings. Later, I found the flow sheet plans among his other drawings. Then he stated that my plan was impractical, and from that time on I was not responsible for what happened during the next two years.
But after all, I cannot blame Mr. Sage and Mr. Byrum, as they were oil men and never had any experience in ore dressing mills. Now the engineers in charge of reconstruction have had experience in designing and operating ore dressing plants,^ and this is what we should have had in the beginning of construction instead of refinery engineers who had never -been in an ore dressing mill.
I mention this because I do not know anything personally about these matters; all I can do is to take the advice of men who should know, who are practical men.


Gordon Graydon: There is one over on this side.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I think it is not too much to say that the mistakes in designing both the plant subsequent to 1935 and the one that followed the fire lay in the fact that the designing was done largely by oil geologists and not by practical engineering people. That is why, when this arrangement was made and we were putting government money into the development of a testing plant, we wanted to get the very best technical assistance we could find, and I have no hesitation in saying that in my judmment the General Engineering company are unsurpassed in their knowledge and ability to do that kind of work.
My hon. friend made some criticism of the town site. I do not wish to add to what I said previously about that. You must provide the necessary staff-there is a considerable operating personnel in both the plant and the office work-at a place like McMurray with decent quarters in which to live. They may call it a town site or a city site or a village site. What was aimed at was the provision of accommodation which was designed and built to meet reasonable needs.
My hon. friend had a comment to make about wintertime production. I rather differ

War Appropriation-Mines
and Resources
from him there; I think it is very important to ascertain whether or not operations can be conducted in winter weather at that plant.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Of course I agree, but I say it had not been done.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It was not done in the past, but in the new set-up it is intended to carry on these duties throughout the year. The margin for profitable operation in any event will, I think, be very, very small, even if all the difficulties are overcome. It is quite possible that if you get large-scale operations, day and night, 365 days in the year, the overhead expense can be cut to the point where it can be made a commercial proposition.
Therefore the expenditure in this plant is designed to provide that test. Whether it will, I cannot say, but I can assure the members of the committee and the hon. member for Davenport, for whom I have the highest respect, because he is one member of the House of Commons who has endeavoured to inform himself on these matters, that what we aim at is to get the most complete test we can, since it is only on that basis of known facts that commercial operation for the future is possible. .


John Ritchie MacNicol: May I make one correction in regard to the amount of oil produced in 1941? I find that everyone has different figures. It is so hard to get figures that fit in with other estimates. Doctor Ells knows all about Abasand; he knows what is produced there and in the June, 1942, issue of the Canadian Geographical Journal he states:
Nevertheless, production during the period May 19-September 30, 1941, amounted to approximately 17,000 barrels of crude.
I had said 30,000 barrels because my recollection was that was the figure sent to me by the Abasand company. Doctor Ells states it is 17,000 and now the minister quotes a figure a few thousand less. That is our trouble. We never get correct figures that agree. As regards the McClave system, I thoroughly understand it. It was in operation in 1941 and 1942 in both plants. I did not see any difference as between 1941 and 1942. It works very simply. It is a system such as you would see in a gold mining plant. It has a flotation tank. It takes the emulsion of hot water and oil that flows out of the large revolving tank in which the sand is placed first, and when it flows out of the separation tank it goes into the McClave stationary flotation tank in which the sand in time goes to the bottom and at the top the oil is fluffed off from one comer into the sedimentation tanks. Shortly after, it receives a dilutent and then it goes from the sedimentation tank to the refinery. The
trouble at the Abasand plant was that the refinery was too small for the amount of oil produced. What amazes me is that the separation plant was pulled down. It was equipped with McClave's own apparatus. I may observe in passing that the last time I was there McClave slept, not in the same bed but in the same room, with me. I found him a very capable man. What I want to know is whether the new plant will have the McClave process installed and the same revolving emulsion tank?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We do not differ on the process. The difficulty was not in the process of treatment. There is no criticism of the Abasand company's process in their operations in 1941 and 1942. It was rather in connection with the lay-out of their plant, the general design of it and the construction, which was not such as to give the most effective and economical operation. I may tell the hon. member that this data I have is taken from the reports of the Abasand company, and in 1941 the total virgin crude produced, namely, the bitumen as it comes from, the sands, was 20,282 barrels.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I thought the minister said a few moments ago 11,000.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No; I was speaking of 1942. This is 1941. In 1941 the total virgin crude produced was 20,282 barrels.


John Ritchie MacNicol: In 1941?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes. In 1942, after they had the new plant going, it was 9,958 barrels.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I total the figures in the report as about 11,000 barrels.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not know that it is of a great deal of importance. This is contained-


John Ritchie MacNicol: In a report.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes. The information is contained in the report made by the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company of Canada, which was tabled in the house.


William Earl Rowe: How much was produced in 1943?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They were not operating in 1943.


William Earl Rowe: It is getting less every year.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The revamping of the plant was taking place and that is going on now. The plant will come into operation again this year and we hope there will be continuous operation throughout the winter season.


Mr. DECHENE:: I am sure the committee will agree with me when I say that I have not wasted the time of parliament during the
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present session. I have been impressed at all times, in taking that attitude, by the necessity of going ahead with the work of the house. I have been impressed with the terrific situation that exists overseas. I have been impressed by what has appeared to me to be the interminable delay occasioned by members in carrying on the work necessary for the war purposes of the country. Indeed, we are still trying to pass estimates relating to the war, and as I speak this afternoon I am quite conscious of the importance of getting on with the business of the house, and I would not speak but for the fact that these sands which we are at present discussing are right in the riding of Athabaska.
I will not say that it was an error, but I will say that through some unfortunate occurrence when the question was before the house a few weeks ago, I was not permitted to speak while those who knew less about the matter were allowed all the time they wanted. I am impressed with the fact that right now your boy, Mr. Chairman, and mine are up in the air over Germany possibly, risking their lives, that your boy and mine, perhaps, are in Italy gloriously carrying the arms of Canada in the first big victory in which our forces have been engaged in this war. I am struck with the fact that there are members of the house who are spending day after day, week after week, in criticism, some of it very unfair and unjust, to my mind, taking up time with repetitions, day after day, week after week, when we know how much these debates cost.
When we remember, Mr. Chairman, that these debates cost from $1,200 to $1,500 an hour-these are the figures put on the record by Mr. R. B. Bennett himself some years ago-and when we remember that all over the world millions of men and women are in want, some of them starving, walking skeletons, we have seen pictures from Greece, Serbia, France, et cetera, and realize that in Canada we have been spared anything of that kind-foods of all kind are more than plentiful. Everything is plentiful. We are living on the fat of the land, to use an expression that is commonly heard in the street. When we remember all these things and find some hon. members carrying on carping criticism of things that are most difficult to do as, for instance, the successful development of the tar sands at McMurray, it makes one wonder. Apparently the hon. member for Bow River has forgotten about the mines in his own constituency being idle.


Charles Edward Johnston: No, he did not; he brought the question up here.


Joseph Miville Dechene: He talks about something about which he knows nothing.


Charles Edward Johnston: The hon. member is doing that right now.


Joseph Miville Dechene: The hon. member is a
champion in this house. He is a champion of some kind. He can talk more often, more fluently and longer of things about which he knows nothing than any other hon. member. I do not make a practice of doing that. The hon. member for Davenport knows something about the difficulties of the situation. They were explained by the Minister of Mines and Resources. I believe he is able to handle the situation without my help, but I wish to remind the hon. member for Davenport that at Fort McMurray we have a proposition that is entirely new in Canada. Geologists and other men who have knowledge of the oil game as it is practised on the north American continent, taking the crude oil out of the ground as it is done in Turner valley, for example, refining it by cracking and other methods and putting it into use, know the situation up there is different. That is the oil game as we have known it; but at Fort McMurray it is a mining proposition, and a most difficult one. The engineers who are hired and who know all about oil find that they do not know much about the other process. That has been a part of our difficulty. It is a most difficult thing to work.
I may tell the committee that I, for one, have been interested in these oil sands for many years. As I said in this house a couple of years ago, some of us invested and lost our money in that country to try to develop the sands many years ago. We are not criticizing anyone. We tried to get those vast resources into production.
At this time the war has come to the rescue of this oil field and we are getting the same field proved for the people of Canada. I deprecate the attitude of people in public life whose criticism is unfair and unjust and which may retard the successful operation of that field. Not so long ago we had the spectacle of a minister of the crown of Alberta moving, on the floor of the legislature of that province, a resolution couched in language that no public man to my knowledge has ever used before in addressing another house. I sat in the Alberta legislature for many years. I sat there during the depression. I know how severe conditions were and how often our tempers were tried. But never for a moment would we have moved a resolution in the language of the livery barn or the words of a bushwhacker to be sent to the parliament of Canada in order to suggest something-


Mr. CASTLEDEN:: You ought to come to Saskatchewan.

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


Joseph Miville Dechene: This was done by a minister of the crown of Alberta. The other day in speaking to the question the hon. member for Davenport said that some friend in Edmonton had sent him a copy of the Edmonton Journal and he saw the resolution and the arguments put forward on this question by the minister of public works of Alberta. The hon. member for Davenport said, according to Hajisard, that he thought this gentleman was responsible and conscientious. Well, his definition of a gentleman is not the same as mine apparently. I shall read what the minister of public works of Alberta, said:
Shortly after the dominion government took control of the property strange things began to happen. Out of the north came an endless procession of weird, incredulous stories of criminal incompetence and scandalous waste of public funds and charges of sabotage were heard on every hand.
Mark the language used by a minister of the crown of Alberta. Then he goes on to say:
. . . some time after the survey party which was sent to McMurray to investigate the oil sands, a prominent Edmonton citizen came to his office and told him that the men in chaTge of the party were in his room in a city hotel the previous night. He said they proceeded to get very drunk and openly bragged that they had been sent here by the dominion government *to bring in an unfavourable report in connection with the development of the oil sands.
This is the language used by a man whom the hon. member for Davenport says he believes is a conscientious gentleman. Can any reasonable man conceive anything of the kind? Could any reasonable man say that a minister of the crown of Alberta was justified in stating that he got his information from a lot of drunken men?


Charles Edward Johnston: He did not
say that.


Joseph Miville Dechene: He said they gave him the information that they had been sent here by the dominion government to make an unfavourable report. If that were the case it was the duty of the minister of the crown of Alberta to report the matter immediately to the Minister of Mines and Resources and the Minister of Munitions and Supply. As a public man it was his bounden duty to do that, to report such an unusual procedure and a waste of money.


Charles Edward Johnston: He is asking for a royal commission to investigate the whole matter. That is exactly what he is doing.


Joseph Miville Dechene: If the hon. member would sometimes keep his mouth shut and open his
ears he might learn something. If he had a head on his shoulders for some other purpose than for keeping his necktie from falling off he might learn something, and he might concern himself with-


Charles Edward Johnston: The hon. member was talking about a minister of the crown and ought to be more careful.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I am speaking about a particular matter concerning my own constituency.


Charles Edward Johnston: This is the first time you have done it.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I have never interrupted the hon. gentleman. I have sometimes wondered about the things he has said, but I have left him severely alone in the hope that some day he might tumble to himself, open his ears and learn something.
McMurray is not the only region. From Waterways and McMurray and along to Clearwater and down to Fort McKay is the region where these oil sands are found in large quantities, but it is the portal or entrance to the great north lands where such vast minerals are available. Day after day in the house and in committees we are talking about our men in the forces. I know our minds at this time are taken up, and rightly so, with what we can do for those boys on their return. I have always said that there is a place for a lot of them in the north. These young men have had an experience far greater than others. These young men have been thoroughly trained. After they come back we are prepared to train them further to take their part in the development of this country. Northern Alberta and the Northwest Territories, north of Edmonton, is the place that could take care of thousands of them. Everything is there. If hon. members have travelled, as has the hon. member for Davenport, to places like Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, they will have seen the three elements which have made it possible for one of the greatest developments of the world to take place there. They have coal, oil and power.


John Ritchie MacNicol: And limestone.


Joseph Miville Dechene: At McMurray we have oil. It is there, and it can be developed if we try to help, rather than hinder; if we do not sabotage the effort by unfair criticism. I believe that some day they will find a proper method of extracting the oil, gas, bitumen and other materials from the vast tar sands deposits in that area.
At Waterways there is a modern salt factory which produces some of the finest salt to be found in this country. They turn out table
3228	COMMONS
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salt as well as salt for stock and other purposes. But they are held down in their efforts because of the high freight rates they must pay. There used to be only one train a week until they increased it to two or three last year when the Canol pipeline at Fort Norman was being constructed.
I think I would be in order to urge upon the federal government the construction of a highway from Edmonton to Fort McMurray. I do not think we shall get this from the provincial government. The paving materials are available right there and construction could be started at both ends. There is no doubt about the value of this paving material because it has been proved. Some pavement was laid in Edmonton twenty-five or thirty years ago, and it is still just as good as pavements made from other materials imported into the country. Such a highway would not only help to develop these oil resources, but open up many thousands of acres of new land. Fleets of trucks could be used to carry materials for the refinery and so on and bring back the finished products to Edmonton.
Such a highway would go west of Lac la Biche and, as I say, it would open up thousands of acres of the very best land. When the Alberta and Great Waterways railway, now part of the Northern Alberta railway system which is now operated jointly by the two great railway companies, was first built it went around the east end of Lac la Biche even though one of the original surveys was to the west. To the west of that lake and along the Athabaska river to Fort McMurray is to be found some of the very best land in the country. The country through which the railway now travels provides little traffic and the result is that the railroad must obtain its revenues from through traffic. The rates charged are adjusted to take care of from 150 to 200 miles of country from which little local revenue is obtained. These rates are too high to permit the successful operation of a plant on a large scale at Fort McMurray or Waterways.
The building of this highway would make this possible. The building of such a highway should form part of any effort by the federal government to develop these tar sands. We are being asked to vote $150,000 and $650,000, and I think I am justified in suggesting that some money should be devoted to the construction of this highway as part of our war effort and for post-war use. It would open up considerable new land and would help in developing the tar sands area at Fort McMurray and Waterways.
I think it was in 1906 or 1907 when I first visited this region. I went down the Athabaska river for about a hundred miles

and reached the Pelican rapids. These rapids would provide considerable water power and there is also a tremendous supply of gas in this area. Then you continue down the Athabaska to Ells river-this is named after Doctor Ells-and Fort McKay. A few miles farther down you reach a point where the waters of the Athabaska river and the Peace river and all their tributaries pour through a great funnel. A vast amount of water power is available here. The flow is so great that even with the extreme temperatures of the far north these rapids never freeze.
I am not an engineer and I think one of the troubles faced by the hon. member for Davenport and myself is on account of our inability to understand their reports or why they do certain things. It is like a doctor's diagnosis. One doctor will diagnose a certain disease, another diagnoses another disease; they finally operate; the patient dies, and the operation is declared to be a success. That is according to what we read about it. That is just said in passing. I am not going to enter the field of criticism which has been entered upon by the hon. member for Davenport.
I do not believe that any engineer, whether he is working for a company or for a government, will not fulfil his duties properly according to his knowledge and his lights. I have been acquainted with many engineers, and I believe they are just as proud of their work, their honesty and their integrity as are members of any other profession. That is part of their training. The hon. member for Davenport has referred to the trouble that took place, but I am convinced that the plant operated by Max Ball was not good enough to enable the government-
Mr, MacNICOL:	They are not changing
the separation plant.


Joseph Miville Dechene: It was not good enough to warrant the government expending a large amount of money in an attempt to make thorough tests of the possibilities of the tar sands of the Fort McMurray area. In order not to spend money foolishly; in order that money would not be spent without results, the government decided to follow the engineers reports-these men were members of a well-known engineering firm-and construct a modern plant which would assure that a full and final trial of the possibilities of the tar sands would be made. We would then know whether we would be justified in going on.
I know the oil is there because I have seen some of the gasoline produced by Max Ball. It can be done; but whether it can be done commercially, whether it can compete in western Canada with gasoline produced in other fields, is another question. It is sometimes

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
harmful for a man to attempt to debate a proposition of this kind without being fully informed. In the discussion which took place the other day the hon. member for Bow River stated that to his knowledge $500,000, which is a vast sum of money, had been spent to send two carloads of tar sands to England.


Charles Edward Johnston: Where is
that? I have Hansard right here.


Joseph Miville Dechene: If the hon. member will wait to make his own speech perhaps we shall get along better.


Charles Edward Johnston: I am just trying to check in order to keep the hon. member to the truth.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I quote from page 1732 of Hansard of March 21:
In the course of my remarks I said that on one occasion the research department had spent $500,000.


Charles Edward Johnston: Who said that? Doctor Ells?


Joseph Miville Dechene: It continues:
I should like to read a little of the evidence to show what a disgraceful performance the whole thing has been. Mr. Ells appeared as a witness before the reconstruction and reestablishment committee. . . . He was asked this question ... he does not know for sure


Charles Edward Johnston: Yes, he does.


Joseph Miville Dechene: He said, "I have heard of it." I am quoting from Hansard, and it says:
That is a vague recollection. Mind you, two carloads of Athabaska tar sands were sent clear to England-


Charles Edward Johnston: Do you deny that?


Joseph Miville Dechene: at an expense of $500,000-


Charles Edward Johnston: Do you deny that?


Joseph Miville Dechene: -and Mr. Ells, who was giving evidence said: "I have heard o>f it but I think the results have not been given out."
No such thing was ever done.


Charles Edward Johnston: You are entirely wrong.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Two carloads of tar sands were sent to England by a private individual, General Lindsay. I know him myself. All that the Department of Mines and Resources -at that time the Department of the Interior-had to do with it was that they took the tar sands from McMurray to Edmonton.
General Lindsay paid all expenses from there to Europe. Not one dollar was spent by the government of Canada. No part of $500,000, or any other amount of money, was spent by the government of Canada to send sand across the sea.


Charles Edward Johnston: You are entirely wrong.


Joseph Miville Dechene: The hon. member should know it, but he does not even understand it yet. I despair of making him understand anything; only I know he put on the record and stated something that is absolutely untrue.


Charles Edward Johnston: On a point of order, the hon. member has said that I made a statement which was absolutely untrue. I demand that that be retracted; because the evidence from Doctor Ells, when he spoke before the committee on reconstruction, indicates the truth of what I said, and it is recorded at page 965 of the proceedings. I shall read it, if you wish.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I have the floor.


Charles Edward Johnston: I wish to put the statement correctly on Hansard.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I have the floor, Mr. Chairman.


Charles Edward Johnston: No, not
now; sit down.


The ACTING CHAIRMAN (Mr. Golding):: The hon. member for Bow River may make notes, and speak later.


Charles Edward Johnston: No; this is a very serious matter. The hon. member has said that I made a statement which was absolutely false. I ask him to withdraw it, because I have the record right here in my hand. The hon. member is saying something which is not correct.


William Henry Golding: The hon. member did not make that statement deliberately.


Charles Edward Johnston: I ask for a ruling on the point of order.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I gave my proof. I will give the hon. member proof of what he said, and he can ask for a ruling, because-


Charles Edward Johnston: The hon. member said something that is not true. I am speaking to a point of order, and I am asking him to withdraw.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I am not withdrawing that remark, because it is true. Here is the proof in Hansard.
3230	COMMONS
War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


William Henry Golding: When an hon. member makes a statement, and another hon. member makes the accusation that the statement is absolutely untrue, in the opinion of that hon. member that may be so.


Charles Edward Johnston: But that is not what he said.


William Henry Golding: When an hon. member says that another hon. member deliberately makes a misstatement, that is different.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is the accusation he made, that I had made a statement which was absolutely untrue. However, if he is not gentleman enough to retract, let it go.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Mr. Chairman, here is the report of what happened in the House [DOT]of Commons, as it is reported at page 2590 of Hansard for May 4. On this page we find questions asked by the hon. member, himself. They are as follows:
Mr. Johnston (Bow River):
1.	Was a quantity of Alberta tar sands sent to England?
2.	If so, for what purpose?
3.	In what year was it sent, and what quantity?
4.	Who was the sender?
5.	What was the total cost to the government [DOT]of Canada?
6.	What report, if any, was received iby the government?
The answers on the same page are as follows:
Mr. Orerar: I have the answer to this question, but perhaps a word of explanation would be in order. At the time the shipment of tar sands was sent to England there were two departments of government dealing with it. They are now combined with the Department of Mines and Resources. There was considerable correspondence at the time, which has not been included in the answer to the questions, but certain reports that were made by officers of the department have been included. I may say there was no expense to the government in *connection with the shipment of tar sands. I *think the information that is relevant to the question is all here.
Department of Mines and Resources (from the standpoint of the Department of the Interior):
1.	Yes.
2.	Experimental purposes.
3.	1920 and 1922-21-2 tons in 1920; 20 tons in 1922.
4.	General W. B. Lindsay.
5.	All expenses in connection with shipments [DOT]of this material from Edmonton to England were borne iby General Lindsay.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is all Tight. Now look at page 2665. That was only part of the answer. That was the answer from the former Department of the Interior. Tell us the rest of it.


William Henry Golding: The hon. member for Bow River cannot interrupt unless the hon. member who has the
floor consents.


Charles Edward Johnston: I want to keep him on the right road, though.


William Henry Golding: 1	have now before me a citation with respect to the point of order which has been raised. This is what I find at page 775 of Beauchesne's Third Edition:
February 18, 1915.
The Honourable Thomas Simpson Sproule, Speaker. It is not unparliamentary to say that a statement is untrue.
Mr. Speaker explained to the house on the 18th February, 1915, that the ruling which he had given on the 16th instant in connection with a statement of the hon. the Minister of Justice, was not that "it was unparliamentary to say of a member's statement that it was untrue", but that "it was unparliamentary to say that it was untrue to the knowledge of the member making the remarks."
Journals, House of Commons, 1915, vol. 51, page 57.


Joseph Miville Dechene: The other part of the question put on the order paper by the hon. member was replied to, as he said, by the Department of the Interior. The answer to the first question was yes. The answer to No.
2	notes where the tar sands were sent, and the answers to questions Nos. 3, 4 and 5 set out the cost. There is no record of any charge in connection with any shipment being delivered to the Department of Mines and Resources. That is clear enough.


Charles Edward Johnston: The minister will not say that, though.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Not one dollar. ,


Charles Edward Johnston: You will not find the minister saying that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: If I understand correctly, the hon. member for Bow River has challenged the hon. member for Athabaska with respect to the shipment of sand to Great Britain.


Charles Edward Johnston: I was not challenging him at all.


Joseph Miville Dechene: What were you doing, then?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I missed what was being said, but the facts are that the dominion government bore the expense of taking the sand to Edmonton, and from that time on there was no further expense.


Charles Edward Johnston: But that cost alone was over $850.


Gordon Graydon: Let the hon. member for Athabaska finish.
^Mr. Dechene.]

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


Joseph Miville Dechene: I regret that this has arisen. This matter had to be checked up. When a man says on the floor of the House of Commons that $500,000 was spent, as it appears at page 1733 of Hansard

"Two carloads of Athabaska tar sands were sent clear to England at an expense of $500,000 "-


Charles Edward Johnston: That is correct.


Joseph Miville Dechene: And when he says that Mr. Ells, who was giving evidence, says he does now know anything about it, I want to check it up, because that is absolutely untrue.
At six o'clock the committee took recess.
After Recess
The committee resumed at eight o'clock.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Mr. Chairman, I am sorry I was unable to complete my remarks before six o'clock. I have in mind the great possibilities of the development which we are now discussing. I have briefly touched on the great resources of that far north country, not only the tar sands we are now discussing but its water powers and its great salt mines, et cetera. Its waterways are the portals to this tremendously rich north country, which some day will be the richest part of Canada. I can envision the building of a great city at the junction of those rivers, the Athabaska and the Clearwater. The old timers, the Hudson Bay travellers, used to call it the Hudson Bay portage. That was a hundred years ago or more.
If I became a little heated this afternoon it was because I feel so keenly about that great north country. I have seen it as a little fellow; I have lived in it since I was a young boy, and I hate to see it discredited and criticized. I am getting to be an old man, but I hope to live long enough yet to see a big city rise at the junction of those two great rivers, the Athabaska and the Clearwater. If I criticized a member of another legislature this afternoon, a minister of the crown, which may have appeared to you, Mr. Chairman, perhaps a little uncalled for-but I have his own words which appeared in the press-it is because of this fact. He poses as a brave man who criticizes this government so bitterly. He was elected in his own riding in 1935 through a fluke, in the catastrophe of 1935. Then in 1940 he was not so good, but got elected, and now he knows he cannot be elected from that same riding again. This man who puts all these statements in the press, which now appear
in our own Hansard because they have been transmitted here by some of the members from Alberta, is now running in a northern riding where he thinks he, as provincial minister of public works, may have some influence against the soldier candidate. This soldier candidate has served overseas since 1939 and is now in Sicily or elsewhere overseas, where unfortunately most of us are too old to go to serve. This great big man, this minister of public works of Alberta, this brave man who uses the press and information given him by a lot of drunken men in the hotel at Edmonton, now quits the riding where he knows he cannot be elected and is a candidate in Grouard against a soldier officer. The officer's name is Tremblay. He has a brother in the commons, also a returned soldier, who fought in the last great war as well. The minister of public works of Alberta, this brave man who finds all this fault, is pleased to run against a returned soldier in Grouard, a man who is now overseas and cannot defend himself against his opponent. I will not say any more about the matter.


Mr. KUHL:: Because you are on dangerous ground.


Joseph Miville Dechene: No, I am not on dangerous ground. What I said about the $500,000 is in Hansard; it was not in a committee's report.


Charles Edward Johnston: You are changing your story now.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I quoted from Hansard and nobody can deny it.
I was saying, Mr. Chairman, that I believe a great city will rise at the junction of those two great rivers, the Athabaska and the Clearwater, because in that northern country we have everything-water powers, coal mines, gas and oil, salt, everything that goes to make a country prosperous. I have already stated that I think a highway should be built from Edmonton to McMurray because it would enable us to develop that country much more quickly. To-night I have a vision of northern Alberta. I wonder how many members have seen northern Alberta at the end of May or the beginning of June. I have known that country for fifty years and I know what a grand country it is. I do not think there is another place in the world as beautiful as northern Alberta, when the prairie is a mass of flowers and along the road are wild roses growing up almost to the height of this ceiling. We might call it the wild rose country. That is something you cannot see anywhere else. I was going to say that it talks to you, but most certainly it appeals to you. I think
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War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
northern Alberta has more resources than any other part of Canada. I may be wrong but I believe it has. Do not let us ruin the future of that great country by unfair criticism, from motives of political expediency. I believe I know the feelings of the old-timers in the province of Alberta, those who came and settled there from the old provinces of Quebec and Ontario, and others from the United States, up through the Kootenay and down the Peace river to Edmonton before 1880, and those who came later. We all love that country and love Canada more than anything else. We never allowed political differences to interfere with what we believed would be for progress of that part of the country. I believe that the Department of Mines and Resources is not asking for enough money. We should vote enough money to ascertain the possibilities and the resources of that country. We know that gas and oil are there and also great water powers. Everything is there to make the country north of Edmonton a Mecca for thousands of our young men when they come back from overseas.


Charles Edward Johnston: Mr. Chairman, I had not intended to say very much about this. I thought I had made the record quite clear by my statement of March 21 when I spoke in this house. But the hon. member for Athabaska has gone to some length to misquote statements of mine, and I wish now to correct him.
He seems to be quite disturbed because there is some criticism in this house of government policy and government expenditure of money. But it seems to me that that is the very reason we are here, and I am sure that his constituents will agree with me when they read over the hon. member's speeches in Hansard-if they can find many of his. Constructive criticism is what we are here for. I have listened for quite a long time, expecting to hear the hon. member give the government some suggestions or offer some constructive criticism, but apparently he is quite satisfied with the way in which the development of the tar sands is going on. For my part I am not satisfied at all, and I may say that I have tried to go carefully into this matter.
Before I start to deal with the subject I wish to correct some statements which were put on Hansard just before the dinner recess by the hon. member for Athabaska . He quoted some statements which I made on March 21, 1944, as reported on page 1733 of Hansard. I will read some of these so that the committee will know exactly the words I used. On this particular occasion I was discussing the samples of sand which were sent over to England back in 1920 by the government of the day. As a
[Mr. Dechene.J
matter of fact two carloads, or a little over forty tons, were sent. I will not stop to refer to the way in which it was sent over, although that in itself is amusing. When the question was asked of Doctor Ells, he said:
I have heard of it but I think the results have not been given out.
Then I go on to say:
He does not know for sure.
May I say I was criticizing Doctor Ells at that time for his apparent lack of memory with regard to this transaction. I was commenting upon the testimony he gave before the committee, and I believe I was entirely justified in doing so. I said:
He does not know for sure. He says: "I have heard of it." That is a vague recollection. Mind you, two carloads of Athabaska tar sands were sent clear to England at an expense of $500,000.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Who said that?


Charles Edward Johnston: I was speaking there.
Mr. Ells, who was giving evidence, said: "I have heard of it but I think the results have not been given out." He was then further questioned about this matter and on the next *page he says: "No, I have not any definite recollection." That is, he has no definite recollection of its having been sent to England. I think I should go back to the next .page and read the question of the hon. member for Davenport, which was as follows: "Have you any recollection of the sand having been sent to England?" The answer is, "No, I have not any definite recollection." If anybody sent two carloads of Athabaska tar sands over to England at an expense of-with the investigation which was carried out-$500,000, there is something wrong with his memory if he does not even remember it.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Did Doctor Ells make that statement?


Charles Edward Johnston: Yes, exactly so. But Doctor Ells recollected a little later on. He said that it was sent to England, at whose expense he does not mention, but he says that an expense of $500,000 was incurred. I am not criticizing that point of it; I am putting on Hansard what I said that day, which the hon. member for Athabaska entirely misconstrued and misrepresented. The answer of Doctor Ells goes on:
I do recall that some years before that there were two carloads went over to England, to Cardiff, Wales, and a rather large amount of money spent in testing a method-1 think about $500,000.
Mr. MacNicol: It was sent over to Cardiff?
Doctor Ells:	Yes, two carloads; I shipped
them myself.
At that time Doctor Ells was an employee of this government, and he says most definitely that he sent two carloads of tar sands over to

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
England. While I will not now read the exact words from the committee report, I will give the committee the pages at which they may be found; they are in the report of the reconstruction and reestablishment committee of November 30, 1943, page 965, and I hope the hon. member for Athabaska will take the trouble to read the report; he may learn a little and know what he is talking about the next time he speaks. It ill becomes anybody in this house to say what the hon. member said in speaking of Hon. W. A. Fallow, who is a member of his majesty's provincial government of Alberta and minister of public works.
I wrote down what the hon. member said, and it is corroborated by two or three hon. members who sat close to me. I do not think it is proper to refer to a cabinet minister anywhere, or to a member of this house, as having "got his information from another drunken man." The clear inference is that Mr. Fallow was a drunken man. *


Mr. DUPUIS:: He did not mention his
name.


Charles Edward Johnston: Let the
hon. member keep still. The hon. member for Athabaska may speak for himself.


Joseph Miville Dechene: I never said that. The
hon. member is absolutely wrong.


Mr. MacKINNON (Edmonton West):: He did not say that.


Charles Edward Johnston: Well, I do not know whether the Minister of Trade and Commerce was here or not.


James Angus MacKinnon: I
was here.


Charles Edward Johnston: Those are the words the hon. member uttered. I took them down and had them corroborated by other hon. members.


Joseph Miville Dechene: Mr. Chairman, on a
point of order, I never said anything of the kind. I repeated what he said in the hotel.


Charles Edward Johnston: I sincerely hope that the hon. member does contradict it, because those words should not be left on Hansard. As regards Mr. Fallow being elected again, I think he will be able to take care of himself when that time comes. I have talked to him at considerable length about this matter, and his only concern is that these tar sands shall be developed.
To me this question is of great importance. My concern was aroused when the Minister of Munitions and Supply stated a year or so ago that the government was going to investigate this problem because the war emergency
was so great, the need of gasoline so pressing, that we should develop every possible source of supply and do so as speedily as possible. I thought that was the right attitude to take. But the thing which amazes me is that we have spent three or four years and have not got anywhere. The Minister of Mines and Resources, when referring to this matter this afternoon, said that the company which is up there now had to start out and break absolutely new ground. That is not quite right. Probably he meant, as far as that particular location was concerned, and even then he would not be exactly correct, because this investigation, as he himself indicated, began away back in 1920. One of the agreements entered into by the government was signed on July 16, 1920. Tar sands were shipped to England around 1920 to 1922 to a company whose name I forget, but which was being run by a Mr. Lindsay, I believe. It entered into an agreement with the federal government, whereby certain things were to be done by both parties, and some lands were leased to the company by the federal government. In shipping the tar sands to Mr. Lindsay the government undertook the responsibility of bringing them as far as Edmonton, at an expense to them of somewhat over $850. So that when the hon. member for Athabaska said that they did not pay anything, he was wrong again, although the amount was only a matter of a thousand dollars, which in relation to the total expense is neither here nor there. In the contract entered into at that time it was stipulated that the government should get fifty cents an acre for rentals. The English company had the land leased for two, three or four years, but the government, so far as we can find out, never received any rental payments, so that they lost that in addition. Then the contract was finally dropped.
But the thing that amazed me when I was reading the correspondence-of course the present minister had nothing to do with it then-was that one of the reasons why the operations were slowed down in connection with the Athabaska tar sands was the fact that an oil company in California was having a surplus of production. That was one of the factors that had a controlling influence on the development of those tar sands-overproduction in California. At that time such overproduction would have meant, in the development of the tar sands in Athabaska, so far away from a large city, that the work would have been uneconomical. That is what I am afraid is happening now, that these tar sands are not being developed as rapidly as they might be.
3234	COMMONS
War Appropiiation-Mines and Resources
Let me quote an extract from the report of a committee which was set up by this government. It gives a fair indication that things could have gone better. This was a committee set up by the present government, the Kirkpatrick committee, I believe. The minister will correct me if I am wrong. I understand that there was set up a committee known as the Kirkpatrick committee, appointed by the dominion government in the spring of 1942, and the following is a part of that committee's report:
We ibelieve in general that the production of the crude oil from these sands is a practical project as a war measure. We also believe in general that the project would have more than a reasonable chance as a post-war commercial enterprise.
That was as late as 1942, and it is fairly good evidence that there is a good chance of this being developed if handled properly. I am not standing up here this evening to defend Mr. Fallow, not by any means. He is a minister of the crown of Alberta and he belongs to the same political party as I do. I do	say	to	the	Minister of Mines andResources however, that in the report which he gave us this afternoon he has not refuted one of the statements, one of the accusations made	by	the	minister of public works ofAlberta. I was somewhat interested in that letter which the minister read and I was going	to	ask	him	this afternoon, only hethought I should not interrupt him then, to table the complete letter, because Mr. Fallow, in a	part	of	his	statement in Edmonton,referred particularly to one part of the letter which I noticed, namely, about the laying of the pipeline, the water line. I am not going to attempt to give his exact words, but Mr. Fallow stated in general that the pipeline was laid and the ditch was backfilled without any test having been made of the pipes, when they	tried	to	run	the water through, the
pipes leaked and the dirt had to be taken up again and the pipes fixed and the dirt put back in a frozen condition, and still it was not satisfactory.
The letter which the minister read this afternoon did not contradict that statement. In fact, it tended to give the impression that it was a true statement of the situation, because the man who wrote the letter, Mr. McClave -I am speaking purely from memory-took no responsibility whatever for it. I believe he said that he let the work to those whom he considered to be responsible men inasmuch as they had had some experience in laying oil pipelines and therefore he concluded that they would or should know how to run their business. But that does not refute the argu-

ment made by the Hon. Mr. Fallow. That is why I say that, in fairness to Mr. McClave and the committee, the whole letter should be tabled lest we get the wrong impression. At any rate, the impression I got from the letter was that the Minister of Mines and Resources had written to Mr. McClave trying to find out something about the statements made by Mr. Fallow.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My hon. friend is mistaken about that. He states that the letter from Mr. McClave is in reply to one sent to him by Doctor Ells. As a matter of fact, at that time I did not know that there was such a man as Mr. McClave in existence. I had no correspondence with him, but Doctor Ells, who was interested in the matter, had written to him and this reply was given.


Charles Edward Johnston: Was that after the statement of Mr. Fallow came out?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: After the raising of the pipe?


Charles Edward Johnston: No; the letter that Doctor Ells had written to Mr. McClave asking for information. Was that after the statement that Mr. Fallow had made?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It was before that. It was prior to Mr. Fallow's statement in the legislature. I did not wish to interrupt my hon. friend but simply to correct that impression. However, I may have a word to say a little later about his remarks.


Charles Edward Johnston: I am glad the minister has made that reply, because I would not want to accuse Mr. McClave or Doctor Ells of anything of which they should not be accused. But that was the impression I got when the minister read the letter, and that is why I thought it should have been tabled, so that there would be no misunderstanding about it. That is what I intended to ask him at that time; but I will say frankly to the minister, and I think he will agree with me, that the statements Mr. Fallow made were very serious charges, and I think it is the duty of the government to set up a royal commission, as Mr. Fallow has suggested, to investigate the matter. I am sure that one of the first witnesses they would call would be Mr. Fallow himself to substantiate the remarks he made, because I do not think any responsible person in this country either in this government or outside should be permitted to make such statements and have them go unchallenged. Of course, when I say that, I know the hon. Mr. Fallow is agreeable to that, because I discussed this very matter with him and said to him what I am saying

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
here and he agreed with me. He was quite prepared to give the evidence when the time came.	,
I take it that this question is too serious to have all these charges that are made go by lightly without any investigation whatever. A reference was made to that drunken survey party sent up there, and I will read what Mr. Fallow said in the provincial legislature in that regard. I do not think it should be allowed to go unchallenged:
Some time after the survey party which was sent to McMurray to investigate the oil sands, a prominent citizen of Edmonton came to my office and told me that the men in charge of this party were in his room in the Macdonald hotel the previous night. He said they proceeded to get very drunk and openly bragged that they had been sent here iby the dominion government to bring in an unfavourable report in connection with the development of the oil sands.
He goes on, but that is sufficient. Mr. Fallow is definitely accusing this government of sending up a survey party to bring in a wrong report. The proper and only place where that can be investigated is before a royal commission. Then he states-this is another accusation that Mr. Fallow makes about the government in connection with the tar sands:
Instead, the dominion government appropriated another $500,000 to investigate the possibilities of producing oil from the sands. The next move was to take possession of the property being operated by the Aibasand Oil Company. Mr. Max Ball, an engineer who had been the promoter of this operation from the beginning, and who knew more about the physical operation of this process than anyone else, was immediately pushed out of the picture by the dominion government and the plant put in charge of men who knew nothing about the process.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not wish to interrupt my hon. friend, but I will deal later with what he says.


Charles Edward Johnston: I assume that the minister will deny that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I will say this. When Mr. Fallow refers to Mr. Max Ball as an oil engineer he is wholly mistaken. Mr. Ball was never an engineer at any time; he was an oil geologist.


Charles Edward Johnston: I do not think it is of material importance whether he was an engineer or a geologist. The fact is that he was in charge of that plant; he was the man who was getting results; and after he was removed from, that job, as far as practical results were concerned there were none; they just stopped. So that the only logical conclusion one could reach is that he was of some use. But the proper way in which that charge could be investigated is by a
royal commission which would go into the whole question. Here is another statement made during the course of this speech:
Shortly after the dominion government took control of the property strange things began to happen. Out of the north came an endless procession of weird, incredulous stories of criminal incompetence and scandalous waste of public funds and charges of sabotage were heard on every hand.
Then listen to this:
So persistent were these ugly rumours we decided to investigate and we found there was ample justification for the rumours.
In other words, this cabinet minister in Edmonton made certain charges, which he said were so serious that an investigation was held, and it was found that there was ample ground for such rumours. You cannot take that lightly and just dismiss it as nothing. The government have some responsibility in this regard; they are being accused by a man who should know what he is talking about. If he does not know what he is talking about he should be brought to account, but if these things are true those who are responsible should be brought to account. I do not agree at all with the hon. member for Davenport when he says that this government is not to blame, and that no blame should be attached to the minister.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I did not say that the government was not to blame, but I did not criticize the minister.


Charles Edward Johnston: I am going farther than that, then; I am going to criticize the minister. I do not criticize him as an individual; it is not a personal matter in any way, but the minister must accept responsibility for the things done in his department. These charges are a reflection upon the government of this country, and they cannot be lightly dismissed. As I said, after hearing of these charges there was an investigation, and it was proved to Mr. Fallow's satisfaction that there was ample justification for these rumours. Here is' another charge which I do not think can be overlooked; further in his remarks Mr. Fallow had this to say:
To add to the antics of this crazy circus, someone poured sand in the oil boxes and pans of the machinery working on the job, putting all out of commission at one time.
That is a deliberate act of sabotage, and in time of war we should not permit such things to be carried on in this country, especially when they affect the production of oil. I do not know whether that statement is true, but I do know it was made by a cabinet minister of Alberta. Once more I say that . the only proper way to investigate these matters is to appoint a royal commission. Just a
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short time ago the Minister of Mines and Resources said that he was not competent to judge on the mistakes made. Having made that statement he, as a responsible minister, cannot merely rise in his place and deny these allegations, expecting his denial to carry a great deal of weight, since already he has said that he is not competent to judge as to these mistakes. In what other way can a proper investigation be made than the way suggested by a responsible minister of Alberta, the Hon. Mr. Fallow? Surely a responsible man would not make such statements unless they had some foundation, and in the same breath ask this government to set up a royal commission to investigate the charges, for he would know very well that he would be one of the first witnesses to be called. Then he went on to say:
At the time that the dominion government took control of this property, about the first thing they did was to cancel 'the agreement which existed between the research council of Alberta and the Abasand Oil Company in which both parties agreed to cooperate in research and investigation in order to improve the separatisn process. '
I think that is true; I do not believe there can be any disagreement on that.
We were advised that all future research work would be carried on by the dominion government.
That is an amazing thing in time of war, with labour so scarce and skilled technicians so hard to find. You would think the dominion government would have been anxious to make use of the scientific research of the university of Alberta or anyone else to assist in the development of this natural resource, but apparently that was not the case.
As a result of the circumstances which we found, I made a public statement at Vermilion on November 9 last, charging sabotage and a deliberate attempt to discredit the whole undertaking.
That is a very strong statement.
On November 11 last, under an Ottawa dateline, my remarks were criticized as "sheer nonsense" in which it was also claimed that there was a shortage of equipment and man-power.
The Minister of Mines and Resources spoke about the shortage of man-power and the priority difficulties. Here is what Mr. Fallow had to say in that connection as a result of his inspection:
I want to 'assure you, Mr. Speaker, that on *the two occasions when I visited this plant there was certainly no evidence of a shortage of man-power or machinery. There was enough machinery and man-power to handle (half a dozen plants of this size, most of which was idle.
I am not going to quote any more of the charges made by Mr. Fallow, but certainly

there is enough evidence to compel this government, for the sake of its own selfrespect, to hold an investigation and see if these statements are true. When I spoke on this question on March 21 of this year I went into the matter in detail to the best of my ability. I had only one reason for doing so; I want to see these tar sands developed, because in my opinion we are short of oil and this war might be easily lost through lack of sufficient fuel for our machines and aircraft.


Mr. ROSS (Calgary East):: Did Mr. Fallow
cause the saboteurs to be prosecuted?


Charles Edward Johnston: This is a dominion affair.


George Henry Ross: Oh, no; the province could prosecute them.


Charles Edward Johnston: No; the hon. member cannot get away from the responsibility in that way. This is definitely a dominion affair. It does not even matter so much whether or not Mr. Fallow informed the Minister of Mines and Resources. The point is that now the Minister of Mines and Resources has this information and he is aware of the charges which-were made.


Mr. MACKENZIE (Vancouver Centre):: May I ask the hon. member who made the charges?


Charles Edward Johnston: The Hon. Mr. Fallow.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Is he a responsible minister of the crown of Alberta?


Charles Edward Johnston: He is the minister of public works.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Why did he not follow up his charges by appointing a royal commission, of the province of Alberta to investigate them?


Charles Edward Johnston: The Minister of Pensions and National Health knows very well why that would not be done. If the provincial government set up a royal commission it could not demand that these civil servants who work for the dominion government should appear before it.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Nonsense.
Mr. JOHNSTON (Bow River); That is the responsibility of this government.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: * That is nonsense.

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Charles Edward Johnston: It is no use trying to push off the responsibility on another government.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: That is the worst nonsense I have ever heard in this house.


Charles Edward Johnston: The responsibility lies right here. We have spent over a million dollars on the development, and the Minister of Mines and Resources has not shown us one pennyworth of value that has come from it, other than a little bit of construction.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Mr. Chairman, I rise to a point of order. The hon. member for Bow River is quoting a lot of allegations which were made in a provincial assembly by a responsible minister of the crown. My hon. friend should do one of two things. He should either not waste the time of this committee by repeating statements made by a minister of the crown in a provincial assembly, who is not here to support what he has said, or make the charges himself on his responsibility as a member of this house.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is not my responsibility at all. If the minister had told me that about nine years ago I might have fallen for it, but not now. He knows, from the statements I have made, it is up to the federal government to do the investigating, not me, I am not the one in charge. I can only bring these things to their attention and, if they want .to disregard them, that is their affair. My conscience is clear and whether theirs is is a matter of indifference to me. The charges have been made and they know ' them as well as I do. They know who made . them.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: He had the right as a minister of the crown to follow them up, and he did not do so.


Charles Edward Johnston: The government and the Minister of Pensions and National Health have the information; why do they not follow it up?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: Is my hon. friend making any charges on his own responsibility?


Charles Edward Johnston: I am just stating exactly what was said.


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: The hon. member is taking this indirect route of quoting a provincial minister who did not have the moral courage to prosecute the charges he made in the legislative assembly.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is just the trouble with this government; they have not the moral courage to go ahead and hold this royal commission and call the minister of public works of Alberta as a witness. If they did that they would find out whether he is guilty-I am not trying to defend him- they could find out whether he is right or wrong. Mr. Fallow was quite agreeable to this. He would not be so anxious to appear before a royal commission; he would not have suggested that a commission be appointed unless he had good grounds for the statements he made. I think it is quite evident that up to date we have not had any actual practical results from the development carried on in Athabaska. It seems to me, and it seems to a great many other people that there is something wrong with the organization which was sent up there to do this work. The minister says that he is not competent to judge of these mistakes, and I doubt if he knows whether there have been many mistakes made. But he should investigate to see if such is the case. He should certainly get after those who are responsible and see that they are required to pay whatever penalty they should pay. He should appoint a royal commission and put the minister of public works of Alberta on trial along with the rest.


An hon. MEMBER:: Call his bluff.


Charles Edward Johnston: Call his bluff, yes.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: In the opening part of my hon. friend's remarks he referred to a shipment of sand sent to Great Britain, and he said something about some committee that had been set up, or some arrangement that had been made between the federal government of that day and a Mr. Lindsay. As a matter of fact it was General Lindsay who was interested in the project at that time. This happened many years ago, long before my period in office. The information I had is that the federal government of the day who controlled the resources were prepared to give General Lindsay and his associates leases on oil-bearing sands sufficient to enable them to carry on an operation if they could prove up a useful commercial method of extracting oil from these sands.


Charles Edward Johnston: Something like 1,795 acres.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: So far as the evidence given by Doctor Ells before the reconstruction committee is concerned he said, according to the quotation which my hon. friend read, that he was not very familiar with the matter. I do not know whether the total experiments cost $500,000 or $5,000,000. The government of the

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day were not interested. All they did was to transport a certain quantity of sand to Edmonton. Any work that was done in Britain was carried out by General Lindsay and his associates. They carried on their investigations to a certain point. There is a letter here which is on the record and which could be tabled addressed to the Hon. Charles Stewart, who was then Minister of the Interior, from General Lindsay under date of April 16, 1924'. This was almost two years after the sands had been shipped to Britain. I shall not read all the letter, although there is no reason why I should not, since it is a public document, but one paragraph reads:
Until oil can be -produced from tar -sands and sold in competition with -oil derived from wells it does not appear -to be feasible to develop these deposits economically. The present tremendous excess -production of oil in California has necessarily retarded this. It will -be recognized that it is hardly practicable to induce capital to enter this field until assured of a successful process,-
I should like that phrase to be noted.
-leases which can be developed profitably and a reasonable market for their products. All of this will take time.
I would gather from that that whatever investigations General Lindsay and his associates carried on in Great Britain, they had not yet found a successful process at that time because he- stated it would not be feasible to enter into it until a successful process had been found.


Charles Edward Johnston: What is the date of that letter?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: April 16, 1924. I must confess that I am somewhat astonished at the position taken by the hon. member for Bow River. He seeks to leave the impression that something very harmful to the public interest has taken place and should be investigated by a royal commission. There are two things that may be said with respect to this. The hon. member quotes Mr. Fallow. I have read Mr. Fallow's speech, and I am bound to say that I do not think there was ever an address delivered in th-e Alberta legislature so filled with inaccuracies and misstatements. For one thing he said that the dominion government has spent $1,700,000. Where did he get that figure? The dominion government did not spend half of that.


Charles Edward Johnston: Oh, yes; it did.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No, it did not.


Charles Edward Johnston: Oh, yes; according to a return you brought down.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: He stated that the government had spent $1,700,000 in the eighteen months prior to his making his speech. He was just 10O per cent wrong on that, or even a little more, and that is just about what he was out on his other statements. I invite the attention of the committee to the grounds upon which the hon. member for Bow River asks for a royal commission. He says that Mr. Fallow demanded it and that his demands should be granted. What were Mr. Fallow's grounds? One of them was that some fellow was drunk in the Macdonald hotel and he told someone else who told Mr. Fallow that some officers had been sent out from Ottawa to sabotage the whole enterprise. Will anyone in his reasonable senses here or anywhere else; will the hon. member himself when he goes home to-night and, in the calm of his room, think this over, agree that that is a basis for putting this country to the expense of a royal commission to investigate this -matter? Here is someone who is intoxicated in the Macdonald hotel. Someone comes up to see him; they have a talk, and this drunken man says that he has heard something to the effect that people have come from Ottawa to sabotage this thing. He tells this friend; this friend goes to Mr. Fallow, and Mr. Fallow, on his responsibility as a member of the government of Alberta, rises in his place in the legislature, and gives that as a reason for a royal commission.


Charles Edward Johnston: That is only one of the many reasons.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It is the main one the hon. member has given. It was the first one to which he referred. The thing is too ridiculous for words.
There was another remedy open to Mr. Fallow. If he believed a fraction of what he said, then there was another remedy open to him. All this property is within the province of Alberta.


Charles Edward Johnston: This is dominion property.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: And Mr. Fallow's government could have appointed a royal commission, and investigated it; certainly they could.


Charles Edward Johnston: No; the dominion government had a lease on the property, with the Abasand company.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They could have Bubpcenaed everyone who had anything to do with it.


Charles Edward Johnston: No, they could not.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes, they could.

War Appropriation-Mines end Resources


Charles Edward Johnston: My information, from a legal authority, is that they could not.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I did not interrupt my hon. friend, and I would ask him not to interrupt me. The Alberta government could have appointed a royal commission; they could have subpoenaed Mr. Max Ball, and they could have subpoenaed every person on the work. They could have investigated everything. Why did they not do so?


Charles Edward Johnston: I just told you why.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: And I will tell you why: Because Mr. Fallow knew that he could not substantiate the charges he was making in the Alberta legislature. That is why they did not do so.
Then, to make matters worse, the hon. member comes here and retails all this gossip which Mr. Fallow retailed in the legislature. And on the basis of that he demands that this government appoint a royal commission. I will tell the hon. member right now that if he will rise in his place and make these charges against the government, and stake his responsibility as a member upon it, he will get his investigation.


Charles Edward Johnston: Not my responsibility, at all.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: When my colleague the Minister of Pensions and National Health suggested that to the hon. member a moment ago, what did he say? "Oh, no; oh, no. Nine years ago I might have done it, but not now."


Charles Edward Johnston: That is right, too.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: In other words, "I have learned something since then."


Charles Edward Johnston: You are telling mel


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Might I say he has learned since then that he is not going to risk his precious political skin on any proposition of that kind.


Charles Edward Johnston: The government has taken the same stand.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I ask the members in this committee: Is there any reasonable basis for the demand that a royal commission be appointed?


Charles Edward Johnston: The hon. member for Davenport agreed with me.
100-204J


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I wili say more than that: The government is making an honest effort to see that the possibilities in these sands are worked out. What my hon. friend has 6aid this afternoon and evening, to get some headlines in the papers, and possibly to get on the radio at ten o'clock to-night-


Charles Edward Johnston: I do not care whether it is or not.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: You do not?


Charles Edward Johnston: It is not my concern.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: But I think members of
this house should have some sense of responsibility for statements they make.


Charles Edward Johnston: I am not speaking for political advertising. I am not seeking to advertise.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: When my hon. friend
makes an allegation of that kind, I really- because, quite frankly, I like him, and I do not think for a moment that he was serious in the statements he made-must conclude that it is unfortunate that such statements are made.


Charles Edward Johnston: Well, the hon. member for Davenport almost said the same thing as I did-and he was there.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Another reason given us
is that sand was thrown in some of the bearings of the machinery. He said that there was sabotage. Well, that is quite true; someone did put sand in the oil,-


Charles Edward Johnston: Mr. Fallow has not been altogether wrong, then, has he?


Ian Alistair Mackenzie: At least ninety per cent.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Would the hon. member
for Bow River please let me finish?


Charles Edward Johnston: I am sorry.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It is true that some sand
was thrown into some of the bearings of the machinery. That was reported to the police, and so far they have not been able to find the individual who carried on the sabotage. But my hon. friend gives this as an additional reason why a royal commission should be appointed.
Is my hon. friend serious in that? Does he think, because someone, in a moment of pique, or perhaps to damage the war effort, or for any other reason should, surreptitiously, throw sand in the bearings of the machinery, we must open a royal commission to investigate the government's responsibility? For a good
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many years I have been a member of parliament, but in all kindness to my hon. friend I must say that I have never heard in all that time a more ridiculous or more absurd suggestion than that we should put this country to the expense of a royal commission to investigate the government's responsibility for someone throwing sand into the bearings of the machinery.


Charles Edward Johnston: I never
said that, and the minister knows that very well.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My hon. friend urged it as a reason why a royal commission should be appointed.


Charles Edward Johnston: The minister knows very well I did not say that at all. He is just trying to get out of a difficult position.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: And this was said on his
own responsibility. He said that the government have spent over a million dollars and had nothing to show for it.


Charles Edward Johnston: I said
about a million-and it is not far from it.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: "About a million?"


Charles Edward Johnston: Yes.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We are right on that, then. He has said that the government has spent about a million dollars, and has nothing to show for it.


Charles Edward Johnston: Well, not much.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Is my hon. friend serious
in that?


Charles Edward Johnston: Yes, absolutely.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Well, for the life of me I cannot understand how my hon. friend reaches some of the extraordinary conclusions he ultimately arrives at.


Charles Edward Johnston: Results are what count.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: A million dollars spent, and nothing to show for it? Let me tell my hon. friend a few of the things there are to show for it. For instance, there has been a very considerable amount of drilling done on the sand-bearing land, to determine the quality of the sand, the depth of overburden, and how expensive it might be to get it out.


Charles Edward Johnston: Only $33,000 spent on that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: And that is something. In addition, very considerable tests and examinations have been made by the Universal Oil

Products Company of Chicago to determine what extraction should be made from the bitumen. I gave that information to the committee this afternoon. In the third place, the plant has been redesigned and rebuilt.


Charles Edward Johnston: And torn down and rebuilt again.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The separation part of the plant is completed; and the refinery end of it will be ready for operation by September. In addition, all the other things necessary to carry out a thorough and continuous test of the possibilities of the sands are almost completed. Yet my hon. friend rises in his place in this ' house and says, "You have spent a million dollars, and have not anything to show for it."
Again he is simply retailing some of the gossip indulged in by Mr. Fallow. Or perhaps there was some other hotel in Alberta where someone was intoxicated, and told someone else something, and that someone else told someone else, and that someone else came and told Mr. Fallow that they had wasted a million dollars; and Mr. Fallow gets up in the legislature and wields that as a weapon of attack on the federal government.
There is just one other observation I have to make. Mr. Fallow states that the federal government is trying to sabotage this whole development. He seeks to leave the impression, and my hon. friend gives support to the allegation, that we are more interested in preventing successful development of tar sands than in anything else. Mr. Fallow says that this wretched government at Ottawa have no interest in developing the tar sands; that they are trying to sabotage the project. My hon. friend will not dispute that that was the tenor of Mr. Fallow's remarks.
But Mr. Fallow has a perfectly good remedy right in his own hands. Of the whole vast area of oil-bearing sands the federal government controls about 2,000 acres. Where does the control of the rest lie, of .ninety-nine per cent of these oil-bearing sands? It lies absolutely with the province of Alberta.
Mr. Fallow accuses us of giving away some of the federal government's small area, 100 out of 2,000 acres. That is one indictment he levelled against us in his speech in the Alberta legislature. But he did not tell the legislature and the country, and my hon. friend has not told this committee, that the government of which Mr. Fallow is a member gave large concessions to the Abasand company out of its own resources.


Charles Edward Johnston: That has nothing to do with the matter.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It has something to do with it.

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Charles Edward Johnston: The minister is indulging in political propaganda.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It has this much to do with it; it is an indication of the irresponsibility of Mr. Fallow. Then on the strength of all these wild statements of Mr. Fallow the hon. member rises in his place and demands a royal commission of inquiry. But when he was asked if he would take the responsibility as a member of this house of making charges that would warrant a royal commission he said: "Oh no, I might have done that nine years ago, but not now."
I think the committee can form its own estimate of this whole thing. The Alberta government could have gone ahead fourteen years ago and aided in the development of these sands. It could have put in its own plant. It could have used public money and [DOT] bonused the industry, encouraging the industry to go on and develop the sands. But it did not do so; and now, when this government is making an honest effort to find out the commercial possibilities of these sands, all we get by way of thanks in return is the sort of speech that Mr. Fallow made in the legislature and the kind of speech my hon. friend made here this evening.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Investigations of petroliferous deposits and of potential petroliferous areas in Canada, $145,000.
Howard Charles Green: Will the minister explain to the committee in which part of this country this money is to be spent?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It is difficult at the moment to say just where it will be spent. The money voted last year was spent in investigations for oil in the Wainwright park area and to pay the expenses of drilling on the tar sands we were discussing a few moments ago. There were also surveys for oil exploration in New Brunswick. The vote this year is not allocated to any particular project. It is to meet requests that may come from the oil controller during the year. This vote does not touch the ordinary civil administration. We shall have our ordinary civil estimates to vote for [DOT] this kind of work.


Howard Charles Green: For exploration?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: For exploration, but that will be on fairly definite projects. We have plans mapped out already in connection with our civil estimates. As I say, this vote is to meet requests that may come from the oil controller during the year. If no requests come from him the money will not be spent.


Howard Charles Green: 
Thomas Alexander Crerar: My hon. friend is now discussing a matter which should be discussed When the ordinary civil estimates of the department are before the committee.


Howard Charles Green: I think the minister is not quite right about that, because several of these items deal with expenditures for research and for finding new -mines and oil wells and so on. Surely under items of this type we are entitled to ask the policy of the government with regard to developing northern Canada.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Under these war appropriation estimates we could make excursions into every branch of departmental activity. In the ordinary civil estimates of the mines branch we have an item of $314,000 for geological surveys, and it is under that vote that the work as to which my hon. friend is pressing for information-and it is very important work-would be carried out, and the details can then be given. As I stated a moment ago, this item of $145,000 may not be spent this year at all. It is in the war appropriation for war purposes, to meet requests from the oil controller should such requests be made; also perhaps a small part of it is to complete undertakings of last year where the vote lapsed at the end of the year. In addition, provision will be made from this vote for whatever drilling operations are carried on in this area of oil sands in northern Alberta.


Howard Charles Green: Well, could the minister give us some idea now of the policy of the government with regard to developing northern Canada? It really is a war item. For example, we have what is known as the joint Canadian-United States economic committee, and a branch of that committee was given the job of surveying all the resources in the Yukon, Alaska and northern British Columbia and of making recommendations as to what developments should take place in those areas. Could the minister not give us some idea of the general government policy on the development of the north country? It is probably one of the most important matters which faces Canada to-day. Its importance is evidenced by developments which Russia has made.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not for a moment decry its importance, but the information which would fully satisfy the questions of my hon. friend is not here to-night, because I expected to deal with the subject when the ([DOT]Mr. Green.]
ordinary estimates of the department were up. The government has not been unmindful of the possibilities of the north country. I just asked the director of the mines branch, who tells me that last year we had two geological survey parties in the Yukon territory.


Howard Charles Green: Two?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Two. I do not know how many there were in the Northwest Territories, but almost every week, perhaps every day, in the summer months mining claims are being recorded in our mining recording office at Fort Smith by prospectors. As my hon. friend knows, there has been a substantial mining development in the Yellowknife district north of Slave lake, and we have had geological parties there for several years. In addition, we are sending out this year oil geological parties; that is, parties to search for oil deposits.


Howard Charles Green: In the Northwest Territories?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Some in the Northwest Territories, some in Alberta, some in Saskatchewan and some in the northeastern part of British Columbia. But I could have more complete information on all that when I have the data before me to deal with the civil estimates.


Howard Charles Green: Perhaps to-morrow the minister could make a statement on the northern policy of the government.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Well, that can be done, perhaps, when we come to our ordinary civil estimates.


Howard Charles Green: That may not be until the last five minutes of the last day of the session, and would not leave any time for discussion. I think the minister should make the statement at once.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: All I can say in a general way, Mr. Chairman-


William Henry Golding: The minister has pointed out that this item has nothing to do with the question which the hon. member for Vancouver South has in mind, and he has promised that he will deal with it at the proper time. I appeal to hon. members to realize that if we hope to make any progress at all in these estimates we must try to deal with the items as they are. I hope I shall not have to say any more in that regard to hon. members.


Gordon Graydon: Are you speaking to the minister too?

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


Howard Charles Green: With regard to that, this particular item is for investigation of petroliferous deposits and of potential petroliferous areas in Canada, and the most important oil field in Canada is in the Northwest Territories. I have been asking the minister if he will make a statement on government policy with regard to developing the resources, including jil, in the Northwest Territories. The very next item has to do with mineral deposits. Surely we cannot be ruled out of order in asking questions of this type. ,


William Henry Golding: I again appeal to my hon. friend. When this item was up on Tuesday evening the minister gave the committee information as to what the item was for, and he has done the same thing to-night. It does not deal with the question which my hon. friend raised.


Howard Charles Green: It does, or it does not?


William Henry Golding: It does not.


Howard Charles Green: That is exactly where you are wrong, Mr. Chairman, because the minister himself has stated that some of this investigation for oil-bearing areas is to be in the Northwest Territories.


George Hugh Castleden: I brought up this matter on Tuesday night. I was dealing with the subject of exploring those areas and I was ruled out of order on the same ground. The minister did, however, intimate that there was another item to come up later-it is on page 397 of Hansard-dealing with the expenses of liaison officers in connection with the Alaska highway and Canol projects. If he is willing that we should deal with the Canol project at that point I am quite willing to discuss it then instead of on this item. But I maintain that order in council P.C. 2904, tabled by the minister on May 5, has very much to do with this particular item-boring for oil in that area-and opportunity should be given to hon. members to discuss that war-time action on the item dealing with the exploration of those oil fields.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It is a mere matter of proceeding in an orderly fashion-


George Hugh Castleden: I am agreeable.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: -in the consideration of this. The hon. member for Yorkton who spoke a few moments ago raised this question on Tuesday night. This vote has nothing whatever to do with the Canol project. You might as well discuss reindeer on the arctic coast.


Gordon Graydon: They come under your department.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There is another item in the estimates on which the Canol project can be discussed. Let us discuss it when we come to that item. I say again to the hon. member for Vancouver South that this vote is not earmarked specifically for any particular project except perhaps one, namely, the expense of carrying on drilling to determine the extent and quality of sands in this northern Alberta area, which expense will be taken out of this vote. The remainder of it is there to meet requests from the oil controller. We have had these requests in each of the last two years, and this is provided, I understand, at his suggestion. He may have something that he would like the department to investigate, and if we should receive such a request we provide for expenditure in connection with it under this vote. When we come again to the general permanent work of the department which is covered in the votes which parliament will be asked in due course to pass, relating to geological surveys and the like, such matters can be raised. I sympathize with the request of the hon. member for Vancouver South. I appreciate his claim that it is important to have wise policies for the development of the north country. I do not think there is anyone in this committee who has a better appreciation of the possibilities of northern Canada than I have, if I may modestly say so. I have travelled over a good deal of it; I have seen and watched with interest, and have had some little part, through the agency of the Department of Mines and Resources, in the endeavour to restore the furbearing animals for the benefit of the Indians, and I know there is great need for a wider dissemination of knowledge of the north country. I have used my influence, modest as it is, in connection with the work of the national film board to see to it that, through the medium of the film, they should carry information to the Canadian people as to the possibilities of the north country and endeavour to clear up a great many of the misconceptions that exist about it. One day toward the latter part of August I was in Aklavik, 150 miles beyond the arctic circle, a disagreeably warm day, something like this-


William Henry Golding: Order. I wonder if we cannot deal with this item now.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I appreciate your calling me to order, Mr. Chairman,-


Gordon Graydon: I think the minister
should deal with it in the civil estimates.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: -but I want to impress upon the hon. member that the government has not been remiss-
3244	COMMONS
War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


Howard Charles Green: You need not impress that upon me.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: -in its consideration of the possibilities of the north country.


Howard Charles Green: Is there any reason why there should not be a development in northern Canada similar to the development in Siberia?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not think so. I think we have the resources.


Mr. FAIR:: Is any further exploration work being carried on at Wainwright this year? If so, to what extent?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There are no further investigations in the Wainwright area; that is, in the park area at Wainwright. These investigations were carried on last year and the right to secure leases will be auctioned off. We are putting up the area inside the park.


Mr. ADAMSON:: Will the minister undertake to bring down his civil estimates at an early date so that a full debate can be held on these matters? Many of us wish to discuss this item and I discussed the matter personally with the minister before the house met. These items are not really the place to deal with the broad policy of his department. That department is so important that I should like him to try to bring his estimates down so that a full-dress debate can be held on these matters in the near future.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I shall endeavour to bring them down as soon as possible, but if my hon. friend asks me when they will come on, I cannot tell him. There is a good deal to be disposed of before then. I agree with him, however, that the question of developing the vast resources of Canada is one that could well engage the earnest attention of the house. I do not think there is anything more important, and I do not say that because I happen to be the minister in charge.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.
Special exploration and development work in connection with the supply of strategic materials, $60,000.
Mr. WHITE:: Will the minister give a break-down of the persons or corporations to whom the $500,000 was paid during the last year and to whom it is expected that the $60,000 he is asking for will be paid during the coming year?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The break-down was given when the vote was asked for last year, but-


George Stanley White: I am interested in the moneys advanced for the development of fluorspar in the county of Hastings.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The vote for strategic
minerals last year was $500,000. Does my hon. friend want it all, or some particular items?


George Stanley White: Just the items that deal with fluorspar in Hastings.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There was the Reliance fluorspar estimate of $10,000, of which $9,234 was advanced. Then- there was the R. T. Gilman loan of $106; nothing was advanced against that. Next is H. C. Miller, $8,731, of which $8,036 was spent. Then there was the Trent fluorspar loan of $6,235, of which $6,085 was advanced. I am giving round figures. There was also the fluorspar drilling at Madoe. For drilling at Madoc $20,000 was provided and $18,692 spent.


George Stanley White: What is the total amount
advanced by the government to date for fluorspar operations in the county of Hastings and, second, the amount it has cost his department, in connection with this money advanced, for salaries of their engineers, surveyors, auditors, travelling and other expenses in connection with the operation of these fluorspar mines?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I can give the total expenditures authorized and the net advances. I am afraid I cannot give it in the detail requested by my hon. friend, but I find that Reliance Flourspar at Madoc had an authorized expenditure of $48,000, Did my hon. friend want the net advances in each case?


George Stanley White: Yes, the net amount.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Reliance Fluorspar, Madoc, $46,881.92; Gilman Fluorspar, Madoc, $22,778.14; H. C. Miller Fluorspar, Madoc, $34,196.89, and Trent Fluorspar, Madoc, $9,848.41.


George Stanley White: That is up to what date?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: That is at May 19, 1944.


George Stanley White: Then could the minister
answer the other question, as to what has been the total cost to his department, or whatever department this comes under, for salaries, wages, cost of engineers, auditors and other expenses in connection with the operation of these mines?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not have it broken
down.


George Stanley White: I shall be satisfied with a
lump sum if the minister has it.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I have the total for salaries for all the strategic minerals, but that covers not only fluorspar developments; it includes chromite, tungsten, molybdenite, and metals like that. The total salaries for all of that

War Appropriation-Mines and. Resources
were $19,221.11, but if my hon. friend wants
them for fluorspar alone it will be necessary to have that figure broken down. If my hon. friend is interested I can have my officers prepare that information and send it to him.


George Stanley White: That will be satisfactory.
Then the minister stated that the amount advanced to one H. C. Miller was $34,196, out of an appropriation of $35,000. In connection with the advances to this man, could the minister give the committee any information as to what led up to the granting of this appropriation, just what has been done on the property, the amount of money he has actually expended, the production of fluorspar that has been developed, the amount that has been repaid to the department on this loan, and the manner in which it has been repaid.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Mr. Miller received $34,-
196.89. I think that information was given in answer to a question asked by my hon. friend. His total repayments to January 31, 1944, were $7,229.95.


George Stanley White: I have that information
already in a return brought down by the minister on February 22. I should like the minister to give the committee some information as to how Miller came to get this appropriation, what led up to the granting of this amount of $35,000.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The Department of Mines and Resources does not initiate these contracts, if I may so describe them, with these individuals. In the first place they are initiated by the metals controller. He hears, perhaps from various people, or from one source or another, as to possible deposits of these strategic minerals. In this case it is fluorspar, which I understand is used as a fluxing material in the production of high grade steel. The metals controller, in some manner of which I am not aware, learned of Miller's deposit and gave the particulars to the Department of Mines and Resources. The technical officers of my department examined the deposits, gathered all the data they could, and were in a position to say whether or not this was a property that might offer possibilities of supplying fluorspar. The next step was when the metals controller, supported by the director of the mines branch, made a recommendation to me as minister, and on the strength of their recommendation the order in council was passed providing financial assistance.


George Stanley White: Does the minister know that Mr. H. C. Miller, the man who obtained this money, is a civil servant? In an answer which
was brought down on February 11' to a question which I had asked it is stated that Mr. Henry C. Miller has been in the employ of the government since June 8, 1942, and that he receives a salary of $3,720 a year and devotes his full time to his position. Under the contract drawn up and signed by the minister with Mr. Miller it is stated that Mr. Miller was unable to finance the development of this mine. In proof of that there is attached to the contract a list of the debts owing by Mr. Miller at the time he obtained this grant. I should like to know if Mr. Miller put up or supplied any of his own money in the development and operation of this mine.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not know Mr. Miller; if he were to walk down the aisle right now it would' be the first time I would have seen him. I understand he is employed in some capacity in the oils and fats administration of the wartime prices and trade board, but I do not know what his duties were, what they are, or what they may be in the future. All I know is that the metals controller had reason to think that Mr. Miller controlled a deposit of fluorspar that would be of use in the war effort, that the deposit had been examined by the technical officers of the Department of Mines and Resources, and on the recommendation of the metals controller and the director of the mines branch of the department I sent a recommendation to council that gave authority to make these advances.
When the advances were made provision was made for the return of them in all cases at so much per ton of the product mined. The government also retained a lien on all tangible assets that were secured for development purposes. In some cases I anticipate that these advances will be fully repaid and there may be other cases where they may not be repaid. In any event the procedure was as I have outlined.


Howard Charles Green: Does the minister's department not make any check?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Oh, yes. When these deposits, whether it was tungsten or anything else, came to the attention of the metals controller he asked the mines branch to have its technical officers report on the possibility of getting useful results from a working of the deposits. That investigation was made; if the report was satisfactory the metals controller and the director made a recommendation to me as minister of the department, and from that followed the order in council that appropriated the money.


George Stanley White: I do not think the minister has answered the question I asked, whether or not Mr. Miller had advanced any of his

3246	COMMONS
War Appropriation-Mines and Resources
own money in order to equip this mine and get it ready for the production of fluorspar, or was all the money supplied by the department?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My advice is that the department supplied the money to get the mine into operation, and then the working capital necessary in the initial stages was provided by the owner, in this case by Miller.


George Stanley White: The minister probably knows that his department had a competent and capable engineer in charge of these operations and that no money could be expended without the approval of that engineer. He must know that audits were held and a careful and proper check kept on all expenditures. How much did it cost Mr. Miller to bring this mine into production?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I shall be glad to give the information if we have it.


George Stanley White: I am sure the minister must have it because I know exactly the way it was done. There was a careful check made and no money could be advanced-this is all covered by the contract-without the consent of the departmental engineer.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I have not that information here, but if it can be found in the records of the department it will be brought forward. I can either give it to the committee to-morrow if we do not finish to-night or give it to my hon. friend privately, whichever he wishes.


George Stanley White: Has the minister any knowledge of any part of this $35,000 being used by Mr. Miller after the mine was brought into operation?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that we have no knowledge of that.


George Stanley White: I do not think that is satisfactory, because no one could have kept a more accurate check than the engineer supplied by the minister's own department. Complete records were kept of everything and audits have been made. The minister should have this information.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I should have said that I have no record here to-night. It may be in some of the reports that the department has in connection with this operation. That would be a public document and I would have no objection to giving it to my hon. friend, but I have not it with me to-night.


George Stanley White: The minister has just stated that the money advanced under these contracts was to be paid back on a royalty basis

of $3 a ton. The question I asked was answered by1 sessional paper 169. Question No. 9 was:
Is the operator permitted to make a profit before repayment has ibeen made in full of all moneys advanced by the government?	.
The answer was:
Under the terms of the agreement, the operators are permitted to use balances of revenues after payments to government for the purpose of carrying on mining operations. It is doubtful that these balances of revenues are more than sufficient to continue necessary mining operations.
The return shows that Miller produced some 2,377 tons and paid back 87,229.95. Has the minister any knowledge as to what profit Miller made out of those 2,377 tons of fluorspar he produced and sold?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We have no information
on that point. As I explained, when these contracts were made they were made on a more or less arbitrary basis of a certain repayment per ton of product mined. In the case of Miller those repayments have been made. Whether Miller had some money left after paying his other expenses, I cannot say. It may be that my hon. friend is on fair ground in criticizing the government for making that sort of arrangement, but the repayment of these advances was estimated on a basis which the officers of the department thought was fair and reasonable. I have no apology whatever to make for accepting their advice. Miller may have run into a little richer deposit, or may have had some other advantage in operation that I know nothing about. Whether he made a profit or not, I cannot say. All I know is that we gave him a certain advance; that he was to pay it at so much per ton of the product mined. Up to the present time he has paid about $7,000; and the government holds a lien on all the tangible assets provided out of this grant, until the full loan is repaid.


George Stanley White: The minister admits that he does not know whether Miller made a profit. But I would point out again that when the fluorspar ore was sold to the various steel companies those sales were all made with the approval of the engineer from the Department of Mines and Resources. They had copies of all the way bills, and everything else. They knew wneu the cheque came back, and they would know exactly how much profit, if any, Mr. Miller made.
I understand that during the very short time that this property was operated by Mr. Miller, who was a full-time civil servant at Ottawa, and who was unable to finance the mine in any way with his own money, but who was granted over $34,000 of public funds,

War Appropriation-
-Mines and Resources
he made a profit of anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000. The minister has told me that he has no knowledge as to whether or not Miller made a profit. But I would say to the minister that his officers, his engineers, or somebody in his department would have some knowledge as to the profit that Miller made. Would the minister be good enough to get me that information?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There is not the slightest objection. I do not know, really, what my hon. friend is driving at. There is no objection to giving any information that our records can disclose.


Gordon Graydon: What he is driving at seems clear enough.


George Stanley White: I will explain what I am driving at, if the minister would like to know. Here is a man, a civil servant, .who makes a contract with the crown. It is stated in the contract that he is unable to provide the money to finance this mine. Attached to the contract is proof of that, because there is a statement of his debts. The government advanced him $35,000; and during a very short period of operation, extending perhaps from eight to fourteen months, a man who is already drawing from the crown a salary of over $3,700, is allowed, without risking one cent of his own money, to make a very large and substantial profit. At the same time he is only asked to repay to the crown the very small sum of $3 a ton on all the fluorspar ore produced. Why should that contract not have been drawn so that all the profits on the sale of the fluorspar, over and above, the operation of the mine, should be paid back to the government until such time as the full amount of the money advanced had been paid in full? Would that not be the logical way to do it? I should like to have the minister comment upon that.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My comment would be this: In this case Miller-and in other cases, others-had property that probably was of considerable value. It cost them money, in the first instance. I do not know how much-


George Stanley White: If the minister does not know, then please do not say it cost him money. The minister does not know.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Well, that is rather remarkable. I do not see how a person would get property of value unless it cost something. He may have inherited it, or it may have dropped in his lap from the gods, or something of that kind. At any rate, he owned the property, irrespective of what it cost him, and it may have had some value.
100-205J
We were not doing anything in a confiscatory manner. In this instance it was found Mr. Miller had a deposit of fluorspar, something which was very badly needed. He Was approached by the metals controller, and the metals controller asked the officers of the department to investigate. They, in turn, reported that the deposit was worth developing. Money was advanced; the property was developed, and the fluorspar so badly needed was secured.
My hon. friend says that we were improvident in not providing that more than $3 or $3.50 a ton, I believe it was, was repaid on the loan out of each ton of material produced. I quite admit that my hon. friend is justified in offering that criticism, if he thinks that is a pertinent criticism.	*


George Stanley White: Does the minister not think it is pertinent?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No, I do not think it is a pertinent criticism.


George Stanley White: You do not? All right; go ahead.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: After all, we could have
expropriated this property.


George Stanley White: That is the next question I am going to ask. Why did you not do that?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Were we going to expropriate all the fluorspar sites, all the tungsten property and everything else? I did not have the responsibility for making these arrangements. They were with the Minister of Munitions and Supply, and the metals controller.


George Stanley White: You signed the contract.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The Department of Mines and Resources entered into the arrangements on the recommendation of the metals controller. I still submit that the arrangements were reasonable, and that the repayment was fair. They were reasonable arrangements.


George Stanley White: They were very reasonable; that is my complaint. They were too reasonable-far too reasonable.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My hon.iriend can make a play on words, if he wishes.


George Stanley White: Oh, no.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not know about this mysterious man, Mr. Miller, who happens to be employed, I believe, in the oils and fats division of the wartime prices and trade board. In that sense he is not an ordinary civil servant. I presume that he is someone who was secured by the wartime prices and trade board because of competence in doing a job they
3248	COMMONS
War Appropriation-Mines and Resovrces
*wanted him to do, or that he volunteered his services. At any rate, be that as it may, by whatever road he reached his job, he is employed by the wartime prices and trade board, according to the information I have. Quite probably he is doing a satisfactory job.
Does my hon. friend argue that because he was employed by the wartime prices and trade board and getting a salary of $3,700 a year, when we had a chance of getting fluorspar from his property we should have turned it down because of his government employment? I do not think my hon. friend would argue that seriously, for a moment.
The main point is that fluorspar was badly needed. This man had property on which there was fluorspar, and we entered into arrangements for its development. It was done on a basis that we thought was reasonable, and offered a reasonable chance of the government's receiving back the money it had advanced. I still maintain that position. Whether Mr. Miller mad6 a profit out of it, or whether he had debts, or whether he was employed by the wartime prices and trade board, or employed anywhere else, are not factors in the matter, so far as the department is concerned. The main point is that we helped to finance this property, and we are getting repaid for it. Then, too, we are getting fluorspar, which is badly needed-and after all, that is the main consideration.


George Stanley White: It is all very well for the minister lightly to brush aside spending the mere bagatelle of $35,000. Where I live, and where this money was spent, it is considered a large sum of money. But of course the way in which this government deals in millions and billions, it is a trifling amount. I think the minister overlooked the point, entirely, or perhaps he can tell me if it is the usual thing to find persons coming to his department, or to some other department of government, and putting up a proposition under which they will not be called upon to risk one cent of their own money, and will receive out of the public treasury of Canada sufficient funds to operate a property by remote control, under foremen, and thereby make a substantial profit. That is what I am objecting to. I think it is entirely wrong for any citizen of Canada-


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Does my hon. friend contend that Mr. Miller should not have been allowed to make any profit?


George Stanley White: After he had paid you, he could make all the profit he wanted to, certainly.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Since my department is
responsible, perhaps I might ask my hon. friend a few questions. Has he any evidence whatever that Mr. Miller made a profit?
I Mr. Crerar.]


George Stanley White: The Minister of Mines and Resources says that he does not know anything about it but that he is going to get the information.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Does my hon. friend know?


George Stanley White: I am not answering your questions.


Clarence Decatur Howe: The hon. member is basing his statements on an assumption he cannot prove.


George Stanley White: Do not get off on any line like that. All these fluorspar properties were financed entirely by the government-Miller, Reliance, Trent and Gilman. Not one of them was able to finance alone. Since these fluorspar properties are all located within an area of one or two miles, and are probably the same vein, would it not have been more reasonable for the government to take over these properties and operate them themselves instead of advancing all these moneys to these four different companies, having four sets of everything, equipment and all the other things needed for these various properties.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: In reply I would refer the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough to the hon. member for Davenport who, speaking this afternoon of another development, stated that he was opposed to the government operating properties, and I confessed that I agree with him. Now the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough comes along and accuses the government for not having taken over these properties and operated them as government enterprises. I would suggest to my hon. friend who leads the opposition, who is a philosophical gentleman, that he try to reconcile these differences among his supporters.


Gordon Graydon: You have a job of that sort to do on your own side.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I do not know whether the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough contends that the owners of these fluorspar properties should not get anything for them. Perhaps my hon. friend could tell the committee how much money the people who own these fluorspar properties have made out of them in the last fifteen or twenty years. 1 am advised that the properties were so unprofitable that they were not being operated, and that operation came about only because in the stress of war this material fluorspar, of which I confess I know nothing, was found very useful for fluxing purposes in the making of high-grade steel, which was urgently needed. The metals controller learned of these properties and wanted to get them developed. It may be; in fact it

War Appropriation-Mines ana Resources
is contended by the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough that the government should have taken these properties over. Supposing we had done that; what would we have had to pay for them? We could not take them over for nothing. At any rate I can assure my hon. friend that this government, with all the sins that may rest upon its head-


Mr. FRASER (Peterborough West):: And they are plenty.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I dispute that. I do not think the hon. member for Hastings-Peter-borough would contend that the government should take these properties away without compensating the owners. If we could not agree on a price we would have to resort to the exchequer court and have it assess the value of the property. The next step would be to buy the property, and then we would have it on our hands and would have to operate it as a government enterprise. That is the contention of the hon. member for Hastings-Peterborough. But if we had done that, one of our first critics, and I would have sympathy with him, would have been the hon. member for Davenport.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I am wholly opposed to government operation of industry.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Let us get down to essentials. The fluorspar was urgently, almost desperately needed. We entered into arrangements with people who had the properties. They did not know what they would get out of it. If the war lasted only a year or two they would lose money if they went ahead on their own. But they did not have the capital. Even if they had had the capital, they would not want to risk it under those circumstances. Therefore, on the advice of the technical officers of the department we made the arrangement that we should be paid so much per ton on the fluorspar mined. I do not think it would be reasonable to say that the people who own these properties should not get something. The deposit might be depleted before the loan was returned. They entered into this arrangement at the request of the government. They cooperated in that respect, not only these people who own the fluorspar properties but many other firms throughout the country engaged in other lines of business, to which the Minister of Munitions and Supply can testify.


Mr. KNOWLES:: He has taken a lot of them over.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: If the war goes on for another year or two and the fluorspar deposit lasts we shall be repaid. In the meantime we
have security on all the tangible assets, and that is a proposition that I am not afraid to defend in this house or anywhere else.


George Stanley White: It will be interesting to learn, when the minister's war estimates are before the committee next year, how much was lost through this deal, which the minister thinks is very fine.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We may lose some money;
I do not deny that.


George Stanley White: I have one or two questions to ask in regard to the various contracts made with these companies. Are the terms the same in each contract as to the amount of repayment on the basis of $3 a ton, or is there one contract which provides that all proceeds from the sale of fluorspar are to be applied on account of the loan after the payment of operating expenses?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that the contracts were all identical, except the one with the Reliance company. They got an advance in the first instance and the basis of repayment was the same as in the other contracts. Later on they came back for an additional advance, and a higher rate of repayment was agreed upon.


George Stanley White: Can the minister tell me the amount of what he calls the higher repayment, and further, does the Reliance company have to pay back, in addition to a stated amount per ton, the profits on the sale of fluorspar over and above the amount of operating expenses, or does the department just get a certain amount per ton?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that, after
the second advance, repayment was to be at the rate of $5 per ton of the fluorspar mined.


George Stanley White: Is that all that the Reliance has to pay as far as the second advance is concerned?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that it is.


Mr. DIEFENBAKER:: There are some
questions pertaining to the country as a whole which I should like to ask in connection with this item. According to the report of the department for the year ended March 31, 1943, $325,000 was expended in the preceding year in the form of loans to mine operators, contracts for exploratory work under dominion or provincial government supervision, purchase of mining equipment, and so on. How much was expended under this vote during the past year?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Under the vote of $500,000? Mr. DIEFENBAKER: Yes.
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Thomas Alexander Crerar: I am advised that the total amount expended was $117,787.


John George Diefenbaker: That is considerably less than the year before. What degree of success was attained by the expenditure of money under this particular item? Is the minister satisfied with the returns which were secured and the discoveries or exploratory work done?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: It will take a little time
to get the details, but I can indicate the results roughly. We got fluorspar, tungsten, molybdenum, chrome for hardening steel- those four at any rate, in the class of strategic minerals.


John George Diefenbaker: I assume that the minister will give the figures pertaining to what actually was discovered as a result of this vote.
I wish to refer to something which was dealt with last year, namely, the expenditure which is being made or was made under this item in the three provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. How much was spent under this item for exploratory or development work in connection with research for strategic metals; first, during the year 1942-43; second, in the year 1943-44?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I would doubt whether
under this vote there was any expenditure in Saskatchewan or Alberta in respect of strategic minerals; that is, for chrome or tungsten or the others I mentioned a moment ago. I believe there was some expenditure in eastern Manitoba. I have not that from my officials, but that is my recollection. There were some explorations for tin. The Minister of Munitions and Supply advises me that money was spent on exploration or investigation relating to a chrome deposit in Manitoba.


John George Diefenbaker: That was a comparatively small amount, was it not?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I could not say how much.


John George Diefenbaker: The figures will be made available, I presume?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They can be dug out of
the records if it is of any particular importance.


John George Diefenbaker: Well, not dug out, just given. I am asking for the figures. Surely the officials must have the figures showing what expenditures were made in those various provinces.
We in the western provinces find ourselves in this position as regards our great potential mineral resources, that we are not receiving any consideration from the government in con-
nection with exploratory and development work. As I recall it, a report was made some years ago by the Saskatchewan department of mines and resources that chromium, molybdenum and tungsten were to be found in northern Saskatchewan. Yet, at a time when money is available for exploration work in this connection, none or very little of it is expended in the western provinces. Last year I brought this matter to the attention of the minister and asked him why consideration was not given by the metals controller to mineral development in the prairie provinces. Over a large part of their area is the pre-Cambrian shield. We have vast potential resources of what have been designated strategic metals; yet, at a time when money is expended everywhere else in the dominion, it seems impossible, even with a minister representing a Manitoba constituency, to get any assistance for the development of our mineral wealth.


Gordon Graydon: Charity might begin at home.


John George Diefenbaker: Last year I pointed out that the metals controller or his branch seemed unwilling to cooperate with the western governments in connection with metals to be found in these provinces. I mentioned Saskatchewan, and asked him whether the government of that province had brought to the attention of the federal government its potential resources in strategic metals. As I remember what the minister said at the time, it was that no doubt the provincial government had, and that he personally would give consideration to mineral development and exploratory work taking place in the western provinces during the past year. We in western Canada find ourselves in this position, that industry is concentrated in eastern Canada and, to a lesser extent, at the coast. Certain industries could have been established in the western provinces, but for some reason Saskatchewan, Manitoba and, to a lesser degree, Alberta have not received consideration in that respect. I think it passing strange that no portion of the money comprised in this vote is available to the western provinces with the exception of Manitoba, and there only to a small extent.
We have no resources to equal our mineral resources. They are valuable to-day, in war time. We are now laying post-war plans for the employment of men when they come back from overseas. It is all very well to say that governments should control the mineral resources of a nation. Governments may cooperate with private enterprise. When you see the record of the development of mines over a period of years, and if what the Northern Miner suggested the other day is correct,

War Appropriation-
-Mines and Resources
namely, that in Ontario, out of 4,426 organizations, 98-2 per cent made no return whatsoever to their shareholders and only one per cent of starters finished at the post of economic success, it becomes obvious that the government, if it were engaged in mineral development for itself, would not continue long. But here we have a vote to make possible the finding of strategic minerals, and none of that money has been made available to the western provinces with the exception of a small amount in Manitoba. I do not want to transgress your ruling, Mr- Chairman, but I think that, as the hon. member for Vancouver South said, it is a very important matter to ascertain from the government its plan in regard to mineral development. In my opinion, all the provinces having potential mineral resources have a right of equal access to moneys being expended by the dominion government at this time-at least reasonably equal access-and that has been denied.


Mr. BERTRAND (Laurier):: What about wheat?


Gordon Graydon: What about fish?


John George Diefenbaker: That indicates that the Minister of Fisheries feels that wheat is a mineral resource or a strategic ore, and that does not show that he understands the problem as well as he should. I am dealing with mineral and strategic ores.


Ernest Bertrand: But we are spending the money.


John George Diefenbaker: Is the Minister of Fisheries objecting to the moneys that are expended in connection with wheat and on agriculture in western Canada?


Ernest Bertrand: Not at all. But when somebody from the west compares what is being spent in the east with what is being spent in the west, he should take into consideration certain moneys that are not spent in the east on things like wheat.


John George Diefenbaker: No one is criticizing what is expended in the east. I am pleading for a diversification of industry in all parts of Canada and not the concentration in any one part. In connection with this vote I would ask the minister how he would react to the suggestion that under the vote an opportunity be given to some of the men coming back from overseas to-day to engage as prospectors for the purpose of exploring for minerals. Many soldiers coming back to-day, used to the outdoors, willing to go prospecting, require training in that direction; and I suggest that under this vote, instead of reducing it from half a million to $60,000, the grant should be
continued and an opportunity given, by the establishment of prospecting schools and the like, to train some of our men who are returning from overseas so as to enable them to engage in this very important work after the war. If you do this you will be doing war work, prospecting for strategic metals, and you will be training men for a vocation after the war. I believe that one of the committees in connection with post-war rehabilitation has made that suggestion and I should like to hear the minister's view in that connection.
I suggest that there should be at this time, under this vote, a declaration by the minister, indicating something of the long-term policy of the government with regard to a general survey of the dominion for metals, the intensification of activity in the development and discovery of our metal resources, to the end that when the war is over, this very important source of our wealth will be available in greater measure for post-war purposes. The vote this year is considerably reduced. I know that the government of Saskatchewan has asked consideration of the department in this connection; and I cannot understand why it is that, when we have the potential resources, when, according to the surveys made by the western provinces, we have the strategic metals which the minister mentions, such as chromium, manganese, molybdenum, tin, and possibly tungsten-


Clarence Decatur Howe: Where is the manganese located?


John George Diefenbaker: After all, if the minister knows where it is located, and there is none located in the west-


Clarence Decatur Howe: None in Canada that I know of.


John George Diefenbaker: I am referring to returns of provincial governments. At any rate, I suggest that we have a right to ask for a share of this vote. I say, too, that there should be an extension of the grant asked for this year. The sum of $500,000 was small enough. We should have an extension to the end that we might encourage exploratory work now and train men coming back from overseas to fit them for this very important phase of endeavour, to secure in an ever-increasing measure this potential of great wealth. The minister said that he could not very well declare the policy of the government except on his civil estimates. These estimates give him an opportunity to do so. These estimates will indicate whether or not, in the midst of war, and as a part of the war vote, the government is looking forward to the future, after the war, to secure the employment of many men who will be returning from overseas and who will require jobs. If we are to answer those who
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say that jobs cannot be procured under the present system, we must now be in a position of having a post-war plan established so that jobs shall be made available. This is one potential source of jobs, mineral development in Canada. We have potential resources in western Canada and an unequal economy there as at present constituted; and on behalf of western Canada I ask the minister this question: Will he not this year give the three western provinces an opportunity to share in the discovery, and in exploratory work incident to the finding, of these minerals, so that our economy may be developed on a wider and more comprehensive basis than in the past? In that connection I suggest that the department give to the Department of Finance suggestions in regard to relief from taxation to a greater extent than prevails to-day for the benefit of those who are prepared to gamble their wealth and financial future on exploratory work in the finding and development of mineral resources. Taxation as it now stands prevents the development of our mineral resources as we would wish them to be developed. It denies to the adventurer the willingness to gamble on uncertain profits. It denies the development we have at our door if we but took advantage of the opportunities that are ours. Through this vote, with the minister's cooperation, much good would result if he would be willing to give all the provinces-not only one or two of them but all of them-an opportunity to join in the development of our mineral resources through the extension, expansion and discovery of those resources. Only in that way may we be sure, particularly in this one phase, of greater employment after the war than there was before the war.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The first comment I have to make is that the hon. member for Lake Centre has not displayed the clarity he usually brings to bear in his contributions to the debate in this chamber.


Mr. SLAGHT:: A little louder, please.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: For the benefit of those hon. members who did not hear me I shall repeat what I have said. I am afraid the hon. member for Lake Centre has not brought to the discussion of this item the clarity he usually displays when he discusses matters in this house, and I think also he has confused this estimate with the ordinary civil estimates of the department. I am just as anxious as my hon. friend is to see mining development in the western provinces, but Alberta does not have within its borders any of the preCambrian shield. The northern part of 
Saskatchewan has a substantial area of what is known as the great shield, and of course Manitoba has a much larger area.
My hon. friend seemed to be under the impression that under this vote we send out parties to search for strategic minerals. That impression is wholly wrong. This amount is put in here to be available to meet requests from the metals controller for the exploration or development of properties that may come to his notice. I sympathize wholly with my hon. friend's appeal that a substantial part of this money should be devoted to northern Saskatchewan, for instance, but we do not know whether there are any strategic minerals in northern Saskatchewan, and the purpose of this vote is not to discover strategic minerals. Its purpose is to provide for the exploration and investigation of proposals or suggestions that may come to the metals controller in regard to properties that already exist. Thousands of properties are registered; thousands of claims have been staked by prospectors and others who have no capital with which to develop them. A prospector may have a claim registered in Ontario, or northern Saskatchewan, or somewhere else. He will say, "I have tungsten on my claim". His reports are examined; his story is listened to, and if the metals controller is convinced that there is a reasonable possibility of getting tungsten from that claim the matter is investigated. The cost of that investigation is chargeable to this vote, and that is the sort of thing this vote is for.


Howard Charles Green: Is none of the money spent for prospecting?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No. Under this vote we do not prospect for properties, nor do we carry on geological surveys. Such surveys are carried on under the ordinary estimates of the Department of Mines and Resources.


Gordon Graydon: Why do you have an item in here for exploration when you do not explore?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: My hon. friend is quite mistaken in his understanding. Let me illustrate. A prospector in northern Ontario comes to the metals controller and says, "I understand you are in very great need of tungsten?" The metals controller replies in the affirmative. Then the prospector says, "Well, I have several claims staked in such a township, and I have strong evidence of tungsten on that property." The metals controller listens to him, and perhaps has him tell his story to the technical men of the Department of Mines and Resources. If the metals controller is convinced that the property is worth exploring

War Appropriation-
-Mines and Resources
-and that is what I mean by "exploring"- the work can be undertaken and is chargeable to this vote.


John George Diefenbaker: That is my complaint, that you cannot convince the metals controller that Saskatchewan and Manitoba have these resources.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I would not say that.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Saskatchewan and Manitoba are the biggest producers of base metals of any of the provinces, in proportion to area.


John George Diefenbaker: Yes, developed by themselves, by private industry.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: A moment ago my hon. friend asked me about Manitoba. There are chrome deposits in Manitoba, though so far not a great deal is known about them. There are evidences of tin in places in Manitoba, and I am told that evidence of tungsten has been found there as well.


John Ritchie MacNicol: Up on lake Athabaska.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: That is not in Manitoba, and I am speaking of that province. Several of these possibilities have been investigated under this vote. If a prospector came along with information in regard to claims that he * had registered in northern Saskatchewan, and convinced the metals controller that he had a property worth investigating or exploring, to use the language of the vote, it would be investigated. That is the purpose of this vote. The ordinary business of development, of geological surveys, of mapping surveys, the work done in the mines bureau-all that comes under the civil estimates of the department. These are special votes provided to meet possible demands that may arise during the coming year for further investigation of these strategic minerals, and should not be confused with the ordinary estimates.
My hon. friend raised the question of the taxation of mines. Perhaps that question could be better discussed when the budget is brought down. If I were to express my own personal view, I think taxation in nearly all respects is too high to-day; and I have said publicly within the last two years that in a peculiar way it is onerous and heavy on mining development. If we are to secure the mining development that is possible in this country I think that matter must have attention, and I do not for a moment disguise my opinion.
As far as returned men are concerned, certainly they should be given every opportunity. I did not quite understand the point my hon. friend was making in that connection; I do not know whether he was suggesting that the
government should engage these men and send them out as prospectors, with the idea of getting into governmental development of mining. I believe the part of the government is to provide all possible facilities; that is, the geological surveys and information, the mapping surveys, and all the necessary technical knowledge which may be made available to the prospector, so that he can study it and go out on his search for metals. I feel sure that a great many of the men coming back from overseas will want to return to mining, because I doubt if enlistments in any other branch of our economy were heavier than in the mining districts.


Arthur Graeme Slaght: Hear, hear.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: When those men come back they will probably go to those districts and we want to have as complete information as possible ready for them so that they will be able to expend their efforts on prospecting in a way that will help.


John Ritchie MacNicol: I have a recollection of receiving from a man living west of lake Winnipeg in Manitoba a letter giving information about manganese. The hon. member for Lake Centre mentioned manganese and the Minister of Munitions and Supply stated there was none in Canada. As I recall it, I sent this letter to the Department of Mines and Resources asking them to write to this man and tell him where he could make a sample shipment of manganese. Having been in the iron and steel business I was interested in this matter, because I know how important manganese is to the industry. I am sorry I did not follow the matter up and I have no recollection of having heard from him again. Perhaps the minister could tell us if there is any manganese in northern Manitoba.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: There is some evidence of what is known as bog manganese, but I am quite frank in saying that I do not know anything about it. It is found, not in rock formation, but in other forms. Several of these deposits have been examined, but they were found to be low grade and would not be practicable for the production of manganese.


Howard Charles Green: This vote is one method under which development work for the supply of strategic minerals could be carried on. I understand that this work is also carried on by means of advances made by the Metals Reserve Corporation of the United States. The minister can correct me if I am wrong in that. Could he tell us whether there are any other means by which mining development is encouraged, and could he give us some
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idea as to the amount of money spent under the different methods? We are going to spend only $60,000 under this vote, and I should like to know what has been advanced by the Metals Reserve Corporation and from other sources.


Clarence Decatur Howe: Companies like Flin Flon. Consolidated Smelting and International Nickel carry on private operations and they sell their products at world prices. At one time there was an urgent demand for zinc and copper, and the result was that certain low grade zinc and copper deposits were opened up. These required a much higher price than was paid for the output of our commercial mines. Canada had a surplus of those metals and there was no need of our paying a higher price, but the Metals Reserve Corporation of the United States did have a higher price for zinc and copper. That is, they had a commercial price and they had another price almost twice as high for marginal properties. They placed a few contracts in Canada for high-priced zinc and copper.


Howard Charles Green: Were they placed through the metals controller?


Clarence Decatur Howe: Yes; they asked us to act as their agents. Those high-priced contracts were cancelled.


Howard Charles Green: Was tungsten in the same
category?


Clarence Decatur Howe: We developed tungsten on
our own, not for the Metals Reserve. Zinc came into easy supply and the high cost contracts were cancelled recently. Certain high-priced copper contracts are being continued. There are other ways of developing. We have a corporation known as Wartime Metals Limited. It has advanced a certain amount to a tungsten mine in British Columbia, to a chrome mine in the eastern townships in Quebec and to certain other mines. These properties have been financed as mining operations. All these strategic metals have come into excess supply since we have had amazingly favourable results in our search for rare metals. They were found in ample supply, and some of the properties opened up by Wartime Metals have been closed because the product is no longer required. One small property got into production through the vote we are now discussing. Another was developed by Wartime Metals Limited, and then there were the high-cost operations, a few of which were financed by the Metals Reserve Corporation.


[Stage Direction]
Item agreed to.

Assistance to provincial governments in construction of transportation facilities into strategic mineral, including oil, properties, $75,000.
Howard Charles Green: Will the minister explain
how much of this vote was spent last year and why it has been reduced from $200,000?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: The vote last year was
$200,000, of which $128,300 was expended. According to the notes I have here, $73,818 was expended in connection with the development of the Kam-Kotia copper mine west of Timmins.


Howard Charles Green: About half the vote.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: A little more than half.


Howard Charles Green: Was that spent on a road?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes. This was a copper
property being developed in that area. It was a three-way split. The Hollinger mine, which was developing the Kam-Kotia property, put up one-third; the provincial government put up one-third and the federal government one-third. Then assistance was granted in Quebec for the construction of a road into a zinc property on Calumet island, and for a road into the Sterret property near Richmond. An amount of $1,503.57 was spent in connection with a mica mine in Mattewan township, Ontario; in Quebec, for road from Pressiac village to Indian molybdenite mine, $2,427; for the Calumet zinc mine road, $11,759; for the Sterret chromium mine road, $1,301, and for the Cadillac-St. Maurice road, $30,974.


Howard Charles Green: Those are in Quebec?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes; those are in Quebec. Then, in British Columbia there is the Twin J mine road, at $2,991; and the Bralome mercury mine road, $3,523. That is for a mercury mine that the Bralorne people control.


Howard Charles Green: On what basis are those amounts spent?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: In practically all cases I am advised the mine made a contribution of one-third, the province a third and the federal government a third. There may be a few instances where the expense was shared between the provincial and federal governments.


Howard Charles Green: On whose recommendations are expenditures made? Is it the recommendation of- the metals controller?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They are made on the recommendation of the metals controller.


Howard Charles Green: How is the money to be spent this year?

War Appropriation-Mines and Resources


Thomas Alexander Crerar: We are appropriating
$75,000 this year to meet requests that might come along from the metals controller. I [DOT]would impress upon the committee that there is one difference between these estimates and ordinary civil estimates. Civil estimates are prepared for particular projects. On the other hand, in respect of war estimates one simply *draws out of the war appropriation a certain amount so that it may be made available to meet a need should it arise during the year.


Howard Charles Green: The minister does not expect as heavy a demand this year as there was last year?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: No; we think $75,000 will cover it.


Mr. NEILL:: May I ask if that expenditure at the Bralome mine produced any mercury?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Yes, it has produced mercury. I have asked my officer if he could tell me the amount, but he has not that information with him.


Alan Webster Neill: I might add that for at least forty years I have been familiar with a mercury mine in my district, which is only a stone's throw from deep water. We would not have needed to spend $72,000 to get mercury out of it. It is easily accessible in Barkley sound. I know of my own knowledge that there is mercury, because it was worked in a very primitive way. They had trouble with the Chinamen who did the work. The mercury affected their teeth. The teeth got loose, and dropped out. But why the government needed to spend $72,000 to get mercury in Bralome, when it was available right there, at the water's edge, I do not know.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: Where is that located?


Alan Webster Neill: In Barkley sound, on the west coast of Vancouver island. It is a place called Sechart.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I shall inquire about that. The director has no recollection of its having been brought to the attention of the department. I do not know whether it has been called to the attention of the metals controller. However, inquiries will be made.


Alan Webster Neill: The mercury is there, all right.


Mr. ESLING:: Since the United States markets are closed to Canadian zinc, as a result of which contracts for production are cancelled on the four properties, as recently announced by the department, what market is there for the disposition of Canadian zinc by the Slocan producers of lead and zinc ores?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I understand that my hon. friend is inquiring what market may now be available for ores from certain mines which hitherto have been shipped to the Metals Reserve Corporation in the United States. I am unable to say. The metals controller of the Department of Munitions and Supply might be able to give information on that.


William Kemble Esling: As the minister knows, the only outlet for Canadian zinc other than that which goes to the British government, has been in, the United States market. Now, apparently the United States market is fully supplied, by reason of which fact these contracts were cancelled1 with the Quebec properties, and the Kootenay-Florenee in British Columbia. There are a number of small producers of lead and zinc ores. Where is their market? I am just wondering if some arrangement cannot be made for marketing those ores somewhere?


Thomas Alexander Crerar: I regret I cannot give my hon. friend much information on that. I know that through the agency of the Department of Munitions and Supply certain mines were reopened for the production, of concentrates for shipment to the Metals Reserve Corporation of the United States, when zinc was very badly needed. I understand that in some instances that corporation has terminated its arrangements.


William Kemble Esling: In practically all instances. That is the reason why I asked.


Thomas Alexander Crerar: They have terminated these contracts. Why they have done so, I cannot say. I can only assume they have done so because their zinc situation is easier in supply. What may be done to keep these mines in operation, I am, not in a position to say. I do not think at the moment there is any other market, so far as I am aware, for these concentrates, other than that in the United States. Perhaps my hon. frieind might discuss the matter with the Minister of Munitions and Supply, and get some information from, him.


William Kemble Esling: One naturally looks to the Minister of Mines and Resources to tell the public what market there may be, or if there is not to be a market, or if all lead and zinc mines are to be closed definitely and permanently.
Item stands.
Progress reported.


[Stage Direction]
At eleven o'clock the house adjourned, without question put, pursuant to standing order.
Selective Service
[Stage Direction]
Friday, May 26, 1944